Our 16 year old daughter who has been diagnosed with BPD hates us

[Heartbroken mom1]

Hi,
My story is a long one, so I'll stick with just the facts. Our daughter began self-harming and threatening suicide at the age of 13. Things progressed pretty quickly. We had her counseling, we had her in outpatient care, but that didn't stop her from mutilated her back with a pencil because she felt guilty about sneaking out to meet a boy during a blizzard to have sex. Followed by emergency care stays we decided to put her in her first residential care facility two weeks before Christmas. This was the hardest decision I have ever had to make. Her mental health team along with my husband believed that this is what would be best for our daughter. I believe this was the catalyst for her hatred towards us. It wasn't until she was discharged and readmitted to another emergency care unit that a psychiatrist brought up BPD. He told us that although she was young she checked all 9 boxes for the diagnosis. We found her another counselor and a psychiatrist. All 3 of her psychological tests show a strong BPD diagnosis. She has had one test every year. Seven months after her first residential stay she is placed in a second residential stay right before Halloween. What we thought might make this time different is the residential placement was in the same state we live and she would receive care from her same psychiatrist and same counselor. She was discharged in May of 2021 and we felt she had made progress and was going better. She had coping skills and me and my husband and educated ourselves on BPD and even took a class. Things were good over the summer the once school started so did the drugs, self harm, and multiple suicide attempts. She has also started to take her anger out on me. Constantly trying to pick fights, being nasty and mean. Once again right before Christmas she is back in the same residential facility. We are growing desperate. She is now 16 and in a couple of years we will have no say in getting her help. By now she knows how to play the system and tells people working with her exactly what they want to hear. It worked she was discharged 13 days ago, started using drugs, self harming, even bought a knives and hid it in her room. One week ago she ends up in the ER for a seizure and her blood work comes back showing drug use. Which is believed to have caused the seizure. My husband calls CPS and tells them she's not coming home they need to take her. After this is when we found the knives and I won't lie it scared us. She's an angry teenager with BPD. Before the blood work came back we told her that it was best that she rest at home once discharged and cancel her date with her boyfriend, which by the way has become her life. She grew extremely angry. Had we taken her home and grounded her for the drug use, and not knowing about the knife who knows where it would have ended that night. So a foster family has been found and her social worker asked if she wanted to work on unification with us and she said she would rather age out of foster care and have nothing to do with us. I have never experienced hurt like this in my life. The tears only stop briefly until a remember how much she hates us. Like I said in the beginning this is the short version of the last three years. I also want to mention the strain this is putting on my marriage. I don't see my husband cry often, but there have been a lot of tears this past week. All we have ever done was out of love for our daughter. I hope one day she can see that.

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

[By Still Water]

My heart hurts for you, as we, too, have been rejected and scorned by our adult son. His childhood was fraught with ADHD, OCD, anxiety, and tantrums. We have two other children with whom we have close, healthy relationships.  The mantra, here, that has helped me is, “I didn’t cause it; I can’t cure it; I can’t control it.” Are you and your husband getting support from a counselor? Do you have other children? It is important, we’ve found, to find ways to practice self care.

[Sancho]

Hi Heartbroken mom1
I can hear the exhaustion and pain as you give us just a brief insight into these past three or so years. Living on high alert, trying to explore any and all avenues of help - and being confronted with terrible abuse and seeming rejection.

Your loved dd was diagnosed at a very young age for bpd - usually they hold off until older I believe, but it seems the signs were very clear.

When I came here I learnt two important things: one was that I was not alone - there are people out there who go through the same thing every day, and day after day, who carry the pain and exhaustion with them. This was a great comfort to me. The other thing was that things that I had experienced - such as the terrible abuse from my dd - was something that others experienced too. I was able to see that it is part of the illness, not my individual dd hating me for things when I have tried my best to love and care for her.

It is so hard when the 'letting go' is taken out of your hands, and it seems all the love and care will fade.

My dd is over 30 now and it has been an awful journey to be honest. But I remember back when she was in her teens, I remember thinking 'She is not going to listen to anything I say' and so many times I wished there was another adult in her life that could guide her.

I hope by coming here you can come to understand that the 'hatred' you feel is part of this illness - not anything that you or your husband have done or said. I can tell when my dd is about to fly at me - I can almost see her looking for something - anything - to use to blame and abuse me. Sometimes it still hurts and knocks me for six. Mostly now I let it pass me by and keep going.

I hope you can hold your dd in your heart and send loving thoughts to her.

My experience of bpd is that it is also incredibly changeable. My dd would be here with me, off and moved into a place with the new bf, blow ups and back with me, off with someone else, blow ups back with me and on and on.

In the end I used the times when she chose not to be here to regroup myself, refuel my love for her and to practise 'letting go'. Your dd walks with you in your heart. This might be a moment when you are able to grieve - something you probably haven't had a moment to do since things started to fall apart.

In many instances we seem to 'lose' our loved child to bpd and we have to live in a constant state of grieving. It is important though, when you feel able, to just nurture yourself and your husband - just a little time here and there to be thankful that you have each other.

Thank you for posting. I will be thinking of you over these coming weeks.

[Grolleoll]

I can relate to your situation. My 21-year-old daughter with BPD recently "disowned" me and said I'm not her mom any more after I told her that she can't come back home to live if she and her boyfriend run out of money and get evicted. She lived with us until recently, and we tried to help her in every way we could, doing more for her than most people would do for their adult child. We put up with a lot - lying, disrespect, disobeying rules, not helping around the house, dropping out of college, frequently not showing up for work, uncontrolled spending, bad boyfriends. I'm very devastated.