BPDFamily.com

Hello,

I have an adult son who possibly might have BPD.  I am looking for guidance as to how to get appropriate therapy for him and ourselves.  For the past 17 months he has been extremely angry and verbally abusive, blaming us for all that is wrong.  We spent most of the months with a couple of different therapists, the last was 7 months long that we all went to individually, did not diagnose specifically and I believe caused more problems for us.  Family includes one other adult child.  We all have traits of at least high sensitivity, some genetic mental health links as well.

Hi pzzld1516,

We are glad to have you here with us on the Parenting Board.  I'm sorry to learn that your family is struggling and it is good to learn that you are all willing to go to therapy individually.  Did you ever meet together as a family in therapy and what type of therapy were you all participating in?

Dialectical Behavior Therapy is specifically designed to cope with intense emotional thinking.  Have you looked into the availability of DBT for your son and your family?

Having someone verbal abuse us is so damaging.  How do you respond to this kind of behavior from your son?

I look forward to learning more about you and your family so that I can help where I am able.

lbjnltx

Thank you for your response lbjnltx,

We never met as a complete family because my son refuses to see me in person.  I have not seen him in 17  months.  We have had sporadic email communication, he cuts it off ("do not respond to this email" and then starts it up again. He did some therapy with my husband, but that turned out to be the psychiatrist "facilitating" my son's  request for reparations and was psychoanalysis. In the beginning I was emotionally crushed, extremely grief stricken, because his anger seemed to come out of nowhere.  He said many horrible things to me, and I doubted myself and did much self blaming and examination,wondering if I had been that horrible a mother. I did block his texts at that time and told him I did. The therapist we went to told us that we could temporarily do "family" therapy individually and he would hold everyone's "story'.  That was a big mistake on our part.   

My son's position continues to be that my husband and I should take his concerns to "our" new therapist so that we can understand how much we damaged him and how he feels, but there seems to be no way to bridge the understanding among us all because he is so angry and refuses to participate as a family.

He is currently looking for a new therapist, is very unhappy at how much we agreed to pay for the therapist even though he has a high paying job.  He said he is looking for Mindfulness CBT.

I wonder if we would all be better off just identifying the mental health issue in him out in the open some how and having some structure to follow?  I have a younger son as well, who also has estranged somewhat from me following his older brother's lead. My husband and other therapists we have spoken with believe he is just following his bother.

I feel like I understand what is going on much better right now.  I have examined my behavior as a mother, and realize I contributed in some ways.  We do have this issue in another generation in our families, and the four of us are all "sensitive" types.

My husband and I feel very stressed most of the time, but thankfully we started on a road of self-care many years ago and take pretty good care of ourselves.  It is however, very sad and very stressful right now.

No parent is perfect! We all make mistakes.