Just joining in

[Mo75]

Hello everyone! I am new here and wanted to introduce myself.

I just got home from a weekend trip with my mother, where I found myself increasingly anxious and spending every movement and word on trying to please her. My mother has been volatile, overly emotional, depressed and overly critical for as long as I can remember, back to my childhood. I've suspected for a long time that there was something mentally wrong with her.

After returning from this trip, where she was blaming me for doing everything wrong (we were camping), complaining endlessly, showing extreme entitlement and dislike/distrust of others, showing complete disregard for my needs (keeping the tv on, extremely loud, late at night when I'd asked her repeatedly to turn it down, then turn it off, and she rolled her eyes and ignored me) and explosive anger at my one criticism (she'd left me waiting in a restaurant for well over an hour, when she arrived in a huff and I asked her why she was mad at me when I was the one who'd been waiting, she had an angry outburst and told me to "just shush with that high-pitched voice of yours," as if she was the persecuted person. Anyway, it goes on and on, but I was anxious all day every day, and after getting home I started googling personality disorders and finally found some pages on the children of mothers with BPD. I saw an amazing outline of all my mother's behaviors, from the bizarre (what I call "backwards" thinking) to the overly angry and critical, to the volatile moods, paranoia, and way she makes me feel guilty for ever confronting her behavior.

Anyway, it is a huge relief to read about this explanation of what is going on in her brain, but now I realize I have a lot of work to do in myself- I can't continue to let my mother upset me, make me feel anxious, make me feel guilty, make me continue to have imaginary angry conversations in my head, etc. I just have to learn to detach. And of course, because of the way my mother has acted all these years (I am 40), I already feel guilty for having to detach from her, and anxious about how she's going to react if I change my own behavior.

Wow, I could write for hours! Thank you if you've read this far. If you have any advice for me, someone who is just starting to realize the years of anxiety I have been put through, I appreciate anything you can tell me.

[HappyChappy]

explosive anger at my one criticism (she'd left me waiting in a restaurant for well over an hour, when she arrived in a huff and I asked her why she was mad at me when I was the one who'd been waiting, she had an angry outburst and told me to "just shush with that high-pitched voice of yours," as if she was the persecuted person.

 Welcome to the family. Your mom does sound very BPD from what you write. The bit above, attack is the best form of defence. They feel justified in keeping us waiting and truly annoyed if we dare to complain. My BPD kept us waiting every single time, but she also mastered the perminantly p*ssed off look, so resistance was futuile - unill we all moved out Ha !

I found understanding some of the key underlying principles helped. So the effects of triangulation (if you had siblings) the effects of F.O.G. The need to radial acceptance. There are also a load of good self help books aimed at BPD children. And I found Therapy CBT also helped. It's common for kids of BPD to have eating disorders or PTSD. But hey you’re still young, so there’s time. Where would you like to focus first ? Your healing begins here.    

[Enoughforme]

I too just want to welcome you to the family. I really like the way you have expressed yourself with your words. It stinks that as a adult child of a BPD person we have to do so much work to keep our sanity. Thank you for joining us and I look forward to reading more for you. The best relief is having a definition for the craziness.

[Mo75]

Thank you for your responses. I've done a lot of thinking in the past week and I'm past my initial anxiety and ready to move forward. I find I'm avoiding my mom- I'm so angry right now about what she put me and my sisters through our whole lives, and trying to be around her with my current feelings would definitely just push her buttons and set her off again. I'm going to do some reading around here and looking into starting the steps of healing.

[Needless2say]

  Welcome.

I suggest you find a therapist that deals with BPD.  That is what I did and she taught me so much.  I am not NC with my family and living a life of my own for the first time.  I never would have been able to do that without her help.  Good luck to you!