Why is it always so difficult when we have good news

[Strawberry29]

My wife and I expect our third child. We are super happy.
Of course, every time I am happy, I am scared of sharing my happiness with my BPD brother. When I announced I was getting married, we were in a good relationship, so he was clearly shocked but nothing too bad happened. When I announced the coming of my first, he was not writing to me. He did not respond and, months later, said he didn't because he thought I wasn't ready.
When I announced my second, he "jokingly" said I had to stop having babies because otherwise he would get less money when our parents died. Few months later he added he wasn't joking and that it was a reasonable position.

Now I had no idea what to do with the announcement of this third because right now we are no contact. He chose it, and right now I am very happy about this choice because the situation had become unbearable for me. This no contact made me realise a lot of things, to be honest. BTW, the only contacts we have are emails he sends to my mom's therapist, copying me in, about supposed wrongs we do to him. In one of the latest emails he wrote that he didn't even want to hear about me if I died.

Talking with my wife, she made a good point: whatever you do, it will not work. If you somehow write to him, he'll lash out. If you don't, he will lash out. It's a lose lose, so if you don;t want to write, just don't do it, which is exactly what he told you to do.
I still thought it didn't cost me much to send him a text, and ignore his shenanigans later on, but my mum offered to tell him herself. I asked her at least 3 times if she really wanted to do it, as I didn't want to put her in a difficult position for my laziness. She said yes and seemed confident enough. We didn't talk about it anymore, and I assumed she had told him, as every time we talked over the phone she referenced the pregnancy no problem, and he lives with her. I also never thought about asking her, as in case she had not told him and he heard I was referencing it (or read a text) it would have been even worse.
Turns out, 3 weeks later she had NOT told him. Today he found out from somebody, and of course the reaction was the worst possible. I am really sorry for  my mom. I mean, I told her she didn't need to do it and she willingly offered to help, but maybe I should have just written to him myself. Had I known she was postponing this, I would have understood she didn't really want to tell him...

ANyway, I suppose what I need to understand is I have no responsibility over how my brother reacts and there is nothing I could have done to make things better. Maybe next time I will not let my mom take over such a responsibility, even if she says she does not think it is so difficult... But if she offers to help, it is her right to do it, and I don't have responsibility oevr what she does afterwards, I suppose.

[Notwendy]

Congratulations on your happy news!
I don't think this could have gone well with your brother no matter how he found out.

I agree- you aren't responsible for your brother's feelings or his reaction. Also, your mother agreed to tell him and then didn't- that is on her. You aren't responsible for that either.

Still, it's great news and you and your wife can protect your own happiness. If anything- I'd consider this a learning experience for the future. You see now that maybe your mother got distracted, forgot, or she herself didn't think there was a good time to tell your brother. Now you know she may have this tendency, so something to keep in mind.

Congratulations again!

[Pook075]

Congrats- that is fantastic news!

For your brother, I hate to sound crass but honestly, who cares what he thinks.  Your wife said it best, he will be unhappy no matter what, so let him be unhappy by himself.  Don't let it ruin a second of your day.

Truthfully he found out the perfect way- he heard it from someone else, melted down, and you weren't directly involved at all.  That's great!  Your mom probably took some abuse over the news but that was inevitable no matter how the news was delivered.  Either she stands her ground or she doesn't...that's her choice.  That's not directly your problem either though.

[CC43]

Hi Strawberry,

I think that a pwBPD can't stand to see other people happy, because it's in stark contrast to his own negativity, and it reminds him just how unhappy he is.  Basically, he can't be happy for others when he's feeling inferior, miserable and victimized.  In addition, he's jealous of all the positive attention you'll get from parents and other siblings if you have them.  He can't stand not to be the center of attention, right?  He'll think, all the congratulations, well wishes, presents, visits, etc. should come his way, not yours.  Since you're the same gender as your brother, he can't help but compare himself to you.

Anyway, if your brother has cut off contact with you, I'd say, you go ahead and respect his desire for space.  That's his way of saying that he can't handle the negative feelings that well up when he interacts with you, which probably reminds him of all the ways he feels inferior to you.  Generally my advice on these boards is to consider sending a neutral text or card with a Happy Birthday or Happy Holidays message on those occasions, just to show you haven't forgotten him and you're not excluding him, sort of the way you might send greetings to a distant cousin or a business colleague.  But otherwise, I'd say it's important to respect his desire for space.  My guess is he'll reach out only when he's ready.

Just my two cents.  Congratulations on your growing family.  I'd advise to try not to let your disgruntled brother ruin it for you.  He's going to feel how he's going to feel, and if he has untreated BPD, then his demeanor defaults to negative, and there's nothing you can do about that.

[ForeverDad]

Congrats- that is fantastic news!

For your brother, I hate to sound crass but honestly, who cares what he thinks.  Your wife said it best, he will be unhappy no matter what, so let him be unhappy by himself.  Don't let it ruin a second of your day.

This reminds me of a time many years ago when I invited my grown niece to a restaurant one Sunday after services.  She's single but she only agreed if her parents were included.  Maybe she didn't want them left out, maybe they'd said some bad things about me, I never did figure out why.  It was so awkward and sad at the same time.  There was no incident then but I never invited her again.  Needless to say, I haven't had contact with my brother, who lives close nearby, ever since there he vented about details with my mother's estate a decade ago.  I've concluded that he's been a sourpuss my entire life and a likely PD.  It just is - I can't change it - and I leave it at that.

[Pook075]

This reminds me of a time many years ago when I invited my grown niece to a restaurant one Sunday after services.  She's single but she only agreed if her parents were included.  Maybe she didn't want them left out, maybe they'd said some bad things about me, I never did figure out why.  It was so awkward and sad at the same time.  There was no incident then but I never invited her again.  Needless to say, I haven't had contact with my brother, who lives close nearby, ever since there he vented about details with my mother's estate a decade ago.  I've concluded that he's been a sourpuss my entire life and a likely PD.  It just is - I can't change it - and I leave it at that.

I approach things the same way.  For my BPD kid or BPD ex, I'm kind to them whenever we talk and I genuinely want to see them have a great life.  But at the same time, I fully accept that it may be months or years before I ever hear from them again and I'm 100% okay with that. 

I've learned that either I can be in the center of their world and all the drama that comes from that, or I can be a distant friend who's mostly painted white.  I much prefer the latter- no drama, no fuss, and let someone else be caught up in all the chaos.  I don't have to be in direct contact because I know that ultimately leads to conversations I don't want to have anymore.  Even if things are great, eventually something will happen that brings back all the disordered stuff.

In other words, I'm no longer a favorite person or a sworn enemy...I'm just someone from their past that they can turn to occasionally.  Neither want a real relationship and honestly I don't either, not at the cost it brings.

For instance, my BPD kid texted me the other day to tell me a volcano was erupting in the Philippines and it looked like a meteor hit just behind it on live footage.  She wanted to know if I was close to the volcano (I'm not) and we texted about that for a bit, then she called me to catch up a little.  I hadn't heard from here for months before that and I may not hear from here for many more months.  That's okay though because the relationship works, it's stable.

[CC43]

This reminds me of a time many years ago when I invited my grown niece to a restaurant one Sunday after services.  She's single but she only agreed if her parents were included.  Maybe she didn't want them left out, maybe they'd said some bad things about me, I never did figure out why.  It was so awkward and sad at the same time.  There was no incident then but I never invited her again. 

My guess:  your brother "punishes" his daughter whenever she does anything "fun" without him, or "fraternizes" with other other members of the family "behind his back."  He lashes out when she gets home:  "You're late, you didn't do your chores, you neglected me, I have to do everything around here, you excluded me, you don't respect me, so next time you want something from me, well just forget about it, you don't deserve any favors because you're disrespectful and don't do anything for me."  He's furious whenever his daughter gets some fun and attention, and he's insanely jealous, and so she's learned she has to include her dad or face his misplaced wrath.  The result?  She doesn't get invited much anymore, because it's weird, and it starts to feel like surveillance.  Ultimately she can become isolated.  I think this could be akin to the covert, controlling behaviors that are typical of pwBPD/NPD, and I'm bringing it up in case readers can relate.  I'm not saying it's exactly what happened, but I've experienced this sort of thing before.  Sometimes the victims don't know what's worse:  having a social life but facing the BPD wrath, isolating, or draging the BPD along to social situations with a high risk of "spoiling" behavior.

[Strawberry29]

Thanks everyone!

Yeah, I think luckily I have learnt (to some extent) to not pay too much attention to this sort of things in terms of his reaction. I can do nothing to control them, as you all say, and since the problem is that I have good news, there is no way in the world to make that "better" for him, and I have a right to be happy. He literally said he didn't want to hear anything about my kids and me, so no reason why I should feel guilty in the slightest.

Regarding the story from ForeverDad, I've had plenty of situations similar to that. My brother has no children, but when he had a girlfriend he was always constantly demanding we include them in everything we used to do. I (stupidly) ended up not going to many meals and days out with friends simply because they had not invited them as well. My wife was painted as a bad person just because she had friends she liked hanging out with more than his girlfriend.

[Notwendy]

I have some similar stories. My BPD mother disliked my father's family. They didn't say much to me about it until after my father passed away. Apparently they didn't like her much either. Even though they invited her to visits when they invited us, she sometimes didn't come. I assumed that after my father passed away, they'd have nothing to do with each other.

Some time after that, they planned a get together, invited us (the adult children) but not her. We dreaded telling her, because we knew she'd feel hurt that we were visiting them, and not her. We didn't want her to feel hurt but we really wanted to go and see our relatives on that side.

We told her and she got angry. When I asked her why- she didn't like them and she would not have gone anyway, she replied "they should have invited me".

Sometimes this kind of thing sounds confusing because the reason for their being upset isn't the actual reason they say. Your brother sees that you have the kind of relationship and stable family that he doesn't have- and this may trigger his insecurities. It also means more attention from your parents on your family with the new baby.

I also think that my mother was upset over our visit to my father's family because we were visiting them and not her, even though we didn't intend for the visit to hurt her feelings. However, the reason she said was not this.

[Strawberry29]

Yes, that all makes sense Notwendy!

In the meantime, as expected, the reaction I got was a stream of emails full of accusations, hate, victimism, etc... As I was saying above, the funny thing is these emails are not even addressed at me, but at my mum's therapist. He sent the same email three times to different addresses, and even more weirdly he has not even included the therapist among the addresses, despite starting the email with "dear therapist"...
The bulk of the email is that because I am so lucky that I will have a third kid, he demands that I give him the house I got as part of our father's heritage, and he gives me the one he got...

Of course if he ever says somehtign directly to me about any of these emails, my response will be that:

- I don't respond to emails that are not addressed at me;
- I don't respond to messages that contain accusations, insults, threats or general negativity, as I have made clear multiple times now. 

[Notwendy]

It's interesting that he states he's NC with you but copies you on emails to the therapist which usually would be confidential.

He's communicating with you.

This is not to excuse his behavior- or for you to not have boundaries with him. For your own well being, it's important that you don't get involved in his emotional drama. You can enjoy your family and protect your circle of "normality".

However, it may help to see his behavior as not being about you, or anything you have done, but his own emotions and his own shaky sense of self. This way it doesn't affect you emotionally as much (I think we always have feelings about a family member but it's more about him than you).

Even though their behavior is dysfunctional and even hurtful, pwBPD want what other people want and for my mother - how people perceived her was important to her. One of the unspoken family "rules" was to not speak about BPD mother's behavior and to maintain the impression that she was competent and "normal".

She wanted what every other woman her age wants- to have her grandchildren show up for her and to have people see her as a grandmother. However, visits to her were not always pleasant- and there could be drama. It wasn't something we'd choose to do as a family vacation. We did visit her more than any other family member over the years, but also I had boundaries to protect my children too.

We hadn't visited my father's family in their area. This was a first time for us. A part of the visit was that it was in an area we wanted to visit as a vacation. In addition to seeing family- we did activities, saw sights. There wasn't a way to rationally explain this to her.

For my BPD mother, what she felt was that we were making an effort to visit my father's family and not her and she wanted us to do it for her. However, relationships are formed over years, and we were close with my father's family, and I think this visit triggered a lot of emotions for her. We had no intention of hurting her but due to her own feelings she felt it was.

Shame is a difficult emotion for anyone and especially for someone with BPD.  For your brother, I think he feels a lot of shame for not having what is a common situation for men his age- a job, a stable family. He wants what peers his age want but his BPD has made achieving that difficult. That's not your fault or anyone else's fault. So when he sees you with your family, and sees you achieving- it is hard for him to deal with that emotionally.

It's possible that his wanting more material possessions like your house is his way of feeling "equal" to you, however, a house won't fix his feelings. Neither would it help for you to not enjoy or protect your family from dysfunction or try to "fix" your brother by sacrificing any of that. Even if you did, it wouldn't be effective. Sadly- this is their own emotional issues. I hope though that seeing it this way will help you to feel his behavior less personally.

[ForeverDad]

The bulk of the email is that because I am so lucky that I will have a third kid, he demands that I give him the house I got as part of our father's heritage, and he gives me the one he got...

Those demands are just that, demands.  One of the facets of BPD is the FOG (Fear, Obligation, Guilt).  You need to balance your own welfare and your own wishes as to what you want to do with things you own, even if inherited, versus his predictable lack of appreciation.

Even if you treat him overly-fair and gift him whatever to appease him, he will still be the same problem person.  Knowing that, then make the decisions you wish to make, not what he wishes.  Yes, sadly, that's the way it is.