Has your family member been diagnosed?

[love.hope.dream]

Hi all

I was referred here by my therapist as my mother has many traits consistent with BPD. I love her dearly but it can be very challenging at times and was much more challenging growing up with her when I was a child and teenager.

She also has a lot of narcissistic traits but I still believe there is an unselfish and loving part of her... .sometimes it's hard to tell though what is genuine and what is manipulation.

Was just wondering are there others on this site whose loved ones or family members have not received a formal diagnosis? I feel somewhat guilty even being here. It feels like I am betraying her. I recognise I feel this way as she has recently been calm and is also great at projection and manipulation.

Anyway, I would be interested to hear from other people who feel the same way in that their parent or significant other has not received a formal diagnosis so they are not sure if they should be here and feel that they are betraying them and "doing something wrong".

I look forward to connecting with others and hearing your stories

[Sprinkledinkles]

My mom hasn't been diagnosed and I'm not in any position  to say she's a narc or not but I know for certain something is and has been definitely off. I like you am unsure if there is anything genuine there because I've been left to my own devices without a good role model to tell me anything different. Since coming out of the fog I've realized my parenting style has been trying to do opposite of what my childhood was... .i learned I have mimicked some traits that last year I never would of recognized in myself if it wasn't for groups like this. I'm getting more comfortable being on sites like this because I know the happy lulls do end and a storm is coming. So I'm justified being here. My mom is the forever more victim type that uses anyone's heart strings to her advantage down to getting free stuff since becoming a widow.  I'm trusting my resentments are not me being too sensitive and that I have a right to heal from past hurts big or small. I listen to other stories here and think my mom's not that bad but then I look at friends with healthy mom's and know my mom wasn't ever a walk in the park either. Labels are easier for me. Id find it easier to say she's just having a BPD episode. My mom struggles with counsellors and hasn't met a match so I doubt there will ever been a formal diagnoses so I just accept our relationship is off. Her behaviours upset me. I'm worth being treated with kindness. I refuse to accept anything less and it is my job to teach myself how to react in a healthy safe way for my own sanity.

[annernan]

My mom has not had a formal diagnosis of personality disorder that I'm aware of. However she was in the hospital at least once when I was a baby with a "breakdown" of some sort and there have been multiple times since then when she should have been hospitalized.
She seems to have a combination of symptoms from Borderline, Paranoid, and Narcissistic PD's. The Paranoia seems to be the most troublesome.

[madeline7]

My Mother has not been diagnosed, but I think she is a borderline with narcissistic traits along with depression and anxiety. At one point, she was hospitalized for a suicide attempt and I discussed the possibility of personality disorders with her Social Worker, but by the time I was to to talk to the Dr., my Dad, the enabler, stepped in and raged at me to mind my own business. So frustrating and exhausting.

[Turkish]

I originally came to the site due to the mother of my children,  only bring formally diagnosed with depression. I found out two years after she left that she was also diagnosed with anxiety.  I saw it on the intake forms when we got our son diagnosed with level 1 autism. 

Before that,  I made my way to this board, looking into the past to make sense of the present.  Over a year ago,  my mother admitted to me that she had BPD.  It was a back-handed Dx by one of her therapists,  but she was smart enough to see it,  especially being an RN. Later,  she admitted that she had been in treatment for PTSD when I was a little kid. 

From the hundreds of stories I've read here,  not a few deal with the emotions you describe.  Growing up with BPD parents  (diagnosed or not), I see this as normal. The emotional messages communicated to us as children were that we were defective  (e.g., my mother took me to family therapy when I was 12, then abandoned me to do it alone after one joint appointment). We were often emotional and physical caretakers of our parents.  This seems twisted,  but what kind of parent abandons or says bad things about their child?

 Caretaking a parent is a dysfunctional role reversal.  A lot of us here carry this and continue this for decades.  We don't know any better.  When parents turn invalid, even more guilt can set in. 

What I think is that whatever Dx is irrelevant. Mom hurt me in the past, she hurt me on the future.  Dealing with the behaviors are important.  How can I learn to deal Auth them better in order to improve my relationship,  or how can I learn to deal with myself in order to detach and move forward?

[Fie]

Welcome 

My mum and my grandma are BPD, undiagnosed. My father is narcissistic, undiagnosed.
I understand your feelings of guilt. I think Turkish gave you a good possible explanation of them.
Also we do not want our FOO to be defective... .because then what does this say about us ?
This is I think the first time I write out that my dad is a narcissist. Usually I'd like to think he has narcissistic traits... .But who am I kidding... .he himself once said his own father was a narcissist (undiagnosed again).
My great grandmother sounds very BPD when I hear my grandma talk about her.

Don't let the guilt suffocate you and stop you from writing. It will get better. We are all here for each other and we understand.

xx

[Avriel]

My sister is undiagnosed BPD. My mom took her to counseling in high school because she wasn't completing her work (she never did finish--got a GED instead). They suggested depression meds but didn't actually diagnose her with anything. She was smarter than her therapist and managed to dig into the therapist's life and beliefs while hiding her own problems.

Father and brother both seem NPD/HPD. Neither have ever seen a psychologist.

[Turkish]

She was smarter than her therapist and managed to dig into the therapist's life and beliefs while hiding her own problems.

No patient will reveal anything to a T they don't want to reveal,  no matter how good the therapist. 

When my mother abandoned me in family counseling when I was 12/13, I intuited that whatever I told the T would be communicated to my mother,  so I held back and redirected.

Over 30 years later my mother told me what the T thought of me: "he said that you were one of the most well-adjusted young men he'd ever met." THANKS.  I could have used that at the time,  and it contributed to my "healthy disrespect" of the profession,  as my adult T in my 40s told me. 

[pyropsycho]

My mother has never been diagnosed either, but I know in my heart that she's BPD. I do have a lot of formal training and education in psychology, so I guess that helps me with the guilt. However, I do often feel like people don't believe me or take me seriously or something, even mental health professionals I've seen. Maybe they just don't understand the extent of it or they label me as neurotic or too young to know anything? I'm not sure what exactly is going on there, but this is one of the few places I ever feel validated and heard.