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My parents divorced before I can recollect.  I must have been 1 or 2. My earliest memories are of my parents fighting whenever they saw each other or in the phone. 

Growing up my mom used to tell me all kinds if stories about the terrible things my dad had done.  How he was an abusive alcoholic. How he beat her all the time. 

When I turned maybe 22 I realized my mom had probably been lying about a lot of it. There may have been instances it did escalate I have no doubt as my dad has a temper and reacts with anger often. Although he comes off as cool as a cucumber when he interacts with people outside the family. I remember when I had this realization. And how my mom filling me with all this in my head my whole life created a aides of emotional rift between myself and my dad. Especially from bonding when I was young.

Hi Blimblam,

I also have a BPD mother.  She is not an alcoholic, but she is a rageaholic.  She and my biological father divorced when I was 3 and then when I was 10 my mother had him give me up for adoption to my stepfather.  I didn't only lose my father, I lost his entire family as well as my ethnicity since she changed my name to my stepfather's name.  This was so painful for me.  At times, I saw my biological father's mother, my grandmother, but she lived in another country so it was difficult.

Finally, when I was 38, after I had cancer, I reconnected with my biological father and have had a relationship with him since.  I have also reconnected with his family - my cousins.  None of it has been easy.  None of them know me at all, but in many ways it has filled a big gap that existed in my life.

My father has told me that my mother really made it difficult for him to have any kind of relationship with him and I can see that.  I will probably never entirely be able to forgive her for making such a big decision for me when I was too young to understand the ramifications of it.  But it's done and there's nothing I can do.  I now find myself living with her out of necessity and it's very difficult.

My mother is like a tornado that rolls through and disrupts everyone's peace and puts everything exactly where she wants it to go.  I doubt I'll ever fully recover from having such an emotionally overwhelming mother, but I'm trying so hard to have my own life.

I dont have any advice for you.  I just wanted you to know that you're not alone :-)   

Hi Blimblam.  Parental alienation is a tough thing to deal with.  My mom did the same type of thing with my dad, though they never divorced.  She would also triangulate and play us against each other.  My relationship with my father was practically non-existent... .unless you count feelings of anger, contempt and pity.  I never got to see my dad outside of my mother's dominate shadow, even after her death.  It makes it very difficult to process through a lot of my feelings for him.

Anyway, I just wanted to let you know I can relate to the rift and lack of bonding.  Would you ever feel comfortable talking with him about it?

Take good care.   :)

Blimblam I feel like you described my childhood! Feels great to know I'm not alone. 

ditto. Great that some of you have contacted your biological father, I held a lot of anger towards mine thinking he was the bad guy for many years. When the penny dropped, I looked him up but he had already died. So many unanswered questions... .