The right way to respond to nasty texts

[wowza]

Hi,  My son is involved with a woman and has an almost two year old daughter with her.  She has had mental health issues since she was a little girl.  I met her when she was 8 months pregnant.  My son and her were not a couple when she got pregnant but she is his child.  He went out with her for 1 - 2 years and she moved to a different province. Their relationship was based on drinking and partying at her house.  Always texted fighting, he would see her for a weekend then not for another week.  He was crushed.  She was there for about 3 weeks and got into a fight with her boyfriend and he charged her with assult.  She called my son from jail and being a caring person he helped her.  She came back, got pregnant immediatly and the drama began.  My son stayed at her place the last month of pregnancy and after the baby was born.  She threw him out in the first month, after a few days begged him to come back.  She never took her medication during pregnancy.  I was called to the house one evening and it was like a scene from cops.  She had made deep scratchs down her face and neck, she was passed out on the couch my son was in tears on the front step.  He didn't know what to do, neither did I. He wouldn't phone the police because she was on probation and would loose her job.  i stayed on the couch and when she woke she said "what the f*** are you doing here, oh right I asked you to come"  I was in shock, I have never had this or witnessed anything like this in my life. I offered help with the baby, not knowing her at all and she never accepted.  Everytime they would fight she would send me vulgar text messages saying what a looser deadbeat son I had.  He would come and stay with us and once for 2 months, he gave her child support money.  Anyway he went back and forth 3 or 4 times , she went back to work after 4 months of maternity leave. She works nights.  She wanted to get away from her room mate so they picked out an apartment and thought things would change.  Since Jan 2016 I was called to the apartment and had to call the police, on the way for mental evaluation she assulted the officer, was arrested and put in jail for 5 days.  Child services was involved and she couldn't see her daughter till CFS talked to her.  She says my son took their daughter and wouldn't bring her back.  She blames me for her trouble.  My son not wanting to bother his family stopped communicating.  A few months later he had to call the police because she was drunk and physically violent.  Its his fault shes in trouble. She quit drinking, he is staying with us and had his daughter on the weekend. She can't handle taking care of her alone. She will not stop texting, threatens suicide and in danger of losing her job. Blames him for leaving, he knows its not healthy to live there. Tells everyone how miserable she is living there.  I don't know how to deal with her actions.  Shes miserable with him and doesn't want to be without him.  She wouldn't come here for Christmas said my son told her she wasn't welcome, not true, then sent me nasty texts about how opening presents was more important than her mental health and threatened suicide so my son and his brother went to check on her and she was gone.  called her mother and asked if she could call her because she wasn't answering my sons number and she laughed at him and said no. My blood pressure and stress can't handle this, I need to find a way to deal with her.  I have never had anyone be so unrespectful and say the nasty things to me she does. I

[HappyChappy]

Hi Wowza,

Well you certainly do describe unreasonable behaviour, I'm not surprised your blood pressure has been affected.

It does seam like she is trying to provoke a reaction and draw you into the drama, which is very BPD. There are various tried and tested techniques you can use. With abusive text, the easiest is to simply blank it, but I appreciate there are times that is no possible. So you can use "Medium chill." this is where you show no emotion at all. Don't get draw in. But don't ignore the BPD as this may make them escalate. But you simply acknowledge what they say, but don't add anything if you can. Certainly don't ever show any emotion, because this is what a BPD feeds off. If they can't get it from you, they will probably ignore you. But only if they assume you are no threat, hence avoid disagreeing or showing emotion. Now if you need to assert yourself, or interact, here are some other techniques:

Communication tools (SET, PUVAS, DEARMAN)

Hope this helps.