Hello

[FrustratedSister]

Hi this is my first time here, but I am finding myself in need of more support outside of my family and my therapist. I have a sister who, from everything I've read and my therapist's opinion after hearing about her for the past 4 years - has BPD. She also suffers from depression, anxiety, ADHD, and low self esteem.

She is my only sibling, has 1 daughter of her own. They have been living with my parents for the past 3+ yrs since she split from her daughters' father. We have always been close, but I find myself exhausted and having difficulty keeping up with this relationship with as much empathy and energy as is needed as I also have 3 young children of my own and my own anxiety. I feel like my husband and I are the most empathetic and well read on mental health concerns, and trying actively to have discussions with my parents and educate them on where my sister is coming from. I also feel a large weight on my back because she constantly tells me I'm the only support she has. We had a falling out about a year ago and I didn't speak to her for a month; she took that really really hard.

She is a hard worker and always holds a full time job, but she doesn't seem to realize how good she has it and how much our family as a whole supports her monetarily, with a place to live and watching her daughter regularly. At one point I was very concerned about thoughts of suicide after a couple comments she made and took her to a crisis center. This got her into therapy, but therapy hasn't been consistent.

We all think she needs to move out on her own or metaphorically fall on her ass, but are scared for our niece/granddaughter and how well she will be cared for if they move out. Not to mention how my sister will take it. Any time my mom has suggested it in the past, my sister has a meltdown and tells my niece that my parents are kicking them out and they will have nowhere to go. It feels like every little thing triggers her, a comment, a facial expression, how I interact with my own children, etc. Then we get into cycles of her exploding and verbally spewing at us in very public places and at home. It feels like all we do is cycle and have the same arguments constantly. My husband and I have even looked into legal guardianship of my niece, but never went ahead with it.

I feel like we can't figure out the fine line between making her accountable for her own actions and enabling her because we are all so tired and worn down from the constant explosions and arguments. I feel like I can never truly say how I really feel, even as the person she says she feels the most close to. How do I support her, while being true to myself? I try so hard to follow the tips on dealing with heated situations, to validating their feelings and stay calm, but honestly when you are being told what a horrible person you are and arguing for 30+ minutes in circles...I become less calm and careful with my words.

I feel like it's so hard to encompass everything in here or even start to describe it, but it feels good to hopefully send it out into a group that understands.

Thanks for your time and listening ear.

[Mommydoc]

Hi FrustratedSister, and welcome to this board. All of us can understand and relate to your experiences. I have learned so much from the tools on this site, and even more from the peer support and this forum. It doesn’t change our pwBPD, but it has helped me separate myself mentally, created perspective and helped me get to a much better place. You have come to a safe and supportive place.

How do I support her, while being true to myself?

This is one of the things many of us struggle with. It seems as if your family’s dynamic has always been on focused on helping and supporting her (and her daughter) with your own needs and feelings taking a lower priority. Kudos to you for taking the perspective that your feelings matter. You are human, and  the meltdowns, accusations and one sided nature of the relationship can be both overwhelming and exhausting. And at that point, we all struggle with validation and staying calm.

It sounds like you, your husband and your parents are in conversation together and are able to validate each other, which is a very positive thing. It can be very lonely, if you are the only one who sees/recognizes the dysfunction. In my family, my parents were in denial, felt shame/guilt and just couldn’t validate me, which led me to “try harder” to make things better with my sister wBPD. Somehow the harder I tried, the more I triggered her. With support from my husband, this site and my therapist, (like you my therapist also suggested the possibility of my sister’s behavior being c/w BPD), I began to separate myself emotionally from her accusations, recognize her projections and ultimately realize that no matter what I did or did not do, she was going to get triggered.  I stopped being totally conflict avoidant and changed the pattern. I stopped doing what she wanted me to do just to avoid triggering her.  In doing so I made a lot of mistakes, as my communication/BPD management skills were not well developed. So, she got more triggered, more often, and we have had much less communication in the aftermath of her blow ups. My parents eventually were able to validate me at some level.  But through this process, I have become much more keenly aware of my feelings and focused on self validation. Has my sister changed? No, and I don’t think she ever will. What has changed is me. I have given up on having the two way relationship and closeness I wanted with her. I have accepted that she is not capable of seeing me, hearing me or understanding me or my feelings. I seek that elsewhere in other relationships. She still has the power to hurt me with her venomous accusations and words, but I recover more quickly. I try to acknowledge where she has valid concerns and mentally reject/ignore the ridiculous ones. I have set clear boundaries with her that never existed before. That was difficult for me as it meant working through and rejecting some of the expectations my parents had set for me as a child but that were not serving me or my sister well. To do so meant embracing my personal values and using those as a guide for my actions and words.

Your situation is a very challenging one, given the sense of responsibility you feel for your niece. I don’t know what the answer is, but I encourage you to shift your priority and focus to yourself and your needs and away from your sisters needs.  Are you able to mentally reject the idea that you are obligated to be her “sole support” system and fixer of her problems. Can you focus on what you owe yourself, your kids and husband and less on what you owe her. You don’t have to announce any of this to her, it can be a personal mental shift within yourself.

The reading sections have great tools and books that have all helped me. Some I have to read over and over. Like you, I am very empathetic and some of the tools felt  counter intuitive and not authentic to who I am. But learning and practicing them, I realized there were circumstances with my sister where these tools helped me be more authentic to myself and my values.

I wish you the best!

[zachira]

My heart breaks for you hearing the challenges you have with your sister with BPD. My mother who is deceased had BPD, my brother has BPD and my sister NPD, along with having many disordered relatives in the extended family with personality disorders. It seems like no matter what you do, your sister is triggered, and the family is subject to her endless meltdowns. Your family loves your sister's daughter, and wants to do what will help her. It seems that the most important step you can take is to be an example to your sister's daughter, not that you aren't already, by modeling how to not take on the emotions of your sister when she is melting down, which are all projections of how badly she is feeling inside and have nothing to do with you. Growing up with a BPD mom and a father with strong narcissistic traits, the biggest differences in my life were made by other adults who validated me and whose body language demonstrated they thought how my BPD mother treated me was cruel. Some of the adults who validated me while growing up were at times people who only for a few moments let me know I was a person of value, and I still am grateful to these kind people to this day. Do not underestimate how modeling being a separate person from your sister with healthy emotions, can help you niece, even though you do not spend much time around her. You may at different times need a break from your sister, to heal to the point that you are able to continue to set more healthy boundaries when around your sister so her meltdowns do not affect you so intensely or for so long. We are here to listen and help. Post as often as you need to. Many of us with family members with BPD have been on this site for years, and continue to learn how to better deal with our disordered family members to the point, that we are no longer as severely negatively impacted by their aberrant behaviors.