SIL affecting my mental health and our family

[Apollo11]

SIL wBPD is ruining the family

There is no formal diagnosis, but my SIL displays many traits of BPD. Not only is this making issues with our relationship with my in laws, but it’s making a normal family dynamic almost impossible as she is always at their house when we go, (they live several hours away) it’s also means my husband’s brother and his wife refuse to be there whenever possible.

There’s been ten years of a fairly turbulent relationship, but just lately, my SIL has been getting a bit physical with me and I think she’s trying to provoke a massive row, so she can be the victim. At my FIL’s 70th, she kept bumping it to me, which I just let go. Then later in the night, she very deliberately barged in to me and sent me flying. I wasn’t hurt, but me and my husband were in Total shock, a few other family members saw it too. We know better than to react. Around this time she seemed to resent us having a good time (just several generations standing around and chatting, nothing raucous) and was passively aggressively tidying up. FIL asked her to relax, but she just kept saying it was his party and it wasn’t for him to be tidying up (he wasn’t).

My SIL has lots of health issues and this seems to drive a lot of the enabling behaviour by her parents. She has lost most of her hearing and also has a fairly recent possible diagnosis of complex partial seizures, she’s almost 40 and is single, with no real friends. I think she is diagnosed as bipolar.

There’s a pattern of behaviour with my SIL, where she will either pick a fight, or take massive offence at a perceived insult and then depending on the ‘severity’ will either storm off and be passively aggressively doing something in the next room, or will (in severe instances) threaten to kill herself as no one is paying her enough attention. She will almost always pick the fights when her parents are not in the room and will then storm off to tell them what has allegedly happened, then they will be frosty with the ‘perpetrators’ and usually we sit and eat the remainder of Sunday lunch in awkward silence, while she bangs about in the kitchen. Then they will demand that my kids hug her when we leave, even though they refuse.

Something about me really triggers my SIL and I genuinely don’t know what. I have reacted on a handful of occasions over the years, so could this be why? I don’t know if she just enjoys baiting me or what, but there are a few too many things now I’m not comfortable with happening in front of my kids (6 and 4), and the way she treats us/them. On top of all of the rudeness ( she won’t speak to us or exchange pleasantries), storming off and now whatever this physical escalation is, there’s a lot of stuff I don’t like directed towards the kids, “I bought you a birthday present/ice lolly so you have to give me a hug, or shouting at me because the kids messed up the doll house etc. I feel like if she hates us, she can’t feel entitled to a relationship with our children.

When we were engaged, my MIL demanded SIL be a bridesmaid and completely cut us dead until we agreed. This caused massive. Issues between me and my husband as I kept demanding he talk to his parents about her behaviour and he refused, knowing it was pointless. To this day I still feel like I wasn’t worth fighting for, so I’m not that objective at all.

When our eldest was a very young baby, SIL did a few stupid things (I hope in complete innocence) such as sitting her on a rocking horse and rocking it violently so she flew off, or sitting her on the corner of the table in a cafe, when my husband said she should watch her as the throws herself backwards now, she just stormed off and left her there. In these situations, I’m always scared to actually speak up, as I know she will fly off the handle and I’ll be cold shouldered by my in laws. As it was, she ended up flying in to a massive rage and neither she nor my in laws  spoke to us again for for several weeks afterwards on both occasions.

I’ve spoken out a few times and twice I’ve yelled at her, but this is the worst possible thing to do.

I know a lot of what my SIL does comes from a place of unhappiness and maybe is a symptom of something she can’t easily control, but she really is an awful person to be around and now that she’s crossed a physical line (and we just allowed it), she seems to have stepped up trying to bait me and provoke/undermine me in front of my kids. It’s made me realise that I’ve basically been bullied now for over ten years and we’ve all just allowed it to happen. I’m not prepared to stand for it any longer.

My in laws have this nasty habit of lying by omission, so they’ll turn up with SIL or if they have the kids, very rarely in emergencies perhaps once a year, they’ll not mention she’ll be around. If we’re invited over, she’ll just appear at some point and then ignore us until she picks a fight.

My husband has said (unprompted by me) that enough is enough and he’ll speak to his parents and we will be NC with SIL unless things change. His brother also wants to be involved in this conversation so they present a united front (his wife just refuses to go around there). My husband knows this will cause a few months of guilt trips and cold shouldering. But actually nothing has been said yet and it’s slowly sending me crazy. I do also have my own physical and mental health struggles, plus a relationship with my parents which is toxic and often strained. I feel like I’m the common denominator and at best, I’m bringing out the worst in/provoking people. This last week I can barely look at my husband because he’s allowed this to happen for so long and I’ve been begging him on and off over the years to speak up for me and for us. I know none of this is truly his fault but until he does have this awkward confrontation, I just don’t feel like he thinks I’m worth the fight. I suppose I’m always seeking validation, even though I don’t want responsibility for his parents being awful to him. I’m also just left thinking what is it I’ve actually done to deserve being the family scapegoat?

Please help, I’m losing my mind. Thanks x

[livednlearned]

We'll help you keep your mind 

You sound like the most sane person in the whole dynamic so hopefully there is at least a little comfort in that.

One reason you might be getting singled out is that there are multiple weak boundaries in the family and yours has the appearance of being the weakest. Meaning, because of his position in the family (son, brother), your husband is expected to handle things, and that is not an empowering position for you to be in. You SIL knows this.

Your SIL probably has a one-up or one-down view of relationships. She is either in a one-up position or a one-down position, and because you cannot directly defend yourself she perceives you as one-down and weak, making you bully bait.

What you have going for you is a husband who shares your perspective. He may regress when it comes to confronting his parents so the more support you give him, the more strength he may find.

How do you feel about following in your other sister-in-law's footsteps and opting out of family gatherings? Or adapting them so that you feel safe?

Direct approaches can sometimes be the most effective though the backlash is often greater: If your H speaks out and directly acknowledges the problem dynamics, your FIL will likely align with SIL given their track record of triangulation. And your H likely feels cowed by his parents given what you've shared. With you, your H may feel he can express what he thinks is right, but when it comes to action he might feel like he's 5 years old. His parents have some bullying behaviors, too, from what you describe.

Indirect approaches can work better, but the trade-off can lead to long tedious conversations about how to handle things. An indirect approach might be insisting on meeting in public places for lunch or brunch where it will be more challenging for SIL to harm others, if she comes.

Dysfunctional family dynamics seem to get worse the more time spent together, and get even more dysfunctional faster if there is alcohol. It's is perfectly within reason for you to control what you can, which is the environment, since you cannot control people who behave badly.

I have a dysfunctional family of origin, and I'm re-married into a family with a stepdaughter who has BPD.

I spent a long time feeling powerless and frustrated (in retrospect it was full-blown grief) about SD26, who lived with us on and off for 4 years.

I learned that we always have power, it's a question of fine-tuning what we choose to do in a way we can tolerate.

Do you feel you can tell your husband you will visit your in-laws under conditions in which you feel safe? That might help him help you think about what it means to feel safe, and problem solve from there. If the first round of solutions don't work, no contact is always there as the nuclear option.