"I need help with this relationship or to break it"

[Before you can make things better, you have to stop making them worse...]

I have been married for the last ten years. My wife is Russian while I am Portuguese. We met each other in a dating site and we have been living in Portugal. We have a common son and her teenage daughter. At the beginning all seemed perfect and I felt I had been very lucky to find my wife. Yet, after a short time, problems began to emerge. In the beginning our differences and arguments had to do with her elder son, who also lived with us at that time. He was a problematic thirteen-year-old fellow and eventually I decided that either he should go and live with his father in Russia or we should separate. My wife decided to send him away. Yet, her son’s absence didn’t bring us peace: after a while problems re-emerged stronger than ever, and she became violent. I was beaten and offended in front of children, threatened, etc. Once she threatened to jump out from the car in the motorway, because my son from a previous marriage, then a 6 years old boy, asked me to listen to some song. Eventually, I prevented my son from visiting me, fearing that he would suffer further harassment. One day, in despair, I went to the police station to present a complaint against my wife for domestic violence, but later withdrawn the complaint and the case was closed. This procedure repeated at least another four times, but when faced with the question: «do you wish to proceed further with the complaint against your wife», I always answer «no, I do not wish her any bad». Eventually, upon pressure, my wife agreed to attend couple therapy, but after a few sessions, she dropped out. Three years ago I went to visit a lawyer to ask advice, who suggested me to visit a psychotherapist before taking any decision. The lawyer thought, quite wisely, that I was still too weak to embark in a divorce process. I then began to attend consultations regularly and upon my descriptions the therapist suggested that my wife suffered from BPD. Eventually I managed to persuade my wife to resume couple therapy, but like before this led us to nowhere. My wife never really take seriously couple therapy; she attend it under pressure and spent her time there joking and provoking everyone around. Eventually the couple therapist made and ultimatum and told us that she would only see us again to help us with divorce and the sessions were interrupted. Recently we resumed couple therapy, but my wife continues provoking and often failing sessions. I don’t know what to do anymore; feel desperate. If from the one hand I feel an enormous wish to put an end in our marriage, on the other hand I feel unable to do it. She can be as good as she can be bad, and I am very much addicted to her. Besides, I am afraid of what will come next. The biggest issue, of course, is our common son, now 8 years old. She can be a fantastic mother, providing him all attention he needs, sometimes in excess. She spends her days taking care of his education, planning visits to museums, taking him to violin lessons, etc. On the other hand, he lives a constant nightmare, witnessing all kind of daily arguments, sometimes nasty ones. She constantly threatens him to leave him forever, sometimes to punish him, others to hurt me. If we were both native from the same country or if she would have any relatives here, we could well have already separated. Yet, she threatens to leave for Russia forever and never see our son again if we divorce. I don’t know what to do. I am feeling weaker and weaker every day, with less and less resources to fight against this problem, I am isolated and sometimes even questioning my own mental consistency.

[Vronsky]

I have been married for the last ten years. My wife is Russian while I am Portuguese. We met each other in a dating site and we have been living in Portugal. We have a common son and her teenage daughter. At the beginning all seemed perfect and I felt I had been very lucky to find my wife. Yet, after a short time, problems began to emerge. In the beginning our differences and arguments had to do with her elder son, who also lived with us at that time. He was a problematic thirteen-year-old fellow and eventually I decided that either he should go and live with his father in Russia or we should separate. My wife decided to send him away. Yet, her son’s absence didn’t bring us peace: after a while problems re-emerged stronger than ever, and she became violent. I was beaten and offended in front of children, threatened, etc. Once she threatened to jump out from the car in the motorway, because my son from a previous marriage, then a 6 years old boy, asked me to listen to some song. Eventually, I prevented my son from visiting me, fearing that he would suffer further harassment. One day, in despair, I went to the police station to present a complaint against my wife for domestic violence, but later withdrawn the complaint and the case was closed. This procedure repeated at least another four times, but when faced with the question: «do you wish to proceed further with the complaint against your wife», I always answer «no, I do not wish her any bad». Eventually, upon pressure, my wife agreed to attend couple therapy, but after a few sessions, she dropped out. Three years ago I went to visit a lawyer to ask advice, who suggested me to visit a psychotherapist before taking any decision. The lawyer thought, quite wisely, that I was still too weak to embark in a divorce process. I then began to attend consultations regularly and upon my descriptions the therapist suggested that my wife suffered from BPD. Eventually I managed to persuade my wife to resume couple therapy, but like before this led us to nowhere. My wife never really take seriously couple therapy; she attend it under pressure and spent her time there joking and provoking everyone around. Eventually the couple therapist made and ultimatum and told us that she would only see us again to help us with divorce and the sessions were interrupted. Recently we resumed couple therapy, but my wife continues provoking and often failing sessions. I don’t know what to do anymore; feel desperate. If from the one hand I feel an enormous wish to put an end in our marriage, on the other hand I feel unable to do it. She can be as good as she can be bad, and I am very much addicted to her. Besides, I am afraid of what will come next. The biggest issue, of course, is our common son, now 8 years old. She can be a fantastic mother, providing him all attention he needs, sometimes in excess. She spends her days taking care of his education, planning visits to museums, taking him to violin lessons, etc. On the other hand, he lives a constant nightmare, witnessing all kind of daily arguments, sometimes nasty ones. She constantly threatens him to leave him forever, sometimes to punish him, others to hurt me. If we were both native from the same country or if she would have any relatives here, we could well have already separated. Yet, she threatens to leave for Russia forever and never see our son again if we divorce. I don’t know what to do. I am feeling weaker and weaker every day, with less and less resources to fight against this problem, I am isolated and sometimes even questioning my own mental consistency.