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Although there are a lot of good things going on in my life at the moment I'm still having problems with depression and thinking how much life sucks. I hate it.
I hate that I have to walk on egg shells with my daughter I gave up for adoption. It REALLY upsets me.
She started talking to me a lot online and acting like she really cared and then suddenly, wham there she is dropping out of sight again.
When I finally got hold of her she told me that she had been avoiding me because she has too many problems in her own life and she doesn't want to deal with mine. She was rude and mean about the way she said it and it really hurt.
I haven't been telling her much of anything that was going on in my family. Just occasionally telling her my mom's progress or other things that have been going on like our having the flu so bad around here but how glad I was it was getting over with.
Pretty much keeping the really bad stuff out of our converstation. I figured it would just be better that way and yet here she is telling me she is avoiding me because my problems aren't important to her and hers are more terrible than anyone's in the world basically.
It's not that I don't care about what she's going through. I do care. But I feel that with how far out of the way I've gone NOT to mention any problems except to say things are getting better here and there, she's just a selfish self centered brat.
I'm sorry to say that but I'm tired of walking on egg shells and still breaking them anyway. HOW can anyone be so selfish and uncaring about other people as my daughter turned out to be? I just don't get it.
Every one of my other children care about other people and when or if I need help with something they're right there. I don't burden them with problems either if I can help it. Obviously becuase they are closer to the situation here they see when something isn't right but I have made a huge effort not to burden them with things if I don't have to.
Even when my mom was in the hospital I didn't go out of my way to do anything more than tell them that she was in the hospital and it would be nice for them to visit her if they could. That was it. They care about what is going on.
My daughter doesn't give a crap what we're going through here and by her words has not time for us if we even mention one solid thing that isn't "happy" when I talk to her.
I just don't get it. :(
Rylee
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Rylee,
I have read a number of your posts. You remind me of me a few years back. So many overwhelming emotions. So many overwhelming events. Thank goodness I survived that period of my life and am now in a good space. It was really hard work to get here. And a huge part had to do with overcoming a terrible loneliness.
My childhood left me so hurt and alone. I was desperate for someone to love me. However, in my desperation I was so hard to be around that I pushed everyone around me away. As I look back at that time in my life, I'm amazed I had any friends. I was that hard to be around.
Of course, back then I couldn't see that. I couldn't understand why everyone couldn't see the horrible pit I was in. I couldn't see how my deep well of sorrow was covering everyone I touched.
So I say this with total empathy and compassion, but I wonder if you are doing what I did. If you are so overwhelmed by your feelings that even a simple conversation (to you) comes off as heavy and depressing to the person you are with. Perhaps your daughter has a psychic type relationship with you so she can tell that you're in pain and it's just too much for her to handle.
What worked for me was to try and understand myself better. I read books on co-dependency, anger, relationships, communication, assertiveness. Pretty much most of the self-help categories that were out there. I looked at my relationship to my past and to how my parents raised me and hurt me. I found Harriet Goldhor's Dance of Anger and Dance of Intimacy books to be really helpful. Then there were all the counselors I saw. Some were better than others, but they helped me figure out how I was making my own life harder than it needed to be.
Perhaps it would help you if you took a break from your daughter. Got some perspective on your parents and your hurts. I don't know how old your daughter is, but my guess is she is too young to understand your pains. She probably won't get them for another 20 years or so. It seems the best you can do is find some peace in your life so she can feel you as a peaceful person she can turn to rather than a pained person she is too overwhelmed by.
I hope you are not offended by this (as I may well have been, once upon a time.) I just know that, for me, the only way out of the deep dark depths was to climb up on my own shoulders and stop hoping someone else would solve my problems.
Gook Luck
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Rylee, to me it seems like you let your daughter's behaviour affect your emotions too much. You give her too much power over you. You say you don't like walking on eggshells around her?? Then don't. It doesn't seem to matter how you act anyway, she still treats you in ways that you don't like. So why not throw caution to the wind and just be YOU and to heck with how she responds? As it is now, she has way too much control over your feelings and I'm afraid you are the only one who can stop this pattern. It could very well be your daughter has a personality disorder (I'm guessing borderline, though I hate to diagnose people, especially those I don't know!). If so, you will be hard pressed to have any sort of "normal" relationship with her, and will just have to accept her as she is and keep healthy boundaries and distance with her, or go no contact, if it is that extreme. But one thing is for sure, you will not have the "Norman Rockwell" version of a mother/daughter relationship. I also think you should not compare your placed daughter with the ones you raised. Obviously, they were raised differently and come from different circumstances. It would probably help if you could stop asking "why" and just accept that it "is." Otherwise, you will keep running in circles with this and it isn't doing you any good. If I were in your shoes, I would ratchet down my expectations of what I hoped for with my child, and take whatever good came out of it and leave the rest. Detach from the situation, recognize there will be a lot of inconsistency with her, and when she gets in her moods, you do NOT have to engage with that sort of energy. Remember, no one can make you feel badly without your permission.