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Suz 
My friend emailed me a link to this website and I just joined. It has been a very busy and stressful Autumn because we have been trying to get the house ready for winter. We live at 8,200 feet and it began snowing already on Sept. 15th! We have been working non-stop to get the house winterized. In addition, we have been having some difficulty getting one of the boys to study lately. My boyfriend has great identical twin boys and they are Juniors in high school. The deal their father made with them was that to keep their cars and be able to drive, they both have to maintain a 3.0 GPA. Unfortunately one of them is not studying enough and is probably not going to make grades this quarter. He is struggling right now and I think it is because he is having a difficult time individuating. The boys' mother has Borderline Personality Disorder which is a VERY difficult personality disorder to have to deal with for anyone, let alone for kids. One of the boys can deal with their mother better because he is better at setting boundaries. He has individuated more and he doesn't get caught up in his mother's manipulative games. Unfortunately one of boys has a harder time setting boundaries and he is allowing himself to be "bribed" by her. He was planning on moving in with us because at the end of the school year last year he said that he just couldn't deal with his mother anymore. Unfortunately, she bribed him by buying him a very expensive sports car that she said she was going to "share" with him. She is very controlling about his use of the car so he is finally starting to see that the car really isn't his. It is confusing for him because he knows now that his mother will do anything to keep him living with her. He uses her by always asking her for money. Unlike the other twin who worked over the summer, we could not get the other one to work and now he is allowing his mother to buy him. Living in a wealthy community where many parents don't teach their children a strong work ethic and instead give their kids everything doesn't make it easier. The boys constantly tell us everything that their friends' parents bought them. We are trying to teach them a work ethic so that they don't become "entitled" children who never grow up because they were never taught how to be independent. Unfortunately their mother wants them to be dependent on her because she doesn't want them to leave her because she is so mentally ill. Needless to say, we know the best thing would be for the boy who is struggling the most to move in with us where he can be in a more stable and consistent environment. However at the moment he is being bought by his mother and it is very sad indeed to see it. We can tell it has been causing him emotional stress because he is no longer maintaining his 3.0 GPA, he has been lying (something he has never done in the past) and he is simply not himself lately. He doesn't yet understand that when he allows himself to be bought by his mother and manipulated by his mother and then he participates by using her to get money, that this lowers his self-esteem. It also makes it impossible for him to individuate and become independent. Instead if he isn't careful, he will be be forever tied to his mother's apron strings and perhaps be one of the 40 year old men who still live with their mother. We have been working hard trying to communicate with him and teach him how to set boundaries and not get sucked into his mother's chaos. However it has been very difficult because he wants to get money from her because he knows we won't just hand him money every time he asks. Instead, we tell him the things he can do around the house to earn some money. I'll keep you posted on our progress. If you have any input, let us know!
