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The experiences of children with mentally ill parents.
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Written by Lisa
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“ I learned to give up on trying to reason or help my mom see what was real ”
“ I often felt lost, without feedback to help me define how I felt or who I was ”
My mother had an un-diagnosed (until I was 18) bipolar disorder. She also has a narcissistic personality disorder. My father’s “dry drunk” behavior included frequent unpredictable rages and criticism. My parents separated when I was 6 weeks old, but my dad stayed close with calls, letters, and visits, even though he usually lived in another state. Visits with my dad were always a mixed bag, and although I do believe he did the best he knew how, I spent a lot of time honing my survival skills while trying to fend off his anger about something I’d done or some other family member had done. His intelligent criticism was brutal and often cruel. I grew to count on at least one extended tirade each visit during my school years (an almost violent rant about my mother’s impossible behavior, during which nothing I could say or do would appease the rage), which ended in my having a disabling migraine for most of a 24-hour period. I often felt anxious and extremely insecure. My mom's narcissism rendered her largely incapable of authentic interactions. She had difficulty reflecting genuine, appropriate emotions in daily life. It made me feel unseen, unheard, frustrated, and sometimes lost. I learned to give up on trying to reason or help my mom see what was real, as it was an exercise in futility - and I often felt lost, without feedback to help me define how I felt or who I was. Even 25 years after having moved out of my mom’s house, I still find it difficult to know what I am feeling, and still find it nearly impossible to ask people for things with any confidence, or to even just tell someone no. My sense of fear and insecurity persists. When family life feels out of control, my husband says I micromanage or over-control situations. I look for healing and peace through meditation, talking to good friends and occasionally a therapist, and in group classes of various types. I'm still figuring it out but feel as if I'm making progress toward a more secure sense of self. I reach for my own healing by paying attention, journaling, asking for help, and being grateful for the joy and peace that are all around me in daily life.
Lisa |
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Written by Administrator
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Feeling emotionally messed up
Abuse, Trust, Sisters Relationships
Well there isn‚t really a situation any more. I guess my little sister and I made it through a childhood of trauma and abuse but we are doing ok. We have a few underlying issues with relationships but we do our best to fit the profile the best we can. We no longer have our mentally ill violent manipulating mother in either of our lives anymore. We are better off for it let me tell you.
I actually released her grip from my life on my 30th birthday after she attacked me and I decided that was the turning point for me to never let another violent person into my life. My sister at the time wasn‚t talking to me but she was still talking to our mother. They seemed to have a relationship that i could never understand and i guess it sometimes made me think that i was the one with the issues and maybe i should try to get rid of the chip on my shoulder.
I just never trusted my mother. I believed that one night at my house she slept with my sisters boyfriend but i never had any proof so that theory stayed with me along with the guilt of wondering why i felt so strongly about something i never actually new was true or not. The fact that i thought my own mother could or would do something like that to my sister or her 4 grandchildren really made me wonder about myself and where these trust issues were coming from.
Just recently when my sister decided that 3 years was long enough to shut me out because of her own issues and we started to slowly try to build something we never really had before "a bond" then we found out through my sisters ex boyfriend that in fact my mum had not only slept with her boyfriend and the father of her children but had an affair that lasted 2.5 years.
Closure is kind of one word that describes it all BUT why does it all hurt so much still. I am happy that i have my sister back and my nieces and nephews I just don‚t have a lot of faith in relationships anymore. Why now after going through so much and now having everything that i want and nothing to worry about am i now ANGRY. After all these years i have been emotionally messed up but not angry but now i feel angry and lost. I guess being pregnant and that happening straight after finding out about my mother doesn‚t help.
I am interested to know more about you guys. It may be good for my sister and I to get to melbourne at some stage to join in and meet others from similar backgrounds. That may never happen but its just nice to know there are others like us. We are thinking of you all.
Yours sincerely
IamMe |
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Written by Robyn
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I was trapped! in some ways that child in me always will be. There was no escape from my schizophrenic mother and there is always that sense deep down in my psyche that part of me will always be there-in that house-where emotions were petrified where the horror surrounded you with the night and any unimagined nightmare could and would come to life at any rapidly approaching second. I am fifty now and that training in hyper-vigilance served me well in dealing with a child of my own that never slept- staying awake and alert for days, months and years-just try me. Thank goodness that my baby grew up to be seemingly stable, intelligent, successful and happy. Of course you are petrified again that you can’t protect your own baby/child from experiencing any fear-that is an unbearable thought that they might suffer the way you did. The world never quite remains real-because you always carry that "other" world with you-that world for me where my mother was trying to kill my father with a carving knife-and by association me-because he was my lifeline. In a way I was already dead because you are dead inside when one moment there is someone whose mind is so disturbed they are rocking, scratching the wall, there are police, ambulances, or worse still no-one to help-and then-then you are shuffled out to school where you pretend all is as it should be. I know how that feels, it feels like you have no voice, you cannot be heard and what would you say if you could anyway-there are no words to express the heartbreak, the cavern of madness, the emptiness and panic you feel. My heart goes out to any child living with a parent who is mentally ill, there are those of us who have walked in your shoes-who were alone in that world. Life has bought me many beautiful wonderful, magnificent experiences but you don't want to hear that when you are still trapped in the horror-you only want to hear that yes I know -I know it seems like the days, the years will never pass, that you are desperate, truly desperate to grow and escape but mostly for now that someone will "do something" to save you.
Robyn
Victoria Australia |
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Written by Crayolakitty
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Hamburger With The Lot 2
‘They ran an MRI and found that she has MS’
I'm 19 years old now and have lived with my mother's mental illness for all of my life. (Just to recap) My mother is Manic Depressive, bi polar, and has multiple personality disorder. When I was 17 January 2009, I came home from school to find all of our stuff out on the curb. We had been evicted I moved in with a friend and finished school there. I'm still living with my friend and her father. I graduated High school 2010. Since then my mother has been living in a bad place. Doing god knows what kind of drugs probably multiple. About 3 weeks ago I was informed that my mother was in the hospital. She had fallen down a flight of stairs and taken to emergency room. They ran an MRI and found that she has MS. (Multiple Sclerosis- An Autoimmune disease that attacks the Spinal cord and Brain.) She is now in a rehab clinic they are working with her to regain basic functions such as walking, talking, and coordination. She is in a wheel chair unable to walk by herself. Her hands are week and extremely shaky and her words roll together when she speaks. So far she hasn't made a whole lot of progress in regaining and strengthening any of these functions. Since then i have gone to see her twice. She looks like a totally different person i didn't even recognize her when i first saw her. Growing up my mother was always a bigger woman(plump). She now weighs 130 pounds and I liked her better before. She also has very bad memory loss which could be caused by the MS or the drug abuse. I guess we will never know. She looks very sad and i cry a lot when i think of her. She looks like a withered shell of what my mother used to be... I guess i always knew that when we were evicted my mother would never be mom again but i hate that i was right. The last time my mother was mom was in October 2010, I called her one night just to say hi and because i was sick, and she told me to put crushed up garlic in my tea like she used to when i was little. She also told me how to make this onion syrup she used to make when i was sick(I know it sounds gross but it works!) That was the last time i can remember her really being mom. I know that there is still a chance that she can get passed all of this and regain basic motor functions. But her mind has been gone a long time and i don't think that she will ever regain the holes in her memory.
Crayolakitty
Crayolakitty previously wrote the following to Your Stories when 17 years old.
EVICTED
Hamburger With The Lot 1
‘My mother is Manic Depresive, bi polar, and has multiple personality disorder’ &
'a constant battle with substance abuse’
I'm 17 years old and have lived with my mother's mental illness for all of my life...My mother is Manic Depresive, bi polar, and has multiple personalitie disorder. Every two to three years she has a manic attack. Wich puts her into the hospital, besides her mental illness she has had a constant battle with substance abuse (marijuana). Up until i was 5 my mother dated different guys off and on but they never stuck around. Until she met Mr. Miracle and he witnessed one of my mother's manic attacks and decided to stick around. I think he felt bad for me.
Mother married Mr.Miracle and became Mrs.Miracle. They had a baby! The Miracle family and me. But it didn't last we lost our house. Mr.Miracle and Mother got devorced. We moved and Mother had another manic attack, she got into a car accident. While she was in the hospital I had to put my dog to sleep Oct 29, I was 13. When she got out of the hopital she had a broken leg and arm so i had to take care of her and my lil sis while finishing my 8th grade.
Mom had another Manic attack Freshman year, and another summer after sophmore year. Junior year...second week of january 2009 I came home from school to all of our stuff out on the curb. We had been evicted and my mother didn't tell me I had an hour left to get everything i wanted out of my bedroom. I moved in with a friend and finished the school year there. I'm still living with my friend and her father. I have my own room. I'm taking summer school now and am starting corisponding classes so i can graduate on time. I've been dating my Boyfriend since November/13/08 and i honestly believe he is the only thing that has gotten me through the last year. He is everything to me and he seems to be the only one i can depend on in my life. There is a Court date. The coutny is going to take custody of me and my sis and place us with relitives. I cant wait till my birthday in February so i wont have to deal with this anymore. I live in the Midwest US.
Sorry i wrote so much I really really wanted to get this off of my chest. I have not recieved any counsling over this and I really wish i could. But i'll be soo glad when this is all over...
Crayolakitty |
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Written by Netgal
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I was incredibly over protected as a child and very severely disciplined for any act that my mother
perceived to be making her look bad.
somehow my dad came across this website and suggested I have a look at it. I have been reading the posts in the forum and even just the subject headings sound like they came straight out of my own life. |
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