Brother with BPD traits

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Hello! I'm a 29-year-old woman, and I'm here because my 40-year-old brother has BPD traits and I'm trying to get to a place where I can comfortably live with them rather than trying to "fix" him. I figured talking to others with similar experiences might help it all feel less daunting.

I love my brother deeply, and often, he can be hilarious and one of the most caring people I know. But his moods shift very quickly, and his bad ones are worse than anyone else's in my life. We can be having lunch and laughing and reminiscing and he can be talking about how much he loves his job, and then an hour later, he gets this look on his face — I always know he's had a mood shift because that look is unmistakable — and he becomes cold and distant and sometimes even mean. He'll talk about how he's so worn out from his job, and no one understands, and he wants them to just lay him off, even though he was temporarily laid off months ago because of the pandemic and he repeatedly told me as he was unemployed that he was the most unhappy he's been since our brother died by suicide six years ago.

He sees a psychiatrist and takes medication for depression, but he refuses to see a therapist, no matter how many times I encourage him and offer to help him find one. It's exhausting because he treats me like his therapist, texting and calling me sometimes every day to complain about his life and his work and everything. This wouldn't be so terrible if him complaining wasn't so dramatic. It's never just "I had a bad day, but maybe tomorrow will be better." It's always "I had a bad day and I've been unhappy for so long and I'm not okay and no one gets it and I can't talk to anyone because they all say the wrong thing." It's exhausting. I end up trying to validate him because that seems to be what he wants, but that also sometimes requires me to squash my own beliefs and feelings, and I'm starting to get tired of that.

We don't even live in the same state, but he is still the number one stressor in my life. I feel terrible admitting that, but it's true. I myself go to therapy and we spend a lot of time working on this, which has helped enormously over the years. Even still, whenever I'm physically with him, or whenever he is in one of these moods and calls or texts me, I can't help but think, "How will I deal with this forever?" I am not one to run away, but it makes me want to run away.

A lot of this has to do with me fearing that his bad moods, because they are so dramatic, will lead to suicide. He was in one of the moods tonight, and as I write this, I'm afraid that he's going to kill himself (at my therapist's suggestion, I've asked him to make a pact with me that we aren't going to kill ourselves and he's agreed to it). I find my own moods mirroring his — when he's in a bad one, I become anxious and have tunnel vision; when he's in a good one, I can finally relax — and that's something that scares me. I want to have a normal relationship with my brother — or, at the very least, be able to love him without that love causing me to feel so bad.

[Peppery]

Hi there!

What a difficult situation. With telehealth on the rise, would your brother consider counseling with you and a clinician on the computer or cell phone, as opposed to going in person?

His world is probably so chaotic and his thoughts so disorganized, that he doesn't really comprehend the intrusion and stress he causes you. I have BPD and was equally dependent on my 2 brothers who, also, live in a different state. My narcissism had me so caught up in me and my world, that I couldn't really see that commandeering that amount of time and energy was inappropriate. When they'd pull away I was insulted and hurt.  And, I cried wolf over and over for 30 years.  I'm sure they cringed every time they saw it was me calling.

Only after I was diagnosed and had treatment that was laser-focused on the dynamics of BPD, was I able to really experience empathy.

I commend you for researching and learning about BPD. My brothers were not interested in finding out about the condition that has been the single most influential element of my life. Now, I'm just embarrassed and ashamed at my previous episodes and the bother I was to them and their families over the years. I wish they had learned about BPD - as it stands, I'm pretty sure they think I was just a nasty, unhappy person by choice.

What does your therapist suggest you do to set loving boundaries with your brother?

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Thank you so much for this response! I really appreciate you telling me about your own experience as someone with BPD. Was there anything your brothers could do *right* during that time? And what led you to seek a diagnose and get treatment?

To answer your questions, my brother is not open to any form of therapy, even text therapy, sadly. I don't think he thinks that this is anything to work on — last night when I was talking to him and suggesting therapy for the millionth time, he kept changing the subject to be about how terrible work is. I get the feeling that all he wants me to do is say "you should quit your job" when I very much do not believe that and do not want to encourage that. Before this job, he was unemployed for over two years by choice and it was not good for his mental health or the mental health of my family, and the only reason he got out of it was because my aunt basically gave him the job he has now (which he excels at and is actually very cool and that most of the time, he's thrilled about).

Something my therapist recently suggested is letting him know that when I don't immediately answer the phone, it's not because I'm ignoring him, but because I'm doing something else or have put my phone away — that way when I don't call him back right away like I usually do, he might think "oh, she put her phone away" first instead of "this bitch is ignoring me." (Key word being "might.") She also advises me to discuss these types of things when he's in one of his good moods so that we might come to figure out better ways to tackle the bad moods together. I have a hard time doing that, though, because whenever he's in a good mood, I'm scared of doing anything to make it end, including bringing up how he frequently calls me to catastrophize about his life and the stress that puts on me.

When he's in the bad mood, he'll say things like, "sorry to bother you" in a mean way if I express any sort of perspective that isn't the one he's looking for. I don't want him to feel like he's bothering me because I want him to trust me and know that I support him, but at this point I just feel like nothing I do is right — even if I respond to every call and text immediately, even if I validate everything he says, even if I drop everything for him anytime he's having a "crisis."