Toxic relationships

So sorry. I can only imagine, I have no experience or helpful words on the subject. Sometimes we’re the bird, sometimes we’re the windshield.

Thanks Orson.

I just needed to vent in a safe, supportive place. After a few quiet hours, I’m starting to breathe normally again. I know there are others who carry burdens I can’t even imagine and at least my MIL goes home and I get a chance to recover between the trauma. Many people don’t get a break from their challenges. My husband and I come from very different families. In my family, we are open, emotive, and as fiercely loyal as we can be hot headed (though we have cooler heads as we age). In my husband’s family, everyone buries their feelings, no one is open or honest about how they feel, and the most important thing is maintaining a facade. My MIL is mentally ill and my FIL is an addict. My husband and his siblings live by avoidance because they’ve learned that any attempts to speak to their parents as if they were responsible, normal, thinking adults inevitably backfires and causes all kinds of chaos and craziness.

When they visit, it’s like we are all locked inside an asylum and because we tip toe around them (any other approach is like doing the cha cha in a mine field), they are the ones controlling every interaction. Because they are unstable and unpredictable (more her than him – he’s at least predictable), you are still in the mine field only when things blow up, you are caught completely off-guard.

My husband said tonight that his mother can’t come visit anymore. Our older children, now young teens, are starting to become aware of and emotionally impacted by the situation. Frankly, I don’t know how much more they will be around. They have both abused their bodies with drugs and alcohol over the years to the point that they are physically at least 20 years older than their chronological age.

Anyway, thanks to everyone for letting me unburden my soul here this afternoon. I’m so exhausted that I’m going to pacify my aching head with ibuprofen and try to get the sleep I haven’t gotten for the last couple of weeks.

MNG. You are a really good person. The good news is you can get back to your life now, but you are right, it is toxic and it is not about you, and you have to protect yourself and your family.

I can’t imagine the Christ-like thing to do is to allow people like that to keep hurting you or your family.

You compared it to how some deal with the Church. Perhaps there are some similarities for some people. Sometimes there are really no solutions. Sometimes you can’t just keep trying harder and make it work. Sometimes…you just draw boundaries with realistic ideas of what your limits are, and what needs to happen.

See, I no longer subscribe to unconditional “what would Christ do?”. My philosophy is that “What would Christ Do” is only one input into my decision. What He would do is inspiration for what I COULD do in my own feeble situation. ultimately, what I end up doing is a blend of the information from different sourcses, filtered and applied to my own unique personality and situation.

So, my input, is to do what is best for your mental health. I had a SIL come over with two kids for 3 weeks and finally, we found a way of putting her up in a hotel at our expense she was so draining to be around. It sounds mean, but when I look back and how I felt with the drama she brought to our own household, I still don’t regret it…we ended up swapping out the hotel the last few days — she stayed in it for two days and then myself and my son stayed there for another two days, getting four days fo time away from the women and her children.

It took me about 3 days to get back being myself after she went home.

M&G, I enjoy your posts. Not because the information shared is always happy(obviously) but because you come off sincere and compassionate. It’s hard to be “Christ like” sometimes. Partly because we ignore or forget those other moments that Christ didn’t act so “Christ like”. That’s not to say Christ was unchrist like, but to say we have a distorted view of it sometimes as I do to. We call charity the Christ like love(the pure love of Christ). We examine it and it says– long suffering(not endless suffering), is kind, every not, not puffed up, is not easily provoked( not not ever provoked, that would be a lie by New Testament recordings). Rejoicing not in iniquity but in the truth(hmm that opens up a whole new can of worms on some things we see and hear), beareth all things(not necessarily bearing well composed), hope in all things, endureth all things(indeed Christ endured much but it wasn’t always composed as we try to view it, even he left to be alone by himself to endure). A lot of us who try to be Christ like (including myself), have a distorted view sometimes of what that means. Hoping and enduring all things doesn’t mean turning a blind eye or pretending any more then leaving ones kids alone at a store because we hope and thinketh of no evil means we pretend that they will be well off alone at the store. So as parents we hope that that isn’t the case but acknowledge it is and we protect our kids from it by not leaving them alone at a store. Indeed our own prophets show anger, resentment, anxiety , discouragement and not hope sometimes at the pulpit because I doing so they do not turn a blind eye and in the end we are only human. We can only endure so much until we have to remove ourselves from a situation which is indeed part of enduring to realize our limits and protect ourselves so that we do endure. We are not infinite sufferers, we all have limits, we survive by hoping but drawing a line. Just as the GAs survive the gospel by hoping but drawing a line with “apostates”. We are not exempt from drawing a line for survival sometimes.

Just your post makes me smile in the sense when I see people trying to be the best they can be in a Christ like love. I admire the strive for it in the face of adversity. Your husband seems to deal with it the only way he knows how to successfully without confrontation. I tend to act that way too when it comes to myself but differently when it comes to watch others being emotionally or physically abused(I am much more assertive then). I deal with this every year at Christmas when visiting family. It’s difficult in finding the balance with many people involved. I wish I could be more successful at it many times, but I do my best. It appears you do very well from your own explanation of it. From my experience my siblings are not as long suffering as I have been(not necessarily a bad thing), they call it point blank and remove themselves from it if the need arises to protect their kids who have become fully aware of it. I don’t have kids yet but am fully protective of my niece and nephews.

What would Christ do is generally the loving picture we imagine, but not always as we read the New Testament and take all accounts into the situation.

I hear you saying “projection,” “victim,” and “drama from nothing.” Sounds like you should read up on borderline personality disorder and histrionic personality disorder. Most borderlines have also a huge HPD streak too, so check out BPD for sure. Just google it. Read the criteria, see if it fits. If it does, there are some measures you can take to protect yourself emotionally but you will have to be 100% vigilant in setting and keeping boundaries, boundaries, boundaries. Your husband will have to stick by your side 100%, or you will find that you will become the evil one. You need him to do this with you. You will find all suggestions online lead you to the book “Stop Walking on Eggshells.” Get it, keep it, highlight it, re-read it. If you find the criteria fits, he might finally be able to make sense of some things, and it might help him come to a place of great healing.

If that is what she has, I am so sorry. I have way too much experience with this, and I know how horribly exhausting it can be. Yes, absolutely kryptonite. I went through the same battery of tests, the same thought I might have lupus, and I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia after being with my BPD for 5 years. Yes, it literally makes you sick. Good luck!

Sounds about right. The control, control. Projecting on him and everyone else. Probably one of the hallmark tips is “I even start to think I am the crazy one.” BPDs are very good at that! If she is saying its him, its all the more reason to think its her. Especially if you don’t see it. Your husband must be an amazing man to have grown up with that and not have crumbled! Its very very hard to deal with these people as you know!