Hereditary?

[Before you can make things better, you have to stop making them worse...]

I don't remember.  What is the consensous on BPD/NPD?  Are they believed to be hereditary?  

The reason that I ask is that his mother lives out of state and I didn't see her a lot but I talked to her on the phone a lot and she seemed to say one thing one day and something else the next.  I talked to her right after he and I went NC and she was talking totally out of her head and now I hear that she in the hospital with "mental problems".  I had also heard that she was hospitalized with serious mental issues about 25 years ago.  His brother told me about it, but my exBPD acted like it was a nonevent.  Of course that is how he would act about things anyway.

[ve01603]

I don't remember.  What is the consensous on BPD/NPD?  Are they believed to be hereditary?  

The reason that I ask is that his mother lives out of state and I didn't see her a lot but I talked to her on the phone a lot and she seemed to say one thing one day and something else the next.  I talked to her right after he and I went NC and she was talking totally out of her head and now I hear that she in the hospital with "mental problems".  I had also heard that she was hospitalized with serious mental issues about 25 years ago.  His brother told me about it, but my exBPD acted like it was a nonevent.  Of course that is how he would act about things anyway.

[eeyore]

no clue on the real numbers, but my opinion is that it is genetically passed on so more so than just a freak occurrence. 

[ve01603]

no clue on the real numbers, but my opinion is that it is genetically passed on so more so than just a freak occurrence. 

Seems so.

[once removed]

i don't know if there's actually an established link. i could certainly see how there could be connections though, with PD parents raising BPD children. i think my BPDex has an NPD father. i haven't decided if her mother has a PD, or if the poor woman is infested with  s from what she has to live with, and without.

[catnap]

Something I wondered myself.  I have read a few articles (having a granddaughter whose mother is uBPD).  Yet none of her mother's siblings seem to have it. From what little she has said about her deceased mother I suspect that she may have had BPD.


Did a quick Google

www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/9670.php

Doctors don't know for sure what causes borderline personality disorder, but there are clues. Most likely, no single factor explains its development. Instead, it may be a combination of:

Hereditary predisposition. You may be at a higher risk of BPD if a close family member - mother, father or sibling - has it.

Childhood abuse. Some people with BPD may have been physically or sexually abused as children.

Neglect. Some people with BPD describe severe deprivation, neglect and abandonment during childhood.

Neurologic injury in early childhood. There appears to be a high prevalence of childhood head injuries in people with BPD.

[2010]

Neurologic injury in early childhood. There appears to be a high prevalence of childhood head injuries in people with BPD.

I would recommend staying away from websites that link personality and bi-polar (as this link suggests) as well as anyone who states that a certain personality can be grouped cohesively with resultant behaviors based upon childhood head injuries.

[OTH]

Neglect. Some people with BPD describe severe deprivation, neglect and abandonment during childhood.

This was mine.

I think her mother had issues but I never spent enough time around her to know how bad they were. I know her mother had a similar bad childhood from going to her father's funeral and hearing about it.

Sounds like part hereditary and part upbringing... .I have read that there are some who have had good childhood's who still develop it. They can detect a likely hood of PDs on brain scans but the question still remains. Did their brain's not grown the necessary wiring because of neglect or was it genes? Or both? The world may never know.

[Marcie]

Yea my mOm was abandoned for a month with her little sister when she was 5 years old.

[TheSomberlain]

Did their brain's not grown the necessary wiring because of neglect or was it genes? Or both? The world may never know.

I would argue they were neglected because their own parent had a PD thus inheriting the genes that led to them being neglected to begin with. Chicken and egg argument. At least, that is what I would argue in my ex's case. Genes are like switches. Some lay dormant until the proper environment expresses them. Some people are more apt to obtaining physical and mental illnesses but may never know until the environment exists for those reactions. I.E. someone could be allergic to poison ivy their whole life and never know it without being exposed to it. Being neglected doesn't simply rewire someone's brain. That's a little far-fetched in my opinion--seeing as how many come from caring families. They just happened to inherit the gene that was never expressed in one or both of the parents.

Even behavior is hereditary. Pick up the Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins.

[nowheretogo]

What is NPD?

[TheSomberlain]

Neurologic injury in early childhood. There appears to be a high prevalence of childhood head injuries in people with BPD.

I would recommend staying away from websites that link personality and bi-polar (as this link suggests) as well as anyone who states that a certain personality can be grouped cohesively with resultant behaviors based upon childhood head injuries.

Though I agree, it is interesting to note that brain trauma can alter someone's personality. Phineas Gage, for example. Citing it as a cause of BPD is a bit "out there" though. Probably some fluke outlier, if even possible.

[OTH]

What is NPD?

Narcissistic Personality Disorder

[nowheretogo]

Thanks... .

[nowheretogo]

I am betting on genes definitely involved.  I am convinced my H has BPD.  His brother and sister have very similar personalities, and of course I've never been around them enough to know for sure, but they seem "off", too.  Mother "never wanted them" and father was "abusive".