New here...sad and exhausted

[lentil_soup66]

I'm the mother of a 25 yr old trans son who has a number of diagnoses...ADHD/depression/anxiety/ASD as well as very probably BPD and a very active eating disorder. We live in a major city in Canada.

He lives at home with us. We are a longtime blended family with myself, my husband, my other son (23) and stepdaughter (21).

My husband and I are currently doing the Family Connections program, about halfway through. I'm learning a lot, my husband even more so. Even with that though, I am exhausted and burnt out, and have been for a long time. Right now my son with the issues is extremely hard to live with on all sorts of levels. I spend way too much time trying to get him help, doing paperwork to do with his disabilities etc. Right now I am working on getting him case management because I can't do this long term, I swear it is slowly killing me. And even though I do so much for him it feels like he can't stand me. I'm just especially sad and tired today. Learning a lot about how important validation is but I can't really validate him when he's not talking to me .

Anyhow I am glad to be here and looking forward to hopefully get support from people who get 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

[Sancho]

Hi Lentil_soup66 and I am glad you are here. This is the one place I have found where people understand just how exhausting it is to support a child with Bpd – and the other conditions you mention.

And sad? Gosh it is heart-breaking. Whenever I find a picture of my DD young and smiling  - well I just can’t cope.

I am so glad you and your DH are doing the course and learning. The big thing is that you are doing it together, so you can have a shared approach on how to cope with your situation. You have a lot on your plate with other children’s needs to be met too.

There have been times when I have been so low. I think taking mental ‘time-out’ has been helpful. I found myself waking up thinking of DD and continuing to think of her all day. So I learnt to time-out – ‘I will think about DD at 5pm today for half an hour’.

Start with small time-outs – 15 minutes here and there. You are exhausted and it will take a while just to feel some emotional and physical energy again. Small but regular.

I am glad you are looking for other support for DS. I think we need to do all that we can do, then there will come a time when we can say ‘I have done all that I can’.

When we say this it doesn’t mean we have stopped loving our child – it just means that the outcome is not in our control.

When I got to this point I found comfort in telling myself that though I couldn’t do any more, my DD was loved – and that was the most important thing.

I hope you can get the breaks you need to feel some energy again  - and feel the value in your life and the love you have for your family.