BPDFamily.com

I am wondering if there is any truth to BPD symptoms decreasing with age? Are any of you in relationships with people who exhibit signs after the age of 50?

My upwBPD is 56 and not much improvement over the 34 years I've been with him.

My uBPDw's grand mother is 94 and shows all the signs. Even more so than I can ever remeber. Also demtia to so maybe thats really the cuase but apparently she has suffered with mental health issues her whoel life and in those days you never talked about them.

Hi Asherah7777


BPD symptoms are strongly related to how invalidating the environment of a pwBPD is. For some pwBPD it can be that over the course of their live they find a stable environment that provides them with sufficient validation and for whatever reasons the relationships involved are not turned by their behavior upside down. Some of them can be found on the Staying Board while others are cases where the pwBPD is living alone and is maintaining a set of less intensive relationships. Symptoms may well decrease over time as there is more support and few drivers for dysregulation.

For others this is not the case and the BPD related behavior causes people close to turn against the pwBPD. Despite the continuous and unmanaged conflict for whatever reason the relationships are not terminated but are maintained in their toxic state and symptoms are not getting better.

Then there are some pwBPD who start understanding themselves better (usually through DBTherapy with good success) and are sufficiently able to manage their emotions to not display symptoms.

It is really hard to generalize here.

While not diagnosed, my dad thinks my mom has some symptoms of BPD.  A light bulb went off in his brain after I told him about my girlfriend, and later when my sister in law was diagnosed with BPD.  Now he thinks that is what my mom's issue has been all these years.

She's now in her mid 60s, and this Christmas was the happiest I have ever seen her.  I think a lot of it has to do with the "unknowns" about the future are no longer "unknown".  I know my girlfriend goes into high anxiety mode if she doesn't know what is going to happen next.  Having a wrapped gift that she must wait to open practically causes a nervous breakdown.  My mom can be the same way, obsessing over the future that she has no control over, or of things that she does have control over but are big things.  For years she was worried about retirement, how much money she and my dad would have, moving into their new house, moving to a new town, etc.  She just could not picture herself in her new life, and worried about it.

Now that they have moved, she joined a hiking club and a gym, understands how much money they have, her role as a grandmother, and feels comfortable.  And she is happy, and seems to worry about very little these days.

I think that is about the only thing that makes a pwBPD relax - when there are no more unknowns or future things to obsess over.  So maybe when they get to a place where they are not obsessing over the next phase of their lives, their careers, their kids, whether or not to have kids, money, etc, they finally calm down.

My BF is 52 and his symptoms continue to get worse the longer I stay with him... .

My experience has been the same. With each year, my husband's symptoms and behaviors get worse than ever before, and  have really escalated in the past three years.  He's 44 now.  He shows absolutely zero signs of slowing down or getting better, which is why I'm here.

My uBPD mother has more or less stayed the same, although I think she may have developed a little bit more self awareness in recent years, since I significantly started changing my reactions to her rages. However as she ages I think stressful situations are causing her even more distress.  Stressful situations include: my sister getting married, and having kids, me establishing boundaries, etc.  I think that unless they develop self-awareness, and an understanding of their triggers and how to cope with stressful situations, then they are vulnerable to stressors of any kind, regardless of age. Just my two cents.

I've read untreated BPD continues to get worse with age, and in my experience it's yes and no, depending how you define worse.  I had the 'privilege' of knowing my borderline ex twice, 25 years apart, and although she's got less energy and she's screwing fewer people now, the mental side, the abuse, manipulation and raging, is much, much worse.  My take is it's because she's gotten better at her games and has more experience, she seems to know what she's doing now as opposed to just reacting as in her youth, plus she's got a much bigger temper and lacks tolerance, which is pretty common for people her age, my experience.  Another factor was PMS; for those 3 or 4 days a month before her period started she was predictably a raging btch, to the point where I'd schedule things around it, my menstruation sanity calendar I called it; never schedule anything together during those days, and preferably find somewhere else to be.  She's starting to miss periods so menopause is approaching, and that will probably help, at least on a monthly basis.  As an0ught mentioned, the environment is critical.  My ex's youngest children are almost out of the house, and once she's an empty nester life will mellow a little, and then it depends on her partner, if they are able to create a non-triggering world together.  I will not be that partner, had more than enough for a lifetime, and please don't anyone say third time's a charm... .