New Member: Just read SWoE, and my wife sounds like a high functioning BPD

[Depression = 72% of members]

Hi everyone.
I've been here a while, reading a lot of your posts. This is my first post.

After 35+ years of a really troubled marriage, I came across "Stop Walking on Eggshells" and I realized that my wife is an undiagnosed High Functioning BPD. Since you use acronyms here, I'll call it uHFBPD even though I have not seen that yet. I think “High Functioning” is an important distinction. As an uHFBPD she directs all of her borderline behaviors at me only. To everyone else she is a very nice and thoughtful person. As a result she refuses any kind of counseling and therefore will never be diagnosed.

I also think our adult daughter that lives with us has BPD, hence my username. I plan to join the "Son, Daughter or Son/Daughter In-law with BPD" forum to get help and advice about that relationship

My first impression here is that most of you have it worse than me. My experience has included the following:
1) Blame. Everything is my fault. EVERYTHING. I see that is a common problem among those of us in a relationship with a BP. Before I realized that this is a symptom of a disorder I would attempt to dialog with her about her accusations. That led to some really convoluted "logic" on her part, in an effort to maintain the idea that everything is my fault. This was my first clue that something might possibly be wrong with her.
2) The silent treatment. I get this all the time. Seems like some of you get this as well. In my case it seems to be triggered randomly (as far as I can tell), and usually last 3 days. Sometime she will explain what I did to offend her so greatly, other times I think she felt it was obvious and required no explanation. Typically I have no clue.
3) Bizarre, irrational emotional reactions, apparently provoked by NOTHING. This seems common in the posts here. I learned the term "dysregulation" here and that describes my experiences really well.
4) Alternative facts (that’s my name for this BPD phenomenon). She recalls just about everything we have ever experienced together VERY differently than I do. The explanation in the "Stop Walking on Eggshells" book is that I base my feelings on facts, she bases her facts on her feelings. This explains a LOT.
5) Black & White. Everything is expressed in extremes. If I have to work late one night, she says I am NEVER home. If I don’t feel like ordering fish for dinner, she’ll say “I see you hate fish now”. These consistent wild exaggerations have started to rub off on me. That’s scary to see the ways she may be poisoning my mind.

The symptoms she has NOT displayed are: harming herself or threatening to harm me or the kids or grandkids. While she constantly criticizes me, she does not use the really foul language some of you describe hearing from your BPD partners. Mostly its' just that I'm mean, cruel, thoughtless, self-centered, a bad husband and a bad father.

For decades I thought I was a bad husband and/or a bad person. After reading the book I am finally free of that and able to get a better grip on reality.
Since I have not read any posts that specifically identify problems with High Functioning borderlines, I am wondering if this is a small subset of the forum? Or do people in my circumstance typically not post here?
Am I in the right place?

[DoubleBP2018]

Hi everyone.
I've been here a while, reading a lot of your posts. This is my first post.

After 35+ years of a really troubled marriage, I came across "Stop Walking on Eggshells" and I realized that my wife is an undiagnosed High Functioning BPD. Since you use acronyms here, I'll call it uHFBPD even though I have not seen that yet. I think “High Functioning” is an important distinction. As an uHFBPD she directs all of her borderline behaviors at me only. To everyone else she is a very nice and thoughtful person. As a result she refuses any kind of counseling and therefore will never be diagnosed.

I also think our adult daughter that lives with us has BPD, hence my username. I plan to join the "Son, Daughter or Son/Daughter In-law with BPD" forum to get help and advice about that relationship

My first impression here is that most of you have it worse than me. My experience has included the following:
1) Blame. Everything is my fault. EVERYTHING. I see that is a common problem among those of us in a relationship with a BP. Before I realized that this is a symptom of a disorder I would attempt to dialog with her about her accusations. That led to some really convoluted "logic" on her part, in an effort to maintain the idea that everything is my fault. This was my first clue that something might possibly be wrong with her.
2) The silent treatment. I get this all the time. Seems like some of you get this as well. In my case it seems to be triggered randomly (as far as I can tell), and usually last 3 days. Sometime she will explain what I did to offend her so greatly, other times I think she felt it was obvious and required no explanation. Typically I have no clue.
3) Bizarre, irrational emotional reactions, apparently provoked by NOTHING. This seems common in the posts here. I learned the term "dysregulation" here and that describes my experiences really well.
4) Alternative facts (that’s my name for this BPD phenomenon). She recalls just about everything we have ever experienced together VERY differently than I do. The explanation in the "Stop Walking on Eggshells" book is that I base my feelings on facts, she bases her facts on her feelings. This explains a LOT.
5) Black & White. Everything is expressed in extremes. If I have to work late one night, she says I am NEVER home. If I don’t feel like ordering fish for dinner, she’ll say “I see you hate fish now”. These consistent wild exaggerations have started to rub off on me. That’s scary to see the ways she may be poisoning my mind.

The symptoms she has NOT displayed are: harming herself or threatening to harm me or the kids or grandkids. While she constantly criticizes me, she does not use the really foul language some of you describe hearing from your BPD partners. Mostly its' just that I'm mean, cruel, thoughtless, self-centered, a bad husband and a bad father.

For decades I thought I was a bad husband and/or a bad person. After reading the book I am finally free of that and able to get a better grip on reality.
Since I have not read any posts that specifically identify problems with High Functioning borderlines, I am wondering if this is a small subset of the forum? Or do people in my circumstance typically not post here?
Am I in the right place?

[RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING]

RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members are welcomed to express frustration but must seek constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[flourdust]

You are in the right place, and welcome! After reading SWoE, what did you think? Is there anything in there that might help you?

[Wrongturn1]

Welcome, Double!  You are definitely in the right place.  My uBPDw also fits in the "high functioning" category.  Nobody else but me (and also to a significant degree our children) experiences my wife's negativity, paranoia, blaming, accusations, emotional volatility, compulsive drinking, etc.  If I told anyone that knows both of us about the version of my wife that exists behind closed doors, I doubt they would believe me.

My situation and our relationship has improved greatly over the past several years as I have started to implement boundaries around verbal and emotional abuse.  I try to always be prepared to protect myself from abuse or remove myself from the situation if she persists (false accusations are abusive behavior, by the way).  I make efforts to have emotionally validating and self-protecting lines ready to deliver such as, "our relationship is important to me, and I care very much about how you are feeling; at the same time, this conversation is not helping either of us and it is hurting our relationship, so I will not be a part of it".  Then be prepared to leave the room or the house if she is not willing to drop it.

Another book I found very helpful after reading SWOE was "When Hope Is Not Enough" by Bon Dobbs.  This provides great examples of emotional validation and how it can be used to improve a relationship with a borderline.

[DoubleBP2018]

flourdust,
I read SWoE about a year and a half ago. It made a lot of sense to me, I was really impressed by the idea that she changes facts to fit her feelings. Suddenly I was able to see that she really believed the things she was accusing me of. I stopped arguing with her and let her believe the wierd, incorrect and often horrible things she was saying to me. That was counterintuitive! That really helped our relationship. Turns out that me relentlessly making her face reality was just making her angrier and angrier over time.


One of her go-to tactics has always been the silent treatment. I'd get that every few months for the last 3 decades. It's been emotionally exhausting. She has not done this since I started not responding to the "alternative facts" about 1-1/2 years ago. That's by far the longest gap between silent treatment episodes.


Long-winded way to say yes, the book has helped me.

[DoubleBP2018]

Wrongturn1,

Glad to hear that your situation has improved. So far mine has just stopped getting worse. That's a win, but now I'm hoping to see if I can do things (or stop doing things) that might actually improve our relationship.

Thanks for the book recommendation, I will look into that.

[once removed]

so, how is it going today DoubleBPD2018? any update? what are you learning about that might help?

I also think our adult daughter that lives with us has BPD, hence my username. I plan to join the "Son, Daughter or Son/Daughter In-law with BPD" forum to get help and advice about that relationship

thats certainly an added load on your plate. did you scope out the S/D board?

[Radcliff]

Hello DoubleBP2018,

My wife is high functioning BPD as well.  Everything you said resonated with me.  It can be tremendously isolating to be with a high-functioning pwBPD because we may be the only ones who see it.  The thing I found is that the tools we teach here are still tremendously important.  When I first arrived, I just posted in a single thread, got an answer to a couple of questions, then went back to flying solo with Stop Walking on Eggshells as my guide.  It wasn't until six months later that I came back to bpdfamily and became and stayed active on a regular basis.  The power of the Bettering board comes from discussing our efforts to refine our use of coping tools.

What aspect of your wife's behavior concerns you the most now?

RC

[Ozzie101]

Hello DoubleBP2018! I'm in a similar boat, with an uHFBPDh. We've only been married 2 years but I also just read the book and found this forum. It's been very helpful so far.

I don't get the silent treatment. My husband is more likely to fly into a rage. But he definitely does all the other things you mentioned.

When he first started this cycle of dysregulation a few months ago, I assumed it was me. I was a bad wife. I was making mistakes. I was making him unhappy. Then, I started noticing things in his rages. Looking in his eyes, it was as if someone else was behind the wheel, so to speak. His emotional reactions to things were so extreme. Our arguments and conversations were strange loops that started to make no sense. He would contradict himself multiple times in one conversation. It finally dawned on me, "Something's not right here."

I've been working on setting boundaries and validating feelings without validating his "false facts." I'm learning that sometimes I have to let things go and not fight back because fighting back against something that's not true just makes him worse. For instance, he told me he knew my father or grandfather must have molested me and then brainwashed me as that's the only reason I would be so attached to them. At first I was horrified and lashed back at him. Now, I just calmly say, "not true" and then move on to something else.

The problem in my case is that when I try to use careful language to validate his feelings but not agree with him, he picks up on it and accuses me of choosing my words carefully. It's a learning process. But I have noticed that if I stay calm (NOT easy when I'm someone who reacts very strongly to falsehoods), his rages aren't quite so bad.

Luckily, I have friends and family who would and do believe me when I tell them what's going on and they've been supportive. It's very helpful to know you have a system behind you when you need it. And if you don't have those people in your daily, physical life, having people in cyberspace who understand and can give advice is invaluable.

[DoubleBP2018]

Once Removed,

Right now things are not great. The holidays bring out the worst in my wife, she is upset at me for who-knows-what right now.

I took Wrongturn1 advice and ordered the WHINE book. I have not read very much of it yet, but it seems very promising because the author has a BPD wife and daughter like me, so I'm hoping to get a lot out of it.

I have not spent much time on the S/D board yet.

[DoubleBP2018]

RC,

I have certainly felt the isolation you mentioned. uHFBPDw is so nice to other people, and a very loving grandmother. I think my non-BPD kids might see some of the crazyness, but no one else does.

I'm reading WHINE, I hope that the specific advice it promises will help me learn to validate her feelings without validating the invalid. So far all I do is stay silent when she is blaming me for something. That's better than JADE,  but she will start to think I'm just ignoring her if I don't come up with some meaningful responses.

[DoubleBP2018]

Ozzie,

I have benefitted from one friend that believes me and has been supportive. That has kept me sane but does not help my situation at home. This forum and the books are giving me hope for a positive path forward.

Like you I react strongly to falsehoods, and that has made things a lot worse over the years. The first thing I did after I read SWOE was to not respond to falsehoods at all. That seemed to smooth things out with uHFBPDw pretty quickly so I was able to adopt that as a routine behavior.  Well most of the time.

I know what you mean about careful language to validate feelings. Whenever I try that she seems to figure out what I'm doing and it does not go well. I'm reading WHINE now, I hope that I learn ways to validate feelings in a more genuine way.

[Circle]

Hi,
Good thread.
I get some of the false stories from family.
It is really hard to shake it.
Letting it go is key though I guess.
I struggle more with this currently than partner relationship stuff.
That's because I am single.
I appreciated some of the thread advice like quietly saying 'not true'.
Anyway, hang in there with the holidays!

[once removed]

Right now things are not great. The holidays bring out the worst in my wife, she is upset at me for who-knows-what right now.

whats going on?

[SlothMaiden]

Hi DoubleBP2018,

I feel for you! I am currently on "silent treatment" mode by my uBPDexbf and when we were still together, he sometimes raged by throwing things and hitting himself. He always criticized me and blamed me for his hurt. And distorting the facts to match his feelings was something similar too. You are not alone in this.

You said that it's not going well during holiday. Can you tell us what is it?

[lenfan]

Hi Border.  My situation is with a high functioning too, and most of what you describe resonates with me.
My UHFBPDW is really heavy into blame right now. The SWOE approach helps, but like in your situation she seems to sense something is different in my response to her and adjusts her verbal assaults once it seems like  I have made some progress.

One thing I did not see in your list, which may be an issue that is present but is uncomfortable to bring up, is a lack of a sex life. "No sex" comes up periodically here and no one seems to have any solutions. Someone posted recently on that topic, and I was going to reply there but can't find the thread now. Where your situation seems pretty close to mine both in terms of length of the relationship and the high functioning component, I' m going to take a guess that you have encountered the same problem. I'm going over a year without now, and before that it was sketchy too. Are you in the same boat? If not, how did you avoid it?   I'll go on about my own situation some other time. For now, let me just say your observations are on point and you have come to the right place. You are not alone.  Good luck with everything.

[DoubleBP2018]

Short story: The current dysregulation started with a financial dispute.

Long version: We are on a fixed budget. I'm not retired yet, but in planning for that future retirement I realized we need to control spending now. I worked out a retirement plan that's based on our current budget so it did not require any cost-cutting. uHFBPDw has never participated in financial planning at all. (She does not work) She treats money as binary, do we have money or not? I think that by not participating in financial planning she can always blame me for any problems, which of course she does anyway. After I worked out the plan she not only agreed to it, but gave me a very rare compliment, saying I did a nice job making the plan. That was 6 months ago.

Now out of nowhere she wants to buy an expensive piece of furniture that will put us WAY over budget this year. I told her we can't afford it now, but we can plan for it next year. Since then she keeps saying we have no money, we can't afford anything, and other extreme (and completely false) statements.

I understand that she feels this is a "need" (it is actually a "want"). I understand that when I can't giver her what she wants right now, she feels we are "poor" (we are not).

What I don't get is how I can validate her feelings in these circumstances.

I don't think she wants her feelings validated, she wants me to buy her something.

Any insights you have for me are appreciated.

[DoubleBP2018]

Ianfan, your guess is correct!  :-(

My relationship with uHFBPDw had been in decline for over 3 decades before I found SWOE and this forum. She has a way of accumulating resentments over time which has led to us not getting along very well at all. I have always assumed lack of romance is a direct result of our dysfunctional personal relationship. If I can learn how to deal with her in a more positive manner our relationship may improve and that might come back. Maybe.

[once removed]

I don't think she wants her feelings validated, she wants me to buy her something.

probably... .

there isnt really a lot there to validate, specifically... .sometimes validation is just listening, really listening with empathy (https://bpdfamily.com/content/listen-with-empathy).

and it sounds like you heard the message between the lines.

is she big on gifts in general?

[DoubleBP2018]

is she big on gifts in general?

Yes, that is her primary love language as far as I can tell.

In an effort to better understand her I read the 5 love languages book. She thought it was stupid and refused to do the assessment. So I answered the questions as I thought she would. I could be way off.

[Notgoneyet]

    DoubleBP2018,  I'd like to give you a late Welcome Aboard !    In many ways our situations are very similar. 40yr R/L , uHFBPDw +/- 35 yrs (short Divorce & remarriage) early on in there as well.  Lots of blame,distorted facts,black & white thinking, bizarre emotional reactions. And her personal Favorite: (Silent Treatment) Has gone on for up to over a month. Which I've recently read here as well as a few books that this can be a form of (abuse),which by the way I'm glad to hear because that's exactly how it has felt sometimes!

Quote:"Now out of nowhere she wants to buy an expensive piece of furniture that will put us WAY over budget this year. I told her we can't afford it now, but we can plan for it next year. Since then she keeps saying we have no money, we can't afford anything, and other extreme (and completely false) statements."

  I get this same reactions & some of the Exact words sometimes from From my SO as well when she finds some must have deal of the month or yr. Ignoring the false statements of our financial situation & tell her we can try & plan it into the next few months budget works well a lot of the time. She is very much an (impulse buyer) if left to her wishes. The budget was one of the best ways that worked for us to prevent it.  20 yrs ago the CC spending was out of control and we had a horrible time getting that under control. 
She gets a cash budget(an amount She helped set) every week now for food, household, & gifts and Most all of the $ fights have ended with this technique !
 We r now on track to get mortgage payed off before I retire in about 8 yrs.
 Keep up the great reads & r/l work that you've posted here. 
 Sending hope & strength, NGY