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I have been reading a lot about setting boundaries. Still trying to totally understand them.  The issue with myself is that I think all my life I have had weak boundaries and then when I met the woman I am married to now I just let her kick the weak wall down.

I am going somewhere with the boundary thing but I have to explain this situation.

Friday night my wife and I had a really good talk. She opened up about a lot. She was all good with going to MC. She talked as if she was wanting to get help. She explained to me how she views me compared to how she viewed me the first two years we were together. She even said that she did both of us a disservice by holding me too high (idealizing) she didn't use that term. That was Friday evening.

Saturday morning rolls around. She is in bed until 12:00pm she was supposed to get up and take the cat to the vet at 9:15 while I was doing something helping my daughter. All of these things were agreed upon prior to saturday. The sleeping until 12:00, 1:00pm is her usual behavior.

I knew she would not be out of bed to take the cat so I rescheduled it for 3:45 that afternoon. When she got up at noon she sat around and did nothing until 3:30.  I was patient and understanding. I was a little discouraged inside because she is so un productive with her life. Anyway we took the cat to the vet and the rest of the evening went well.

Then sunday rolls around. I get up at 7am go to church@11am and get home around 12:45pm ( I get a text in church of things to pick up at store on my way home) I get home and she is still sleeping. She finally gets up at around 1:15 and I was going hiking with my daughter. My wife was going to go to the store and buy stuff for dinner sunday evening while my daughter and I were out hiking. At 4:15 coming off the mountain my texts start coming in that I need to go to the store and buy groceries, she just could not go. No reason other than she just didn't want to.

So I was aggravated inside. I wasn't mad just discouraged because she couldn't muster up enough to go the store. She had nothing else to do. So I text her and tell her that she needed to go get her anti depressant which was ready at pharmacy.

I was going to pick it up for her on the way home but since I had to go to the store the pharmacy would have been closed for me to make it. She was out of her medication. The pharmacy is literally 3 minutes from the house and she would not go get it. This plays into part of my aggravation explained in the following.

I get home. I am tired my feet are burning and my facial expression was that of a tired man. She asked did you have a nice time I said yes. I still had my tired face with some put off feelings inside of having to go to the store, not bad. She says are you mad at me? I said "what because I had to go to the store?" just in a normal voice.  She then said "well I hope you didn't have a nice time"   

My brain said buckle up, sunday evening may be tense. So we were both a little quiet. About 9:30 she asked me to sit by her on the couch she wanted my opinion about a Facebook post. I must have sighed a little, she asked me what was wrong and I said nothing just tired and she said I don't believe you. She pressed me about what was wrong.

In a nice way I told her how her depression is getting to me. That is all the further I got. Could not detail anything. I swear I was saying it in calm voice, I was already aprehensive ( I know she didn't want to hear it)

So she raises her voice and reprimands me " why don't you just pray for me instead of telling me what’s wrong with me?" I felt like saying that’s what I have been doing for four years and its not helping, but I didn't. I got up off the couch and said that this is what you always say to me.

I raised my voice a little (she always tells me I scare the dog) He just senses the tension. All I remember thinking was I know where this is going so I said I am not having this conversation, this way. She wanted to lay all the blame on me. I didn't want to stand there and JADE. When I said I can't have this conversation like this she said "Good... .Bye".

so in about 5 minutes I decided to go for a drive to just calm my mind.

I came back in about 15 minutes

then I get this text from her:

something down inside you really detest me, doesn't it? We've been doing pretty good, I thought, now you want to start your whining about me not being this and not being that... .tend to your own damn self and if you feel the need to discuss something with me that bothers you, you need to do it in a nice way. I have already got mama, my son and my brother whining to me about what they don't prefer about me, I don't need you added to that list

this is Sunday evening….I go to bed can’t sleep. I pull the text up and go to forward it to my email and accidentally send it to her phone. Oops!

Then she texted why did you forward me my own text?

I texted because I meant to hit the delete button but hit forward by mistake

Her: either that or you forwarded it to the wrong person.

I decided not to respond….I laid there and finally fell asleep

Fast forward to Monday morning 11:51

No texts or talking between her last text to me and this one at 11:51 am

Her: Like I said before, if this is how “Christians” act that go to church, I’d just as soon stay home. Your “ admonishment” doesn’t hold much water for me now. Not coming from you

10 minutes passed and I had not texted back

Her: I wont go to counseling with you while you are treating me this way, so address this NOW with me or go alone

Me: I will call you in a little bit

Her: now or forget it

5 minutes passed I had not replied

Her: Ok then. Have it your way

I am going to MC tomorrow on my own.


Ok I walked away from a situation that could have gotten out of hand and then came the insults from her and pretty much silent treatment all day Monday and Tuesday. Her detaching from me.

I think I did “ok”

Her deal is that I should have never said anything about her depression. So I was the irresponsible one.

Should I accept any responsibility for my timing being “off” ? It was going to come out sooner or later and I was not nasty about it.

my next post is the sequel… tuesday night got really bad

I don't have time to write much. Continue to tell what happened. But I will give you my impression from my own experience with BPD mom.

First of all. You did nothing wrong. You don't have to apologize for your normal behavior. You went out of your way to deal with your wife's feelings and take care of your family. So, IMHO, I would not engage her in this latest episode until you have some feedback from some posters.

I can see where this got derailed, and it isn't your fault. You spoke the truth, but the truth is not something that is easily dealt with in this kind of relationship. This does not mean you deny it, or ignore it, but that it is triggering to her. A part of her relationship is built on mutual denial, reinforcing her idealized self, but you don't have to do this.

My mother is like your wife, stays in bed all day. My father went to the store for her, watched the kids, like you. However, this is a source of her unhappiness. In fact, it makes it worse. Each day she does nothing, she feels worse about herself. Yet, it has to be her to change it. Part of it is depression, but I think this plays into poor sense of self.

In my mother's mind, she wishes to be a great mom, one who does things. The truth is - she does very little and she is very ashamed of that. Any sort of reminder of this is painfully triggering to her. For instance, saying something like "mom, you hurt my feelings when you yelled at me" could make her go ballistic.

This is where it started In a nice way I told her how her depression is getting to me.   You spoke the truth, but the truth is triggering to her. It all went downhill after that. Everything else comes from that. Now , hopefully others can help you with what to do when things go unto that rabbit hole.

The short answer is no, it doesn't matter when you said it, your timing would never be right.  In BPD world, you are in basically one of two potential states with your partner - on a pedestal with beyond realistic expectations or in the doghouse because you have inevitably failed them, just as they knew you would.

Actually, it sounds like you are making good progress on boundaries in that you are learning to just leave and not engage in the circular arguments and you are also not responding to the threatening (controlling) text messages that will have you feeling like a yo-yo.

IME, it's never the right time. I say what I need to say and accept where the cards may fall.

It is important to consider sensitivity and timing when approaching a difficult issue in a relationship or problem that you partner may have or be enduring.

But let's get this much straight. You are in a relationship with someone suffering BPD and your sensitivity is unlikely to ever be enough and your timing will always be off.

Part of that problem is she "perceived" your facial expression and sigh to be contemptuous and she was triggered. When a pwBPD is triggered everything after that is usually a downhill slide from there.

It is what it is.