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I really thought I'd had some borderline traits when I was younger and I told my therapist. She told me I did not have borderline because I had too good a heart and guilt and remorse when I do something wrong, but there is no doubt that CPTSD and borderline have some traits in common.

Do any of you think you have been misdiagnosed with a personality disorder when it was really CPTSD? Let's face it. We grew up with PDs. They raised us. Or maybe they had CPTSD too from THEIR upbringing. My mom was awfully horrible to me. But her mother wasn't that great to her, although she was nicer to her than my mother was to me.I was the scapegoat by entire FOO (it's a very small one, luckily), but she was openly second best to her brother, my uncle (another piece of work).

What do you think about the CPTSD/borderline traits being similar? Any thoughts?

I can't think of anything that feels worse, makes me doubt the most or causes more shame in me, than that my siblings deny the abuse. Yes, I was the scapegoat and a lot of it happened not within their hearing or sight and my youngest sister is seven years younger than I am and things changed. Yes, I was a difficult child who had tantrums and was very unhappy. But there are some things they DO know for sure.
My mother told me she had not felt anything for me while she was pregnant or after I was born. She would not hold me because I "siffened" so she  propped a bottle of milk in my crib. She almost bragged about it. She did anything to shut me up. I guess I cried a lot and fed my chocolate milk in a bottle for five years. Yes, five years. She had no real caring for me my entire life and called me horrible names that I still hear in my head unless I talk myself out of her tapes. I was lazy, selfish, I never thought of anyone but myself, I was a brat, I was a troublemaker, I was stupid, etc. etc. etc. I never got hit, which makes me doubt the abuse.

I tried to love my mother until the end, but she disowned/disinherited me. I really hurt with that, even though I saw it coming. The money wasn't a lot and I didn't care about it. It was how she dismissed me as a daughter. I kept calling her, kept trying, although she never called me back. She has a GC, my brother, who can do NOTHING wrong, never could. And my sister sacrificed a lot to get along with her, although sister has mental health issues too...anorexia and refused to invite GC to her wedding because he was too ugly and she was ashamed of him. Now they are bosum buddies. Who knows what she said to him to make him excuse that? She wasn't exactly quiet about her disdain. There is just so much. My sister hangs up on me whenever she is angry at me and if I call back to try to find out why she is upset, she calls the cops. Her latest is to post on a forum that I am diagnosed borderline. That's a lie.  I was never diagnosed. I thought my CPTSD might be borderline and the only person who mentioned the disorder was me. I think she acts a lot more borderline than I do.

Recently, my sister and brother both told me it was ME who abused my mother and everybody else, not the other way around.They insist I was never abused, that Mother was a good person. She may have been to them. I can not invalidate their experience with her. I'm sure she was good to GC. But they invalidated me.

I am going beyond no contact with them. I'm refusing to even look at their social media as it is a trigger for EF, but I'm still pretty stunned that t hey really seem to believe I was not abused. That I caused it. An infant? A little child? I WAS the one who tended to speak up for myself and to bring up our problems. GC was blissfully unaware of any and sister just suffered quietly.

Does anyone else find that relatives invalidate your memories? My sister said I make things up. I guess my brother agrees. Fortunately, that is all I have of a FOO, besides a very elderly father who has always treated me fairly. He was not a great father, but did not play favorites and is being very kind to me lately.

Am I the only one? Invalidation? Gaslighting maybe?

I'm just going to share what happened to me and hope it helps somebody else.

I have been in therapy since I was 23 and I'm over 21 a few times now

My dx. have included depression, anxiety, panic disorder, mild OCD and at one time I had depersonalization/derealization. Since I was bullied both at home and in school I had used maladaptive daydreaming to deal with the present, especially in school.

Once my grandma died, the only person in my FOO who loved me unconditionally, it was no holds barred for BPD mom and she dragged my siblings along wit her. I hadn't been abused. *I* had abused. Ok. Yep.An infant and child can be very abusive. I thought I had BPD mostly because I am so hard on myself that, of course, I had to have a diagnosis that was "baaaaaaaaaaaad." Nobody diagnosed me but me. Instead I have been diagnosed with trauma and most recently CPSTD.

My scapegoating FOO basically have all disowned me and I wish they or I had done it at an early age. Without them playing a large role in my life, I have been able to find a great husband and raise wonderful chidlren (this is after one rather verbally abusive and financially abusive marriage that nonetheless lasted seventeen years). In my first  marriage I had no idea that calling me names and belittling me was abnormal. I thought all marriages were like that. Plus first hub had a chronic  illness so I thought I had to be nice to him and not stick up for myself because he was sick. The first time somebody told me he had no right to be mean to me was in a group setting. I got so upset that the group didn[t understand that I HAD to accept everything because he was sick, I left crying. But I learned after joining CODA.

The less my FOO was in my life, the clearer my life became and I now have a loving relationship with a man who can feel and show intimacy. My kids benefited big time from our loving marriage. I still have my FOO's tapes in my head (L"you're bad" "you're stupid" "you're lazy" "you're selfish" etc.), but I can talk back to them more and tell myself, "That's all a lie."

My sister likes to tell everyone I have borderline, diagnosed.

I don't talk to her, read her FB page or know what her life is like now. It was not good the last I checked.

I turned out to be the only one with a loving, peaceful, sane family. I think the less contact one has with people who make you feel two feet tall and like you are worthless, the better off you are the more you can heal.

I'm no doctor so take my two cents with a grain of salt. Even hearing my brother or sister or mother's first names can cause an EF. Their voices cause EFs. I don't like EF and would prefer to have as few as possible so I try to avoid triggers. I think your family is who loves and respects you, not whose DNA you share by accident.

Anyhow, just my two cents. I am still in therapy, still working on me. I probably will always be in therapy. But I'm happy most of the time now. I'm here because I'd never heard about CPSTD before, although many of my therapists asked me if I had experienced trauma, which I used to disavow. I'd say, "Look, I was a horrible kid. My mom was a GREAT mother. It was MY fault." And I believed that too.

Don't give up

I'm not a kid. In fact I'm a senior citizen and my entire life has been challenging. I had an neglectful, name-calling mother who influenced my entire small family to scapegoat me and, to make things worse, got picked on at school too. So my childhood was a nightmare. My mother freely admitted she did not feel anything at all when she was pregnant or when she held me and s he used to prop my bottle because "you stuffened in my arms." Names from her followed me all my life as did depression, anxiety, panic disorder, derealization/depersonalization (thankfully these two horrible symptoms have been gone since my 20's) and my own anger issues and lack of being able to control myself during triggers, which was almost always with FOO. I am through with t hem and did manage to have a good life with a great husband and kids.

I was so hard on myself that I thought I had borderline personality disorder because, after all, I was "bad." My therapists said I was too k indhearted to have that and my siblings, especially one, continue to all me that, more as a bait then a fact. I don't' talk to her anymore. Never will. My therapists all mentioned trauma, but I was not ready to hear it, I guess. I tended to say, "No, you don't understand. My mother was a good mother. It was ME. I was a terrible kid. It was MY fault." I did not hear "But you were a kid."

Fortunately, I wanted to be better, even though I did not realize the big picture and got help for the symptoms and really did get much better. I had a few setbacks. My mother disinherited me and that hurt, not because of the money (she didn't have much), but because it is such a complete rejection.  I had to go through realizing that nobody in my FOO is really well or balanced and that it was probably good, especially for my kids, that they were not in my life. They cut ME off though, not the other way around until just recently.

Sometimes it takes 60 years. Don't let this happen to you.

Since I've been in therapy since age 23, I have many coping skills. One is to write. So here I am. It's another resource to learn (you're never too old to learn from others). I just learned, in fact, what an emotional flashback is and, because of that, I could figure out why I would lash out at my FOO and not others. The sound of t heir voices alone, any of them, are triggers. It seems just hearing them speak makes me feel small and child llike, when they get angry.

I suspect my mother was ubpd and my sister has traits too (as do I). My FOO denies mother was abusive to me. I was the scapegoat., Oh, well. I understand not wanting to think your mother was abusive/neglectful/a namecaller, especially if you were not the target. It is hurtful to think otherwise. I did break the cycle with my own kids.

I am happy I found this site. I just finished Pete Walker's wonderful book. Seemed like every page spoke to me...I guess to all of us.

Have a good day and so happy this forum exists.

It's mindboggling to me, but I WAS the scapegoat. I can see GC not getting it, but I don't understand my sister, who has had so many problems due to our upbringing...intimacy problems, picking good men, substance abuse, anorexia, looking good but having anger issues...you name it. I've gotten help so I am in a better place t han her, but I actually got the abuse worse of all. Well, that and my father.

When I found that both siblings were invalidating my abuse and spaying on my posts on another healing site, I decided I never wanted to see them, talk to them, read their Facebooks, check their comings and goings...literally it was such a shock and slight to me I want them to disappear from my life totally, and since my sister went NC for the 100th time, that is possible.

But it just makes me wonder: "Was it that bad? Nobody hit me. I wasn't sexually abused. Others have it worse." Yet the tapes in my head: "You're stupid" "you're lazy" "you're selfish" "you're no good" still play sometimes, even with all my therapy. I live a good life now, which I worked hard for, but still suffer from panic disorder, depression, anxiety disorder, mild OCD and my newst therapist insists I have CPSTD. My sister has decided I have borderline. My therapist says I have too good a heart and don't meet the BPD criteria, and I think she just says it to be mean. She is not always mean...I feel she is just damaged and never got t he help she needs.

Is it normal to feel "I can't have CPTSD" because other were hit or sexually abused? The sibling invalidation doesn't help, however I have learned that this is common.  I can't really digest that I have CPTSD although I have every single symptom, including suffering on and off with derealization and depersonalization (what a horrible feeling, but I have learned to help it go away). I also never achieved up to my IQ level, but have learning disorders.

My mother never held me as an infant. She said I stiffened in her arms so she propped a bottle and when I cried because I didn't like it, she gave me chocolate milk and propped it. I was not taught boundareis, rules, or anything about life.

Still...can't help but doubt...