BPDFamily.com

Hi. I've posted a few times but then things got better so I stopped... .then everything came crashing down.

My husband and I dated a year before marriage... .fresh on the heels of my divorce. He was everything I ever wanted. He acted like I was the best thing he had ever met. He wanted to be inseparable... .he told me I was the live of his life. He had a history of abuse and ptsd. He was struggling with addiction but winning. He told my long time family friends that he wanted to marry me. He loved my kids. I took a chance. He was and is the live of my life. He gave me everything I never had in marriage number 1. It was a dream come true.

Fast forward almost 5 years. He stopped one addiction and started a better one (extreme sarcasm added). That is his issue, and even with it we are ok. About four years ago he had a religious experience of sorts. He asked God for truth in all things and after prayer, found himself in the presence of God. I do believe he had a spiritual conversion experience. After that, though, he became increasingly erratic. He raged and lwctured at ke a great deal. By benefit of his experience, he had wisdom and as I remained unawakened, I had none. It was hard.

A year after that my first husband was about to have the house I bought with him foreclosed on. My current husband agreed to move into the house to protect us financially, so i moved with him and the ex moved out. This started  the craziness. My ex's girlfriend lives across the street. It's unpleasant. Drugs increased, and the anger and rage increased. He left for a few days. Always a huge conspiracy theorist, he believes he ia a victim of gang stalking, mind control, etc. He takes kernels of truth and expands and believes them. I tried to get him help, but he saw that as a betrayal. He left for a few days. I see the man I married every few days, then he goes wacky again.

He agrees he has BPD, complicated by PTSD and addiction. He refuses treatment vehemently. I am committed to staying with him because he is the man I married. I recognize my own codependence and I am working on it. He does not beg me to stay with him. Instead, he thinks I am an insecure nag. It all hit the fan last night... .the rage at everyone and everything. Telling me that he loves me but he loves me just as he loved women before me, which makes me feel so sad. He says he's overwhelmed and broken and I am driving him crazy with my insecurity and emotions. I asked him if he wanted to leave and be someone I used to know and he said "no". I'm waiting for the shoe to fall though... .

I don't want to be divorced again. I want the man I love back. I want to feel like I am more than a nuisance or a millstone around his neck. I'm so hurt, I can't be strong right now. BPD complicated by whatever mental illness he has is so hard. Someone, please tell me there is hope. He gets angry if I ask for affection, but asks if I want a hug... then blames me for asking for a hug. I have become an insecure sad person. I want my husband and I am still willing to work on my part of my marriage but I am becoming thin skinned. I'm just so sad. If he leaves, my children and I will be financially destroyed.

  There is always hope.

Start by taking good care of yourself and your kids, and not making things worse.


His statements like that are pretty suspect, but this would be a good time to work 10X as hard to do zero of that.

I've been nagged. I've done some nagging. Pretty much all of it created conflict without helping anything.

One thing that helped me stop was the idea "He's not stupid (or ignorant), he's crazy." Start with the drug addiction as a prime example.

I'm sure he's heard from you a few times that drug addiction is dangerous, and that it is harming him. I'm sure he's heard it from other sources as well, and even seen people who have problems and are messing up their lives.

You aren't going to find the magical words to say it and he will suddenly "understand" and stop it.

He isn't doing drugs out of stupidity or ignorance.

He's doing it because he's addicted, and because there is some giant gaping emotional hole in himself that he's trying soo hard to fill by throwing drugs into it. And perhaps he feels less empty briefly when he starts using, before he crashes down even worse.

He is working very hard to convince himself that what he sees himself doing isn't really happening. VERY HARD.

If you say anything about it, he is able to take the fight with himself over it and turn it into a fight with you... .and this gives him some relief from his inner conflict because now he's mad at you and can blame everything on you. No, it isn't right, true, or accurate... .but it FEELS easier for him.

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I wish I could say that he would figure it out if you stopped nagging for just a day (or a week, or a year), but I can't say that. He might. He might not.

What I can say is that any nagging you do makes it HARDER for him to see himself and make that tough choice, if not impossible.

Thank you Grey Kitty. You are right. I know... .you replied a long time ago! :-)