How to set boundaries with an adult child who threatens suicide?

@1775house I hope listening helps; however, I see it as enabling the person to continue behavior that helps either person. I spent years listening and providing financial assistance, all to no avail.

I will sound different here, alcohol abuses you. It contols you, it masks you, it makes you say things differently than you meant to say. You aren't the one who are hurting the people who get hurt around you it is the alcohol that went into your body. Yes you wanted it when it made you happy, not you use it to try to make you happy again. My Mom literaly died from alcoholism. She was absolutely gorgeous when she had me at 30. When she died 27 years later she was skin and bones, she was lonely because we were all living our own lives, gosh I told my girl friend across the street when her husband died I wasn't goimg to let her die like I did my Mom ( I was 26 and lived 2K away and didn't realize how bad it got My 37,38 y/o sister did) so I told my girlfriend my thoughts, it has been 20 years and she finally has gotten to the point where she says she doesn't need it to get through the night ( that's her worst time). Gosh I sound like some preacher on some high mountain, I am not. I feel if you realize that if you don't think everything has a reason to blame things on something your reacting to, you can "TRY" to laugh through your tears and that doesn't mean your tears are any less painful. For me it is eating - I lost 80 almost 90 lbs without dieting "just" not eating to eat or when I am angry or sad (not depressed, everything makes you depressed ;} ) So I say cheer up you only depressed! One of my mantro is causing me to want to erase all of this and I won't only because maybe there is one person it might help and that person might be me - Bye!

@1775house
Thank you for thoughtful and caring reply. Yesterday I realized if I don’t set serious boundaries with my daughter I will probably drink myself into dementia or an accident that leaves me disabled. Yesterday my husband even courageously told me my drinking is out of control. It is. I have done many weird things to cope with my situation. I gave my car to my son because my daughter would use car trips to trap me into having no escape from her verbal tirade. When I’m drunk I don’t give a rip what she says and I can just pass out and sleep. But, my husband and granddaughter always make sure I’m awake in the early morning as they won’t take no for an answer. It’s jacked! No amount of money, time, patience or listening to demeaning insults will help me or my daughter. My granddaughter needs me to be sober. If we kick my daughter out her daughter will not be able to stay in our grade A school district.

@ilovemycrazyadultdtr
My daughter has felony DUIs and a judge threatened her with automatic 4 months in jail if she is caught driving. She also has celiac disease and is now claiming to be a lesbian. She had her daughter at 19 and thankfully had a tubal ligation. She exchanges sex with men for weed and shopping trips. In the past I would try to identify who she was leaving with in case she didn’t come back. My husbands aunt was a prostitute and was murdered in an alley. My husbands father learned this reading the newspaper. I suspect my daughter is a reincarnation of this aunt! Thanks for letting me type and share this.

Gosh, life throws so much back, just thinking about it makes you so tired I get so tired about the sex stuff on the TV I learned about my gay cousin when I was 10 he was probably 20 I said OK we were back east it was the 60's that was it, he moved out of the house got a job in New York City but me I kind ofeel like on a personal basis no one needs to have dinner conversation about it, talking about it like this is OK because there is a reason not social chit chat. I owned a motel with my husband, my father -in- law right after I got married right after we got married we agreed to run it for a 50-50 share of the profits when we sold it. We would not allow prostitutes to work there but we allowed them to live there - they followed our conditions until it was too easy (this was the 70s) and then we'd tell to leave it was sad now I know girls and guys who do the same, I live in a nice upper middle class city neighborhood, but from the stories from my grandkids its sad - my street we have 70% are here 40+ years not so on the other streets one of the first rentals they turned out to be drug dealers somebody came by they had a fight and they got killed- they weren't dealing drugs there just living, but that didn't help the 20 year old who grew up in the neighborhood that was selling - Gosh I understand your pain. My daughter Ex kept on fighting the divorce --- I won't go on just to say we can keep on digging holes of darkness --- another saying I mad up maybe 15 years ago to try and get through a lot " without the darkness there can be no light" think about it. How would you know there were stars unless the sun had gone down, you can't even look straight towards the sun you need to look away, you could really not know that the sun and everything that is great about it without knowing the dark too. It is KNOWING the dark is the key I kept on thing as long as I could think of where the light might be I'll get through -- not be OK -- because, it doesn't feel that way but OK gets you to the next step and every next step gets you to something different or you saying "no that wasn't any better," that was my say back when I was in my late 50s trying to try to get through things on my own. Most days I ... well, I come back here I drop out for months at a time and then come back. OK BYE Hope the day goes well memories can bring you down but the resolve not to let them bury you I think is the key!

I appreciate you sharing similar experiences with me. It can feel very isolating and hopeless dealing with seemingly insurmountable family drama. I always question myself about what I’m doing to keep the dysfunction churning. It’s frustrating. My husband- tired and disgusted with all of it once told me I just need to say “F-it”. Move on. It’s so hard to separate myself emotionally from my daughter. My maternal grandmother lost 2 daughters within months of each other in the 1940’s from leukemia and lupus. My mother was left only remaining child at 9 years old. The legacy of that loss is deeply burned into my soul and when my child threatens to end her own life on purpose it’s too much to bear. I rarely cry but I’m crying now. I don’t want to outlive my children

Emotional black mail. Will destoy you if you let it. My mother and husband were both alcoholics and died young. In the end I had to walk away because the more I stayed and enabled them to play the victim the 'poor me game' the less they would do to get help. You cant love anyone better and the longer you reward them by giving them what they want the more they will do it. They have to seek help and you need to save yourself and to walk away. Nothing I could have done would save them from themselves the more I did, the more burnt out I got. I had to save me and my children and joined Alanon which gave me the emotional support I needed. By saving myself I saved my children too. There is help out there and they need to get it to save themselves like we all do .

There are many ways to move on, and none of it separating yourself emotionally from your daughter, you will - even if you think you have never cut yourself from her. I've deleted what I've written twice because it was about a situation that I have learned to deal with. Every night (not every night) I think about when I told my son he had to leave and think about who told me to do that and why and if that situation was gone can I have him move back in? I at the moment can not say, and given that it means you can always make a mistake that was because of you and when somone says they want to commit suicide, ask them why? - don't tell them you don't want to do that or I'll have to....... If doesn't answer ask it again and ( and this is just a thought) say if you don't know think about it and I'll come back later and we can talk. People who say they want to commit suicide ( not all) really want someone to listen to them and you can't listen if they are yelling - you can't really say that to your husband but it goes for him too! I keep on thinking I have literally gone from sleeping in a city park at traveling to Europe and Morroco at 15 drinks with ... to financial aid it has been a wild ride but it all still goes down to asking questions about how can I do this differently, better, who can help me, who can help her, you are not at fault, you are tired, your husband is tired and when you feel lost well good gracious no wonder you feel that way. Well tonight was my grandson's 6th birthday and he smiled and that was a plus for him --Bye

I hadn't thought about Alanon for a long time. It I heard was good for a lot of people. Everyone need people who have shared and are dealing with a similar thing. My daughter kept on accusing me of enabling her brother with his drug use in that I did not kick him out soon enough. When I left my family home at 19 because I couldn't handle her blaming me for everything, the only enabling I did was to pay her bills that she didn't see; every one else who saw her, saw her as the one they could take advantage of because they knew there was no one looking. NOW that doesn't mean you were wrong as you know. My mother (because she got worse when my Dad died) went to a rehab center time after time because all of us kids ( 19,25,27,28) had lives going on for me it was college across country, my brother the Air Force, my older sisters were married and I did not have the slightest idea what a rehab center was and they were the ones who told me. I left it alone. It is only now that I think I did not do anything wrong, but I wish I knew. I could have called and just have taken the grief, because maybe, just maybe, one day might have been better for her. There is nothing you can do to fix things, taking care of yourself and family is the first thing. Because of my Mom, I try to think of what I can do in a situation I'm involved with, that will make it better. I am give you an example right now. I may have said something that seems to contradict what you've said I agree with everything I am just adding to it from my history. Now I did not go back and read anything so bye!

@1775house Everyone experience is different but when dealing with alcoholics or drug addicts you cant keep rescuing them. It has to come from them and you need to take care of your own mental health when trying to deal with them Good luck.