not officially diagnosed, but...

[nicole1983]

I am nearly positive my mom has BPD. No official diagnosis has been given, but the criteria and symptoms is nearly nail on the head, save for things like cutting.

My mother has severe trauma and abuse (sexual, emotional, and physical) in her background. She's in her late 50's. As long as I have known my mother, she's always been really fragile emotionally, vacillating between anger and depression. I learned pretty early my mom desperately needed validation in all things, even if those things were not good. I would be her "little counselor", talking her down when she got upset and telling her she was normal, fine, it was the world that was terrible (or people if the negative focus was on a specific person). I got a job and paid bills when she "couldn't work". I realized that making her feel not bad or shamed, or alleviating her negative emotions, was the best way to keep her happy. She could call me anytime and I would respond.
Our relationship started a downhill slide when I left for college. I started to notice, in spending time with other people and their families, that maybe the behavior i had always thought was normal, as just "mom being mom" was feeling unhealthy. selfish and childish. My mom was an adult and could barely handle the emotional side of life. she was always the victim. there was always an "emotional fire" that i was expected to put out. I got tired of being her counselor. I stopped calling as frequently, stopped going home every single break. This didn't go well. As I started pulling away, she got more angry.

I moved back home after college and she was a full blown alcoholic at this time, something she hid from me in college. her emotional extremes now being fed by alcohol was severe. One minute I was the amazing daughter, the next minute I was the scum of the earth. The next day it would be as if nothing had happened. I told her i wanted to move out and started making plans to move in with my boyfriend. She lost it, and i couldn't figure out why. She told me to get out and be a whore with my boyfriend, that i was a piece of ___, who was causing her mother and siblings to be homeless (because now i wouldn't be giving rent to my mom) and other horrible things.

the day i left she cried and told me she would miss me so much. over the years i lived with my boyfriend she often requested i come back and live at home. My remaining siblings also got this treatment when they decided to leave home "it was going to be their fault she would be homeless" by taking with them their financial support that would no longer be going to her.
she was never happy or overly supportive when we wanted to leave and live as adults should. it was a betrayal.

my mom had risky and emotional relationships that never worked out, affairs with married men (my mom is divorced), etc. Her relationships with people go from complete idealization to utter devaluation within very short spaces. once people start asserting their needs, or can't benefit her, they are crap. I've literally seen this behavioral change overnight. she claims she found out that so and so are "really unhealthy, toxic people. Their narcissism is dangerous for me". and i don't know how to describe this issue, but frequently she seems to operate on a complete emotional spectrum with no logic at all. If she "feels" something has/is happening, it's happened! whether or not that is actually factually true. I wouldn't call it lying per se, but it's almost like her view and perception of things is so skewed, she can't see situations as they are, she can only see how she feels them. she reacts emotionally and rashly based on those feelings. recently she became involved in prescription drug addiction. she was struggling with it and was going to go into treatment.

she felt she was being "investigated" by section 8 for drug abuse. there was no actual evidence of this, at all. but she slowly became more and more emotionally unstable at this idea and claimed it was only a matter of time before she was "screwed". she decided she would give up her housing before they got rid of her ( she later admitted this) but at the time she told me she would go into long treatment for a few months. she requested to live with my sister and my sister let her move in.

from day one, my sister was insenstive to her emotional needs, insensitive, narcissictic and selfish, and absusive. my mother said my sister had set boundaries that were unfair. she claimed my sister was abusing her, and also abusing her kids. My sister is not abusive, never has been especially to her children. unfortunately my mother, according to my sister, had been emailing her therapist and social services advocate saying she was abusive. my sister became upset and alarmed. she told me she needed mom to go, that mom was now endangering her home and family with her "lies".

my mom moved out into a friends house. she verbally praised this friend to no end. her savior. in the meantime she sent a mass text to me and all my siblings that she wanted nothing to do with her abusive daughter who would abandon her and that if we had contact with my sister, or believed the things she said about my mom, then we should all just stop talking to mom now, and that she would have to cut all ties with the rest of us and we would be supporting an abuser.

unfortunately, the second home didn't go well either. She texted me saying her friend was really abusive and mean to her. She told me a couple days later she was on the streets, kicked out for "standing up to her friend's abuse and defending herself". since then it's been a hugely emotional roller coaster yet again.

my siblings and myself all rent, most are making minimum wage, and all of us live with roommates, or significant others. my siblings, aside from my sister who had already taken her in, cannot take her in. she threatens suicide alot, but won't tell me where she is (she knows i'll call emergency services). she tells me she met a man on the street who wanted to rape her and that she saved his phone number and threatens me subtly with it. she can't understand how her bad decisions got her here. she says she didn't do anything wrong. i'm scared, and feel guilty, and that if she dies it will be all my fault. I want to help her but, i can't take her in. I'm at a loss.

[nicole1983]

my mom has also been in therapy for over a decade and i have seen little to no change in her behavior. she has gone through multiple therapists, a few who said after years, they could no longer help her. I don't understand how the therapist could miss such a diagnosis. I know she is aware of BPD. I mentioned i think she might have it and told her to mention it to her therapist. she says she told her and her therapist said she doesn't have BPD, that she has complex ptsd only. I don't know that I believe that, but I'm not a therapist. I know something is very wrong with my mom. my friend who has known my family for 20 years (will get her doctorate in psychology soon) told me there is a good chance my mom probably has BPD along with PTSD from a lifetime of abuse. I want to help my mom, but I'm becoming exhausted, emotionally. mentally too. I had a breakdown at work the other day and just burst into tears because my mom texts me non stop about how her children have abandoned her, that we don't love her. Then i responded by saying i did love her and tried to help her get in touch with resources, someone who might be able to take her in , and things were great again. she was so happy and nice. then as i paused in my responses (i got off work and had to drive home, so didn't touch my phone) she freaked out. the pause made her emotionally lose touch a bit and she accused me of not really loving her.

i feel like i walk on egg shells with my mom. that the happiness and fluiditiy of our relationship is entirely dependent on me not presenting her with anything she perceives as negatives. no criticism. i can't even set boundaries for my own personal mental health, without that being interpreted as hurtful, or invalidating, or mean. Even when what she says is hurtful, it's just easier to not upset her because then i go through the emotional wringer for the next 12-24 hours with non stop texts, histrionics, voicemails etc. i feel like my mom is very clever at emotionally hijacking a situation completely to her benefit, and always at my detriment.

she vacillates so quickly from approval, to disapproval, without any seeming trigger point that i completely recognize, that i'm left floundering. This has been a theme all my life. at times i've had conversations with her that seemed to be going so well and then they switch 180 degrees like a light switch was flipped. if i don't give her the emotional validation she wants, i'm in the poop pot so to speak. she turns my siblings against the child she currently has issues with as well, saying we said and did things we did not, to achieve this effect. my siblings are at their wits end. we are unable to help her (i.e. let her live with us while she doesn't work until she wins her social security) in the way she wants. so we're crap and we're the reason she's going to die or be raped on the streets. i don't know what to do. I love my mom, that doesn't change because I can't have her live with me and endanger my own housing, nor do I make enough to support her from afar. It's been a month and the constant stress of her situation is really taking a toll on my life and my marriage.

she seems, not just down on her luck, but for the whole of my life, she seems stuck in a state of perpetual victimhood, unable to help herself, while the world and people don't care about her.she has almost no friends anymore due to her idealization and devaluation pattern, once people in her life she she loves them so long as they benefit her an dgive her what she wants: time, attention, love, etc that is all consuming and ignores their emotional and mental needs for her own. the sad part is she doesn't even seem to realize she is doing this. she's so intelligent, but unaware at the same time. She seems everyone else as the problem, nothing wrong with her behavior. she's had chances and has burned bridges with people and family that tried to help her, opened their homes to her, because they suddenly become abusive and mean and selfish and evil, etc.

i'm so tired, but can't let her feel alone. not when she feels literally alone, is homeless, and is suicidal. i'm the only one of her six children still keeping in regular contact, even though its tough. I love my mom, i don't like the things the does. I don't want her to kill herself. I want to have a real relationship, one of mutual respect and trust and openness, instead of the one sided street it currently is. This is going to sound probably horrible, but I feel like im trapped by her emotionally. she's fragile and homeless and suicidal, therefore i don't feel i can present any "negatives", for instance examining the choices she make that lead to real consequences. i know that if i tell her i can't handle the emotional roller coaster of her threatening suicide and then refusing to tell me where she is so i can call the cops to have her put into hospitalized suicide watch. do you know what it's like waking up to two people in the same day? one person loves you and praises you and is nice as long as you meet her needs. then the other feels emotionally injured and the world is against her, and she's doing all the right things but life hates her and she blames you for her inevitable death. suicide isn't a joke and i'm left on the fence knowing its partially used at times for reaction, and others because its real at the same time.

 At 33 I feel utter responsibility to my mother, to fix things for her. over a decade of therapy is doing literally nothing for her, but her therapist says she progressing marvelously according to her. i don't see it. i also realistically know there is no fixing anything. she has to fix herself. at the recommendation of a friend i told her about dialectical behavioral therapy and how it might help. she said her therapist said she doesn't need it. I'm just not sure how after all this time, and all this therapy, she can be the way she is. she's so easy to love, and so hard to love too. i see her traumas and her abuse and i understand that it must have been horrible, and maybe it just broke her. like maybe she just can't fix it. she can't be any other way than the way that she currently is. at nearly 58, i'm not holding out a huge amount of hope that she will drastically change, and emotionally grow up. she's so fearful of the world, of people, of their lack of love, approval, and she hates rejection and reacts illogically if she feels in any way slighted. she cannot process it.

[MrWtn1978]

I learned pretty early my mom desperately needed validation in all things, even if those things were not good. I would be her "little counselor", talking her down when she got upset and telling her she was normal, fine, it was the world that was terrible (or people if the negative focus was on a specific person). I got a job and paid bills when she "couldn't work". I realized that making her feel not bad or shamed, or alleviating her negative emotions, was the best way to keep her happy. She could call me anytime and I would respond.
Our relationship started a downhill slide when I left for college. I started to notice, in spending time with other people and their families, that maybe the behavior i had always thought was normal, as just "mom being mom" was feeling unhealthy. selfish and childish. My mom was an adult and could barely handle the emotional side of life. she was always the victim. there was always an "emotional fire" that i was expected to put out. I got tired of being her counselor. I stopped calling as frequently, stopped going home every single break. This didn't go well. As I started pulling away, she got more angry.
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I definitely empathize to your situation.  I have been the emotional spouse, best friend, counselor, etc... .to my mom over the years.  Even though my mom is much more high functioning and can control her emotions on que, I still feel all the things you are describing!

You can't save her.  This isn't your responsibility!  Your responsibility if towards creating a healthy life for yourself.  It is easy to drown in her pain, guilt etc... .  But you really can't save her.  Everything you do for her is a temporary fix.  Band-aids don't cure cancer.  But we feel compelled to slap them onto the wound anyway.  We desperately want to fix the unfixable.  She isn't going to get better without therapy and most BPDs refuse to admit a problem, so don't seek help or participate when they do.

I have spent 6+ months in idividual counseling and it has helped me so much!  I journal and draw and read books about BPD (Stop walkling on Eggshells, and Surviving a Boaderline Parent).  When my emotions wash over me and I start to drown in guilt I grab my journal and start writing about what I am feeling.  I write about what I hear her saying to me (even if it is implied), THEN I speak TRUTH into the situation.  This is the best thing to fight anxiety.  Also getting support from friends/family members and this forum will help a lot!

You are not alone in this!   

[Janneke]

Hi nicole1983,
 Welcome!
 Why do you think you feel complete responsibility for your mother? To play devil's advocate   she is an adult.
 Her threatening you about the man who allegedly wanted to rape her is not okay    you do NOT deserve to be treated that way.
 Some therapists are better than others... .also, BPD sufferers sometimes lie. Perhaps when your mom says her therapist says she is doing great, she is lying. What do you think? Has she lied to you before?
 I am pretty new too but this is a good community 
 J