BPDFamily.com

I have just joined here so still learning. I am looking for your advice on this current situation i'm in. So i am with this guy (uBPD) for 18yrs now and married for 4yrs. In relationship phase we didn't live together but after marriage, ie the last 4yrs, since we have started to live together things have become worse. Last year things were worst, and over several months he accused me and my family of several things, most of which are extremely inaccurate. His family doesn't know (and doesn't really care) about his BPD and they aided his behavior in all this. I have been struggling with my mental health for last fews years and at this point it has set very badly. I am into higher academia and the pressure of PhD has also left me drained.

Currently, i have joined postdoc and since it is in a different city, i talked and discussed with him before taking up the position and when he agreed, i took a rented apartment and furnished it with everything that costed me all my PhD savings. I arranged this just so that he and me can live together because after this postdoc, i may have to go abroad for the 2nd postdoc so for next 1 or 2yrs we may have to be long distance. I have discussed all these with him. He is not at all good with long distances. But to make our relationship work i compromised my Phd stream, postdoc, everything to stay near him. This current postdoc is in another city for not very far from our home or his workplace.

For last about 3weeks we went to our respective houses to take care of some family needs. One day in between we met up and i was late. This enraged him and he started to threaten that he wont stay in our rented apartment anymore. There's literally no connection between the two. So that day i cried for 2.5 hrs over the phone, tried to cool him down, requested him not to move out of our apartment (i felt so bad because i am the one who has rented it and bought everything to furnish it).. he then cooled down and said he'd rethink. Then everything was fine he was in good and 'normal' mood.

Yesterday I told him i'd return this Monday and asked him when he'd come back. He again started to say he won't go back. Apparently he's in good mood but just trying to frustrate me and 'getting back at me' for no apparent reason. He has always made me 'beg' for him to stay here, as if my getting a postdoc in a different (but still nearby) city was a crime. My friends from Phd went abroad for postdoc or atleast in other states in good institutions for their career. I have chosen among the only 3 or 4 institutes which were around our city. Even getting into one of these 3-4 institute of very hard, but somehow i managed.


Recently, i am starting to take more responsibility for my mental health. I can't really describe just how extremely bad my mental health is. I am highly sensitive person, also have ADHD,very low self esteem. Chronic stress has manifested into numerous physical symptoms like bad indigestion issues, very frequent allergies, miscellaneous nd severe body pains everyday, migraines everyday. There is no therapist here in my country who understands these kind of issues. I am trying my best to regain my health. Trying to read relevant books on these issues, trying meditation and art therapies for my mental health.

At this point I feel like i should take a stand for his behaviors. The series of accusation of last year have left me very damaged on the inside. All i have done is accept everything and say sorry because I can't deal with conflict at all, it impacts me very badly maybe because i am highly sensitive. So this time i decided that if he doesn't return to the apartment i will say 'we are done'...i don't think he will be expecting this, all he will expect is more pleading and crying on my part. I am trying to mentally accept the fact too that if he continues like this, we should really be done. And if we are to stay, he needs to take up atleast some bit of responsibility towards his behavior and towards this marriage. I shouldn't be the only one trying to keep everything together. Just to clarify, i am not really ready to move on.  We have been together for 18yrs and am still very severely codependent on him. But just want to put my foot down.

What are your views on this? I am afraid that if things escalated and we really break up. But honestly I don't know how else to bring a change in this relationship. If i approach by 'normal' conversation he will not even hear. Whenever i try to say something serious he avoids badly, he doesn't like any serious conversation. Previously, as i recall, i have given him ultimatum twice in two occasions long back and as i remember, it had worked both the times. What are your views on this? Is there any alternative? what are your experiences regarding this, esp regarding major changes that you could bring about in the relationship? how did you make it happen?

Thank you for reading. Any support would mean a lot.

Hello and welcome to the forums, thanks for posting and sharing.  Many of us have been in this exact circumstance and it is extremely volatile.

A fear of abandonment is a prevailing trait of BPD.  I understand that your post-graduate work can only happen in certain places, and I understand that it makes sense for you to finish your education.  I am looking at this logically though; you've been in school for 7+ years already...it makes total sense to do the last year or two.

Your husband, however, is seeing this emotionally.  He FEELS (an emotion) that if you actually cared about him, you'd never leave him.  Yet that's exactly what you're planning...you've already pulled him out of his comfort zone in the nearby city.  This makes him FEEL like you're not committed to the relationship, like your career is more important than him, and maybe you'll meet someone else overseas and fall in love.

Is that logical?  Not at all.  But when we're talking about feelings and how BPD's process emotion, it shows how he can dig deeper and deeper into a destructive narrative.

Why is this happening?  Well, you're apart.  He's not waking up each day and drinking coffee with you, you guys aren't watching your favorite shows together, going to your favorite restaurants, etc.  So he's feeling the abandonment and spiraling.  Everything is emotional right now, logic doesn't matter, and he's going to say what he FEELS in the moment, even if it's not what he truly believes.

You're talking about implementing boundaries, which is a good thing.  He shouldn't speak to you that way, or threaten to leave the relationship just to get under your skin.  But once you "call his bluff", things will get worse as he doubles down on his FEELINGS in the moment and faces his worst fears of being abandoned.

Now, for the actual advice part.  Making boundaries are a good thing, even though it will make things work and threaten the relationship.  Let's cut to the root of the problem though, his unstable FEELINGS that you're abandoning him.  He FEELS in the right for punishing you for making him FEEL this way...notice how I keep putting FEELINGS in caps?  That's because it's how he's hard-wired and it's not tied to logic. 

When he becomes overly-emotional, the logic part of his brain shuts down and the FEELINGS take over completely.

Boundaries are good...but not in a "I'm punishing you for being a lousy spouse" type of way.  The boundaries are simply for saying, "this is hurting me, so I'm taking a step back."  You absolutely have to do that with love and compassion though while remembering what's driving all this from him, and you have to stress that you're not going anywhere (even though you literally are eventually for school).

If I were in your position, I would talk to him about why he's feeling the way he is and where it stems from.  We can already guess, it's the long-distance stuff happening right now and again in the future, so you need to get to the root of the problem.  Ask him if he'd prefer for you to postpone the second part of post-doc training....not because you want to do that...but because you're allowing him to be a part of the process he fears the most.

I hope that helps.

Hi pook,

Thank you soo much for your reply and support. It was really so empathetic and relatable. You are so right in your explanation and I completely agree. Sometimes when one is frustrated, it's really difficult to keep things in perspective and just believe that 'he is doing it just to harass me'... you are totally right. I can literally feel his underlying issue at this point. He feel something like : "what's the point of staying together, ultimately she's gonna go to another country and leave me.. so it's better to start staying away from now, in that way i won't be hurt later and also she won't have to waste the money now as rent" ..

I understand, eventually if i have to go abroad that will be a big step and honestly i already have in mind that i have to make a lot of accommodations regarding it.. and honestly, if possible, i won't even go.. that is, if i manage to get a job right after this postdoc itself, then obviously i won't go. Also, i am here for 1.5-2 more years while i am completing this postdoc.

But as for the current situation, i am afraid that he may not come back here and i don't know how else to convince him. Rational talking is not at all his thing - this is something we need to start practicing in the relationship in the near future. However, in current equation in the relationship, he will simply say 'no, i wont come, its my wish'.. I will again have to cry and plead and after that even if he agrees to come, he will have unreasonable 'conditions', like, i won't do this, i won't bear that and so on --like it's a crime i am making him commit.

Instead of saying 'we are done', maybe i can modify and say 'its ok, if u dont want to be with me, dont come, after all staying together is a choice which both of us has to agree to and a decision both has to make.. if u r unwilling, no probs, i will stay alone here'...something like this.. but honestly, he having some kind of discussion about his 'feelings' is not in the books at this point. He doesn't even believe that there are something called 'feelings'.. it's the societal narrative, that boys doesn't have feelings. In more developed countries, the awareness is increasing, but it's still poor here in my country. After marriage it took me a year to convince him to say 'my mood is not good' instead of just saying 'my body health is not good' when he was sad..