Title: Overwhelmed Post by: Susan72 on November 04, 2022, 11:44:03 AM Hello, I am new to this forum and typing my first post, seeking help, advise and support of our situation with our 19-year-old daughter who this past summer was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, avoidant personality disorder, dependent personality disorder, negativistic characteristics and years ago with severe depression and severe generalized anxiety...to top this off we just found out she is 14 weeks pregnant.
Mental illness runs on my husband's side of the family and her issues stem from genetics rather than childhood trauma but, she experienced a "trigger" in 9th grade when she got involved with a mentally and emotionally abusive boyfriend (shortly thereafter the COVID isolation did not help things). I have known for at least two years there was something more to her diagnosis than depression and anxiety but our psychiatrist, at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, would not listen to me and instead listened to what my "adult" 17, 18, 19-year-old daughter said instead. I finally had her tested independently and her diagnosis was revealed and made perfect sense. Her moods are and have been so unpredictable, she is absolutely miserable to live with as she is downright cruel to everyone in the home. She has been in all sorts of therapy for years, talk therapy, DBT, CBT, exposure therapy, cranial sacral etc. and it has never helped her. She is taking meds, Duloxetine and now Seroquel too, which has helped stabilize her moods somewhat but her erratic behavior, impulsive decisions, lack of understanding of her thinking and denial of her choices being due to BPD is so frustrating. I cannot reason with her using facts, logic, her actions as proof or in any way. She honestly believes she is correct and the entire rest of the world is wrong. I have poured my heart and soul into this girl for 19 years and now there is a baby on the way. I worry for what this will do to her mentally, the baby's life, our lives etc. I am working against the clock to make some progress with her mentally prior to her becoming a mother. Any suggestions, help, advice ANYTHING is appreciated. I Title: Re: Overwhelmed Post by: Swimmy55 on November 05, 2022, 05:01:02 PM Welcome. I am sorry for the circumstances that brought you to this forum, but you are not alone. The one bright thing here is that she is on medication, meaning she does accept and want help. That is huge. I take it there is a mental health provider involved , since she has meds?
1. Educate yourself on BPD - there are suggested readings in the "library" here. Believe it or not, one of the first thing you will learn is to take care of you first. Meaning establishing boundaries if/ when necessary. 2.Some of us actually have our own therapists that help us with crafting boundaries we would like . In your case, maybe looking at how you plan to help your daughter and grandbaby/ how far you will go in this endeavor, what will and won't be acceptable behavior from your daughter, etc.. 3. Unfortunately, there is no one thing that fixes BPD. It's a whole lot of trial and error, but good on you for reaching out and adding this forum to your network of support. We are all in this together here. Please feel free to write in more here as you need to. First , please try to take this one day at a time. Looking into future wreckage is going to derail you. This illness is unpredictable , to put it mildly. |