How to validate him best? How to help him regulate his emotions?

[Agathe]

Hi everyone, first time posting here. I'm here because I feel a bit lost. I've recently started to suspect that my 14yo may have bpd and I'd like to have your insights as I'm quite new to the topic. It's been a very difficult year because his dad and I divorced. Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure his dad has an undiagnosed bpd. For reasons that would be too long to explain my ex got custody all this past year while i lived far away (desperately trying to move back). He has been trying to alienate my child from me. I started to hear my son talking and acting like him, it was horrible. My son was very sad with him.

Fast forward to this last few months, I finally managed to move back and what I'm seeing is something quite new and concerning. I'm struggling because I'm not sure whether I should attribute this to adolescence or to bpd. In short:

- son is quite manipulative, e.g., in the middle of an argument he would say "I'll jump off the balcony" as a way to get me to change my position. When I get alarmed at hearing this he immediately claims it's just a way of talking that he obviously doesn't mean it.
- if I won't agree at something he wants, he will start mocking me, ridiculing me, talking in a very dismissive way, even saying that im mental, etc. There's a lot of gaslighting too. Unfortunately this behavior he learnt from his dad. I am shocked by this because I never talked this way to my parents and with literally nobody so it hurts a lot to see this behavior in my own child.
- I react by saying that I won't accept disrespect and that there is this line that cannot be crossed, etc., ill say we will talk about this when we will be calm and respectful and disengage. After a few minutes he will feel very guilty and apologizes
- he seems to have a hard time fully controlling his eating impulses. Nothing too serious but I do notice that he quickly eats several cookies in a raw
- past few months he smoked weed and got vape pens.

Now, what I'm seeing is a completely different child from only one year ago. I don't know whether it's just all the stress he accumulated this past year, if it's just teenage hostility/lack of self-regulation, or the learning of bpd behaviors from his dad. I don't know. All I know is that I want to do everything I can to help him before it gets worse. I will talk to a therapist soon, but I'd appreciate some advice. I wonder whether I might have been inadvertently invalidating with him, I've read this is a root cause of bpd, so I wonder which ways are best to validate his feelings? Whenever I do it, for example saying I understand how you are feeling etc., he mocks me and it's really hurtful.

How to help him learn to regulate his emotions? How to stop the manipulative behaviors? The fact that he feels guilty and apologizes after being very harsh gives me hope, but on the other hand I worry it might also come from a place of low self-esteem and like he might lose my love if he doesn't apologize (which is obviously not the case). What can I do to minimize the damage? Is it necessarily going to get worse? Hoping to find some wisdom here with more experienced parents. Thank you.

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

[Aralia]

Hello Agathe.  I am full of sympathy for your situation--the divorce, the custody issues, the separation and even just being the parent of a teenager, which can be stressful even when there are no other issues to contend with.  I completely agree with your proactive approach of speaking with a therapist.  Most of the behaviors you are describing are not unusual with teenagers and children of divorce, so hopefully you and your son will be able to sort this out and he will get the help he needs.