Is this the end of the road?

[Looking For Peace]

I don't really know where to start with this.... it all goes back so far! I first stumbled across this forum years  ago now and through it gained a lot of support. My UNPDMIL put our family through years of misery. After my husband was diagnosed with cancer, I realised I couldn't take any more and made the decision for myself and my children to go NC. My husband followed suit soon after. She riled at first and tested our boundaries many times, but for the most part we have had peace from her and her awfulness for the best part of 5 years. During this time my husband has been extremely ill and at times fighting for his life. The last few years have been better as his health has slowly improved. Suffice to say it's been an extremely challenging few years!!
Fast forward to today and my husband started a conversation about his Mother, and how he had been feeling his sadness for her that she no longer saw her grandchildren. (Grandchildren which she manipulated and used for narcisstic supply and who she set against each other and us). I reminded my husband why she no longer saw them and he started to become angry saying that we couldn't even talk about her without it triggering me. I was actually quite calm and didn't feel particularly triggered, I just feel very clear with my boundaries. I said to him (as I have always said) that he is free to try and repair his relationship with his mother on his own.. and that IF that went well and she wasn't game playing (which she would find near impossible) then possibly much further down the line then myself and the children could see her again as well in a safely arranged way. (Eg a 1 hour met up in a public space). The last time he tried to rebuild his relationship with her, he didn't get beyond the first meeting before she started making demands to see the children. Sadly I think this is all she is really interested in. And only one of our children at that! She never had any interest in the others.
Anyway, the conversation got quite heated and my husband said he felt 'trapped' and that things had been 'stuck' for too long. And I admitted that I sometimes felt anger for everything that I have had to go through to be with him.... first his awful mother and then cancer. Maybe I shouldn't have said it. I said I knew it wasn't his fault and that it wasn't rational but that those feelings existed in me.
And then he suggested that we should perhaps separate!!
I am in total shock. I always knew deep down that this woman could be the thing that came between us. But after everything we've been through I can't believe it. I have spent the past 5 years caring for him through harrowing illness.
But maybe he is right? I actually feel completely unsupported by him and I told him this a couple of weeks ago. The realtionship is not balanced. I had Covid a few weeks ago and was unable to get out of bed and he came to tell me how much he was struggling and what a hard time he was having. I could hear he couldn't cope with the children. I lay in bed crying, gutted that I couldn't be out of the picture for even a day without everything falling apart. I feel like I have had to literally hold up the sky for him and my children these past few years. And yet no one is there to hold me.
And now he is blaming me for feeling trapped? Why?
Sorry this is not very coherent and a lot of different things going on here. I just feel so sad and lonely and broken tonight. And for some reason I've come back here!

[treesgrowslowly]

Hi there Looking for Peace,

I'll offer my thoughts on your situation.

Here is some of what I have learned from many years of figuring out this whole FOG thing...

From your husband's perspective, let me comment on where he said he felt "trapped" and "stuck".

IMHO, these are the emotions that can come from having unaddressed / unresolved grief.

And I have learned that unresolved grief is very very common in adult children of narcissistic parents.

Until we grieve (usually in therapy), we have a lot of anger. It can come out in all sorts of ways...Such as saying we are stuck, and that we are trapped in our marriage.

He has now had to watch his children grow up without the grandmother he wanted them to have. None of that is easy. Even for those of us with high levels of emotional literacy and self-awareness it is still not easy to navigate the grief and loss of watching our children grow up without loving SAFE grandparents. I know that I felt this as a huge loss. This can be a HUGE loss to process.

It is complicated grief because the grandparent is still alive, but is not in the child's life. This is different from a grief where the loss is due to the grandparent not being alive. I think that more therapists are starting to learn about this form of loss. Is he willing to talk to someone about the losses he's had to face?

Perhaps due to his illness and the focus on young children, he did not do this grief work after going NC.

I think that for many of us, the grief work lags for years after we go NC...because right after NC we are still just getting our bearings in a lot of ways (and also you know, working, battling illness, parenting our children, etc etc etc...).

So IMHO, all signs here point to that he's dealing with a loss that he doesn't really know what to do with. And as humans, we do not like feeling lost, so we get angry.

He is blaming you. Likely because it feels safe to do so. This is why very good therapy can be so helpful to those of us who grew up with PD parents. He is the adult child of a narcissistic parent. In therapy, he would get the support he needs to sort out why he is blaming you for feeling trapped and stuck.

My understanding (I am not a therapist), is that DBT, CBT or EMDR modalities could assist him in exploring why he feels trapped and stuck, and what to do about it. There's also other modalities like IFS etc...

If like me, he grew up with a narcissistic mother, then I have some guesses here as to why did he feel trapped as a child? Because he had a mother who made her needs the only needs that mattered (if she is a narcissistic person, then this is how they "parent").

Perhaps one of the children has hit a milestone recently, and it hit him all over again that his kids are growing up without the grandparenting he wanted them to have.

Or perhaps as his health status improved, he now resents that his mother was not there for him while he battled for his life over the last few years.

Not having emotionally stable, emotionally safe parents in our lives doesn't just affect us as kids. It affects us throughout our lives. It would be very reasonable if he wished for a loving parent who was there for him and his kids over the last few years.

I think a lot of us can relate to that wish for a loving parent over the last few years. But even more so for someone who battled for his life as your DH did.

Much luck and peace to you.

Hope you find the boards helpful!

Trees

[Leonor]

Hi Looking,

Oh, I hear your pain and bewilderment, and I'm so sorry you're going through this with your beloved.

Yes, he's frustrated, he's grieving, he's afraid. He's a little boy who feels lost and is looking for mommy, and you are not mommy, so he vents at you.

I'm not saying your dh is childish or delusional or immature. He's traumatized from being raised by a disordered mother. And I agree with Trees; something might have triggered him, or mom said the magic words, or the old fog rolled back in, and all of a sudden he's reacting to an old hurt rather than responding to his dear wife.

You did good by pointing out the reasons why you and your children are NC with your MIL. Reality checks are helpful when we're in a triggered state. "I know this is not an ideal situation and you would really like it to be different, but these are the reasons why we have the boundaries in our relationship with your mom."

Now of course it's extremely difficult to maintain your grown up centeredness when your spouse has gone all a-foggy and is defending his mother against you. When my dh did that, it threw me into my own triggered cptsd, and I sank into BPD behaviors to cope. Not healthy, but also not easy to avoid.

There's an old Simpsons episode where they go to family therapy and the therapist hooks them up to little shock buzzers so they'll learn how to treat each other nicely and not get zapped. Well, of course they wind up zapping each other nonstop, and this is what it felt like to me when dh and I were both triggered "at" each other. Zap! Zing!

Your dh married you for a reason. He knows that his relationship with his mom isn't healthy. And even as he complains, he's likely grateful that you put the boundaries down. He may be kicking at them, but at least he didn't have to do it himself and face the Wrath of Mom. He's likely not aware of this, in the way that we're aware that it's sunny outside. But he married a woman who put up a firewall with his mom. It's in there somewhere!

Looking, you are doing a lot of caretaking in all of this. Who is taking care of you? Who is thinking about how you'd like to spend your time, whom you'd like to see, what you would like to do in this situation?

DH is having a bit of a fit. He's in a tantrum because his mom is pushing all of his buttons. So, ok, let him have his tantrum. Leave him a copy of Dr Ken Adams Silently Seduced on the nightstand and go draw yourself a bubble bath. Plan a trip to the zoo with your kids. Go out for coffee with your girlfriends. Do not get sucked into your dh's mamma drama. That's his problem. He needs to work that out, and he can't just upchuck it all onto you. You've got 99 problems and mil ain't one of 'em.

You made this decision for the health and wellbeing of your marriage, family, and sanity. It's a good decision. It's the right decision. The more calm and centered you stay in your adultness, with kindness ("I know this is hard for you") but firmness ("but this is what's best for me and the kids") and not JADE-ing (no "well you said so yourself," "let me remind you what happened," "but don't you care about how I feel?" business) even as he's crabbing about the house, the faster he'll eventually come around.

Especially if you're having an enjoyable time while he's all pouty. It's no fun to argue with yourself, and it's boring to sit around and sulk all day. Hey, why doesn't he go spend the hour you'll be at the knitting class with his mom? That'll remind him pretty quickly why she's a bummer and life with you and the kids is actually pretty great.

It will take a longer time than you think and certainly more than you would like. But you are not going to part ways because his mom has her nose out of joint. You are not stuck. He is stuck - stuck in a fog trying to placate an irrational, hurtful, and abusive parent. You are maintaining your boundaries and living your life and enjoying yourself. He's welcome to come along whenever he likes. Kiss kiss, hug hug, see you later! Love you! Bye! And out you go.

You're not abandoning him or giving up or settling for less than you deserve ... You're showing him that life can be calm and enjoyable and peaceful, and living out your boundaries is sane and kind, and love is freely given.

Peace to you, Peace.

[bloomie]

Hi Looking For Peace - I am really glad you have returned and thank you for sharing this painful time you are facing. You and your DH have been through a LOT!! And from what I understand, it is sometimes after weathering the storm and beginning to come out of it that things can get rocky and very confusing.

You and your DH are moving out of survival mode and it seems like both of your expectations of the relationship and each other are changing and adjusting. I am wondering if you are able to talk through what you both want your lives to look like - both personally, as a couple, and as a family? If conversations get too emotionally fraught, maybe writing to each other could help give you both time to filter what you are saying and thing through how to respond.

For 5 years now it seems your DH was most likely fairly unavailable due to life threatening illness and you did everything. Everyone got used to that. Everyone may need to adjust and begin pitching in and paying attention.

As for the accusations and the resurfacing of the specter of your mil... seems to me you have told him what you need to and clearly pointed out his freedom to pursue that relationship and your boundaries around contact for yourself and the children. You don't need to convince him or repeat where you stand. You don't need to ask permission or get his approval. This is where things stand. So, he knows he can see his momif he wants. You are not keeping him from doing so.

Sometimes we find we are carrying all of the emotions for our H's. And possibly have been for a long time. Your H may be finally feeling his own feelings and wants to push the discomfort onto you. You don't have to pick it up. You can leave his grief, anger, frustration, confusion, possible situational amnesia all right there for him to deal with by having strong inner boundaries and lovingly disengaging in ways that keep you grounded.

Another thing... when you are flat on your back in bed and a full grown man comes in to share about his struggles... YOU be there for yourself and send him away "I am unable talk right now." and ask him to please close the door on his way out. If the struggles with the kiddos is nothing serious, put in your earbuds and rest and let him figure out how to parent his own children.

The most important person in your life that you need to back you up, support you, advocate for you, see and hear and know you is YOU! And we are here to support you as well! Keep coming back and let us know how you are doing! I sure hope you are feeling much better!!

[Looking For Peace]

Thank you all SO much for your thoughtful and considered replies. Finding this forum years ago was life-changing for me, and coming back now has once again been an incredible support.
Trees, I agree whole heartedly about my H having unresolved grief. He did have regular psychotherapy a couple of years ago when he was just starting to get better, but he found it too challenging. He said it used to leave him feeling worse. I guess working through this kind of stuff is no walk in the park. In some ways it's a whole lot easier and nicer to stay in denial. In this same conversation we had a couple of days ago he started talking about his magical childhood and upbringing. I find this baffling as I know that his childhood was peppered with serious abuse. His own father went to prison for child abuse when he was a baby. One family member told me they were taken into care when this happened. Another one told me they were nearly taken into care. my H has no idea and doesn't want to talk about it. And that is only one of many examples of hazy but known facts that things were not all rosy. The only things that get talked about from their childhood are the same funny, rose tinted stories that come up several times over the years. It's always seemed to me like a deliberate retelling of the past. Keep repeating the good bits, never mention the bad.... and hey presto! You have adult children whose own memories have been chiselled and moulded to fit the myth! The facts surrounding the not so good times are left out. And the now grown up children don't care to know! They all say they felt loved. Which I guess is good, but it is also disturbing to me seeing what that love looks like! It makes me realise how deeply engrained all of this stuff is.
So no, he hasn't done the grief work. And I don't think he wants to.
Let me be clear that I have always said that he is free to have his own relationship with his mum. And I stand by that. I think some of the anger I feel from him is because he knows full well how it will go. He knows she is not really interested in him now. She moved on to our first born who was always the golden grandchild. (She doesn not have contact with him or any of our children though). Any contact my H has with her will not be good enough for her. And he knows that so he is pre-empting it by singing her song and saying how sad it is that she doesn't see her grandchildren. It is sad of course but is it also not sad that she does not see her own son? I think he also prefers the idea of our family coming as a package because its diluted and in some ways less stark then just him and his mother face to face. But to me it feels so much like using our children as currency.
And Leonor thank you for reminding me to stay strong with my boundaries. And to try not to get triggered or drawn in. (I learned about JADE when I used to have contact with MIL but not thought about using it with H. But you're right I do just end up repeating the same stuff I've always said which only angers him more!) I absolutely do have 99 problems and i do NOT want my MIL to be one of them ever again! Ha! That did make me laugh.
I feel so validated by all of your replies and able to see this as something that HE needs to work out for himself. I have done a LOT of work on this. I've read a lot, chatted on forums, on helplines, had my own therapy, we've had couple counselling.. and I am clear! Since then, my two sister in laws have also gone NC with her and ALL of her grandchildren either don't see her or only see her in other company. She has not changed a bit!
Bloomie, what you said about coming out of the storm and finding the terrain rocky and confusing is spot on. Not least because his illness was all around the same time that things all came to a head with MIL. He was first diagnosed just months after a huge blow up. It was then a complicated and painful dance of VLC and finally NC so that we could just try to make it out alive. That part was successful thankfully!  And yes.. I carried a lot of his emotions at the time. Some things I had to hold on my own for a long time as he was just too ill to know what was going on! I have carried a lot and I must admit I am very very tired. And with our own beautiful children all needing me a lot in their different ways, I just wish my H was ready to start being my rock instead of me always having been his. I absolutely did send him on his way when he came to tell me how hard it was for him when I was ill.... but then I cried for a whole day because of the stark realisation that I had no support.
So when this stuff rears its ugly head again after all this time.. just when things are feeling stable and calm.... I am gratefully reminded by you all that I do not need to take this stuff on all over again.
I will gently hand it back to him and go on as I have for the past few years.. in relative peace without 'her'! xxx

[treesgrowslowly]

Hi Looking for Peace,

Yes, this forum is such a valuable place for us to connect and share in ways that hopefully, help each other out of all this, and get to peace! as your name suggests.  

Having entered into the mucky terrain of grief work (for childhood PD abuse) several years ago myself I can say that it is intense. It was not like the therapy sessions where they just la la la focus on CBT sort of stuff (thought catching, negative thinking, etc etc...) and send you on your way. That sort of therapy is nothing like the therapy that focuses on grieving for the childhood stuff.

The grief work for someone with complex PTSD was, in a word, terrifying. It can cause all sorts of flashbacks to surface and those can be very disorienting. Looking back on my own experiences with it, I did not have the supports in place that were needed in order to do such deep digging into the psyche. I'm being honest here. I wish I could say, oh yes, you go into therapy, you get direction from them on how to do the grief work, and then 6 months later, you feel better. That is what I probably hoped. But like your DH said, it's actually really upsetting work to embark on. It left me feeling worse too. I was paying someone to make me feel awful! It felt very very disorienting. Almost like surgery without anesthesia at times (I can only imagine if that is a good analogy or not).

I'm not sure if any of the above is helpful to your situation.

You are certainly not alone in the situation you are in. Your DH (on some level) still hopes to repair the relationship with his own mother (a PD who won't change). By having his attention on this, it leads to issues with his present day relationships (i.e. his marital relationship with you). This is the dilemma faced by many survivors of childhood PD abuse.

Some of us got into marriages without really knowing how to navigate such a demanding, long term commitment to another person. Our primary framework or model for 'relating' was with a PD parent (or 2). Adult children of PD parents did not experience effective problem solving, to say nothing about the low levels of love and attention and protection and support and nurturance we 'received' as children. When our partner needs those things with us, when our marriage demands that those things are strong, we can be at a huge loss as to how any of that 'works'.

For us, the first relationship (the relationship that taught us how to be in any other relationship) was, dysfunctional, unsafe, shaming and exploitative. None of that helps us when we get into our marriage.

The problem with denial, is that it blocks all sorts of processes from occurring. Like you said, instead of recognizing the things he endured as a child, he's in denial about it. Instead of learning to manage his mother's PD behaviours, he remains hopeful she can change.

And many of us survivors of PD childhood abuse , have legitimate anger. Anger that can really affect our marriages longer term...As you are experiencing that lack of his support or presence to focus on strengthening the marriage. He's in a trauma bond with his mother.

It has been a very regular theme here (sadly) over the years. The MIL who believes she is entitled to access to everyone in the family system. I have not visited my MIL is years. She's not entitled to visits with me just because I'm with her son.

I highly doubt that I would be here on this forum, enjoying my connection to the people here who want to heal, if I was still mired in the drama of trying to make my MIL happy. I tried to make that relationship work for years, and I tried everything I could think of. Thankfully, I got out of denial and I realized I can't fix people's fleas or PD's.

I completely agree with you that it is your decision to make regarding contact with your MIL. She may believe she's entitled to all sorts of things but that doesn't mean any of it is true.

Hang in there,

Trees