POLL: Adopted or Biological

[StressedOutDaily]

Just curious...
Did your BPD child join your family through adoption or are they your biological child?

Our BPDd 16 was adopted - domestic adoption, we do not know much about her biological family

Our objective is to better understand the struggles our child faces and to learn the skills to improve our relationship and provide a supportive environment and also improve on our own emotional responses, attitudes and effectiveness as a family leaders

[GaGrl]

My husband and his first wife adopted the ex's niece from a rural village in an Asian country. The niece was almost 14 when she was adopted. DH's ex is full-blown uNPD/BPD. The adopted daughter has traits, but I have not seen her in outbursts of episodes that appear to be a PD.

In our case, we know a lot about three generations to know there is both a genetic and nurture situation going on there.

[stampingt1]

Stressedoutdaily,

Our BPD 18 son is ours biologically. The more that I read, I'm realizing that my dad had BPD & grew out of it. However, our son never saw my father acting like that.

ST1

[FaithHopeLove]

Our diagnosed DS24 is our biological child.

[Mr. Dake]

Our 16 year-old daughter we adopted through the state.  She came home at 2 months.  She has a mostly positive relationship with her bio mother and little brother, but no relationship with her bio father other than through letters.

[SkellyII]

My daughter is biological, however her mother, who also suffers from BPD was adopted. No clue as to her mother's background. She was put up for adoption as an infant.

[Only Human]

DD25 is my biological child. I was adopted at birth and know nothing significant about my bio-parents.

~ OH

[Turkish]

  Added a poll. Please vote even of you've posted (lurkers may not want to post).

I'm adopted and hung out with a lot of adopted families.  I know we can have attachment issues,  even if adopted very young as I was at 2.4 years.

[Only Human]

Thanks for the poll, Turk! 

~ OH

[StressedOutDaily]

Thanks for adding the poll!  I didn't know how to do that (or that it was even possible!) . 

[mggt]

We adopted our d at 5 days old.  Found out birthmother was on drugs the day we picked up our d from adoption agency. Cocaine was in our d system when she was born. Meaning birthmother had done drugs right before she gave birth.

Our objective is to better understand the struggles our child faces and to learn the skills to improve our relationship and provide a supportive environment and also improve on our own emotional responses, attitudes and effectiveness as a family leaders

[mamabolivia]

Father undiagnosed BPD, sister (who committed suicide at 24 undiagnosed BPD), daughter (21 YO) diagnosed BPD
All biological. I wish i could go further back to trace the genetical budren on my father's side...

[Mirsa]

My daughter is my natural child, but here's the family history (all undiagnosed)

1.  her Maternal great-grandfather:  probably Asperger's and a sexual abuser of his daughters, some kind of PD...he was gross, weird and scary
2.  her Maternal grandmother: uNP  
3.  her Maternal Aunt:  diagnosed bi-polar (my sister)
4.  her Maternal cousin:  aged 3, has all the classic signs:  charming and engaging, throws incredible tantrums, bites, hits when he doesn't get his way...not typical three year-old behavior, has been thrown out of multiple playgroups and daycare
5.  her father:  says he had a lot of BPD traits when younger, rage attacks, anxiety, OCD, ruminating though (funny he thinks he doesn't have these anymore!  

[twocrazycats]

I adopted my daughter from Romania. She was supposed to come home to us at 7 months, but due to the political situation, she ended up staying with her foster family in Romania until she was almost 2 years old. We know nothing about her birth family. Her foster family, however, was wonderful. We visited them twice over the years and they seem like loving, caring people. The foster father told me how he would carry her in his arms around their apartment at night when she would cry.

My daughter seemed happy and fine until she was about 9 or 10 years old. Around that time, she asked me how she got from her birth mother to her foster family. I thought she was ready to hear it, so I told her that her birth mother left her at the hospital (basically abandoned her), and the adoption agency took her from there and placed her with the foster family. At the time, I didn't see that that's when her problems began, but looking back, it seems clear. It seems she had this fantasy of the birth mother walking up to the foster mother and saying something like, "here, would you take care of my daughter? I'm not able to take care of a baby now." And that fantasy was shattered by my mistake of telling her the truth, although in an appropriate way for a 10 year old. It seemed like just anxiety for the first few years, but then when she was 12 and became interested in a boy, the lying, manipulating, blaming me for everything started. I must have read or seen something about BPD, because that's when I started seeing it in her. But my therapist at the time said they don't diagnose them that young. So I put the idea out of my mind.

For several years she had health problems and was very needy. She also had boyfriends who lived farther away, so she wasn't seeing them that much. But it wasn't until a few months ago when she started seeing another boyfriend who lives closer that everything has really exploded again. And only now, I'm looking back and wondering if it all started, or at least got triggered, when she found out that she actually was abandoned as an infant.

[Turkish]

twocrazycats,

It sounds like you were honest with your daughter that she was adopted before you told her the details.  My mother was also honest with me.  I always knew I was adopted.  I don't remember at what age she told me,  but my birth mother was an alcoholic and a drug addict.  She was adopted from an Indian reservation.  My white father struggled similarly.  My mom told me they gave me up as a baby because they couldn't take care of me and keep me safe.

We adoptees can be hard kids.  I've talked to others who pine away for, idealize, and obsess about their birth parents. I never did though I used to think,  "yeah, right they loved me.  They loved their drugs more." Despite being BPD herself, I always thought my mother spun my origins the best possible way.  My anger was my own. 

[twocrazycats]

Thank you, Turkish. I always appreciate hearing from adoptees. Yes, my daughter knew from the beginning that she was adopted. I always stressed how much I loved her birth country, and tried to keep connections to the country and language for her. I took her back to visit the foster family twice (they now treat us as part of their family) and also paid for a searcher to try to find her birth family. He found some of them but not the birth mother. I also taught myself enough Romanian to communicate with them. But I do think it just turned her world upside down when she found out she'd actually been abandoned (although I never used that word).

I had planned to take her back to Romania as a graduation gift this summer. But she's been so awful to me lately that I've decided not to. She ruined a trip to the UK last year to visit my son who was in grad school there. Money is too tight for me to pay for a trip to have it ruined, and I just can't reward the abuse I've taken with something that costly. Maybe someday, but not this year.