I’m Struggling

[Gracie84]

For the past 5+ years, my daughter has been in and out of treatment centers and hospitals. She has tried to kill herself, she uses drugs, drinks and is just generally challenging. I used to think she just had middle child syndrome on steroids, but as she got older, we learned it was much more than that. She is now living with her dad. She hates me for it and feels abandoned. Her behavior was extremely taxing and was threatening my whole family unit. Her dad has no other children so he was potentially better equipped to take care of her full time. Now she barely talks to me, is very broken and does not believe I care about her. I miss her. I want so much more. At the same time, I know that if she came home, it would be a disaster and more of the same chaos. I’m so sad. I don’t know how to help her. I don’t know where to go from here. She isn’t getting better, nor does she seem to want to get healthy. I have no idea how to best support her. There are no support groups in my area and I am just wondering how other parents have dealt with similar situations.

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

[beatricex]

hi Gracie84,

Yes there are support groups (try NEMA in your state to start).  And, there is this board.

I'm sorry to hear you are going through this.  Do you care to share a little bit more?  Hear to listen not judge.

b

[Gracie84]

Thank you.
Sure. It’s a pretty long saga. She is very abusive and blames me for everything that has gone wrong in her life. She is pretty privileged  and there is not anything that I can point to as far as a reason or what led to her BPD diagnosis. She has had multiple suicide attempts. We have had police at our house on multiple occasions because she is violent - physically and verbally abusive. She believes that we favor her sister and don’t love her. How do people in similar situations cope with the hot and cold from their loved ones with BPD? Sometimes I wonder if I should let go and just let her make her mistakes… or keep fighting.

[beatricex]

Sorry the resource is NAMI (National Alliance for Mental Illness).  I found an online support group (we met over Zoom) in my state.

This is tough.  I too have two stepdaughters so I get the feeling jealous of one another.  Literally the first time I met them and everytime after if they were together, there were arguments about which one was Dad's favorite.  Kind of disturbing since they are now 26 and 33 with kids of their own.

You could stop fighting and see how she reacts.  We have done that and the two are now in an alliance against us, .

Not sure how long this will last however, the oldest (non bpd) is somewhat financially dependent on us.  My husband cosigned on her apartment.  We'll see how she feels when her lease comes up for renewal in a few months (we have decided we are not cosigning again).Maybe her younger sister won't be as cool when she doesn't kick it in and help her sister with the living situation like Dad and stepmom (me).  They basically like to both tell us it's my husband's job to take care of them since they are his Daughters.  They cannot believe it's their job to take care of themselves.  Both imply and the bpd gave her Dad the ultimatum that he must divorce me and take care of them.  Not sure how that is supposed to work, they are insanely jealous of one another .  The crazy making is the worst part for me, there's just no logic.

something u mentioned that concerns me is your daughter is physically abusive?  we just get the verbal and emotional abuse, cutting us off from contact with the grandkids, telling us how horrible we are.  I'm sorry you are going through this, it is really disturbing, obviously something needs to give.

How old is your daughter?  Does she work?

b

[Leaf56]

Gracie, I absolutely would let go and let her make her own mistakes at least for a period of time. I say that because it's what I myself have decided to do. My son is also living with his father, my ex husband. He also wants to move back. I will never allow that. I also value my life and the lives of my second husband and teenager still in HS. He's 24, he has a college degree, he had all the privileges of an upper middle class life, he suffered no abuse and had every need taken care of, always with the explicit expectation that when he graduated from college he was expected to support himself. I've been through the guilt, etc, but I wouldn't take this from anyone else and I've decided I'm not going to take it from him. His choices and his life are his own.