BPDFamily.com

Going through a divorce with a pwBPD wife after a 7 year marriage. That relationship story itself is long and chaotic like all these rs stories are and probably someday i will write a book about it, as a way to get final closure.

The hardest part for me is behind me, the focus on her is gradually fading away and i am sitting down with myself now most of the time to deal with the wounds and insecurities that got me attracted.

And today i struck me very clear.

I HAVE KNOWN ALL ALONG that she was unstable, that she had a chaotic relationship history, that she could devalue other people in a split second over virtually nothing. I have seen all that happen over the years, how she dealt with even her closest friends, villifying them over virtually nothing. How she made up lies to avoid responsability or appointments. How she could have passionate new interests one moment and suddenly drop them a few weeks later. That she was eager to play the victim towards other people, and that she always found reasons not to blame herself.

and here it comes:

I had the magical belief that i somehow would stay immune and spared from that behaviour.

In other words, i thought i was this special snowflake that would always escape her destructive tendencies, that i had this magic place in her life that kept me safe from all that, and remain that one true white knight. And it worked for nearly five years, that even after the 6 month honeymoon phase we had many years of relative bliss... .there was abandonment fear, extreme yealousy and some intense rages but we were doing okay.

And then a year ago suddenly there were things happening and words coming out of her mind that didnt match up with the person i thought i had married. She started to find fault in every little thing i did or said. She began rewriting our past together and even found ways to default the most special moments in our relationship history. After the initial shock i found out that i was being devalued and on my way to being discarded.

I always knew she had borderline and bipolar, yet i was so confident it would never turn against me... .I was different... .

But i wasn't, there is no escape from these diseases, for no one. And I am not that special snowflake that can dodge the BPD bullit.

Yet... .

For years she made me believe i was this special one. It wasn't even my magical believe really, it was part of the fantasy she had about us, and it worked as long as her fantasy was sustainable for her. As long as she could sustain the persona that is required for that particular fantasy. And that's probably a very important issue in BPD. They don't have a self. They take on a fantasy and become the person that is able to play out this fantasy, they mirror you as a way to make that fantasy come true; and are extremely convincing at it.

It's just a way to avoid dealing with their fragmented self, the fantasy is an escape, and when reality catches up, they destroy one fantasy and the person(s) attached to it and hatch on to another fantasy where they can can start all over with a totally different persona if needed.

My personal conclusion:

I wanted to believe the fantasy as much as she did, i didnt want to admit though that contrary to all the evidence around, she would one day split me black and turn her own fantasy into her self-created nightmare, and channeling all the blame and shame to me in the process.

I now know that these BPD relationships are like stage plays, you can improvise a bit along the way to keep the fairy tale going for a bit longer, but the last dramatic act is always set in stone.

Even though the first act made me believe otherwise. And on that i realise today i have let myself be fooled. And i am not judging myself too hard here, it's just an invaluable lesson to take towards the future... . 

Word for word, I think that is exactly what happened in my relationship.

8 years, similar behaviour.

A very insightful post.

I'm glad to be reading this because at one point I thought I could do things differently to avoid her going down the pattern. Indeed, I managed to slow down or extend the stable period, but it still crashed down dramatically.

Hi woundedPhoenix,

Welcome to bpdfamily. I'm glad you're here, and thank you for this insightful read. I can relate to that fantasy you describe. I've come to believe that my relationship with pwBPD was in large part based on a fantasy: that we would somehow "save" each other (from what, I'm not sure). At first, it really seemed that we had an amazing and healing connection, but in my case, the relationship broke down very quickly and caused a lot of heartache on my part, and triggering of past trauma on his part. Very sad situation.

How are you coping with the divorce, wounded? What strategies have been most helpful for you?

heartandwhole

Hey HearthAndWhole.

How am i coping with the divorce? Like everyone i think. The triad of working through the emotions and traumas, figuring out the rs rationally for as much as you can do that and looking into your own needs and wants to get on and build a new life and set strict boundaries towards the old life.

Meanwhile i am reading a lot, seeing a therapist and giving it the time it needs to work through this all.

And i am chatting daily with someone who has both come out of a borderline and a narcist relationship, we kind of carry eachother through the thougher moments :-)

Same here, the saving part as well, saving eachother from childhood pains to be exact... .And its ironic that the downward slope was actually initiated due to her therapy.

They went into deep trauma recovery way to early and it made her so unstable in just a few weeks time that it brought on a failed suicide attempt.

And after that all trust was broken, and her character began to change totally... .

Wow it kills me that this is exactly what happened with my wife:  one mental illness turned into half a dozen in the space of a few months, she decompensated, had daily SI and we considered having her committed only for her to balk and then leave our family a few weeks later.  I could never really figure out why she changed so rapidly but I will be bringing this up to my T as a question next time I go.

I thought therapy was making her worse but I couldn't put my finger on it.  Was it the psychotherapy itself that caused her to decompensate?  That just rips my guts out if true - the thing I thought would cause my wife' life to turn around caused her to no longer be in our lives.

Well early July last year she had a particular therapy session where they went back to a key moment in childhood abuse. The next weeks she got increasingly paranoid and distrusting and started to project the uncovered abuse on me, leading up to a day where all hell broke lose, she set out to destroy me characterwise as a standin for her father, i had to withdraw as the situation became too explosive but contacted her T to intervene. yet by the evening she already attempted suicide.

And after that... .Full on devaluation, and slow but steady it brought on a complete character change. i tried for many months but in the end she had changed so much, i simply couldn't bridge it anymore