What's it like? (Children of BPD mothers)

[SomebodyThatIUsedtoKnow]

I want to hear your stories of having a BPD mom.  I had a rough childhood.  I've shared some stories on another website, and an alarming amount of people said they suspect my mother has BPD.  I am a Psych major, but not far enough along in it to feel confident in making a "mental diagnosis" of my mother.  So, I'd like to hear about your experiences and compare them to my own and see if perhaps this is what I dealt with.  I am mainly here on BPD Family because of my BPDex (also, my BIL's wife has it, I am SURROUNDED).  But, I keep thinking about what people told me about my mom and I'm curious.  Now that I do not live with my mother, our relationship is way better, so that is what is making me unsure if she is BPD, or not.  It's hard to explain.  

My sister has been painted black twice in the past year.  This time last year, she moved in with her dad.  At that time, I received a series of texts from my mom that she was "done with that bhit!" (I apologize, but that's what she said, precisely).  She said some pretty horrible things, all because my 20 year old sister moved in with her dad.  My mom blocked her on all social networking.  My sister eventually moved back in with my mom.  Then, she moved back out again this April or March to go live with her dad.  Again, I got the texts and nasty stuff about my sister.  She was a "whore," only moving to her dad's to be around the guys she likes, etc.  Things calmed down, like always, and my sister is talking to my mom again (or vice versa).  

My mom is painfully controlling and mean to the men she dates.  She's been with a trooper for the past five years.  This man has been so great to us kids (even though we're not kids, !).  He basically waits on my mom hand and foot.  It's really sad because he is never able to relax.  The whole situation gets so awkward with her barking orders, rolling her eyes, and snapping, that DH and I never go to their house.  She thinks it's because I love my MIL more than her.  But, that's not the case.  It's just painful to watch how she treats her bf like an indentured servant, but I know better than to say anything because I'll be painted black if I do.

I could tell a million more stories, but I'd like to hear from others.

[GeekyGirl]

Hi SomebodyThatIUsedtoKnow,

At the very least, your mother's behavior sounds pretty alarming. Although you know that the only way to know for sure that your mother has BPD is to have her diagnosed by a professional, the behavior she's exhibiting could be attributed to BPD.

You'll find here that many of us grew up with BPD mothers, so you may find that you can relate to many of the posts and stories. Feel free to contribute--we're all here to support each other as we heal from our childhoods.

How is your relationship with your mother now? Do you feel like you need to help her partner?

Welcome!

-GG

[SomebodyThatIUsedtoKnow]

Hi SomebodyThatIUsedtoKnow,

At the very least, your mother's behavior sounds pretty alarming. Although you know that the only way to know for sure that your mother has BPD is to have her diagnosed by a professional, the behavior she's exhibiting could be attributed to BPD.

You'll find here that many of us grew up with BPD mothers, so you may find that you can relate to many of the posts and stories. Feel free to contribute--we're all here to support each other as we heal from our childhoods.

How is your relationship with your mother now? Do you feel like you need to help her partner?

Welcome!

-GG

She would NEVER go to a professional.  If I were to suggest that to her, I would be on the receiving end of the silent treatment and bashing.  I do feel like helping or reaching out to my mom's bf.  He's been with her a while, but I am not sure that he's happy.  The first thing my mom does in a relationship is to isolate her partner from his family.  She's always done that.  She says she doesn't "do family" except for her children.  At Christmas time, she will "allow" her bf to go to his family's Christmas gathering but she will not go.  As far as I know, he won't go at all, anymore.  Because in the days and hours leading up to the holiday, my mom will verbally bash his family and him for wanting to go to the gathering.  Lots of cursing.  I remember the last time he went to the gathering, I was still living at home.  He came back to having things thrown at his head and my mom threatening to throw him out on the streets.  She has done that to me a few times as a teenager whenever I chose to go to one of my father's family's family functions.

I am assuming she struggles with an abnormal perception of abandonment, which is also why she becomes angry with my sister for going to her father's house to stay.  Either way, you're right, her behavior is perplexing.  Even though I would never suggest BPD to her, or any other mental illness, I think I would feel better if I knew what was going on.  Sometimes I am paralyzed by the fear of "turning out like her."  I'll catch myself saying something to my husband and think, oh my goodness, I'm her!  I've noticed myself isolating from people, at times, like my mom does and I wonder if it is just the product of my upbringing or if something is really wrong with me.

As far as my relationship with her goes, things are great now that I do not live with her.  We text almost everyday and talk on the phone a few times a week.  Also, we talk on Facebook a lot.  We haven't had any fights or disagreements, mainly because after a lifetime, I know how to tread lightly.

[GeekyGirl]

Sometimes having some distance can help, as it helps you to have your own, separate life. I can imagine that it's a lot easier for you to get along with your mother now that you're not under the same roof.

Many of us struggle with BPD traits that we've picked up from our parents. We call them fleas  here, and fortunately, we can work on them as aware and empowered adults. I know what it's like to be afraid of being "like her"... . that's what drove me to therapy and this site. Now that you know what's likely going on with your mother, you can work on those fleas so they go away, or at a minimum, aren't as bothersome. You'll find some good tools to help you here, and if you're not currently in therapy, I'd recommend you try that as well. It's helped me to develop some healthy habits and coping strategies.

It makes sense that you'd want to help your mother's partner; I'm sure this is difficult for him. At the same time, though, he's choosing to enable your mother, and it sounds like he's co-dependent. It's very likely that your mother would be angry if you tried to intervene. Has he ever said anything or done anything to make you think that he's willing to get help for himself?

[Finding Courage]

My mom is very, very self centered and manipulative.  She always, always puts herself and her needs first at anyone's expense.  She is emotionally abusive to my dad who is very enabling.  She is also extremely needy and dependent on me, if I let her.  When I was a child she used me too meet all of her needs.  I was treated as her partner and friend but not as her child.  She was simultaneously smothering and neglectful.  She can turn on a dime with her mood and she does not handle her emotions well at all. 

For me this combination led to feelings of constant anxiety and loneliness. As an adult, I am hyperviligant and hyper aware of other people's cues.  I have a hard time trusting in relationships and a hard time being "giving" because she tried to take so much from me when I was younger.  And I only have limited contact with my mom now because any more than that is totally toxic.

Good luck on your journey. 

[Calsun]

Hi Somebodythatusedtoknow,

My mother is an uBPD.  Her behavior was very abusive, very controlling, very manipulative.  She would say the meanest, most sadistic things and acted with emotional dysregulation.  She could fly into a rage and a tirade, become physically abusive in a moment.  She had a hair-trigger temper, and I was always wary of when it would go off, and it would go off at the slightest provocation.  She had no sense of humor and saw everything as a slight and an attack that she would respond to with wild violent attacks.  She would scream so loud that I could hear her across the street.  And all of this became normal in our home.  We were under warning to not let our dirty laundry be seen in public, so this was a closed world she tried to create around her abuse.

She appeared to outsiders to be mild, almost kindly, doting.  If she had a fault, it was that she gave too much, cared too much, was too selfless.  And she gave, but never gave us anything that she didn't throw back in our faces, eventually.  I was a straight A student, but she would take credit for my accomplishments, and leave me only with ownership of my "failure."  The controlling was once again portrayed as her being such a great, caring mother, when in reality it was her attempt to ease her dysregulation by controlling through a kind of annihilation the people around her.  Our doing well in school and being "liked" by others was confirmation that she was doing a great job as a mother and that her tactics worked.  And in her estimation, she was doing everything right, even though she was abusing us verbally, emotionally and physically and even though given her illness, she couldn't see us as individuals or allow us to grow up and individuate.

As I exercised autonomy as I became older, she would say, why do you have to be so independent.  As I took steps, she would threaten me with abandonment.  Of course, she was terrified of my growing up because she would be abandoned.  As her sons became more interested in girls, she acted like a jilted lover who needed to undermine the value of girls and women in our lives, so that we would never leave her.  And if we did, it couldn't really be for a woman who would challenge her illness or for someone we really were in love with.  No one could challenge her illness.  I did and was branded as sick and need in of help, as hateful to my mother, and as the bad son.

She did the splitting, making my brother the good son and the hero and me the black sheep.  BPD's have black and white thinking and they often project good things onto one child and bad onto another.  My father enabled all of this by declaring that the problem wasn't my mother, the problem was my perception of my mother.  And of course in the process, he allowed his children to be severely abused and allowed himself to be severely abused.

My uBPD mother was like a child who never emerged from her terrible twos, stamping her feet and raging and crying.  She would rage, abuse, humiliate and then would cry like a baby.  She didn't have friends and so her children were her whole life and she lived vicariously through her children.  Their accomplishments became her accomplishments.  She saw us as a reflection of her, and she would in fact use those very words.  And in public, many people would think that she was sweet.  So, she could turn off this side of her in public.  And in fact was so tight-lipped in public, probably because she was afraid this side of her would accidentally come out and because she was so full of shame.

She was incredibly depressed and would walk around just saying things like Jesus, pray for me.  She would complain of mistreatment and play the role of the martyr.  She would complain that no one helped her, but she would refuse help and then complain that everyone was selfish and unloving.  In her incapacity to really see and love her children or a husband, she would say that I was unlovable.

Yes,  painful, impossible person to have as a mother.  No one inside to bond with, impossible for her to see that there was anything inside her children.  And she created scripts, roles for us to play based on her own needs and dysregulation, so I felt as though I was nothing inside, but  the bad, unlovable person she described me as.  Felt that everything I accomplished was imprinted on me and didn't come from within.  And she explained away the positive feedback and loving connection that I had with others outside of the family system by saying things like, they don't know you the way I know you.  She was jealous of any connection to others, saying things like why don't you stay home with me, why do you have to go out.  And she didn't know how to make friends of her own or to experience her own accomplishments.

She saw independence as lack of love for her, saw feeling good about yourself and self-esteem as conceit.  She twisted reality to suit her own ends.

That's some of what I experienced.

Calsun

[isshebpd]

My uBPDmom absolutely terrorized me in my teens. I'm the first-born so I was the first to trigger reactions (abandonment) to a child becoming independent. She listened into phone calls, searched my room, and other violations.

Reading this thread made me think of couple of disturbing incidents in my mid-teens.

The first was when I was about 15 and my Mom and her best friend started a weird conversation with me. They both started cajoling me to date the 13 year-old daughter of my Mom's best friend. I thought they were joking at first so responded with snark. I grew up with the girl but never thought of her in that way. But then they kept pressing me on it, made me feel weird, and I just left in confusion. I never told the girl what our Moms were saying, and no doubt she would've been horribly embarrassed.

A few months later, I asked another girl out on a date. I'd never dated before and only asked after a friend pressured me, telling me the girl liked me. Anyhow, we were going to a concert and buying our own tickets. I asked my uBPDmom to help me buy the ticket with her credit card. After the ticket arrived, my uBPDmom got mad at me (for no good reason) and burned the ticket in the kitchen sink. I told the girl what happened, and she was shocked. Then I felt humiliated for having such a crazy mother. After that, everyone in my peer group understood I had a difficult relationship with my uBPDmom.

After all that insanity, I stopped telling my uBPDmom anything about my social life. My bedroom was in the basement, which allowed me to come and go pretty much unnoticed. My parents were distracted by my two younger siblings, so I just did my own thing for the rest of high school. My parents had no idea what I was up to, though I think they followed me occasionally. I became the Forgotten Child.

[Calsun]

I think teenage years, adolescence was particularly filled with peril and  difficulty with a uBPD mother.  It was a time of growing independence, sexual development, and maturity, all of which were extraordinarily  threatening to a BPD mother.  There was that sense that my mother was going to stop me from growing up, stop me from becoming a man, and because my father was so controlled by my mother, there was really no masculine figure in the house to identify with or to guide me.  It was a very lonely and scary time.  I really experienced on a deep level that my mother was seeking to annihilate me, seeking to destroy me.  And people who have not experienced that kind of behavior and energy from a BPD mother, cannot even fathom that that is within the bounds of possible human behavior, let alone within the scope of behavior from a mother towards her children.  That has been a source of great loneliness that a "normal" healthy person could not imagine or begin to believe or connect with what I went through, what my uBPD mother had been capable of doing. 

Calsun

[delusionalxox]

Calsun your posts have moved and disturbed me very much... . I am female and one of 2 sisters, yet I can relate to almost everything you have written. Enabling father, black/white splitting, hysteria and rage, the writing of 'scripts' which she would try to force us to play out, the swallowing of accomplishments... . the mockery, intrusion and constant criticism... .

my mother also verged on sexually abusive. She would refuse to allow me to lock the bathroom door and would come in and stare at my teenage body and make unpleasant comments about it, or laugh at it, call me fat etc. Accused me of wanting to have sex with my dad? Sometimes would make vile comments in a silly baby voice. God, revolting really eh... . but I got so used to just putting up with it and hating her, because my enabling dad made a sort of goddess of her and her ludicrous, nasty demands.

She has been in therapy for 25 years and is now a therapist (!) and a far  nicer person I must say.

But she is deep in denial as to what she has done. Both daughters suffer long term depression and in my case, disrupted relationships (last relationship was with a deeply intrusive, abusive, raging, critical man... . well  hi there mum  ) The last time I confronted her with her abuse she collapsed in a faint! That's how deep the defences go... .

[Calsun]

It was disturbing, so much so that I didn't quite believe it myself. Denial. After all, I was a child who was taught to think of my mother as being good, loving and protective, and yet she was, in her illness, trying to destroy me. That cognitive dissonance has been troubling for me as an adult, let alone for a child.  And on some level, since my father was weak, I wanted to feel the power that my mother alone seemed to wield in the family, and yet her power was  destructive and unregulated.  Not the power that builds great things which takes time and focus and dedication, but that destroys in a moment of wildness and chaos.  To feel my power and to uncouple constructive power which protects and builds from the destructive power of the uBPD mother is an important part of the healing for me.

Calsun

[delusionalxox]

I really understand about the wish to wield power.

At the same time, I didn't want to be her. I wanted to be something deeply different.

Being female, I became a mother and at that point the worst depression of my life was activated. I had no model for it, other than grotesque emotional abuse. I didn't know where to start. When my eldest son was 7 months old I was writing him suicide notes telling him I was sorry and he would have a better mummy soon.

Because she was in me as a mother I had to kill myself... . it was as simple as that. I believe this same conviction to have destroyed my marriage. I had a false self set up to escape her, that simply couldn't survive the emotional challenges of a relationship and looking after children.

i very nearly either died or completely ran away from my family, but have clawed a semi functioning personality together in recent years (until BPD ex turned up  one has to laugh, blackly... . )

[susiecue]

For years I thought it was all about my dad's alcohol addiction.  I also thought my dad was someone who continually cheated on my mom, according to her.  We were drug out of the bed anytime of night or the wee hours of the morning to go "chase" my dad around at the bars.  If my dad wasn't home she would go by every bar in town until she would find him only to fight him all the way up the street to come home and he would only agree to come home if he could drive and he couldn't hardly even hold himself up but mom always agreed.  I figured out just a couple of years ago this charade was due to her insecurities from the BPD.

She is very vindictive and someone I cannot ever trust, which is sad since children always trust their mother if anyone.  I was trying once to get out on my own with my young daughter and had applied for an apartment about 15 minutes away.  I was asked by this complex for 2 references from people who knew me well and one of them was my best friend who was a second mother to me and the other was my mother. 

I called to ask when would be a good time to pick up the key and pay my deposit and rent and they said one of my references was bad so they could not offer me anything at that time.  I called and spoke with my best friend and she showed me the letter she wrote and when I spoke with my mother she admitted she didn't give me a good reference because the place I had chosen wasn't some place she approved of and at that time I was nearly 30 years old. 

Needless to say I had to plan my next move by keeping ALL DETAILS to myself.  This move was way further away as in 6 hours away.  She became very possessive with my daughter and tried talking her father into taking her away from me.  I know this since his mother called me and told me and then when I confronted her she admitted it.  Needless to say I did not speak to her for a long time after.

She and my dad had been divorced for about 5 years and he and I started having a good phone relationship.  He was shot and killed along with my aunt and uncle in 2002 and immediately my mother took the responsibility of ordering his stone and doing up the funeral and then tried to find out what churches did for widows in the area.  BTW, she didn't pay for any of the stuff she ordered either.

Once she found my journals that I had written for my counselor each day and asked me why I lied so much about my feelings.  She wanted to know if I was just trying to get sympathy because everything I was saying was a lie.    Nothing could ever be her fault.  Everything happens to her and no one else.  No matter if it is her home or not, she makes judgments on how it is suppose to look and be run.  Once after she first saw my home she got back home 6 hours later and called me to especially say that the dining room table needed to be directly under the dining room light.  Not to tell me she had a good time but to criticize my taste in furniture placement. 

[Calsun]

It is one of the saddest and most troubling issues of having a mother who is BPD, that you don't know who or what to trust.  Your mother is the one who you have to trust as a child and look to for love and support and comfort and nurturing.  But because of the BPD and the abuse, she is not trustworthy. Her sense of reality is distorted and off, But she is telling you that you're the one who is off.  She is abusive, exploitative, unloving, cruel. So, you end up trying to get your needs met and you try to bond with someone who is  ill, abusive, and unstable.  And the enabling parent is not trustworthy either; they are teaching you to not trust your own judgment or perceptions about the abuse you are experiencing.  And that creates such a level of anxiety and paralysis.  What can I trust?  Who can I trust? And the feeling of not being able to really trust anyone to really be there for me and love me.  And to not even trust my own two eyes about what I see and experience.  Restoring a capacity for trust in relationships is a major part of recovery when you grow up with a borderline mother and trusting your own judgment and sense of reality.

[susiecue]

Calsun this message is completely directed to you.  You have described my life to about 95% similarity.  As I read your post I was so completely in awe as to the similarities that my chin was nearly on the floor.  One of the differences of course is that I am a female.  My mother had to power to turn her whole church against me and one member, to this day, refers to me as "the prodigal child".

It has been passed all through my family how "hateful" I am.  I have always been a b*tch and to this day my brother, whom I think may be uBPD as well, taunts me with name calling using that word.  My dad has since passed away and I remember some of the things I heard him say when I was young that now I completely understand why he was saying them.

As I stated a minute ago we were taken out in the middle of the night to chase him around the bars and my grades reflected it but was always disciplined harshly for it because "I could do better".  I had continual headaches as a child and now continue to have headaches, especially migraines.  I usually am able to keep them at bay if I stay stress free, which means, not answering the phone or calling her if I am uneasy about it.

Made the mistake of calling her for the 4th to wish it happy and to share the thrill that my daughter had her first interview on Tuesday and she turned it into using a job to avoid having any visit with her.  Of course it could not be because my daughter was wanting a job and btw she also accused me of forcing her to get a job to make sure she didn't visit with her again.  AMAZING!  All that from that one sentence.

As she awaits for my email giving her resolution for her wrong doings but claiming them totally my fault, I sit back and let her steam and boil.  Most times I am pretty strong toward her but this time it bothered me a bit more for some reason but I am slowly calming down.  Just tired of the roller coaster of feelings involved with her.  Now my brother as well.

[SomebodyThatIUsedtoKnow]

I just wrote a huge thing and it was deleted because I accidentally hit the backspace key  :'(  Anyway, I just want to thank everyone who has taken the time to respond.  I notice some similarities in your stories with my own mother's behavior.  I just want to get a better understanding/explanation of what I went through as a child.  I now suffer from severe panic disorder, am a very dependent individual (am 23 and cannot drive a car), and am generally shy/scared/nervous all of the time.  I will suffer greatly before I ever ask anyone for anything because, as a child, there were times I would be berated, screamed at, or even physically abused for asking for things.

An incident playing over and over in my mind tonight is this one:

I was 18 on Christmas Eve, 2007.  My mom's ex-boyfriend was over our house to hang out.  Things were going well.  I was sitting on the couch doing a crossword puzzle and my mom's boyfriend was on the other couch talking to me.  My mom will not sit down for very long at any given time, so she was in and out of the room.  Well, I guess she got jealous that her boyfriend and I were laughing or something because out of the blue, she wanted me to do some inane task right.this.minute.  Since the mood of the evening had been pretty lighthearted and joking so far, I just told her I'd do it when I finished my crossword.  After all, it was something so stupid that it really didn't need to be done, at all.  The moment I said I would do it after my puzzle was finished, my mom waltzed over to the front door and told her boyfriend, "It's time for you to go, now."  He was very confused because he had come over to watch movies and hang out.  It was only about 5 PM and he'd only been there an hour.  At that moment, I knew it was about to hit the fan and I was scared/confused.  Nevertheless, she literally pushed him out the door.  Once he was out, my mom began raging.  She screamed and yelled that I was worthless, etc.  Then, she went into mine and my sister's shared room, beat my sister in the head repeatedly (she'd done NOTHING) and saturated my bed with an entire bottle of lotion.  After she emptied the bottle all over my comforter, my mom hurled the bottle at my face along with other hard objects.  

She had a roast in the crockpot, so next she went into the kitchen, unplugged the pot (the roast was not done) and threw all of the food in the garbage.  She said, "F8ck this, I don't give a damn if y'all starve!"  Then, she locked herself in her room and did not come out until the next day.  My sister was lucky enough to have her father come and pick her up so she could spend a normal Christmas with him.  My little brother and I ate a box of Kraft macaroni and cheese, terrified, in silence on Christmas eve.  

There are so many more stories like this from when I was growing up, up until I moved out at 21.  You just never knew what to expect and I was always the prey, because I was the weakest, emotionally.  My sister has always been a strong, fighter type.  My brother is the precious boy (although he has been physically beaten, painted black and cursed to high heavens) and he ignores her outbursts, for the most part.  I can remember pretty much every major event in my life being tainted by my mom's "illness" (even if not BPD, that behavior is indicative of some sort of illness).  My confirmation into the Catholic church, I was cursed, belittled and berated the entire way home because the ceremony "took too long."  My sweet 16, she offered to take me out to my favorite restaurant.  A few days later, she stood in the kitchen screaming at me that we had no groceries because I "wanted to have a 'big, fancy' birthday."  My graduation, I know I was hysterical and in tears for some reason I cannot recall.  The list goes on.

Another thing about my mom and I am unsure if this is a BPD trait or not, she is overly-concerned with what others think of her.  That extends to her children.  She wants everyone to think our family is 100% perfect.  If any of the three of us write anything on Facebook that doesn't contribute to that facade, she gets out of her skin embarrassed (and none of us are those types that post over-dramatic, personal details on there!).  Then, she attempts to make ME self-conscious.  I cannot count the number of times she has said, "Everybody is worried about you!  People keep messaging me on Facebook about it."  When I confront her about who "everybody" is, she either lies or rages.  The truth is, nobody has ever said anything to her about anything I've ever written.  She *wants me to think* someone has, so that I will be self-conscious/humiliated/start lying about my life to impress others.  Everywhere we go, someone is staring at her or, "they must be thinking _____ about us."  It is very weird and delusional.

[Calsun]

Thank you for all of the posts.  

Susiecue, I can really relate to the kind of projection that your BPD mother engaged in with you.  My mother's behavior was hateful, cruel, destructive, violent and yet she called me hateful.  She had no friends and would claim that I had no friends, clearly, objectively untrue.  She would say that no one liked me, clearly untrue, yet she was alone and had alienated herself from others.  She was in some ways like Michael Scott from The Office, (much less benign, however) in her absolute lack of self-awareness.  But as a child, I didn't have the emotional and psychological boundaries to understand that the reality that what she was projecting onto me was really about who she was and not about me.  I didn't have a father who could provide me with a consistent sense of my mother's reality as being off, so that I could develop those boundaries.  Now, as an adult, I have dealt with the depression of feeling unlovable, an unreality, because my mother would say that I was unlovable.  Learning to give back her feelings of being unlovable to her and not taking on that identity is a struggle. The reality is my uBPD mother didn't see me at all,  a more disturbing reality in some ways than accepting her unreal projections of unlovability onto me.  And I guess that's what this environment was, one out of touch with reality. It was the borderline that was hateful, sick, manipulative, even though she was projecting that outward. I have a friend who will say that you can tell the degree of a person's unhealth by the degree to which he or projects.  And BPD's are off the charts unhealthy in that regard.  I came from a family that was not friendly to the truth or objective reality.  You could be in denial, delusional even.  That was OK, the one thing you never did was think less of your mother than she wanted you to think of her.  And to think that she was this great mother (which she would say and believed) was to be out of touch with reality. My mother would abuse and then no one would ever talk about it.  Unpleasant things never happened.  Hurtful words... . never spoken. Crazy behavior, what crazy behavior.  Why are you so hateful to your mother? Her calling others certain names... . I never said that, why are you so hateful?  Where was the enabling adult who was mirroring back the reality of extreme behavior and out of touch behavior? Out of touch and unreliable, too.  The reality matters.  The truth matters.  Reliable witnessing of events matters.  But not in a family run by and spun around the BPD.  In that family, the objective reality is subjugated to the needs of the BPD, and the BPD will demand that you conform to her sick and distorted delusions, projections and denials. If you don't, you're hateful to her.  In a borderline's experience, reality has a bias against the borderline, so it has to be altered.  Of course, reality chronicles real events. And the real events were that my mother raged, abused, was violent, was petty, cursed at, name-called, was unstable, beat down.  And yet we were supposed to be devoted to her. The reality is that she is and was an abuser. Both my uBPD mother and my enabling father demanded that I give up the reality of my mother's abuse and illness and adopt my mother's reality that she was a good mother.  They threatened me physically and emotionally if I didn't.  They both threatened me with abandonment and a kind of annihilation, which was ironic because they were both inherently abandoning me anyway. It was as though my mother would rather I be dead than to challenge her distorted reality.  And, so I felt utterly alone and terrified with the truth and the history of what really went on.  If I go on any longer can I finally convince myself that what happened really happened and that it matters to be able to own the truth of that.

Somebodythat:  I'm so sorry that you had to go through that.  I experienced it to. I could relate to your experience on Christmas Eve. My mother did not know how to behave in a stable, regulated and mature way. And so you never did know what holidays and major events would be like. After a big graduation, my mother was outside cursing at my sister.  I think that the girl in the family was a particular threat to my mother.  She would say to my sister things like:  I have a man, you'll never have one.  She saw my sister as some kind of rival or competition to her and needed to ruthlessly put her down, so as to be the "only woman" in the house.  It was very sick.  Again, this is the borderline's need coming through for control over others.  And what was presented as normal, both by the borderline and the enabling parent were extreme behaviors, out of touch with objective reality.  And it has been a challenge to break through the denial and delusion of who she was and to see her objectively.  This board is helping me more and more to do that, as well as other friends in recovery.  And to realize that I need not fear anymore, the way I did as a child, standing up with the reality of what went on.

Calsun