is it worth it to speak to the HPD's partner?

As many may know, my mother is HPD (or if not specifically that, she's a mix of the NPD/BPD/HPD). On new year's eve, I cut contact with her completely. THIS HAS BEEN THE GREATEST DECISION OF MY LIFE!! The drama and martyring is gone! Even with the drama #######4 she's pulled since then (my birthday was Sunday, and she sent me a stupid martyring email that was filled with "look how hard i've worked to be a good mother to you and you don't respect me" crap; she wrote a nasty email to my aunt, whom she said has replaced me as her mother and had the audacity to lie and say I told her as much!!!), it's been a great start of a year, and I have been so happy and relieved to not be dealing with her. I feel no sadness or regret by my decision, and actually feel a vast sense of relief.

This evening, her partner (she's gay, if you don't know/remember, and who I've constantly said was an enabler and brainwashed by my mom) sent me an extremely long email asking me why I disowned my mother, after sending an itemized list (64 items) of all the ways my mother has been supportive of me throughout my lifetime. These things are all things a normal parent does for their child (meeting with principals, attending PTA meetings, showing up to softball games, taking care of me when I was sick, etc), yet her partner (We'll call her "B") lists them as if they are extraordinary events that normal parents wouldn't do for their child. Also on the list are things that, as an adult, I never asked for or wanted ("she supported you when you moved in with your boyfriend" "she supported you by driving to Texas to be with you at your father's funeral"). She finishes out the email by telling me that I'll never have a healthy relationship in my life if I can't support, respect, forgive, and love my mother.

I was planning on compiling a response to her and, since I'm not speaking to my mother anymore and B is clearly off the deep end with her, let her know that I think my mother is Cluster B and responding in depth to the ridiculousness of her email. The reason I'd planned to do this is, I've never actually told my mother that I think she's cluster B. I have told her that to continue a relationship with her, she's got to quit it with the martyring, guilt tripping, attention-seeking, woe-is-me, whining, complaining, and other histrionics and narcissistic behaviors (in so many words, not that bluntly). So, I feel as if I've done the best I could to try to have a relationship with her. But I've never said, "You're off your freaking rocker, and I don't want someone like that in my life anymore." I'd never planned to tell B this, either, since I didn't feel like it would do any good.

But now that she's sent me an email and plainly asked me why I am disowning her "after all the wonderful things she's done for you and how she still hasn't given up on you, despite all your viciousness and awfulness", I feel justified in being honest and telling B the reasons why.

Is it even worth it to do this? I don't feel like it'll hurt anything, since the relationship is already destroyed with my mother, and I don't really care to have a relationship with B either, since I don't respect her and she's always just been the person I've been forced to accept as my mother. But given the tone of the letter, I also don't feel like it will do any good. But since I'm not trying to repair the relationship, I feel like at least B (and through her, my mother) will understand WHY I've disowned her. I know they won't accept the answer, and will likely respond the same way that they already have (which is, "OMG HOW COULD YOU SAY SOMETHING LIKE THAT ABOUT YOUR LOVING AND RESPECTFUL MOTHER???"), but at least they'll know why. Maybe then, they will leave me alone and let me live my life in peace, and I won't have to worry about my biggest fear (which is, "what happens when I have children?").

What are your thoughts?

Hi TaylorPie
Difficult to provide valuable advice to a girl that has an HPD mom. There shall always be a bond between you, unlike many of us on here whom are no longer with our X's, just trying to manage the after shocks of the past relationship. When its just a partner relationship I would always say distance and indifference is the only way, but with a mom, that's not possible...

Here goes for my few cents worth:
I believe that if your mother is a true HPD, and her partner is trully in love, there is very little that you shall be able to say or do, whether face to face, or by writing a letter to convince her that your mother is the true source on the conflict between you two. I found that HPD seem to have their followers that don't have conditions, including poor treatment, they have a kind of unhealthy Guru type of power over those real close to them. If that is the case between your mom and her partner, then I think you are wasting your time, may be even making things worse (if you react...) and i also think that your mom's partner is perhaps just being used as a puppet and amunition to attack you. This is because you have stopped all contact with your mom, so she can no longer attack you directly. However, if you feel that your mothers partner is balanced enough and independent enough to be practical about your relationship with your mother, you may want to have dinner with her and explain your side of the story; just to save your honor. You would need to do that calmly or without signs of bitterness, otherwise you shall come across as being the unbalanced one. I would in all cases avoid writing anything down. My experience with that, is that selective parts of what i wrote to my X was subsequently used against me add-hoc as conflict amunition. She rarely wrote anything down about her nastiness towards me, everything was face to face when we were alone, and so I had no proof of her Gaslighting and duplicity towards me, yet she had mails written by me in anger, and she kept every single one to be used as needed... !

Good luck, and choose your approach strategy carefully!

Thanks for the response! I thought adding a bit of information might help clarify the situation:

I live in Texas, and my mother (and partner) lives in Florida. So no contact can be easily maintained. Most of our family is scattered across the country, so there aren't family get-togethers during holidays. I think because of that, it's easier to cut off contact. B's family lives in the same city I do, but since I've lived here, they've come to visit once. Even with all the drama that's happened in the last two years between me and my mother, we've only seen each other a handful of times (including my father's funeral, my wedding, and holidays). Holidays with her and B have been agonizing for the last six years, so I look forward to not enduring them anymore.

So really, despite that she's my mother, it'll be easy to (physically) disconnect from them both. Even if they moved to my current city, it's large enough that I'd never see them. When me and my husband move again, we don't plan on giving them our new address. Emotional disconnection has been just as easy, because every time I talk to her, all I EVER hear is how much she's supported me throughout my life and how ungrateful I am...or "I work so hard! I'm so old and my body is giving up on me! I don't have health insurance so I can't go to the doctor! Woe is me! Woe is me! Why aren't you sympathetic to all my phantom illnesses! You're so ungrateful!" So...a sane person can only take THAT for more than five minutes before they fling themselves off the building.

The only problem with this disconnection at this point is the dreaded children. I've mentioned elsewhere on the forum that me and my husband have both said that we don't want to have children right now BECAUSE OF HER. We don't want to deal with all the whining we'd have to endure ("Why won't you move closer to me so I can spend time with my grandbaby?" and all the associated whining and guilt-trips), so we've said, "Nope. Not going to happen for awhile."

Now, if they realize I think my mother is Cluster B and her partner is an enabler/oblivious, maybe they would stop trying to initiate contact with me as well and I could live my life in peace. Of course, it could also make them both go off the deep end and try to "prove" my mother isn't crazy. Sigh.

Hi TaylorPie;
Your decision with your husband to have children or not (and the timing...) should be separated from the state of the relationship that you have with you mom. Her role (whether she can assume it or not...) is to be a grand parent, nothing more ,nothing less. If she can't handle that role, or does not manage it appropriately, then fine she does not get to see her grand children. I think other considerations are far more important before deciding to have a family; both for parents and childrens well being; i.e. parents trully in love with one another, emotional stability from the father and mother, and a healthy financial situation. Without sounding stereo-typed, grand parents for me make jam, provide treats and read stories, and should have very un-complicated relationships with their grand children. If they can't manage that, but the other items I mentionned are in order for your husband and yorself, then have your kids when you feel ready, but leave the any unbalanced grand parents out of it...

Cheers, Musician

Musician924 wrote:Hi TaylorPie;
Your decision with your husband to have children or not (and the timing...) should be separated from the state of the relationship that you have with you mom. Her role (whether she can assume it or not...) is to be a grand parent, nothing more ,nothing less. If she can't handle that role, or does not manage it appropriately, then fine she does not get to see her grand children.

The way I read it, Taylor and her husband actually do want children but have avoided having them purely because of the extra drama they would entail from her mother. Hence, now that the drama-queen mum is out of the picture, they can consider having a child purely on their terms.

Taylor, the drama you're getting from your mum and her partner since you cut ties is precisely the reason that total non-contact is the only real solution in cases like yours, where the disordered person won't accept responsibility and work towards recovery. Some people even have to repeatedly ask mutual friends not to pass messages either way, as the *PD person will use any means available to continue their efforts at manipulation. I found that the bridge metaphor (http://www.bpd411.org/bridgemetaphor.html) helped me to really understand this dynamic.

Tattered has it right regarding children. We didn't want the burden of dealing with them when I became pregnant, so we were both dreading the notion rather than being excited about it. Now, we both talk about the possibility with joy and hope.

And wow. That bridge story was chilling. Truly chilling. I loved it and hope to use it with others when they don't understand my choices (though, surprisingly, everyone whom I've told has been extremely supportive because they've seen the same attitude and actions that I've seen in my mother).

So your opinion is to ignore B's letter? Leave them questioning why?

In part of the letter, B asks, "If your mother died tomorrow, would you regret your decision? Would you wish you'd let bygones be?" My response to that after days of thinking it over is this: I would regret my mother dying without knowing why I have extricated her from my life. Even if she didn't agree with it, even if she felt like I was the crazy one (and no doubt, she will, and she'll tell everyone else that), she'd at least know and understand. I just don't want to waste days of my life writing to B, gathering materials as "proof", printing out old journal articles to validate my point, only to have it burned two days later.