Genetics?

Gracefulsilver's picture

I'm curious, how many BM's that are mentally unfit seem to have children that have inherited BM' mental issues?  SD is begining to make me thing she is just as mentally disabled as her BM

hereiam's picture

Well, it could be genetic but it could also be SD mimicking what she has seen and grown up with. Or, it could be a combination of both.

It has been proven that BOTH nature and nurture matter.

Left out mama's picture

My sd acts very similar to her BM. It can be very challenging but I feel like part of it is her conscious effort to  act like her as a way of feeling close to her. BM sees her for a few weeks once every few year and that created some major abondonmment issues. Mimicking her behavior is a way for Sd to close the gap and feel less abondoned. 
but some may be genetic. 

Exjuliemccoy's picture

Yay, my favorite topic. I love talking about genetics and the impact they have on steplife.

My DH has bred with not one, but two mentally unstable women. Both have been treated for and received mental health diagnoses. BM2's mother and grandmother were both institutionalized for it. Additionally, his own family (particularly the maternal side) presents a lot of mental health issues. Anxiety/social awkwardness is common, LOTS of Axis II stuff, and then of course addictions and alcoholism. In the younger generation, both of DH's daughters have issues (BPD & NPD), and his niece and nephew have each had inpatient psych treatment as well as addictions to opiods.

Obviously I'm biased, but I've been around long enough to see each SD start out emulating their mother before progressing to their own issues. Both are higher functioning than their mother, but neither has progressed far in life. One has divorced, the other has had multiple failed relationships and baby daddies. The nephew (in his thirties) has straightened out and cut Addict Mom from his life, but the niece is a junkie who is very enmeshed with AM. And she's reproduced, so sadly the beat goes on. Why do they always reproduce??

This is why I'm always banging on about vetting the whole dynamic (including the family of origin) rather than just the man. I ignored/missed many red flags and questioned my own perceptions due to the cognitive dissonance that exists in DH's family. We were married for twelve years before visiting his mother's people over 2,000 miles away. My mind was blown by the similar traits I observed. DH's crazy uncle presented many of the same behaviors I'd struggled to get help with for YSD. Different generations, different upbringings, they'd never even met - but the same flavor of crazy. And just like my inlaws, everyone acted as if it was completely normal.

Gracefulsilver's picture

Well, SD15's BM is bi-polar, social anxiety, mildly mentally retarded.  My SO's mothers side of the family has a run of people that had dementia in old age.  So I guess that makes it even worse than just behavior that can be changed.  This child is beyond help in my eyes and needs to go back to BM.

notasm3's picture

I believe that my SS34's issues have a genetic basis. His maternal grandfather (who I never met and is now deceased) was almost certainly bipolar. Or what used to be called manic depressive. He had extreme highs and lows. 
Bm( his daughter) had extreme depression issues back before modern anti-depression meds were available. SS was referred to in patient psych treatment before he even started elementary school. 
 

SS's son is non-verbal and autistic at 4 years old. But I have never thought that autism was genetic. 

Jcksjj's picture

My theory is that it depends on the individual situation whether nature or nurture play a stronger role in a situation. I think it's the same as anything else that can go wrong health wise. Some people can live a healthy lifestyle and that avoids getting cancer; for others the genetics are too strong and they still get cancer regardless of how hard they tried to prevent it. If you have the genetics for something like bipolar I think that's not always going to be preventable.

And in reverse, I think if someone has a severely traumatic childhood that might cause issues that they wouldnt have had otherwise just by genetics.

Overall I think genetics do play a significant role, more than people like to admit because that means it's out of their control. But nature does also have an impact. It just depends on the situation which is going to be stronger.

RisingtheWave80's picture

While BM will never have a formal diagnosis because "nothing is wrong with her" I'm fairly certain all of her actions, behaviors and reality exist under NPD. Recently SD was formally diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder which now of course BM is weaponizing, meaning she has done has had any negative impact of her daughter *scratch_one-s_head*  she also suffers from depression and anxiety.

My DH has batteled with depression in his life and BM appears to also have some anxiety issues. 

This is the reason I have never ever reproduced...my own anxiety would elevate and I would most likely make my own kid worse. 

 

Eve-Bee's picture

BM most likely has narcissistic personality disorder, and so does SD20. I believe it is genetic, and I also think that BM mother (the common environmental factor) has been spoiling BM and SD20 to a sickening level, she is an enabler with a big E, but also has this poor me attitude, does not understand why SD20 and BM are so very little grateful for everything she has done and keeps on doing, instead of putting down boundaries she used to call DH to complain. He has since stopped these phone calls. She has even in the past tried to engage me in these converastions. If I meet her unexpectedly on the street, she would complain to me about how BM freeload on vacations, get drunk, cheat on her SO, etc. (it is beyond crazy)

About a year ago she and her SO sold their beautiful big house to move into a two-bedroom apartment because she could not say no to adult people in her family, they all moved in whenever, rent-free of course, and her way of stopping the endless job off cleaning and making food for all of the people was to sell her home. However, the one spare bedroom has been occupied ever since. Her inability to say no to people is so beyond normal. There are numerous examples of that. At one point, a neighbor down their street, adult daughter broke up with her boyfriend, and the now ex-boyfriend moved into BM mother's house for years. Also, a friend of SD recently failed HS and moved into BM mother's apartment to not face her parents or any consequences.

RisingtheWave80's picture

My SD14 has been diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder (this could fluctuate but she is 100% in the Cluster B family) her mother I thought would be diagnosed with NPD but when I talk about what she does and says to my own therapist he feels that she may be in the NPD/ Sociopath arena. My SD is 100% the mini-me to her mother, most likely why my DH has trouble connecting with her because she is her mothers daughter. BM refuses to parent, exploits her daughters mental health, doesn't want her to get better because its easier for something to also be wrong with her etc. 

Rags's picture

Nurture or nature.  IMHO it is a crap shoot.  And... as often as not parents who create shitty kids bring both crappy genes and shitty personal behaviors to play in the behvioral nighmares that they often pollute the human gene pool and society with.

I the case of my SS's SpermClan, his SpermIdiot is a dope head serial statutory rapist out of wedlock breeding gang banger wannabe whose mother and father did everything in their power to keep their idiot progeny out there mollesting and impregnating undrage teens to expand their shallow and polluted gene pool.  

Of the SpermIdiots 4 out of wedlock spawn by three different baby mamas only one is a successful viable adult (who has zero use or respect for any of the adults in the SpermClan), one is a struggling semi self supporting adult (who hates her SpermIdiot), and the youngest two are gangbanger wannabe POS people just like their SpermIdiot though in comparison to the two youngest the SpermIdiot is downright succesful (the two youngest worship their idiot father).

In very interesting stroke of karmic clarity, even the SpermGrandHag has come to the realization that her son is a POS and has told my SS that she is grateful that he has had a good example of a man and father in his life and she wishes his three younger half sibs had the same.  Too late SGHag.  If she had gained clarity when the POS status of the eldest ejecta of her and SpermGrandPa's pelvic effluence was abundently clear she would have saved any number of teen girls and a number of his children from having to deal with his genetic sewage, complete lack of character and shitty parental influence. Interestingly, SpermGrandHag has a long history of ingnoring the infidelities and womanizing of SpermGrandPa so... in the shallow and polluted gene pool of the SpermClan it appears that there very well may be a genetic component to the crap and a lack of character in the partner of the cheater who facilitated for decades the same shitty behavior in the SpermIdiot.

SpermGrandHag served her GKs up on the same alter of shit behavior that she tolarated in her husband and facilitated in her spawn. Fortuneatly for my son he won the mom lottery with a much higher jackpot than than one he lost in the BioDad lottery. 

Genes and idiot parents get equal billing in the list of stars in the creation of the little shits resulting from the merging of gonad immenations that should have never come together to begin with. Fortuneately, far more often than not, even when one breeder carrying a shallow and polluted gene pool and shitty character gets a chance to breed the other person participating in that breeding process is of genetic and character quality enough to counter the genetic and behavioral influeces of the shitty parent.

Sadly, there is no licensing requirement to breed and the court system has an insane history of mistaking giving these idiots interface with children they had no business having in the first place as being in the best interests of the kids..

Team gene or team nurture.... can both be right.. or wrong and can both bring positives or negatives to the mix.

 

 

End7r's picture

SD is only 6, so it's hard to say, but things aren't looking too good. Her BM is Borderline/Narc. She (BM) had abusive parents which makes me think it was genetic, but then also was born of the abuse.    I cringe when I see her daughter acting that way - like blaming every one else for her being bad at soccer.  She's missed 17 days of school because her mom says she wakes up with anxiety.  She also exhibits many characteristics of ADHD, but her know-it-all mom says she's fine.  I know there are normal people out there who were raised by narcissists but most don't recognize it til much later. Hopefully she will be one of them.