First post - seeking practical advice

[Momwithhope]

My 18yo daughter was a joyful, affectionate and creative child, but she has been argumentative and provocative since middle school. She is incredibly intelligent, articulate and beautiful and presents an image of competence and kindness to most people outside our family. A year ago she was diagnosed with depression when her cutting and suicidal thoughts became evident. The depression had apparently been present for some time before that, and she traces its start to some peer-related events along with our lack of awareness of her pain in 8th grade. We are not aware of any childhood trauma or abuse, and she has reassured us that she is not either. She had a happy, normal and safe childhood with her two siblings,but our conflict with her has been escalating since she entered HS. She is now on medication for both depression (which reduced her desire to cut or self-harm) and ADHD, and she sees a psychiatrist and therapist. She has fits of extreme anxiety, often brought on by the consequences of her actions, and there have been several instances of substance use over the last year including benzos, alcohol, marijuana and addiction to nicotine (vaping). When confronted, she denies, flies into a rage and runs away from our house. Her fits of rage are as verbally abusive as you can possibly imagine, and she particularly takes aim at me even if my husband is equally involved in the discussion. She very rarely apologizes afterward and things just return to normal. This happens once a week on average. She has not been diagnosed with BPD, but I just started reading SWOE and recognize several of the traits in her behavior. She lives with us, and is scheduled to graduate from HS this May. She has been accepted to the college of her choice for next year and has admirable and lofty goals for her education and career, but she seems to lack self-control. We are often questioning how much of this is a symptom of her immaturity vs. mental illness.

We are having a very hard time enforcing any boundaries, and she is making our lives very unpredictable and painful. We see that she is trying to turn things around with the start of the new year, but she continues to lie to us constantly and refuses to be accountable for her actions or the clear boundaries we have set (like not using illegal substances). We try to affirm, praise and recognize her positive qualities and accomplishments, but questioning or limiting her in any way triggers this blind rage, and her decision-making abilities in those moments are extremely impaired and out of line with her long term goals. We don't know how we are going to endure having her under our roof until next fall or whether we should sacrifice for her college education under these conditions. If there was a safe place where she could move out, we would help her do that, but we don't want to impose this difficult situation on any friends or extended family members. She thinks that she could be self-sufficient with her waittressing job and her savings, but we know that would not last long. We are willing to let her try and fail, but we want to keep her safe as much as we can.

I look forward to finishing the book, SWOE, and getting some practical advice from those on this forum.

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

[Huat]

Hello Momwithhope and welcome .

Glad you found us... .sorry you had to.  You have certainly come to the right place to find "practical advice."  I so wish I could point you to the "magic button" that, once pushed, will make everything better.  Sadly, no such button.  Life with our BPD'ers is, indeed, time-consuming to say nothing about hurtful at times.  If only they would realize that we, their parents, only want the best for them and want to save them from the consequences of their actions.  That is a pipe dream!

Our daughter (now 51) started using marijuana when she was in her early teens.  Before that she was a fun-loving child... .a joy for us.  We know she dabbled with other drugs, too.  Even though today we are confident that she is a non-user (more of a hypochondriac) we feel damage was done at that early age.  While some developing brains can come out of those times of experimentation unscathed, others can't.  That could well be the case with our daughter... .maybe yours, too.

There will be others responding to your post with good suggestions/advice on how to deal with your daughter, my focus is more on YOU.  It is so important that you do your homework, empower yourself.   Carry no guilt because you have done the best you could along the way with the information you had... .and as you learn differently... .you will do differently. 

I'm sure all of us will agree that it is heartbreaking to watch our children make choices that we know will lead to bad consequences but sometimes... .sometimes... .those consequences have to  happen to them in order for them to learn.  Bottom line... .we can't force change on them... .but we can change us and the way we approach them.  (See Lesson 2 "If your current approach is not working, change it."  This is not what any of us planned for our lives... .for our children's lives... .but this is it!

So, Momwithhope, there really is hope but I will repeat that you have to look after yourself and by implementing some of the tools to the right  you will get more of a feeling of empowerment.

Hope you stick with us!  We learn from each other.  You are not alone.

Huat