Borderline Mother Quotes

“Unbearable pain that is expressed and acknowledged becomes bearable. But borderlines received no such responses in their childhood. Therefore, they are stuck in the past, trying to elicit what they needed as a child—validation of their unbearable pain.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Although borderline mothers may love their children as much as other mothers, their deficits in cognitive functioning and emotional regulation create behaviors that undo their love. Borderline mothers have difficulty loving their children patiently and consistently. Their love does not endure misunderstandings or disagreements. They can be jealous, rude, irritable, resentful, arrogant, and unforgiving. Healthy love is based on trust and is the essence of emotional security.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“The borderline’s children are preoccupied with what researchers call “risk assessment”—with determining the nature of their mother’s state of mind from one moment to the next. It is an unconscious and involuntary process, like breathing. They do not realize they are doing it.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Children of borderlines and survivors of hurricanes have much in common. Survival is dependent on finding a safe place, staying low, and not being fooled by the eye of the storm.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Borderline mothers who threaten or attempt suicide keep their children emotionally trapped, and their children may suffer from extreme anxiety even as adults.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Some children of borderlines secretly wish that their mother would die, not because they hate her, but because living with her seems impossible.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Children of borderlines may tune out by dissociating and disconnecting from their environment. They cannot feel embarrassed, humiliated, ridiculed, or hurt if they are no longer in their own bodies. Unfortunately, the sensation of depersonalization or dissociation makes them feel crazy.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“The relationship between a borderline mother and her child may change dramatically when the child is approximately 2 years old, begins to speak, and expresses a separate will. The mother’s anxiety intensifies because the child is no longer totally dependent and cannot be completely controlled.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“It is rare for even adult children to abandon their mother, regardless of how many times their mother has abandoned them.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Therapists sometimes warn family members not to depend on the person with BPD to validate their self-worth, yet young children have no choice. They can and will do anything to hold onto the good mother (the loving, caring person) who unpredictably turns into the Witch mother (the terrifying, raging beast).”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Because she lives in a state of alarm, she notices things that others miss.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Attacks by the Witch mother are like tornadoes: random, devastating, and unpredictable. Naturally, her children are on constant alert for changes in the atmosphere that might indicate when and where she will “Turn.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Upon entering therapy, adult children of borderlines are initially reluctant to discuss their childhood experiences. Several patients developed psychosomatic symptoms such as feeling a lump in their throat or experienced panic attacks following sessions during which they discussed their mother.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“The voices of children are easily silenced by the fear of not being believed. If 3-year-old Michael Smith had somehow miraculously survived, would he have told anyone that his mother tried to drown him? Would anyone have believed him? No one wants to believe that a mother would sacrifice her own child, especially the child.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Ernest Wolf (1988) explains that “merger-hungry” personalities need to control others completely. The borderline Witch’s merger-hungry personality leaves her children feeling devoured, suffocated, oppressed, and imprisoned. Even as adults, her children may dream about prison camps, holocausts, invasions, wars, and natural disasters. They fear for their survival.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“When enraged, some divorced borderlines may deprive their children of contact with their father either to punish him or the children.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Children with borderline mothers adjust to the chaos of their lives by learning to expect the unexpected. They associate love with fear and kindness with danger.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“Borderline mothers have difficulty allowing their children to grow up. The dependency of a newborn can be intensely satisfying to the borderline mother, but as the child becomes increasingly independent, conflict erupts.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother

“The desperate hunger of the borderline Queen is akin to the behavior of an infant who has gone too long between feedings. Starved, frustrated, and beyond the ability to calm or soothe herself, she grabs, flails, and wails until at last the nipple is planted securely and perhaps too deeply in her mouth. She coughs, gags, chokes, and spits, eyeing the elusive breast like a wolf guarding her food. Similarly, the Queen holds on to what is hers, taking more than she can use, in case it might be taken away prematurely.”
― Christine Ann Lawson, Understanding the Borderline Mother