My Broken Brain Breaks My Kids' Hearts
A roadtrip exposes the repair needed in relationships ruptured by BPD
“Mommy, when will you love me again?” asked my then 6 year old at bedtime.
The question hung in the air between us like a ghost.
It draped over me. My body went cold.
But my face felt hot.
The “I do,” I wanted to say was lodged in my dry throat.
The hug I wanted to give her was stuck in my numb arms.
You might think this was devastating. But it wasn’t the first time she’d expressed feeling unloved as the daughter of a mother with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD).
The broken brain
A quick internet search will tell you that:
People with BPD struggle with caregiving and any relationships that generate strong feelings, especially relationships that involve need and dependency. Like the parent-child relationship.
Mothers with BPD experience intense attachment to their babies, but are ambivalent about parenthood, often experience hostility toward their children, are challenged to recognize and meet children’s needs, and fear their distress and neediness.
Children of mothers with BPD experience them as controlling, inconsistent, volatile, suddenly engulfed in rage, unable to empathize.
Yep, that tracks.
The broken brain on stress
My daughter’s question came at the end of a grueling 10 hour road trip home from a vacation with family friends. I was the only driver and adult in the car.
The stress of this would have rattled even the most mentally stable, compassionate parent, causing them to question their parenting or feel guilty for losing their shit.
My BPD brain amplifies the questioning and guilt into worse case scenarios.
My daughter compulsively sucker-punching her older brother in the head multiple times throughout the trip with no regret means she’s turning into a mean girl, who will grow into a sociopathic narcissist.
And all present and future crimes committed by this little terrorist are my fault.
My son giving me looks that say, “Why can’t you keep her from hurting me?” means he’s going to need extensive therapy for PTSD and depression, become a drug addict, and commit suicide.
All my fault.
Cue mom guilt, shame, and devastation turned up until the emotional roar is deafening.
Amplified by the thought that I’m worthless not just as a parent but as a human being.
It’s always all ways all my fault
Into the ever more toxic cesspool of my increasingly stressed mind comes the intrusive thought of driving our SUV straight off the cliff, killing the three of us, ending all of our suffering.
But no need for a 5150, dear reader.
Ironically, the antidote to the vehicular murder-suicide fantasy is the aforementioned guilt, plus illogical reasoning. I would feel terrible (from the afterlife?) if I caused our friends and family to grieve our untimely demise.
That level of guilt somehow keeps me on track to keep our vehicle safely away from guardrails and nosedives. Keeps me safely on the surface of the toxic negative self-talk swamp that constantly threatens to engulf my broken brain. And is barfed all over my children when I feel distressed.
Warm love and cold wrath
I let my kids have chocolate torte when we stop for lunch. I cue up whatever songs they want on Spotify. I play road trip games with them.
Allow my daughter to unclick her seatbelt and stick her head out the window when driving slowly through towns.
Allow my son to play Wordle and Tetris on my phone.
They feel the warmth of my love.
And in the blink of their little blue eyes, there’s just too many big rigs on the road. The electronic video game music is annoying. The summer heat is stifling. My head hurts. My ass hurts. He’s repeated his favorite pun one. Too. Many. Times. And now she’s unbuckled (ON THE INTERSTATE)?! And has hit her brother (AGAIN)?!
Suddenly I feel terrified. My eyes dart from mirror to mirror, looking for a highway patrol cruiser to happen by while this crazy kid is not clicked in.
Suddenly they feel the cold of my wrath.
A switch flips in my brain, turning off compassion and love.
I become an empty shell, a kind of black hole sun that sucks in the light.
I lecture, threaten something ridiculous and insensitive. Pull over a bit too fast at the next exit. Double down and threaten something even more ridiculous. Icy glare at both kids, jaw clenched, eyes narrow, lips thin.
I get out of the car. Slam the door. Scream into the air. My whole body is wound tight. I am enraged. My fingernails dig into my palms. I kick the car tires. I am embarrassed. By my daughter’s ignorance of the importance of safety for herself and her brother. By my son’s repetitive and grating neurodivergent behaviors.
Because of course. It’s all my fault.
The rage and embarrassment combine to birth a shame baby. Now I’m crying. Staring at the pink half moon marks in my hands. I feel silly and stupid for the ridiculousness of my idle threats. My body goes limp. I half fold-drop against the back of the car.
Now the highway patrol will happen by while this crazy lady does some strange snot-dripping downward dog on her rear bumper next to the offramp.
I kick at the gravel.
Stand up and breathe, comes from somewhere deep in the exhausted puddle of my mind.
I blow my nose ungracefully into the gravel.
Breathe in the mountain air. Notice the beauty of the valley and mountains, and the thumping of my heart.
The soothing sound of traffic brings a wave of guilt.
I’ve scared and further scarred my kids.
I close my eyes. Ask myself, What would love do right now? over and over and over...
Grief is the repair
Over the past few decades, I’ve thrown thousands of dollars and dozens of different strategies at the problem of my broken brain and its disordered thinking.
Yoga, breath work, and meditation? Ohm-my yes.
Self-medicating with weed, whiskey, and sex? Duh.
Diets, exercise regimens, and detoxing? Bet your kettlebells.
Shamanic healing, hypnosis, visualizations? Spirit guides nod.
Plant medicine journeys, prayers, affirmations? This head is sufficiently broken open.
Internal Family Systems, inner child reparenting, the gold standards for treating BPD: Dialectical Behavioral Therapy and Mentalization-Based Treatment? Of course! I’m a pro.
You name it, I’ve tried it.
And yet.
What is healing me is parenting my sensitive, neurodivergent, empathic, brilliantly creative and curious children.
Or rather the grief I feel in parenting them.
I grieve the fact that I can’t love them the way I think all children deserve to be loved. Because I wasn’t.
I grieve that my abusive, narcissistic, perfectionist father and berating, self-absorbed, martyr mother couldn’t love me the way I think all children deserve to be loved. Because they weren’t.
And there in the depths of despair I find the way home.
To my heart.
That, yes, still implodes into a black hole when distressed.
And fights like hell to come unstuck and back into play.
To help its counterpart brain believe it’s not broken.
To love the pieces of itself that walk around in the form of a 12 year old boy and a 7 year old girl. Who will someday understand how hard this heart fights to love them how it can.
The way home
When my breathing, heartbeat, tears and snot slowed, I opened my daughter’s door, and felt a slight sting at the fear in her eyes.
I slowly and softly pulled her into a long hug, then lowered her into her booster seat, and gently, playfully fastened her seatbelt.
I’d like to say we made it through the rest of the trip without further incident, but who am I kidding? There were a handful of annoyances, escalations, attacks from the back seat, lectures and idle threats, and gravel-kicking stops on the side of the highway.
And every time a repair.
Every time a little grief felt for the mother and love my mother didn’t have, I didn’t have, and my kids don’t have.
Every time a little opening for the love our broken hearts are able to give and receive in the relationships that are.
“Mommy, when will you love me again?”
“When I can, my little terrorist. Again and again and again...”