New situation new life direction

[Lifenow]

Hello -
I (we) have a daughter who has BPD traits, and she left home at 18 almost five years ago exhibiting extremely self destructive behavior (online contact, running away, meeting up and hook ups with much older men, some pimps and gang members, ODD, serious anxieties and depression), as well as abusive treatment of her family, including claiming abuse.

She also has a genetic condition that affects her joints, making normal daily life painful.
She was pregnant twice at 15, one not viable and one abortion after lying to us about it for months. After she left home she was on the streets and in abusive relationships, ending in one that produced a child in 2013. We are now $20k into getting her a divorce, which isn't over yet. We had no pleasure of graduation, marriage, or childbirth.

We came back into her life 2 years ago, when we agreed to help with housing. Her genetic condition had worsened to the point that she needed a hip brace to walk. Her husband became more demanding and physically abusive as she became less able to comply, and eventually resulted in her being wheelchair bound.

We bought a house and renovated it for her needs - which she and her husband trashed because neither was physically capable of taking care of a baby / toddler or cared about what a garbage pit it was.

When her husband was arrested for trying to strangle her (I know that this is awful to say but I'm sure she gave him reason) we spent the next 9 months helping her cope with being a single mom of a toddler.

We decided to do another remodel closer to our home to make assisting her easier, and provide whatever necessary for our granddaughter as our daughter is on disability only and her former husband has no income.

Through all of this, she treats me like I'm the hired help, taxi, maid, financier and displays zero compassion for us or all of the work we have done and continue to do for her and our granddaughter.

She is angry and in pain 24/7 and never happy... .no wait, when she is smoking without having to do childcare and talking to yet another 45 year old mid life crisis male (she is 22) who fawns over her online she is "happy"

She hopes she will meet a sugar daddy who will take care of her and provide her the life of Downton Abbey - even though she is a die hard left wing liberal who thinks every thing should be free. I wanted to encourage her to get out and meet people so dropped her off at a fabric store one time (she loves sewing and clothes) for an hour... .and she managed to find a man and start a relationship. Who does that? He actually sent us an email a month later saying she was the one, and he knew we would object because he is so much older, but he was bound and determined to marry her. What?

It ended when he realized she is really young and needy and he had PTSD himself and needing taking care of, HA!

She is so nasty to us, but my husband thinks we just need to suck it up for our granddaughter's sake, otherwise our daughter might flee with her to some shelter claiming abuse.

One day at a time... .

To be perfectly honest, we are only doing this for our granddaughter. If it were just our daughter, we would have told her to leave long ago.

I find I cannot love someone I don't trust with my feelings, even if she is my daughter.
I just hope my granddaughter isn't the same way?

 

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

[wendydarling]

Hi Lifenow and welcome to bpdfamily parenting board  

I'm glad you found us. I'm sorry for what you're going through but glad you have found a community where many of us have been through similar experiences, and we can learn from each other and provide much needed support, care and hope. That is a long tough journey you’ve had with your daughter, you are right to feel the way you do.   As you’ll see from the board, there are many grandparent like you looking out for their families, grandchildren seeking solutions and using the lessons and tools at the right of your screen. You are not alone. One day at a time as you say, works for me too.  

You say your daughter has BPD traits as you describe, is she undiagnosed? Does she accept she has a disorder? Does she want to recover? Mostly we are here because someone in our lives has behaviours that are characteristic of BPD. They haven't all been diagnosed with BPD, but it's the behaviours, and how we deal with them, that are important.

You are right to feel angry, hurt and exhausted by the destructive and abusive behaviour and she very fortunate to have parents like you and your husband. Have a look round the tools and lessons. There are communication skills that will minimize the behaviour of someone with BPD and these have proven successful for some of the members. Here is one I found very useful and use it in my everyday life - communicating boundaries and limits https://bpdfamily.com/parenting/06.htm the resources here can help you help your granddaughter too.

So welcome nb! Keep reading and posting, you'll get help and support (as I have).

WDx

[Lifenow]

Thx WDx -

To answer your questions:

Because BPD is not an allowable diagnosis before the age of 18, she was diagnosed with Major Depression, ODD, and Anxiety, although she was treated for many of the symptoms of BPD when she did DBT and they were in agreement that's what she had.

To this day she denies having Borderline, saying that because she wasn't "legally" diagnosed with it therefore it is not true, and if we say it is then we are liars. And no, we are the problem, the world is the problem, she is never the problem.

Since we have been through DBT, (highly recommended, although watch out for the accusations of "non validation" we are schooled in many coping tools to employ with her, and we were able to use boundary techniques and other non incendiary ways to communicate with her before she moved in with us for a temporary stay.

Basically she has no compassion for anyone who isn't meeting her needs, including her 3 year old.  She wants calm and quiet all day, but screams at her toddler when she is tired and being... .3.  Unfortunately she doesn't have the physically ability to chase after the her, and her child uses her own strength against her... .as is typical.

When her child was smaller, she was able to lock her in her room for hours at a time with a bottle and food ( you can imagine what that smelled like) and she would play calmly and go to sleep while my daughter went outside to smoke, took a shower, and trolled FB.

The child never went out of the house to play before she was 18 months old and we came back into her life.

Now our granddaughter is smart, curious, and a ninja toddler. We are now concerned for her safety, even though we are doing everything possible to make the new place safe for her.

The biggest issue right now is that my daughter has always had this idea that "everyone" (but especially me), is trying to "control" her.  If there is any criticism at a time she is feeling vulnerable, she threatens to leave, saying "we are abusing her and horrible horrible people and she hates living in this hell being controlled".  In this hell she has her own room with a bath, free food, cleaning, laundry, and child care, including swim lessons and pre school.

In the past, we said ok, go. Even though it was to the streets and meant sexual and other kinds of abuse (burns, tatoos, sex videos, swinger clubs, pimps etc.)

Now we have a granddaughter whom we love.

When our daughter threatens to leave, she means to take the bus downtown to a shelter, with the toddler on her lap in her wheelchair. It is incredibly irresponsible and dangerous.

My husband is distraught when she does this, and I worry he's going to have a heart attack with the stress of worry and sadness she causes. But he just wants me to let her say awful things to us until she moves into her new house so our granddaughter has a home.

I know my daughter. As soon as she thinks she has a new ally, a new guy, she will tell him we abused her. She will tell the town we abused her. She will tell her daughter we abused her.

So I'm stuck with this snarling nasty hyena of a person (sorry hyenas), and I don't know what I should REALLY do if she leaves with the child on her lap.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Thx

[wendydarling]

Thx Lifenow, my heart goes out to you,   How are you and your husband coping you say you are worried about your husbands health, do you have support from your Dr, friends, family, counselling to help you get through this? Are you taking time out for self care?

You ask what you should do if your daughter leaves for a shelter? Are social services involved in your daughter/grandchild lives? I'm in the UK- social services are the agency who work with vulnerable parents/children to ensure the child is not at risk and if they are work with them or remove the child from the situation. If they turned up at a shelter in the UK social services would automatically assess the situation. Also looking ahead when they move into the new home your daughter is likely to continue her behaviours and by the sounds of it that will involve men and more trouble. How would you deal with that? If the situation became untenable for your granddaughter and you, would you and your husband be willing to go for custody, as you say it's your grandchild's wellbeing that is your concern. Same if they went to a shelter would you be willing to apply for custody?  I recognise that's not where you want to be ... .I hope that helps you think through your question, what you could do if your daughter left. I guess it comes down to how far you are prepared to go, if need be.

What are you thoughts?

Wishing you a peaceful day nb.

WDx

[Lifenow]

Well the short answer is that it is complicated.

We do have friends who know her history, but we do not burden most of them with every day stuff - I have one friend who's sister was on the streets for a year then came back to reality somehow... .and she is great. No doctors or therapists at this point. But I have come up with a response that helps ME - every time my daughter brings up single moments in our history (where she has blown incidents so out of proportion that she now believes we were involved in horrific acts against her), I offer to go to counseling with her to discuss the entire history of her adolescent years. She always says no, because "you will just lie and they will believe you and I already have PTSD every time I look at you from what you did to me".  She tells every person she gets close to that we abused her.

In the US we are innocent until proven guilty and that goes for a parent with custody as well as anyone else who might be thinking about doing something reckless - maybe even more so. In other words, she would have to have something very bad happen while doing something reckless before anything could be done, and even then DHS would try to work out keeping the child with a parent. We helped her get custody even though it is very tough for her in a wheelchair to care for a toddler, and we helped out several hours a week, and now every day. We want this to work out for her and our granddaughter, and we are doing everything we can to make it happen.

Fortunately her former (but not quite) is trying to get his life together and adores his daughter. He has thanked us for everything we have done and are doing to help. He has many issues of his own to deal with (heroin addicted mom and dad, meth addicted sister), and he supports our being with our granddaughter.  We hope he can just be a positive person in her life in the future, but dealing with more visitations is the next step and we are going to be heavily involved with that as neither my daughter or her former husband drives and both depend on relatives to make things happen, and my daughter does not want our granddaughter around them. Ok how is that supposed to work. They are her family too, good bad and ugly.

Really, the future is such a huge question mark - who are we supposed to be now? Grandparents with no personal life, banking our ungrateful daughter's choices in life. Some days are fine - but usually after a major blowup.  Then my daughter is calm and I am walking on eggshells... .

I must say however, I predicted all of this when she was 15 and determined to get pregnant - she wanted a "friend" and we will have to support it because she will choose the wrong guy and have no means of support or recognize any consequences of her actions.  Oh and blame us for everything.

Viola.

[Lifenow]

Voila - stupid spell check

[wendydarling]

Many thanks for explaining Lifenow. One hopes the threat of leaving for a shelter is just that. Good to hear your offer to go to counselling with daughter works for YOU when she raises issues, blames you.

It must be hard living 24/7, when do they move into the new home?  As you say the future is a huge question, I hope you are able to make space for you, your life.  Good to hear the father thanks you and appreciates all that you do, I hope he comes good, it's encouraging he is trying to sort himself out. Small steps I guess.   

You have and are dealing with so much Lifenow and you deserve support. Have you considered counselling for yourself as you move forward, you are 2 years in supporting them and it's important we care for ourselves, I'm concerned you may burn out.

WDx

[Lifenow]

Thanks WDx -

Things are a little better now - SET helps as well as non reaction to things that frustrate my daughter, and we try to take my granddaughter to get some much needed exercise as much as possible. My daughter has only had one "I hate you I'm going to leave NOW" outburst in the last week.

The hardest part of living with and watching my daughter is that this may well be the best she will ever be physically, and compared to almost 5 years ago it is has been a rapid decline in function and muscle strength, so her pain levels are high even without the emotional overloads.  The irony is that back then she was courting a death wish every time she left with another strange man and did the horrible things she did, so I'm ambivalent about the changes.  I have no idea who she would be if she did not have this condition.

She has never believed that she can make a difference in her condition, and while it is true that there is no cure for it there are ways to improve overall health. Unfortunately she sits in her wheelchair all day long, smokes a pack a day, drinks caffeine all day and then can't sleep until 2-3 am, making her nasty at 9 am when we finally get her up. Her daughter gets up at 6:30, which she has said is our fault because we "taught" her to do it and we "ruined" her sleep schedule, including eliminating her 2 hour daily nap.  Nope, this is normal for a growing child. 

So we get our granddaughter up; bathroom, clothes, diaper, breakfast and 2 hours of play before mom is forced to get out of bed. We have no idea what will happen when they move.

I am in a weird life zone. I quit working eight years ago to advocate for my daughter's medical condition, as it is considered rare in the US but is well known in the UK and Australia and there are specialists who deal with it.

My husband works harder than ever and loves it, but it is stressful and long hours. We are fortunate that I do not have to work, because that would not be possible with the current situation. However there are days when I'm overloaded (most days?) and there is no one to help.  I feel foolish for getting annoyed with things like a dirty, cluttered house (we joke we could be on the show "hoarders" ), little of the right kind of exercise and not enough attention to pets, but these are the little things that make up some of the cohesiveness of our lives.

Philosophically I am satisfied with what I have accomplished in my very full life so far, and I feel no need to overextend my time for anyone else or any cause. So although I'm overworked with no pay, I'm not sure what else I would be doing (I am highly trained in my profession and have run a business) other than "playing" at finding new directions / focus / research for what I used to do. Physically, however, I would exercise more and work in my garden and not eat so many sweets or frequently drink wine after especially hard days... .

So being here for my granddaughter's present and future well being is my task at hand, and I'm doing it because it seems like the right thing to do with my time.

I just hope my body can hold up long enough for my granddaughter to be strong enough to help her mom - 10 years? Yikes!~ And what a cross to bear - poor kid. I see us as her safe house.

One day at a time

[Slipping]

Hi Lifenow,

I have a uBPDd29 who sounds very much like yours.  Just like you, I wonder (every single day) what she would be like if she did not have a painful physical condition.  Her condition has become significantly worse in the last 5 years also, but I never realized that she was in so much pain growing up so I'm sure I must have constantly invalidated her.  Oh the guilt... .I work on Radical Acceptance and some days are better than others.

And like you, I'm constantly accused of trying to control her life, when all I really want to do is help her. Over the last year, I've learned to stop offering suggestions and to try to ask validating questions instead when I can.  I struggle greatly with trying to distinguish what is a mental disorder and what is physical.  It's so interesting that you became an advocate for your daughter's medical condition, bravo for you! That is fabulous!   

I'd love to discuss this with you if you're interested.  I've sent you a private message but don't know if you've seen it.  I'm working on advocating for BPD research and education, and I would love to compare notes.

Hugs to you,
Slipping