This post is 16 years in the making... how do I deal with my BPD mother?

[Depression = 72% of members]

Hi everyone, this is my first post... .feels nerve wrecking but I am proud of myself for finally having the courage to write this... .brace youself, this is long... .

I will never forget the day when I was 16 years old and sitting in class, it was Psychology 101 and I remember first reading about borderline personality disorder. It was like being hit by lightning and I thought to myself “This is my mother!”.

Fast forward 16 years... I am now 32 years old, I suspect my mother suffers from BPD. When I first read about BPD all those years ago, I promptly put it to one side in my brain and never thought about it or really heard about it again since then. I don’t know why I blocked it out, but I went to therapy at 4 different times in those 16 years since just to learn how to deal with my mum, but for some reason I didn’t believe she would ever be considered someone who had a diagnosed condition and it was never something I talked to therapists about especially – I would usually say that she wasn’t well but not defining it more than that– I also always thought it was all in my head.

Just a few weeks ago, that moment in school came back to me clearly, when I saw a poster at the local grocery store - “Do you support someone with Borderline personality disorder?”. I took a photo of the poster and went home and started researching and here we are, almost a month later.

So let me tell you about my mum...

She grew up on a farm and was raised by a single mother with 3 kids and they were very poor. My mother’s father abandoned his family when my mum was 4 years old. My mum finally left home to live in a different city and her mum (my grandmother) threatened suicide if she moved away, but my mum did anyways.

My mum went on to work as a bookkeeper, met my dad and had two kids. During my childhood, I didn’t really think too much of my mothers issues until I turned 14 years old: My mum was leaving work one day and she couldn’t find her bike (even though it was there right in front of her) and had a mental break down and had to call my dad to come and pick her up. It was like she changed over night. She was diagnosed with “burn out” and depression and spent the following 3-5 years in bed, too depressed & anxious to do anything or function properly. My dad turned to working a lot, and I took on a lot of responsibilities for our home, such as cleaning and laundry. During this time, I started noticing my mother displaying a lot of signs of what I now know could be BPD such as fear of abandonment, splitting between hating/loving people, suicide threats, frequent mood swings & hollow/empty feeling. She would tell me all about her feelings and treated me like a friend instead of a child. She didn’t partake in any reckless/self-harm behaviour other than her own torment towards herself.

For the past 20 years, here are some of her behaviours that I believe might be reason to suspect BPD:

My mum says that I am the reason she is alive and that if it wasn’t for me, she would not be alive today. She has threatened suicide but has thankfully never tried.
She refers to me as if I am her. She talks about “you and me we are just the same” and will always say “you and me who often feel depressed” or “you and me who are very sensitive”(this is without me ever having offered up to her that I have ever had feelings of depression or in any way being sensitive). She has even given me a number of self-help books that she thinks I should read because she believes I need them to help me better deal with life (without ever having given her any idea that I am in need of any help!)
She puts me on a pedestal but will always try to bring me down and make me upset (but ultimately I cant do anything wrong according to my dad) but she is constantly angry at my dad for a new reason every week, he cant do anything right. My brother keeps her at arms length and even though they live in the same town, he only sees her a few times a year and she is very upset that he is not present in her life, which I believe puts even more pressure on me.
She criticised me through out my childhood for my weight (I was mildly overweight) and always told me “don’t eat that, you will get fat” and worried a lot about my physical appearance and also always said “you and me who are overweight”.
She always thinks the worst about every situation and when I got promoted, she asked if I was given another job because I couldn’t handle the job duties of my previous role. She didn’t think I was actually promoted. She isn’t quite comfortable with the fact that I have gone on to have a successful career, she worries that I have ‘changed’ and that I will ‘become too stressed to function’.
She always tells me that surely I love her more than my father (and when I tell her that I love them both equally – she will say “but don’t you love me more?” in a sort of fake-crying/laughing way and tries to force me to say yes).
She doesn’t let my father visit me, but she demand to visit me at least 3 times a year. She doesn’t allow me to have my own relationship with my father and if I call him, she gets jealous and asks why I called him. We then have to think of a practical reason, such as me needing practical advice on a topic that my mother doesn’t know anything about.
My mother has angrily demanded to know when my husband and I are having children. She says its really unfair to her and to her future grand children as she says she thinks she will develop dementia any moment (no signs of it according to her doctor) and its so unfair to her unborn grand children that they didn’t get to see their grand mother before she died. She thinks we are being selfish and that we are being cruel to her and that if we don’t have children soon, she will have to find someone else’s children to be around and babysit to fill that void. (I have not disclosed to her that my husband and I are battling infertility. Its stressing me out beyond words to worry about another one of her attacks that could come at any moment. This breaks my heart – its clear she doesn’t really care about me, its always just about her).
I cannot be myself around my mother and I have to put up a mask when I talk to her. If I do not provide emotional support for her, she thinks I don’t love her and that I will abandon her and will cry and cry and cry. She treats me like I am her parent/friend/therapist and she relies on me to feel better when she is anxious/depressed/feel hollow & worthless.
I cannot show my mother any feelings of anger/sadness of my own, as then I will hear about it for years afterwards. I once showed her the tiniest bit of anger about 8 years ago and it took her 5 years of constant reminders that “you don’t really love me” until she finally stopped.
I also cant tell her about anything important or worrying, as she basically cant cope with that OR makes it all about her. I had a kidney infection and was in the ER and she called me the same day and said she was also experiencing pain in her kidneys and thought it was best to go to the doctor to have it looked up to make sure she doesn’t have a kidney infection too. The next day she said that it was a bit silly that she had said that, but she said ‘that’s because you and me are like one person and when you are ill, I feel ill too’.

My mother and work/friends
My mother was out of work for 7 years after her break down but then managed to keep down a part time job, working 2-3 days a week as a book keeper for about 10-13 years or so until she retired but even then, it would make her incredibly stressed, worried and exhausted. She would constantly be complaining of some sort of illness, she was always sick with something and if it wasn’t her head, then it was her foot or her ankle or her back or her stomach.
She would love a job at first sight and really love her co-workers/boss but eventually they would all turn horrible and show their real sides and she would hate the job and her colleagues who were usually said to be unsupportive & cruel. In all of her jobs, she would frequently have outbursts that she couldn’t control if something was worrying her or if someone had made her upset in front of large groups of people or one to one. She was finally offered early retirement from the company she was most recently at and her boss said “I cannot stand having you around anymore, we can’t deal with you anymore”. She took early retirement (she is in her early 60s).
She has a number of friends and puts a hugely value on these friendships to make her feel better, but she falls in and out of love with each person – they are either in her good books and are ‘absolutely amazing and are the most amazing friend to her’ or they have turned out to be really not nice and therefore not worthy of friendship anymore. Usually it starts with her becoming friends with someone and absolutely idolising them only to a year later, saying that they had betrayed her or disappointed her and either finishing the friendship or letting the friendship dwindle. This has been a pattern for as long as I can remember. She started out loving my husbands parents, but then quickly said my husbands father didn’t like her and that she therefore didn’t like them anymore and didn’t want to see them (completely unfounded as my husbands father has never had a bad word to say about her).

My dad said to me when I was 15 years old that he would never had stayed with her, had he known that she ‘would never get better’. He has also always referred to her as being ‘sick’. She has seen a number of therapists throughout her life but it never seem to make any difference and my dad says its like ‘throwing money into a fire’ and she will never get better and will never change. He has completely given up and now that they are both retired, he finds it really stressful to spend so much time with her (before he worked 6 days a week). She has violent raging rows where she attacks my dad verbally. Afterwards she will cry and seek his consolation. Her moods and behaviour seem to come in waves and one never quite knows how she will be. I get so agitated when I see a call from her and have to brace myself to answer. Once I have spoken to her and have managed to get through the call, I can breathe a deep sigh of relief. I find myself being constantly worried/stressed/anxious and I really struggle with my sense of self. On one hand I am a strong cookie because of everything she has put me through, but at the other hand – I get episodes where I feel so weak, depressed and sad and don’t know how to get out of those feelings. I have often thought that I won’t be able to relax until she’s dead. It really worries me what would happen if my dad died before her.

She is currently on antidepressants, anti-anxiety and sleep medications (she is an insomniac). She has only ever been treated by her family doctor, and she once said to me a 10 years ago that she wishes that someone would have taken her to the psychology emergency room when she was at her worst – but that was a fleeting comment made once...

I guess my main questions are these.
My mum shows a lot of signs of BPD but she doesn’t really have any extreme impulsiveness/reckless behaviour and she has never attempted suicide (although threatened it a number of times). She is more of the anxious/depressive kind rather than raging (except towards my dad who gets all the rage – she is also generally always angry at men). I can identify intensely with at least 5 of the diagnostic criteria, but she doesn’t seem as extreme as others with BPD might be? Many people outside of our family would never think there was anything ‘wrong’ with her, she doesn’t show those sides to anyone outside of the family. Does it sound like BPD and if so, should I let my brother and my dad know of my new found knowledge?

My other question is this: how do I deal with the constant stress and worry in my life about what my mum will throw my way? She has always got negative ideas about me and my life including my husband and she is always saying that I am either depressed, over worked, stressed, my husband is bad or something similar to try to bring me down. I feel like she sees right through me and it takes SO much energy to keep the façade up and to not loose face, to the point where I feel like it really impacts my life. I have been in therapy before to get some help on how to set up boundaries with her and how to address her accusations – but I still feel like I have not really come to terms with it. I also keep slipping back into the role of saving her, over and over again. Would you recommend therapy again now that I have made the discovery that she might be suffering from BPD? I feel like I skipped a step, I learnt some tools and they really help keeping it at bay and not making interacting with her worse, but they take a huge emotional toll on me.

I feel lost and would really appreciate your help. It has taken me so long to even work up the courage to write this, I live in perpetual fear that she will find this post – I feel like everything in our relationship is a lie and it makes me sick to my stomach. I moved to another country when I was 19 years old and manage to keep my distance that way (it was a life changing experience for me to live so far away from her and changed my life forever for the good), but she still has a hold over me, even though we are in separate countries and I dread a visit from her for months.

Thank you so much for reading ALL this way. You have no idea how much I appreciate it. Thank you. 

[Lovingyouishard]

Hi everyone, this is my first post... .feels nerve wrecking but I am proud of myself for finally having the courage to write this... .brace youself, this is long... .

I will never forget the day when I was 16 years old and sitting in class, it was Psychology 101 and I remember first reading about borderline personality disorder. It was like being hit by lightning and I thought to myself “This is my mother!”.

Fast forward 16 years... I am now 32 years old, I suspect my mother suffers from BPD. When I first read about BPD all those years ago, I promptly put it to one side in my brain and never thought about it or really heard about it again since then. I don’t know why I blocked it out, but I went to therapy at 4 different times in those 16 years since just to learn how to deal with my mum, but for some reason I didn’t believe she would ever be considered someone who had a diagnosed condition and it was never something I talked to therapists about especially – I would usually say that she wasn’t well but not defining it more than that– I also always thought it was all in my head.

Just a few weeks ago, that moment in school came back to me clearly, when I saw a poster at the local grocery store - “Do you support someone with Borderline personality disorder?”. I took a photo of the poster and went home and started researching and here we are, almost a month later.

So let me tell you about my mum...

She grew up on a farm and was raised by a single mother with 3 kids and they were very poor. My mother’s father abandoned his family when my mum was 4 years old. My mum finally left home to live in a different city and her mum (my grandmother) threatened suicide if she moved away, but my mum did anyways.

My mum went on to work as a bookkeeper, met my dad and had two kids. During my childhood, I didn’t really think too much of my mothers issues until I turned 14 years old: My mum was leaving work one day and she couldn’t find her bike (even though it was there right in front of her) and had a mental break down and had to call my dad to come and pick her up. It was like she changed over night. She was diagnosed with “burn out” and depression and spent the following 3-5 years in bed, too depressed & anxious to do anything or function properly. My dad turned to working a lot, and I took on a lot of responsibilities for our home, such as cleaning and laundry. During this time, I started noticing my mother displaying a lot of signs of what I now know could be BPD such as fear of abandonment, splitting between hating/loving people, suicide threats, frequent mood swings & hollow/empty feeling. She would tell me all about her feelings and treated me like a friend instead of a child. She didn’t partake in any reckless/self-harm behaviour other than her own torment towards herself.

For the past 20 years, here are some of her behaviours that I believe might be reason to suspect BPD:

My mum says that I am the reason she is alive and that if it wasn’t for me, she would not be alive today. She has threatened suicide but has thankfully never tried.
She refers to me as if I am her. She talks about “you and me we are just the same” and will always say “you and me who often feel depressed” or “you and me who are very sensitive”(this is without me ever having offered up to her that I have ever had feelings of depression or in any way being sensitive). She has even given me a number of self-help books that she thinks I should read because she believes I need them to help me better deal with life (without ever having given her any idea that I am in need of any help!)
She puts me on a pedestal but will always try to bring me down and make me upset (but ultimately I cant do anything wrong according to my dad) but she is constantly angry at my dad for a new reason every week, he cant do anything right. My brother keeps her at arms length and even though they live in the same town, he only sees her a few times a year and she is very upset that he is not present in her life, which I believe puts even more pressure on me.
She criticised me through out my childhood for my weight (I was mildly overweight) and always told me “don’t eat that, you will get fat” and worried a lot about my physical appearance and also always said “you and me who are overweight”.
She always thinks the worst about every situation and when I got promoted, she asked if I was given another job because I couldn’t handle the job duties of my previous role. She didn’t think I was actually promoted. She isn’t quite comfortable with the fact that I have gone on to have a successful career, she worries that I have ‘changed’ and that I will ‘become too stressed to function’.
She always tells me that surely I love her more than my father (and when I tell her that I love them both equally – she will say “but don’t you love me more?” in a sort of fake-crying/laughing way and tries to force me to say yes).
She doesn’t let my father visit me, but she demand to visit me at least 3 times a year. She doesn’t allow me to have my own relationship with my father and if I call him, she gets jealous and asks why I called him. We then have to think of a practical reason, such as me needing practical advice on a topic that my mother doesn’t know anything about.
My mother has angrily demanded to know when my husband and I are having children. She says its really unfair to her and to her future grand children as she says she thinks she will develop dementia any moment (no signs of it according to her doctor) and its so unfair to her unborn grand children that they didn’t get to see their grand mother before she died. She thinks we are being selfish and that we are being cruel to her and that if we don’t have children soon, she will have to find someone else’s children to be around and babysit to fill that void. (I have not disclosed to her that my husband and I are battling infertility. Its stressing me out beyond words to worry about another one of her attacks that could come at any moment. This breaks my heart – its clear she doesn’t really care about me, its always just about her).
I cannot be myself around my mother and I have to put up a mask when I talk to her. If I do not provide emotional support for her, she thinks I don’t love her and that I will abandon her and will cry and cry and cry. She treats me like I am her parent/friend/therapist and she relies on me to feel better when she is anxious/depressed/feel hollow & worthless.
I cannot show my mother any feelings of anger/sadness of my own, as then I will hear about it for years afterwards. I once showed her the tiniest bit of anger about 8 years ago and it took her 5 years of constant reminders that “you don’t really love me” until she finally stopped.
I also cant tell her about anything important or worrying, as she basically cant cope with that OR makes it all about her. I had a kidney infection and was in the ER and she called me the same day and said she was also experiencing pain in her kidneys and thought it was best to go to the doctor to have it looked up to make sure she doesn’t have a kidney infection too. The next day she said that it was a bit silly that she had said that, but she said ‘that’s because you and me are like one person and when you are ill, I feel ill too’.

My mother and work/friends
My mother was out of work for 7 years after her break down but then managed to keep down a part time job, working 2-3 days a week as a book keeper for about 10-13 years or so until she retired but even then, it would make her incredibly stressed, worried and exhausted. She would constantly be complaining of some sort of illness, she was always sick with something and if it wasn’t her head, then it was her foot or her ankle or her back or her stomach.
She would love a job at first sight and really love her co-workers/boss but eventually they would all turn horrible and show their real sides and she would hate the job and her colleagues who were usually said to be unsupportive & cruel. In all of her jobs, she would frequently have outbursts that she couldn’t control if something was worrying her or if someone had made her upset in front of large groups of people or one to one. She was finally offered early retirement from the company she was most recently at and her boss said “I cannot stand having you around anymore, we can’t deal with you anymore”. She took early retirement (she is in her early 60s).
She has a number of friends and puts a hugely value on these friendships to make her feel better, but she falls in and out of love with each person – they are either in her good books and are ‘absolutely amazing and are the most amazing friend to her’ or they have turned out to be really not nice and therefore not worthy of friendship anymore. Usually it starts with her becoming friends with someone and absolutely idolising them only to a year later, saying that they had betrayed her or disappointed her and either finishing the friendship or letting the friendship dwindle. This has been a pattern for as long as I can remember. She started out loving my husbands parents, but then quickly said my husbands father didn’t like her and that she therefore didn’t like them anymore and didn’t want to see them (completely unfounded as my husbands father has never had a bad word to say about her).

My dad said to me when I was 15 years old that he would never had stayed with her, had he known that she ‘would never get better’. He has also always referred to her as being ‘sick’. She has seen a number of therapists throughout her life but it never seem to make any difference and my dad says its like ‘throwing money into a fire’ and she will never get better and will never change. He has completely given up and now that they are both retired, he finds it really stressful to spend so much time with her (before he worked 6 days a week). She has violent raging rows where she attacks my dad verbally. Afterwards she will cry and seek his consolation. Her moods and behaviour seem to come in waves and one never quite knows how she will be. I get so agitated when I see a call from her and have to brace myself to answer. Once I have spoken to her and have managed to get through the call, I can breathe a deep sigh of relief. I find myself being constantly worried/stressed/anxious and I really struggle with my sense of self. On one hand I am a strong cookie because of everything she has put me through, but at the other hand – I get episodes where I feel so weak, depressed and sad and don’t know how to get out of those feelings. I have often thought that I won’t be able to relax until she’s dead. It really worries me what would happen if my dad died before her.

She is currently on antidepressants, anti-anxiety and sleep medications (she is an insomniac). She has only ever been treated by her family doctor, and she once said to me a 10 years ago that she wishes that someone would have taken her to the psychology emergency room when she was at her worst – but that was a fleeting comment made once...

I guess my main questions are these.
My mum shows a lot of signs of BPD but she doesn’t really have any extreme impulsiveness/reckless behaviour and she has never attempted suicide (although threatened it a number of times). She is more of the anxious/depressive kind rather than raging (except towards my dad who gets all the rage – she is also generally always angry at men). I can identify intensely with at least 5 of the diagnostic criteria, but she doesn’t seem as extreme as others with BPD might be? Many people outside of our family would never think there was anything ‘wrong’ with her, she doesn’t show those sides to anyone outside of the family. Does it sound like BPD and if so, should I let my brother and my dad know of my new found knowledge?

My other question is this: how do I deal with the constant stress and worry in my life about what my mum will throw my way? She has always got negative ideas about me and my life including my husband and she is always saying that I am either depressed, over worked, stressed, my husband is bad or something similar to try to bring me down. I feel like she sees right through me and it takes SO much energy to keep the façade up and to not loose face, to the point where I feel like it really impacts my life. I have been in therapy before to get some help on how to set up boundaries with her and how to address her accusations – but I still feel like I have not really come to terms with it. I also keep slipping back into the role of saving her, over and over again. Would you recommend therapy again now that I have made the discovery that she might be suffering from BPD? I feel like I skipped a step, I learnt some tools and they really help keeping it at bay and not making interacting with her worse, but they take a huge emotional toll on me.

I feel lost and would really appreciate your help. It has taken me so long to even work up the courage to write this, I live in perpetual fear that she will find this post – I feel like everything in our relationship is a lie and it makes me sick to my stomach. I moved to another country when I was 19 years old and manage to keep my distance that way (it was a life changing experience for me to live so far away from her and changed my life forever for the good), but she still has a hold over me, even though we are in separate countries and I dread a visit from her for months.

Thank you so much for reading ALL this way. You have no idea how much I appreciate it. Thank you. 

[Turkish]

Hi Lovingyouishard,

To start near the end,  if you feel it is right to seek a professional to talk to,  then it's a good idea.  He or she may not agree with your thought of BPD. I would develop a r/s of mutual trust with the T first before suggesting it.  That being said,  the Dx isn't what we need to deal with, but rather the behaviors. 

"Enmeshment" is a term which denotes a pathology.  From what you wrote,  it sounds like she has been enmeshed with you for many years,  yet on the other hand,  you are differentiated enough to not be so with her.  That is despite your frustration,  anxiety and even pain.

Have you seen this article at the top of the board?

https://bpdfamily.com/content/was-part-your-childhood-deprived-emotional-incest

I understand that the pressure to have children is great... .a great guilt.  I was the recipient of it for years.  At could talk about the implications of that later.  I just wanted to say hi first.



Turkish

[Kwamina]

Hi Lovingyouishard

I am glad you joined our site. I know how hard it can be making that first post, I have been there too and I am glad I did join because participating on this forum with others who have similar experiences has been a great source of support and I hope it will also be to you

Though there are often many similarities, each person with BPD is still different and the disorder can manifest itself in various ways. Not all people with BPD exhibit all of the diagnostic criteria and even when they do exhibit certain criteria, the extent can still vary. We cannot diagnose people here, but from the stories on these boards you will see that are similarities and also differences, most important thing though are the problematic behaviors/traits you witness, regardless of the exact label used to describe our disordered family-members.

To help you deal with the stres and worry, it might help to practice mindfulness/meditation. This can help you keep your mind focused on the present and stay more calm. Have you perhaps ever tried this before?

Welcome to bpdfamily

The Board Parrot

[Lovingyouishard]

Hi Lovingyouishard,

To start near the end,  if you feel it is right to seek a professional to talk to,  then it's a good idea.  He or she may not agree with your thought of BPD. I would develop a r/s of mutual trust with the T first before suggesting it.  That being said,  the Dx isn't what we need to deal with, but rather the behaviors. 

"Enmeshment" is a term which denotes a pathology.  From what you wrote,  it sounds like she has been enmeshed with you for many years,  yet on the other hand,  you are differentiated enough to not be so with her.  That is despite your frustration,  anxiety and even pain.

Have you seen this article at the top of the board?

https://bpdfamily.com/content/was-part-your-childhood-deprived-emotional-incest

I understand that the pressure to have children is great... .a great guilt.  I was the recipient of it for years.  At could talk about the implications of that later.  I just wanted to say hi first.



Turkish

Thank you Turkish for your response. The article you linked to has my mother and I down to a T. It really helped me see my childhood and upbringing for what it was. Thank you also for highlighting that the diagnosis isn't the most important thing here... I think my first instinct is to want a diagnosis in order to feel entitled to post, in order to feel entitled to my feelings... .I am realising now after reading many posts and reading about FOG that this is probably quite symptomatic for a child of a parent with suspected BPD... the more I read though, the more I realise that the diagnosis itself will not magically change our relationship or situation.

I am sorry to hear that you also felt the guilt from your BPD parent to have children... .its hard as it is on your own with your own guilt, but then someone else's on top of that too... !

Thank you so much for all your kinds words. Just joining this forum has helped immensely. Thank you! 

[Lovingyouishard]

Hi Lovingyouishard

I am glad you joined our site. I know how hard it can be making that first post, I have been there too and I am glad I did join because participating on this forum with others who have similar experiences has been a great source of support and I hope it will also be to you

Though there are often many similarities, each person with BPD is still different and the disorder can manifest itself in various ways. Not all people with BPD exhibit all of the diagnostic criteria and even when they do exhibit certain criteria, the extent can still vary. We cannot diagnose people here, but from the stories on these boards you will see that are similarities and also differences, most important thing though are the problematic behaviors/traits you witness, regardless of the exact label used to describe our disordered family-members.

To help you deal with the stres and worry, it might help to practice mindfulness/meditation. This can help you keep your mind focused on the present and stay more calm. Have you perhaps ever tried this before?

Welcome to bpdfamily

The Board Parrot

Thank you for your wonderful words Kwamina! I am amazed at the kindness from everyone on this board.
I think you are so right, the exact diagnosis isnt whats important - its dealing with the person. The more I read too, I realise that my mother used to have a lot worse symptoms when she was younger (suicide threats), but they dont come as often now. Perhaps she's mellowing a bit, and instead of enjoying that - I am quite hung up on the past, and worries I have from the past of what she was like at her worst - which I can hopefully start to heal from and move on from. The FOG is real... that I know for sure now!

I do practice mindfulness, yoga & meditation and I find that it helps a bit to manage the situation, but I might need to see a therapist just to get a little boost. I have not seen anyone for a number of years now, and so it might be time for a "top up".

Thank you again for your encouraging words. All the best to you 

[Kwamina]

Hi again Lovingyouishard

I am quite hung up on the past, and worries I have from the past of what she was like at her worst - which I can hopefully start to heal from and move on from.

Processing and coming to terms with the past can be very challenging when you were raised by a BPD parent. Do you perhaps feel like your past, particularly when your mother was at her worst, has left you traumatized?

Having a support network in place can be invaluable and a therapist has for many of our members been an important part of their support network.