New to group - Aunt to nephew with BPD traits

[JLoCali9450]

Hi! This is my first post.  I'm so grateful to have found this group and all the helpful information it provides!

I'm an Auntie to a young man that has BPD traits and is resistant to going to therapy.

He’s had a very, very difficult childhood: his mother died when he was a toddler (~2yo), about 2 years later his father handed him off to family, family took him to another country & ended up kicking him out of the house as a child. His mother’s sister found out & brought him back to the US, but there was poverty, instability, chaos and violence in the home (her son is an addict and had 3 kids with his addict baby mama, who were later adopted by another family). Additionally, they lived in East LA - an area with poverty, crime, gangs and drugs. He’s had a few brushes with the law, but no jail time. He’s smart & in his early twenties returned to community college later transferred to university. His first or second year the aunt who took him in passed away. He graduated in 2021 – the first generation in his family to do so.

We’re alumni & that’s how our paths crossed. The original agreement was for me to help him with his first job search out of college - which I’ve done with a number of young people related to an educational nonprofit. He was in talk therapy at the time and still on-campus because of housing insecurity during COVID. After graduation he was no longer a student so his access to his therapist ended. He worked hard on his job search and first got a temp job on campus. He’s impressed supervisors and managers with his work ethic at work, and has developed a good reputation, which helped him get a regular job on campus – I’m proud of him for that and also relieved. He has health benefits, but he refuses to find a new one.

He has a good heart, is a sweet kid, has a good sense of humor, has aspirations, morals & values, and is very bright. He does not want to go back to East LA/the hood and he’s working hard to build a better life for himself. He has told me several times that his years at university was the best time in his life – he was safe/no violence, he had food, and he could just work on campus and concentrate on his studies.

Fast forward a year and after many trials & tribulations, conflict & outbursts, I happened across an article about BPD & noticed that there were more checked boxes than unchecked. I don’t want to label or put him in a box, but I’m looking to understand where he’s coming from and how to deal with his unproductive behavior – resistance, angry outbursts, suicidal ideation (thinks about being dead/better off dead), resistance/anger with being held accountable, unable to communicate his needs/assert himself, shame, feeling numb, feeling worthless, broken promises, not thinking about consequences/risk assessing, and more recently, lashing out/insulting and embellishing facts/not being honest in order to manipulate, because it’s happening A LOT - at least weekly, if not more. Bottom line, I’m emotionally exhausted right now and getting worn out.

He’s resistant to regular talk therapy because he doesn’t want to relive his childhood trauma. I can’t say I blame him. So, I’ve suggested DBT and somatic therapy to him, hoping that if he could learn to regulate, calm his nervous system, communicate, etc., then maybe he’d feel better and be open to meds and/or CBT/other therapies in the future.

So, that’s where I’m at – looking for support as a caregiver/parental-type. I know he’s suffering and I know he’s putting out a tremendous amount of effort to keep it together. I want to support him in the way he needs support, but I also need support and information, which is why I am here.

JLo in Cali

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