Guest guest Posted April 10, 2010 Report Share Posted April 10, 2010 Welcome to the group!!!! I must say, you win the unfortunate prize of having double the nadas most of us have! Not to make light--my heart really went out to you when I read your story. That is just excrutiatingly difficult. The only insight I can offer is this: BP does not allow for change. They can't adjust, they can't " see the light, " they can't be convinced to be anything other than what they are. What they have is a mental illness, not a poor mindset. And that mental illness doesn't go away with even the best of interventions. You may spend a lot of effort, but you will not change the fact that she has BPD and her cognitive distortions are beyond reason. The distortions, sadly, can't be touched by the most well-planned out intervention of caring of people trying to help her. My first concern would be you in this situation. And, please please please don't underestimate her abilities if she " deals heavily " in revenge. She will view any " intervention " as a gang-like attack, and will come back at you with all the fury of someone fighting for their life. Except with cold and effective calculation, of course. I think we all, at some level, want to change and " fix " our nadas and take them out of their BPD. Unfortunately, they are the only ones that can even begin that process. Hope that helps. Do you have support while you deal with this? I know that is the only way I have been able to cope when nada started to lose it. Blessings! Karla > > I was the only child of a single parent nada. She was unstable for many years and as a teenager I was adopted by a relative...who turned out to be a nada#2. Nada1 committed suicide years ago. Nada2 is now spiraling down even more than usual. Unfortunately it's causing a tremendous amount of damage (both emotional and financial) to the immediate family and even a few outside the family, not just to herself. > > Which brings me to my question...has anyone here ever tried an " intervention " with a nada? What was the outcome? Is it even worth trying? > > My nada2 deals heavily in revenge and I'm carefully weighing the possible outcomes of trying to do an intervention and the likely backlash of rage, revenge, etc from nada2 if it were to go badly. > > Thanks very much in advance for any insights anyone might have! > > Paige > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted April 10, 2010 Report Share Posted April 10, 2010 Paige, I'm sorry you're in that situation. If she's typical of BPD sufferers, I don't think an intervention is worth trying. I think it is very much the wrong technique because it involves ganging up on her and that's likely to really bring out the BPD symptoms. BPD generally makes our nadas see even a slight disagreement as an attack. I can't imagine how you would stage an intervention without making her feel thoroughly attacked and if she feels that way, she's not going to be willing to pay any attention to what you're trying to get through to her. It is more likely that she'll decide to do the opposite of what you want. A successful intervention requires the person involved to have some degree of ability to think logically about what is being said so she can realize that she needs to get help. BPD robs people of that ability. Nadas are emotionally like small children. The best way to get them to change their behavior is to make them feel like it is their decision to change, not yours. You can't control their behavior. You can only control your own. So the thing to do is to change how you react to their bad behavior. To get them to change, you have to react in a way that makes it clear to them that they're not going to get what they want unless they change. For example, I've succeeded in mostly getting my nada to stop bad-mouthing my sister and various other people to me by telling her I'm not willing to talk about that when she starts doing it, then hanging up the phone or leaving her house if she continues. She wants to talk to me more than she wants to say those particular things to me, so she has learned to do it less often than she used to do it. (I'm sure she still says those things to other people, but at least I don't have to listen to them myself.) At 12:45 AM 04/10/2010 lastpaigefirst wrote: >I was the only child of a single parent nada. She was unstable >for many years and as a teenager I was adopted by a >relative...who turned out to be a nada#2. Nada1 committed >suicide years ago. Nada2 is now spiraling down even more than >usual. Unfortunately it's causing a tremendous amount of damage >(both emotional and financial) to the immediate family and even >a few outside the family, not just to herself. > >Which brings me to my question...has anyone here ever tried an > " intervention " with a nada? What was the outcome? Is it even >worth trying? > >My nada2 deals heavily in revenge and I'm carefully weighing >the possible outcomes of trying to do an intervention and the >likely backlash of rage, revenge, etc from nada2 if it were to >go badly. > >Thanks very much in advance for any insights anyone might have! > >Paige -- Katrina Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted April 10, 2010 Report Share Posted April 10, 2010 Paige, I'm sorry you're in that situation. If she's typical of BPD sufferers, I don't think an intervention is worth trying. I think it is very much the wrong technique because it involves ganging up on her and that's likely to really bring out the BPD symptoms. BPD generally makes our nadas see even a slight disagreement as an attack. I can't imagine how you would stage an intervention without making her feel thoroughly attacked and if she feels that way, she's not going to be willing to pay any attention to what you're trying to get through to her. It is more likely that she'll decide to do the opposite of what you want. A successful intervention requires the person involved to have some degree of ability to think logically about what is being said so she can realize that she needs to get help. BPD robs people of that ability. Nadas are emotionally like small children. The best way to get them to change their behavior is to make them feel like it is their decision to change, not yours. You can't control their behavior. You can only control your own. So the thing to do is to change how you react to their bad behavior. To get them to change, you have to react in a way that makes it clear to them that they're not going to get what they want unless they change. For example, I've succeeded in mostly getting my nada to stop bad-mouthing my sister and various other people to me by telling her I'm not willing to talk about that when she starts doing it, then hanging up the phone or leaving her house if she continues. She wants to talk to me more than she wants to say those particular things to me, so she has learned to do it less often than she used to do it. (I'm sure she still says those things to other people, but at least I don't have to listen to them myself.) At 12:45 AM 04/10/2010 lastpaigefirst wrote: >I was the only child of a single parent nada. She was unstable >for many years and as a teenager I was adopted by a >relative...who turned out to be a nada#2. Nada1 committed >suicide years ago. Nada2 is now spiraling down even more than >usual. Unfortunately it's causing a tremendous amount of damage >(both emotional and financial) to the immediate family and even >a few outside the family, not just to herself. > >Which brings me to my question...has anyone here ever tried an > " intervention " with a nada? What was the outcome? Is it even >worth trying? > >My nada2 deals heavily in revenge and I'm carefully weighing >the possible outcomes of trying to do an intervention and the >likely backlash of rage, revenge, etc from nada2 if it were to >go badly. > >Thanks very much in advance for any insights anyone might have! > >Paige -- Katrina Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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