I know the standard childhood that leads to BPD is typically one marked with distant parents and neglect, but does anyone here feel like it could develop after being particularly coddled as a child? I had anxiety and depression from a super super early age (panic attacks present in toddler years), but my parents were always incredibly present. My dad was your typical dad, worked a good job, made money for the family, and was fairly emotionally distant (his version of giving a compliment is to not actively be criticizing you), but still generally present, especially compared to a lot of fathers. My mom was the ultimate mom who came to school to do art projects with the class, was my best friend, and was super loving. 

My parents were super present throughout my childhood, and only went out by themselves maybe twice a year (anniversary date and one day of Christmas shopping errands, maybe something else once or twice) and would leave my brother and I with my grandparents, but I would have extreme reactions to those twice yearly excursions. And I mean we all went EVERYWHERE together otherwise. Doctor’s visits, haircuts, grocery shopping, you name it, we were all there together. This catered to my father’s crippling anxiety, as he would have intense panic attacks if he didn’t know what we were all doing at all times. I didn’t realize for a long time that most families didn’t operate that way. Those few times each year when my parents would go out together alone were the first times I could remember having true panic attacks and I would dread that time of year just because I knew they would be “leaving me”. I would feel abandoned, frantic, desperate, the way I feel now when I can’t get in touch with my FP or when I’m feeling abandoned by someone. I would resort to manipulative tactics to get their attention and make sure that they didn’t or couldn’t leave me. 

In hindsight, I was a fairly insufferable child and probably just incredibly spoiled, but I’ve been thinking recently about whether or not there could be a correlation between coddling your child and them developing BPD later on as we begin to realize that the real world doesn’t cater to us the way they may have once thought, or developing really extreme reactions to perceived “abandonment”. 

Or maybe sometimes there just isn’t a root cause for BPD and I was just born a little broken and am trying to figure out how to justify myself. 

(Please note that I am not complaining about my childhood or my parents, and fully recognize how privileged I was to grow up the way I did.)