Guest guest Posted June 24, 2012 Report Share Posted June 24, 2012 Hello. I'm grateful to have found this site. I'm just wondering if anyone has knowledge of what the undesirable effects are on grown children of BPDs? My positives are that I am very resilient, capable of taking care of myself, and find it easy (after working on it for ten years) to set boundaries with my NADA. But I'm trying to understand how my ubringing affects how I relate to others, especially my spouse. I find myself always questioning if what he says is true (as in, he says he's not mad at me, but I think he might be anyway), needing a fair amount of verbal approval, and the slightest raising of a voice triggers me. I can't stand it. For years I have been patting myself on the back for surviving life with a BPD with " no effects. " Ha! Realizing this isn't exactly true. Any thoughts appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 25, 2012 Report Share Posted June 25, 2012 If often think about the negative behavior and other fleas I picked up from me FADA.....  The ones you mention in particular. I still sometimes get emotionally bent out of shape when people are upset with me.  But I think that's b/c anger was something that when expressed by the FADA, was coupled with physical or verbal abuse.  Anger itself doesn't necessarily need to be coupled with abuse, but I had come to associate the two.  I've tried to disassociate anger and abuse in order to de-condition myself to my emotional response.  But finding a relationship where I can feel both the target of anger, and also safe has proven difficult. As for questioning peoples honesty.  Part of me still does that.  I often used to wonder what reason does anyone have to ever be honest....  I believe this is also a flea from my FADA's gas lighting.  Personally, I try really hard to avoid lying b/c I'd rather feel understood than whatever else lying would provide me with. Feeling " understood " is something that my FADA just didn't get, and I didn't either until recently.  I think people that were raised by emotionally healthy people intuitively get that " feeling understood " thing, and don't worry as much as I do about being lied to. (Those word fleas is cool and all, but the words " infected psyche " resonates more with me.  Or something else that's infectious, like " Alien " , Zombies, or Vampires.) ________________________________ To: WTOAdultChildren1 Sent: Sunday, June 24, 2012 10:07 PM Subject: Effects of BPD Mom  Hello. I'm grateful to have found this site. I'm just wondering if anyone has knowledge of what the undesirable effects are on grown children of BPDs? My positives are that I am very resilient, capable of taking care of myself, and find it easy (after working on it for ten years) to set boundaries with my NADA. But I'm trying to understand how my ubringing affects how I relate to others, especially my spouse. I find myself always questioning if what he says is true (as in, he says he's not mad at me, but I think he might be anyway), needing a fair amount of verbal approval, and the slightest raising of a voice triggers me. I can't stand it. For years I have been patting myself on the back for surviving life with a BPD with " no effects. " Ha! Realizing this isn't exactly true. Any thoughts appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 25, 2012 Report Share Posted June 25, 2012 Here's a short list of possibilities off the top of my head. It is by no means exhaustive: depression anxiety PTSD chronic fatigue or physical ailments, such as fibromyalgia " mind-reading " (assuming you know--or should know--what other people are thinking or feeling) conflict avoidance (instead of talking/working through it) co-dependence and a need to be the " helper " or " fixer " thinking other people's moods are your fault or your responsibility passive-aggression negative self-view; the other alternative is unhealthy narcissism perfectionism/procrastination inability to say " no " other " fleas " (learned BPD behaviors), such as: black-and-white thinking (all or nothing)/splitting (people are alternately idealized or devalued) fear of abandonment impulsivity labile moods little sense of one's individual identity lax interpersonal boundaries etc. How about those? Any of those sound familiar? Sveta Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 25, 2012 Report Share Posted June 25, 2012 Oh wow. Yes, that was very helpful. Topping my list would be mind-reading, feeling responsible for the mood of others, inability to say no, a bit of B&W thinking, lax interpersonal boundaries (have improved greatly), and overactive fantasy life, and can be a bit impulsive. Must get to work on fixing these.... Thank you, Beth > > > Here's a short list of possibilities off the top of my head. It is by no means exhaustive: > > depression > anxiety > PTSD > chronic fatigue or physical ailments, such as fibromyalgia > > " mind-reading " (assuming you know--or should know--what other people are thinking or feeling) > conflict avoidance (instead of talking/working through it) > co-dependence and a need to be the " helper " or " fixer " > thinking other people's moods are your fault or your responsibility > passive-aggression > negative self-view; the other alternative is unhealthy narcissism > perfectionism/procrastination > inability to say " no " > > other " fleas " (learned BPD behaviors), such as: > black-and-white thinking (all or nothing)/splitting (people are alternately idealized or devalued) > fear of abandonment > impulsivity > labile moods > little sense of one's individual identity > lax interpersonal boundaries > etc. > > How about those? Any of those sound familiar? > > Sveta > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 26, 2012 Report Share Posted June 26, 2012 Like you, the positive side is that I'm resilient from being shuffled around from one school to another (14 in 12 years), one male person in the household to another, one city to another. And I am fine being alone, entertaining myself since I grew up doing that. Some things that are negative are: I don't enjoy being hugged by people, it feels like I'm trapped. I get pretty angry if I think someone is telling me how to run my life; it feels like my nada controlling me again. I tend to think in terms of " should. " I catch myself thinking I should do this, should do that; my whole life was geared to doing what nada wanted/demanded. I strive very hard to not cry or show too much emotion to others; my feelings/thoughts were not allowed as I was growing up. The plus side of that is that most of my friends think I'm very serene, calm under pressure. LOL Inside of me is another story. > > Hello. I'm grateful to have found this site. I'm just wondering if anyone has knowledge of what the undesirable effects are on grown children of BPDs? My positives are that I am very resilient, capable of taking care of myself, and find it easy (after working on it for ten years) to set boundaries with my NADA. But I'm trying to understand how my ubringing affects how I relate to others, especially my spouse. I find myself always questioning if what he says is true (as in, he says he's not mad at me, but I think he might be anyway), needing a fair amount of verbal approval, and the slightest raising of a voice triggers me. I can't stand it. For years I have been patting myself on the back for surviving life with a BPD with " no effects. " Ha! Realizing this isn't exactly true. > > Any thoughts appreciated. > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 28, 2012 Report Share Posted June 28, 2012 I understand exactly what you mean > > > > Hello. I'm grateful to have found this site. I'm just wondering if anyone has knowledge of what the undesirable effects are on grown children of BPDs? My positives are that I am very resilient, capable of taking care of myself, and find it easy (after working on it for ten years) to set boundaries with my NADA. But I'm trying to understand how my ubringing affects how I relate to others, especially my spouse. I find myself always questioning if what he says is true (as in, he says he's not mad at me, but I think he might be anyway), needing a fair amount of verbal approval, and the slightest raising of a voice triggers me. I can't stand it. For years I have been patting myself on the back for surviving life with a BPD with " no effects. " Ha! Realizing this isn't exactly true. > > > > Any thoughts appreciated. > > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 28, 2012 Report Share Posted June 28, 2012 I think, aside from the ptsd some of us have, that a bpd or npd parent affects the way we think and see the world. I know it's in all the bpd literature that they have cognitive distortions--black and white thinking and so on. But it seems to me they typically have whole belief systems that are both incorrect and self-serving. As children and as people just spending a lot of time with them, it seems to me we probably end up absorbing our end of that flawed belief system. For example, many bpds and npds both believe they are entitled to take what they want from others and that the usual rules don't apply to them. Some of them additionally have a strong belief that they are emotionally deprived. These individuals believe that they aren't getting enough from other people and from life in general and they have a right to demand it. I think this sets up a lot of KOs to be rescuers. Some nadas/fadas will also criticize their children's every action, which sets the child up to have unrealistically high standards for their own performance or to feel in some indescrible way permanently flawed. Others will abuse and demean only one child in a family, making that child feel isolated and alone. The child may later believe no one will help or understand and find it difficult to reach out to others or to know who to confide it. I was interested when I looked up some information on early maladaptive schemas to see some of the same kinds of belief systems I grew up around and also hear about second-hand from other bpd survivors. Schema theory lists 18 different schemas. I recognize 15 of them as being things that seemed to be behind nada's actions. About half of them are ways of thinking I recognize in myself as having now or have had at one time. Luc Reid has some very interesting blog postings on this if you want to read more about them. I'm not advocating any particular kind of therapy over another, but I did find it interesting to see ideas I'd had for a long time delineated clearly in writing by someone else. I've known for a while I had ideas about life that are wrong and need to be taken apart, and the clarity helps make that a little less daunting. The ptsd is the first layer of the damage, but underneath is this other damage that has a much more complicated and longer-lasting effect. Those are the bigger " fleas " --couch-sized fleas... Take care, Ashana Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 28, 2012 Report Share Posted June 28, 2012 Me too. Though the resiliency for me is also the inability to be vulnerable. But yes all those good counter-dependent self reliant traits. I have learned to enjoy hugs and not recoil from physical contact but must not be surprised. V serene on outside and roiling inside w occasional outbursts of ire on the side. Sent from my iPhone Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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