BPDFamily.com

Hi,

I have been reading through posts on here and it has given me a good insight on what BPD is and how it looks in reality! I have found it really helpful so far, and it has helped me to see that there have been many times where I have actually made the situation worse with my fiancé or fuelled it which I was aware of just by having a ‘normal’ argument!

Tonight I am stumped though.. I have read about JADE and understand it in principle.. but I don’t know how to approach this.

My fiancé is in jail, I’ve known him my entire adult life. He has struggled with this his entire life but it has never affected our relationship before. He had an episode a few years back but was able to hide the severity of it from me so I was a bit oblivious on how bad it was. He has just been through a traumatic experience that has triggered him badly!
He is convinced I will leave, that I don’t fancy him or love him.. despite me telling him! I’ve started a new job and he is convinced I fancy a Co worker.. who is half my age!

Hi Lay, welcome  :hi:  so glad the site has been helpful to you and that you've found valuable info here for your journey.

You've got a lot of moving parts going on right now, so just a few questions to help us understand your situation a little better --

How long have you and your fiancé been engaged and/or together?

When did he go to jail? If you feel comfortable answering (ok either way), what is he in for? I'm assuming that you have some kind of real-time communication with him -- is that by phone, or visit, or...?

You're not alone in having a loved one with BPD who seems to have some paranoia. His worries about your fidelity are showing up in a big way, and one of the things that some members here have learned is that trying to "prove" your faithfulness, or "prove" anything, really, tends to add fuel to the fire, even though it'd help a normal person. A pwBPD might experience the repeated "proofs" not as "ahhh, now I can relax, I finally know my loved one is faithful", but as: "the more my loved one explains why she is faithful, the more I become suspicious, because why would she have to work so hard to prove she loves me, unless she really didn't?"

Normal strategies to reassure a loved one sometimes don't work with a pwBPD -- and I think I hear you bringing that up when you say that it's hard to not JADE in practice. Typically, if we just Explained ourselves to a loved one, that'd help, but not with BPD.

As you work to avoid Justifying, Arguing, Defending, and Explaining, maybe you can look to substitute the JADE with SET? Have you heard of the  Support, Empathy, Truth (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=143695.0) approach yet? Could be worth looking into.

Fill us in on how you're doing, whenever works best for you;

kells76

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. Known him nearly 30 years. Knew him a long time before he went in, but he has served a long time for violent offences. Never had any issues with him personally, and never dealt with his BPD like this until now although I have known about his struggles with this throughout his life. We have been together and then friends and now together again for 6 years.
He was recently sexually assaulted and since then he has been like this and been struggling really badly. It’s been a difficult time to say the least.
I have tried really hard to manage my responses and not react in the ‘normal’ way. It’s better, but I’m not sure it’s entirely under control with the co worker issue rather it feels like he has put it on the back burner for now.
My issue today is we have both been working hard at this together, much less arguing, better communication, more like how we’ve always been.. but the calls have now got longer.. and it feels like he is constantly waiting for more love and reassurance. Tonight after a two hour call where I had said so much lovely stuff about him.. he said he ‘waits and waits and it just never comes’? What is he waiting for? Doesn’t seem like i could ever say enough!
I said that he was clearly having a tough time, that we had been on the phone a long time, that I was tired and needed to go to sleep, and that I would like to talk to him about it in the morning..he said oh well I will just ring you once tomorrow and make sure it’s quick! And then hung up.

I feel like the last 30 mins he was waiting for me to say amazing adoring stuff to him, and that he’d forgot all the other stuff or it wasn’t what he wanted or good enough to meet his expectations!
How do I end a call like this without it being taken badly or make him notice actually I did say lots of nice things and I had a nice evening… he just wouldn’t go as he was waiting for something magical that didn’t appear!