I do not know what to do anymore--I feel so sad

[Roxy Pearl]

Hi--I m not sure I am doing this correctly.

I have a daughter who is now 31 years old.  She has had difficulty with every job she has had.  She just does not get how to get along with others in a work situation and probably socially as well and yet she feels she is "sticking up for herself" when she is really destroying the situation for herself.  I believe she will lose her current job.  When I look back at her life I see how very difficult she has always been--rarely had friends, rarely cooperated.  I think that I backed off trying to discipline her just to keep some peace in my life.  She is extremely intelligent but she does not get that she needs help.  My husband has offered her information on DBT in her area and she chooses to ignore it.  We all see that she needs help.  Her sister who is a physician sees this and advises me to just back off and have little contact.  She tortures me by texting me how she does not feel well, how she is being told by us that it is her fault that she has problems when she feels it is not her fault, but the fault of others.  My therapist, who I go see basically to discuss her, has said that I have a right to tell her that her texts make me feel terrible and to not respond.  It is so hard for me.  I feel so guilty.  How can we get her to see that she needs help?  My husband wants to send her yet another letter with regard to this, but all his letters seem to do is exacerbate her negative reactions.  I am the one she screams at and it can been very scary.  If anyone has suggestions on how to get someone into therapy please let me know.  Also how to handle the guilt of trying to separate from her. Thanks so much.

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

[Respect]

Hello

It is very very distressing to read your post. This is my first post on this site but your situation seems familiar. Our daughter is almost thirty, highly intelligent and has suffered for many years with symptoms like those of BPD. We have had to nurse the situation day by day for a long time and it all went very badly when her therapist whom she had been seeing once a week and for some time it was twice a week pointed her in the direction of Dialectical Behavioural Therapy in acknowledgement that she wasn't going to make progress with her. This was devastating coming at a time of  other life changing transitions. Since April she has been self harming by controlling food and now it is all out of control and she is in big trouble physically and even more confused psychologically. The problem with this condition is that the person often does not want to be helped yet demands understanding and help.

There is no winning.

BUT it is not about us. It is the distress talking. We are in crisis ---we seem to lurch from one to another and it is not doing anyone in the family any good. I think a daughter will blame a mother more than anyone else when she is in that mind set but really that has to be because she is in pain... .it is hard however to remember this when you are being disrespected.

Thinking of you --- try to remember we cannot live someone else's life for them. I keep telling myself this.

[Kwamina]

Hi Roxy Pearl,

The situation with your daughter sounds complicated and I can see how this could really take a toll on you. BPD really is quite a challenging disorder. I understand your desire to help your daughter. Unfortunately we can't make people change if they don't want to. Do you feel like your daughter has ever in any way acknowledged that there might be something wrong with her behavior and/or indicated that she might be willing to get into therapy?

You can't make your daughter change if she doesn't want to but what you can do is change your own behavior. By changing your own behavior you will change the dynamics of the relationship you have with your daughter. To help you achieve this I suggest you take a look at some of the communication techniques described on this website:

A 3 Minute Lesson on Ending Conflict

S.E.T. - Support, Empathy and Truth

S.E.T. is a technique for communication with a person with BPD. The technique helps you to express your truth while minimizing the chance of (further) conflict and maximizing the chance of getting through to the other person.

Since you mention how she 'tortures' you by texting and how she screams at you, I also suggest you take a loot at some information we have on here about boundaries:

Getting Our Values and Boundaries in Order

Examples of boundaries

Do you feel like setting and enforcing (stricter) boundaries with your daughter is something you would be comfortable with doing?