BPDFamily.com

Mod note: This discussion was split from the following thread as it merited its own discussion: https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=339646.0

SH4 - So sorry, but I could see this in my wife too.

Enabler - I can see my wife with this cage bit too.  She had told me "I no longer know who am I.  What have I done with my life?  For 30 years I have been a wife, mother, cook, maid, but never myself" and "I don't know if I want to be married anymore, but it's not you, it's me"

And I'm like SH4.  I never tried to contain her at all.  But she did say she felt smothered by me.  All I wanted was a little bit of her time and attention vs her spending it all texting and on FB.  I never made any demands of her.

Gadget

Gadget,

Sometimes I think they say this stuff just to make up a reason to leave.  Like how can they say they feel smothered if we aren't smothering them.  And things like this relationship caused me to lose who I am.  Isn't it their responsibility to keep in touch with who they are.  I know half of the time my W will say she did things or didn't do things so I wouldn't get mad at her, however I wouldn't have.  So it was her feelings of how I would react to things that made her feel "caged" in.

Thoughts?

SH4

Thanks SH4 and Enabler!

Great points.  I do believe my wife (and other BPD people) adjusts her thinking to fit her fantasy.  Anything that I do supports her thought that I suffocate her.  And any other idea about why she left, etc.  She will bend it to fit her fantasy to justify her leaving.  I did the world for her, and yes I was co-dependent.  I willingly wanted to do things for her before I did for myself.  I derived great joy in making her happy.  Crazy that those acts can turn around and bite me and turn into me smothering her.

Gadget

Gadget,

ME TOO!  And it feels like...I do everything for you and I have given you with world for the past 10 years, I want nothing in return but to feel appreciated and loved and YOU LEAVE ME?  It makes no sense.

I'm having a really rough day today.

SH4

Hi SH4,

Sorry you are struggling today.  I was the other day too.  Today is just calm and numb :)

I agree with you about using all the tools, listening better, doing our best to make improvements.  And I am willing to wait a reasonable amount of time for the wife I have loved for 30 years.  The therapist said this built up (Compassionate Caregiver Overload) over 24 years.  It will take a long time.  But I want/need to see some hope, some progress.  My wife tells me nothing about us and any possible future, the therapist sees we are still good friends and she loves me and believes there is still hope for us.

So.. since my therapist told me my wife has Compassionate Caregiver Overload and to read the book Trauma Therapy, which I did, I will ask my therapist in my next session "How is Compassionate Caregiver Overload usually treated?".  Why I ask.  I know there are many many therapy types.  I've recently read that CBT therapy can show great results in 6-10 months.  I'll gladly wait that long for my wife if CBT is being used and I hear/see improvements in my wife from her or the therapist.  And outside of CBT therapy I've heard that many BPD people can recover in 2-10 years.  I won't sit in limbo for 2-10 years.

So I will wait still.  But there will come a time I will ask my wife where are we going?  Is this the new us forever?  Are you getting better?  Do you want to come back home and be my wife again?

Gadget

Gadget,

I totally understand, we can't wait forever.  Well we can but that wouldn't be taking care of ourselves.  Even if we don't get involved in another relationship, just waiting forever wouldn't be healthy.  But it sounds like your situation has hope.  Your wife knows she needs to work to get better.

In my situation my wife doesn't think she has a problem really and thinks most of our problems are from me and she believes I have "issues".

SH4

Hi SH4!   :hug:

Sorry to hear in your case that your wife blames you.  In my case my wife says:  "It's not you it's me" and "You are a saint, I am not".  My wife is very down on herself.  She has said to me before "You shouldn't be nice to me.  I don't deserve it".  And she would always take everything I say the the worst possible scenario.  She's a very very negative person.

I type out on paper for our therapist some of our longer/more interesting texting interchanges.  One time the therapist said "That's guilt.  She feels guilty for who she is and what she has done."

The next text interchange I shared with our therapist 2 weeks later.  The therapist said:  "That reeks of Shame"

But I still love her so much, and I'm grateful she is still willingly going to therapy.

Gadget

Hang in there SH4,

My therapist said the Compassionate Caregiver Overload has been building up in her since my special needs child was born 25 years ago.  It will take time to undo.  I think my timeline is 1 year.  After 1 year of being apart, 1 year of us both going to therapy (separately), then I will ask my wife where do we go from here.  I don't want to live in Limbo.  Are we trying to fix us?  Is this all it will ever be?

I figure after 30 years of marriage.  I can give her 1 year and I will work on me 1st.  Remove my co-dependencies, and learn and apply ALL the tools (SET, Don't JADE, etc).

Gadget