People with BPD traits (pwBPD) can and do quickly overreact.  You're thinking, But I tried to be reasonable and calm, why this extreme vitriol of rants and rages?  She lives in a different world, mentally.

Hers is a world of self-oriented perceptions, perceived slights, feelings, moods, no seeming awareness of consequences, etc.  On the other hand, your logic and reasoning are a total disconnect to her.  The problem is that hers is not a reasonably normal world view.

So approaching communication with JADE (Justify, Argue, Defend, Explain) are typically doomed except in rare moments.  Over on our Tools & Skills workshops board we have threads on JADE, DEARMAN, SET, BIFF and more.  Browse them and ponder the benefits of each approach.

There are also threads there on how effective Boundaries can work, somewhat.  PwBPD resist boundaries so boundaries are up to us.  How are boundaries ours?  Boundaries are our response to poor behavior.  At the most basic it can be illustrated as, "If you do or don't do ___ then I will do or not do ___."

So once you've informed them of Your Boundary, then you can proceed.  For example, if the other rants and rages you can say goodbye, end the conversation, hang up or leave until the other has reset or otherwise calmed down.  Does that make sense?  It's not intuitive but it's a better pattern that will have more success than in the past.

Frankly, all these concepts aren't complete solutions and may not work every time - BPD patterns often seem intractable and resist recovery - but they have a track record in our collective experience to work better and more often than what was tried before.

Sorry guys I'm still getting the hang of how to reply and respond effectively to everyone's questions and feedback. I think this is a common bx that others have experienced with BPD partners- an extreme need for validation and of course attention from these people they talk to. It hurts to read the way he talks to these women- kind and flirtatious just like he used to talk to me in the beginning.

I am not ready to end the relationship so I am trying to find a way to respond effectively to this challenging and strange behavior. I check his phone regularly because it helps calm my anxiety and fears that he could be cheating or meeting up with people. I DO NOT want him to find out that I know his password obviously because then I wouldn't be able to do this checking. I think this is fair and maybe a part of him knows that I do this - he can't be that naive I would hope. It's almost like he wants me to see that he is talking to other people as a threat that he might or could leave. But again of course he never does. I constantly reinforce the fact that he is engaging in this behavior and yet continues to accuse ME of cheating and I have explained projection to him. I think if you suspect something is going on in your relationship it's on you to investigate and collect evidence so they can't deny it. It's a protective thing from lying or manipulation.

Sounds very familiar.  My partner, another male, I suspect has BPD.  He has never come out and told me, but from the roller coaster ride our relationship has been for the last three years, I’m pretty confident I’m correct in my assumption. 

Lisaea1523’s post about the phone really resonates with me.  The Phones in our relationship have always been a very contentious subject from the beginning.  We met on grindr, and after a couple dates we were pretty much inseparable, and eventually he moved in.  I began to notice he was on his phone constantly.   Looking back I feel like he tried to hide some of the phone addiction from me at the beginning, but 3years in, anytime he has a free minute, outcomes his phone, and always scrolling through something, usually doing it where I can’t see his screen.  The whole first year I just stayed quiet about it and let him continue. Just a little bit of backstory, There is a 12 year age difference between us, I’m in my early 40s he is in his early 30s, social media has never been a big part of my life.  But because it was such a big part of his I felt like I was missing out and after the first year, it was beginning to feel like he was more into his phone than me at times.  I used to ask him what’s so interesting on there?  And he would reply, I’m just scrolling through some funny memes or entertaining videos on TikTok, made it seem like what he was doing was totally fine.   
More time had past and I just couldn’t help my curiosity any longer.  I wanted to know what he’s doing on his phone so much usually behind my back so I set up some parental controls on our home Wi-Fi network and added his phone to monitor. With that feature I am able to see every website he visits daily, weekly, and/ormonthly and how many minutes were spent on each.

I was shocked at my findings.  Yes there was enormous amounts of time, like hours, on Facebook, several visits to Instagram, snapchat, and twitter(x), tictok, and some days I would see visits to grindr and fetlife, a bdsm community site. 
I was shocked I didn’t know how to confront him about this without having an explosion in our relationship, because I knew somehow he would just turn it around on me like I was in the wrong for spying on him.  So I figured out his code and logged into his phone one night while he was sleeping.  I found some messages on Snapchat that said delivered, but they had already been deleted so I couldn’t read them. But they were sent to other guys that are only looking to ‘hook up’.  It was the same situation on fetlife, yet he must’ve forgot to delete one message because it was in an archived folder, but it was pictures of him, mostly selfies, and then a picture of me and him as the very last one at the bottom he Sent to some guy that lived within 10 or 15 minutes from us! ?
This  put me on guard.  I needed to know what he was up to. I continued to monitor for weeks, tracking the site visits. 
Now mind you, this is happening all while he is constantly being paranoid that I’m cheating on him and he was actively going through my phone periodically behind my back, trying to find what he calls ‘crumbs’, little hints or things that make him believe that I’m doing something I shouldn’t be.  He told me he had to do it just to ease his conscience and worry, I didn’t have anything to hide so whatever.

 In the next argument we had, was another time he had found something he thought was incriminating on my phone, but turned out to be nothing, blew it all out of proportion, screaming, and yelling at me for being a liar and cheating on him, told me I’m constantly manipulating him and gaslighting him, so I just whipped out my phone and I text him the screenshots I saved of his fetlife messages.  I said you’re so worried about me cheating on you,? Maybe you can help explain these messages and why you’re on Grindr?  There was a brief moment of silence and he screamed. I f’in hate you, and stormed off…. He knew in that moment he was caught red-handed.  He claimed he was just trying to find us an another partner that maybe we could have a threesome with.   Except we had never even discussed having threesomes, maybe it was brought up once early on in our relationship but It wasn’t something we both actively were seeking on a weekly basis.  And it definitely shouldn’t have been something that he was seeking behind my back. 
that’s just one occurrence , several other arguments have happened since stemming around the same issue and situations.  But I continue monitoring the daily Internet traffic behind his back because I feel like I have to now. 

I have since made an Instagram and a twitter(x) for myself, and he was on board with adding me as a friend, and when you’re friends with somebody, you can see the list of people that they follow and the list of people that follow them, this also proved  interesting because the list of followers on his Instagram looked like a bunch of his ex-boyfriend‘s from his past, several of them were local guys, and yeah, I was also able to see who likes his pictures and which pictures he likes, and he likes a lot of other guys photos too, just like hiiumma mentioned in their post about facebook.  I still haven’t joined Facebook only because I’m scared.  This is the one he spends the most time on, and I can only imagine.  But soon enough, I probably will.  What was interesting is the fact that after two years of our relationship, he still didn’t have any pictures of me and him on his Instagram, making it look like he was still single, that was on our second Valentine’s Day that I confronted him about that, then after a day or 2 he ended up putting a couple pictures on it, of us together, and in his words, did it to ‘pacify ‘ me.  It’ll be interesting when I make a Facebook to see what his relationship status is and how many pictures of us together are on that.

Now we are 3years in and I’m always on guard, there’s been times we've gotten into an argument, and I honestly wouldn’t put it past him if he went out and had a fling behind my back to make himself feel better about his emotions, I know he is always hyperaroused and constantly loves the ‘emotional cheating’ looking at other guys profile pictures on fetlife, , insta, and Grindr, it makes me feel like he’s just exploring his options In case our relationship fails so He has a back up plan or someone else ready to take my place.

Here is a prior post years ago which explains why I wrote that those of us parents and family members can't make much progress with those pwBPD close to us - the baggage of the relationships is quite a hurdle to overcome - but others trained and emotionally neutral sometimes can.

Hi,

I re-read my latest post and felt that I might have come off as too negative and stern.  It's probably because the situation I described was extremely tense, bordering on traumatic.

Anyway, if the time comes that your daughter decides for herself she's ready to get help, you might frame it in these terms:  We love you and are glad you're being proactive about your health and wellness.  Doctors are professionals, they know what to do, they help people manage overwhelming emotions/cope with trauma/deal with suicidal thoughts all the time.  We will support you on your journey to improve your mental health.  It's mature of you to prioritize that right now.  We know that this probably feels overwhelming right now, but this treatment program has good success.  Your doctor thinks it's a good fit for you.

It's just that with my stepdaughter, many of her decisions were tied to needing more money from her dad.  Historically, her dad basically wrote checks for anything she wanted--cars, apartments, tuition, international travel, expensive hobbies--in the vain hope that if she had whatever she wanted and were "set up" in various "new" environments, she'd be happy.  But what was really happening is that the bottomless ATM was enabling continued dysfunction.  She wasn't in school, she wasn't working, she wasn't in therapy, at least not consistently.  She was an adult but not functioning like one.  I felt she veered way "off track," she was miserable, and she was making everyone around her miserable, too.  And so her dad felt compelled to use the remaining financial leverage he had to get his daughter to focus on therapy, because the emotional leverage had been exhausted.  Basically, the threat of withdrawal of continued financial support was needed to get her to re-focus on therapy.  But my guess is her dad framed it more positively than as I described:  If you focus on therapy, don't worry, I've got your back and will pay the bills.  But for me to do that, you need to do whatever the doctors say this time.  That's the only way this is going to work.  You're an adult, you can choose to do whatever you like, and I respect that.  But if you want my continued financial support, you really need to focus on therapy right now.  I can't stand to see you continue to struggle so much.

Hi again,

I second Pook's analysis. In my experience with an adult BPD stepdaughter, her dad had arranged for a couple of intensive treatment programs, including one residential program.  At the time, my BPD stepdaughter seemed just to "go along with" getting treatment, without really being committed to working at it, because she felt she was "forced" to do the programs by her parent.   In fact, one time she characterized the situation as being "assaulted" by her parent to get her into treatment against her will.  Her victim mentality kicked in, and she continued to blame her family for all her problems.  She felt her parents had to change, not her.  And while it's true the programs helped stabilize her, the benefits were short-lived.  My BPD stepdaughter was allowed to resume her "normal" life (e.g. go back to college full-time), which in hindsight was basically setting her up to fail.  She did, over and over again.  Each successive failure made my BPD stepdaughter feel even worse about herself and sunk her deeper into a black hole of anger and despair.

Anyway, when did a residential program work for my adult BPD stepdaughter?  When SHE checked herself in--not her dad or mom.  Granted, I'm pretty sure she wouldn't have been able to research nor select a treatment program all by herself--she just wasn't that high-functioning nor blessed with a genius-level IQ that some posters talk about.  She didn't agree with the BPD diagnosis in the first place.  But her dad, therapist and medical team knew about the various treatment options available.  She had been in and out of hospitals enough that it was clear to others what program would be a good fit for her.  In fact, her doctor had suggested a specific program in the past, but she declined to participate at the time.  My point is, only when my stepdaughter was the one who took herself to the hospital and asked for help, did the program actually work the way it's supposed to work.

Thus the inflection point was when my stepdaughter took an Uber to the hospital.  Her dad met her at the hospital and struck a "deal" with her, which was, for her to continue to receive financial support, she had to follow doctors' orders (and not decline to do recommended treatment(s) because she wanted to do something else).  She was free to go her own way--she was an adult after all--but then she wouldn't get financial support from her dad.  In essence, he refused to continue to enable her dysfunction.  Another nuance is that she agreed to allow doctors to share treatment information with her dad, especially because he agreed to pay the bills.  Previously she had denied the sharing of her medical information.  I don't know if this decision was intentional, or if she just checked the relevant box on the admission forms, mistakenly reasoning that since her dad was paying the bills, he had a right to know her medical information and confer with her doctors.  But at the end of the day, I think it was a big plus that her dad was able to know (in general terms at least) what was going on with his daughter's treatment plan.  At the time, which was exceedingly stressful by the way, I told my husband--This is a turning point.  Your daughter is deciding to get the help she needs.  The doctors know what to do, they are professionals.  Your job right now is to ensure she follows doctors' orders, whatever they are.  She needs to prioritize therapy right now, and everything else can wait.  I think he was relieved by this perspective, because he was exhausted from trying to fix his daughter.  Everything he had tried in the past hadn't worked, even if he tried his hardest and did everything out of love for his daughter.

As an aside, I think my stepdaughter actually warmed to the notion of getting help from "professionals."  It generally validated her narrative of needing help to get past traumatic experiences.  In addition, I'm pretty sure she was sick of getting well-meaning advice from her dad and me--there was too much emotional baggage attached to it.  Fortunately, with hard work, she turned her life around, and it looks much better today.  I'm not saying everything is perfect--she's experienced several setbacks, and she's estranged from all her family members, including her dad at the present moment.  But her dad keeps tabs on his daughter through a periodic dialogue with her therapist, and we know she's OK.  She's living semi-independently in an apartment with her pet and a roommate right now and working as a restaurant hostess.  That's significant progress indeed.

Personally, I feel like you're overstepping on almost everything.  On the car, the cosmetology school, on the allowance, and certainly on taking her abuse.

Your daughter will take mental health seriously when she has no one else to blame but herself.  Yet every time she gets in that position, you're trying to save her from herself.  So instead of her seeing the actual problem (she's mentally ill), she sees you as the problem and lashes out.

Your kind-hearted support is being interpreted as entitlement and proof that you're a bad parent.  After all, why else would you keep paying for everything?  She thinks you feel guilty so she continues to manipulate and blame you.  Ultimately it's making her sicker mentally.

I do agree with your daughter though that she doesn't have to prove the boyfriend's intentions to you.  That's for them to figure out together and if he's not a good guy, then she needs to learn that on her own.  So let her be an adult and face the consequences of these actions.

Your kid needs a supportive mom right now, and her next year will be 1,000x harder without it.  So I don't think you should go no-contact but at the same time, you must end the circular arguments with very clear boundaries.  If she explodes on you, you're not speaking for a few days.  If she wants financial support, she will be kind and thankful or she will make her own money.  Hold her to the same standards that you'd hold anyone else to, because they're lessons she has to learn in order to get better.

And honestly, if she's just a month or two pregnant, it's better to have this blow-out now than later.

To add some context to this- yes, if the apology is on us, it benefits us to apologize.

What if it's on them to apologize? Expecting that may be unrealistic. It's understandable to want one. It's how we repair relationships if we have done something we are sorry for. That is, if the relationship is between two non disordered people.

If someone is in Victim perspective or is avoiding the extreme discomfort of shame, they may not apologize. What I experienced is that, even if BPD mother has said something hurtful, and stopped contact for a while, when she did reach out, she acted as if nothing happened. The expectation is that we also act like that too. Whether or not she had recall of what she said or did that was hurtful was not possible to know. Sometimes she did and was avoinding shame. Sometimes she was so dysregulated when she said/did it that she didn't recall. The unspoken "rule" was that we don't bring it up - ever. If we did, it would start the conflict again.

This limits the level of emotional connection in the relationship because, without this process, it feels like there's no closure, no accountability on the part of the pwBPD. This is their mental illness.

So in context of the advice- one can reach out at any time- this is true. This puts you in the position of deciding when, not him, and not waiting for him to make the first move or apologize. If you need to apologize, you can do it. If you don't- then don't make one up, we don't need to apologize for something we didn't do. However, I think the "act like nothing happened" and don't bring up what happened is still something to consider. It was the only way to do this with BPD mother.

This was not a normal way to relate to someone but it wasn't a "normal relationship" between family members. BPD affects all relationships. We maintained contact because we chose to but the frequency varied according to her circumstances. Emotonally, for me it was more low contact- as getting into emotional discussions didn't go well for either of us. You can also choose the extent and content of your contact with your brother.

Oops, I forgot the other issue- the house you're building.  Are you too far in to back out yourself?  If so, build the house and then sell it.  That's all you can do in this situation.

Some might say to sue your sister.  I wouldn't advise that though because she has nothing for you to sue for.  You're going to spend years in court with considerable legal costs to get...nothing.  You'll win, of course, but even then you'll still lose.

Hello and welcome to the family!  I'm so sorry you're going through this and I wish there were clear answers.  Unfortunately, there's not because mental illness is complicated.

First off, good for you for taking in your sister.  Good for you for offering to build her a home nearby.  Good for you for putting up with this for so long.  This is all noble stuff, helping a sick family member.  Because that's what this actually is, she's mentally sick and not making good decisions.

Second, while you had the best of intentions in everything from part one, they've backfired due to mental illness.  What you're seeing is manipulation from your sister as she paints herself a victim in all of this.  And in some ways, she is a victim- of mental illness and being sick.  But that doesn't mean it's your responsibility to fix her or support her.

In my home, wherever I've lived my entire life, there's been two simple rules.  #1 is respect others and #2 is help out.  At any time, if someone couldn't follow those two rules, I politely, calmly asked them to leave.  Now, that might sound like me throwing them out, but that's where the boundary comes in.  Others can do whatever they want- follow the rules or ignore them.  The choice is theirs to make and I'm going to give them exactly what they want.

Your sister is sick and should not be your burden under these circumstances.  But as long as you're offering financial support, she will remain in that victim mentality and take advantage of the situation. 

The clear path here is to make your own rules and then enforce them.  She's the guest and she gets to choose what she wants to do.  But she doesn't get to stay, not help out, and bad-mouth you on top of it all.

I hope that helps!