Are you the only one that knows ?

[HappyChappy]

Reading other threads it would appear most of us do feel isolated in our new found knowledge. It may seem obvious now the penny has dropped, that our relative has BPD, but why don’t others in the family notice?

Does anyone have any ideas on how you can encourage the penny to drop with other relatives ? Anyone got an example of that happening ?   

[Linda Maria]

Hi Happy Chappy!  I know exactly what you mean.  It starts to seem so obvious once you find out about BPD and so many things fit.  All my life, I have found my uBPDsis "difficult" and there have been certain episodes and events that were off the scale in terms of madness and nastiness.  But they were isolated incidents, and as I moved away, and haven't lived with her for over 27 years, she hasn't been able to have a massive impact on my life.  But when my Mum died early last year she completely turned on me, and made my life hell for the last 18 months.  As there is only the two of us now from our FOO, other parties just aren't that interested.  Eventually I had to enlist a solicitor to help me, firstly to deal with all the hate mail that was coming my way, and secondly, because I realised I would never get my Mum's estate sorted out, and property sold etc, without professional help.  Very quickly, when other parties were involved - it really exposed the behaviour for what it was - I was still running around getting upset and JADEing all over the place, but the solicitors, estate agents, and other professional people were just saying to me - "Off the record - we think your sister is mentally ill, you have our deepest sympathy, we've never seen anything like this in 30 years etc etc".  That made me realise that other people see it very clearly, but its different if it's family and you're emotionally involved.  There's the whole taking sides thing.  I haven't had the pain of that with family members, but it has made some long standing friendships with mutual friends very strained, because people just don't know what to say or do, or who to believe.  I have a stack of completely vile and quite mad letters that have been sent to me.  I don't talk about the situation too much with most people, but I have the evidence if I need it.  Also, since she hasn't been able to impact me so much since I am NC as far as possible, she has to turn it on other people.  So all sorts of people are supposedly being "sued" at the moment, official complaints against various parties etc.  Sooner or later, the penny drops, and people realise that something is not right.  But unless they have to be involved, they just keep away and who can blame them?  So - not really an answer, other than, it's a very hard thing to believe of someone unless you experience what we have experienced, because most of what they say and do, as well as being horrible, just makes no sense, and often does them no good either, so you can't rationalise it or make it sound plausible to other people.  It's such a no-win thing for everyone involved.  For me - going NC and dealing through third parties completely exposed the situation for what it was.  But I realise that's a much harder thing to do with other family members who aren't affected by it currently.  But if you are in a position to go NC or very LC, sooner or later, the other people around the PWBPD will start to realise.  I wish you well with your situation. 

[Deb]

There are family members who know, like my dBPD sisters children. Most of our relatives have no clue. One uncle said my sister was always "difficult." A few of my friends know because they have witnessed her odd behavior and heard her lies about me. Lies they KNEW were lies. But most people have no clue because the mask she presents to them is of a sweet natured person, suffering from depression because of how mean her family is.

In the begining when I first began to learn about BPD, I thought I was alone but I have been validated in unexpected ways from unexpected people. Like my Stepmother. She knew something was off about my sister when my sister was 11 or so.

And then there are some people who see it but czan't believe what they are seeing.

[Woolspinner2000]

Hi HappyChappy,

When I first read something that said to me my mom might have BPD, I was so uncertain in my thinking that I asked my sister, a safe person, what she thought. Took her months to read the information I gave her, and I kept bugging her to see if she thought I was right. Finally she told me she had read it. Her response? She said she cried all through what she was reading because it was so accurate. Since then I have shared some of my journey with her but only bits and pieces, and a little information from books. I don't give her too much though because she is not ready.

As far as my brother goes, I've never suggested it to him. I don't consider him a safe person that would be validating in this area, but he did say when our mom had died that something was wrong with her and that he thought she was mentally ill. There are some things though that he is good to talk with, such as comparing our childhood experiences.

I've also taken the risk to speak with our dad, just this summer, quite in depth. He was open and gets the fact that she was borderline (he recognized it from a book I loaned him). I needed to hear from him if he thought she was BPD. He even offered that her best friends never knew she had a problem, only those within the immediate family or extended family on one side. Late this summer I spoke with some family members about her (my aunts). Those she had difficulty with and painted black recognized there were problems but didn't know the extent, only that they experienced the short end of the stick. Those she got along with famously (the ones she painted white) were not good at hearing me say she had problems, so I didn't go too far with them. I just had to leave it alone.

So to answer your question, in my experience, those whom the BPD paints black or puts on the naughty list will be most likely to understand. Those the BPD paints white or has on the nice list will probably not understand. If a family member is lucky enough to get on both lists at different times of their life, then they would probably get it too.

Woolspinner

[NeedanEar]

I still feel like I'm in the beginning stages of understanding that my mom is quite possibly uBPD. I have a feeling if I asked my dad what he thought, that he might agree, but since my parents divorce, I don't really discuss one parent with the other. It was very hard to do, specifically with my mom. If I talked nicely about my dad, I obviously wasn't on her 'team' and it would lead to a fight. My dad is pretty good about discussing my mom. It's usually in the way of fond memories and not of the bad times. Anyhoo... .

I don't know that anyone in my family thinks there's anything going on with her and I don't feel safe enough with anyone just yet to explore and see if I'm alone in my thinking. I'm not sure I ever will feel comfortable talking about it with family, as even discussing it here I feel like she's somehow going to find this and shut me out further because I was talking about her. (Just read on this site about how common that is!)

Just read your post again, and know you're looking for examples of how to deal with this. I'll be following along to see how other people handle it as well. As for me, I think it's going to take a long time before I'm ready to find out if other family members feel the same.

[JulesC]

Good post!

And thought provoking.

Why don't others in the family recognise BPD? Others in my family know that my uBPD mother is very difficult but I don't think anyone except me would even know what BPD is. I know because unfortunately I married a BPD (unwittingly) & learned about the illness through my therapist in the process of trying to separate and get divorced.

Ideas on encouraging the penny to drop with other relatives? I have tried "hinting" with my bro and father. Both are in denial. My bro certainly has lots of fleas and some fairly worrying npd traits. Am pretty sure his wife, my SIL is uBPD. My father also has npd traits. I've been the "scapegoat" for many years so these days I tread carefully and am not keen to set myself up for a fall!

Sometimes it feels lonely to be the only one who knows what's really going on but at least I finally know! That's easier than endlessly being tossed about in a sea of confusion. As I see it my bro & father are in the matrix. Both men live w BPD so doesn't deeply question it's abnormality. If they did they wouldn't be able to tolerate staying.

I am LC with them all. Have v short weekly phone call with my parents, don't share about my own life. Much less contact w bro. See both as infrequently as possible, and try to stick to a max of 24 hrs at any one time. It helps. So does slipping into "neutral" when I'm around them, trying to remember who they are, not hoping for connection anymore, not looking for love.

Don't have much extended family. I think some know that my mother's been v difficult, but no-one has ever come out and said that straight, just hinted. Same with neighbours and friends of theirs.

I'm slowly getting more used to the terrain of being the daughter of a BPD mother, enabling father and product of a neglectful and abusive upbringing. It's a profoundly painful past to face but gets easier with time and a lot of therapy.

Happy Holidays to all those other "only ones" out there  

[HappyChappy]

Thanks for the feedback so far. When the penny dropped over my NPD bro he’d been hitting our kid and slapping him etc... .He did a clever thing after that. Because my BPDm tried to play it down (he's the GC) and even demanded an apology from us for making too much of a fuss. My NPD bro suggest that because Jimmy Savil (a prolific paedophile) was in the news, idiots like us are jumping to ridiculous conclusions. My wife simply stated his behaviour was abusive. He escalated the “abusive” bit and then ridiculed it to great effect. I have since read other people with PD use this technique.

Woolspinner2000“those whom the BPD paints black or puts on the naughty list will be most likely to understand.” Very true, but if you’re a scapegoat, you risk being seen as playing the victim if you point out the prejudice. If you’re the GC you risk losing privileges if you agree. Triangulation is extremely effective. All my friends agree my BPD was the crazy scary lady. But as they never saw her worst episodes, it is hard for them to believe that your own blood would show no love, no mercy and no loyalty. Unless they’re a radical ISIS/IRA  type person.

NeedanEar I felt the same as you when I joined this forum. Hang in there, clarity and healing will come, just a matter of time.

JulesC Love your point about scapegoats should avoid setting ourselves up for a fall. I for one was programmed to be easy to manipulate, that’s changing.

Happy X-Mas  

[goingtostopthis]

      You mentioned scapegoat.   I am the youngest in my family and if I were to say anything about BPD possibly going on with my sister I would be slandered to death.

                            Her behavior has been strange to me ever since I moved here and Ive had no one to talk to about it until just recently, I found a therapist. Ive only had one session and it was taken up mostly with a questionier but my next session Im sure I will be able to express what's been going on with her.

                            Things will be all right for awhile but then she will say something or do things that just dont make sense. Today there was a problem with my dad not communicating with me about something really important. I ask him to call me since my phone is with me all the time but he keeps sending emails and expects me to see the right away and answer right away when 80% of my time is spent out of the house doing work around this farm, not in front of my computer.    So he calls my sister and tells her what to tell me I need to do. Why is he calling her?  This is my issue hes helping me with, not hers.   Anyways,  I had just got back with my sister from the landfill and she says by the way to me as Im walking to the house, and tells me what my dad wants me to do.

                               The whole thing just struck me strange and I got really angry about my dad and was making it very plain I was mad at "him" for not calling ME and communicating this to me and I kept on saying I was frustrated with him as I went griping into the house.     Well, 2 minutes later as I was about to call him ,he calls me and tells me that my sister just called him and said I was Yelling!  at HER!   And so all of a sudden Im a bad bad person.  How could she have translated everything I was saying to me yelling at "Her"?   Just because I got angry with my dad and voiced it, what? was this some kind of inconvenience  to her royalness? when in fact it had nothing to do with her?

        She was out walking the dogs so I followed her out there and told her that I wasnt yelling at her and that I thought It was very clear I was angry at my dad.  (It was... .) She just looked up at me calmly and said, "oh I know you werent yelling at me."  I just stopped my reaction right there and told her I was very sorry if I upset her and that I know she was only trying to help. (since everything is all about her feelings ,obviously)  I wanted to say,  Then why did you tell him I was yelling at you?  I wanted to scream it!  But I didnt want to go there.

                 So I text my dad and told him that I apologized to her and that she told me she knew I wasnt yelling at her. and I ended it by saying, why she said I was yelling at her,  I dont know.  This has been so goofed up because I have been having problems with my father believing her distortions before over my truth of it all.  He hasnt wanted to truely believe me. He's believed her over me when I know she's been lying. It's awful!  Something isnt right with her and everyone is in denial except my brother but I hardly talk to him. He's far away.  I do think confronting her immediately like I did was the thing to do and to keep incidences like this as much out in the open to other family members as much as possible.  I cant depend on my dad ever really getting it,  but I can see my therapist and have a safe place to get it out of my system and deal with coping with her. 

[stepper123]

I first realized my mom had uBPD this past year during my clerkship rotations in medical school. I had a patient during my weeks working on a psychiatry inpatient ward that had BPD, and when I met her and read the description of the disease in the DSM-V, it was like a gigantic lightbulb turned on. At my next therapist's appointment I told her I thought my mom had BPD, and she smiled and said, "I thought you'd figure it out eventually during your time in med school."

I am the only one that knows in my family. People know that my mom is "obsessive" and sees things "either all good or all bad" and that "emotions run high." But nobody knows that her traits have a name. I thought about discussing this with more immediate family like my dad or my sister, but I didn't see any benefit aside from me looking for validation. For me at least, I worried that either would turn around and tell my mom, and she would be devastated because she has always believed she was the "perfect mom."  So I have always kept it to myself. I guess you have to consider the potential consequences of sharing this information, and what the benefits might be.

[HappyChappy]

It is amazing how a BPD’s propaganda is so effective. goingtostopthis I totaly understand your frustration. I’ve read of a BPD who set up a religious sects and persuaded the masses to follow him. Look at how ISIS can convince people to blow themselves up  . BPD are like con men, they select their mark and gaslight, projection and all the rest for decades before any of us ever cottoned on. So convincing your spouse of anything, must be childs play to a BPD.

My BPD use to send us to bed by 7pm right up until age 14 and we weren’t allowed to leave our bedrooms until 7.30 am. I now realise these times reflected my Dad's exact working day and were about keeping us isolated from him. We never saw him until l weekends, because the BPD wanted to convince him that his kids had been terribly behaved, so any abusive behaviour from our BPD could be passed off as punishment. Come the weekend, he never believed anything we had to say about the torments of the week. His BPD had convinced him of her untruths. She use to control all communication. We had a phone extension she always listened in on. It was apparently a “mothers right.” We bought my farther a number of mobile phone, but he “lost” every one. Not that he lost much else.

stepper123 my BPD like yours, thinks she’s a huge success, despite never doing anything well. Her fantasy world is so far from the truth, that unlike you I’d love to tell her I was on to her. But she’s so far in denial, that I couldn’t puncture her bubble even with a pneumatick drill. So we avoid the BPD and hope the problem moves on to someone else... . Happy Christmas.   Here's a toast to being NC with all BPD's for the rest of my life.  

[Hostage1234]

Same hear man I see now so easy I've been away from my ex over a year and I just feel like crying when she talks to me it's like nothing was ever real and every woman I date if she says anything that my ex would say I'm gone.also they have to know there projecting they can't beleive there lies can they

[Woolspinner2000]

HappyChappy,

Though I mentioned black and white in my earlier response, I was only thinking of the possibilities of those who would maybe, hopefully get it, I wasn't thinking about the effect it would have on the person sharing the news. Of course one would be wise to consider the risks vs the rewards or outcomes in any potential sharing about a person with BPD. If the risk is greater than the reward sought, then you'd have to ask if it is really worth it. If the outcome would accomplish what you wish or be worth the risk of sharing, then you'd have to decide if that is what you want.

Woolspinner

[Ziggiddy]

Great thread HappyChappy

I would add in that not only is it harder for those who are enmeshed to see that the protection and guff of any enablers/family members/close friends in protecting the pwBPD also makes it hard to see.

I mean we all ourselves wondered for however long whether it really was BPD didn't we? How easy to tip the balance the other way and think "No I must be wrong."

On a personal note, my brother was trying to undeceive me for YEARS as to our mother's weirdness but I was fully invested in believing her assertions about him!

As far as encouraging others to see I guess it's more  a lead-by-example thing. My brother was so consistent and adamant and I also saw other friends of his who were reasonable and kind also one who'd known my mother for many years in our childhood all agreeing with his assertions.

To convince other people I guess the best way is just steadfastly living what you believe as much as you can. Maintaining your assertions and maybe pointing out odd behaviour. Many people never put two and two together particularly if they've known the pwBPD for a long time. I have found logical reasoning and asking people if they would behave the same way in the same situation enormously helpful.

Eg to a friend "You remember we stayed at your place  2 weeks? Even though there were 5 of us? Even though you had a family of 5 including 2 babies? Even though you only had a 2brm house? Do you recall how we wanted enormous amounts of food, attention, wine and red carpet treatment? Remember how you put aside obligations and engagements and family commitments to be available to us? And remember how one day your mother was tired and cranky from being up all night with a teething baby and my mother threw a tantrum that she wasn't being nice enough to her? how she packed us up in tears and drove us away without a word of thanks? Remember how she never really spoke to your mother again? Does that seem rational? Would YOU do that? or would you have helped the baby? Helped the mother. Bought take away food. Assisted. Appreciated. Empathised.

Patience an  steadiness.

It takes time patience and steadiness.

Oh and a good dose of logic and reasoning.

[polly87]

Thanks for this thread. In my case, my uBPDm convinced my grandma, aunts and uncles, and my cousins that I was the one who was mentally ill. They all believed her. In a way I'm enourmously grateful for this because I was forced to break all ties with my FOO and this was the only way to ever get out of a very bad case of continuing abuse by uBPDm and my FOO. I haven't taken the trouble to confront my mother or to try and convince any family members about BPD. I don't believe there is anything to gain for me. I like and need the peacefulness I finally have.

I don't have the time just now to elaborate and it might seem like a strange story but if you want to ask anything more particular feel free to ask