Recently (within the last few months) my brother has started saying that he relates pretty strongly to BPD symptoms, but he doesn't want to see a therapist because he doesn't trust them. He definitely experiences frequent splitting and has for several years. I can sort of relate because I spent a lot of time during my teens and early twenties surrounding myself with abusive people and often had confusing feelings about them. With time I've learned to distance myself from toxic people and not give them my time or energy, and most people who've hurt me I've been able to either forgive or cut out of my life completely.

With my brother, I can see patterns where he needs people and draws them into his life for brief, intense periods, but then pushes them away for a long time until he needs them again. And he splits on people frequently, including me. Splitting on me is something we've been working on for the past year. Mainly by me giving him space to fully process his feelings before engaging him about them, and then we usually talk out what caused the splitting.

My concern is that splitting sometimes causes him to make impulsive choices which he later regrets. For instance, quitting a job because a coworker said or did something he didn't like, and he decided in the moment that he hated the job and was going to quit. But then later will complain that he misses having that particular job, it was the perfect job, he didn't know how good he had it, etc.

The same goes for his friends and some of our family members, particularly our mom.

Right now he's splitting on one of his closest friends, and I think it's important for him to realize that while she has become a toxic person in his life, she is also his oldest friend and her own person, and that making some new friends so he isn't leaning entirely on one friendship until his dissatisfaction makes him split would probably be helpful.

I'm afraid that if I point out when he's splitting and that it's influencing him to make impulsive, life-altering decisions, he might think I'm unqualified to make observations like that.

Sorry if this is lengthy and somewhat insensitive. Would love to hear some insight!