New Here - Think Parent(s) have BPD

[Depression = 72% of members]

Hello all.

I learned about BPD a few days ago, and feel like it might describe both or at least one of my parents. I haven't gotten the book yet, but our growing up lives we definitely "walked on eggshells" with my dad. Once my parents divorced and we lived with mom, it became apparent that she was part of the problem, not just him even though she blamed him for basically every single thing. Eventually we realized that yeah, he has issues (possibly undiagnosed Aspbergers/mild autism, depression, etc.) which he eventually began to get help and medication for, but hello, mom also has issues. At this point we think she has strong NPD traits, possible BPD traits, PTSD (that one has been diagnosed), anxiety, depression to name a few.

Trying to keep the story short, there are eleven children, I am the second oldest but the one that my mom leaned on to "parent" the others and for emotional support over the years. My dad was gone a lot for work but when he was home anything could set him off. He had violent anger episodes - yelling, phyiscal abuse, punching holes in walls, throwing things. My mom had "lesser" episodes - mostly yelling and throwing things and making us sit through long lectures about how horrible we were, how much she has/had suffered in her life, why we should be sorry, and so forth. Ugh, I still hate to think about those. The kids at home still get subjected to them. We know basically what will set her off these days. Besides verbally abusing my dad any chance she got, she goes after whichever kid is annoying her the most or daring to think differently than her or basically go outside of her control. Right now that is me behind my back (for encouraging my sister to move out, telling her mom needed counseling, that mom was overreacting to my sister's decision to move out, etc.,) and my sister who moved out, broke up with her boyfriend, and then was encouraged to come back to the "loving" fold of home with the promise that she would not be made fun of. Of course she gets back and all she gets is regular lunchtime and other diatribes about how she should never have moved out, how awful she was to talk to me behind my mom's back (she expects us to inform on each other, especially if we "talk bad" about her), how she betrayed mom and the family by going behind her back, and so forth.

My relationship with my dad was not close until a few years ago when he started to get help, medications, and to make a real effort to be a dad in any way he could. He respected our wishes (finally!) and never pushed for more than we wanted. I grew to love him, although still with an undertone of distrust from a lifetime of hurt. But I got to the point that I forgave him, felt empathy for him, and no longer wanted to kill him or see him dead. I wanted to do that a lot as a teenager, but felt scared to admit it for awhile. And then it got bad enough that I didn't care. Now I'm not sure that I will ever know everything about him or what was going on as he passed away in a motorcycle accident in October.

My relationship with my mom started going downhill as a teenager, but at that time I was still under her thumb and felt powerless to say anything against her (that's disrespectful, disobedient, not in the Bible) or go against her wishes. Actually, it has never been healthy but it felt like it was at one time. She is a pro at passive aggression, guilt trips, and making suggestions that are actually loaded "do this or face my wrath" directives. It started to get stretched as I asserted more independence - I moved out, stopped "helping" and "fixing" everything in the family so much (although I still took charge of my disabled older brother's care, because she refused - "i'm getting older and so busy and who will look after him when I'm dead?" She kept hinting that I was welcome to move back home whenever I wanted. Never mind that I was in the military, successful, in a church I loved (not hers, which caused issues until I refused to talk about it), with friends I loved, and a life of my own. Every time I called or visited (which was not often) she complained about how my sisters never listen to her, don't clean up after themselves/lazy, she never has time to do anything, has no friends, etc. Just waiting for me to jump in and rescue her. Sometimes I did. But more and more I didn't want to do anything with her. Fast forward to being 26/27 years old, my little sister gets engaged at 19 (she's too young, what is she thinking! what, why is her engagment only 6 months? She will never finish college now. They are rushing just because they want to sleep together and live in different states.) and then proceeds to get married without involving my mom "enough" in her wedding. She relies on her bridesmaids for a lot of things, and mom gets jealous and pouts the whole day and finds whatever she can to disapprove of. I meet my future husband at her wedding (no joke! it was such a setup ) and eventually we decide to get married and get engaged. Only, oops, we got engaged on my youngest sister's birthday. After that day, she was no longer as nice to him and started getting poutier about it all. Especially because we chose only a six month engagement too! And then she proceeds to reluctantly be involved in the planning, but mad because she can't do it all herself and jealous that I involve my bridesmaids. She is late to the wedding, misses out on most of the pictures/events, refuses to talk to anyone at the reception, makes the whole day miserable and is rude to my in-laws. The day ends with me sobbing in the car on the way to the honeymoon because she was so emotionally draining and awful and pushed me to show loyalty to either her or my husband and guess who I chose? Not her. She tried to interfere during the honeymoon, talked bad about me when I got home, cornered me to tell me how much I hurt her and demand apologies, and the result is that I stopped talking to her once I moved south and got "free" with my husband. She pouted during the birth of our first child because she wasn't the first one to hold the baby (she didn't come down for the birth) and made remarks about how my daughter had better not look like my MIL. Yeah, it was all awful and my breaking point.

I've been getting counseling for about six months now. My counselor says I am/was in a codependent relationship with her. We've worked on boundaries (I had zero) and getting me to not be afraid to stand up for myself and to tell her she is wrong to her face. That is really hard. I still feel soo guilty for doing that and avoid the conflict as much as I can. She refuses to listen, or pretends to, and then makes excuses or twists things to show why she is right and everyone else is wrong. I no longer share most of my life with her, because now that I am on my own, I am forming my own opinions and beliefs, and they differ from hers. Her house is seriously an echo-chamber, a place where whatever she says is gospel, almost like a cult. Her interpretation of life, the Bible, morality, everything is the only right way. I'm getting braver and am starting to show where I disagree and all. To make things confusing, she got real nice at my dad's funeral and said that she would support me no matter what I chose to do with raising my daughter (although I guess now that it was her giving "permission" to be different once she saw that I was gonna do my own thing anyway.)

My sister texts me on the regular letting me know how awful it is at home, how she wants to move away but can't right now, how the littlest girls are spoiled and the oldest ones can't do anything right, everyone gets picked on, the littlest girls get yelled at instead of parented - generally it sounds like it always has.

I have mild to moderate depression (it goes in cycles,) my sister who married first at 19 has anxiety disorder, depression, panic attacks, and is on meds and has a service dog, another sister has dissociative identity disorder, and the rest haven't been to counseling for various reasons so who knows what they have going on.

Soo... .that's the really shortened form of my story, which turned out to be long anyway. I need to do more reading around here, but - any thoughts on what my parents may have/had? Anyone have similar stories? I've recognized our family in a few of the stories I read before posting.

Hoping to find additional support and validation here, and tools to continue to healing journey and maybe possibly encourage siblings on theirs or to start theirs. My desire is to be a healthy, whole person who is a great wife and mama and friend.

[skylark23]

Hello all.

I learned about BPD a few days ago, and feel like it might describe both or at least one of my parents. I haven't gotten the book yet, but our growing up lives we definitely "walked on eggshells" with my dad. Once my parents divorced and we lived with mom, it became apparent that she was part of the problem, not just him even though she blamed him for basically every single thing. Eventually we realized that yeah, he has issues (possibly undiagnosed Aspbergers/mild autism, depression, etc.) which he eventually began to get help and medication for, but hello, mom also has issues. At this point we think she has strong NPD traits, possible BPD traits, PTSD (that one has been diagnosed), anxiety, depression to name a few.

Trying to keep the story short, there are eleven children, I am the second oldest but the one that my mom leaned on to "parent" the others and for emotional support over the years. My dad was gone a lot for work but when he was home anything could set him off. He had violent anger episodes - yelling, phyiscal abuse, punching holes in walls, throwing things. My mom had "lesser" episodes - mostly yelling and throwing things and making us sit through long lectures about how horrible we were, how much she has/had suffered in her life, why we should be sorry, and so forth. Ugh, I still hate to think about those. The kids at home still get subjected to them. We know basically what will set her off these days. Besides verbally abusing my dad any chance she got, she goes after whichever kid is annoying her the most or daring to think differently than her or basically go outside of her control. Right now that is me behind my back (for encouraging my sister to move out, telling her mom needed counseling, that mom was overreacting to my sister's decision to move out, etc.,) and my sister who moved out, broke up with her boyfriend, and then was encouraged to come back to the "loving" fold of home with the promise that she would not be made fun of. Of course she gets back and all she gets is regular lunchtime and other diatribes about how she should never have moved out, how awful she was to talk to me behind my mom's back (she expects us to inform on each other, especially if we "talk bad" about her), how she betrayed mom and the family by going behind her back, and so forth.

My relationship with my dad was not close until a few years ago when he started to get help, medications, and to make a real effort to be a dad in any way he could. He respected our wishes (finally!) and never pushed for more than we wanted. I grew to love him, although still with an undertone of distrust from a lifetime of hurt. But I got to the point that I forgave him, felt empathy for him, and no longer wanted to kill him or see him dead. I wanted to do that a lot as a teenager, but felt scared to admit it for awhile. And then it got bad enough that I didn't care. Now I'm not sure that I will ever know everything about him or what was going on as he passed away in a motorcycle accident in October.

My relationship with my mom started going downhill as a teenager, but at that time I was still under her thumb and felt powerless to say anything against her (that's disrespectful, disobedient, not in the Bible) or go against her wishes. Actually, it has never been healthy but it felt like it was at one time. She is a pro at passive aggression, guilt trips, and making suggestions that are actually loaded "do this or face my wrath" directives. It started to get stretched as I asserted more independence - I moved out, stopped "helping" and "fixing" everything in the family so much (although I still took charge of my disabled older brother's care, because she refused - "i'm getting older and so busy and who will look after him when I'm dead?" She kept hinting that I was welcome to move back home whenever I wanted. Never mind that I was in the military, successful, in a church I loved (not hers, which caused issues until I refused to talk about it), with friends I loved, and a life of my own. Every time I called or visited (which was not often) she complained about how my sisters never listen to her, don't clean up after themselves/lazy, she never has time to do anything, has no friends, etc. Just waiting for me to jump in and rescue her. Sometimes I did. But more and more I didn't want to do anything with her. Fast forward to being 26/27 years old, my little sister gets engaged at 19 (she's too young, what is she thinking! what, why is her engagment only 6 months? She will never finish college now. They are rushing just because they want to sleep together and live in different states.) and then proceeds to get married without involving my mom "enough" in her wedding. She relies on her bridesmaids for a lot of things, and mom gets jealous and pouts the whole day and finds whatever she can to disapprove of. I meet my future husband at her wedding (no joke! it was such a setup ) and eventually we decide to get married and get engaged. Only, oops, we got engaged on my youngest sister's birthday. After that day, she was no longer as nice to him and started getting poutier about it all. Especially because we chose only a six month engagement too! And then she proceeds to reluctantly be involved in the planning, but mad because she can't do it all herself and jealous that I involve my bridesmaids. She is late to the wedding, misses out on most of the pictures/events, refuses to talk to anyone at the reception, makes the whole day miserable and is rude to my in-laws. The day ends with me sobbing in the car on the way to the honeymoon because she was so emotionally draining and awful and pushed me to show loyalty to either her or my husband and guess who I chose? Not her. She tried to interfere during the honeymoon, talked bad about me when I got home, cornered me to tell me how much I hurt her and demand apologies, and the result is that I stopped talking to her once I moved south and got "free" with my husband. She pouted during the birth of our first child because she wasn't the first one to hold the baby (she didn't come down for the birth) and made remarks about how my daughter had better not look like my MIL. Yeah, it was all awful and my breaking point.

I've been getting counseling for about six months now. My counselor says I am/was in a codependent relationship with her. We've worked on boundaries (I had zero) and getting me to not be afraid to stand up for myself and to tell her she is wrong to her face. That is really hard. I still feel soo guilty for doing that and avoid the conflict as much as I can. She refuses to listen, or pretends to, and then makes excuses or twists things to show why she is right and everyone else is wrong. I no longer share most of my life with her, because now that I am on my own, I am forming my own opinions and beliefs, and they differ from hers. Her house is seriously an echo-chamber, a place where whatever she says is gospel, almost like a cult. Her interpretation of life, the Bible, morality, everything is the only right way. I'm getting braver and am starting to show where I disagree and all. To make things confusing, she got real nice at my dad's funeral and said that she would support me no matter what I chose to do with raising my daughter (although I guess now that it was her giving "permission" to be different once she saw that I was gonna do my own thing anyway.)

My sister texts me on the regular letting me know how awful it is at home, how she wants to move away but can't right now, how the littlest girls are spoiled and the oldest ones can't do anything right, everyone gets picked on, the littlest girls get yelled at instead of parented - generally it sounds like it always has.

I have mild to moderate depression (it goes in cycles,) my sister who married first at 19 has anxiety disorder, depression, panic attacks, and is on meds and has a service dog, another sister has dissociative identity disorder, and the rest haven't been to counseling for various reasons so who knows what they have going on.

Soo... .that's the really shortened form of my story, which turned out to be long anyway. I need to do more reading around here, but - any thoughts on what my parents may have/had? Anyone have similar stories? I've recognized our family in a few of the stories I read before posting.

Hoping to find additional support and validation here, and tools to continue to healing journey and maybe possibly encourage siblings on theirs or to start theirs. My desire is to be a healthy, whole person who is a great wife and mama and friend.

[schwing]

Hi Skylark23 and

Trying to keep the story short, there are eleven children, I am the second oldest but the one that my mom leaned on to "parent" the others and for emotional support over the years.

One aspect that you might consider looking into is the possibility of "covert" or "emotional" incest; when dysfunctional parents give children inappropriate adult responsibilities, this affects the child.  In a way, this robs the child of his/her childhood. As adults however, we have the ability to recover some of what we were denied.

... .my sister who moved out, broke up with her boyfriend, and then was encouraged to come back to the "loving" fold of home with the promise that she would not be made fun of. Of course she gets back and all she gets is regular lunchtime and other diatribes about how she should never have moved out, how awful she was to talk to me behind my mom's back (she expects us to inform on each other, especially if we "talk bad" about her), how she betrayed mom and the family by going behind her back, and so forth.

Your sister was effectively "recycled."  Mothers who have BPD act in a manner that runs contrary to a child's development of independence because BPD mothers will generally interpret a child's need and desire to separate (and become independent, whole adults) as imagined abandonment. You should also consider reading C.A. Lawson's "Understanding the Borderline Mother" for more details on how BPD interferes with healthy parenting.

Every time I called or visited (which was not often) she complained about how my sisters never listen to her, don't clean up after themselves/lazy, she never has time to do anything, has no friends, etc. Just waiting for me to jump in and rescue her.

Consider that because you had such a large family, your mother has had free reign to always play each child off against each other.  I wonder if the complains she leveled at her children were to some degree projections of her own self perceived failings.  A major motivation for people with BPD (pwBPD) to project their own deficiencies onto those close to them is so they can preserve their own fragile egos and maintain the delusion that they are "perfect" or only a "victim."

... .mom gets jealous and pouts the whole day and finds whatever she can to disapprove of.
... .She is late to the wedding, misses out on most of the pictures/events, refuses to talk to anyone at the reception, makes the whole day miserable and is rude to my in-laws.
... .She pouted during the birth of our first child because she wasn't the first one to hold the baby.

I'm sorry your mother isn't mature enough to be a healthy mother to you. A healthy mother would have endeavored to find ways to make your wedding day a joy for you and not disapprove or act unjustifiably needy.  A healthy mother would have celebrated the birth of your child rather than make that day (or any other day of family celebration) all about what she deserves or requires.

We've worked on boundaries (I had zero) and getting me to not be afraid to stand up for myself and to tell her she is wrong to her face. That is really hard. I still feel soo guilty for doing that and avoid the conflict as much as I can.

Feeling guilty and avoiding conflict at your detriment is what your mother has trained you to do.  It is in the best interest of your happiness to untrain yourself of these habits and re-train yourself in a manner of your choice.

She refuses to listen, or pretends to, and then makes excuses or twists things to show why she is right and everyone else is wrong.

This is how delusion works. You shut out reality and reshape it to suit what you need/want.  :)elusions are a coping mechanism for the fragile.

My sister texts me on the regular letting me know how awful it is at home, how she wants to move away but can't right now, how the littlest girls are spoiled and the oldest ones can't do anything right, everyone gets picked on, the littlest girls get yelled at instead of parented - generally it sounds like it always has.

My wife has a father who exhibits BPD behaviors (like my mother) and when she recognized that his behavior was consistent with the behavior described in some of the books I have on BPD, she was very excited and wanted to share this information with her siblings (against my admonition not to do so).  She got shot down and her sisters started accusing her of having mental issues.  That was years ago, they are much more aware now of my father-in-law's dysfunctional behaviors.  My point being: don't be too eager to "fix" or "educate" your siblings.  We all become aware of our own dysfunctions (such as those we learned from our families) at different paces.  Some of us aren't ready to accept the truth of our childhood. Denial is also a coping mechanism.  

Do be supportive of your siblings when the opportunity presents itself, when you are able to do so not at your detriment. But for now focus on your own "recovery."  As a co-dependent, you will find that it is far less comfortable for you to take care of yourself, than it is for you to take care of others.  And I believe it is in your best interest, your family's best interest, that this should change.  You should take care of yourself as least as well as you can take care of others.

You are in the right place.

Best wishes,

Schwing

[skylark23]

Hello Schwing,

Thank you for the thoughtful reply!

I have heard about "covert" or "emotional" incest but don't know much about recovering from it. Do you have any tips on where to start?
Thank you for telling me about "recycling." This I've never heard of, but it sounds like I need to read the book mentioned.
One of my sisters and I have been considering recently, especially through work in counseling and learning about BPD, that she really is projecting how she feels about herself. It definitely makes sense especially as much as it seems she has the need to tear others down and project herself as so saintly or victim or what have you.
I have printed the "Ten Twisted Ways of Thinking" and the ways to untwist it to put on the wall and look at regularly - also working with counselor to retrain the inner dialogue. This stuff is hard work and sometimes it's hard to know what to do when! Hopefully it begins to get clearer soon.
I've done more reading from the Tools section and have realized that I need to be more careful/back off with the family and wanting to fix everyone. A problem for me is knowing where to draw the line between love/support and enabling/trying to fix. However, some of those articles have been super helpful (like how to get a family member into counseling.) I definitely made mistakes with my mom flat out telling her that she was codependent and needed therapy. You and counselor have both reminded me today that my family needs to realize/want to fix it themselves.
Thank you for the kind and encouraging response. I look forward to learning and growing here.

[schwing]

I have heard about "covert" or "emotional" incest but don't know much about recovering from it. Do you have any tips on where to start?

You might try "Silently Seduced: When Parents Make Their Children Partners."

Thank you for telling me about "recycling." This I've never heard of, but it sounds like I need to read the book mentioned.

It's a term that is used often in the forums.  Think of it as "re-engaging" in the BPD loved one's pattern of intense and unstable interpersonal relationships.  We get re-engaged into repeating the cycle.

This stuff is hard work and sometimes it's hard to know what to do when! Hopefully it begins to get clearer soon.

First learn to identify how/if you want to change a dynamic.  Then see which tools work for you and which don't.  Eventually it will get easier with practice.  Expect to make mistakes and try to learn from them.