I have just begun to try and deal with my daughter with BPD this past year. She had been depressed and always seemed triggered as a young girl. She had numerous attempts at suicide, and excess drug abuse. She is in her mid 20's now. She had 3 long stays at an out of state psychiatric facility and all 3 times, they never diagnosed her as BPD. Her mom and I divorced when she was around 5 or 6 yrs old. I have always been supportive of her and she was never abused. She had very infrequently visited my wife and I when we lived 45 minutes away. Visiting her was not the easiest thing to nail down, partly because she lived with her mom. Recently, I needed to move into an affordable place to live as I was retiring and this seemed to trigger something inside of her. My new home was about 3.5 hrs away now.
Recent events brought up accusations of abandonment, not helping her with her diagnosis and choosing my wife over her. These just came flying out of the air and I was shocked. There was no talks of working this out by her and I was never able to get details out of her why she felt like this. I have studied about BPD and spoke with 2 good friends of 35+ yrs that are psychologists. I was given an ultimatum to seek counseling before she would talk to me with no explanation as to why by her. As much as I tried to talk sense into her and rationalize all of these accusations, it all failed. The pain I am accused of inflicting on her goes as far as to blame me for being this far away, me fighting cancer AND a heart issue all at the same time. As much trauma as I went through 4 yrs ago with my health....her pain is my fault for not living closer to her. Keep in mind that both my kids know they are welcome any time to visit and stay with us. That rarely happened. I have no challenges at all with my son and he is very loving and understanding. As of today, we are still at square one with her and I am blamed for her pain and suffering. She was a 'Daddy's Girl' up until this development. I struggle to make sense of her tone and do my best to remain calm and validate her feelings. One thing that I am forced to realize is that my wife and I have to maintain our mental health. It hurts.
Thank you all for sharing your experiences....it helps.
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