Dealing with my aging mom's BPD as the only family memeber still in her life

[Chickenlady76]

I am surrounded by people with BPD. The one that is affecting me most right now  is my Mother. She is flipping out right now and I am so sick of it. . The majority of my life growing up I remember dealing with my mothers mental illness, but not realizing at the time it wasn't normal. Every event is clouded with an episode, but until a couple years ago I didn't even know what BPD was. I bought stop walking on eggshells and it helped me immensely. I ended up moving serveral hours away from my mom to establish boundaries, but ended up moving back to the area she lives in to help care for her as her health declines. I am the only family member that will deal with her. She is volatile when she doesn't get her way, and down talks everything I do to help her. In the spring our house flooded, and my husband and I moved in with my inlaws. Their house is not big enough for all of us (we have 4 children)  so my daughter who is 20 moved in with my mom. We have stayed with my inlaws longer than we thought due to their poor health and having to take care of my mil while FIL was in the hospital after a heart attack.   Every chance my mom gets she complains about my daughter. Last week she called me on the day I got out of the hospital from having surgery at 1 in the morning and told me to come get my daughter. I couldn't  drive so I told my mom to just ignore my daughter and I would try to find her a place. Well yesterday we found my daughter a place and now mom is flipping out saying we all just use her. I would think she would be happy that my daughter is moving out.  It's what she has been saying she wants. This year alone I have bought my mom 2 flat screen tv's, a computer and gave her a car. I have paid some of her bills when we found out her accountant had not been paying her bills. I dealt with her accountant situation, found her a new accountant, and dealt with Adult Protective Services to help her get her money back. This is on top of working full time and both my husband and I having surgery in the last week.   When I was younger I would have taken this all to heart but now I just get irritated. I know what is true but is so frustrating. It's hard that I know I will never have a "normal" mother. My daughter has been diagnosed with BPD as well, but I really think that the majority of hers is learned behaviors from being around my mom so much growing up.  Only time will tell as she is embracing her diagnosis and trying to get help. I am happy I found this site to help me on my journey of continuing recovery.  

[Notwendy]

My BPD mother is also elderly and it is difficult to keep the balance of what is helping an elderly person and the BPD drama.

I am not her caretaker. When my father died, she was angry at me and I was disowned. I didn't cut contact with her. She later reversed the disownment, much like the push pull, painted black/white pattern that is typical of BPD relationships. I do understand that it has to be scary to be alone at her age and that she would want what she sees her friend have- children and grandchildren who care for her and help out. However, our relationship is different than a typical mother-daughter one.

I also recognize that her own unhappiness is a feeling she has. She may perceive things as the cause but they aren't really the cause or the solution. I could make every effort to do something nice for her, but she tends to also find something wrong with it. She can paint me white or black in an instant. If I see these things as her perception, I don't take them personally.

It may be hard to not help out an elderly person. They do need help. However, your daughter is legally an adult, and can take care of herself. It is good she is moving out on her own. The black/white thinking on the part of your mother is a part of the condition. My mother also blamed me as a teen for her issues with my father. I truly believed that when I went to college, my parents would then be happy. They still had the same issues after I left home.  Your mother still is the same with or without your daughter living there.

Time will tell if your daughter has BPD or learned behaviors. Family patterns can be learned by the next generation. One of my tasks as a daughter of a mother with BPD was to work on the behaviors i learned. It helps to not see ourselves negatively. We needed to learn these behaviors to survive in our FOO's as children. We don't need these behaviors as adults and we can learn more functional ones.