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Title: Hello Post by: jc3321 on March 10, 2017, 11:03:49 PM My wife had a therapist "remotely diagnose" her father as BPD several years ago. The conversation went something like, "I can't in good conscience diagnose your father without seeing him, but I'm fairly certain he had BPD." I looked into it then and thought yeah, that's kind of her too. Today my therapist says effectively the same thing to me, but about the wife. So I'm trying to figure out what the world looks like if that's true. I don't even know where to start. I just had a conversation with her today about another topic where she was mad at me for talking to a friend before her about an entirely separate life issue. But how do you not process that kind of ___ externally before trying to talk to the spouse? I'm at a loss and saying hi I guess.
Title: Re: Hello Post by: infjEpic on March 11, 2017, 05:53:38 PM The most simple answer is that you - as the partner - are never the one to tell them
Excerpt https://bpdfamily.com/content/how-to-get-borderline-into-therapy Professionals do not recommend that you tell a loved one that you suspect that they have Borderline Personality Disorder. We may think that our loved one will be grateful to have the disorder targeted and will rush into therapy to conquer their demons, but this usually doesn't happen. Instead, this is difficult advice to receive and more likely to sound critical and shaming (e.g., you are defective) and incite defensiveness, and break down the relationship trust. It's not like a broken leg where the affliction is tangible, the cure is tangible, and the stigma nonexistent. While we are grateful to learn about the disorder and the pathways to recovery - for us the information is validating and represents a potential solution to our family problems- to the afflicted, it is shaming (you are defective), stigmatizing (mental illness in general, Borderline Personality Disorder specifically), and puts all the responsibility for the family problems on the loved one's shoulders. |