Crazy Town In My Backyard: The Wounded Mother

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 I’ve been dealing with a lot of bizarre behavior from outside the hive lately. A girl involved with me and my children has taken to lying, backstabbing, gossiping, throwing tantrums, and really exhibiting inappropriate behavior at almost every turn. If this was a child, you’d immediately wonder what’s happening at home to make her behave this way. But since this is a woman in her early 30s, it makes me question what didn’t happen at home to make her think this is normal behavior for an adult woman?

On the perfunctory, she seems ok. A little fake most times, but I assume her life isn’t exactly how she wants it, and dammit – Fake it until you make it! :) She’s smart enough — Not Mensa but not eating dirt, either. Sure her intelligence is a little on the lower end, but I think that’s from lack of exposure, not from inability.

Her clothes are always nice enough, her house seems ok. She is constantly on about the newest diet or exercise routine she has started and how well it’s working, though you can’t ever quite tell from how she looks what it’s doing for her. Again, I always assume it makes her feel good. She’s no beauty queen (who is really?) but she’s not a hag, either… Pretty average all the way around, really.

Yep, just your average, stay at home mom with both kids in elementary school and a day full of time to do what needs to be done or pick up a few babysitting jobs.

However, the inward, more intimate problems she faces are so complex and deep seeded, I tend to label it Borderline Personality Disorder. If you haven’t dealt with this disease from the outside, then you don’t realize that, like this woman, they want everyone to love them so much that they do all the shit that makes people want to run in the opposite direction. Every thing is always black and white, and most generally, the world is out to get them. Often feeling picked upon when there is no assault happening, they end up driving themselves crazy while they drive everyone away. And that is this woman — She is very insecure, clingy, needy, and accusatory. She lives her life under the assumption that all things either belong to her or they are out to get her. She lives in this constant state of fear that at any moment what she has is going to be taken away. This leaves her with a really dramatic life, full of battles that wage constantly unbeknownst to those she’s battling against. Passionate friendships and love affairs that are, eventually, ripped away from her by the demons in her head and the unending need to possess and control — and mostly if not completely without the knowledge of the supposed loves and friends she’s lost.

Because of these things and so many more, she is left having more problems than solutions:

  • She has a real problem with authority.
  • She has a real problem with not being in charge.
  • She has a real problem with anyone having more than she has.
  • She has a real problem with me!

Although this is pretty common in your standard primary and secondary schools, the proving ground for relationship interaction throughout most of your life. It’s not so common once you get past the age of about 20. Not to say I haven’t encountered it in adulthood before. There was a bizarre incident in college that ended up with a girl following me around campus, spinning lie after lie about her life and why she needed me to help support her emotionally. She was exhausting and selfish and all the things a good friend just really isn’t – at least not all the time ;)

She started calling me constantly, meeting me as I came out of class. She even got her unstable husband involved when I stopped paying as much attention to her. (He posted up horrible comments to a group of very angry young men in my name online — Posting up my phone number, address, email — the whole nine yards. Was horrendous and took me pleading with one of them who actually showed up to threaten me in person to help me fix this spiteful bunch of crap. He was pretty apologetic when he showed me the posting he had been moved to respond to and realized I honestly knew nothing of this and was horrified that someone had done this to me.)

She kept calling me, off and on, and driving by my various homes until I moved out of divorce and got rid of a land line… and even now, nearly 15 years later, she stalks me online, sending friend requests and asking if I wanted to hang out via private messaging on various sites. I block, she pops up as a new permutation of her name. Just a ton of trouble that one.

So when I smelled a bit of the crazy on this new friend, I steered clear. Actually, I did whatever I could to stay out of her sight. I placated. I catered. I cowed. I shut down, turned off the emotion chip and just existed when she was around. It just wasn’t worth it to fight with her and certainly wasn’t worth what crazy provides when it’s angry, sad, or hurt. Avoidance was my best friend and I used her right up.

But eventually, I was the one she was after – gossiping about me behind my back, lying about me, distorting the facts about our interactions. I had suddenly become the villain in her passion play of martyrdom and self-pity and it was effecting my relationships with other people — Because what do you believe? The salacious tidbits from one mouth hungry, and loud, and needy  claiming to be your very best friend ever or the understated denials from another who understands that she’s dealing with a crazy person who would twist whatever she aid into a slight against her so she says very little?

Exactly.

So, there she is. Crazy even though I ignore her. Even though I’ve dispatched her from pretty much every facet of my life. Even though I avoid her like the plague. Crazy she is and crazy she will be until she finds a new person to single out — Then she’ll be crazy to them!

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