BPDFamily.com

Hi everyone,

Just to introduce myself.  I moved from my home in the UK to Mexico to try and kick-start a pretty directionless single man's life in 2011.  I'm still here in Mexico (which is a lovely country, by the way!).

I had had very little experience with long term romantic relationship and 6 months after arriving I started a relationship with a Mexican lady of roughly the same age (early 40s). 

It all accelerated very quickly, and as I too wanted to have kids before too late, we got engaged after 6 months, married 4 months after that and had a baby boy 10 months after the wedding. Phew!  Our son is the most wonderful thing ever in the history of the universe. 

I had had glimpses of my wife's BPD behaviour during our early relationship, but, I either got sucked into believing I was at fault, or dismissed it as her being stressed.  But the manipulations grew more frequent.  The fabricated accusations of perceived infidelity and thought-crimes fuelled by jealousy became more frequent.  She withdrew almost all intimacy especially after our son was born when she went off to sleep in the baby's (now toddler's) room, only to return to our marital bed 5 or 6 times a year for fast vanilla sex with minimal post coital intimacy before she'd head back to the baby's room.  Now she goes to bed at 7pm with the little one, leaving me alone in front of the TV for company.

Whenever I have confronted her with my feelings and expressions of my needs, it has ended up with me apologising for not taking out the trash yesterday and for being inconsiderate to her needs.

After a lot of googling about my experiences and her behaviours I have come to a firm conclusion that she is a classic BP.

Being Mexican, she has a large family and they are particularly tight-knit.  I would like to discuss our problem with some members of her family, but I am scared that they are going to leap to her defence, that my wife will consider this a betrayal and that my wife make up some horrendous false accusations about me and poison her family against me.  My greatest fear is losing my son, whom I love more than life itself.

I'm not sure what my next move should be, but writing this has helped me feel a bit better nevertheless!

So here I am! 

Hi Dragon 72,

*welcome*

I'm glad you reached for support. My ex and her family are Mexican immigrants to the US, so I have some thoughts I'll post later. Quick question, did her parents list to you her problems when you committed to get married? Not the BPD, just in general (it's a typical cultural thing, but it may vary). How close are you to the family?

Turkish

Thanks for the reply!  Wow, now I'm not the only one in the world aware of my problem. That makes me feel a bit better!

Her folks never spelled out any issues although soon before the wedding I got an ominous chat from the suegra about the importance of communication. Which I took to be sound and sensible advice to give to anybody but now I think may have carried with it an implied warning. Quien sabe.

My wife has hardly mentioned exes and I have been reluctant to probe deeper.

I get on really well with her family who have been very welcoming to me. But blood being thicker than water, especially in Mexico, I suspect that my wife will always get the benefit of any of their doubt... .

I think that the study of personality disorders with regard to blended cultures, is understudied, if it's studied at all. What your MIL said sounds pretty standard. My ex in-laws laid out her faults, asking me if I knew what I was getting into. My Ex prepared me for this conversation. My exFIL even said, "you know how to handle her" (they didn't).

I would shy away from talking to her family, unless you have a trusted sibling-in-law perhaps. Blood is most often thicker than water, regardless of the culture. Then again, it may be help full to approach your MIL for tips, being careful to not demonize her daughter. You may, however, get tips about dysfunctional coping skills which may have contributed to her BPD traits.

Without going into a sociological discussion, it might be helpful to try and open up a validating dialog with your wife. She's frustrated. You're frustrated. Relationships can be tough,.even more so cross-culturally. She may be expecting you to behave like a Mexican man, because that's all that she knows. The same, in reverse, for you. Have you seen the lessons to the right of the board? Validation (the communication skills are outlined in Lesson 3) can go a long way.

I don't want to assume anything here, but my Ex was emotionally disconnected from her father, and enmeshed with her mother. That may or may not be the case here. She may be trying subconciously to fix both of those relationships. Validating her feelings may help open up dialog:

Communication using validation. What it is; how to do it (https://bpdfamily.com/content/communication-skills-validation)

Though no longer together, I've found that the tools help me in co-parenting with the mother f our small children. Her triggers, probably like those of your wife, may lie deep. Identifying them, and learning to respond to them can help.

This may also help:

The Do's and Don'ts for a BP relationship (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=62266.0)

This is invaluable advice, so thanks Turkish.

As you mention, the cross-cultural aspect has added a dimension of difficulty. 

For a start, she doesn't speak English and although my Spanish has gone from being very poor to pretty fluent, in heated discussions I find it difficult to think clearly when I'm having to express myself in a language which is not my native tongue.  Actually I think her understanding of English is a lot better than she lets on.  She seems to pick up some fine details when she eavesdrops on my skype conversations with my family with whom she refuses to engage.

Secondly, she's a devout Catholic and I'm an atheist (although a tolerant and respectful, non-proselytizing one!). 

Thirdly, Anglo-Saxon Brits and Mexicans have very different views on a number of things, everything from the role of men and women, to how to approach minor health issues, to the consumption of sugar, to raising children, plus many more. 

I have felt bullied into letting her culture dominate the marriage - but we are in Mexico, after all.  All except for the fact that I am raising our son fully bilingual.  I only talk to him in English, never in Spanish, and at 2 years old, he's already showing signs of fluent understanding of both languages, which is great.

I think you're right about the emotional disconnection with the father and the enmeshment with the mother.  I think that was the situation for both my wife and for me in our developmental years - just we reacted differently to it.  I went all "people-pleaser" and she went borderline.

I shall avoid a fully-disclosing discussion with the in-laws for the time-being at least and read up and practise some of the communication exercises on this site. We'll see how that goes.

Thanks again!

If I had a dollar for every time this has happened to me, I'd be a rich man :)

Anyway, just thought I'd welcome you as your story resonated with me. I am also living far from home, our relationship also accelerated very quickly (it appears this is a typical BPD trait), and we are expecting a baby boy in around six weeks. I'm worried I'm going to end up in exactly the type of scenario you describe, with her withdrawing all intimacy after the baby comes.

Nothing in the way of advice for now unfortunately, but again, welcome to the forum. In the short amount of time I've been on here, I have found it very helpful.

Thanks globalnomad.  Best of luck with the birth of your baby! That's exciting!  Just be prepared that fatherhood, which is a tough job anyway, will be even tougher given your/our situation.  Even still I LOVE being a dad, and my son is the best thing that has happened to me. 

Thanks for the reply.

Well, I can relate to the cultural difference. I'm white American, married to an American man of half Mexican descent. He looks very Mexican, and seems to only want to associate with his Mexican side of the family(not his white Dad's side of the family). I never thought it was a big deal, because we were both raised in the U. S., and he swore he wasn't "raised to be Mexican", which I found sort of odd. His Mom spoke Spanish, but didn't teach it to them.

The conclusion I've come to is that here IS a cultural difference. You must be dealing with that even more so. BPDh has a very macho attitude, and he's very controlling and arrogant, and DOMINANT. Now, I know that isn't only because of his cultural background, but I do think it added to it. He'll make jokes about how latino men have the attitude of women being in the kitchen, but I think deep down he buys into some of that. His views of marriage, in the end(no matter what he said prior to our marriage), do NOT match mine.

Add BPD to that mix, and it's a hotbed of issues. I've never experience a family so enmeshed, and so "get together at the drop of a hat". It was/is culture shock to say the least, and there is no compromise, I either go along, or he's mad. He has no interest in getting close to MY family though.