I am exhausted.

[BexMom]

My adult daughter shows signs of BPD and has worn me down. She is 29 but has been wreaking havoc on me since about age 16. She married one year ago after only dating 3 months. Exactly 1 yr later is going through a divorce.

This year has been esp hard on me because she has been in pain over the toxic marriage. Lots of physical abuse on both their parts, along with alcohol and cocaine abuse. I'm her protector one minute, her persecuter the next.

I'mover it

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

[Rapt Reader]

Hello, Bexmom &

I'm really sorry for the troubles that have brought you here, but very happy that you've found us! You will find that there are many parents on this Board who have gone through exactly what you are going through now, and the advice and insights here will help.

Have you had the chance to check out the links to the right-hand side of this page? The TOOLS and THE LESSONS are very helpful, and I encourage you to take some time to read over there, along with the threads on the Message Board.

Is your daughter living with you now that she is getting divorced? Do you see her very often? I understand the "protector" versus "persecutor" back and forth with our BPD children; I have an adult (38) son who was diagnosed with BPD in April of 2013, and before his diagnosis and subsequent treatment I was in that same uncomfortable position. Hang in there, BexMom... .It really can get better eventually.

Is it possible that now that her marriage has failed, your daughter might be willing to admit that she has a problem and then get some help for it? In my experience, once someone can do that, there really is a lot of hope for recovery. My son hit rock bottom (multi-year Heroin addiction, leading to the Suicidal Ideation that eventually landed him in the Dual Diagnosis Center that diagnosed him with BPD and treated him for it), but is now in ongoing treatment and is in recovery. Life is very much better at our house now 

It sounds like she has experienced so much trauma lately, and her disorder makes it that much more difficult to get through in a healthy manner. And I'm sorry for all the pain and angst that you have had to deal with, seeing a daughter that you can't really help, and then having to live with the troubles she causes you in her dysregulation... .Please hang around and read all you can on this site, BexMom, and tell us more of your story. We're here for you, and want to help 

[livednlearned]

Hi Bexmom,

I wanted to join Rapt Reader in welcoming you to the site! It's very exhausting to love someone with BPD, and is definitely one of the harder mental illnesses because of the emotional dysregulation that the immediate family experiences. People with BPD do have a tendency to end up with high-conflict partners. There's a book about the High-Conflict Couple (cannot remember the author). And it's additionally tough when drugs are involved.

What is your relationship with her like right now? I can't recommend enough the tools and lessons that Rapt Reader mentions. I was in crisis mode when I arrived here and have slowly but surely worked my way through the different lessons here and other parts of the board. It really makes a difference to learn what's going on, what skills are necessary. For you, self care is so important. We cannot care for our loved ones when our own tank is empty. It sounds cliche, and honestly, it used to make me mad when people said to take care of myself when it felt like my house was on fire. Your daughter won't learn how to be kind to you until you show her how to do it -- it's really about learning to set boundaries, emotional, physical and otherwise.

It does get better. It's not a linear kind of getting better. More like a step forward, a step back, two steps forward, a step back. I remember reading somewhere on the site that highly sensitive people and people with BPD are the 5% children who need a special kind of parenting. We can't use the 95% parenting skills that everyone else uses. The good news is that this place is all about the 5%. 

I hope you'll share as much as you feel comfortable sharing, and let us know how you're doing. You're not alone. People here really do care.

LnL