Fostering-to-adopt a kiddo with BPD

[bert1982]

My husband and I have been mentoring a teenager that lives in a residential mental health facility and are planning to foster-to-adopt, tentatively starting in June.  His therapist suggested we read the Walking on Eggshells book as he has some borderline symptoms, though he hasn't been diagnosed.  Many of the things in the book apply to him when he's in crisis, many of them we haven't really seen because we aren't currently the focus of his unhappiness.  Right now we're seen as the saviors because while we're definitely a big part of his life, we don't live with him in his every day life.  I know that will change once he lives in our home and there are rules and consequences here.  Has anyone else taken on a minor child with BPD symptoms, one that wasn't born into your home that you haven't known their whole life?  He's a great kid when he's not engaging in behaviors and does very well when he has family visits with us (weekends, holidays, vacation, etc.) but then many times he goes into a downward spiral when he has to return to the residential facility after our visits.  With his traumatic past it's certainly understandable that he would have difficulty processing emotions, but we have a 4 year old daughter of our own that we have to think about and I'm just curious what life might look like when he lives with us full time.  Will his behaviors be reduced because he'll finally feel secure and loved?  Will he still self-harm and AWOL just as often once he gets comfortable in the new environment?  Will his behaviors be more manipulative rather than anger driven because by nature, we're just not a very angry household?  So many unanswered questions!  Do we have a right to expect him to have a period of time without behaviors at his current facility before we're willing to agree to let him come live here?  Or are the behaviors something we have to accept, with the hope that a more nurturing environment will discourage them?  Anyone with experience in this (rare to us) situation, please chime in!

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

[Mutt]

Hi bert1982,  



I'd like to welcome you to the family, thanks for joining us! I'd like to answer some of your questions because I have a pwBPD ( she's undiagnosed ) but I don't have an adopted child. I just wanted to talk about mental illness, experts are not entirely sure why someone develops BPD but there are different reasons why. It could because of their genetics, environment or it could be from a traumatic experience in the person's path, experts found that it's how certain neural pathways develop and you can change your neural pathways with identifying your old habit and how those pathways affect you you can create new pathways by creating new habits, it's not easy, it takes dedication and hard work, but it's not impossible. I'm sure that he'll benefit from an enviroment that is not invalidating and critical, a loving environment that you and your H can provide for him, his traits could lessen if you validate him and he's at baseline, nobody can tell what can happen in the future, you can prepare by reading as much as you can about the disorder, I'd probably talk to the mental health facility about his prognosis, you can certainly prepare yourself for the future and make a balanced judgement call by having all of the facts. Best of luck.

BPD: Treatments, Cures, and Recovery

[Panda39]

Hi Bert1982,

I want to join Mutt and welcome you to the BPD Family 

I think you have to go into this with your eyes wide open.  The closer you are to someone with BPD the more of the dysfunctional behaviors you see.  Seeing someone on weekends, holidays and vacation is not going to be the same as living with someone 24/7. 

I would read everything you can on BPD and read some of the posts on this site by it's members so you can get a realistic feel for what it's like living with someone with BPD (or BPD traits).  You will begin to see patterns in behaviors.  You will also find tools, advice, support and ideas.  You might also consider talking with a Therapist that works with BPD patients or with DBT therapy. 

You will find some information in the box to the right --> each topic is a link to more information just click to see more.

I'm glad you've joined us,
Panda39

[bert1982]

Thanks all!  We currently do family counseling with our kiddo and his therapist twice a month.  The treatment facility he is in provides DBT therapy and we've learned some of these skills with him.  But he will have been there for a year in July (we've been mentoring for about a hear and a half) and just yesterday he tried to self harm and AWOL.  I totally agree that weekends/holidays/vacations aren't "real life" and he doesn't display undesired behaviors during that time.  But even "real life" with us will be very different from the institutionalized life he's lived for several years now and the overall unstable life he's lived in the foster care system as a whole.  The kid is SO SMART!  And has so many wonderful qualities, but he really doesn't seem to be able to overcome his poor decision-making and extreme responses to difficult emotions.  His therapist is hopeful that he can become high functioning, but I think due to the length of time he's been in residential care and the amount of trauma experienced, both in his life which landed him in foster care and then the trauma of being in foster care in general, I'm not sure even she knows where he's headed (despite their very good rapport).  I feel like at this point we're just going with our gut regarding boundaries and the pace of this transition from residential to home placement, and it's scary as hell!  But I'm not sure there's another option.