Is this FOG?

[walking on broken glass]

I haven't been in contact with my mum since our last exchange. Her last message left me angry and sad, as she – again – did not assume any responsibility for her role in our changed relationship, and just guilt-tripped me. I don't feel like talking to her and, in fact, I don't feel like talking to anyone in the family. I was initially thinking that I would be in touch with my aunt to find out about my mum's medical tests and whether her cancer has spread. But I just feel numb about it all, like I don't want to do anything. The possibility of my mum getting bad news is stressing me but I still don't want to reach out. My thinking is, if anything drastic happens, my aunt or even my mum can get in touch to let me know. In the meantime, I will operate as if nothing new has emerged.

Is this a sane approach or am I being avoidant and a coward? I wish the whole thing didn't exist and that I didn't have to think about it, and I just want to be left alone. But my mum and her declining health are a reality that perhaps I shouldn't ignore? My sleep has been disturbed a lot lately, as I get dreams about my mum and my family every single night. Is this my conscience telling me I am handling things poorly or is it just FOG?

[NarcKiddo]

I don't think your dreams are anything to do with your conscience. I think they are a reflection of the fact that you are struggling with what to do about the situation. So your mother and family loom large in your conscious mind and your unconscious mind is trying to continue the work of processing that.

My take on this is that you are not being a coward and your approach is perfectly sane. The only question I would suggest you ask yourself is what information about your mother's condition might make you decide to do something different? There may not be any such situation. But if, for example, you would want an opportunity to make a deathbed visit then you might want to think about how you could make that possible. Clearly, communicating such a desire to her or your aunt would have its dangers. My MIL (who is still alive fifteen years later) dragged my husband across the country on several "emergency" deathbed visits. When he arrived he always found she had "misunderstood" the doctor. Eventually he lost patience with it and told her he would make no more such visits unless he was called by a doctor.

Please remember that you are not a bad person for wanting to be left alone. Just because society at large supposes that you should be somehow invested in your mother's health does not make it right for you. If your relationship with your mother means that her declining health is not something you should be factoring into your life, then don't. Doing so due to FOG will not serve you - or even her, though she might not see it that way.

[TimetoHeal]

 

I agree with NarcKiddo on everything!  You are not handling anything "wrong".

I think wanting to be left alone probably means that you are just exhausted with the situation and having to worry about it and worry if you are handling it properly.  You've learned these are people who you don't trust and who make you feel unwell and you don't want to have interaction with them.  I think this is a normal reaction.

From what you've said, they would be able to contact you if need be.  For now, just try to relax.  It doesn't sound like there's anything you need to be doing. 

[walking on broken glass]

Thank you guys. It helps so much to have reassurance.

The only question I would suggest you ask yourself is what information about your mother's condition might make you decide to do something different?

I have been thinking of this. I guess if she was truly dying, I might want to fly over there and see her. But I don't think there is a question of that just now. Certainly in the future. It is so infuriating that she herself chose to say those horrible things to me because, as she said, she thought she might die and not see me again. The choice she made for her final words to me was not out of love, affection, warmth but cruelty and bitterness. And yet, I feel that I owe her to see her and reassure her before she dies? It's all very hurtful and confusing.

[TimetoHeal]

I think I can relate to what you are saying, WOBG.  My mother didn't have one big blow up at me like yours did the last time you visited her.  But our relationship, such as it ever was, has been deteriorating slowly over the past few years with our only interactions I can recall at this point being very negative - her complaining and ranting and raving about her ailments, politics, religion - whatever toxic sludge was on her mind that day, using me as a dumping ground.  I am so angry at myself honestly for allowing it to go on as long as I did.  I thought I was "helping" her.  Ha.  Now, she is at a more stable place where she is in assisted living and finally taking antidepressants which seem to take the edge off a bit, and she wants to just go on as if nothing ever happened.  I just can't fake it any more.  There is no there, there, as they say.  Yet, she is old and I feel some responsibility...  Is that kind of where you are at? 

[walking on broken glass]

I am sorry you are going through this phase too, Time to Heal. It sounds very similar, yes. I think in my case what made it worse is that I had been through all that for years with my sister, while my mother was the enabler. I had maintained low contact with my sister, to keep my parents happy, and out of a misplaced sense of obligation towards her. I can't be friends with her but I can give her that at least, that was my thinking - quite close to what you are describing with your mum. And just when my sister got unbearable so much so that I had to cut off contact with her, my mum sided completely with her and turned against me. It was like a double betrayal. And suddenly I saw all my previous conversations with my mum in a new light: while I was trying to bond with her and be there for her, she harboured these thoughts for me. Yes, our conversations had always been superficial, but on my side I was doing my best and I longed for more. I now see how one-sided this has always been; how deluded I was, with both relationships, in fact; thinking that when you treat people with respect and kindness, it will be appreciated. Instead, they both turned around to bite me, at a moment that was one of the lowest of my life, at that. It's been the culmination of a very long process of gradual scapegoating; while I was hoping for resolution and release, I was hounded and targeted. And now everything seems pointless and vain. Hence the numbness.

Sorry, that ended up being quite long!

[TimetoHeal]

No worries about it being long!  I always enjoy what you share, WOBG. 

That is very painful, and I am so sorry you had that experience with your sister, and now with your mother.  It does feel like a double betrayal, I'm sure.  One of my worst fears is my brother turning on me somehow because of something my mother tells him.  So far, we have been in sync about her care and logistics and mutually respectful.  But I could see her starting a smear campaign and trying to turn him against me if I go NC with her. 

[walking on broken glass]

I hope your brother is more clear-headed than my mum and he is aware of your mum's disorder, so that if she tried to do that she wouldn't be successful. My mum was always partial to my sister; I just didn't expect that level of susceptibility to maliciousness on her part.

[TimetoHeal]

He is pretty clear-headed, and he has put distance between himself and her, both physically and geographically, his entire adult life.  But I think she is still able to pull on his heart strings where he feels pity for her.  He knows she is toxic and chronically depressed, but I don't think he understands or wants to understand the whole PD thing.  I feel like it's a touchy situation. 

[walking on broken glass]

Ah, I see. I hope he proves an ally!

[TimetoHeal]

Ah, I see. I hope he proves an ally!

Thank you so much! 

[walking on broken glass]

I was discussing today with my partner that, if we had children, my mum would have behaved better because she would want access to the children. Also, it would be harder to vilify my partner because he would be the father of my children (where I come from, and within my family, it is a very children-oriented culture). My sister's machinations would probably have less effect and she would be furious with the attention the children would be receiving over her. Sometimes I think it would be worth having children just to spite her kidding, obviously. It's just one more thing that makes me sad, how my worth as a human being is judged on the basis of my childfree status, and how my partner and I are not a real family in their eyes, because we don't have children.

[Call Me Cordelia]

You know, WOBG, I don't think having children is necessarily any kind of safeguard of status in a disordered family system.

I think that sometimes, even usually, the scapegoat is just the scapegoat no matter what the external circumstances are. How many of us have experienced the golden child being the one who on the outside was a hot mess and having all sorts of problems, but the comparatively functional sibling was the scapegoat? In my own experience the more successful my husband and I became, the worse it got. A big driver of scapegoating behavior is ENVY. We had more money and more children than my parents did, and they had wanted more than what they got. How DARE I be superior to them??? But if we had been poorer, well that's simply no better than Cordelia deserves, lazy girl who refuses to get a job and "homeschools her kids." You see how this goes? The narrative is made to suit the whims of the disordered ones, and not any kind of reality. I heard both sides of the coin regularly, and it's so mindbending. I was both an utterly lazy spoiled trophy wife because I didn't have a job, but we must have been dirt poor because I had a vegetable garden and used cloth diapers. 

Really, there is no winning. There is no gaming the system. Anything you would have gained would at best have been a shallow sham of love and respect and those kids would not have gotten any more love than you did. It's just not there.

I understand the "if only" thought game. If only I had finished my degree, if only I had been more popular in school, if only I had been more athletic... It sounds to me as though your inner child is still trying to make sense of how she could have just been lovable. You were and are lovable! But it's safe now to know that it's really your mother who just cannot love.

[Liketheducks]

I second Cordelia on the idea that having children does nothing to safeguard you from the dysfunctional behavior.   If anything, it made things even worse with my mother.  We also did "better" than my parents did.     My mother thoroughly expressed favoritism towards my siblings families as a result.   She consistently berated us for not doing enough for my siblings families.   Mom had a perception of what we could do for them financially and it was NEVER enough.   She floated buying cars, private school, college for EVERYONE.  She also pulled away from any relationship with my child.  Having our son really illuminated the dysfunction for me.    Both in how my FOC's parenting decisions were so very different from my FOO AND in the mind bending part where I tried to understand why my parents did/do what they did/do with their child (me).   I still can't comprehend pulling some of this behavior with my son.     I didn't really recognize the extent of what my parents did until I became a parent myself.   I think because momma bear in me would always protect my son, but I had very little practice in protecting ME.
 
It DOES sound like you're trying to make sense of the nonsensical/illogical.   

Once again, I'm fairly certain Cordelia and Ladybug hark from the same parents.

I've tried to approach my parents with some empathy.   Clearly, they both experienced some trauma to lead them to parent the way they did.   But, those choices have no reflection on you.   Every person deserves to be loved and cherished by their parents.   Not every parent is capable in the same way.   

The biggest growth I experienced is when I let go of trying to understand my parents....and spent more effort understanding and loving myself.   I'm not saying that this is at all easy.   Growing up in PD parents, I think our default is to fit ourselves into their mold of what we should be in their eyes.   I think it is a survival mechanism we developed as children.
 

[walking on broken glass]

Really, there is no winning. There is no gaming the system. Anything you would have gained would at best have been a shallow sham of love and respect and those kids would not have gotten any more love than you did. It's just not there.

Oh I fully agree on that! I don't think that having children would make my mum love me more: I think she would have more incentive perhaps to behave in a less hostile manner towards me, merely because she would consider the grandchildren her possession and she would want access to them. Nor do I think that my life would have been easier, as she would probably use the (fictional!) children to triangulate and compete with me. What I am saying is that, in her head, since I don't have children, I don't have a 'normal' family (and I was being pressured a lot by both my parents to have children) and so I am still an extension of the family of origin and the new unit I have created with my partner is not important. She would probably think like that even if I had kids; it's just an 'aggravating' factor.

I second Cordelia on the idea that having children does nothing to safeguard you from the dysfunctional behavior.

Yeah, I didn't mean that at all! I don't have any delusions that my relationship with my mum would have been better or that my life would have been easier, if I had had kids. Only that my mum might have faked it better.

 

[TimetoHeal]

WOBG, I can relate to you in a different way.  My mother definitely doesn't think my family "counts" because I am divorced.  Never mind that I have kids!  One way I know this is because all she has dumped on me in the last few years with her "needs".  She says she can't call my brother because "he has a family and a job".  Um, I have a family and a job too!!  Just because I don't have a husband anymore doesn't make me any less than, but in her eyes, I am.  My having her first two grandchildren didn't keep her from treating me terribly at all. 

I second what Call Me Cordelia said, "the scapegoat is just the scapegoat".   

P.S. I love your new avatar and congratulations on being a Senior Member now! 

[walking on broken glass]

WOBG, I can relate to you in a different way.  My mother definitely doesn't think my family "counts" because I am divorced.  Never mind that I have kids!

I am shaking my head. There is always something, isn't there? And it's interesting how they tend to embrace old-fashioned, antiquated notions (family = mummy, daddy, children). In my partner's case, he is also a 'foreigner' and I am sure that counts against him too.

P.S. I love your new avatar and congratulations on being a Senior Member now! 

Thank you! ☺️ I was procrastinating today, hence the new avatar 😂

[Call Me Cordelia]

There is always something. And if there isn't, no problem, just make something up. Feelings create the facts. For my parents and in-laws both my family was an embarrassment because we were too traditional.

Your mom might have faked it better, WOBG, guess you'll never know. But really... I think it's a blessing in disguise that they couldn't or just didn't. Faking it better very well might have left me in denial longer, and that alternative history of my life scares me. As awful as all the drama of going no contact has been... None of us would plug back into the Matrix if we could.

[walking on broken glass]

I see what you mean, Cordelia. It's striking how it can cut both ways. In your case it was 'too traditional', while in mine it's more about rejecting tradition. Either way it puts us in that no-win situation.

There is always something. And if there isn't, no problem, just make something up. Feelings create the facts.

This is so true. And yes, while faking it might have caused less commotion, it's always better to know the truth.

[walking on broken glass]

My aunt just videocalled me. I am trying to sum up the courage to call back. Who knows what she wants to say. It may be about my mum's health. It may be just to put pressure on me. I am so stressed and worried.