Has My Relationship With My Mother Biased My Female Friendships?
The influence of my Borderline Personality Disorder mother on my friendship style
Throughout a lifetime, we develop different kinds of friendships. Some are long-lasting, while some are quickly consumed during summer camp, never to remember them ever again. Some are downright weird. But as the saying goes, “no man is an island,” so we all crave that sense of belongingness, according to Maslow.
I was raised by a single mother, and I never knew my father. She became pregnant with me when she was young, so it remained unknown who my father was. I still don’t know it to this day, and I grew to accept it as part of who I am. This story presents my experience with female friendships raised solely by a mother with borderline personality disorder.
She wasn’t the friendly type. So I felt it in my guts, right from the beginning, that she would influence me on how I’ll make friends. As a matter of fact, except for a short period in my childhood when she met a couple of female neighbors for coffee, my mom was friendless for most of her adult life.
As a child, I noted that she wasn’t missing social interaction, preferring her own company. Consequently, I, too, have taken little interest in developing deep friendships.
