Thinking about breaking NC for mom's bday

[Absent Minded Artist]

I've been NC with my hpd/BPD Mom since August of last year. Today is her birthday and I'm feeling, I dunno... Nostalgic about the mother figure who never existed. Part of me misses the sound of her voice.

I've had a ton of drama with my siblings over the past few days, and I'm going NC with 2 of them for the time being.

I'm not sure if calling her is worth it. How do I decide?

[Twinkletoes88]

Oh goodness I feel your indecision and anxiety over this. I've been in your shoes and can relate.

This may not help but I try to think of it like this: you have two parts to you, your adult part and your child part. It's the child part of you that is feeling nostalgic and missing her mum. And then you have your more rational adult part that probably knows it's a bad idea. I think it's important to hear and feel both parts but not to let the child part take over.

The thing is, times like these trigger us. Birthdays and christmasses and mother's days etc and I think we hate the discomfort and grief and confusion and it hurts us so much that making contact seems like the only logical solution to ridding ourselves of the pain.

From my own personal perspective, I made contact with my NPDm after 6 months of no contact and it changed absolutely nothing. In fact it's only made things harder.

Unless your mother is able to have a proper discussion, be held accountable and apologise (with sincerity!) then it's likely that you'll be sucked back in and then punished for having left her. You went no contact for a reason so only you will know if it was and is important to you or not.

Anyway what I'm trying to say is that only you can make this decision but I just wonder how you will feel tomorrow or next week - once the trigger is no longer there, will you regret making contact? Will you be pleased?

Don't do it out of FOG. Xx

[Juniperberry]

What do you want to get out of an interaction with your mother?

How much of that goal is in your control and how much of it is not? 

Is your goal a healthy one?  Is your goal truly plausible?

Who else will your choice of contact or continuation of no contact affect? 

[Absent Minded Artist]

Thank you TwinkleToes and Juniper. I thought about it and chose not to call her. I think in the long run it would have made things worse for me. In some ways it's like an addict romancing their drug of choice. They remember the "pleasant" times and the consequences have a way of fading into the background. If I do choose to break NC, I don't want to do it out of FOG.

Love to you all ❤️

[Twinkletoes88]

I've been checking your post to see what you did and feel relieved for you. I think you made the right decision for the right reasons and I feel exactly the same about the love addict - I think the same thing! Xx