Like children of the corn

[GoblinMom]

Hello, I'm a new member.  I too have a child with this condition.  I find it very interesting that although we didn't all raise our children the same way, they all act the same.

My daughter was fine until she was 18.  She was a straight A student, very popular, outgoing..  Then she fell in love and the boy broke up with her and  she started using marijuana daily "to relax" and all hell broke loose.  At first it was isolated incidents so my husband kept saying she was just being a teenager.

Now every conversation with her is like walking in a mine field. Disagreements  always end with her screaming and calling me horrible names and then she stops talking to me for months.

So for the past 4 years I've been researching BPD and looking for the answers. 

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

[Swimmy55]

Welcome!
 You mentioned your daughter doesn't speak to you for months- is she still living with you? 

It is unfortunately very common for a BPD to self medicate with drugs , illegal as well as abusing prescriptions
~ Always remember you are as important as your BPD child.  This sounds impossible, but try to put your focus back on you.   She is an adult now and that limits how you can help her, but you can and must help yourself. 

Please write back as you are able.

[GoblinMom]

She just finished college so she lived in the dorms and came home some weekends. 

[Swimmy55]

She's home full time now, eh?  Well, the good news is she graduated college, congrats to you both! 
Is she silent now that she is home with you? 

[livednlearned]

Now every conversation with her is like walking in a mine field. Disagreements  always end with her screaming and calling me horrible names and then she stops talking to me for months.

What are the nature of the disagreements?

When she begins talking again after a silent treatment, how does it usually begin?

[GoblinMom]

Swimmy,
She shares an apartment with a roommate.  She lost her job because of COVI19 so I've been helping but she didn't ask me.

[GoblinMom]

livednlearned
It can be over anything.  One time I asked about her classes and she said she hated all of them so I said if she decided to change majors that would be okay and she said, "Why can't you EVER be supportive of what I want to do?"  If I talk about a health issue she says it's not true and stop acting like a victim.  When I said she couldn't spank my dog she screamed that I didn't know how to educate dogs and I said that I obviously didn't know how to educate kids either and it was my home and my dog and in my home we don't hit children or animals.

Other times she's very sweet.  One Mother's Day she sent me a text that said there were times I gave her the world and she threw it back at me and thanks for always being there. 

[GoblinMom]

I can go from being the kindest, most caring and loving woman who would do anything for her children to being the mother from hell, drug addict, victim, liar from one minute to the next.

[livednlearned]

How do you respond when she says those things to you?

[GoblinMom]

I tell her to stop.  There's no need for insults, if she wants to discuss something we can do it without screaming.  When she gets mad she looses control. 

I'm the one that usually reaches out.  I'm always ready to forgive whatever she did and put it behind us.  But this time she blocked me.

She's not going to come back is she?  For some reason I trigger her.. 

[livednlearned]

She's not going to come back is she?

It is more likely that she comes back than not, is my guess.

She's probably prone to withdrawing because it's the reliable way to bring her emotions back to baseline. Having intense emotions and a shaky sense of self means she won't have an easy time regulating her feelings.

For some reason I trigger her.. 

Close relationships produce more heartfelt emotions, both negative and positive. You have a close relationship with her so she will have more emotions to manage.

I would use this time to become a generous listener with her. She is likely to have extraordinary emotional sensitivity, perceiving your emotions sometimes better than you may be able to in yourself. I use generous listening as a way to get myself grounded for black belt level validation.

It's the first step to building trust in a relationship that may be going through a shaky period.

It doesn't mean you allow her to be abusive.

I think you have a lot of positives in your words and actions. So much of this comes down to how we say it and when we say it, followed by what we do next. For me, I tended to say the right thing and the wrong thing. Some of us have to do a lot of editing 

My tendency was to validate with one sentence and then judge/lecture/spar/debate/explain/defend/argue, etc. for the next three paragraphs. It works best for me if I validate and then wait until a time when trust is there.

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

[GoblinMom]

You're right, I do lots of explaining and defending myself when she accuses me of lying, etc. I'll do some reading on how to communicate better with her.  She's very bright and if she thinks I'm patronizing her she'll be mad.

Thank you for your help, I really appreciate it.