BPDFamily.com

Hi there

Happy to find this forum, found out about a month ago my mother had been diagnosed with BPD(shes 73), suspected she was BPD as my sister was diagnosed with it about 12 years ago, she passed away 10 years ago(suicide).

At the time my sister was diagnosed with BPD, I read up about it and really thought it described my mum as well, turns out I was right.

I actually just started some counselling to deal with a lot of the stuff that went on with growing up in relation to my mums I guess unstable parenting style :)

Cheers

Hi LFCNZ and welcome to our online community :hi:

I am very sorry to hear you lost your sister 10 years ago in such a tragic manner. It's very sad that she had those internal struggles and ended up taking her own life. I can imagine this must have been quite a difficult time for you and the rest of your family.

You are now here because of your mother's BPD diagnosis which you found out about a month ago. How did you find out that she had been diagnosed? Is your mother receiving any kind of professional treatment for her BPD?

I am glad you are getting help through counseling to help you process what you experienced growing up. Being raised by a BPD parent can really affect people all the way into their adult lives. What would you say were/are the most difficult behaviors of your mother?

The Board Parrot

Hey Kwamina

Thanks for the welcome, yes was a tough time with my sisters suicide, but in some ways I felt relieved for her as her life was so miserable and even though I had been trying to understand BPD, felt helpless in trying to get her better.

In regards to my mother, she has been in and out of mental hospitals and coping with anxiety/depression/suicide attempts all my life(well as long as I can remember back).

After her last overdose, I just said to her, this cant keep going on, her continued attempts were just driving myself and my wife away from having to deal with it all the time, she said she was seeing a new psychiatrist and I said well can we have a 2 monthly or so catch up with the new psychiatrist  so I can try to understand whats going on with you better and at the last(2nd) meeting we had, the psychiatrist said mum had been diagnosed with BPD.

So here I am :)

Oh and most difficult behaviors she has for me to cope with, trying to kill herself if she feels rejected in some way, shes anxious/depressed alot of the time and as a kid(still now I guess), when I did something wrong in her eyes the silent treatment, Ive read people with BPD can be quite explosive, she didnt seem to explode, just held a grudge for ages :)

Here you are indeed! :) We have many members with a BPD parent and/or sibling.

BPD is such a challenging disorder, your mother's behavior definitely sounds very difficult for a young child to have to deal with. Even for an adult it's difficult, let alone a young child.

At least now that she's received this diagnosis, she hopefully will be getting some targeted treatment that might help her better manage her difficult thought and emotions, hopefully resulting in improved behavior. Have you noticed any improvements in her moods and behaviors since she's been seeing this new psychiatrist?

When you talked to her psychiatrist, did he/she say anything about your mother's suicidal ideation?

Hi

Shes only seen the new psychiatrist 3 times so far I think, no real change so far, when I spoke to her last I asked had the psychiatrist suggested DBT, but she said no, so maybe not got to that stage yet, and no psychiatrist did not go over her suicidal tendencies.

When ever she does try to overdose Im usually quite blase about it, its happened so many times, Im used to it lol