Is this a "cooperative" conversation?

[Depression = 72% of members]

I go  back and forth in my decision to stay with my BPDw.  My question tonight is, if I stay, can I expect this kind of interaction for the rest of my life?  Does anyone else consider this a "cooperative" conversation?

A little background: My BPW had blindsided my with divorce three times.  Twice, she has filed fraudulant restraining orders and has me removed from the house.  During these times, she has done "sneaky" things like calling social security and having my benefits diverted into her bank account.  She has also cancelled my children's health insurance without notifying me.  She maintains that there was nothing wrong with her actions and she was being reasonable because, "I had to do what I had to do."

Her behavior was become extremely out of control lately and I asked her to leave my home for a few days.  She promised not to blindside me again, but she has broken that promise before because she "was confused".

Here is today's text message conversation:

1. <me> Please Notify me before you contact anyone regarding our status, including (but not limited to) attorneys, social security, health insurance companies, school districts, etc.

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

2. <me> I take your lack of response to mean you have already taken action against me, or plan to do so in the near future.

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

3.  <me> Are you available to meet at 4 tomorrow?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

4. <her> I want to see my daughter tonight.  I will be there at 9PM

5 <me> Who have you contacted?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

6. <me> (placed called to the phone she was texting from.)

<her> (let call go to voicemail)

7. <me> Why are you refusing to pick up the phone?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

8. <me> Why are you refusing to answer me?

<her> (Message read, no response for several minutes)

9. <me> [call attempt #2]

<her> (let call go to voicemail)

10. <me> Please answer the phone.

11. <her> I prefer text

12. <me> Have you contacted an attorney?

13 <her> I am coming to see our daughter tonight.

14. <me> I interpret your failure to respond to my question as "Yes, I hired an attorney and I am going to destroy your life like I did last year."

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

15. <me> Did you hire an attorney?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

16. <me> Did you go against your promises and hire an attorney?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

17 <me> Why won't you answer my question?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

18. <me> Hello? why won't you answer me?

19 <her> You are off base. I didn't go against my promises.


At this point I became very alarmed.  She has a history of framing things in such a way that she is misleading me, but does not consider it lying.  In this case, she isn't saying that she didn't hire an attorney. She is saying that she didn't go against her promises.  She isn't saying which promises she didn't go against, nor did she admit (during this conversation) that she ever promised not to blindside me again.  This was very troubling because she forgot about that promise twice before.

The conversation continued with no resolution... .

When I finally talked to her face to face this evening.  She claimed she had no idea that she was being uncooperative with me.  She thought we were having a "normal" text conversation.  She claimed she had no idea that anything was wrong and didn't understand why I was upset.

Someone please tell me... .

1. Is this normal behavior for a normal person?

2. Is this normal behavior for a BPD person?

3. Is she crazy or just plain stupid?

4. How can I hope to even co-parent with a person who sees this as a "normal" interaction between adults who are not in conflict?

I should add that after I replayed the conversation to her, she said, "I guess I can see how YOU would see the conversation negatively," but she still feels like there is nothing wring with the interaction except the fact that I am too critical and too sensitive.

[Unlikelytarget]

I go  back and forth in my decision to stay with my BPDw.  My question tonight is, if I stay, can I expect this kind of interaction for the rest of my life?  Does anyone else consider this a "cooperative" conversation?

A little background: My BPW had blindsided my with divorce three times.  Twice, she has filed fraudulant restraining orders and has me removed from the house.  During these times, she has done "sneaky" things like calling social security and having my benefits diverted into her bank account.  She has also cancelled my children's health insurance without notifying me.  She maintains that there was nothing wrong with her actions and she was being reasonable because, "I had to do what I had to do."

Her behavior was become extremely out of control lately and I asked her to leave my home for a few days.  She promised not to blindside me again, but she has broken that promise before because she "was confused".

Here is today's text message conversation:

1. <me> Please Notify me before you contact anyone regarding our status, including (but not limited to) attorneys, social security, health insurance companies, school districts, etc.

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

2. <me> I take your lack of response to mean you have already taken action against me, or plan to do so in the near future.

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

3.  <me> Are you available to meet at 4 tomorrow?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

4. <her> I want to see my daughter tonight.  I will be there at 9PM

5 <me> Who have you contacted?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

6. <me> (placed called to the phone she was texting from.)

<her> (let call go to voicemail)

7. <me> Why are you refusing to pick up the phone?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

8. <me> Why are you refusing to answer me?

<her> (Message read, no response for several minutes)

9. <me> [call attempt #2]

<her> (let call go to voicemail)

10. <me> Please answer the phone.

11. <her> I prefer text

12. <me> Have you contacted an attorney?

13 <her> I am coming to see our daughter tonight.

14. <me> I interpret your failure to respond to my question as "Yes, I hired an attorney and I am going to destroy your life like I did last year."

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

15. <me> Did you hire an attorney?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

16. <me> Did you go against your promises and hire an attorney?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

17 <me> Why won't you answer my question?

<her> (message read, no response for several minutes)

18. <me> Hello? why won't you answer me?

19 <her> You are off base. I didn't go against my promises.


At this point I became very alarmed.  She has a history of framing things in such a way that she is misleading me, but does not consider it lying.  In this case, she isn't saying that she didn't hire an attorney. She is saying that she didn't go against her promises.  She isn't saying which promises she didn't go against, nor did she admit (during this conversation) that she ever promised not to blindside me again.  This was very troubling because she forgot about that promise twice before.

The conversation continued with no resolution... .

When I finally talked to her face to face this evening.  She claimed she had no idea that she was being uncooperative with me.  She thought we were having a "normal" text conversation.  She claimed she had no idea that anything was wrong and didn't understand why I was upset.

Someone please tell me... .

1. Is this normal behavior for a normal person?

2. Is this normal behavior for a BPD person?

3. Is she crazy or just plain stupid?

4. How can I hope to even co-parent with a person who sees this as a "normal" interaction between adults who are not in conflict?

I should add that after I replayed the conversation to her, she said, "I guess I can see how YOU would see the conversation negatively," but she still feels like there is nothing wring with the interaction except the fact that I am too critical and too sensitive.

[PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES]

PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members may appear frustrated but they are here for constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[Indyan]

It sounds very much like the "conversations" I'm trying to have these days with BPDh.

I think that, agenda or not, they always want to have the upper hand, they can't help it.

You insisting, panicking, phoning twice etc makes them feel powerful and for a moment, makes them feel good.

BPDh (or s2bx, no idea yet) took baby 9 months away (I mean, geographically a little far, 2hr drive). He made a point at not calling or texting me at all. We had arranged return at 5PM, not only he didn't pick up his phone nor answer messages, but he also asked his dad not to.

On the next day when I suggested mediation, he tried to scare me with attorney/judge. I shrugged it off, I tought "NO MORE FOGGING" and I answered showing that I'm not afraid, that I know the options, and that I'm ready to defend myself, although It is not my wish.

We must stop going after them and showing our fear.

Please, please, try not to play HER game. Her twisted game.

[vortex of confusion]

I had a couple of thoughts as I read this exchange. First, if this conversation were taking out of the context of BPD, it almost makes you sound like the crazy one. I say this knowing that I have done this exact thing with people. If I send a message, I would at least like some sort of acknowledgement that it has been read and understood.

You should have stopped after you saw that she had read the first message. You are desperate to get information from her and she does not want to share that information with you for whatever reason. At some point, you need to be able to walk away from the conversation without demanding or expecting a response.

Also, why are you asking her a question like this if there is a tendency for your partner to be less than honest. My partner has answered me directly at times and has been very dishonest and misleading. It has gotten to the point where he can answer my questions all day long but I am going to doubt him and not believe what he says. Asking him certain questions is pointless.

I have been on both sides of the conversation.

My husband has a tendency to badger me for information. If I don't respond to him in a timely fashion, he will freak out on me. It sounded like that is what you were doing to your partner. I could sense the urgency on your part. For me, it has been frustrating because avoiding those types of conversations is all about boundaries. It is me setting boundaries and not allowing myself to get off kilter when I don't get a response and it is allowing my partner the space to NOT answer questions if he doesn't want to for whatever reason. I realized that I was having some double standards. I would expect him to answer me but I didn't always want to answer him because I knew he wouldn't like the answer or the answer might lead to a fight.

[Unlikelytarget]

What you are saying makes a lot of sense.  The problem is that I don't trust her and can't trust her.  I would be a fool to trust her.

She has called the cops on me and filed fraudulent orders of protection against me (not one has been valid), that now she has used her past fraudulent order of protection as evidence against me for her most recent order of protection.

I know for a fact that she has come very close to calling the police on me and making false accusations on several occasions.  She continues to do this to friends, family and church members.  Fortunately people either don't believe her or aren't in a position to do anything about it.  The only thing keeping me safe is the fact that I have security cameras throughout the house running 24x7, I keep an audio or video recorder on me at all times (capture 80%+ of all of our conversations).

Am I paranoid?  I think not.  She has destroyed my life with her lies several times over and has come close again.  The only thing that has stopped her is that she knows I record everything and I told her that I will press charges against her for perjury if she tries to set me up again.  It is illegal to secretly record conversations in my state without someone's permission.  This is why I make sure she continually is aware that I record everything and she continually gives verbal (sometimes written) approval of being recorded.

Recording conversations has helped me tremendously.  I used to believe her when she denied saying things or told me I said things.  I began thinking I was the crazy one.  Lately, whenever there was a dispute on what was actually said, we used to go back and listen to the recordings together.  This past few weeks, she has refused... .because I have proven she had been completely off base on what has been said in conversations 100% of the time.

No, this is no way to go through life... .but I can't expect her to change, and I refuse to go to jail because my wife is mentally ill.  This is the only way I have been able to survive... .


BTW, I know I may sound like the pushy one in the text messages, but if you know the context that she usually responds to every text within 15 seconds.  The last time she was evasive like this, I was stranded with a dead car battery 5 miles from home.  I asked her to come by to give me a jump (she had my jumper cables in her car).  She ignored me, then told me she was busy.  She said I should call a tow truck.  I later found out she was "busy" because she was meeting with a divorce attorney to discuss her strategy of taking my daughter away from me.

[Indyan]

You sound like you're really are into FOG.

How about reading here about the tools to get out of it?

What you describe of your life (living in suspicion and mistrust) is living hell IMHO.

You need to regain power of your life, noone can sacrifice themselves like this. You could start thinking of what to do:

1) to communicate in a more effective way with your wife (see tools here)

2) to feel better yourself (get out of FOG)

3) to change the situation in order to protect your child and yourself and lead a life that makes you happy.

Take care