BPDFamily.com

Hello,

   I 1st came here 6 years ago when I briefly got tangled up with a BPD woman. That few months forced me to do some real soul-searching. Looking back, it helped me understand the events from my childhood and how they affected my adult life.

Brief background: My mother was 16 and father was 21. Father went to prison for a few years and mother left me. I was essentially homeless  bouncing from relative to relative knowing full well none of them wanted the aggravation of me. Mother's side (her mom) blamed me for ruining her daughters life. I was supposed to be adopted and never thought of again as "nice 16 years old girls don't have babies". Father's mother never truly believed I was his son as she saw her precious boy being forced to marry my mom of face statutory rape charges.

Marriage lasted until dad went to prison. His mother even blamed me for that.

Mother (m) had kid with another guy and when Father (f) got out, they basically split up. I moved from house to house and f thought it would be cheaper to have me live with him instead of paying child support. I pretty much lost touch with m after that. I lived with f and his new wife for about 4 years until they collapsed due to drugs and alcohol. They had a few kids together and it was clear new wife saw me as the unwelcome guest. f's mother always hated me and even sided with his drug addict girlfriends telling them I am not his kid, how even my m abandoned me and of course new g friend  would hate me too. The feelings were usually mutual.

   I think most of us know at a VERY young age our parents are not normal and we are on our own. This is important to understand and it causes us to make (hopefully not too bad) bad choices with spouses , drugs, alcohol , etc.  It's also important to know since you are reading this you must have some sense in your head. PD parents and siblings can detect when people are not like them. They will 1) try to harm you out of hatred, 2) cut you out after a smear campaign or 3) hurt you whenever they can.

Please re-read what I just said as you know it's painful but true. You should also give thanks to God that your brain is functioning well.

   Fast forward late teens early 20's f is a mess and I bail him out of jail at least 8-12 times. I was trying to build my life and still felt compelled to help him at times.

  During this period I was also cutting ties with him. He was completely out of control calling me collect from jail threatening me etc.

  20 years later he hears from someone they saw me. He shows up not recognizing me and wants to see if I am okay in life. He immediately brags about how well he has done in life , etc.

  I spent a great deal of time researching PD's 6 years ago as stated earlier. I apply SET principals with him and he immediately refuses to talk about past. He takes blame in small areas i.e working too much etc. Never once apologizes. He then goes on to say I was an ass for not talking to my mother and him all these years. They were divorced when I was young and it was so violent I was afraid someone would end up getting killed. I do not understand how they stayed in contact other than mutual mental illness. The same for his 2nd wife. She had him sent to prison for kidnapping yet they still socialize.

I play along and say yes maybe I am a jerk for walking away at 16-17  from everyone. I was still curious why he contacted me after all this time. He then began telling me his younger kids from 2nd marriage are on drugs and he needs help with them.   Ex wife is so messed up from drugs she lives in a quasi group home and is barely functioning.

I stop returning his calls although was extremely pleasant to him. We do not speak for a few years and I contacted him asking for a simple request that would take 10 minutes and cost less than $1.00. It would help him to. I could do it myself but wanted to test him to see if maybe I am a jerk. He said he would but never did. I don't know why I conducted this test. The pain is still there and I deep down wish he had changed or maybe I was too critical of him.

Admittedly, it hurt me as it reminded me of being a kid and knowing I am truly on my own. I as well as you were on our own ever since we were born. We should be grateful we survived, understand these people are sick, others in your family may be sick as well and continue  being selfish and living your life to the fullest.

In closing, I saw alot of posts due to the holidays about how to deal with PD's. The only thing we should focus on is not on how to handle them but how to achieve the maturity and understanding to realize these people are not your friends and should be seen as enemies trying to hurt you. Even the occasionally nice gesture is nothing more than groundwork for a future injury they have planned. My m actually smeared me so bad saying I was a total loser (maybe in her eyes I am ) and she had to cut me off due to my drug problem and being a career criminal. The insane people around her believe her. Although to the best of my knowledge they have no evidence of this.

  I have to be honest (as we all do) and realize my mother abandoned me and then smeared me to cover up her own bad behavior. It will always hurt but all we can do is try to grow and heal from these wounds.

  Please be very careful with your own emotions as we may have picked up some PD traits. Build healthy relationships with healthy people and enjoy life.

Stay strong and know many many people have the same wounds you do and function just fine in life. So we have no excuses for bad behavior.

Stay strong !

   

Hi, please help,

It is nice to hear from you. It sounds like you had it rough from the very beginning. It must have been awful as a child to have been blamed for so many problems. None of that is your fault. It sounds like neither of your parents has been able to love you or support you, and I understand how deeply that can hurt. Every child wants to feel loved and accepted by his parents.

You are right that we need to be honest and find ways to overcome our own problematic thinking and behaviors. That is one of the main purposes of this board, which may have undergone some significant changes since you were last here. You can read more about our goals here: Building a Healthy Life Around a BPD Mother or Father (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=56281.0).

Have you had a look at the Survivor's Guide in the right hand margin? Where do you see yourself? Have you been working with a therapist?

Wishing you peace,

PF

Hi please help,

You made some excellent points, and thank you for your post. You've obviously done a lot of soul-searching and work on yourself, which is very brave.

You're absolutely right that as children of BPD parents, we likely picked up traits. That's very common; our parents are our first teachers. We don't see their behavior as abnormal at first, and some children never do. PF Change has made good suggestions, and I'd also encourage you to look at the Survivor's Guide and see where you are--I call that my personal "roadmap to healing."

You've given this a lot of thought and time. How have these discoveries changed you? What other advice do you have for others who have grown up with BPD parents?

-GG

I was asked where I was on the Survivor's guide. I would say definitely in the healing section between 18-20.

  I also realize in the minds of our abusers, we are the abusers. We are the ones who should apologize. When they interact with us as adults, they are the one's trying to restrain rage and anger for what we put them through.

This is why they would never apologize to us. On the contrary, we should apologize to them. One way to validate my point, look at how many people have abused or wronged them. They are always in victim status. 

So true, thanks for posting!