A Nationwide Indirect Recovery Program for Childhood Survivors of a BPD Parent

[Guest guest]

I joined this group and 2005 and I can't tell you how helpful it has been to

have had the experience strength and hope that you all provided me as I took my

fall down the rabbit hole. Some of you I've flown to meet have become like old

war buddies. I've gone into recovery and have done retreats & therapy to the

ends of the earth and I have arrived at the below which has smashed my looking

glass with nothing but love and reality.

http://www.adultchildren.org/

I recently ran across a place where children of BPD's can go for recovery. It's

called ACA, its a nationwide 12 step that focuses on adult children of

alcoholics and dysfunctional families. The meetings that I've been too are

packed with child survivors of BPD's. It seems to be a strong current of healing

that is taking on its own movement, much like how Al-anon arrived as a product

of AA, however alcohol use is not a qualifier in any part of the family. The

program book has been my solution around all the disorders and addictions that

has accompanied the PSTDed adult child such as myself. Therapy and other twelve

steps help stabilize, yet this program develops the major highway to heal the

PTSD (Body, flight, freeze), 14 Traits (Mind) and Inner child (Spirit).

Many of us found that we had several characteristics in common as a result of

being brought up in dysfunctional households.

We had come to feel isolated, and uneasy with other people, especially authority

figures. To protect ourselves, we became people pleasers, even though we lost

our own identities in the process. All the same we would mistake any personal

criticism as a threat.

We either became alcoholics/dyfunctional ourselves, married them, or both.

Failing that, we found other compulsive personalities, such as a workaholic, to

fulfill our sick need for abandonment.

We lived life from the standpoint of victims. Having an over developed sense of

responsibility, we preferred to be concerned with others rather than ourselves.

We got guilt feelings when we trusted ourselves, giving in to others. We became

reactors rather than actors, letting others take the initiative.

We were dependent personalities, terrified of abandonment, willing to do almost

anything to hold on to a relationship in order not to be abandoned emotionally.

We keep choosing insecure relationships because they matched our childhood

relationship with alcoholic or dysfunctional parents.

These symptoms of the family disease of alcoholism or other dysfunction made us

'co-victims', those who take on the characteristics of the disease without

necessarily ever taking a drink. We learned to keep our feelings down as

children and keep them buried as adults. As a result of this conditioning, we

often confused love with pity, tending to love those we could rescue.

Even more self-defeating, we became addicted to excitement in all our affairs,

preferring constant upset to workable solutions.

This is a description, not an indictment.

As ACA becomes a safe place for you, you will find freedom to express all the

hurts and fears that you have keep inside and to free yourself from the shame

and blame that are carry-overs from the past. You will become an adult who is

imprisoned no longer by childhood reactions. You will recover the child within

you, learning to love and accept yourself.

The healing begins when we risk moving out of isolation. Feelings and buried

memories will return. By gradually releasing the burden of unexpressed grief, we

slowly move out of the past. We learn to re-parent ourselves with gentleness,

humor, love and respect.

This process allows us to see our biological parents as the instruments of our

existence. Our actual parent is a Higher Power whom some of us choose to call

God. Although we had alcoholic or dysfunctional parents, our Higher Power gave

us the Twelve Steps of Recovery.

This is the action and work that heals us: we use the Steps; we use the

meetings; we use the telephone. We share our experience, strength, and hope with

each other. We learn to restructure our sick thinking one day at a time. When we

release our parents from responsibility for our actions today, we become free to

make healthful decisions as actors, not reactors. We progress from hurting, to

healing, to helping. We awaken to a sense of wholeness we never knew was

possible.

By attending these meetings on a regular basis, you will come to see parental

alcoholism or family dysfunction for what it is: a disease that infected you as

a child and continues to affect you as an adult. You will learn to keep the

focus on yourself in the here and now. You will take responsibility for your own

life and supply your own parenting.

You will not do this alone. Look around you and you will see others who know how

you feel. We love and encourage you no matter what. We ask you accept us just as

we accept you.

This is a spiritual program based on action coming from love. We are sure that

as the love grows inside you, you will see beautiful changes in all your

relationships, especially with your Higher Power, yourself, and your parents.

We will discover our real identities by loving and accepting ourselves.

Our self-esteem will increase as we give ourselves approval on a daily basis.

Fear of authority figures and the need to " people-please " will leave us.

Our ability to share intimacy will grow inside us.

As we face our abandonment issues, we will be attracted by strengths and become

more tolerant of weaknesses.

We will enjoy feeling stable, peaceful, and financially secure.

We will learn how to play and have fun in our lives.

We will choose to love people who can love and be responsible for themselves.

Healthy boundaries and limits will become easier for us to set.

Fears of failures and success will leave us, as we intuitively make healthier

choices.

With help from our ACA support group, we will slowly release our dysfunctional

behaviors.

Gradually, with our Higher Power's help, we learn to expect the best and get it.

Thank you all for the love & support,

http://www.adultchildren.org/