I think my mom has BDP
I am 28 years old still currently living with my mother.
My mother has had a terrible life growing up having to deal with various amounts and kinds of trauma. We have had bad fights all my life growing up and we get past them.
Tonight was the worst night in recent memory. My mom hasn't been feeling well the last couple days and was having a hard time at work. Today I got home for work bringing her some soup and as I was in her room letting her eat I noticed it was really hot and I attempted to turn the temperature down via the app on her phone but she had gotten logged out and didn't know her password, I started the process of resetting her password. She told me not to worry about it right then but I continued, I think that triggered her, because suddenly she started saying I was being selfish wanting to change the temperature for me and that making it colder would make her feel worse. At this point I was no longer going to change the temperature I just wanted to finish getting her app set back up for the future but she wouldn't accept that answer. She told me get out of her room and take the soup with me. I didn't I stubbornly stayed and honestly made the situation worse and she resorted to threatening to harm herself if I didn't leave or throw the soup across the room making a mess and I physically intervened to stop her from doing that for about 15 min. Before I gave up and left her alone.
Later in the night she came in stating she was going to " disturb me like I did to her" and by that she attempted to violently rip out the wires in my brand new computer potentially permanently damaging so I ended up having to restrain her from physically Breaking my things and we struggled and she ended up falling and hurting herself and after laying on the floor for a few minutes she proceeded to literally drag herself across the floor unable to stand up on her own absolutely refusing any assistance from me and I followed her as she drug herself all the way from my room up the stairs to her room all the while attempting to help her with her biting pushing and hitting me every time I tried to help when she finally got into her bed all she would say is " get out of my room" now I don't know what is going to happen in the morning. and I am scared
Hi there!
Before I begin, remember that if you or your mother’s safety is ever in danger to please contact your local authorities or a domestic violence hotline.
Also it is very difficult to diagnose someone without professional expertise because she may be showing signs that are similar to BPD but it could be something entirely different so it would make it difficult to receive the proper treatments that she needs. It’s a really difficult thing to offer therapy to someone as it can be taken as an insult, however remind her that your coming from a place of love and concern and that you want her to feel better.
For what you can do, maybe try spending quality time with your mother. You could take walks together or have deeper conversations about her life and try to find out what could be a reason or trigger for her behaviors, or you could even suggest meditation together. I’ll tell you, my mother would get very upset with me if I didn’t pick up the phone immediately and that would make me really angry but she told me that her father had died in his sleep and so that trauma has given her the paranoia that if I didn’t answer that I was dead, so maybe try to parse that kind of information out of your mother.
If you find that difficult, you could also try to figure out by yourself what triggers her. In your story about the soup, you now realized that you may have been a bit stubborn in staying in her room when she told you to leave, so maybe next time you could try to choose the path of least resistance. Something that I studied when I was dealing with these issues with my mother was Stoicism. I would definitely look up some material on that subject for yourself that could you out personally to better cope with the situation.
Good luck to you and stay safe!