She has no boundaries and doesn't respect mine. Print E-mail
Written by Melony   
'I felt as if my mother had died. I wondered where the woman I loved had gone and who it was in the shell of her body.'

I was happy to find your site. I wish there was something like your organization in the USA. I have only recently begun looking for support for myself in dealing with my mentally ill mother. It is good to know I am not alone because there are so few that really understand in day to day life. When I was too young to know it, my mother had several "episodes" of losing her mind and being hospitalized. I never knew anything was wrong with her until I was a teenager. One day when I was about 14, she was on the phone. I was waiting for her to get off to ask her something. While I was waiting, I started fiddling with the sink. There was a dish drainer in it and I took some silverware drying in it and was poking at the plastic on the dish drainer. My mother saw me doing it and flipped out. She started asking me what I was doing and why. She completely over reacted to what was the equivelant of doodling on paper while you are waiting. I was a little confused about it but didn't think much more on it. Then a few days later she pulled me out into the livingroom. She showed me a countertop where there was something wooden, something red, and something metal nearby. She then pulled me somewhere else in the house where there was something wooden, something red, and something metal. She then told me that someone was doing witchcraft in the house. I tried to explain to her that no matter where you went, you could find something wooden, red, and metal nearby but she didn't really listen. Then a few days later she disappeared. For a day or two I did not know where she was. She ended up stopped at a house somewhere and telling them to call and ambulance because she realized she was sick. That was the first time she was hospitalized that I remember. The feelings I experienced then were very hard. I felt as if my mother had died. I wondered where the woman I loved had gone and who it was in the shell of her body. I wondered if I would every get her back. I was forced to live with my grandmother for a few weeks. No one really talked about what happened. No one tried to explain it to me.

After she was released, it still took some time before she was back to normal. Even when she was, I was always on the lookout for signs that she was going to go crazy again. I didn't know what caused her sickness. The only thing I did know was that she stopped sleeping before she had the episode.

She was okay, although a little eccentric after that until I was 22. I had moved out and lived on my own by then. Suddenly one night she called me and started talking about things she had read in the bible and the end of the world. I started to get nervous. Then she began calling me at all hours of the night. She would come over my house and say strange things. She took a bible and set it on top of my computer and told me she was playing chess. My boyfriend witnessed this which caused me a tremendous amount of embarrassment. I knew she was in the middle of another episode but did not know what to do. One early morning my grandmother called and told me my mom was missing again. It was the middle of winter and they were worried about her walking around without a coat. My mom called me a short time later and told me where she was. She had started walking to my house and stopped at a store. The man at the store realized something was wrong with her and had her call someone. I went to pick my mom up at the store at 5am that cold winter morning. I remember the look on the man's face as I came and and led her out the door. He looked at me with pity. I brought her to my grandmothers house where my uncle tried calling her doctor. He was nervous to say anything was wrong with her because he feared that they would take my sister(who is handicapped) away from her. I remember hearing him talking to the doctor and telling him that my mother just "wasn't acting like herself". I wanted to grab the phone from him and explain that she had lost her mind. We gave her her medication and tried to make her sleep but she kept getting up. At one point she looked at my grandmother with fear in her eyes and said "you aren't my mother!" My poor grandmother started sobbing. My mother was seeing things and paranoid. I finally convinced her that she wasn't well and needed to go to the hospital. She agreed as long as I brought her to a certain hospital that was further away because she was paranoid about the local one. As I was bringing her out the door, my family stopped me. I can't remember why. They ended up trying to force her to the local hospital. They emergency room took so long that she kept taking off. At one point she beat up her boyfriend to get out of the car. They did finally get her in, though.

Since then, she has never really been back to normal. I am not sure if when I was younger I didn't notice it or if she is recovering less after each episode. She can function in society but isn't normal. She won't share any of her medical information with me so I am not sure what her diagnosis is. She doesn't want to talk about those things and seem to has a problem admitting there is something wrong with her. Life with her is a challenge. She hasn't had an episode for a few years but I imagine it is only a matter of time. She is still paranoid which interferes with her life. She is irresponsible and can't keep a job or pay her bills on time. She has no boundaries and doesn't respect mine. It has gotten to the point where it is starting to cause problems in my own marriage because my husband hates her and hates that she tries to be involved in every facet of our lives. I'm glad to know that there are others out there with similar problems. I always felt like I was so alone.

Melony
US New Hampshire

 

Jarvis Walker     Arlec

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Featured Articles

The 'Forgotten People'

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WHEN nine-year-old "Tom" was asked to draw a picture of himself with his mother be drew her trying to strangle him.

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Bulletin Board

I had to struggle extra hard

Her doctors did not bother to enquire about my father and I.

They only listened to her stories ”

“ I grew up thinking - Nobody wanted to help. Nobody wanted to know.”

Hi, I had a mentally ill mother. She passed away last year. I literally grew up hanging around mental hospitals because my Mom's condition was a cycle that always ends in a mental hospital. When I was younger, there was a long period when I cried my eyes out every time I was separated from my mentally ill mother because she had to stay in a mental hospital. After I grew older, my Mom's mental illness became impossible for me to bear.

Literally, my Mom's mental illness ruined my life. I think. I had to struggle extra hard for everything because of my big handicap at home. There was no support at all from anyone other than my father. Nobody else wanted to know about it. My mother's own cousin even said to my father not to bring my Mom to their place. I grew up thinking - Nobody wanted to help. Nobody wanted to know. My mother's own sister has been complaining since 2000 and her last complain was on 5 July 2014. This particular aunt keeps complaining about the same thing. That she had to take my Mom for her weekly injections and complained that my father and I was not around to do it. Then, she goes on to say that she saw my Mom beat me up with a cane. When she said that, I asked my Aunt, you saw my Mom beat me up with a cane? She said yes and than, she walked away.

I feel very sore with this aunt. Number one, the period she was complaining about was when I was still schooling and my father's and my mental health had deteriorated so badly that we had to leave the state for our own sanity. Before joining my father, I had to live alone with my Mom and my baby sister for almost a year. My aunt who lived a few minutes drive away did nothing when my Mom beat me up every day for months until my father managed to cut the red tape to remove me. My body was full of bruises and I was terrified to go home after school. Nobody helped. Not the neighbours who can hear all my mom's shouting at me, nor my aunt, nor my grandparents, nor my school's teachers. Someone should had intervened for a 12+ little girl. No adult helped. My father was trying his best to get me away to stay with him. Nobody helped him.

On XXXXXXXXXXXX, my Mom's sister let slip she saw my Mom beat me with a cane. And yet she did nothing! My aunt even had the cheek to say that my Mom beat me up because I said I wanted to go live with my father. The way my aunt said it was like the beatings were wholly my fault. What is wrong with the picture? You have a 12+ girl being beaten up daily, you are an aunt who knows something is going on and did nothing. Yet for years later you complain about having to take your own blood sister for her injections. And, I do not think she did it for longer than my own experiences. Probably only a few times because my father and I had to travel frequently to see to my mother. Due to the cyclic nature of her illness.

I have been going with my father when he took my mother for her weekly injections as a little girl, knee high, ever since I can remember. My own aunt is so calculative. There was a nurse that visits my Mom to give her her injections. But, the problem is my Mom will not let the nurse into her house that is why the intervention is needed. I have lost count on the number of times I had to go with my Mom for her injections as a little girl.

Her doctors did not bother to enquire about my father and I. They only listened to her stories and full stop. I think my Mom's doctors are the most heartless people I have ever met in my life. Until today, I do not like anyone who officially practices psychology because those doctors etc... contributed to my life being ruined. That is how I feel. I have been scolded by my Mom's medical team and they even dumped my Mom on me after I just turn 18 and there was no other adult around. And, they knew the situation. I was terrified because my Mom was a very violent. My Mom has pitched me, beaten me up, she has biten me with her teeth, she has smashed my head against the table and threatened to beat me with a piece of hard wood. I experienced all these as a little girl at the tender age of 12+ I had to learn karate to protect myself from her violent ways. And, when my Mom was home, I would lock my room's door and place a chair against it. I was that terrified of her.

All our belongings can go missing because my Mom is good at that sort of thing. You never know what is what with my Mom. It is like having a criminal live under the same roof as you.

My aunt kept repeating to me that on my mother's death anniversary I will have go visit her cemetery. I live in a different state from where my mother's cemetery is located. And, my aunt knows that very well. However she repeated her question to me until I said yes. I hate being forced to do something against my will because I have been forced to do things against my will my whole life.

My life is in ruins because of my mother's mental illness and people like my aunt is perpetuating the troubles for me after my mother's death. When I was 12+, my mother's mother said to me that it is my father's job to take care of my mother. In other words, my father's job and mine. And, they never lifted a finger to help. Just helping a little, my aunt has been complaining about the same thing for more than a decade. Unbelievable. Shameful.

Even though my father and I lived in a different state from my mother, we had to travel up and down every weekend because that is demanded of my mother. Sometimes, we had to travel after school and upon our arrival, she won't let us in and we had to travel all the way back. And, my father will not let me sleep at home as it is a school day, I had to go to school. My education was very important to my father. My mother could not be bothered if I succeeded or not.

I have seen more than any of my Mom's relatives have seen with regards her mental illness but people whom I just met behave like I have no idea about my Mom like they are the authority on her behaviour and her illness. Goodness gracious.

Despite this huge handicap in my life I persevered with my studies. My Mom did not give me any moral or emotional support at all. In fact her mental illness cycle will peak just or during my important exams. In other words, I had to deal with my exams and on top of them a mentally ill mother. By my final year in university, I could not take the pressure of exams and a mentally ill mother's break downs anymore.

When I was in my teenage years and early adult years, I was suicidal. I had to call Befrienders a lot. Thank God for Befrienders.

Before XXXXXXXXXXdate, I do not wish my experience to be experienced by anyone else because it is torture. However, after feeling how hard hearted my aunt is. A so called holy person, a church goer, rich person who has successful kids and grand kids. And, she can talk like it is my fault that my Mom beat me up and she (my aunt) had to take her (her own sister) for her injections when I was a kid. I really wish that my aunt must reincarnate as my father (a few lifes) so that she can eat her own words. If my aunt reincarnates and is put in my father's shoes, she would really deserve it. Hope she learns compassion through it all.

Why can't the world give children of the mentally ill a break? I am so fed up with all this troubles that stem from my mother's sister's attitude towards my father and I. After all shel lives a great lives. Rich live. What is wrong with these people? I really cannot stand them. This is my story.

After I wrote the above - I am more myself now, and I totally forgive my aunt and everybody who did nothing to help my father and I. And, everybody else who were heartless towards my father and I. However, I still think that by living a few life times as my father (my aunt) - would do her some good. But, knowing her character, she might become a psychopath and pose a threat to humanity. My father is a very, very kind soul. My aunt is a hard hearted, prejudiced, narrow minded, one tracked mind person.

How I cope? Trying my best to keep out of their way, and hang out with positive people. There are plenty of great people out there. Nnaami is included :)

GerryCan

South East Asia