BPDFamily.com

I am not sure where to post this

but after reading this in LESSONS  - LESSON 2

understanding your role in the relationship

...Accepting the Role of "Emotional Caretaker";

see below

I feel a great pressure and weight and i question whether i can be an emotional caretaker. This is very hard. after reading lesson 2 , see below. I just was stoped in my tracks and i felt overwhelmed. How am i going to do this ?


https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=56206.0

Tools: The Do's and Don'ts for a BPD relationship

...Accepting the Role of "Emotional Caretaker";

https://bpdfamily.com/content/what-does-it-take-be-relationship

Hey there, DSFB!

I totally get it. There is a LOT of information here and a lot of tools, tips, etc., and it can seem totally overwhelming. I know I had my moments, particularly when just starting out. I thought "There's no way I can do this. I don't even WANT to do this." But I stuck it out. And, in my case, it has worked.

Beginning, it's like standing at the foot of a steep cliff and looking up and knowing you have to climb it. It's natural to look at the whole thing and be crushed by it. But if you instead look at it in pieces (OK. There's one ledge. there's another. And another.) -- in small, individual goals, it can become more manageable. Do you think you could do that? Just look at one aspect of your relationship to focus on at a time? Or one part of the Emotional Caretaker list to practice for a while?

All that said, you don't have to climb it if you don't want to, but that's a decision only you can make.

Regardless of what you decide, you're not alone. We're here to help you whatever you decide.

thanks for your support

what is also very difficult is i feel i am living seperate lives. I have my family, with my two older sons of 23 and 26 and my mother, stepfather, brother and my brother's family with my two young nieces of 4 and 7 years old. Also my father and his wife. We meet for birthday's and holidays. And I have good relations with my sons and see them regularly, despite them being busy with their lives.

but, My P (partner) is not part of my family anymore. I invited him to a family activity only 5 months after we were together. My family were fine, all was fine, everyone was polite. My mum did not have a good feeling about him, cause he does have a gruff , brut appearance and appears rough and culturally too maybe,

But because of our roller coaster beginning , cause from the go, he had behaviours that i had never experienced before and i have come to understand better, but my family noticed the effects on me.

What made matters worse, was this summer, 8 months, we tried to do a trip with my sons and me and him and his son of 8 years old. It was a total disaster and my sons, saw his BPD traits and found him ego-centric , everything was about him and they found him very negative. My younger son could not take it, he is very quiet, hardly talks but could not take my P's behaviour. Before the trip, my younger son was very polite they would talk hockey and it was superficial, but on the trip, it was another story...

So since that disaster trip, my sons do not want them in their lives, they dont want to know him or have a relationship with him and they think he is crazy. my younger son, finds him totally irrational ( from reactions he had on the trip) and controling and so on. they have nothing good to say about him after the trip. This has scared me too. And after that trip and the trip we did the summer before, i dont want to travel with him. He does not know i dont want to travel with him. but i have not been able to talk about the effect of that trip with my sons and how it is still affecting me, cause he does not want to talk about it.

My father met him too, and does not understand why i am with him. so my whole family does not like him, and they have no compassion for him. they feel he is a negative, selfish person.

So i find it very hard , to live these two seperate worlds, on top of the fact that it has been difficult, exhausting

And to add, he is also seperate from my friends. i have seperate set of friends who i see without him. He did meet one friend whom we go to her new years eve supper party, and that is so far so good, and he has met a few other friends and one other friend he accepts. but all the others he has negative things to say about them, and even my male gay friends he is jealous of, i just so happen to not have male hetero friends. But he does not stop me from seeing my friends, and i tell him when i need to see them and i do see them. and it is fine.

But it is ok too that i have my friends seperate from him, but it is more my family

So i am struggling with this too, at time

I mean 8 months ago. and i mean they do not want him in their lives ( they really liked his son of 8 years old and got along well with him. they were actually worried about his son of 8 and felt that at least his sons mother was there. they have shared custody, one week one week. they met my P's ex (mother of his son) and she and I get along fine too, and my sons told me, they thought she was very nice. my sons, met the mother of P's son, cause we picked him up at her place for the trip.

That's a difficult thing to deal with. I know. I'm going through something similar.

My H never really hit it off with my family. He put up walls as a sort of "I'll reject them before they can reject me" type of thing.

During a rough time, I made the mistake of sharing what was going on with my family. Now, things are MUCH better in our marriage. My parents have been cautious, but open and supportive. My sisters, not so much. They've made it clear they don't want him around at family gatherings -- and they're including my 8-year-old stepson in that. So, I get it. The compartmentalization is very rough and painful. There are things going on in my life I feel like I can't share and things going on in their lives I feel like I can't share with H without sparking pain for him.

My H is supportive of my still seeing them and doing things with them and our plan is that we will give them some time to cool down and, hopefully, work to get H and SS reintroduced into the family. But part of that is out of our control. We're focusing on our relationship and supporting each other.

Another poster is talking about a similar topic here:
https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=335776.0
If you have a chance, you might want to take a look.