DEARMAN help please

[zaqsert]

I would like to ask for your help with a DEARMAN that I want to try with my uBPDw.

Background:

My wife generally does a poor job of validating the feelings of our D2 (almost D3).  She tends not to want to take suggestions from me and has not picked up any of the books that I've suggested, most recently I Don't Have to Make Everything All Better.

In the past several days I've noticed that once per night our DD has gotten dysregulated about something right around bedtime.  This is probably not terribly unusual for an almost-3 year-old.  Unfortunately, my wife got dysregulated pretty quickly too, got angry at our DD, and yelled at her to stop crying "or else".  Once she also angrily said that there is no reason for her to cry about what she was crying about.

On almost all occasions, our DD stopped crying pretty quickly, especially when my wife did her "count to 3".  But on all of those occasions it took DD a while to actually settle down afterwards.

I worry that this may teach DD either to bottle up her feelings inside of her and not let them out when they are not convenient to others, or learn not to trust her feelings in the first place.



So, I feel the need to try DEARMAN.  Here's my draft:

D:  When DD gets upset, sometimes the reasons make no sense to us.

E:  I feel that they are her feelings.  As we’ve learned, there is no such thing as wrong feelings [referring to our marital T sessions].  It’s our job to help her learn how to deal with them.

A:  When she gets upset we need to validate her feelings, and stay with her and support her to help her work through those feelings.

R:  Then instead of accidentally teaching her to bottle up or not to trust her feelings, we will be teaching her to listen to her feelings and to work through them in a healthy way.  We will help her build up her own self-esteem/self-confidence.  And doing this for her will continue to build strong relationships between her and you and me.

What do you think?  Suggestions?

Thanks!

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[123Phoebe]

"I wish you'd spend half as much time trying to understand me as you do DD! All I want is some peace and quiet and RESPECT!  I can't get any of that from either one of you!  Waaaaa"

I think you're a great dad, Zaqsert   And what you're trying to do is commendable.  Your approaches to parenting sound very different.  Hopefully, she'll take a little of your guidance here and there.  It might be your place to provide the majority of emotional nurturing for your daughter  

Does your wife teach her other things?  Does she show an interest in DD's learning development?  Does DD help mommy do certain things?

 

[zaqsert]

I laughed when I read the quote at the top of your post.  Thanks, Phoebe!  I needed that.  And thanks for the compliment too! 

I suppose I did spend several years trying to understand my wife, and it finally started to come together since early this year when I started to learn about BPD, but that's another story.

I think you're right about it being my place to provide the majority of emotional nurturing for our daughter.  I realize it can be a lot to ask of some with BPD, so at least I just want my wife to mess up our daughter as little as possible.

My wife does teach her other things.  I love watching (or overhearing) them draw, paint, bake, or anything else.  It just seems to happen rather infrequently and inconsistently.  And sometimes it ends when DD does/doesn't do what she is/isn't supposed to do, or "doesn't listen".  To me these seem to be age-inappropriate expectations.  In a few cases they have not resumed a particular activity in months because my wife has not gotten over what DD did.  My wife seems more likely to set DD in front of the TV with several movies each day, while my wife watches her own TV shows, reads, or surfs the web.

She does show an interest in DD's learning development.  The one book I recommended that my wife actually started was one on expected development for DD's age.  Some of the things my wife does are great.  Unfortunately I think she approaches others as too much of a structured lesson rather than play.  Not surprisingly, DD loses interest after a little while, and then my wife lectures her for "not listening".

DD wants to help mommy pretty often with all sorts of things.  Unfortunately, rather often this triggers my wife to want some space.

I am glad that my wife takes interest, while in other ways I suppose I am glad that she removes herself from some situations that would trigger her around DD.

I just hope I can help my wife learn to be a bit less invalidating towards DD.  To a reasonable extent I've learned to accept that she is who she is towards me, and only I can control what I do in my part of it.  But I suppose I'm still hanging on to some hope that she can learn better ways of interacting with DD, since DD is unlikely to learn at age 3 what it took me almost 4 decades longer to learn.

[123Phoebe]

I'm glad you saw the "quote" in the spirit it was intended

I don't have children so don't feel qualified to give advice, other than to keep rockin' your awesome self!

[zaqsert]

Thanks, Phoebe!

And if anyone else has suggestions on how to improve my DEARMAN draft, please let me know.