First there was husband's ex, now it is my own daughter...

[LazyAtoms]

I first joined this group a number of years ago as I was dealing with my husband's ex wife with BPD. It was very hard.  My daughter was little at this time, but over the years we started seeing things about my daughter that reminded me of husband's ex wife.  We just kept hoping we were wrong though.   Several months ago his ex wife committed suicide.  That is horrible and a whole other subject.

Simultaneouly my daughter kept escalating with personal situations.  She has been away at college. Very brilliant student, works part time, no extreme behaviors like self harm or anything at least not to me.

The emotional intensity has been there her whole life, but overall I still felt like we had a loving relationship despite her emotional outbursts.  Lots of issues with friends and personal relationships always.  She used to call me constantly and I would spend hours talking with her, listening to her life etc.  She started going to therapy while at college and since then there have been multiple splitting situations were I don’t even know what the trigger was, and suddenly I was the worst parent ever.   This has spiraled into her telling my she wants no relationship with me and less I am willing to sincerely apologize and be “accountable” for being a horrible parent that ruined her life.

I have apologized for real, specific things (not being attuned to her particular emotional needs as a kid, etc.). I have offered joint therapy.  All of this has been rejected or reframed, I am told that I play the victim, center my own feelings, and my giant ego won’t let me admit I am wrong.   Joint therapy is rejected because “I will make it all about myself.”  I have tried validating her feelings over and over.  But she rejects all of it because I am unwilling to fully agree with her version of events.  I swear it feels like she read that book “Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents” and that is the box I have been put in, end of story.

I just feel devastated and I do not know what to do. I am taking the Family Connections class and trying to understand her and I know she is truly suffering.  But I feel trapped and there is nothing I can say to change anything.  Does this ever get better? Am I missing something? Or do I just accept her estrangement as is.


Our objective is to better understand the struggles our child faces and to learn the skills to improve our relationship and provide a supportive environment and also improve on our own emotional responses, attitudes and effectiveness as a family leaders