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Title: Dealing with regression defense mechanism Post by: busymind79 on March 19, 2015, 09:29:00 AM Last week during the meeting my husband and I had with the counselor, I mentioned to her that my daughter seemed to have some odd regressive tendencies. The counselor seemed to be quite concerned about this, but offered no comments on how to deal with it. Since then, I have done some research on the regressive defense mechanism. I had no idea it was even a thing or that it was common in BPD. I am relieved to some extent that it is. The thing is, I don't know how to deal with it when it comes up.
My daughter, when stressed, will suddenly seem to be unable to figure out how to do anything and then get very upset that she 'can't do it' or act as though the object of her frustration is out to get her. For example, she couldn't figure out how to set the time on her clock and then got mad when we patiently explained how to do it. We also helped her to set the alarm on the clock. The next morning, I had to wake her and she was screaming and swearing about the clock not working right. She had at some point turned it off. I explained to her that the dial had to be in a certain position for the alarm to go off and she flipped out on me that we hadn't told her not to change that dial. She is 15! It's a simple alarm clock! We also got a new cable box and she can't seem to figure out how to use it or can't remember what buttons to push and needs to be instructed every time on how to use the remote. She has never had issues with this kind of thing before. Honestly, I really just don't know how to treat these situations. I don't want to jump in and help her constantly with simple things, but I don't know if I should be ignoring her when she is seeking help. Title: Re: Dealing with regression defense mechanism Post by: livednlearned on March 19, 2015, 11:39:11 AM Hi busymind79,
Sorry for the long post! This is a topic dear to my heart. My son has a tendency for learned helplessness, and gets very upset over small things. A book that has been changing so much in my dynamic with S13 is "You Don't Have to Make It All Better" -- there is whole section on validating questions that gave me some language about how I can get S13 to help himself. This allows me to get out of the cross hairs, while setting him up for success. When I help him do the thing that's frustrating him, I become the target of his frustration. I think he feels overwhelmed by genuine shame when he can't do something -- he sabotages himself with negative talk, flooding him with shame and critical comments. In these moments, he feels useless. If I come and fix something for him, it makes him feel worse. It's proof that he truly cannot do something. So I'm learning to ask validating questions. Here are a sample of validating questions from the book: Oh? How did you feel about that? What did you do? And then what did you do? What would you like to do? When do you think it could be done? What do you think the outcome will be? What do you think might work? What do you think would work next time? Are there other options? What happened? How did it happen? Where did it happen? When did it happen? What did you think when it happened? How could you stand that? How did you stand that? And then what did you say? What do you think caused the problem? What's wrong? What went wrong? What was that like? Did you enjoy that? Did that hurt your feelings? What does that mean? What would you like me to do? Is there anything I can do to help you? Would it help if I (name something you can do)? And this is for teens specifically: Excerpt They can make wise choices Teens need our expressions of confidence in their ability to think a problem through and make a wise choice. Get in the habit of asking "what do you think?". :)on't slip and tell your teen what you believe the wisest choice to make will be. That will almost always push your child back into defending an unwise choice. The values and lessons you have taught through the years are inside. Your teen just needs a chance to think about them and even challenge them. Most likely, if your child is not forced by you into defending his or her thinking, he or she will be able to process the pros and cons and make better choices. Teenagers are intelligent people, and given the chance, they can come up with good ways to solve their own problems. The process of validation offers them the chance to think a problem through by talking about it freely without interruption, criticism, or lectures. It is interesting to see what good ideas and solutions they can come up with when they don't have to defend their position because a parent is interfering in their thinking process. Allowing them the opportunity to develop problem-solving skills will go a long way toward helping them become responsible adults. I find with my son that it isn't just the big stuff that gets him stuck, it's the little stuff. He doesn't know where his jacket is, and then he's slumped in a ball on the stairs, telling himself he can't do anything right, he forgets everything, he can't even keep track of his jacket, no one likes him. All over a jacket. For the better part of a year, I had to ask him how he would like me to respond, because showing I cared triggered an outburst, and smoothing over things triggered an outburst, ignoring him triggering an outburst. So I started to ask him how he wanted me to respond, and begrudgingly, he started to answer. I didn't know about validating questions until lbjnltx pointed me to this material, and I'm using it all the time. I no longer care if we are late for school, it's more important to slow the world down and do it right. This morning, he had an outburst because he forgot to collect twigs for theater, his favorite class, favorite teacher would be disappointed, he will lose his job doing tech theater for the school musical, he can't do anything right, the whole thing. We calmly sat on the stairs together and I validated how he felt. And then silence for a while. And darned if that kid didn't just come up with an answer without me even asking. "I guess what I want is be on time for school. I don't even know how many twigs I need, and I don't want to carry them through school." Then a long period of silence again. He got up and still mad at himself, walked to the car. Then in the car he said, "I'm going to ask him if I can bring them tomorrow. It's not like he needs them today." It has taken so much to get to this point. And it doesn't always work out so smoothly. I also had to learn to not praise him in these moments, because that made him feel bad Although there have been times when it is fully warranted. In the old days, S13 would cry, claim he was going to be sick to his stomach, get furious with me, I would get upset, feel useless and helpless and often angry to be targeted for trying to help. Bleh. And about your T -- I have found that my son's T does not do a great job of helping me figure out how to interact with S13. I think it's a weakness in general. Title: Re: Dealing with regression defense mechanism Post by: busymind79 on March 19, 2015, 12:58:48 PM Thank you very much for the response! I love lengthy posts because I am a very detail oriented person and the more information and experiences shared the better! I am going to see if I can pick up a copy of that book. It sounds like it might really help with the what to say, what not to say issue. I have noticed that like your s13, my dd15 gets very frustrated and ashamed when I help although she asks and it feels like a no win situation. I am glad to have this shared experience. I am going to try to ask more validating questions and see if she will be receptive to that. Thanks again!
Title: Re: Dealing with regression defense mechanism Post by: lbjnltx on March 19, 2015, 01:29:57 PM Here is the book review:
"I Don't Have to Make Everything All Better" by Gary and Joy Lundberg (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=128027.0) Here are some other resources we recommend: Foundational Reading (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=56210.0) Let us know what you think! lbj Title: Re: Dealing with regression defense mechanism Post by: stepmomma on March 31, 2015, 01:34:09 PM This is great and explains a lot with my step daughter... .thanks for the practical advice.
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