Is it possible to love a person with BPD?

[wundress]

Lately it feels like there are so many negatives to loving my pwBPD.

Aren't loving relationships meant to be equal?

I feel like I have to ignore two thirds of everything my wife says, treat her like a toddler quite a lot of the time, emotionally distance myself so that I don't get hurt by her tantrums and to live under constant threat of her leaving at any moment. We don't really coparent because she can't cope. We don't really talk about much because (no disrespect to her) but we are on completely different ends of the intellectual scale.

I'm struggling to find anything good about our relationship! And I'm angry at myself because I had been putting a lot into getting us back on track. I'm starting to wish I hadn't.

[tryingsome]

The term love is thrown around loosely on this forum.

Is it possible to love a person with BPD, yes.

You can also love your dog, that is easy because they 'need you' unconditionally.

Can you love your children, yes because they are just an extension of your psychological makeup.

You can love a boat, if it has a deep connection to your life then perhaps.

Are relationships supposed to be equal? No, not unless you are a die hard romantic.

But you should both be getting something from the relationship.

I can't tell you what that something is, as it is different for each person.

Now, if you need true intimacy--well, I doubt a BPD can provide that.

But they can provide many other aspects that other people can't provide.

[wundress]

And what are these other aspects that people with BPD can offer? Because at the moment I feel like I get nothing from her except abuse, confusion, upset etc

[Claycrusher]

Lately it feels like there are so many negatives to loving my pwBPD.

That's because there are.  Deceit, manipulative behavior, lack of empathy, and on it goes, through lack of impluse control and a lack of respect for social and cultrual boundaries.

Aren't loving relationships meant to be equal?

Yes, more or less, and for the most part, they are when we're talking about loving relationships between psycologically whole adults.  That's not romanticizing.  That's reality.  A relationship might not look like 50%-50% all the time, every second of every day, but if it doesn't look like that or something very close to it, odds are strong that one or both individuals in the relationship are disordered to some degree.  Decent people treat each other decently.  They may take, but they're willing to give in kind.  They don't use.  They don't abuse.

I feel like I have to ignore two thirds of everything my wife says, treat her like a toddler quite a lot of the time, emotionally distance myself so that I don't get hurt by her tantrums and to live under constant threat of her leaving at any moment.

You "feel like" this because that's the reality you're in if you're in a relationship with a pwBPD -even if they're "high functioning" like mine is.  In some ways, the "higher functioning" they are, the harder living with them is.  I know that's true in my case.  It is that way for me because the outside world sees an industrious, intelligent, committed Christian girl who has a part-time job, has been on the President's Honor Roll for the last six semesters, and comes across as loving and sweet.  That outside world wouldn't believe that this woman they know would be capable of leaving her children to fend for themselves, lie to them and me as to her whereabouts, feigh despondancy to me while doing so, all while having a laison with her new female extra-marital lover and that new lover's husband.  Conversely, if mine were lower-functioning, doing the self-mutilation things, and what-not, the whole world would think she's bat-s**** crazy and my side of our mutal saga would be easily accepted as truth.  As "high functioning" as mine is, she is still emotionally retarded, like a toddler trapped in hormone-enraged teen trapped in a woman's body; she still has little impulse control, especially where sex and spending money where SHE wants to spend it are concerned; she is manipulative and will use finances, emotions, and situations to her sole advantage.  She has little to no empathy for me or our children.  She is a pathalogical liar, too.  So much so that even some of her crying and pouting is an act -something I wasn't fully aware of until it was part of her last bout of marital infidelity.  So from my perspective, you feel the way you do, not because your dulcelt darling isn't really that rotten of a person to live with, but precisely because she very likely IS  really that rotten to live with.

We don't really coparent because she can't cope.

We don't really coparent, either.  Same reason, plus her lack of empathy she hides from the outside world so well isn't just manifested in her relationship with me, but also our children.  If she percieves a need for milk for her morning coffee, her sexy butt is off to the market, post-haste, but our children telling her that they'd like some milk for their cereal has the same affect much of the time as if they made their plea to a wall.  She'll fall asleep and stay that way when most mothers are making sure their children get fed some supper.  She's not a mother, really, but more like having a very self-centered teen babysitter who kind of sucks at the job of babysitting.  Oh, and she's a bigger slob than our children are, too.  They find themselves picking up after her, reminder her to take her epilepsy meds, and so on.

We don't really talk about much because (no disrespect to her) but we are on completely different ends of the intellectual scale.

We don't talk much, either.  But that's not because of some difference in intellect.  My BPDw is very intellegent.  She's not keen on talking to me for the same reasons I don't engage in conversations with the torque wrench I use on my Mustang, or the shotgun I shoot sporting clays with, or the fly rod I catch fish on -they're tools that don't require emotional support and all I require from them is that they do what I want them to do when I want them to do it.  When I'm not using them, they just take up space and are kind of a pain in the ass to have around because of that.  To her, I am a tool.  So I have no logical expectation that she'd want to talk to me.  She does, but it is always about what SHE is doing and what SHE wants to do and what SHE plans to do and SHE is going to do and what SHE needs. 

I'm struggling to find anything good about our relationship!

Yeah.  I used to do that, too.  I used to tell myself, "That's the disorder being hurtful, not the person you fell in love with."  The problem with that logic is that the "person I fell in love with" was a fiction and it was really the disorder in the form of Borderline Infatuation that I fell in love with.  Logically, if that was the "real dulcet darling" then so must be the lying, manipulative, unempathetic, rotten person capable of cramming every Borderline symptom in to one act of marital infidelity.  I fell in love with a fantasy.  Unfortunately, I knocked it up, got it pregnant, and married it.  When I think about it critically, almost all of the fun times happened during the Borderline Infatuation stage.  The only thing really good to come out of my relationship after that was our two children. 

I'm done with struggling to find something that hasn't been there for years, and given the typical Borderline traits, really can't be there.  I can't even work up compassion for her being disordered anymore.  While it might be true that she didn't ask to be afflicted with BPD, it is also true that she's still responsible for her thoughts, words, and deeds, and thus it is HER responsibility to manage her disorder, ultimately, and not mine.  I used to feel sorry for her, at least on some level.  Not anymore.  She knows she's lying when she lies.  She knows she's manipulating when she manipulates.  Fundamentally, she just doesn't give a s***.  I treat my torque wrench, shotgun, and fly rod better than she treats me, and that's not because I am a swell guy, but because these things are supposed to be "durable goods" capabile of providing a lifetime of service if properly cared for.  She's the sort that neglects her tools, even though she needs one of them (me) to function every day if she is to have shelter, clothing, and food. 

And I'm angry at myself because I had been putting a lot into getting us back on track. I'm starting to wish I hadn't.

I've been there, too.  I ain't there anymore.

Here's reality as I have seen it in close to 18 years of marriage to a pwBPD.  It never gets better.  Things never improve.  The relationship WILL eventually end, either on the "Non's" terms now, or the pwBPD's later, when she breaks that pie-crust pedistial she puts her Non "tool" on with progressive decreasing frequency, until she knocks him off for the last time and "paints him black" forever.


I'm in the camp that says, "Run, don't walk" away, and as soon as you possibly can.  And with each passing day, I have a lot more compassion with the VICTIMS of Borderline's ABUSE than I have for the Borderlines, themselves.  They KNOW when they lie.  They KNOW when they manipulate.  They're just so self-centered and have such a lack of impusle control that they don't give a s*** who gets hurt by their behavior, because their misery is the only misery that matters to them.

[Claycrusher]

And what are these other aspects that people with BPD can offer? Because at the moment I feel like I get nothing from her except abuse, confusion, upset etc

With the exception of being generally able to more quickly and accurately read the emotional state of those around them, I don't think there is a single thing a pwBPD can do better than a Non can, and even that ability to intuit the emotions of others is used as a tool for selfish gain, rather than one used to further words or actions on the basis of compassion for others.

Some might argue that the sexual prowess attibuted to many pwBPD makes them better or at least potentially more exciting sex partners, but I wouldn't be one of them.  As racy as the sex with a pwBPD can be, when one reflects on the experience critically, it is often more allied to mutual masturbation than the conjugal relations that psychologically whole adults engage in.  The Bordernline's lack of empathy pretty much promises that sex won't strengthen emotional bonding like it does in healthy Non on Non relationships.  Sex to a Borderline isn't just about multiple orgasms, but also about fueling their need for feelings of empowerment and control and so on -things more allied to "narcissistic supply" than a deep emotional bonding.  Logically, it seems unrealistic to expect a person who is essentially an emotional retard to be capable of deep emotional bonding, whether in the marriage bed or out of it.  So, for the Borderline, sex isn't about pleasing their partner in an altruistic sense, but about GETTING AND TAKING things from him.  At the end of the day, if you're Non in a sexual relationship with a Borderline, you're essentially a breathing dildo and your Borderline could just as easily (and sometimes, in her mind, more easily) get their needs met by any other breathing dildo, equally well.  Many Borderlines don't have to have any emotional bond at all with their sex partners to get everything they can get out of a conjugal foray.  Were that not so, promiscuity and marital infidelity wouldn't be traits Borderlines get branded with.

Beyond the Borderline having the capacity to rapidly and accurately intuit the emotional state of those around them, and beyond the sexual behaivors that some exhibit as a byproduct of a lack of impulse control and lack of respect for societal and cultural boundaries, I can't think of one thing that an emotionally retarded, impuslive, decietful, manipulative, unempathic, moody, often self-loathing Boderline can do better than a psychologically whole adult could.

I'm sure somebody loved Jeffery Dalmer once, too, and likely found something in him that he was more brilliant at than the average psychologically whole person, but that doesn't obligate me to love him.

[wundress]

And what are these other aspects that people with BPD can offer? Because at the moment I feel like I get nothing from her except abuse, confusion, upset etc

With the exception of being generally able to more quickly and accurately read the emotional state of those around them, I don't think there is a single thing a pwBPD can do better than a Non can, and even that ability to intuit the emotions of others is used as a tool for selfish gain, rather than one used to further words or actions on the basis of compassion for others.

Some might argue that the sexual prowess attibuted to many pwBPD makes them better or at least potentially more exciting sex partners, but I wouldn't be one of them.  As racy as the sex with a pwBPD can be, when one reflects on the experience critically, it is often more allied to mutual masturbation than the conjugal relations that psychologically whole adults engage in.  The Bordernline's lack of empathy pretty much promises that sex won't strengthen emotional bonding like it does in healthy Non on Non relationships.  Sex to a Borderline isn't just about multiple orgasms, but also about fueling their need for feelings of empowerment and control and so on -things more allied to "narcissistic supply" than a deep emotional bonding.  Logically, it seems unrealistic to expect a person who is essentially an emotional retard to be capable of deep emotional bonding, whether in the marriage bed or out of it.  So, for the Borderline, sex isn't about pleasing their partner in an altruistic sense, but about GETTING AND TAKING things from him.  At the end of the day, if you're Non in a sexual relationship with a Borderline, you're essentially a breathing dildo and your Borderline could just as easily (and sometimes, in her mind, more easily) get their needs met by any other breathing dildo, equally well.  Many Borderlines don't have to have any emotional bond at all with their sex partners to get everything they can get out of a conjugal foray.  Were that not so, promiscuity and marital infidelity wouldn't be traits Borderlines get branded with.

Beyond the Borderline having the capacity to rapidly and accurately intuit the emotional state of those around them, and beyond the sexual behaivors that some exhibit as a byproduct of a lack of impulse control and lack of respect for societal and cultural boundaries, I can't think of one thing that an emotionally retarded, impuslive, decietful, manipulative, unempathic, moody, often self-loathing Boderline can do better than a psychologically whole adult could.

I'm sure somebody loved Jeffery Dalmer once, too, and likely found something in him that he was more brilliant at than the average psychologically whole person, but that doesn't obligate me to love him.

Nope mine isn't emotionally more intuitive nor has better sexual prowess.

Mine views emotions in others as a weakness and tends to send her off on a BPD spiral.

What makes you stay with yours?

In fairness, mine is in therapy and takes medication. Perhaps I am being a bit harsh on her as the BPD has gotten worse lately whilst under stress. She is only at the start of her therapy journey and I can see small improvements already. Just when things suck they tend to REALLY suck.

I agree about falling for a fantasy though. When I met mine she had a huge facade she created for herself.  No one around her had any idea she had a mental health illness. She was bubbly, chivalrous (in a lesbian kind of way), charming, confident, fun, extrovert, life and soul of a party. After a couple of weeks I realised she was seriously damaged underneath and that's when she told me about her horrendous past. Five years later I'm still learning new things that happened to her.

She used to dissociate awfully. In fact, the definition of dissociation on this site doesn't adequately explain the dissociation my wife experiences. At times she dissociated so badly that she thought I was the man who abused her, she couldn't tell me where she was or what time/day it was.

Her family don't want to know she is ill. They tend to blame me and see her illness as something she developed since being with me. They make me very angry so I now try to avoid them!

Mine is generally high functioning I think as long as there is nothing to discuss (particularly money!). She lies when she starts to get unwell again. Hers tends to be cyclical BPD with hormones making it change throughout the month, weekends being bad due to her past experiences and with two major episodes per year.

Lately I've just been blunt about her behaviour. I've called her out on her lies, told her when she's having a tantrum, tell her when she is behaving like a toddler or teen etc. That seems to sit ok with her at the moment.

[Lucky Jim]

Hey wondress, Perhaps I could rephrase your question slightly: Is it possible to sustain love with a pwBPD?  It's easy to fall in love with a pwBPD, in my view, as most Nons on this site can attest.  Nevertheless, I think it's tough to sustain love in the context of BPD, which is not due to a lack of love on the part of the Non, but due to the complexities of this terrible disorder.

LuckyJim

[cosmonaut]

Perhaps whether it is possible to love a person with BPD is a different question than if it is possible to have an equal relationship with a pwBPD.  Let's look at the latter since I think that's what you are getting at.

No, it probably isn't possible to have an equal relationship with a partner with BPD.  It just isn't something that our partner is able to provide without a great deal of work to achieve remission.  I wouldn't say it's utterly impossible - especially in sub-clinical cases, but generally we will have to be the ones to provide the stability and emotional soothing in the relationship.  We will need to make some difficult changes in ourselves and these changes will require that we have addressed many of the issues that we have regarding our own fears and neediness in relationships.  Our partner is often not able to provide validation or to be an emotional support for us.  There will be times when they struggle, dysregulate, or push us away.  If we want to remain with our partner, then this will be something we will need to radically accept.  This is the limitations that they are working under.  Each of us has to decide if this is something we are prepared to undertake.  The problem arises when we demand that our partner provide something that they cannot.  We must radically accept to continue the relationship.

How do you feel about this?  There is no right or wrong answer to this question.  Only each of us individually can say what is best for us.

[Concerns]

I know it may seem kinda like a flame in this thread but I just wanted to tell all of you how valuable this thread has been to my emotional state. It's definitely a struggle when your pwBPD is a cheater. Radical acceptance will take some hardcore personal work. The discussion of boundaries should be on the burner.

[cosmonaut]

I know it may seem kinda like a flame in this thread but I just wanted to tell all of you how valuable this thread has been to my emotional state. It's definitely a struggle when your pwBPD is a cheater. Radical acceptance will take some hardcore personal work. The discussion of boundaries should be on the burner.

Yes, that's a very good point.  We can certainly set boundaries and decide on what we are willing to accept.  We do not have to accept cheating, for instance.  Radical acceptance is about needing to accept our partner as they are with their significant problems in relationships.  We can't demand that they simply not have BPD and all of the issues that come with it.  That is the part that we must radically accept.  And it is indeed hard.

[wundress]

Hmm... .all good points... .

I wonder if maybe I question my relationship because 5 years down the line it isn't what I thought it would be. I've always thought I would be the one to be "looked after" but this relationship is the other way around. I spend much of my time looking after other people's problems that a relationship to me was meant to be a safe haven somehow. Instead it frightens me and I feel often on tenterhooks.

I guess it's difficult to define the concept of love. For me, it has always been about equality and a kind of equilibrium. I always loved the quote from Captain Corelli's Mandolin about love being like the roots of a tree. However living with a pwBPD is hard to develop those roots as our lives are often just thrown up into the air.

But I think when I initially asked the question what I meant was... .how can one love a person when there are so many traits in that person to dislike? I think it was because I was feeling so badly towards my wife and I had seen so many posts on hear about people struggling. Perhaps it redefines the meaning of a loving relationship when one partner has BPD.

[Claycrusher]

Nope mine isn't emotionally more intuitive nor has better sexual prowess.

Not all pwBPD are talented nymphomaniacs, but given that fear of abandonment lies at the core of most every disordered thing they do, most are more efficient at gauging the emotions of people around them than Nons are.  The develop this skill at an early age and hone it through practical application.  It can seem like they aren't very good at judging the emotions of others, but I suspect a lot of that has to do with what pwBPD do v. what Nons do in response to the emotions of others.  When a pwBPD renders judgement on what another's emotive state is, they tend to use that knowledge more for self-preservation than for responding from a place of compassion.

Mine views emotions in others as a weakness and tends to send her off on a BPD spiral.

Mine does, as well, but about the most dysregulated she gets is manifesting in failure to mask feeling "put out" or "put upon."

What makes you stay with yours?

That's a fair question.  The answer is that I am not staying.  I plan to file on her on grounds of adultery in August or early September.  It is not in my best interest, or that of our children or her,  to have a final decree come in to full force and effect before she completes her degree in December.  There's nothing about my marriage to save.  It was just as doomed from the start as any other of the instable relationships that pwBPD find themselves in is.  I can either end it on my time schedule at a time best for all parties concerned, or I can wait until she "paints me black" forever and does it on her time schedule under her terms, with grounds of irreconcilable differences, or whatever, but it WILL come to an end, eventually.  They almost always do.

In fairness, mine is in therapy and takes medication. Perhaps I am being a bit harsh on her as the BPD has gotten worse lately whilst under stress. She is only at the start of her therapy journey and I can see small improvements already.

I don't think you're being harsh at all, but then, I have precious little sympathy for pwBPD compared to that I have for the Nons they abuse.

And it most definitely IS abuse they dish out.  They know the difference between right and wrong.  They know they're lying when they tell a lie.  They know they're being manipulative when they try to manipulate.  They just don't give a flying f*** who gets hurt by this stuff, as long as it ain't them. 

What makes their abuse even more insidious is that they expect those they abuse to not only take the abuse, but also facilitate further abuse by acting as tools to keep their "false selves" propped up through covering up the abuse they endure.

Take away the clinical name, and you're left with an emotionally retarded person with no impulse control, no respect for accepted social or cultural boundaries, and very little empathy for anyone but themselves, who is also prone to deceit, manipulative behaviors, and mood swings.  If we're psychologically whole, we don't rush to accept this stuff from those we engage in interpersonal relationships with.  We're more inclined to brand someone bringing these traits to bear in a relationship as an a**hole and sever our relations with them in a strict "no-contact" manner.  When we do that, we're holding that other party accountable for their actions as others hold us accountable for ours.  Ah, but give "a**hole" a clinical name and diagnosis protocol, and suddenly we're reluctant to hold liars accountable for their lies and manipulators accountable for their manipulations, because they're "sick" and "need healing."

Except they aren't "sick."  They're disordered. 

Having lived with a BPDw for as long as I have, there is no doubt in my mind that being disordered sucks.  While it is true that those who have the disorder certainly didn't ask for it, it is also true that I didn't give it to them and I can't take it away.  Another truth is that the Internet is filled with peer to peer advice from clinicians to an intended audience of fellow clinicians about how to treat pwBPD without needing treatment themselves.  Even clinicians find them emotionally and mentally draining to deal with.  I see no shame in admitting that I do, too.

Just when things suck they tend to REALLY suck.

Yep.  Those things that tend to really suck never stop happening, either.  They get more frequent as you move through the Boderline Hater stage of a relationship.   Treatment may or may not mitigate this and when it does, it doesn't do so overnight, but over a period of years.

I agree about falling for a fantasy though. When I met mine she had a huge facade she created for herself.  No one around her had any idea she had a mental health illness. She was bubbly, chivalrous (in a lesbian kind of way), charming, confident, fun, extrovert, life and soul of a party.

Add "hot and sexually gifted and talented nymphomaniac" to your list and you have just described my BPDw during the Borderline Infatuation stage of our relationship, including being "chivalrous (in a lesbian kind of way)".

After a couple of weeks I realised she was seriously damaged underneath... .

I had enough psychology in college to have done a pretty accurate layperson's diagnosis on mine within a few weeks of meeting her, but unfortunately, I didn't fully grasp what I was dealing with until I had been dating mine for six to eight months.  By then, i had already sacrificed my religious convictions and commenced to engaging in pre-marital conjugal relations with her.  But once I had it figured out that she was disordered, I wanted out of the relationship, post-haste, and with a strict "no contact" policy in full force and effect.  In true Borderline Fashion, my BPDw waited to tell me that she was three months pregnant until immediately after me telling her I wanted to call it quits on our relationship.

and that's when she told me about her horrendous past. Five years later I'm still learning new things that happened to her.

Mine told me about her horrendous past the first day we spent time together.  She played the vulnerable victim thing to the hilt from the beginning.  The new things I've learned over time really haven't things done to her so much, but mostly things she's done.

Example:  Before we got married, she ditched me on my birthday after giving me every reason to believe that we were going to be celebrating it together.  She was "no contact" with me for several days after ditching me.  When I finally did see her, she admitted that she ditched me to have sex with a man she knew from her prior involvement in a Renaissance Fair Guild.  Seems like a brave thing to do, to "come clean" and "tell the truth" about a thing like that, huh?

Except that when I look back on it, she wasn't really all that brave.  She was deceitful and manipulative.  Prior to ditching me, we had a long, intense theological discussion about Christ's forgiveness of sexual sin depicted in the story of the "Woman at the Well" who some dudes were going to stone to death for harlotry before Jesus entered the scene.   She used that to gauge what my response might be if I found out she'd been out f****** some other guy.  When she told me about what she had done, she only told me a part of the truth, which isn't the same thing as telling the whole truth but is the same thing as telling a whole lie.

Some years go by, I find out that the incident above was three days of virtually non-stop sex.

More time passes, I find out that the man was married, and that my BPDw was "friends" with his wife.

More time passes, and I find out from her telling me so that what really happened was she willing went to play "unicorn" for this married couple for three days of virtually non-stop sex.

More time passes, and she divulges a promiscuous past filled with playing the "unicorn" role, involvement in group sex activity, and some hints and BDSM type activity.

That's the sort of stuff I've found out over time.

Another is that right up until getting caught in her latest extra-marital "sexploit," she claimed to share the same view of sex as a kind of example of Christ-like sacrifice of self when engaged in by Christian couples that I have held and still hold.   But that was an ongoing, repeated lie.  The truth is that sex for her isn't just about multiple orgasms, but also about things like feelings of empowerment and control that are missing in her workaday life -things more allied to Narcissistic Supply than the deepening of emotional bonding.  She also admitted that she doesn't have to have any emotional attachment at all to the person shes' f******* in order to enjoy f****** him or her, and by her own admission, it is more enjoyable in some ways if there is no emotional connection to her sex partners.

In other words, "meaningless sex" means more to her than meaningful sex does.

It only took 17 years for all that truth to come out.

She used to dissociate awfully. In fact, the definition of dissociation on this site doesn't adequately explain the dissociation my wife experiences. At times she dissociated so badly that she thought I was the man who abused her, she couldn't tell me where she was or what time/day it was.

Pretty much the same deal with mine, and I concur regarding the definition of dissociation on this site not adequately explaining what my BPDw's was like.

Her family don't want to know she is ill. They tend to blame me and see her illness as something she developed since being with me. They make me very angry so I now try to avoid them!

That's been pretty much my experience, too.  Mine can act like an a**hole and her relations don't hold her accountable but make it my fault for not loving her enough, or not doing radical acceptance, or whatever.  Very tiresome.  And of course, my BPDw doesn't defend me before them and doesn't take any responsibility for her actions.  This in itself is a very draining aspect of my relationship with my BPDw.

Lately I've just been blunt about her behaviour. I've called her out on her lies, told her when she's having a tantrum, tell her when she is behaving like a toddler or teen etc. That seems to sit ok with her at the moment.

That's what I am doing,  I used to pick and chose which to "mountain of BPD s**** I wanted to die on." But now, every s****** thing she does is brought to her attention.  Mine is acting like it is sitting okay, but it is just an act -yet another lie in a seventeen year long string of deceit.

[babyducks]

BPD is a spectrum disorder.  Within the spectrum there is room for individual expression and comorbid illnesses.

My partner is bipolar 1 and BPD.   She has been in therapy and on medication for years.  She is committed to her recovery.   To a large extent she no longer meets the diagnostic criteria for the disorder except for when under stress.    Sometimes she struggles with hypo mania.

Staying or leaving is a uniquely personal decision based on your own distinct situation.   

It took years for therapy to be effective and in the beginning things got worse before they got better.    While that was going on I needed to look seriously and coolly at my own expectations and understandings.

It does take a special skill set to stay in a relationship with anyone with a mental illness.    Saying yes to this relationship in effect means saying I understand that my primary relationship will always have some level of challenge when it comes to mental health.

I think what is important is to measure against what you want and need.    While it's difficult to list priorities and fears and be unemotional, it can be very helpful.

[Mutt]

Hmm... .all good points... .

I wonder if maybe I question my relationship because 5 years down the line it isn't what I thought it would be. I've always thought I would be the one to be "looked after" but this relationship is the other way around. I spend much of my time looking after other people's problems that a relationship to me was meant to be a safe haven somehow. Instead it frightens me and I feel often on tenterhooks.

I guess it's difficult to define the concept of love. For me, it has always been about equality and a kind of equilibrium. I always loved the quote from Captain Corelli's Mandolin about love being like the roots of a tree. However living with a pwBPD is hard to develop those roots as our lives are often just thrown up into the air.

But I think when I initially asked the question what I meant was... .how can one love a person when there are so many traits in that person to dislike? I think it was because I was feeling so badly towards my wife and I had seen so many posts on hear about people struggling. Perhaps it redefines the meaning of a loving relationship when one partner has BPD.

Hi wundress,

Good discussion. I would feel worried too if things got worse but it only takes one person to change for things fo improve. The traits are not personal, you can learn to depersonalize them.

[Lucky Jim]

I spend much of my time looking after other people's problems that a relationship to me was meant to be a safe haven somehow. Instead it frightens me and I feel often on tenterhooks.

Hey wundress, That's a good description of what it's like to be in a BPD r/s.  Most of us Nons (including me) have codependent tendencies; otherwise, we wouldn't stay in a r/s with a pwBPD.  It's easy to cross the line from caring about someone to care taking them, which creates an unhealthy dynamic for all involved, in my view.  This dynamic, however, often arises in the context of BPD.  It's something to be aware of, which is a starting point for change.

LuckyJim