Good Morning!  As i read this, i sadly feel, numb. My 24 y/o daughter has 3 attempts (that i know of, as she is no longer speaking to me) and i remember the first like it was yesterday (getting that call from the mental hospital, knowing NOTHING was WRONG!) I will light a candle for you & your family this weekend!  Know you are not alone

Oh Tchabs1!
There are no words I can think for the situation you are in. You would be swamped with every emotion as you try to understand and cope with the pain of this.

You are in my thoughts as you try to work through this latest crisis, and I hope you find the strength to cope. I am glad you have come here to let us know what is happening for you. BPD is something so little understood, yet has such a profound effect on the person concerned and everyone in their life circle.

Sending thoughts . . .

This morning I am writing from a place of anger, confusion and sadness. My 22 yr old daughter was diagnosed with BPD 2 years ago. She has been put in the mental hospital twice. The second time she continued IOP right after being released. She has had two suicide attempts. The first time she stood in the middle of traffic and just yesterday she held a knife to her body threatening to stab herself

Good plan.
Distracting yourself with another engagement will help.
We cannot control or fix our daughter’s decisions, but we can actively pursue a life with less distress and pain. And that requires us to commit to a better life for ourselves, and take positive acts to make that happen.
Like signing up for an event on recital day!

My former psychologist emailed me a resource from www.mindpeelings.com titled “Get your daily happiness chemicals”. It listed ways to increase happiness levels by increasing each of the “happy brain chemicals” - dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin and endorphins. I looked at the activities listed - daily to do list, create something, listen to music, socialise, exercise, sunlight, laughter, eat spicy foods etc. 
And something clicked into place in my mind for the first time. I could fight this pain. I did not have to passively live in misery, waiting for my daughter to return to me and praying she would stop doing deliberately hurtful things.
I could decide to make things better for myself and actively improve my happiness. And this chart was as good a place to try doing that as any!

So I packed away most of the photos of my daughter that ambushed me daily and sent me into painful rumination and guilt.
And I selected at least one activity for each brain chemical, and committed to doing them regularly.
I paid for a music subscription and set up playlists of songs I enjoyed from younger, happier times, and listened to them while I did chores.
I walked my dogs in a range of new parks and beaches and gorgeous locations, relishing the breeze and beauty and getting out in the sunshine (or drizzle!)
I made a to-do list every morning of things I could definitely achieve and tick off that day.
I sang, and did crafts, and started playing piano again (still badly) and doing a popular daily puzzle and sharing the results with a friend each morning - a quick daily contact that strengthened that friendship.
I started cooked spicy curries that I love again, but which my husband and son do not, freezing them to eat when they are out or want take away for themselves.

Importantly, I set aside a specific time to Facetime each week with my best friend who lives interstate, and we started sewing together for 2-3 hours - a hobby we both enjoy and didn’t have much time for while raising children. And we commit to that time being for us, and we tell our grown family that that time is taken and precious and not available for meeting their day to day demands. Sounds like a little thing, but it was the first time I had felt able to dedicate set time for my needs alone, and guard it jealously, without feeling that I was being selfish or letting my family down by not putting it off to do something for them instead.
That time has become so precious to us both - we talk and laugh and make something beautiful or ridiculous, and we recharge our happiness meters and our coping batteries.
And I feel happy.
I am so very much happier than I could have imagined possible a year ago.
And the pain of estragement has dulled more than I could have hoped.
I feel like me again. No longer fractured and broken and defined by my daughter's distorted horrible descriptions of me.

Weeks ago, you asked if there were any stories with happy endings.
You didn’t get many responses to give you hope.
But happy endings are not always being reconciled with your estranged child.
Or your estranged child beating her BPD demons.

Being able to make yourself whole again, and live a happy purposeful life, is a happy ending that you can actively work towards. And the only one you have some control over.
Enjoy your event on 1 June!
❤️

DancingMachine,



We all have parents with BPD or NPD and our stories vary, as does contact. I'm glad that you reached out to our community. It sounds like you've done well, despite, on a journey to take back your power.

What do you struggle with regarding taking back your sense of self?

Yes... that's why he said it I imagine. He had a big story about her being someone who was so fragile that she couldn't be in a relationship with anyone, that she was a complicated woman with all these mental health issues, and he just wanted to love her back to health... agreed to caring for her, not really knowing what that would involve. He didn't let onto the fact that he might have added to any of her stress, he just said that she was someone who had a very thin skin and couldn't handle life. At times he even said she was a narcissist.

But I weirdly got inside info from some of her friends that she went to a really dark place when she was with him, but she's doing great now she's not... that he was like a child and didn't contribute to anything, and they even said he turned into 'a monster' right after they married... she had a full breakdown at the end and then she left him.

I guess I believed his story because I wanted to... but it's clear she and I had a similar experience, except I didn't marry him or have a child with him. And it's also become clear to me that he's since labelled me in the same way as her - because of the reaction of anxiety and upset I had to the insane push/pull at the very end.

Sorry Tina - hijacked this thread... I'll have to post about some of this stuff separately...

Oh good, thank you Seeking. Jus like his ex-wife did, exactly. So you both were being denied the normal support/love/respect that you would get in a healthy relationship. Now, I'm still trying to think about why he told you that. There is a reason he did, I'm not sure exactly what it is. I'm sure it has something to do with trying to portray her as damaged or 'needy'.

This was 100% the experience with my xBPD. On the rare occasions over the years when I managed to "fix" something, another problem just popped up to replace it within a few months. Eventually I realized she was just an emotional black hole with chaos at the centre and gave up trying to help her and began to work on myself again. It was setting those boundaries for myself that eventually led to our divorce.


It's natural for people to want to get back to the happy, earlier state of their relationship, but I think that's ultimately the wrong way of looking at it. I like Esther Perel's re-evaluation of relationships after affairs -- the relationship you had with the other person is over because of the affair. Do you want to build a new type of relationship with this person? I think it's a good question to ask of pretty much any significant relationship problem -- replace "affair" with "BPD" and ask yourself the same question.

Expect that when you address one issue, another will pop up elsewhere.  It's like that clown and his long balloon, while forming it into a poodle, he will squeeze one section and the air pops up somewhere else.

If she is not addressing her issues with the therapists as you progressively set your newfound boundaries, she will not improve overall.

Boundaries article in Tools & Skills Workshops board.
Setting Boundaries and Setting Limits

Whether she will abide by reasonable boundaries can indicate whether there might be hope for the relationship.  Sure, she will "fall off the wagon" sometimes, relapses happen, but does she get right back on the program?

Hi Jaded - you didn't make me feel bad at all - I totally see where you're coming from and agree with you. It sounds like your ex needed you to be there to meet all of her needs but yours were very much a burden to her. It just reminded me that I'd said that phrase too... and I said it because I was aware that there was a big mismatch in our relationship in terms of me being there to meet his needs, but him not having the capacity or skills to meet mine and I wanted to level the playing field a bit so we didn't fall into co-dependency and cause me to burn out and resent him, just as his ex-wife did. I think he loved me and wanted to meet my needs, I do... but he literally didn't know how to do that without feeling overwhelmed or engulfed. Again, i just always think through the lens now of my ex unconsciously seeing me as a parent figure - that was my function to him, to be strong and steady and present to meet his needs and be the calm in his storm. The moment I wasn't any of those things for even a day, he would become extremely anxious and create a fight... which over time was really damaging to me to have someone causing extra chaos on my lowest, most stressful days... I didn't need him to come and save the day for me, I just wanted him to be around as normal and not cause extra chaos.

Hi Tina - I feel the same way as you about mental health. I have hope for us all as well. I really do and I feel strongly about it and believe there's always space for compassion. But yes, totally agree with you, I don't think that we can truly understand the true limitations of someone with BPD until we're in it. And how those limitations might make you feel, and ultimately in turn limit you from showing up in a way that he needs as well?

I hear what you're saying about being glad you were there for him - I guess that's the selfless part of love, where you're truly just giving it without anything expected in return. But from what you were saying, being there for him was hurting you... which of course it would. So I'd say in response to your question about contacting him - are you ready for the fact that if you open the door to checking on him, you might be hurting your own heart in the process? And also potentially confusing the boundary you've tried to set with him in terms of not being the one to be there for him?

I don't get this stuff right at all, and it's so much easier to look from the outside at someone else's situation, but I hope that what you choose to do protects and takes care of your own heart first and foremost... whilst still leaving that beautiful care and compassion for others in there too, which I have no doubt you'll always do anyway.