Here's some historical background.  Decades ago Borderline PD was considered untreatable and therefore not covered by insurance.  So when a professional came across a patient with suspected BPD, they would diagnose Bipolar since it had similar symptoms yet did have insurance coverage.  However, they really are different.

Bipolar is caused by a chemical imbalance and meds do help.  But Borderline PD is more of an emotional dysregulation issue where the person's perceptions are self-oriented and often unconnected to facts and reality overall.  While meds do help moderate the behavior, the best approach involves therapy.  Dialectical or Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (DBT or CBT) is effective but it can take years to improve life and even that depends upon the patients continuing therapy and diligently applying it in life and perceptions.

Since many with BPD are in such Denial and prone to Blame Shifting that even mention of a diagnostic label is generally best to be avoided.  Many therapists are known to provide therapy without naming a specific condition or therapy.  It would be wise of us to do similarly.

The above is good general advice whatever the situation.  In my case, though my ex was never diagnosed to my knowledge nor had therapy, again to my knowledge, she frequently ranted and raged.  As a spouse and then an ex-spouse, I had real fears that anything I said would end up being used against me in family court where we had years of parenting conflict and allegations against me.  So I quickly learned I could not risk apologizing for the allegations spewed in my direction or it might be used against me in a legal scenario.  I did not want to risk even a day in jail.

So far as I am aware, apologizing for a person's hurt feelings is permissible since I've never heard of anyone being found guilty in family court of hurting feelings.  The other may still be disgruntled but that's not in our power, especially since they're adults after all.

Hi mitochondrium ,

She will leave on Sunday.

In this other thread, I was trying to convince her to move out to her mom's house. Finally, it seems to be happening. She has packed her clothes already.

She only agreed because as soon as I moved out, she would have to move out also because this is a rented place and she can't pay for it. So she would eventually be removed by the owner, using police if needed. As soon as she acknowledged what she would have to deal with by staying, she finally decided to cooperate. She then also realized two other undesired consequences would be that I would go to a smaller place and that we would not be able to come back to our current home, which is very good.

Things have been very calm since she agreed, because she now wants my cooperation as well. She has asked me to not bring another woman into my life and has asked many times how long this will last, because she wants to return. I told her I don't know and that would depend on her progress after she starts DBT. For her mother, she lied, saying that she is leaving because she is angry at me and doesn't want to do something terrible with me.

But in reality her behavior has changed overnight and is now almost perfect. She is being lovely, with just a few quick anger outbursts that didn't take more than one minute and didn't escalate. Hasn't been digging into drama.

I'll do all of my best to keep her in this mood and motivated, while also trying to avoid everything that went wrong the last time. The worst problem was her food sensitivities, which I'm figuring out better now. She has non-celiac gluten sensitivity, but not for bread that has gone through 24h natural fermentation (we learned this yesterday).

This night will be special, because I'll cuddle with her. I want her to feel loved as she leaves. I don't want her to feel rejected and abandoned, as she did the last time we went through this (two years ago).

The short answer is it sounds like a lot here is BPD (or CPTSD or anxiety, depending on which therapist diagnoses her).

You say you're sensitive and were married 12 years? Did you see any other behavior prior that hinted at this?

In terms of whether you contributed, did you do anything in the past 12 years you felt guilty for doing? If so, then think on that more. Why do you feel guilty? Is it because you did something or merely because she felt bad?

If you can't think of anything, then why would you think so now? 

Two things about that: 1) Women, in particular, with BPD are excellent at manipulation, whether they're conscious of it or not. Much of everything they do is an act, and that act is designed to get what they want and to fool you into giving it to them. When the manipulation doesn't work -- when they don't get what they want -- the mask comes off. When it does, it can be followed by rage, retribution, and hallucination. All of that is potential for disaster, especially if they make false accusations that they might actually believe.

You should talk to a professional. But from what you've written, it doesn't sound like you really did anything wrong. If so, that's pretty much SOP for the victim of someone who is with someone with BPD. That is, you try sincerely to have a relationship with someone who has profound mental and emotional problems, thinking that you can approach that relationship like one with a healthy person. You can't. And the truth is you can't really plan for treating them as being mentally and emotionally ill, either. In other words, they're like a bomb with a timer only you can't see the clock. There's no knowing when they will go off, and there's not much you can do to stop it, if anything.

So, think earnestly about what you did or didn't do, but don't dwell and don't fool yourself into thinking you didn't something wrong when you didn't. Be honest. And then move on, hopefully with the help of a therapist.

Hi there Onda,

You've come to the right place.  I'm sorry that things have been so rough for you.  Many parents here feel some mix of grief, exhaustion, resentment, fear and stress.  The stress is physical, emotional and financial--a triple whammy.  When living with someone with untreated BPD, it indeed can feel like walking on eggshells all the time, and we become a shell of our former selves.  We're living in a FOG of fear, obligation and guilt, and we can't quite see through it.

First off, this is not your fault.  You didn't give your daughter BPD, no matter how much she blames you and how hard she tries to convince you otherwise.  She's just blaming you as an excuse, as a deflection from taking responsibility for herself.  She has a victim attitude, correct?  I think the victim mindset is the worst part of BPD, because it renders your daughter powerless over her own life.  She's so busy blaming others (especially you) for all her problems that she can't see that SHE is RESPONSIBLE for her own life and her own happiness.  Not you, not her troubled childhood.  Unfortunately, she's stuck in a rut because she expects everyone else to change, not herself.  Like you wrote, her expectations of others are unrealistic, impossible to meet, and so your daughter is constantly disappointed, constantly enraged, constantly ruminating in a messy pit of self-pity.

It's bad enough that your daughter sits around all day doing nothing but smoke.  But it's worse when she's a "spoiler" of happy moments like holidays and family get-togethers.  It's typical for pwBPD to have meltdowns during holidays and special events.  I think it's because she can't stand to see other people be happy, because it's in stark contrast to her own misery.  In addition, she can't stand not being the center of attention.  Finally, she's insanely jealous, especially of siblings, because they seem to have such an easy time "adulting," while she struggles so much.  Seeing them is a reminder of how dysfunctional her own life really is.

So what do you do?  First off, I think you focus on self-care.  Maybe you get some therapy.  Maybe you try to get some sleep.  Maybe you take walks in fresh air.  Maybe you pray.  Maybe you pursue a tranquil hobby like drawing, singing or playing an instrument.  Maybe you start the day stretching, followed by a hot cup of coffee.  When I'm really stressed, I'll take a warm bath at the end of the day by candlelight, and then I read a little bit before going to bed early.

It's interesting that you're living at your daughter's place.  That means at some point, you might decide to leave.  To me that sounds a lot easier than asking your daughter to leave your own home.  It also sounds to me that living in close quarters with your daughter every day isn't doing you any good.  Could you find some other living arrangement?  Perhaps you could live temporarily with another of your children until you get back on your feet.

Look, your daughter is 43.  You aren't responsible for her anymore, she is.  It sounds to me like her current situation is working for her:  she does exactly what she wants, which is smoke and sit around all day.  She doesn't care about cleaning up--only you care.  Would it be so bad if she were left alone to live how she pleases?  If you weren't on top of each other all day, would that work better for you?  I know you want her to get some help so that your daughter can feel better, but your daughter is demonstrating that the status quo works just fine for her.  I guess I'd say, respect her choice.  But you shouldn't have to be her maid and cook anymore.  She's perfectly capable of cleaning up and getting food herself, correct?  I think you should stop doing things for her that she can do herself, otherwise you are actually enabling dysfunction.

In the meantime, you might try some boundaries.  One might be that when your daughter talks about an abusive childhood, your response is not to engage with her.  You might say:  We can't change the past, let's talk about something else.  If she doesn't change the subject, you leave the room.

You might read on this site some thoughts about validation.  The general tip is to validate feelings (I'm sorry you feel bullied), but not lies.  If you validate lies or apologize for things which didn't happen, the pwBPD can take that as an invitation to act out and blame you even more.  In my own experience, the pwBPD in my family had a tendency to "test" stories of abuse which were egregious lies.  I think in that particular instance, it was better to nip it in the bud:  "That didn't happen and you know it."

Finally, I think you deserve to have a life.  You shouldn't beat yourself up too much about the past--it sounds like you've been beaten down enough already.  You probably did your best with the skills and resources you had at the time, with circumstances that probably weren't in your favor.  I would hope you give yourself a little grace.  You could start by forgiving yourself and your daughter.  Tomorrow is a new day, try to make it a good one.  What's one baby step that you can take which would make tomorrow a good day?  Write it down tonight, and be sure to do it tomorrow.

I hope that perspective helps a little.

CC and Pook,  I appreciate you both very much.
CC, I tried your Mantra "It's not time to worry yet".  I needed to contact my son about my grandson and I could feel myself getting anxious about my son's possible mood. Your Mantra did help. I since have fine tuned it for my over active imagination. "I have "no reason" to worry - so I won't.   
Pook, boy - you hit the nail on the head. Each time  you wrote "its not your fault" I felt myself choked up.  As I've learned more about bpd - I have been able to let go of carrying all the blame. Especially hearing for so many years how I am to blame. I understand his words at that moment are bpd speaking.  I happen to be blessed that my son can also speak kindly to me. That piece of fault I carry is looking at how I missed it, how I didn't protect him when my intention was to. Lots of thoughts can haunt me. I guess the answer is not to look back and judge myself. To even consider he may have this illness even if I did everything right.

In reading over the following, it is very long. I do not have family to help and I cannot expect friends to understand.
I have recently been living with my 43 year old daughter in her Housing Commission Home. This has occurred due to financial strain in both our lives. This morning, I walked past her bedroom and said good morning and she replied in a tone that suggested she was far from ok. When I asked what was wrong, she replied, in a dark tone, not to worry about it! Hence, I walk on eggshells and succumb to a sense of what might happen next.
I then decided to look on line for ways to cope with a child with BPD and found this site. Reading what everyone has said resonated.
My daughter was born with some physical disabilities and had a few operations in her early life. She struggled academically, but more importantly, making and keeping friends. People constantly disappointed her or did not agree with her ideas. Her adolescence was difficult. Her father left when she was just 14. She had adored him and this left a big hole in her life. He dismisses her behaviours as my bad parenting and says he cannot deal with neurodivergent people. He has, over the last 30 or so years, made some effort to have her stay with him and his various partners. When she threatened to set his house on fire, he gave up. Understandable, I suppose.
When she was 4 she had been diagnosed with ADD and given Ritalin. This helped until she refused to take it.
When she was about 18 years old, a much older doctor diagnosed her with bipolar disorder and she was medicated. It was not that she had mood swings, but rather continuous negative behaviours and interactions with others. No one matches her expectations. Over the years I have read about BPD and can see that the traits are similar to those displayed by my daughter. She will not listen when I suggest seeing someone about a reevaluation of her condition.
Her sister and Brother live far from us. They spent years seeing her ruin family life, many times that should have been happy and fun, particularly birthdays and Christmas.
She had a relationship and had two children with this man. She left the relationship when the boys were 3 nd 5. She still has close contact with him. Their eldest son has Autism and extremely violent episodes. Both boys lived with their father and the younger brother lived in fear from 8 until 14 years old. The eldest was taken into care at this time and now lives in a community home with a carer on call. He is 20 this year.
There was a period of about a year when we lost contact. We had been living together. I was full-time teaching and she was home doing nothing! I tried to get her to help with the cleaning, washing, anything to get her motivated, but she lived in a mess. She also smokes, still smokes (despite the price of tobacco) and would not walk to the closest place to buy her cigarettes. I had to drive her. I know it sounds like I was pandering to her moods, but I did not want to create tension. I constantly walked on egg-shells at home. One day she hit me a couple of times over the head. Not to hard, but scary. I felt like I was in jail.
One evening, I had had some wine and gone to bed. She came to my room and demanded that I drive her to the shops for cigarettes. I explained that I had had wine and didn't want to lose my licence. She was angry and went out and came back with a knife. I managed to get dressed and take the dog and myself out. I called the police.
Last resort, but I had had it. They came while I was outside. She was holding a bag of peas to her face and said I had hit her. They took her to a psychiatric centre for assessment and I took out an AVO. I did not see her for a year until she needed help finding a place to live.
Family Support felt that her eldest son might benefit from living with his mother. While they waited for a home, they went from motel to motel. The son created havoc each time and they had to leave. One night at about 12am I received a phone call from my daughter. They had ended up at a police station near me and had been put out onto the street with nowhere to go.
I collected them and they stayed wth me for 6 weeks until a house was found.
The situation with them living together was difficult and my daughter was exposed to violent outbursts. The last, when he chased her into the street and attempted to strangle her. Luckily, neighbours helped and called the police.
My daughter lived on her own until before last Christmas when I moved in for the holidays. I had tried to help her over the 3 years she lived in the house alone, to look after her house (I lived and worked an hour away), coming down on weekends cleaning and cooking, spending. Her son's father is also close and mows her lawns and comes to see her.
She has created a relationship with someone she saw years ago. This person talks to her in her head. She does not see him.
She talks about being hit with a belt by her father - this did not happen.
She sits on the lounge all day, going to the kitchen for food, only to return to the couch.
She feels she has been bullied about her looks all her life (she does have a big nose, but so do I and her brother) and is using that as an excuse not to eat well, exercise or shower.
I am now in the position I was before. Cooking, picking up after her, staying out of her way when she is edgy and generally keeping things going.
I am not a saint. I've made huge mistakes financially and in choosing a new partner (my daughter ended up living with us, which was difficult). I didn't deal well when her father left and I know at that time I wasn't a good parent to my three children. But I'm trying to learn from all my mistakes and help my daughter find some positivity.
If you do read this, then thankyou.

How are things going

One quick piece of advice since I faced this often with my BPD daughter.

I would not validate the invalid.  So if she said, "You did this and that, which caused me to do this and that..."  Nope, I don't do that.  I won't respond to any of that stuff either because I'm not fighting the battle within her mind.

On the other hand, we can always validate feelings.  When I get those unhinged rants, I will quickly say (when I'm permitted between rants) that I never meant to hurt her feelings and I am so sorry that she's felt that way.

If it goes back to "You did this, and you did that..."  I'll just wait patiently for my turn to speak.  If I just can't do it, then I'll make up an excuse and hang up...but I try to hold out as long as possible.  Then I'll repeat the same statement.  "<daughter>, I never meant to hurt your feelings and I'm so sorry you're feeling this way."  If she's actually letting me talk and listening, I might add, "I would never do anything to actually hurt you, I love you so much."

That either cuts the tension or it doesn't, but it does offer a sincere apology (for feelings) without speaking a single word towards the accusations. 

I hope that helps!

After reading all your responses and reflecting, I realize that although my reaction to my daughter's pregnancy was natural, it was not well handled given that I know I'm dealing with a pwBPD. The email I sent was also pointless, I should have known it would be, and based on her reaction---it must struck a very deep nerve. Today I decided that I would try to rewind things sooner rather than later, and just reach out to her to tell her I love and that I'm here to support her. My decision to reach out to her before she circled back to me was based mostly on the fact that I saw on my Life360 app that although she went to school yesterday morning, she was back at her boyfriend's by 2pm, and that she wasn't in school today. When I tried to text her it appeared I was blocked, which was confirmed when I tried to call her from my cell phone. So I picked up the land line and called. She answered and was completely unhinged, clearly not wanting to "start over". She continued to spew the lie that I threatened to call CPS and take her baby (a complete fabrication), with the emotion of someone who actually believed it. Then she blamed that lie for making her "feel this way" and told me she was at home alone and had to take a week's leave of absence from school because due to my words and behavior toward her, she had been "all over the place". I can't be sure if the leave of absence was a decision she made for herself or if the school imposed it on her, but I don't think that a week alone all day is going to be helpful to her. Anyway, she was demanding that I apologize for things I never said, telling me I'd never hear from her again if I didn't, and was just crying and screaming. I am sort of taken back by all this whether I should be or not, because "usually" when she flips out, the dust settles relatively quickly and she stabilizes after the toxic emotional release. This is something else. I don't think I have any choice but to just leave her alone until she circles back to me in a non toxic way. I don't think there's anything more I can do or say in effort to try to help stabilize her short of apologizing for a complete fabrication, which I don't think is advisable. I also fear that any communication from me could destabilize her more. Please correct me if I'm wrong. I am so worried about her, the baby, the father, and his little girl. I'd be shocked to find out that my daughter's general behavior around him/his family hasn't changed dramatically for the worse and the pregnancy he was initially "excited" about is evolving into a destabilizing situation for everyone. I can only hope that's not the case.