Need help dealing with adult BPD sister after death of mother/chief enabler

[BPDSis]

On August 8th our 86 year old mother died, leaving my 56 sister and me (52).  In my childhood pfamily, my mother was my sister's primary enabler (my parents were divorced when I was three; I have recently come into information that my father is probably NOT my sister's father - which was what we were told all our lives - and this may explain some of our fundamental differences, beyond having, or not having, BPD.)

After getting some education about BPD over the past 8 weeks (the entire length of time I've even known about BPD) I believe my birth was the triggering event for my sister's life-long BPD outbursts.  The birth of the second child seems to act as a trigger for many with BPD, and that would fit our situation, as I have never, ever known a single pleasant day in my sister's company, ever.  For my sister, I was, always have been, and always will be ALL BAD, because I invalidated her with my birth.

I've gone into therapy to try address some of the issues that having a BPD sister has caused, as I can recognize that I've clearly adopted BPD "coping strategies" as part of my usual routine in dealing with the world, and it's no more appropriate, healthy, or self-loving for me to behave like that, then for a BPer to do so.  I also want to address the sexual abuse I was exposed to as infant, committed by my sister. I've read the BPers can sexually abuse their siblings and if anyone has comments on that aspect, especially as infants/toddlers, I'd appreciate any feedback from that.  I realize that a common question is, who was abusing my sister, if she was abusing me? To the best of my knowledge, I can't see any figure in our lives at that time who would have sexually abused my sister.  I can see my sister being privy to, or intruding upon my parents making love, and misinterpreting and misapplying it, but I can't think of anyone who would have sexually abused her (in other words, I don't know where she got the idea to sexually abuse me.)

With our mother's death on August 8th (it's now August 23) my sister is entering into a deep crisis, which has typically meant that I'm about to experience an absolute, hellacious storm of emotional rage and anger, as she will have to face this final abandonment.  I am scheduled to go to our mother's house in another state, next week, to retrieve my half of her furniture.  My sister lives in the same city as our mother did, and has been left in charge of the house by my cousin, the executor, who disregarded my request to have the locks changed and the keys restricted from me & my sister, until he was ready to distribute my mother's property.  This cousin was chosen because my sister & I could not get along & be left as joint-executors, and because it would be too invalidating for my sister, if I was chosen to be executor, even though I am the logical choice, as I am the business woman of the family, and my sister's "career" (if you call constant job changes and work settings a career) and life are a predictable mess.  This cousin, however, is like all the world, an extremely busy person with a full life of his own, and he really does not have the time it takes to close down a house, empty it, put it on the market & sell it, much less deal with a BPer.  At this point, he probably wishes he had agreed to monthly root canal for the rest of his life, than be named Executor and have to deal with my mother's estate, my BPD sister, and me.

I do not wish to see or speak to my sister ever again.  For 13 years I did not speak, see or mention my sister (to my mother, no one else in my life had ever met my sister at that point) from 1992-2005, and they were the happiest years of my life. The single biggest mistake I feel I made, was to let our mother guilt-trip me into letting my sister back into my life, Christmas 2005. Just the thought of having to see my sister makes me tense up, and feel awful inside.  If I were to actually have to see her, and be put in the position of having to explain my actions to her (as if it's possible to tell a Queen-Witch BPer anything) makes me almost physically ill, nauseous, in fact.

Does anyone have advice for how to avoid a physical meeting with an adult BP sibling they do not wish to see again?  It is highly likely my sister will come over to my mother's house while I am there, collecting my furniture, and I'd like to set boundaries so that she cannot.  This has been where all previous attempts with my sister have failed - I've never been able to set boundaries -- AND HAVE THEM HOLD.  My sister always performs counter-maneuvers, and lies, lies-by-omission, and manipulates like crazy, and just knows every way to push my buttons.  I'm working on this for myself, but with less than a week to go to this day, I'm Walking On Eggshells, to say the least, lest I have to be abused verbally one last time.  

Anyone else have any experience with BPD siblings and the death of a parent/chief enabler?  Any tips or hints in dealing with this final "abandonment" of the BPer?  Anyone gone through something similar?

Thanks,

BPDSis

[PrettyPlease]

 Anyone else have any experience with BPD siblings and the death of a parent/chief enabler?  Any tips or hints in dealing with this final "abandonment" of the BPer?  Anyone gone through something similar?

Hi BPDSis,

Wow, that's a very tough story and situation. My uBPD/NPD mother died a year ago, and similarly my sister is four years older than I, and I believe was always resentful of me. But that's the end of the similarity, because I believe she's more like a BPDwaif, never abused me, and she and I got along well in dealing with the death.

So I'll fall back on what I've read on this site as far as what you might do in the coming house-clearing: bring someone with you. Set it up so that you're never alone with her. Is that possible? If so it might defuse a lot of the possible abuse; maybe all of it -- or at least enough to get the job done and get out of there. 

PP

[beatup]

Hi BPDsis,

I am familiar with your plight... . I have an uBPDsis and went thru some kind of hell on earth with her after we lost our father... . she completely unraveled.

I agree that taking someone with you is a very good plan. If your therapist can prescribe an anti anxiety medication... . I would recommend that as well. Perhaps you could plan leaving for lunch just to breathe deeply... .

  Could you reschedule this in order to go at a later date when she would not know that you are coming?

[BPDSis]

Thanks Pretty Please and beatup for your responses.  I will have my husband of 10+ years with me, which is very good, however, he's only just really gotten a good look at how my sister operates over the past 22 months, as we've both nursed my mother, and it was the last three weeks of her life that was the true eye-opener for him. For all sorts of reasons (boundary setting is no more his skill, than it's been mine, chief among them) my husband is not the ideal person, but I'm very glad and lucky to have him.

I wish my cousin was more helpful, especially as it was his wife (of many years - I've known them both since I was 16, and we've been on some memorable family trips through the years) that pointed me in the direction of a BPD diagnosis for my sister. My cousin's wife had already gotten a taste of my sister, but even with an understanding of BPD that surpassed mine, she and her husband had no trouble ignoring my repeated written and verbal requests to lock my sister (and me) out of the house until they were ready to distribute it to us, and to the others that are getting some pieces. 

I know now why my mother chose my cousin (her nephew) as Executor, and it had nothing to do with his degree of interest or dedication he might have brought to the role, but because my mother, being an astute judge of character, knew my cousin would treat my sister with the same hands-off attitude that my mother had treated my sister, and just let her blow & go.  I don't think, however, that my mother realized my cousin would quite so lackadaisical about the financial aspects of her accounts.

There was the heart-stopping moment last week that, because my cousin had again disregarded my specific verbal and written suggestions that he change the PIN numbers on all of my mother's accounts (financial, email, etc.) -- and it was easy to do because my mother was so well organized with a written list of all accounts, user names, passwords, and websites, so it would have been so easy, if only... .

Instead, my cousin figured his younger (female) cousin (me) was simply creating work for him when no need existed to either change the locks or the PINs.  Well, well, well, he won't explain to me know how it happened, but evidently, somebody (could it possibly be my sister? The other person who had easy access to the password list?) changed the PINs on my mother's brokerage account.  This was shortly after hanging up the phone with my mother's (estate planning) attorney who I've tried to warn about the mistakes my cousin was making, ending with the attorney telling me, ":)on't worry. This is going to be just fine. Your cousin is a fine, upstanding man... . blah, blah, blah"  My cousin is indeed a fine, upstanding man of good reputation, but he's going to rue the day he didn't listen to advice about setting boundaries with my sister, like changing the PINs on the account.  My cousin has since assured me that no money was missing from the account, but I am very frustrated at his attitude, since the estate is simple - a 50/50 split of not a whole lot of cash and house sale proceeds between my sister and me, and dividing up the furniture as per the rather complete list our mother left. At the end of the day, in dealing with a BPD sister, I'm the only one of this cast of characters that has anything to lose. But, as I said, part of him letting everything slide, is letting my sister slide, and that's what he was put on the job to do, so to speak.

It's all very frustrating and a real throwback to all the invalidation I suffered as a child. At least in reading the posts on these boards, I have now got an understanding about how that's all part of living with a BP.  And at least now, with my mother's death, we can discuss my sister, and it is acknowledged that she may have a mental illness. This is a huge step, in & of itself.

And beatup - no, I can't reschedule to when she won't know I'm there. She lives in the same town, and since she has a key to the house and has been left "in charge" to make sure the house isn't burglarized, the chances of getting into the house without her knowing... . would depend upon how much I'm willing to spend on an all-expense paid vacation out of the country for her while I go collect my stuff :-)

I have a question - what is a "uBPD" and a "uBPD/NPD" (NPD = Narcissistic Personality Disorder ?)

Thanks for your advise - it helps so much to be able to write it out, and know that not only sympathetic, but knowledgeable people, will respond.

BPDSis

[Chunkybeah]

I am so sorry about your mom and that u r going through this. My BPD sister sounds so much like yours. When my dad passed almost 3yrs ago, dealing with her and my enabling step-mom for days in the hospital watching my father die was unbearable. She controlled everything, from not allowing her sister-in-law to come to the funeral, our mom, and raged at her in-laws the day of the funeral. She even picked out his casket. And told me and my brother-in-law that since we were such a mess, she had to handle everything. I guess my question is this- how important is it to get that furniture? Can u talk to your cousin again? Can u bring more people that would be a good bodyguard? Change those pins yourself if you can! I guess after dealing with my situation , I realized that my peace of mind was more important than anything else. Good luck- we r here for you. Take no prisoners- be strong- you have a right to mourn and a right to say no. God bless

[PrettyPlease]

I have a question - what is a "uBPD" and a "uBPD/NPD" (NPD = Narcissistic Personality Disorder ?)

BPDSis

Here's a link to a chart of the common terms used on this site:

https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=26601.msg427936#msg427936

There's also a link at the top of all pages, but it's not working for me at the moment (I get a 404 error, page not found).

u= Undiagnosed  -- in other words, not officially diagnosed by a psychiatrist or psychologist. But BPD people often don't get diagnosed (for reasons intrinsic to the condition itself: they avoid criticism); so that doesn't mean they don't have BPD. People here use uBPD to mean something like: "has behaviour traits that appear to satisfy most BPD criteria". When this is true you need ways of dealing with the behaviour regardless of whether there's a professional label given.

The BPD/NPD couple appears to be a common relationship pairing (although I don't know of any hard statistics about this); there's some specific discussion and information about it on this site.

PP

[BP sister]

Hi,

I googled BPD sister death of parent and found your post.  My mother, nearly your mother's age, passed on aug 8; my BPD sister is 56, and I am heading into dealing with dividing possessions with her (I have two other siblings as well).  so I hear your fear... .

Don't know what has happened yet since you posted, so maybe its all over (mine trials will start next week).  I won't go into the pain I have had to deal with from that sister as my mom approached the end of her life, but it was wild. what I will share is this:  for my mom, I was the one looking over her affairs when she was alive, and being there - all other sibs a long drive away and rarely visited.  for me, in dealing all the regular trials of with the passing of a parent, and then on top dealing with a mentally ill sibling, what I try to tell myself is this: in the end the only truly important thing was that my mom was loved and well cared for when she was alive. I know that she was.  So to the degree that there will be any drama now from any sibs, especially by BPD sister, that is less important.  If she goes off, it will be regrettable, but in the end is less important. Honor your mom, grieve for her, and let that be your focus.