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I'm beginning to sense a trend: My pwBPD wife and I go out of town and have a romantic, wonderful, kind weekend. Within days of returning home, she's lost it and we end up in hours long fights with me working my tail off to "manage" the situation.

Anyone experienced this before?

My wife and I went out of town for our 1st anniversary trip for 5 days. No fighting, great trip, very loving.

By Friday night, we were at it again, fighting about ... . well same old stuff, but triggered by a "bad" dinner with our daughter.

Is this a trend anyone else sees?

I see this pretty consistently with my uBPDbf, yes. It's so hard and is so incongruent with the wonderful, intimate time we just had together.  Why wouldn't someone want more of that?   I think it's his engulfment fears taking over when it happens. 

After I posted, I started wondering if the problem is that perhaps my wife, stepmom to my daughter is just reacting like:

1. "Great time away with my husband, I love it so much! Dial up the positive!"

2. "Wait... . now I remember that I can't have this all the time because we have shared custody of his kid... . " Sadness ensues

3. Snap and get angry about something the kid did.

4. Yell at me for not "fixing the problem"

And of course, I can't stand the position she constantly puts me in about my daughter and her desire to have me choose between them, so I get defensive, despite best efforts.

Fighting ensues thereafter.

Maybe it's that simple... .

I can definitely relate to this, I couldn't fathom how literally walking through the front door of the house would bring her into a sullen and tetchy mood even after being out having a lovely time with the kids.  There wasn't really a time delay in the response either, literally a few seconds after coming back her voice would become harsher and she'd be picking inconsistent issues where there really needn't be any.  Some of this stuff is really starting to come together in my recognition the more I identify with it.  I didn't know what gas lighting even was til today and I can recognise it happening just yesterday, when there's important information available.  There are definitely traits that aren't obvious when we are not aware of the behaviours…

"Gas lighting"? Do tell.

Yes coasterhusband, the closer we were, the worse I'd be treated the next day.  Trigger bumping, I guess.  Intimacy and laughter mean lack of control over the situation.  Or maybe they just don't know how to feel good.

Travel planning, vacations, anniversaries, holidays, the end of vacations, step children issues . . . all pretty common triggers around here.  You aren't alone, not by a long shot.  

Have you had time to read the Lessons (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=56206) yet?  

There is a lot of good information in there about the condition and about how we can better react to this stuff.  

"Gaslighting" is basically when someone lies to you with the intent to try to get you to question your own sanity.  We have a workshop on it - but its basically lying.  

Hope this helps.   :)

Fear of Abandonment and Fear of Engulfment are 2 ends of the same pendulum... . each can result in a push/pull cycle.

So all was good on vacation, right?  The real world requires an ability to deal with stress - ie, dinner with your daughter.

How are you doing at working on DEARMAN and SET tools to help communication (what you refer to as "manage" the situation)? 

the cycle for me and the ex was - great weekend together, then away from each other ( we arent in the same town ) arguments crept up until a few days before the next weekend together. Repeat to fade

I recognise this in my dealings with the pwBPD, in our short (24 months) time theres been a couple of lovely weekends we've spent which he shot down in flames, one time we had a lovely weekend, went to the movies, came home, made love had a wonderful night and the next morning he had a meltdown disappeared for a week and had sex with 2 prositutes. Another time we had a magic weekend away, came back home he stayed the night and while I was taking my kids to school  hacked my facebook and read private chats with my best friend which I told her some of my private fears around us and had a complete fit and wouldn't speak to me because he said I betrayed him... . always these things and actions occurred after a positive event. *sigh*

I'm very familiar with this. It is almost like when we don't spend time together, my best friend and I, she turns every little thing into something big for no reason.

My questions is, do they ever remember the good times which could have just happened a few hours ago? Or do those good time not count?

Yes, Coasterhusband, this was a trend with myself and my ex-wife.  But unlike you, we had no children and plenty of time to do things.   I found the earlier we went out, the more likely she would have outbursts and down moments. 

At dinner, something would trigger her and it would ruin the evening.  We basically stopped having sex six months into our marriage anyways, so it was especially heartbreaking when we had a great evening but I knew I wouldn't even get to enjoy my wife in an intimate way.

I found the later we went out, the more likely she'd fall asleep and I wouldn't have to deal with a  confrontation.  Sad, but true. 

You may find at some point that NOTHING will make these people happy, especially if they are incapable of finding happiness on their own. 

It is like happy experiences just dissolve when they get home. 

Is it from returning to the same old problems and stresses, or do they feel they do not deserve to be happy, so all the negativity returns?

Maybe both?

Absolutely, and unfortunately most of our conversations between each other were by text, especially after she started picking holes in me she always seemed to have an excuse not to speak on the phone, so we would just text each other all the time which I hated – as it can always be misinterpreted, but I guess after all that’s what she wanted right? but yeah the littlest, stupidest thing would spark her off in a rage


Unfortunately, going by my experience ( apologies Im quite new to this ) the answer is no. The 2nd half of our relationship just seemed to be an uphill battle consisting of her trying to justify why the relationship was failing, and me having to remind her constantly that the good times far outweighed the bad, even if they had just happened! I remember we got home from a night out on valentines weekend, we had a great night she fell asleep on top of me – when she woke up a few hours later and realised she moved to the other side of the bed and physically pushed me away! I don’t think she remembers anything good about the relationship AT ALL – she NEVER mentioned anything good about us

This is an element of BPD that really helped me in my early detaching days. That no matter who my ex gets with in the future, no matter how awesome he treats her, it will NEVER be good enough!

I recall saying to her during one of our final bust ups that if i were to do 99 lovely things for her but then make one minor "mistake" - all of those 99 positives would be forgotten and all she would concentrate on would be the one negative! Because they live in the moment this will continue for the rest of their sorry lives.   

I said pretty much the same thing to my ex as well, one thing done or said that they perceive as wrong and it snowballs from there knocking out any good thoughts they have. I used to think that before I read about BPD that her bad receptors were constantly ‘on’ and her good ones were just on standby lol