Going on a road trip with my dBPDh, wish me luck

[ColdEthyl]

As some of you might know, my dBPDh's parents elderly parents are moving out of state. The decision by his mother to do so was quite spontaneous, and my H has not liked the idea to say the least. Well, in 2 weeks time of deciding this, his father now has a bed in the other state's retirement home. She calls us Friday to ask us to drive them 10 hours from here to there tomorrow morning. He had to be out of the retirement home he is in now by today or they would have had to pay the next month.

So, this whole things has been a whirlwind for both of us. Neither my husband or his siblings have fully processed the information, let alone be ready to see them go. But, they are adults and this is what they want to do. I have worked with his mother and helped get all of the planning and details together, except for a few things my H must do today.

When I got home from work last night, he was pretty worked up with anxiety. He said he was freaking out. He kept worrying about all of these scenarios that are unlikely... .tornadoes at home with us away from the kids, we get there and they won't accept his dad, we lose our wallet/keys, the rental breaks down, etc etc

I told him that was understandable because everything is happening so fast, but I kept reassuring him he is not dealing with this alone, that I am with him. We are leaving at 4am, and I know he's not going to sleep at all tonight, then drive 10 hours. (to be honest, I'm sure sleep won't come for me either)

I've been on trips with him before, where he gets mildly agitated, but I'm worried about with the extra emotional component to this (add in also the nightmares about the last time he sees his dad it will be the last) that he might be even more anxious. But on the other hand, he won't want to act up in front of his parents, so he might behave himself... .until we are in the hotel room.

I'd really like some advice on this. (I'm also accepting any prayers/good thoughts) I know a lot of us have had vacations/road trip with our pwBPD... .any suggestions? Tips and tricks? Thank you

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[takingandsending]

Hi Ethyl.

My prayers and good thoughts are with you and your husband/in laws, and I can see how many opportunities there are for high stress. I will try to think some on what things helped during my last couple of trips with my wife and post later. I think the ":)on't take things personally" reminder was the best help for me.

[vortex of confusion]

Sending you some good thoughts and prayers!

The only suggestion I can give you is to mentally prepare yourself and be prepared to take charge. My husband doesn't seem to get as anxious when I try to make sure that everything is taken care of.

Make a check list and go over it with him. Things like check the oil and tires in the car. Make sure the house is secure. Talk to a neighbor to keep an eye on the house. Make sure that you exchange numbers with that person so that you can call and check on things while you are gone. Packing. Snacks to stave off hunger. And whatever else you can think of that you might need on a trip. That helps ease some of his anxiety and as a result, I am more relaxed and things go better all the way around.

  Good luck!

[ColdEthyl]

@takingandsednign thanks... .I feel pretty confident that I have myself mentally prepared. Keeping JADE out of the equation as much as possible... .show empathy and validate his feelings.

@Vortex I think I got everything under control... .there's a few things I need to get done when I get home tonight. I took over as much as I could, mostly because if I want it done right... .then I'm going to do it. It will make it a lot better if he doesn't have anything more to worry about other than the driving

Thank you both for your suggestions!

[takingandsending]

After some thought, I think I am the last person to give advice here. My last trip with my uBPDw, I had her go on a separate airplane from me and the kids! Actually, that worked. Any chance he can drive in a separate car and follow you? 

[flowerpath]

ColdEthyl, it sounds like you have it all together here! 

We had a 7-hour round trip in one day a couple of months ago.  I really wanted to get out of that one, but it turned out OK. 

As far as preventing conflict goes, I think the thing that helped me the most was being mindful, paying attention to the feelings behind what he said, and waiting before responding.  All mindfulness went out the window when he kept telling me to speed up when people in front of us were putting their brakes on    (S.E.T.? What S.E.T.?), but it was the first long trip we'd made since I found out all of this stuff is BPD, and it was better than many trips we've made before. 

I hope all goes well for you. 

[maxsterling]

Wow.  Good luck

I have leaned after vacations with my wife that a dysregulation is guaranteed at some point.  My suggestion if to plan ahead for this:

1) Take extra money and make sure you have the means if you need to have separate accommodations or need to take a different transportation home.  

2)  Think about ways you can take a break when things get tense.  Think of activities you two can do separately.  

3) Be on the look out for your safety and plan what to do if he dysregulates in the car.  

4)  might want to brush up on the laws/resources where you are going, especially regards to health insurance just in case things get bad enough and he needs to see a doctor.

5)  If he is on meds or sees a counselor, make sure you have his meds refilled and the contact info for his counselor (let his counselor know beforehand).

This may sound extreme, but from my experience this is VITAL.  I've been in a few very scary situations when my wife dysregulates far from home.  Thank God we weren't travelling internationally at the time... .

[Grey Kitty]

You got your H's stuff. You got logistical stuff.

Take care of yourself. You may want some time apart from your husband, whether you can get physical space or not--bring things to occupy yourself, like a good book or two, or make sure you can get online. (Perhaps to vent/post here; let us know how it is going... .)

If you have people on your personal support team, prep them that this is coming up... .

[ColdEthyl]

Thank you all for the good thoughts and advice! We drove about 26 hours in a 72 hour span, but everything went a well as can be expected.

He started the night before after we picked up the rental. We had some storms during the week before, so we had some tree branches stacked up by the driveway. For 4-5 days, he kept saying he was going to mow the lawn, and my brother would help him clean up the branches. Each day, he didn't do it. He tried twice to tell me to ask my brother to do all of it. I told him if he wanted to ask him to do it, he could otherwise I'll pay him to do so while we are on our trip. (I'm trying to slowly make him responsible for himself and his choices)

Well, when we pull to the house, I'm in the rental he's in our car. I'm waiting him to pull our car in, then me behind him since we are leaving. He didn't think of it that way I guess and motioned me to go in. So, I go in and he parks our car on the road in front of the house and scraps the back door on a branch from the pile of broken branches in front of the house.

He gets out, ranting and raving about how if someone would have cleaned this up days ago like he asked, this wouldn't have happened. Without thinking, my mouth flew open and I said "Hey, I've been asking for the lawn to be mowed for days, too so before we start complaining... ." and that set him off. Oops. This one was on me... .I know his anxiety is through the roof.

He leaves pissed to go get cigarettes, when he got got back, I was waiting for him in the backyard. I didn't say anything... .I just wrapped my arms around him and said, "I know your anxiety is through the roof, and I am sorry for my catty comment. I felt attacked when you mentioned the branches not being taken care of yet." He said he didn't say anyone should take care of them (he did) he was just upset the car got scratched. I told him that was understandable, and then he said he was sorry. HE SAID HE WAS SORRY!

After that, we talked for a few hours. He talked about his parents, he feelings on the move... .etc etc. It was a good talk for both of us. He painted me white, saying he knows he doesn't show it or say it enough, but how much he loves me and how awesome and great I am.

The next morning, he was a bit of a tornado... .he decided he wanted to pack a few more things right before we left, and wanted to look for a specific hat. He was really frazzled, and I just stayed calm... .used a calm tone and helped him find his items. We lefty the house 13 minutes later than we wanted, and on the way to get his mom and dad he was freaking out in the car. We kept hitting all the red lights, and anytime he gets stopped by multiple lights he gets agitated. He kept saying this was all going to go downhill "All because of my stupid hat! If it was where it was supposed to be this wouldn't have happened!" (cuz you know... .we all wear his hat, so certainly someone else didn't put it up) I just kept my voice low and calm (that really seems to help) and I told him it's alright... .we are making great time... .10 minutes isn't going to make a difference for when we get there.

When we get his parents all loaded up... .I could tell he was still anxious but he kept himself in check. His hands are gripping the wheel... .his jaw is clenched. Poor thing. But, he did maintain. We even had a part of the trip where he missed the exit and we had to turn around and costed us 40 minutes, but he kept it in check.

The rest of that first night was fine. I told him he did a good job, even with the little hiccup we had he handled it well. The next day, we were going to check out another city while his parents were vising friends. Long story short more of the same but worse since it was just us two. We were driving to the other city, ran into construction and some one way streets and got turned around. Full fledged freaking out. I tried to keep him calm... .reminding him we are not under a time limit, and we will find our way. Wasn't working. I got directions to go back to the small town we were in, and we headed back. I saw 10 minutes of this city... .but it wasn't worth the stress. On the way back, we decided to stop at a national park we had passed. Nature usually calms him down, and this seemed like a good idea. He wanted to go back to the hotel first to calm down and use the bathroom (he really really has a hard time using public restrooms) so we decided to do that... .and took a wrong turn again. Again... .the freaking out... .started yelling about the hat again... .I dunno. He ended up pulling over... .pacing for 5 minutes, and I took the wheel.

We got back to the hotel, and I stayed outside and read while he went inside to pace around. I tried really hard not to get upset or cry... .but I did. When he came outside, I turned away and dried my eyes off so he wouldn't see. He sat out there for about 5 min, went inside... .went to the bathroom and said he was ready to go. So, we went. He was just fine. We even started making jokes about what issues we were having... .we kept going on a portion of the highway that said "Business 96" instead of just "96" so every time we saw a business route he would say "This one honey? Do I need this one?" and I wold exclaim "NO! It's not business time!" and he would laugh. We took that stresser and turned into into a joke

Overall, I think it went really well. He was stressed out, so I expected some dysregulation.

@Max, thank you for those ideas. I did set myself up to have cash in my pocket and insurance and all of that in case something happened. It never got that far, luckily.

@Flowerpath Don't feel too bad, since as you can see my mouth went flying when he was jumping up and down about those branches

He got really obsessed with the idea that everything was going to go downhill because of that hat. He blamed that hat for us getting lost in the big city for a moment there. In my head, I kept feeling pity for that poor hat that didn't do thing but sit where he put it rofl

[flowerpath]

Glad you made it through your trip OK, ColdEthyl.   That hat though…

[OffRoad]

Wow! Great job staying calm! I think you may have hit on a hidden gem, though. While most of us don't really want to get upset or cry, I'm starting to think that maybe we DO need to take a little time and find some way to de-stress when our pwBPD get upset. Your opportunity to express your upset through tears may have helped keep you from reacting badly later.

It is amazing how pwBPD will obsess on something or someone and that will be the cause of all their problems. It can't be that THEY are disorganized, or waited until the last minute, it has to be someone/something else's fault. Do you ever think that sometimes they do these things so that they will have something to blame if something goes wrong later? Like, he could blame the hat for everything that went wrong, but if he hadn't gone looking for the hat at the last minute, he couldn't have used that as a "blame-all".

In any case, I'm really glad to hear that you could joke about one of the stressers and had a decent time.

[ColdEthyl]

@Offroad I think so, and I'm pretty sure it's not even a conscious thought. The finger has to go somewhere... .if he can't find a person, he WILL find an object.

Somewhere in my life, I seemed to have drawn the conclusion that it wasn't ok for me to be sad, or to  cry, or to be upset. Being with a pwBPD hasn't made it any better and has forced me to grow in some areas of my life. He most of the time can't be there to comfort me... .and I'm learning to do it myself. But, I know not only is it ok... .it's NEEDED. I am learning to self-soothe, and that's a thing I haven't ever learned.