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Wavy Soul
USA
779 Posts |
 Posted - 01/13/2007 : 06:31:47
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Has anyone had the experience of living with someone with Borderline Personality Disorder? I am realizing that this is part of the root of my TMS. I just reread the book "Stop Walking on Eggshells," which is an excellent book for people who have a BPD person in their life. It was very helpful in cognitively getting me to see what has been subtly and not so subtly bothering me - or my unconscious - my whole life.
One of the descriptions of a BPD is someone who is overtly or covertly communicating "I hate you, don't leave me." They will put you on a pedestal and then knock you off, in a big way. The other person, for a BPD, is all good or all bad, often in quick succession. You can't win an argument or even have a discussion with a BPD. They are like a politician who has realized that the way to go is to just keep repeating the same lie, and even if people know it's a lie, if they continue denying it, they somehow prevail.
A BPD is like a major toxin - they can make you crazy. It's similar to living with an alcoholic. If anyone has ever been to AlAnon, where the people who live with alcoholics go, you may have noticed that the people there are not in good physical shape. They tend to be overweight or sick. Whereas if you go to AA, there are lots of skinny, attractive, well-dressed people. They may die of liver disease, or an accident, but are more likely to take others with them.
I'm mentioning all this because I am in the process of processing my TMS and realizing that this is a big part of it. My mother was BPD. It was a longterm, eroding process, to live with someone so intelligent yet so irrational and emotionally insane. It tied my emotional self in knots. This in turn enraged me, which led to longterm TMS, but was hard to unravel. This latest BPD piece has been part of my unravelling, although I'm in the middle of it as I write.
Life has brought me a couple of experiences recently that have kindly drawn my attention to what is going in inside me:
The other day I found myself dealing with a person who was having a borderline split. She was attacking me out of control, quite cleverly making out that I was responsible for her problems, her violent husband, etc. It became so abusive that I had to remove her from my space.
I got very traumatized, and cried for hours. This felt like a good thing, and I was hoping that it would help my current TMS manifestation, which is intense jaw and tooth pain
Then yesterday I had to take my cat to the vet in an emergency. The vet walked into the room angry and hostile, and treated my cat so roughly that she had a fit and he ended up trying to control her as though she was a wild lion, which she became. Of course I left as quickly as I could get her back from the back of the vet's fridge into her cage.
This also traumatized me. I have been up half the night with such intense pain I can't seem to take enough painkillers (I am very conservative about this). My kitty also seems a bit wraith-like, but she doesn't have insomnia like me.
The two things are helping me access my experiences with my mother, who was/is probably diagnosable as having borderline personality disorder. Right now she is declining into early Alzheimers, at 87, which is at times exacerbating these irrational tendencies, where she either thinks I am the light of the world, or the cause of all her problems, in quick succession.
Even in many decades of therapy and work on myself, I had not realized quite how much of an effect it had on me living with my mother as a child, especially after my dad left. Now that I am doing the more intense and accelerated healing of TMS work, I am realizing that the trauma from this was basically what made me ill for 30 years.
My current, very intense pain syndrome seems to be an opportunity to visit these feelings to complete them, along with these wonderful "growth opportunities," like my experiences with the crazy person and the vet, manifesting on the outside. I'm grateful that I have the chops to get OUT of situations like the above quite quickly and with dignity. But I wish I hadn't gotten INTO them.
I feel like roadkill.
xx
Love is the answer, whatever the question |
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alexis
USA
596 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2007 : 08:18:32
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| This is a question about your mother, not you. Is she taking any antidepressants or other medication that might that be helpful to her own psychological state? As I understand it, they are used to adress the irritability, aggression and depression of both BPD and and alzheimers...though I'm not an expert and only have the usual anecdotal evidence. I think most of us who have ever lived with people with alzheimers or related dementias (as I did in my late-childhood and teen years) will understand how the rules of the game change radically here. I'm really sorry you have to go through this, I do believe that this type of experience, that I have now lived through more than once, is one of the hardest there is. |
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Wavy Soul
USA
779 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2007 : 09:51:24
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This is a question about your mother, not you.
No it's really not about her. It's about the fact that living with her set me up for TMS.
I have found that naming her behavior has really helped me get a handle on why I would be so unconsciously enraged. This all helps me let go of thinking about the symptoms as though they mean anything.
Love is the answer, whatever the question |
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Littlebird
USA
391 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2007 : 13:16:22
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Welcome to the Twilight Zone. Others call it the Land of Oz. My best childhood friend and I called it the Twilight Zone because nothing is ever what it seems. We both had bpd moms, though mine was not as violent to us children as my friend's mom was to her. But mom tried to kill my dad several times, and we children had to intervene. Just when I think I'm getting a handle on the residual feelings, something like your post comes along and makes me cry, and I start to wonder again if this ever gets better. Both parents are gone now. My mom actually calmed down when she developed dementia, and I took care of her for the last 6 1/2 years of her life. But the dementia was also quite difficult to deal with. Not only did the really bad parts of Mom's personality go away, but so did most of the good parts, especially her intelligence. I felt like I was living with a stranger who looked like my mom, but wasn't. Now my husband has developed early onset dementia, and while it's not too bad yet it's so scary to know where we are headed.
The author of Stop Walking On Eggshells (SWOE) has a great forum for those who are, or have been, in any sort of relationship with a bpd. It's at www.bpdcentral.com, then use the link to "The Nook." It's a very active forum--lots of wounded people out there trying to deal with it. A couple of other books I've found helpful are Understanding the Borderline Mother, by Christine Ann Lawson, and Surviving a Borderline Parent, by Kimberlee Roth and Freda B. Friedman. The one by Lawson is best. The other one has some good info, but also makes a few suggestions that I felt could contribute to TMS, if followed.
I also just read a memoir called Siren's Dance - My Marriage to a Borderline, by Anthony Walker. He's a psychiatrist who married a borderline he met in the hospital, after one of her suicide attempts. He thought his love could heal her. Big mistake. I read the book because one of my grown son's is married to one also. My husband and I have a very difficult time dealing with her, and it's interfered with our relationship with our son and their two children. Our 4-year-old granddaughter is now showing the same sort of behavior. It's the first time I've ever felt afraid of a small child.
Shame on that vet! Hope your kitty is doing ok now.
Borderlines certainly are enraging. Even when you understand what they feel, it's just impossible not to be hurt by them in one way or another. Let us know how things go with visiting and completing the feelings and your jaw/tooth pain. |
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alexis
USA
596 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2007 : 14:23:07
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quote:
Originally posted by Wavy Soul
quote:
This is a question about your mother, not you.
No it's really not about her. It's about the fact that living with her set me up for TMS.
I have found that naming her behavior has really helped me get a handle on why I would be so unconsciously enraged. This all helps me let go of thinking about the symptoms as though they mean anything.
Love is the answer, whatever the question
Sorry, I meant my question was a question about your mother. I understood yours was about you. |
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Wavy Soul
USA
779 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2007 : 17:21:34
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Alexis - got it! Thanks for clarifying - I was feeling mildly "ungotten." Now I can read what you wrote again.
xx
Littlebird
Incredible - I will check out all those links and stay in touch.
And this:
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He thought his love could heal her. Big mistake.
AAARRRGGGHHH! Been there, done that (and I'm not talking about mom)!
Love is the answer, whatever the question |
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Borderline Personality Disorder
