First thread...

[3birds]

I’m sorry, am I really supposed to post first before reading any other posts? Seems strange but ok.

I love my wife very much. Most of the time we get along great. But we go through periods of just horrible horrible arguments. These arguments absolutely destroy me. She becomes this other version of herself, bent on hurting me any way she can. I can’t understand how anyone could treat someone they love the way she treats me. I mean, I know she loves me, but during those moments she treats me like someone she absolutely hates.

She hit me for the first time yesterday. Hit me in the face a few times. I feel strange complaining about that... I’m a man and although she was hitting me in the face I don’t think she was hitting me as hard as she could. I mean, I’m not upset about how much it hurt or anything, I’m upset that she PLEASE READing struck me in the face.

She thinks that I am messing with other women online behind her back. I’m not. But she constantly goes through my phone and insists she’s found proof of me messing around. I mean, she is absolutely convinced that I am. And it doesn’t matter what I say or how many times I show her that everything she’s finding has an absolutely benign explanation. She won’t stop with this. It’s ruining our relationship.

Anyway, there’s a whole lot more to it all than just that. Sometimes I think we’ll be fine and that I’m overreacting. But I know I’m not, and I’m not sure how much longer I can take all of this. I have no life outside of her. I can’t run a couple errands without having her blow up and insist that I’m PLEASE READing some chick down the street or something.

I need help. I feel like I’m going insane. I can’t keep living like this.

She has known she has BPD for maybe 10 years now and we have been together for 2 years. She claims she used to be much worse. Much “more borderline.” She was receiving therapy for years and apparently that helped a lot, but for some reason she stopped going a few years ago and hasn’t been back since.

I love her and I don’t want to leave her. But I can’t get through to her. I can’t live like this. Things are only getting worse. I need help, I am not equipped to deal with this. My reactions are too strong. I never want to think of her as having BPD I don’t know why. I mean she is classic BPD but she’s also my wife and 75% of the time you’d never know she had BPD. But the way I react to her emotional outbursts is just making everything worse, as I can’t seem to help but get offended and hurt.

[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.

[Cat Familiar]

There’s a lot to unpack here.

What do you argue about?

Physical violence is never OK. Do you feel safe or is she escalating?

It sounds like she has some paranoia too.

Of course you feel hurt after these outbursts. Anyone would. But here’s the thing, she has BPD and possibly PPD (paranoid personality disorder) and she’s not going to behave like a healthy partner would. You’ve married an emotionally difficult person and if you want that marriage to succeed, you, as the healthy partner will have to take on the lion’s share of working to make things better.

That you’re here is a good step in that direction. Do you have a therapist? It’s very emotionally draining to be in a relationship with a BPD partner who is acting out. We recommend that you get professional help for yourself. Ideally it would be nice if your wife were to get treatment, but practically more often than not, the BPD partner refuses.

We understand how difficult things are for you. Please take a look at this site and learn what you can. Things can get a lot better.

Something you might look at is  https://bpdfamily.com/content/listen-with-empathy  So often our BPD partners don’t realize how hard we are trying. Lots of times we don’t need to try harder, we just need to try differently.

[once removed]

I love my wife very much. Most of the time we get along great. But we go through periods of just horrible horrible arguments. These arguments absolutely destroy me. She becomes this other version of herself, bent on hurting me any way she can. I can’t understand how anyone could treat someone they love the way she treats me. I mean, I know she loves me, but during those moments she treats me like someone she absolutely hates.

i struggled with the same thing.

likewise, i had a very jealous partner, who would snoop. and wed have fights for hours on end about whatever she found, even if what she found was no proof of her suspicions.

likewise, my partner told me how she used to be worse. in fairness, we probably both did.

Cat Familiar is right about several things: you love a difficult person. that difficult person will almost certainly always be difficult. jealousy, snooping, that sort of thing is driven, and doesnt tend to go away. and physical violence takes precedent over everything. you cant really make anything else better unless and until thats nipped in the bud.

theres a lot more to be said...the good news...the bad news...what you can do with it all...but what has transpired since she hit you?

[PearlsBefore]

You didn't mention her age, but where you said she'd acknowledged having it for about ten years, I'm guessing that would place her in her mid-20s? For what it's worth, my understanding after reading just about every book for BPD caregivers on Amazon is that most female BPDs will naturally reduce their levels of violence, self-harm and addiction starting at 23, 24, 25 years of age even without professional intervention...but will struggle with other symptoms like their lack of identity and fear of abandonment forever. But a minority of women will actually get worse over that same timeframe, and that obviously offers a much poorer prognosis.

CatFamiliar sounds correct in saying it sounds like she has some paranoia issues that are beyond "normal BPD" as well; I have multiple dBPDs in my life and never known any of them with the insane over-the-top "You were five minutes late, you're in love with another woman!" paranoia (though some paranoia was still evident, she was actually in a sour mood if she saw me engaging with my kid sisters for example - because she considered them to be female competition for my affection, but it maxed out at "sour mood and witchy comments")

I knew an Egyptian guy who had a wife who literally phoned him X times every hour he was out of the house, convinced he was meeting other women. Wouldn't believe him either when he explained he was at a coffee shop with me, he'd have to put me on the phone, and she'd demand I explain what color the tiles on the floor of the coffee shop were - even if she'd never been there (as though I'm with him, but actually watching him consummate some extramarital nookie rather than at a coffeeshop?). Their marriage lasted longer than I expected - but yeah, I don't think BPD was her issue.

You say it's the first time she hit you, but you'll probably want to find out (from her, or in-laws) whether it's the first time she's ever hit anybody in that way. My own dBPD first hit me when she was ~22, and by ~23 she'd tried "only once" to push me in front of a train, by ~26 she'd advanced to taking up kitchen knives to try to stab me over issues like deliberately bringing home the brand of mayonaisse I "knew" she didn't want.

Like you, I foolishly brushed it off as "she's weak and not brilliant, I can always get the knife away from her and calm her down" - yeah, King-To-King chat here for a minute? Biggest mistake of my life.

So if she's in her 40s and still displaying this level of violence...I'd say it's likely to continue at this same level of getting slapped around once every couple years. Your call on what to do with that information - I get it, I'm "not abused" either. We're men, wives with rolling pins is just par for the course...except apparently it shouldn't be that way.

Otherwise, don't just rely on her self-reports - try to figure out whether it's true that she's been "getting better" since her early 20s, or "getting worse" in terms of violence, etc. If she used to be much more violent, to herself and others, than she is nowadays - then you're in luck and maybe the other day was just an aberration but she's still on the "calming down" path and by 35 she'll just be quirky, eccentric and insecure. On the other hand, if her teenaged fits were just shouting and smashing of objects but never involved violence but have just now crossed the line into violence...then you're at the point in my life that I would immediately punch into any time machine, to go back and avoid the biggest mistake of my life which was thinking "I'm sure it won't happen again".

[3birds]

Sorry I am only reading this now. Now that I know there are actual people here to help, I will be on here much more often.

Thank you all for your considered replies. My wife is 38. She was diagnosed in here 20s.

She hasn’t been violent since, but the fighting hasn’t stopped. Just today I had a job interview and because it took a few hours, I got accused of cheating on her again. This time she’s playing all of these YouTube videos about narcissism and claiming that I am one and that’s why I can lie to her all the time about where I’ve been.

We don’t have any help and I aim to change that very soon. We need help. I need help. A professional would help tremendously really. I just worry that I’ll be able to find someone who is capable and willing to deal with such a case.

Again thank you all and I’m sorry it took so long for me to log back on here. Things go alright for a while and I forget how bad they can be.

[3birds]

@pearlbefore I guess that was what I was worried about. I love her and I don’t want to leave. I will do anything I can to work though this, but if there’s ever violence again, I’m done. I don’t know how often this has happened in the past. It’s an uncomfortable question that I think I need to ask.

I know she has caused the mental breakdown of two past partners by her own admission. I met one of them and he is just gone. Thinks the rocks in his garden cause hallucinations and believes that there are people living under his house - that kinda thing. By all accounts he was quite sane before he met her. And I can see how it can happen. I don’t see myself going down this path but then again I’m sure he didn’t either.

It comes down to, do I have enough respect for myself to leave when I need to for my own health? Or am I just not being strong enough and taking on the responsibility of making her better, which is what no one has done before? I struggle with that all the time.

[Cat Familiar]

Here’s a great article about being in a relationship with someone who has BPD. https://bpdfamily.com/content/what-does-it-take-be-relationship

You mentioned “taking on the responsibility of making her better.”

I’m sorry to tell you that this is an effort that is doomed to fail. That doesn’t mean she won’t get better, but she has to decide to do that herself. If you try to do that, you will only make her resent you. Think about it, trying to make someone better is not accepting who they are and communicating that they’re not good enough, which is probably a message she’s gotten her entire life.

Now what you can do is change how you respond to her. And by doing that, it will often lead to a much healthier relationship. Keep reading here. We’ve got a great community built knowledge base and there are great books recommendations you’ll find there. Keep posting too. We’ve been in your shoes and we understand.

If you want to find a therapist, there are recommendations on the Psychology Today’s website for online therapy during the pandemic.

[3birds]

You guys are blowing my mind. I’ve been reading as much as I can here over the last few days, and I have both hope and despair in equally strong amounts as a result

I have a lot to learn. But I’m so glad that this community is here. I just wish I had done this sooner I probably could have saved both of us a lot of grief. I don’t know why it took me so long to admit that I needed real help and that almost all of the issues I’ve been having have been due to BPD. My wife is so intelligent and I felt like if she could just understand... but of course that was completely futile. It’s like tying yourself to a tree in order to learn how to prepare sausages for uphill swimming lessons. It’s exactly like that. No no, not a metaphor. That’s what it is literally.

Thank you all so much for all of this material it really is so much more than I expected. I finally feel like things can change for the better. I feel like I can take control of my life back, and I don’t have to be a prisoner or a slave or half of a person. And the very little that I’ve put in to practice so far has produced better results than i have on my own in the last 2 years. By a lot.

I am humbled. Again. And not for the last time. And so very thankful for that.

[Latrodge]

My thoughts...About 10 years ago, after 20 years of marriage, I addressed to my wife how her anger issues were affecting everyone in our family.  I did it in a series of long letters and emails, because over many conversations after her rages, which seemed productive at the time, nothing would change. Verbal communication was typically diverted into blaming me or others, so writing was the only way, where I could keep the narrative on track.  I did not know about BPD at the time, but every time I re-read those letters, I'm shocked at how much I described her behavior as BPD without knowing it.  In any case, she had always been verbally violent and abusive at times, but at some point it became physical. Slapping, hitting with towels, pushing. Sometimes I would feel she was drawing me in to physical confrontation - and she began telling people that I beat her.   Ultimately she hit me with a TV remote several times, and threatened me with a screwdriver.  I went to the police and they arrested her for domestic violence and assault. I got a restraining order. I was lucky in that by that time she already had a criminal record for violent acts against other people in our neighborhood - I've read many posts here, as well as books (check out author Robert Page), where the BPD spouse ends up getting arrested for DV, when the pwBPD is actually the abuser, or instigator. Be careful, both personally and legally.  In my experience it doesn't get better. 

[PearlsBefore]

I've read many posts here where...  

   

  -One of the multiple diagnosed BPDs in my life had a worst psychotic break many years ago now resulting in 30,000 websites carrying the story across at least fifteen countries, according to Google.

  -She panicked when police showed up, and decided the best way to avoid being arrested was to claim she was actually me and I was her, which resulted in me being arrested through what we'll politely call a comedy of errors and forensically analyzed before the government determined, whoops, turned out I was who and what I say I am, and no that does not include any personality disorders, rage issues or BPD symptoms, . They had no experience with BPD and had taken her insanity at face value. They eventually dismissed the dozens of charges I had been facing (always with a smile on my face that aggravated them since they assumed a guilty person would look upset at this turn of events, but she'd literally just switched our identities in stories; if she'd been the same gender as me I assume she would've literally printed fake IDs to claim to be me). All these years later, when people go "wait a minute, you are..." I can't help the same feelings of bemused aggravation arising - the loose ends have yet to be fully cleaned up and likely never will.

  - I have extensive experience dealing with BPD, completed caretaker courses, attend guest lectures and have a library of books on the subject and am certified as a mental health first responder. The patient's history includes one attempted homicide, causing concussions of innocent bystanders during BPD fits and a thrilling road-trip to Johns Hopkins. I find it odd that "the system" took more than thirty seconds to determine she had coopted my biographical details as her own, and claimed I was her (when it became obvious what had happened she backed down to claiming that she has just misused certain 'pronouns, adjectives and verbs' to police but was 'otherwise' honest (yes English is her only language).

  -I don't discuss RL identities to avoid harming that particular pwBPD's interests and recovery (multiple diagnosed BPDs in my life - imagine your fun but exponential!), or the innocent relatives who would likewise be exposed, or dragging the site down with sensationalism...but there's a relatively high chance you're aware of this case. And I don't need to worry about "outing" myself professionally because my history on this website was literally part of the court dismissing all charges against me and turning their focus to the BPD patient.

It's why I tell everybody here that the number one thing you can do is find professionals, whether that's lawyers, judges, therapists, psychiatrists, access supervisors, pharmacists, whomever, but that they  have a detailed familiarity with BPD and do not just shrug it off as "they're only maybe borderline not quite right, like half as bad as bipolar or something". Do not rely on a general practitioner, or "but I'm a licensed psychiatrist of course I know about it". If there's no doubt but that it's textbook BPD and not just a diagnosis of convenience, then anything less than a specialist is like asking your dentist to perform a heart transplant.

On the other hand, if you want a thrill-a-minute life, there's nothing quite like stacking up multiple diagnosed BPDs.   Ah, the folly of youth and believing I'd be able to figure out a cure where nobody else had. If I had a time machine, I'd go back and never read about psychopathy, the line between neurosis and psychosis and all of that. The site doesn't like me to ever advise a specific person who has a particularly concerning case to run, not walk away - so instead I here remind any of you reading this who suspect you are dealing with one of the more extreme variants of BPD and its comorbidities and are not bound by either translation of "blood is thicker than water"...tu fui, ego eris. I was once where you now stand, so please take precautions so you never end up standing where I then stood.


edit: Lol, apparently my 100th post on the site. Accidental milestone!

[3birds]

Damn dude. I need to be honest with myself here don’t I. Denial isn’t doing me any good. Thank you for throwing water in my face. I hear you and thank you

[once removed]

so, how is it going?