BPDFamily.com

So I had a hare-brained thought just now and was hoping someone could shed some light.

My wife tells me she loves me and misses me and loves me forever etc etc etc but she's not willing to reconcile.  I'm not trying to engage in some form of psychological jujitsu, but taking the idea of validation to the limit, would validating that she doesn't want to be with me any more be helpful or harmful?  And if helpful, how would I go about being truly empathetic and validating to someone who I'd desperately like to recommit to our marriage?

Simply because I've seen it mentioned in so many other threads, this is the first time this happened in our marriage; we've never split before and there aren't years of anger and mistrust built up; my spouse literally spiraled into a multitude of mental health crises within a few months culminating in her walking out of my life one afternoon.

The curious thing about your situation is that, while she says she is done with the relationship, she continues to include you in her decision-making. Might be best to focus more on what she does than what she says for now, especially while it sounds like she is dealing with the aftermath of what could be an acute crisis. With an unstable self and a crisis on top of everything, how resolute are her decisions? I would be inclined to wait and see.

Also, would you say she is stable enough to go through with something as cognitively and psychologically strenuous as a divorce?

I mention all of this because she feels how she feels when she feels it, and if she is BPD, then this will change and then change again. It takes some stability to file for divorce and follow through with it.

More important than validation in this regard is you being you, focusing on your well-being. You can care about her and yourself at the same time, yet often we tip too far in their direction and lose ourselves. I know it's hard to find this sweet spot when your relationship is on the rocks. Still, that sweet spot is there.

Validation will work up to a point. Validation-fu used with dubious intent is likely to backfire since the backbone on which it rests is empathy and authenticity. What you are going for is validation of how she feels, not agreement (or disagreement) with what she says.

You might be hinting at something that will reassure her, which is that you are able to care for your emotional injuries independent of what she says and does. People with BPD are aware of the impact they have, though it is often too painful to go there. It's humming away in the background, tho. When we strengthen ourselves, we can strengthen the relationship.

No magic bullets, just regular old emotional health and resilience.  :)

To your point LNL, I've resolved her care coordination issues and gone NC.  Again, NC is for me and not a game.  So, at this point we are not speaking via my choice and she is free to do her thing.  Her issues seem to boil down to control at this point, but  one of the last things I said was that she had all the power and that I need to stop talking to her to heal myself.

I'm struggling because I can't go back to the marriage I was in, but I want to give us a chance. I just don't know if I'm wasting my time

This is a huge step in healing.

To recognize that the status quo of your relationship is tilted way too far in her favor -- it's not healthy for either of you, although because of her BPD, she will feel compelled to tilt it her way, even if that is not the healthy choice, and even if at the end of the day she does not want to have that power.

So you recognized that, and are now taking steps to reclaim that focus back for yourself.  |iiii

It will likely be a moment to moment, day by day struggle to do this, and you will (in all likelihood, and understandably) be tempted to feel that your healing is contingent on future choices in regard to her, and what she does or does not do. It's human nature to do this, and it's also a distraction from the work.


BPD relationships can bring us to the deepest source of pain in ourselves. Once we touch that pain, what we do with that pain is a choice we make. Ultimately, it is about evolving your personality to a point where you may not recognize your old self. You may one day look back with compassion on who you were when all of this started. It will feel like everything was about her and you may see that the relationship, while painful, did not necessarily have to hurt as much.

Will she be the same? It's hard to say. Will you be the same? Also hard to say. You cannot count on her to change, though your own changes,  -- that is in your control.

Even if the relationship is over as she says, would you want to date right now? I have seen a formula here on the boards that for every year of marriage, it takes a month to heal from the divorce. For a high-conflict marriage, the months can double. So for 10 years of marriage, 20 months of healing. The difference between healing from a detaching perspective, and one from a saving perspective, is that both include taking care of yourself, whereas saving skills push you to look at relationship dynamics. Not just BPD dynamics, though they tend to push us harder because the emotional dysregulation is more extreme.

You are NC right now and probably want certainty? It is painful to not have that, and makes sense that you want to have answers, now, so you can move forward with a plan.

For me, I find that certainty can shortcut some of the important healing work. It's part of the pain x resistance = suffering equation they talk about in mindfulness classes.

It used to drive me nuts when my T said to "lean into the pain," and here I am suggesting the very same thing.   For me, it eventually did work, though it hurt like nothing I'd experienced before.  

Boundaries. Limit investments. Limit your own expectations. If you put effort in and you get something back. Good. If it all is into a black hole. Stop digging.


So in any case you need to find an alternative with her or without. Instead of focusing on the old relationship think about how the next one should be. How would you like to behave in it? Start acting that way. She may fit or may not but in any case you win.


Validation should not focus on her wants - this is her conclusion from the confusing emotions she experiences. Conclusions are judgments and that is after b&w thinking came in.

It would be better to focus on the fact that she is torn. She wants but somehow also wants not. Dialectic message  . And considering the past breakup that is all quite understandable. You are feeling ambivalent too.