Sister with BPD wants Family

[Our abuse recovery guide]

My BPD sister has been in a recovery phase after a very difficult summer last year.
She's had a steady good job as a teacher, my parents bought her a condo and give her an allowance to live on, and she's been on her medication.

Now she has even met someone who she brought home to meet the family.
Shes in her late 30s and I know she wants a family but I'm terrified of this prospect.
I wanted to tell this guy to run, but really she needs someone in her life.
I can't even imagine the things she must be telling him.

I'm posting right now be/c I'm about to cry.  She's texting me asking for baby things and to ensure I don't donate them / save them for her.  I assured her I would and that no matter what our family would support her.
Then the rant starts: how can I talk to her like this, I'm condescending, I can never understand her, how I'm a terrible person to her my whole life...  Its just so astounding how mean she can be to me, while accusing me of being mean to her. 
I just can't.  I'm not responding, and just letting her get it out.  I've learned that.  I'm afraid she has stopped taking her medication be/c she wants to try to get pregnant. 

Really I want to tell her she shouldn't have children. 
Has anyone else had to deal w/ this?  What do you do? 
Her BPD has effected her whole life, the damage she has done to herself is so bad I can't even fathom what it would do to her child.

[quietgirl]

My BPD sister has been in a recovery phase after a very difficult summer last year.
She's had a steady good job as a teacher, my parents bought her a condo and give her an allowance to live on, and she's been on her medication.

Now she has even met someone who she brought home to meet the family.
Shes in her late 30s and I know she wants a family but I'm terrified of this prospect.
I wanted to tell this guy to run, but really she needs someone in her life.
I can't even imagine the things she must be telling him.

I'm posting right now be/c I'm about to cry.  She's texting me asking for baby things and to ensure I don't donate them / save them for her.  I assured her I would and that no matter what our family would support her.
Then the rant starts: how can I talk to her like this, I'm condescending, I can never understand her, how I'm a terrible person to her my whole life...  Its just so astounding how mean she can be to me, while accusing me of being mean to her. 
I just can't.  I'm not responding, and just letting her get it out.  I've learned that.  I'm afraid she has stopped taking her medication be/c she wants to try to get pregnant. 

Really I want to tell her she shouldn't have children. 
Has anyone else had to deal w/ this?  What do you do? 
Her BPD has effected her whole life, the damage she has done to herself is so bad I can't even fathom what it would do to her child.

[Harri]

Hi and welcome back!   What a difficult situation (to say the least). 

How long has she been with her new boyfriend?   I am not sure how to handle this to be honest with you. 

I wanted to tell this guy to run, but really she needs someone in her life.  I can't even imagine the things she must be telling him.

I understand wanting to tell him to run.  I don't think that is the way to go though.  We have had members whose SO is/was BPD who had people tell them to leave, etc and it did not work and sometimes backfired.  Usually people need to figure it out on their own.   

Then the rant starts: how can I talk to her like this, I'm condescending, I can never understand her, how I'm a terrible person to her my whole life...  Its just so astounding how mean she can be to me, while accusing me of being mean to her. 
I just can't.  I'm not responding, and just letting her get it out.  I've learned that.

  Sounds like a combination of projection and her feeling invalidated here.  Ugh.  Letting her get it out is good.  I usually think of letting a pwBPD return to baseline and learn to self-soothe.  I do not think that letting it out has to be at our expense where we sit and take verbal and emotional abuse.  How did you handle it?    It is okay to say, I am hanging up, we can talk about this later.

Has anyone else had to deal w/ this?  What do you do? 
Her BPD has effected her whole life, the damage she has done to herself is so bad I can't even fathom what it would do to her child.

I have not had to deal with this as I do not have a sibling with BPD.  I know we have members here whose pwBPD have had children and it is a tricky road for everyone.  If she does have kids, she will need strong support that is validating while also setting limits.  You might find this article helpful.  It is about what it takes to be in a romantic relationship with a pwBPD but I think there might be some helpful info in there for you... at least I hope so. 
The Do's and Don'ts in a BPD Relationship

See what you think.

[Kwamina]

Hi quietgirl and welcome back indeed

I think your concerns about your sister wanting to have kids are understandable and quite valid, knowing what you know about her.

Still, she and her partner are adults and responsible for the choices they make. It would be very sad though if those choices result in negatively impacting (future) children. What is your impression of her boyfriend? Do you feel like they are close, how do they interact with each other?

Not responding to her false accusations was very wise I think. On this site we often refer to the acronym J.A.D.E. which stands for Justify, Argue, Defend and Explain. To deal with false accusations and prevent circular arguments conversations, it helps to not engage in J.A.D.E.-ing, as in not to endlessly justify, argue, defend and explain when interacting with a disordered individual.

Take care

The Board Parrot

[Notwendy]

My mother has BPD.  What I have observed is that she wants what she wants, regardless of whether or not she is responsible. She doesn't connect her behavior to the consequences of her behavior. Due to her tendency to project her feelings, she quickly blames others for it. If people get upset with her, she feels she is being unfairly attacked and experiences this in victim mode.

My mother sees her friends spending time with their grandchildren and she wants that as well. However, she doesn't connect this to her behavior. If you want unsupervised access to your grandchildren, maybe it's not a good idea to be abusive to their mother ( me ). She does have a relationship with my kids, but when they were younger, I made sure visits were supervised, as I didn't think it was safe for them to be alone with her. To my mother, I am a terrible daughter who is "keeping her grandchildren from her". She doesn't make the connection.

Your sister likely wants what many women her age want, and isn't considering her behavior. She is an adult and if she and her partner have a child- it will be their responsibility. How the children of BPD parents turn out is variable. This is due to many factors. BPD is on a spectrum, the partner's ability to parent, support, resources and the individual makeup  of the child- how resilient they are.

I understand the wish to tell the guy to "run" but from what I have observed that will only happen if the guy decides to do it, not because someone tells him to.

If you do become an aunt, keep in mind that your presence in the child's life is important and that you will have a positive influence. However, to be in the child's life, I  would be careful not to be a threat to your sister. That doesn't mean to not have boundaries or to tolerate her behavior, but to not get into a drama triangle with her.

[quietgirl]

thank you all for responding.

She just endless sends me text messages, like verbal word vomit.
I try not even to read them, I know what they say, I've heard it all before.
The last one was her telling me she told all her new co-workers about my behavior and they validated her opinion.  Just to ensure her view is the correct one.
She texted me again this morning apologizing then giving me conditions of our relationship, telling me I can not treat or speak to her this way.  I just did not respond.
I've never heard of "J.A.D.E.-ing which stands for Justify, Argue, Defend and Explain"    This is a good description of how our discussions go when she gets in these moods.  I find not responding is the only way to manage it,  it Doesn't matter what I say, its not what she wants to hear.  Or she twists it to make her the victim.

I think she is Splitting - she asked me for something she needs and is now raging at me for the shame she feels of having to ask.  its helpful to have language to describe the actions and understand how to manage.

I'm going to just pause our contact temporarily until I can manage it. 
thank you for the help, discussing it with people who really understand is more helpful than I could ever thought, 
Most people do not understand at all what she is really like, or how bad it is. 
I can't imagine what she says about me to others...

[Notwendy]

It's amazing how they can appear to others and then, when nobody can observe, be someone else with us.

My mother is a master at this. I know she has said all kinds of horrible things about me to others, that aren't true. I'm actually embarrassed around her family as I think they all think I'm messed up after what she's said. I know she's said things as some have accidentally gotten back to me.

One time, I emailed one of her relatives. The relative passed it on to other family members on my mother's side with a horrible comment about me. One of them accidentally clicked "reply all" and it all came back to me. I replied- so they know I saw it, and nobody said a word to me about it. They act as if it didn't happen.

I think it will help you to read about the Karpman triangle. Your sister went into victim mode and rallied her co-workers to rescue her against you, the persecutor. My mother operates with this a lot. She takes victim perspective ( I think this is the role pwBPD prefer) and rallies her family, friends, ( and it used to be my father before he passed away) to rescue her against whoever she perceives to be her persecutor.

https://bpdfamily.com/content/karpman-drama-triangle


I think it helps to not take this personally. It's how your sister operates. There has to be a persecutor for her to be victim and she casts people into that role. You just happened to be "it" at the time- the one she splits with. I think it's a good idea to not react emotionally to this.