My niece has been diagnosed with BPD

[Auntie123]

My niece is 25 years old.  I was not too involved in her life while she was growing up basically because I was raising two kids very closed to her age also. Her parents divorced when she was 9 years old and she was daddy's little girl. After the divorce her father basically neglected her and her mother ( my sister) was too involved in her own life. She spend a lot of her time at my parents house where she receive a lot of love and attention there. I noticed that she was starting to show aggression, being violent , fighting  at  school etc... .  and told my sister to get some help , but my sister was too immature at that moment and didn't realized that this girl needed help. Time past and this girl start showing  more violent traits being disrespectful, violent, promiscuous, problems with relationships, even hitting her partners. My sister lost all control over her and my niece read this weakness and even started being abusive with my sister. To the point that my sister was already afraid of her  and could no longer deal with this situation.She had to go to live with her father, but she began to have the same problems with him because she smoked weed in his  house and her father confronted her, she denied it and he lost control and hit her. This brings her back to my sister's house, and the condition was that she had to seek  help. Unfortunately she did not follow thru,  her  friends were not the best and began to use other drugs, to the point that my sister had to throw her out of the house because she didn't want to get help.At this point I decided to intervene and try to help her. My position was to try to be understandable,  tolerance and patience. I knew that economically it was going to be difficult for her to live alone, I decided to help her as much as I could, both my sister and I gave her money and we bought the basic things so that she could live by herself . I continued to see an attitude of  haughty, manipulative but I knew that she had a mental problem and I thought she  was bipolar. Recently after more than a year and a half she decided to seek help. By this time she has had several jobs but did not last long, when her partners noticed her attitude and aggressive behavior and tried to leave her she hit them and threat them. When she finally decided to seek help, she did not have a job and her latest  partner told her that if she did not seek help, the relationship would end. We saw the light at the end of the tunnel and my sister began paying for her lodging, groceries and all her expenses so she could continue treatment and improve. I was the one that picked her up and take her to her appointments.  I was super happy that she was finally being treated. Her  diagnosis was BPD. While she  was in treatment she  stayed at my father's  house, but at first everything seemed to go well, but I noticed that she was still lying, manipulative, spending money without having it while my sister and I were doing all these sacrifices. We wondered where she's getting  this money to buy these extra things. My sister was making a sacrifice since she does not make much money and when I could , I also gave her money. Until I decided to look at my father's bank statement and I realized several withdrawals of amounts like $ 400, another day of $ 300 and several more and I realized that it was the days that she stayed at his house. My father gave her the pin of his debit card since he is an old man and gave her the card so that she withdrew $ 20.00  the most but she realized where he hid it and while he was  not paying attention she stole his debit card and made these withdraws without him knowing . When I confronted her, there was no gesture of remorse, regret, not even one tear, and she admitted that it was her. I was furious and told  her that I was not willing to help her any longer that she was on her own, and needed to get a job to pay for all her  expenses. How dare she steals from her  own grandfather to the point that she left  him almost without money. I was so angry and still I am. My sister and I had to go to the psychologist that my niece visits, she told us that we had already done all for her and that she has to hit rock bottom and seek help for herself not because the boyfriend threatened her that he was going To leave if he did not seek help.   I was so glad when she started getting help I said to myself that all this year holding up with her attitude and manipulation was worth it. MY family are witness of all the sacrifices that I made for her but she was dragging me down. I stayed there because I was  worried that she would try to kill herself or  do something stupid . The day that I confronted her I was still hesitating.  My husband and daughter found out what she did,  they were very angry. My daughter told my son what happened and he called me while I was preparing to face her. While he was talking to me he told me that it was over, that I already did everything in my power to help her, that It was in her hands and to decide where she wanted to go. He cried and his voice trembled. There I realized how worried my family were and he gave me the strength I needed. This has been very hard for me since I am the kind of person that don't give up on people. I raised two wonderful kids and thought that I can do something for her. I still feel worried and concern but this has affected me more than I though it would. Still worried about her , she became a delinquent  but don't know how to handle her.

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 Auntie123

Welcome to bpdfamily   I'm sorry to hear what you have been dealing with your niece, after all your efforts of support it's hard for you as you are not the kind of person to give up as you say you are concerned for your niece.

Sometimes standing back, changing our approach can help effect change, handing the responsibility to your niece as her therapist says she needs to be in control of her recovery, management of BPD and the feel the consequences of her actions. I understand when the therapist says she has to hit rock bottom, my 29DD hit crisis at 27 and had no option but to fight to be well, she's doing just that with DBT.

I'm glad you have the loving support of your family to help you through. How long was your niece in therapy?

WDx

[Auntie123]

Thank's for showing interest in this case. She started  Therapy on June , only two months ago. We believe that she began all this because she didn't ' the have a choice, she was fired from her recent job and her boyfriend gave her like an ultimatum . we think that she was using us, we even believe that she was not following the treatment and taking her medication as prescribed. this was just a scheme, manipulative as she is. I feel sorry fo r her and know that this is something that she can't control and do not know how to manage these feelings. We hope that she someday hopefully in the near future seek for help because she wants not for someone used ask her or threatened her to do it . She was my mothers little girl and before she died she told me to not abandon her because she sensed that her granddaughter had a problem and was worried. I promised my mother that I would do whatever was needed to be done to help her, but this is way out of my reached .