I'll keep this brief, if you need any more detail please ask. I recently came Out of the FOG (story for another day) and still trying to understand my PD mother and sister. Any ideas why my PD mother and sister's bond is so tight? As far as I can tell, they are each manipulating each other to get what they want. For example, my sister is stingy and manipulates my mom to buy things for her and pay for things. I've noticed that they are both chronic complainers and complain about all other family members behind their backs BUT they never complain about each other. (except a couple of times mom complained to me about how my sister got her to pay for things that she didn't feel like was fair)
They share information with each other constantly and will both act as a team to try and get what they want from other family members. e.g. act as a team in manipulating then gaslighting family members. Their favorite thing to do is to team up against my wife and provoke/humiliate her. They also act as a team to try and guilt me into doing what they want.
Why is this? They both love attention and loves to play the victim so I thought they would be competing against each other for attention, not aiding each other.
Could be a combination of things.
Enmeshment like that can be precipitated by trauma bonding during childhood (was your PD mother emotionally and physically abusive followed by nice and warm? That yo-yo emotional rollercoaster is called intermittent reinforcement and can cause children to normalise PD behavior).
Additionally, is she getting something transactional from the relationship?
As in, does she get near constant access to your sisters kids? This can be a factor as well.
It is also very common for enmeshed Pdm/pdSis to be gossipy and critical of pretty much everybody. I have the exact same family situation.
Thanks for your reply.
Yeah she gets near constant access to my sister's kids. Also, I just thought of another thing. My mom is divorced and she seems to be in this competition with my dad about who gets to see the kids more. So that could be a factor.
My father did say that my PD mom was selfish towards him, followed by being warm to draw him back, and then would be selfish again. I am still trying to sort out my own memories at this point (only recently Out of the FOG) but to be honest I don't remember her flip-flopping between cold and warm. But she had a very good reason to be warm towards me, to make me hate my father, which was successful until very recently.