<a><a href='http://www.caregiving.com/members/deborah/' rel=\"nofollow\">@deborah</a></a>, you've seemed to jump to the conclusion that I've allowed her to make my life miserable. I'm not on that river with her and I've never allowed my sister to take advantage of me. I set boundaries a long time ago and won't take her calls when I'm not up to listening to her. I've been a sounding board for my other sisters in dealing with her. When you love someone who is mentally/emotionally disabled, you feel pain when you see them struggling, at least I do. You can logically understand their diagnosis and their behavior, but your heart aches. I also have a brother who had brain damage at age 4 from encephalitis, people used to expect his behavior to be normal but over the years, people and society \"get\" that brain damage impaired his behavior and physical skills. Calling him retarded doesn't happen now like it did daily on the school bus when he was a kid. \r\n\r\nI guess what I am saying, is even though we don't drop what we are doing to enable her, it doesn't mean our hearts are hardened to her struggles. Her emotional disability is every much as real and caused from childhood trauma at a critical developmental stage. Understanding her needs and helping her meet those doesn't mean it is enabling any more than it means we are enabling our brother by seeing that his needs are met. Her disability is more deceptive because she is so intelligent you expect her to use reasoning... but her personality disorder interferes with that reasoning, instead her emotional fears rule. The exhaustion comes from walking that fine line of support vs enabling... and believe me, when we got someone in the mental health hospital where I worked with borderline personality disorder, they exhausted the staff too! \r\n\r\nYes, she can be exhausting, just like my MIL and mother who both had dementia, were exhausting.

You are right. There comes a time when being agreeable becomes being an enabler. And that's no good for anyone.

One of my sisters. She refuses to see how her own behavior contributes to her health issues... or darn right causes them. She refuses to take responsibility for herself, and her own care, yet wants everyone else to do things for her and gets pissed off when someone will not drop what they are doing to come and help her. (like picking up her clothes and other junk on the floor so the cleaning staff can clean her apartment,) At 55, she is now in an assisted living facility with a very nice apartment, thanks to a religious charity and my older sister picking up the tab for the difference. Now her rent just went up $300 month because she demands \"extra\" attention from the staff. She has multiple diagnoses both physical and mental, but she is capable of doing many things physically that she just wont do. She is in danger of being kick out for not following simple rules and she easily gets pissed off and says she is going to move out. Thing is she has no where to go unless a sheltered care will take her... and those places are not usually so nice. She has exhausted us all. I know it is all stems from her personality disorder, but she refuses to go to her counseling sessions, when they get to close to her issuses. That is all a part of the cycle. It will never change... Guess I just needed to vent! I worry my oldest sister's health is deteriorating dealing with her all the time.

Wow, Deborah.