The Silent Treatment

[Hoping123]

Hello,

My husband and I are going through a very difficult time with our young adult daughter who is strongly suspected of having a BPD.  Just to put things into context, last weekend, she and her boyfriend from out of town got drunk in our house and then she got very upset when he shared a personal detail of his past with us.  She became very aggressive with him, swearing at him, calling him names and telling him to leave.  My husband and I tried to calm her down while dealing with her boyfriend who wanted to drive away in a drunken state.  Things got out of hand and we had to call the police.  At that point, our daughter wanted to reconcile with her boyfriend and her anger turned towards us.  He did not cooperate with the officers so they eventually took him to the police station and released him in the morning.  He was fined but no charges were filed. 

There's more to the story but, to make a long story short, since then, our daughter is giving us the silent treatment.  Any attempts on our part to talk to her result in rude replies and swearing so we stopped trying.  I wrote her a letter which she tore up.  When she needs a favour from me, she doesn't ask me, she orders me.  I do not give in to that but then her anger escalates.   It feels like our life at home will never be the same; the tension is palpable.  We don't know how to handle this.  We were wondering if anyone could give us advice on how to handle a silent treatment that lasts so long.  We feel the need to discuss the events that took place last week because she seems to have distorted memories of what took place but, given our failed attempts at communicating, should we avoid that talk altogether?

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

[Gorges]

Does your daughter live at home with you? The silent treatment will end, trust me.  In the meantime, focus on yourself.  My daughter gave me the silent treatment for 6 weeks.  She said her therapist recommended it.  It actually worked out because during that time I signed up for 2 graduate courses on top of full time work.  I was actually able to do it and I didn't realize how much energy was going into her drama.   She did not live with me so it made it easier.