Adult daughter—how do you help?

[Parents! Get help here!]

Hello! I can honestly say that I am over the moon at finding this group. My family has been struggling for the last several years, and I am so happy to finally be putting the pieces together.
I have a long family history of mental illness and abuse. My husband is also unpacking some past childhood trauma of his own. In spite of that, I feel like we have always had a pretty stable little family with our children and done our best to pay forward the hard lessons we have learned. In a lot of ways, we were great for a long time.
My daughter is the one I am concerned about. As a child, she was diagnosed with ADHD. We learned to adapt and did pretty well. She had a lot of learned helplessness, but we did our best to help her work through. She always struggled with friends and would dispose of them just about every year. She fought with her younger sibling often to the point that we worried the younger sibling had issues because my daughter always claimed their fights led to threats that the younger sibling doesn’t actually remember. For a long time it was a lot of little things, but she did well and was successful. My daughter also experienced moments with such a deeper intensity that it has become clear now what the rest of us saw as little upsets, she saw as something else entirely. I used to find her in the corner as a child sometimes, and when I asked her what was going on, she would say that I shouldn’t worry about it, she had done something bad and was punishing herself. It was a bit strange, but I would tell her she had probably done her time and try to talk with her about what had happened.

A few years ago as my daughter was nearing the end of high school, my mother found out her cancer (after 15 years) was terminal and she passed away. This sent all of us spiraling. My daughter started acting out, inappropriate relationships and anger issues with the family, eating disorders, etc. we were all so deep in grief, it was hard to know what to do, and often we acted poorly.
Fast forward a bit, she left for college in an attempt to start over and things got worse—self-harm, and dangerous situatio s, and she fell in with people that convinced her that our attempts at setting boundaries and helping were gaslighting. They convinced her to cut ties with us. Her counselor at the time told her about BPD, which is how I found out and started researching, but her biggest focus was on blaming my husband for childhood abuse that never happened. We were certainly not perfect parents and we have a lot to work through, but the whole thing left us reeling and has broken us..
We are now a year out from all of that. She has made contact again after a bad break up. At first, we gave in and gave her money. We let her know that we love her and have seen her a few times. It became clear pretty quick she does not want contact with my husband and only wants contact with me on her terms.. I ask her to send all financial requests through my husband because I cannot handle to be the go between. It is so hard to feel that hurt between them. She has told us that she needs two therapists and goes on multiple dates a week but cannot hold down a job. She is in college but can’t always go to class because of her issues. I try not to judge, but I also don’t want to enable problematic behavior. . We stopped paying for school when she cut ties last time. This time we have explained that we can only help financially if we have enough of a relationship for a monthly visit. We want to support but don’t want to be a bank. It’s all so hard to balance, especially when she isn’t eating and we just want to make sure she’s okay. I recognize that I have to let her face the consequences of her choices and I couldn’t save her from this if I tried, but my mama heart is breaking. We used to be so close, and I feel like it all slipped out of our hands when we weren’t looking. It’s awful. Any advice y’all can give would be great. We are all getting on the therapy train, which is helping, and I am reading a lot. It helps to see more current research that says a family history of mental illness plays a big part in BPD. I feel like some counselors do so much blaming, when all we want to do is heal our family and help our daughter.
Thanks for listening and for being a part of this support. I have a lot to learn, and I am happy to be here.

[Flamingomama]

Hello! I can honestly say that I am over the moon at finding this group. My family has been struggling for the last several years, and I am so happy to finally be putting the pieces together.
I have a long family history of mental illness and abuse. My husband is also unpacking some past childhood trauma of his own. In spite of that, I feel like we have always had a pretty stable little family with our children and done our best to pay forward the hard lessons we have learned. In a lot of ways, we were great for a long time.
My daughter is the one I am concerned about. As a child, she was diagnosed with ADHD. We learned to adapt and did pretty well. She had a lot of learned helplessness, but we did our best to help her work through. She always struggled with friends and would dispose of them just about every year. She fought with her younger sibling often to the point that we worried the younger sibling had issues because my daughter always claimed their fights led to threats that the younger sibling doesn’t actually remember. For a long time it was a lot of little things, but she did well and was successful. My daughter also experienced moments with such a deeper intensity that it has become clear now what the rest of us saw as little upsets, she saw as something else entirely. I used to find her in the corner as a child sometimes, and when I asked her what was going on, she would say that I shouldn’t worry about it, she had done something bad and was punishing herself. It was a bit strange, but I would tell her she had probably done her time and try to talk with her about what had happened.

A few years ago as my daughter was nearing the end of high school, my mother found out her cancer (after 15 years) was terminal and she passed away. This sent all of us spiraling. My daughter started acting out, inappropriate relationships and anger issues with the family, eating disorders, etc. we were all so deep in grief, it was hard to know what to do, and often we acted poorly.
Fast forward a bit, she left for college in an attempt to start over and things got worse—self-harm, and dangerous situatio s, and she fell in with people that convinced her that our attempts at setting boundaries and helping were gaslighting. They convinced her to cut ties with us. Her counselor at the time told her about BPD, which is how I found out and started researching, but her biggest focus was on blaming my husband for childhood abuse that never happened. We were certainly not perfect parents and we have a lot to work through, but the whole thing left us reeling and has broken us..
We are now a year out from all of that. She has made contact again after a bad break up. At first, we gave in and gave her money. We let her know that we love her and have seen her a few times. It became clear pretty quick she does not want contact with my husband and only wants contact with me on her terms.. I ask her to send all financial requests through my husband because I cannot handle to be the go between. It is so hard to feel that hurt between them. She has told us that she needs two therapists and goes on multiple dates a week but cannot hold down a job. She is in college but can’t always go to class because of her issues. I try not to judge, but I also don’t want to enable problematic behavior. . We stopped paying for school when she cut ties last time. This time we have explained that we can only help financially if we have enough of a relationship for a monthly visit. We want to support but don’t want to be a bank. It’s all so hard to balance, especially when she isn’t eating and we just want to make sure she’s okay. I recognize that I have to let her face the consequences of her choices and I couldn’t save her from this if I tried, but my mama heart is breaking. We used to be so close, and I feel like it all slipped out of our hands when we weren’t looking. It’s awful. Any advice y’all can give would be great. We are all getting on the therapy train, which is helping, and I am reading a lot. It helps to see more current research that says a family history of mental illness plays a big part in BPD. I feel like some counselors do so much blaming, when all we want to do is heal our family and help our daughter.
Thanks for listening and for being a part of this support. I have a lot to learn, and I am happy to be here.

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

[PearlsBefore]

Minor note because I'm headed to bed, but did just read your whole post. What concerns me is where you talk about her efforts to engage you without engaging her father. In my amateur experience, you might be better to let her do that - insisting on his involvement is likely to just encourage the "Splitting Black/White thinking" and triangulation...two of the facets of BPD that make progress most difficult. I think my own bias would be to actually be grateful she's only engaging with the one apparently-preferred parent but alright not needing to rope the other one in.

[KBug]

I'm so sorry that you are going through all of this.  It sounds similar to our story.  My step daughter with BPD is 23 and in and out of college.  She's very intelligent but struggles profoundly with her emotions and relationships.  Her mom has BPD, too and has spent SD's lifetime engaging in parental alienation.  Her brothers now seen through it and we have a great relationship with them now that they are living independently.

SD moved in with us for a year because her life at her mom's was very difficult.  She moved back in with her mom when we set some firm boundaries around her behavior.  This cycle repeated a couple of times. After she moved out the last time, she started to spread ugly accusations to all her dad's sisters about her dad regarding something that supposedly happened when she was young, not to her but to someone that she hasn't had any contact with in years. Her mom tells her lies (including about me) and she makes up her own, too. It's not unusual for her to gain attention by telling them to all the family in secretive dramatic "meetings."  The family has a lot of experience with her and her mother, so they understand what's going on. They let us know. 

We finally set a boundary and told her that we do not feel safe being alone with her or having her in our house until she sees a therapist with her father (his therapist, her therapist, or someone neutral-her choice) to discuss the accusations, and we'll allow her back into our house if we feel safe.  We told her that we will meet her in public places and would like to still see her.  We haven't seen her since and she only contacts us when she wants money. My husband texts her and/or calls her every week or so but she never responds. I love her and I miss who she is when she's not in the deep pit. I have a lot of empathy for her because I know that she's in a lot of pain.  It makes me feel guilty to say this, but our lives are so much easier now that she's not in it.

She's miserable with her mom and her mom is miserable with her.  They war with each other and her behavior is outrageous (like bringing strange men home overnight without even telling her mom, wrecking 4 cars, etc.).  She's been in and out of inpatient. She wants out of her mom's house but she spent all of the money that her mom gave her at 18 for college on pot, alcohol, and taking her boyfriend out.  She texted my husband asking for her 529 money to move into the dorms because she doesn't want to live with her mom.  He flat out told her no because she's just using him for money. Her tuition is paid for.  He told her that he's more than an ATM and that she can't treat people in her life badly and expect them to do things for her. He also pointed out that she's had 8 months to set up sessions with a therapist and it hasn't happened yet. Last winter, he had offered to set up the sessions and she refused and said that she would do it. She's now blaming him for all her problems. I'm really glad that he's setting and holding boundaries with her. She's never really had to face deep consequences for her choices because she would just move back to her mom's house when we set boundaries.

I think that you are doing the right thing in setting boundaries about not helping her financially without having a relationship. I also think that you are right in making her deal with her father directly.  You don't want her to start triangulating with you and your husband.  Your relationship with him is more important that your relaitonship with her.  You are helping her to be as independent as possible. You don't want her to start back up with the learned helplessness.  In the weeks leading up to her moving back in with her mom, my SD told me that she was terrified that she would have to love with her parents for the rest of her life.  I told her that she could live independently if she really worked closely with her therapist and that she's more than capable.  I also told her that I was glad that she was afraid because that's her mind fighting for her to be independent.  I told her that when she didn't feel able to go to class, she should ask herself what she was more afraid of, going to class or living with one of her parents for the rest of her life.  This is so hard and my heart goes out to you but it sounds like you are on the right track in supporting her to be as independent as possible.

[Elizabeth22]

Hi, Flamingomama

I am so sorry for your pain.

I am actually feeling overwhelmed from reading this, but it's something I really needed to read. I can relate to this so much and it has shown me how much denial I have been in regarding my daughter.
We also have a huge family history of mental illness, luckily I escaped just about all of it and my problems are due to abuse, because that is what can happen in these families.

I need to digest this a bit, thank you so much for posting and sharing.

I am so sorry for the problems you are having, my daughter and I are no contact, by her choice, but I have made the choice sometimes too, it seems permanent now and I have grieved her and have no desire to have a relationship with her ever again.

To answer your question, I couldn't help her, no matter how hard I tried. It was never enough. She also makes up stories of abuse and posts them to social media where my friends can see them.
She found an enabler and married him, he will do anything for her and suffer any humiliation she throws at him just to be with her, and she takes full advantage. That is what she wants in life.