Hi all,

My younger brother has always struggled with mental health and diagnosed with bpd, anxiety, eating disorder etc.  He has worked really hard at seeing therapists and taking their advice and putting himself first in the last 15 years- we were very hopeful for a recovery. He was a little weird I would say at times but was functioning. Then he stopped taking his meds, our mom died suddenly and then everything changed. (This is the second time he has gone no contact after an outburts and scapegoating episode).

About 6 months ago he started making excuses to attend events and other family things but kept in contact.  About 3 months ago he sent his immediate family a text saying he was taking care of himself and would reach out when able. We texted him maybe once a month, if that -to try and keep touch, no reply.

Last Friday he sent a facebook message to an aunt, a cousin and a cousins wife (that we know of)- saying that he was molested when he was 2-3 years old, his email went into great detail about a pair of pants he was wearing and stopped short of saying who did it or what really happened. He also said he would be walking away is getting support and won't acknowledge any of us if he sees us in public.

The thing is, we all have asked him when he was in therapy and on meds if that had happened when we were trying to wrap our heads around helping him.  He always answered no, I have a supportive family and always have.

I don't believe he was molested, no one does- except him.  According to his email, he contacted the police, lawyers and they all said to move on with his life. The whole situation is just sad for everyone.

We as a family are respecting his wish for no contact (he is 42 years old) knowing that he isnt capable of holding a job or paying for himself.  My dad gave my sister and brother and I a considerable amount of money in Feb, my dad left it in his mailbox.  He cashed the cheque a week before he sent the email. My dad is 80 years old.

I feel guilty, I had promised my mom I would take care of him before she died.  I don't know how she would react to this. 

I'm not sure if we just respect his no contact wish, I dont know what else we can do at this point.

Thanks for listening.

Notwendy,
Lots of golden nuggets in your response. Thank you.

My biggest challenge right now is to stop self isolating. This past year, I have faced some painful betrayals from several people who love bombed me, then betrayed me. I am slowly reaching out again to make more real long term friends. Yes, the self isolation is when we feel safe. I am finding that the safe people take time to get to know and are genuinely interested in other people, not just pretending to be extremely generous to see how they can take advantage of another person at the right time.

I realize I will never be so visually successful as the golden children and flying monkeys in my large extended dysfunctional family, yet I am proud of the things that I have accomplished that they never will. I am able to have close sincere relationships with some very special people. My family members do have lots of superficial relationships and run from relationships in which they get any kind of feedback that suggests they are not special people to be looked up to and admired. I on the other hand value constructive feedback so I can learn and grow. I frequently have said that a person is not a friend until we see how we handle disagreements and our differences.

I also feel that I have a healthier relationship with money. I may not be as well off as my disordered relatives, yet I am able to have experiences they will never have because I am open to new challenging experiences with people from many different backgrounds. I love to travel to places most people would never consider going to and  to learn languages. I have much to look forward to. I think for my disordered family members their futures are more of just the same.

Let me share what happened in my case, though the genders were switched so I admit it is not an exact match to your situation.

My ex was arrested after a particularly extreme ragefest.  I had called the police and they initially asked me to "step away".  My preschooler was in my arms and refused to go to his mother.  They left and after I downloaded my recording of the incident, I made a police report and she was arrested for Threat of DV.  Yes, there was no overt violence as in your case.  But after a few months of continuance her case was dismissed.

Here's what happened when she was released... she promptly went to family court and sought protection from me for herself and our preschooler.  This was when I had just been granted a temporary protection order from her!  Unbelievably to me, family court granted her temp custody and majority parenting time.  I was stunned.  What world was I living in?  I had a temp protection order!

My point is this:  My court viewed a spouse's behavior as separate from a parent's behavior, almost as though two separate people, as nonsensical as that sounds.  All I'm saying is that once there is a review of the family dynamic, your role as parent is not as hopeless as you feel right now.

Welcome to BPD Family.  We do understand what you've had to deal with for so many years.  You will find excellent peer support here in the weeks, months and years to come.

My first thought is that all is not lost.  Yes, you're at a distinct disadvantage as a parent, but recovery after all this is still possible.  We've walked in your shoes, "been there, done that" and hope is not lost.

Have you sought help with local resources such as legal representation with an experienced family law attorney, or if necessary a criminal lawyer?  I recall my divorce lawyer stated his first task was to sit on his new clients... so they would not say anything without his approval so his work was not made more difficult than it already was.  He always said you have the right to remain silent, you do not have to testify against yourself.

It sounds like the separation is quite recent.  Do you have a protection or stay-away order filed against you?  If so, is it still pending without a final ruling?  You need legal guidance to minimize the risk to your parenting.

Is reconciliation a possibility?  Reconciling with your spouse and dropping the recent incident would not mean you could never separate in a future separation or divorce.

You are also encouraged to seek local therapy.  (My lawyer always said, "Courts love counseling!")  Having an expert assist in resolving the relationship issues in your family is always a good thing.

• ... for yourself
• ... for the children (surely they have been impacted by living in a dysfunctional home)
• ... for your spouse (although she is likely to reject therapy since many people with BPD have extreme levels of Denial, Blaming and Blame Shifting)

While we are neither lawyers nor counselors - we are peer support - we have a wealth of collective experience and are here to share however we can help.

I am so sorry.  This is not an area in which I have any knowledge or experience to share.  But I can offer sympathy.

I lived with a quiet BPD partner for 10 years, and about a month ago, after a major argument, we separated.

I met her 10 years ago, when I was 28 and she was 19. Not long after we started dating, she became pregnant with our first child. Because I loved her, I decided that we would have the baby and build a family together.

Before she met me, she often spoke badly about her ex-boyfriend. She said that when they broke up, he tried to take his own life, and at the time I wondered why things had gone that far. She had also had quite a few relationships for someone who was only 19, and she often said that if someone wronged her once, she would never forget it and would completely cut that person off. I thought she was still young and maybe that was just how she was at the time, but I never imagined that it would eventually lead to such a tragedy.

After our first child was born and began growing up, I saw my wife neglect our child and, at times, handle her very harshly. She would place the child on the bed almost as if throwing her down. Once, when our child was running away, she threw a toy at her, hitting her and causing a cut under her nose that bled. Another time, she pushed the child into a door and our child’s head was cut and bleeding. There were actions that felt close to abuse.

I could not understand my wife’s behaviour, so I asked her why she was acting that way. She said things I could not understand, such as that she could not understand the unconditional love of a parent, and that she could not feel a bond with her daughter.

Then one day, I saw my wife self-harming with a knife alone in the bathroom. Later, when I felt I could no longer continue and decided to separate from her, she began threatening suicide. At one point, she tried to take her own life by taking my antidepressant medication, so I took her to the emergency department. There, a doctor told us that she had BPD.

That was when I realised that my wife had borderline personality disorder. But by then, 10 years had already passed, and our second child had already been born.

After that, many pieces of the puzzle slowly began to fit together: her lack of financial awareness, impulsive and risky choices, dangerous driving, and many other signs that seemed consistent with BPD.

Because of the repeated suicide threats, the ongoing neglect and mistreatment of the children, and the constant broken promises, I became financially and mentally exhausted. During one argument, I lost control just once and used violence. I was arrested by the police, and the children left with her.

I became a family violence offender. Now I cannot see my children, and I have to rebuild my life from a completely broken place at the age of 38.

Less than one month after our separation, she is already looking for someone else to date.

I am struggling every single day, not knowing what will happen to my children, what I should do, or whether I will ever be able to care for them again in this completely broken life.

It's OK to vent, we all do at times. I also think you are doing well. If I post advice to hold your boundary- it's to validate you- and what you are doing. To have minimal to no contact with this ex is fine- and it may be exactly what you need. Being cordial and not too personal at work is a standard. We know who we can be "friends" with at work, but even so, there are work boundaries and topics that don't belong in the workplace. Personal aspects of relationships are one of them.

My best guest is that she's oversharing and people hearing only her version are trying to be kind to her. You are the one with the work appropriate professional behavior and can keep that standard.

I understand  and when I look back at how success, achievement, money was handled in my FOO, the main purpose for all of it seemed to be to bolster BPD mother's self image, and- we also saw that emotional turmoil she struggled with, no matter what anyone did, or what she had materially.

I do think having sufficient material security is important and a good thing to have, and I undrerstand feeling that you weren't given the chance and opportunities other family members had or were given. I hope that you can also overcome this disadvantage with the strenghts you do have, and even if it doesn't reach the level of what your FOO has, be able to feel secure with it.

I don't have a lot of friends or socialize a lot but I find when I do more socializing- it's not the kind of closeness that has meaning for me.

I learned in ACA groups- and they have extended the description to include adult children of dysfunction in that- is that adults who grew up in these kinds of families tend to self isolate. Maybe that is true- but it's not that I don't want or have friends, it's that having alone time is a time where we feel emotionally safe- and I think we need some of that as a form of self care. I also think it's more difficult for us to build trust in people. But we also need people, friends, too. One of my closest friends is very social and enjoys that sphere. I don't join her in these events but- we are friends in the sense that we can trust each other.

To have friends also means taking risks, risks that for us are difficult to take. If I think of someone as a friend and they betray a trust or turn out to not be such a good friend, it's crushing. But we can't cut out the world either- it's a risk we need to take to have friends. It's actually hard for me to do this. I can be social at a party or get together but to actually become closer friends- I'm hesitant.

The kind of friends your FOO seems to have may not be the kind of friendships you want- they may be more like business or social connections- and while these have their purpose and benefits, they may not have the emotional connection one might wish for in a friend. One good friend may have more meaning to you than 10 business contacts.

Hi To All Reading This,
I am a mother of an adult child who is suffering with BPD and she doesn't have a clue this is her disordered personality. I would love to find other adult mothers that have a simular situation. I live in Southwest Virginia where there is no support groups organized. I know there are mothers suffering in silence as I have with no one to talk to and theripists that don't have an understanding of what I and you have delt with all of their upbringing and beyond into their adult years. These are the rough numbers of people that suffer from this mental illness I found online:

Approximately 1.6% of the U.S. adult population is diagnosed with BPD.
Women are diagnosed with BPD at a rate of about 75% compared to men.
This suggests that around 3.4 million adult women in the U.S. may have BPD.
BPD often co-occurs with other mental health disorders, complicating diagnosis.
Awareness and understanding of BPD are increasing, leading to more diagnoses.
 
I recently got an insiteful book called "Traumatic Cognitive Dissonance" by Peter Salerno PsyD. It is the first comprehensive self help book that focases on "Healing from an abusive relationship with a Disordered Personality". I am divorced from her father that suffers from a Disordered Personality also and have realized within the past year that is what I delt with in a 36 year marriage. I am a survivor that is just beginning to understand it has detrimentally affected my nerves system and am figuring out through the book a path for healing. With my daughter having this mental illness it is double trama for me going through it once again. I have my good days and bad days with my nerves system and the symptoms of trama I have been through.

Thank You for reading this post and I hope to hear from those mothers out there that are looking for support to not feel alone.

Notwendy,
I often feel sad about all the missed opportunities in my life because of being scapegoated by such a large extended family. The golden children and flying monkeys appear to be so much more successful than I am when it comes to wealth, outstanding careers, marriage, children, having lots of friends. It does help  to remember that I have a capacity for empathy and some common decency that I have learned from years of therapy and making myself accountable when I behave badly from learned dysfunctional behaviors of my family of origin and large extended family. I realize I cannot put myself in my disordered relatives shoes and fully understand how unhappy they must be deep down inside from having a compulsive need to maintain a false image and ignore their deepest fears. I need to continue to focus on doing the hard work of moving forward while spending less and less time thinking about the disordered relatives behaviors which are so crazy most of the time that I will never truly understand why they behave so badly. I wish no contact was completely possible and it will never be.