Do you have BPD traits?

[Before you can make things better, you have to stop making them worse...]

I don't know if this post is of any use but I hope it may help someone. People with BPD project, i am certain that a proportion ( perhaps significant ) proportion of posts are from people who are actually BPD that think there partners are, It is always wise to have a good look at your self an seek genuine impartial advice about things ( not from someone you have discussed your relationship with already in a negative way ) perhaps some people could suggest a few simple self checks to help this situation ( the general state of denial in BPD may however prove to difficult to overcome ) I find it wise to always examine your real motives

[SlyQQ]

I don't know if this post is of any use but I hope it may help someone. People with BPD project, i am certain that a proportion ( perhaps significant ) proportion of posts are from people who are actually BPD that think there partners are, It is always wise to have a good look at your self an seek genuine impartial advice about things ( not from someone you have discussed your relationship with already in a negative way ) perhaps some people could suggest a few simple self checks to help this situation ( the general state of denial in BPD may however prove to difficult to overcome ) I find it wise to always examine your real motives

[Lucky One]

Personally I think that is a very good question.

And I've already wondered if it applies to me. Why!

Because my early childhood background and environment, would almost certainly qualify me to have some sort of PD.

Just in case, I've done both CBT (Australian University) and DBT (Marsha Linehan) self help courses, referred by this website.

I really enjoyed them, and I gained a huge amount of benefit by doing them. I'm already using some of the new things in my own relationship with uBPDw.

Obviously DBT is a on going thing, and the lessons need to be applied on a daily basis over a couple of years. And even this does not guarantee a full remission or 100 % cure.

If one has a PD, most know that it can be relieved, even 100 % cured, if one has the motivation and will, to find a cure.

I'm 65 years old by the way, so if I've got a PD, I've hidden it for a long time. Then don't call me "Lucky" anymore, call me "Crafty".

Nevertheless this is serious stuff, so I may even go and see if I can get a proper and complete diagnosis from an experienced professional. But these things cost money.

At my age, I wonder if it would be worth it!

Maybe I've only got some of the traits, like most people have. We just process some of the issues in a more balanced and fair way. Those that we don't, we can improve on, by being a member here, and by taking note of the lessons carefully.

This is a great site - I've learnt so much in a very short period of time. I'm an academic myself, but NOT in the field of medical or mental health, so reading and studying, comes naturally for me.

Next time, after a few more posts, I'd like to talk about this HUGE anger I've had over more than 45 years. I've never been able to let it go.



It's also one of the reasons, I take note of your question.

Thanks so much

[Swiggle]

I asked my T this jsut last week. Reasons for wondering if it could be me with a disorder but blame/project everyone else are... .

highly dysfunctional childhood. Over sexualized environment in actions but sexual things were taboo and dirty to talk about. I have very few memories of my childhood and they ones I do have aren't good ones. My brother and one sister I'm sure engaged in a sexual relationship. My one sister sexually violated/molested me. My step father did things to me and my other two sisters but mom didn't believe us and stayed with him. Mom was so uninvolved and there always seemed to be some drama with family. I made some poor choices as a child/tenn. I was married for almost 11 years and had an affair, my ex and I recycled for about a year and I lost it a couple of times with him. He once accused me of being bi-polar.

When I asked my T about this she explained that when diagnosing a PD they look at pervasive behavior over the course of time. She went on to say that anyone can at times exhibit traits or behaviors that could be associated with a PD. I mean at times we can all be a little narcisistic, right? For me I look at behaviors or choices/mistakes and work to figure them out. I can empathize with people and am a care taker by nature, I feel like if I were disordered I wouldn't be able to keep that up for long periods of time. Just becasue we grew up with the dysfunction doesn't mean we turned out to be dysfunctional.

I then went on to ask her how some people can make it out of the dysfunction to lead somewhat of a normal life. Take my siblings for example, two of us lead what some would consider normal lives and my other two siblings have quite a bit of drama, drug and money problems and other troublesome behaviors.

T explained Protective and resiliency factors come in to play, you can google these they are an intersting to read about. A child’s temperament can also be a factor when growing up with major FOO dysfunction. Those of us that make it out without PDs, addiction issues, drugs, money troubles and other things had a mix of temperament and protective/resiliency factors that helped us see/learn healthier ways of coping and not falling victim to what was going on around us.

IMO while I've had issues, made some poor choices and had a crappy FOO, on the continuum my behaviors/personality are more toward the middle with certain stressors or major life changes contributing to those that fell on the crazier side.

[Lucky One]

Hi Swiggle

My childhood was also horrendous:

Two close family members of mine, committed incest and I saw it happen right before my eyes, by accident, before I was 15 years old. I knew then already that it was wrong.

I've lived with it ever since, IN MY MIND. Two Clinical Psychologists tried to help me, when I was in my thirties, but to no avail. I still see it, in my mind, as if it happened yesterday.

And it affected me terribly. Until today, 50 years later, I do not like to see any close relationships between a father and a daughter.

Also I suffered physical (violence) abuse from my father, until I was 19 tears old.

One year after finishing school I basically ran away from the family home, and disowned my father and elder sister. He died about 15 years later from a brain tumour.

My mother divorced my father when I was 13 years old, and abandoned all three of her children, to the custody of my father.

I have a huge anger towards my mother, who I also have basically disowned. She's still alive, aged 90 years.

I have had to do the above, to at least, maintain some sanity for myself. I found it helped me, or relieved the mental anguish, by having NO CONTACT with my family of origin.

It shall remain so, until I pass on to the next life!

That I did not end up in an asylum for the mentally insane is a miracle. But this could also be due to the fact that I have always been very strong in character and an independent type of person. I don't need someone to lean on.

But I have cried a lot in my life. NOT many know this, as I hide it, because I'm a man. Crying is a sign of weakness! Or, supposed to be, even until this day and age.

I was able to have a successful career, and a reasonably happy family life of my own, until about two and a half years ago, when my W started showing some PD's. But this also goes back some time before this.

We're working on these at the moment, but it is extremely difficult because she also came from a family of origin with major problems.

We'll get to the bottom of this. Hopefully still in this lifetime!

Until next time.

[Swiggle]

Lucky One

That is awful that you had to and are still dealing with the stuff from your childhood. Hopefully in time you will find the answers and relief you are searching for.

I know that my childhood could have been worse but it affected me none the less. As I grew older I think I just realized, for whatever reason, that my family was f***ed up and I would shake my head at the nonsense. They were never able to quite pull me all the way in and take me over like I feel they did so many others.

I have also disowned my family. I haven't spoken/seen my mother or had a relationship with her since 1996. And haven't spoken my brother or one sister since like 1995. I am pretty close with my oldest sister (I am the baby) and she also hasn't spoken to these people since even before 1995. For me I just realized that I didn't need that drama/unhealthy stuff in my life and they have obviously made zero effort to reach out so that tells me that I am not important since I don't give them anything.

I'm not sure why but I don't ever get sad or angry that they aren't in my life. I get angry that certain things happened but I'm not sad because I "miss" them or wish they would change. Frankly I've surrounded myself with people who care about me, respect me. The one thing that I am sad about is that my children don't have the grandparent relationship that I think can be so fulfilling for little ones but that loss far outweighs the unhealthy relationship they would have with my FOO.

I often thank goodness to that I did not end down a dark path because I certainly was set up for that and on some levels I think that is what my mother wanted for me. I promised myself that I would never be that kind of mom for my kids!

[Samuel S.]

A BPD usually would not ask this question, because they are enraged for any number of factors. Indeed, how they choose to respond makes them become a BPD. I too come from a very bad family environment; however, I choose not to continue that same pattern of thinking and behaving. I see more good than bad. I treat people humanely. Sure, I get angry like anyone else, but to take it out on others is not life fulfilling. It is life draining, such as what a BPD does. I hope this helps you.

[Lucky One]

I have also disowned my family.

I promised myself that I would never be that kind of mom for my kids!

Thanks so much, for everything you've written so far.

There are quite a few things that have happened to us that seem to be similar, in some respects.

Looking after the kids properly - Thank God for that.

I'm going to list maybe 50 to 100 PD traits over the weekend and post them here, next week because I do agree with SlyQQ that we need to look quite carefully at ourselves.

I read in my studies on this PD question, that NOT only does one have to be the victim (as a child) but even if you hear or see it in your childhood family, while one was still with them, that the effect can be quite major.

Its possible to have PD's, but be in DENIAL. And I certainly do not think that a SELF assessment would be 100 % accurate. One might just be fooling oneself.

So, I'm going to make certain for myself  -- Whatever it takes.

And if I've got a PD, that's no problem. I'll work on it, to cure it. That's also no problem.

Why would I do this - because I "see" and "feel" the huge damage they can cause, from my own uBPDw, even unintentionally. Maybe she's the innocent party, and I aggravate her.

Although I don't think so, because of some of the weird and false accusations and strange things she says about me.

[Swiggle]

I agree with SlyQQ that BPD’s project and do a great job at it but I would disagree that a significant number of posts here are from those who would be diagnosed as BPD, some yes, majority I don’t think that is the case. BPD’s want supply and I have a hard time believing they would seek out a forum to project. Could people here exhibit traits of personality disorders, sure but I would be surprised if majority would be true BPD’s. It seems as though the payback here isn’t significant enough of supply to maintain what a BPD would need.

We grew up in dysfunction and didn’t come out unscathed but the fact that we look for answers, try to heal and change patterns of behavior I feel we are likely not disordered.

I was unfaithful in my marriage at the very end. I was lonely and tried so many times and ways to get my ex to work with me for what I needed. He is uNP and nothing I said or did mattered. I couldn’t understand why I strayed which was my reason for leaving him, I didn’t want to hurt him anymore. I was broken and needed to figure that out or else I could never be happy or make him happy. While working in T I realized that it made sense why I would seek someone outside my marriage for the things I longed for from my husband. I was sexually abused and primed I equated love with sex. The person my husband found out I was having an affair with was an addict, couldn’t keep a job, wasn’t that great looking and was just a complete loser. This person told me he had been diagnosed as bi-polar but I wanted to help him, he made me feel sorry for him and I was an easy target for him. While I always equated sex for love I didn’t have pervasive behaviors throughout my marriage of cheating. It happened once, I accepted it, got help about “why” it happened and moved on.

I’m remarried and my DH now after starting T that some of his behaviors didn’t help the situation with his uBPDew and he is working through his childhood stuff. We can’t control those in our life who are discorded but we can control how we react, respond and enable certain behaviors. Getting better mentally and emotionally and working through our own demons can heal us and we then respond in healthier ways to those around us.

[Lucky One]

We can’t control those in our life who are discorded but we can control how we react, respond and enable certain behaviors.

Getting better mentally and emotionally and working through our own demons can heal us and we then respond in healthier ways to those around us.

Thanks once again for sharing, what I would call a very well balanced viewpoint.

The thing is, everyone is different even if there are some similarities in certain respects

I just want to be sure - so I'm going to have it checked out.

I've been in my relationship 38 years, 32 years married. Never, not once strayed. Never had the inclination. I met my wife when she was 17 years old, a few days later she turned 18.

Pretty, blonde, blue eyed, beautiful smile. So had no reason, ever, to be interested in another woman. Same applies to-day, 38 years later. Yes-  its true. There are people like this. I'm one of them.

She's been diagnosed with Graves disease, Hyperthyroidism, very low, almost non existent Serotonin levels and unbalanced hormone levels. And very high liver enzyme levels. Also she seems to be wasting away. If you saw her 3 years ago and now, you'd think she had some sort of cancer. She weighs less than 50 Kg.

The doctors and specialists have been trying, for the last year, to help and find some sort of cure for her. To no avail. She suffered from acute depression and anxiety as well, but the depression seems to be improving a bit, with the use of a anti depressive.

It's quite difficult for us, at the moment, because she seems to have lost her confidence in herself, and has a great fear that I am interested in other woman. Which I'm not. She's been  giving me a very hard time about this for the last two and a half years. Although I think it went back before this.

In the meantime, I'd actually just like her to get better and spent most of my time with her, either receiving silent treatment or ducking and diving her false accusations and very bad moods. And she knows so well how to stir things up.

So now, I'm learning how to respond in a better way, but it's still extremely difficult, especially if you've got someone down your throat most of the time (every day), looking for trouble.

I'm not sure at this point in time, but we could end up separating, as no-one can take an unhappy marriage for long. I've taken it for 2 1/2 years so far, and at this stage, see no light, at the end of the tunnel.

At my age, this could be classified as a complete disaster.

Amazing what life dishes up sometimes - I can only wonder why!

I've been through the lessons, Stop the Bleeding, Setting boundaries, SET, and have done the CBT (Moodgym) and DBT ( Marsha Linehan) self help courses referred by this site.

I'm basically a academic myself, although not in medical and mental health, so reading and studying come naturally to me. I've only been a member of this site for two months, but have covered a huge amount of NEW learning, which I'm slowly putting into practice.

But as you know, these things take time - and there is a big learning curve involved. 

I'm just hoping I got to this site, soon enough!

[mitti]

Interesting and good question. I feel that I have always had a higher sensitivity than a lot of other people and the intensity of my feelings seems to often have been stronger than that of most that I know. My childhood was not emotionally, or even physically very safe, and I have a large part of my life had abandonment fears that just seemed to rule my life and my choices. After a failed marriage with an APD man I had CBT and I asked for assessment for BPD. My T told me beforehand that was unnecessary as he saw no indications but I insisted, it came out as he suspected. He did however tell me I most likely had Complex PTSD from years of emotional neglect in my high achieving FOO.

Personally I think a lot of people, me included, share lots of more or less disordered behaviours with pwBPDs, but it is the intensity and the combination of these behaviours and triggers behind them that will make for a diagnosis. It seems to me that some of the criteria listed for BPD are more typical and also less common with people who would not get a diagnosis such as the poor sense of self and the push pull, I suppose because I don't understand them.