Thank you! @kells76

As odd as it sounds, you could contact a DBT treatment center, describe your situation, and see if they would work with you (the non-BPD). DBT trained therapists would likely have a lot of experience with BPD relationships.

It can also help to go on the psychologytoday.com "therapist finder" for your location and use the filters "BPD" and/or "DBT". Again, even though the therapists may be trained to work with a pwBPD, they would also be able to work with non-pwBPD. It's not like their training is limited to PD's and would damage others; in fact, DBT can be helpful for anyone wanting to build better emotional management skills.

You could also consider asking your current therapist(s) for recommendations. T's will know that they can't help everyone and can't specialize in everything, and hopefully would be willing (and have the network and connections) to direct you to someone more specialized.

Is there a counseling service or person specifically trained in dealing with bpd relationships?

Thanks

Mark

I am learning more and more about BPD and its effect on family. After considerable therapy for myself and udBPDw, I am in a quandary. My wife has not been formally diagnosed with BPD but the therapist who I was working with suggested "Stop walking on Eggshells." She said a colleague recommended it. She was quick to point out that she cannot diagnose my wife as she has never seen her. However, she collaborated with my wife's therapist during our sessions. We have 3 grown daughters (married with children) who have been on the receiving end all of their lives. I am the only one that has been the target of rages. Family and friends are unaware of what goes on, however I sometimes get the question of "what's wrong with mom" or what's wrong with your wife. I have divulged nothing with regards to BPD or therapy to anyone. I have been cautioned by a therapist that discussing my wife's BPD with our children would be detrimental. My heart aches at times and I want to tell them about BPD so that they have some understanding of their mom and why she does what she does.

My question: Should I broach the subject with my daughters or leave it be?

@foreverDad @Maddog

Thank you sincerely for your thoughts and advice.

It's great to know I'm not alone, but also depressing that my greatest fears seem to be real:

that it's very very hard to get help through this.

I will check out the forum materials on boundaries specifically for bpd

Thanks so much

And @ForeverDad - thanks for the advice on the police and even documentation for down the road.


Thank you

People here will recognize the confusion and pain you have Dwelling. And confusion. So much confusion.

I just want to note that I got an anti anxiety drug when my relationship exploded in a barrage of put downs and belittling and yelling. Just over. Done. It was really helpful in getting me some sleep, which I hadn't gotten in nearly two months at that point.

But just be careful with them, this class of drugs is really addictive.

Her behaviors sound so similar to my stepdaughter (SD27), who has BPD traits too.

Over-texting seems to be a common impulse.

It's good that she can seem reasonable in person. If she has BPD traits, it might be that engaging like this is kind of the payoff. You're paying attention to her, so things are ok.

How do you think it might go if you used that relatively grounded time to let her know you're trying something new. Something like "I realized something about myself. I struggle to process lots of texts and long texts. I will _______ going forward."

In your words, as simple as possible.

With my stepdaughter we have to be very consistent and firm and make few exceptions if any. Less talking is better because engaging in the anguished topic is the whole point.

It works best when you can point to a boundary and offer something healthier in return. "I will be home at time o'clock and we can talk then." If it's a lot of anguish or serious mental health issues, my husband's go-to response is to point to SD27's therapist. "I'm a big out of my league here. Have you made an appointment with your T?"

He is also much better at stating time boundaries. "I can talk for 5 minutes and then I'll have to go. We can set a time to talk later."

It's hard work because you'll likely feel guilty and those emotions are not easy to tolerate. For us, what helped was having a therapist say that underneath SD27's boundary-less behaviors was a scared child who feels safer when the people around her assert healthy boundaries. On some level, SD27 knows her impulses are intense and push people to a breaking point.

As for moving out -- prepare for a dysregulation and even SI. When a new boundary appears it's pretty common to test how rigid it is. If you like your friend and want to reassure her she's in your life regardless of moving out, give her some structure like setting up days to have her over or go do something together. Giving notice will trigger her abandonment fears and she may dysregulate no matter what you say. It's kinda like she gets on a roller coaster and wants you to join the ride.

Except you choose to stay on the ground. It may take a lot of repetition and even a cooling off period for her to get over the distress of feeling abandoned but if her traits are not too severe and she doesn't feel like she got away with "injuring" you too badly, things could settle down.

Mark, I read your post and it really hit home. Following is my initial post from yesterday. Hello to everyone on this blog. My story is not unique, yet despite attempts at counseling I often feel hopeless. 30+ years ago my wife and I had issues which I did not understand. I am an alcoholic and sober for 25 years. As time went on, I began to feel like something was wrong with me and I sought out a therapist. After several sessions the therapist said she would like to meet my wife if possible. My wife agreed to meet as a couple. At the first and only meeting my wife had prepared a written statement which she proceeded to read. When the therapist asked her if we could just talk, her response was "no" and she continued on with her written statement and then had nothing more to say. I continued to work with the therapist for several months, focusing on my self esteem. Several years later, when things again became unbearable, I sought out therapy again for myself. The original therapist retired so I started anew. When my wife would ask, "why are you going to therapy?" I would respond I was "trying to be a better person". After several sessions my wife decided she wanted to attend "to see what lies I was telling about her." The initial visit was like the first therapist, she had a written script which she would not deviate from but at the end of the session said she would come back. I was elated. After several couples sessions the therapist felt it would be best if each of us worked with our own therapist. I willingly agreed to seek out someone for myself, I was thrilled that my wife had established a relationship with a therapist. We continued on with out individual therapists with written consents that the therapists could consult and discuss our sessions as needed. Shortly thereafter, it was recommended that we see a therapist the specializes in "high conflict relationships". After just getting started (2 sessions), the therapist missed out scheduled visit (it was a 40 minute drive) for us. She was apologetic but wife was done. I continued with the individual therapy with my therapist. I expressed my concerns about not getting any answers and nothing seemed any better in my marriage. She assured me she had been in contact with the other therapist. Finally, during one of our sessions (all of which were via Zoom due to Covid, she recommended "Stop Walking on Eggshells." More accurately, she stated that someone recommended the book. I quickly bought it and my eyes were opened and things started to make sense. After several more sessions I decided to stop the therapy as I now had an idea of what had been going on all these years! We continue to have episodes of rage and I have learned to accept that they are part of the condition. I have gone on long enough for the moment and just had to unload as I had just been verbally assaulted once again. I feel better now that I have found this forum. Any help and insights would be greatly appreciated. We have been married for 48 yrs. and have 3 grown daughters who are married. I have been warned not to share their mother's diagnosis with them, as it will cause more harm than good. Thanks for your time.

Notwendy,
You have described exactly how I am experiencing this group and what I need to do to make it less emotionally overwhelming for me when I have to interact with these people. Thank you.
 
Your experience with having a flying monkey turn the group against you, is exactly what bothers me the most in the group I am dealing with. It has taken me time to figure out who the worst flying monkeys are. One of them would make remarks about somebody liking me. Then one day, she walked up to me and said I am going to replace you as the favorite of a certain person. And indeed she has turned this person into one of my adversaries. Another one came up to me and told me who doesn't like me, some of whom do, then demanded to know who does like me. I assume this was to find out how to turn others against me. Being in control through narcissistic abuse is a dynamic that strongly defines this group.

Your detaching from the group that turned against you is what I need to do with the group I am interacting with. I am gradually detaching from my FOO and large extended family which is an arduous painful process. This group is very much connected to my family and still interacts with them. I have some more work to do on detaching from disordered people who need scapegoats to feel better about themselves and who like to talk about being superior to other people. 

I realize I am far from alone in all of this. So many members on this site have people, mostly family members, that they have to interact with who are disordered and deliberately cruel. We all get triggered at times when we are stuck in relationships with disordered people with whom we are not able to go no contact. The detachment is an ongoing process as the disordered people seem to need others to project their distress on, and they choose certain people to target, to treat badly on purpose. It is nearly impossible to predict when and what the next round of cruelty will be like. It is like they enjoy hurting and upsetting others so they don't have to face how  badly they really feel inside.

Thank you so much for your insights and sharing your experiences.

Hello BPD family!

It's been a little while since my last post.  Things have been going quite well actually.  We are in the midst of a move to a new apartment and have been able to spend some quality time together.  We even went on a little vacation for a few days to the beach and were able to really connect.

My partner is in between jobs at the moment, sort of.  She's starting work at a new place and working part time when she's available to help them get more organized.  The rest of the time she's working on moving things from our current place to the apartment.  Yesterday during the day she offered to stop by my VRBO that I'm using as an office space because she was passing by.  I said that I would love to see her but didn't have a lot of time because I was under the gun to get some work done.  Later that day I went to do my hobby like I've been doing regularly for the past few months.  On my way out the door one of my friends asked about a bottle of whiskey that was in the corner.  I explained that I brought that in because I was just trying to cut down on the amount of booze in our house.  He asked if he could have some and I said sure.  Then he offered me a drink and I accepted.

When I got home my partner could smell alcohol and asked if I had anything to drink.  I admitted that I had one quick drink before leaving.

This morning she said she wanted to talk about me having a drink last night before I left.  She asked if I thought I was breaking our agreement that I would come straight home after practice.  I said that it was literally 30 seconds and I was out the door so no I didn't.  She then asked about if I was feeling stressed at work and that was why I didn't want to see her yesterday.  I immediately started trying to walk that back, which was not what she needed.  What was really going on was that she was feeling lonely yesterday and felt that I didn't express that I missed her?

She's gotten very spun up this morning about the whole thing.  I did not do a good job validating her feelings this morning and she felt I was acting "defensive".  Before I left for work she said that I need to be prepared that she may ask to break up with me by the end of the day over this.  She thinks my work and my hobby are more important to me than her and she's done with it.

I know that she doesn't really want to break up but this is almost exactly the situation we were in at the end of last year.  We were getting ready for a move, I was late getting home from hobby, she demands I quit or we will break up and she'll move without me.

Now, I probably shouldn't have had a drink last night knowing that she could have been sensitive about it.  She's got a pretty good nose and hiding that isn't an option, nor should I hide it.  I feel like the only thing I can do today is make apologies and maybe say that "yes, of course you were lonely yesterday and I should have gotten home right away" even though I didn't get home any later than usual.

I realize that this isn't about the drink or the amount of time that I spent extra at my hobby.  This is about her feeling sad/upset that I wasn't thinking about her and that I did something with someone else.

I'd love to hear what the forum thinks about this situation.  I know that I need to be validating and reassure her that I want to be with her.