My mom has Borderline Personality Disorder that went undiagnosed until I was into my 20s. Her outbursts of rage were and continue to be so violent that I feared for my life. The belittlement and put downs wrecked my self-esteem. The constant admittance of not loving me was so painful. The victim mentality she presented strapped me with guilt if we got in a fight (which was always). She hated all of my friends and boyfriends and tore them down till I didn't have any. Everything was about her. If I was 4 years old, fell in public and hurt myself, she screamed at me to suck it up as not to embarrass her. Slapped me across the face if I cried and yet she was always crying. Nobody could do anything right. Pitted family members against each other till me and my sisters didn't speak for months. Took away any moment of calm and happiness. Broke more appliances against walls behind our heads than I can count. Chased me around the house screaming at the top of her lungs all the horrible things she thought about my weight, my looks, my attitude, my unintelligence and my behavior. I'd try to escape into my room but she would pound her fists on the door for hours until Id finally open it and see blood from her knuckles in the wood. Then walked out the door and pulled of normal, fun, "cool mom" like you would not believe. Some of these are memories I have from when I was 3, 4 or 5 years old. It's been 30 years of this almost daily. Honestly I'm not doing a very good job of painting a picture of how terrible she is.

But the worst part was how my entire life, even as a tiny little girl, I was blamed for my own abuse. "You butt heads with your mom" or "You shouldn't have said that" and "You you you YOU are doing everything that is making her mad." People never understood that she was going to be mad no matter what I did because she wanted to be. Because her brain demanded it. As a little girl I was envious of the little girls who had bruises to show adults as proof of their abuse so people would intervene. But if I told people "she fights with me a lot" it didn't have as much of an impact. So they resorted to telling me what I should do differently. But nobody ever told the little girls who's dad hit them that they deserved to be hit because they were "mouthy."