New here, need advice with drugs in the house

[CoasterMom]

My 20yo BPD step daughter moved in with us in December.  My husband and I have two other young children.  When she moved in we explained that she could not have marijuana on the property. She could not possess it, never mind use it.  She was free to keep it in her car or elsewhere.  It is the only rule in our house with her.  She continues to break this rule.  My kids smell the smoke all the time. We tried consequences, that didn't work.  We understand now that BPD people don't understand consequences? Does anyone have any suggestions for how we can get her to not have this in our home? My husband won't kick her out (yet) and has told her that he won't. She truly has nowhere else to go.  It is frustrating that she can't follow this one rule.  Thank you.

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

[Kwamina]

Hi Coastermom

Sorry to hear you are having these difficulties with your stepdaughter. In what way did you communicate to your stepdaughter that there would be consequences if she broke this rule? To help you set and enforce boundaries with her, I encourage you to take a look at some resources we have here:

Getting Our Values and Boundaries in Order

Examples of boundaries

Here is a short excerpt:

Boundaries are how we define our values to others.   A boundary is nothing more than the outer perimeters of our independent core values -  it's like a fence  - anything inside the boundary is consistent with our core values and anything outside the boundary is not.  For example, if your independent core value is "always to be respectful of others" a boundary question might be "would abruptly walking out of the room when someone says something offensive be inside or outside of your definition of this value?"  It's not always obvious as we all see things differently.  As you can quickly see, with values, we have a significant responsibility to lead, educate and inform others - we must walk the walk, have effective communication and be consistent.

Has your stepdaughter been officially diagnosed with BPD? Is she getting any targeted treatment or therapy for her issues?

To help you get started here I also strongly encourage you to take a look at the tools and lessons to the right of this message board. I think they can help in your interactions with your stepdaughter and give you a better understanding of what's going on with her.

[kelti1972]

Hi:   Welcome, our son was using marjuana also before we kicked him out the first time.  He is back and he cannot have any drugs at all, around the house, outside, etc.  If we find out he has to leave again.  That is the boundary or limit.  Sometimes I think I have smelled it, but not sure at all.  Not like when he was using it with our knowledge.  I have little children around too and there is just no way he can use it in the house again.  We would have to call police or tell him to leave again.  Oh I do not want to go through that pain and drama again.

I just pray it will not come to that again!  I know my husband and I have to be totally united and on the same page to enforce anything,including consequences.  Sometimes I feel very alone.  I feel sometimes my husband is totally somewhere else in his head.  Kelti

[CoasterMom]

Thanks for the replies.  My stepdaughter has been diagnosed with BPD.

When she first moved in with us it was because we thought she had an eating disorder.  She was dangerously thin.  She was also in an abusive relationship (emotional as well as violent boyfriend).  It was easy to get her into therapy, as she loved all the attention.  Right from day one in our house she ate complete meals with no struggle.  It didn't make sense to us or her family doctor.  So we started questioning the reason for the "eating disorder".

Then other patterns began to emerge.  She was very promiscuous, falling in love with guy after guy.  She was smoking marijuana.  She had lost one job previous to moving in with us because she thought they were bullying her.  Then she quit a job here because she thought they were bullying her. She has also recently been fired from two more jobs.  Then she would cut her arms.  Her dad had always been her best friend when they lived in different cities.  Now that she was living with us, and he was more involved with her daily life, he would go from being her best friend to her worst enemy, depending on her mood and what he said to her.  Having a discussion with her was so frustrating.  She would twist things around, she would forget things that she said, saying we were lying.  We were always 'on her', always negative.  She would leave for days at a time when she was mad with us.  We found out later she would sleep in her car.  In our house, she has the basement.  There is a door between her place and ours.  We don't go into her place.  She has her own entrance.  It baffled us that she would sleep in her car when she was mad, even when she could come and go undetected into her own place. 

Through out all of this she had been seeing a counsellor weekly, as well as a couple of visits with a psychiatrist.  She was officially diagnosed a month ago, although we had suspicions many months ago.  We just found out yesterday that she has been accepted into the DBT program here starting in September. 

We are admittedly new to BPD and how to interact with a BPD person.  We could definitely be doing things better.  We have had very little support from anyone with knowledge of BPD. we attended one 1 hour seminar on DBT for family members.  They stressed validation and mindfulness.  Other than that, we have been crying for help and have had not much luck.  Now that my two little kids are having mental health issues, we are getting some family therapy beginning next month. 

We told my stepdaughter when she moved in that there were to be no drugs on the property.  We explained that we had two little kids that were impressionable and we did not need them getting habituated to the odor or seeing the paraphernalia around.  We did not say that there would be consequences. 

She would respect our wishes for about a week at a time.  Then we would detect the presence of the drugs again, and discuss it with her.  We would stress the importance again of not having them on the property.  Usually she would then get mad and walk out for a day or two. 

After many repeats of this pattern, about three months ago she smoked right in our house and our entire house reeked of marijuana.  We sat down with her the next day and said that it wasn't acceptable behaviour if she wanted to live with us.  We loved her and wanted to support her, but would not enable her.  We then explained that if we detected the drug again, we would be removing her access to either the laundry, the wifi or the cable. 

She said she understood, and it was about a week before we detected the drugs again.  So we took away her laundry. She was frustrated, but said she would not have the drugs around anymore.  Two weeks later we gave the laundry back.  The very next day we could smell the drugs again.  So my husband told her he was taking the laundry and the cable.  She asked if it could be the wifi instead of the cable.  He agreed, told her she could have them back in a month if she complied with no drugs.  Every 5-6 days she would tell my husband she didn't understand why he was punishing her and putting these obstacles up for her to get better by taking away the laundry and wifi.  Why did we want her to have dirty clothes and smell bad? We told her she could go to a laundromat, and that if she had money for drugs she had money to do laundry.  She said it was embarrassing to do that. 

Anyways, we gave her back the laundry and wifi access on Saturday.  Yesterday, three days later, we could smell marijuana in the house again.  We went down to her floor, tried to wake her up but could not.  We found the weed and removed it.  Now we don't know what to do. I'm anxiously awaiting her waking up. 

Thanks for reading all of this.  It helps just to talk about it. 

[lbjnltx]

The consequences are not uncomfortable enough to out weigh the rewards she gets from smoking marijuana.  Is this an addiction? 

[CoasterMom]

The consequences are not uncomfortable enough to out weigh the rewards she gets from smoking marijuana.  Is this an addiction? 

Wow. That is very thought-provoking. I have never thought of it that way. Yes, after this morning and how mad she got when she discovered that her marijuana supply was gone, I would say it is an addiction. She said "you know how much I need it to get through the day."

I guess time for us to come up with some other options. Thanks again.

[GaGrl]

What she might need to lose is her expectation of privacy. If you smell mj, maybe you invoke your right to rid your property of illegal substances, locate it and flush. Yes she will be furious.