There’s a person I know who is very: toxic, manipulative, has extreme mood swings, is sensitive/often interprets things the wrong way/will create an issue or argument when no one else is upset which causes confusion for everyone around her, demonstrates extreme rage, always angry and feels like the whole world is against her (and frequently argues with strangers in public), waves of crying fits and depression episodes (where she’s the victim and everyone else is wrong), doesn’t get along with anyone in her life, always shit talking about people in her life yet playing victim when no one wants to be around her or no one wants to help her due to her behavior, acts helpless and relies on people to handle general life stuff for her, has extreme overreactions, verbally abusive, sometimes physically abusive, tries her best to pretend or put on an act and be on her best behavior around certain people and then always flipping a switch when those people leave her presence, doesn’t know how to end arguments (keeps going even when the other person has stopped or is confused about her anger and doesn’t even have an issue), won’t ever admit fault or apologize (if people cut her out of her life there will be months/years of silence and then she will call or text people out of loneliness but still think everyone except her is the problem), etc.

Can anyone advise if these symptoms are characteristic of someone with BPD? If not, what do you suspect so I can learn more?

I know some of the examples above are vague, so some detailed specific examples are below.

1) Frequently told her children (when they were young) to go die and telling them to kill themselves. (Many outsiders have observed and commented that they don’t know why she had multiple kids if she’s so mean to them.)

2) If her child told her she’s not hungry and doesn’t have an appetite at dinner time so she’s going to skip dinner, she chases her child through the house with a knife, repeatedly telling her child to kill herself, body slamming the locked door trying to break it down.

3) Every time she sees person X, she bitches and complains about person Y saying person Y never returns her Tupperware they borrow. Person X is tired of getting yelled at and attacked for person Y’s inaction, so person X kindly asks for the Tupperware to be returned (without sharing the behind the scenes rage that the tupperware owner intentionally hides from person Y). Once the Tupperware owner receives all missing Tupperware and finds out about the request, she lies to person Y about never making such a request and acts surprised and says who cares if they have my stuff don’t need it. She then yells at person X in front of everyone: get out of my house, don’t ever come to my house again, you’re not welcome here, etc.

How do you deal with someone with mental illness if they’re untreated and unwilling to get help?