Older sister is possibly BPD with NPD traits...

[Breakthrough]

I have 3 sisters, we are all in our 40s and have kids.  My oldest sister is very difficult and was emotionally, mentally and even physically abusive to me when we were growing up.  She is still a bully.  She criticized a parenting decision openly last year, in our group family txt and then would not stop texting me privately when my little sister told her to get off the family txt.  I was at work and she was making me feel like a horrible parent.  I told her I would not discuss this with her and she sent me 45 more txts.  I decided to block her because she won't take no for an answer and it was disturbing my peace of mind too much.  I ended up in tears at work.   I have a crazy busy and stressful job where we are always short staffed and I have two small kids and a husband who isn't responsible or reliable (and is a full time SAHD), so I have enough on my plate as it is, without having to also deal with someone so difficult.  She hangs Christmas break over my head every year because we end up going to her house.  My husband has reminded me every year she finds a way to uninvite me and cause drama and I always end up an emotional mess about it.  I have always felt left out as well, and it is in part because she tried to exclude me growing up.  She of course did that this past New Years too, but eventually invited me through our other two sisters and I unblocked her number at her request at the time as well.  I feel traumatized by her actions in the past and sometimes present.  There are double standards in our family, mostly regarding her.  She is allowed to treat anyone however she likes, usually very harsh when it comes to me, and I just have to pretend nothing happened.  If I stand up for myself, I am somehow rude and not cultivating a good relationship.  This week she brought up the same topic, I shut her down and told her if I received one more txt about it, I would have to block her again.  She responded by saying it was a verbal slap in the face and I need to learn how to treat people better and be considerate of her feelings.  A simple no would suffice.  I pointed out that the last time I said a simple no, was met with 45 txts by her, and that she was trying to make me feel like a bad parent, which also is not considerate of my feelings.  I haven't heard back, but she knows I didn't block her number again.  Hopefully she will get it this time.  She has also told me I am overly sensitive in the past and she has to walk on eggshells around me.  Well, I have dealt with enough abuse now (my 5 year on the job training was awful, toxic, and almost resulted in a nervous breakdown), I am definitely not overly sensitive.  If anything, since she holds me to this double standard where she can be hurtful but I must always be pleasant, so it's the other way around.  I have learned from my uNPD MIL, the only way to have a relationship with a PD is strong boundaries and limited contact.  Having this past Christmas with UNPD MIL, it was helpful, I just avoided her as much as possible and it was fine.  Kept conversations with her simple and only necessary topics.  No need to discuss anything about me, sharing any info with them in the past always ended up being thrown back in my face.  They didn't even grill me with questions I don't want to answer, they are learning

I guess my questions are, beside holding strong boundaries and limiting contact when necessary, what other tools might be helpful?  I am not sure she is a full fledged PD, but she definitely has strong traits of one at times.  I live no where near her, but we will always see each other for family get togethers which are usually twice a year. TIA and thanks for reading.  It was therapeutic to write this down.

[guitarman]

I can relate to much of what you posted about. I have an undiagnosed BPD/NPD sister.

Fear, obligation and guilt sums up my life coping with my sister's behaviour for decades. I am learning to stay calm whatever happens and learning to let go. It's been so hard. Other people really don't understand unless they've experienced this for themselves.

I now call my sister my abuser and I am her target of abuse. Abuse should not have to be tolerated. It's OK to look after yourself and set boundaries. If this were not your sister but a stranger would you tolerate their abusive behaviour?

Why should we tolerate continued abuse from family members? This is something that has fundamentally changed how I view my relationship with my sister. I now say that she is just someone that I used to know. She is not the person I expect her to be. She probably never will be. She's not going to change, no matter how I behave towards her. I wish her well but I really don't want her in my life any more. I care but can't cope. The cost to my own physical and mental health is too much.

I never know how she is going to behave if I have contact with her. I never tell her anything personal about my life. She'd only use it against me in some twisted way.

I've simply had enough of all the life threatening dramas and crisis phone calls and visits. She turns everything around to be my fault. I've learnt about the Narcissistic Circle of Abuse where the abuser turns everything around to become the victim. My sister provokes me to shout or scream at her, which I never do. She does this so that she can become the victim and tell people that I've shouted at her. It's all so immature. I'm not playing her games so I stay calm, which infuriates her even more.

I have learnt to become a lighthouse rather than be a lifeboat constantly rescuing her from her own disasters. It's not been easy to stand back and not get involved. I consider myself to be a kind, caring and generous person but I've learnt not to do "idiot compassion" any more where I am the idiot. It's a Buddhist term.

Little by little things can change for you. So set firm boundaries and stick with them. Stay calm. Keep strong. Keep sharing. Talk more about your own feelings. You matter as well. It's OK to put yourself first.

Best wishes

Guitarman X

[Breakthrough]

Thx Guitarman!  I have definitely grown a lot as I used to get sucked into her abusive behaviour all the time.  Making me feel like a bad parents because she thinks she's right was the last straw.  Blocking her felt very empowering.  Setting boundaries felt very empowering.  My issue is then my entire family sees me as the one tearing us apart and give me a hard time.  This time I told them, look, it's my kids and nobody else's business, I am educated and intelligent, I can make my own decisions regarding my kids.  Don't talk to me about this again, and stop taking sides with the older sister.  It was good, they all backed off, after a while that is.  My other sisters acknowledge that she is difficult and if you want a relationship with her, you have to just let it go because she won't ever apologise when she behaves badly.  I think it was eyeopening for her when I blocked her.  I am not sure she knew I had it in me, but dealing with having to keep strong boundaries with my MIL for my own sanity has helped.  Part of the issue too, is my older sister actually did have a mental breakdown at one point and was institutionalized for a short time.  She also had it the hardest growning up, her abuse to my was a cycle because my parents were abusive to her.  They got successive better with each child, but my dad in particular like to label us, and she and I were the bad kids, my other 2 sisters the good ones (I have a brother too, but he is a fait bit younger and by then my parents were much more relaxed and he was quite spoiled, so the dynamic for him is quite different) .  My sister abused me because she thought I was the most like her.  I was afraid of my dad growing up too, i remember  even as a teen, hiding when I thought I heard him coming.  My mom asked me why I did this, I never told her the whole truth because she might have just made it worse by telling me so what my older sister had worse, but it's because he was scary and had hit me across the face so hard once, I flew across the room.  I was 12.  He had hit me in my 20s as well.  He disowned me for marrying outside our culture.  It didn't last long because of the pressure from my sisters and mom.  He has mellowed a lot in his old age, but he can still be very mean and hurtful with his words with no reason.  These are the two ppl in my family I find the most difficult.  My dad and my older sister, the abusers and the abused.  My dad's childhood was not easy, and I do my best to look at how much he has grown as a person and how far he has come.  My sister too, but I also do not have the time or energy to be targeted by her abuse anymore.  I have my own children to look after.  As an aside, my sister and I are actually not alike at all. She is an extrovert and attention seeker, I am an introvert and just want some peace, which was hard to come by in a family of 5 kids.

I relate to the drama though, my sister always did that too, she is better now because she is a mom I think, but honestly, she still tries to turn things around into my fault as well.  Saying I am too harsh when she caused the issue in the first place by not taking no for and answer and not listening to boundaries.  At least I have the presence of mind to know it's really her gaslighting me, I just won't fall for it anymore. 

Thanks again for the response.  It helps having someone to relate to about these things.  I know she is still toxic, but for the sake of my mom, and our kids, I do my best to maintain the peace while keeping my sanity when it comes to her.  I do my best to be understanding of her and give her what grace I can for her issues (because she comes by them honestly and my parents were much harder on her).  I am going to keep setting boundaries and avoid as much as possible though too.

[Breakthrough]

Also, she is still trying to blame me and gaslight me for her behaviour (new txt).  Too bad we can actually look at the texts and see that what she claims (I never set a boundary) isn't true, because I clearly did.  No apology, but the power is also out of her hands right now, she doesn't want me to block her on my phone, she better respect my clearly set boundaries. The more I think back to past behaviours, the more I realize she has always baited me into anger and then blamed me.  I am quite she she is a PD of some sort, I am just feeling done with dealing with it.  I will tolerate her for my kids and our family and for her kids, but only if she sticks to boundaries.  Not being afraid to block her gives me more confidence.

[LemonLime]

Breakthrough, I have really found after dealing with my uPD sis that there truly is no winning with these folks. 
If I cave and go along with her wish that all things go back to normal with no apology from her, I am not being true to myself and not respecting myself.
If I stand up for myself with reasonable boundaries, she accuses me of "punishing her".    Classic DARVO.

I just want to keep my head down and exist in my FOO.   But that may not be possible with the PD in the family.   

Guitarman, I completely hear you about the baiting that they do.   She tries so hard to engage me in a fight, and I refuse.  Which infuriates her even more.
Again, a no-win situation.   I believe that these no-wins she creates help meet her need for control, which is part of her PD.

Perhaps one of the worst things for me in this whole scenario is that she has placed me in a no-win.    I really really resent that.

[Breakthrough]

Kat, I hear you.  The no win, my older sis does exactly that.  It's an abusive power move.  It's definitely not healthy or appropriate behaviour and I honestly just won't tolerate it anymore.  She like having things to hang over my head.  I have told both my other sisters I feel they always side with her because I hate having the holidays at her house, but it is the biggest and my parents stay with her in the winters, so it does make a lot of sense.  I hate how hypocritical she is.  We pay for food at their house, that they eat.  We have the most expensive flights and are always the ones to rent a car.  Nobody else cares.  She complained about just that recently (that she would have to do that one time, never mind I have to do it every single year).  I am just sick of it.  There are a lot of double standards in our family, mostly with my sisters being cheap or stingy about something, but they don't seem to think it's an issue when the situation is reversed.  I guess I am just getting tired if it.  Most of the time, I honestly just don't let it bother me because I do care about the relationship, but with my older sister in particular, I completely get what you mean about not being true to myself.  Honestly, It's not worth the stress to me to bother most of the time, but since we see each other may be 2 times a year, and it's diluted by all our other family, I do my best to ignore it.  She tried to lecture me about how I need to be more considerate to her, to her  .  It's infuriating if I think about it because she has always treated me so poorly.  I think having my own family and valuing them above the nonsense that occurs sometimes in my FOO (and oh man the stuff in my husbands FOO, even worse), helps me balance things.  It's a waste of my energy to stay upset about the unfairness that is the way my sister has always treated me.  I can't change her, I can however go about my own way and just let those frustrations  go.  I think that has her stumped.  She used to affect me so much, I was so stunted by her and cowed.  I honestly don't care anymore except to keep it civil enough that it doesn't cause drama to the rest of the family.  Even then, certain things, she just needs to back off and I have told her so.  I do my best to keep my responses brief, less fuel for drama.  I think she feels powerless now because she can't really manipulate me anymore.  Too bad sister, too bad.  At least one of us grew up, I hope for her she will too, but since she's older than me and still hasn't learn to be respectful of boundaries, I have my doubts.  It is freeing though to think "not my problem".  I see so much that she does that I disagree with, I don't say anything.  She finds out any one thing and she jumps on me.  I guess the one thing growing up with someone like her has taught me is patience and self control.  I don't think she has yet learned either (though yes she has gotten better so I know  she has grown as a person).  Again, thx for the response, it is therapeutic to get this out to ppl who get it.

[benormalwithme]

Hi, my first message on the forum, and I haven't read it all and I'm still learning about NPD and BPD and my older sister but...the total exhaustion, the being trapped into natural emotional reactions to unnatural behavior and that being used as fuel for a game you can't ever get your head around, being forced to play a role they decided, watching your family fragment around reactions to this person and how they've chosen t treat individuals differently... god, it's so tempting to walk away from it all, your whole family, given the games, and isn't that exactly what they want if they can't be the centre of it all, just t destroy their family?