I agree with I'm so confused. When I try to validate my daughters feelings when she is upset with me it's never enough and she finds a way to twist my words to continue to blame and rage at me.

Hello and grateful to find this place,

My 29 year old daughter was diasgnosed with BPD in her early 20's.  As a child she had a very low frustration tolerance and began experiencing anxiety around 10 years old.  She started cutting herself in her mid teens, which started after her boyfriend left her.  She is the oldest and her dad was very hard on her as a child.  We had different parenting styles and I was also struggling with my own mental health issues.  My youngest was born very ill and took a lot of my attention away from the two older girls.  It was stressful and my marriage suffered as a result and that was difficult for all of us.  Fast forward and my daughter wBPD is married and out of the house now but a recent medical crisis with my husband has created absolute chaos for me especially as the mom.  I had reached out to let her know about her dad and asked for her help.  She said she couldn't help and blamed me for frustrating her. She said I could have asked someone else instead of her. I apologized and said it was fine. My middle adult child who has OCD and narcisstic traits was verbally and emotionally abusive towards me during this crisis so I decided to set a boundary and told them that we would not be hosting Christmas. My dwBPD was so upset with me and told me that in order for her to continue having a relationship with me I woud have to acknowledge her pain and suffering as result of my boundary.  When I said we could talk but it had to be about understanding not blame and that we could meet in person she refused and told me she would wait for me to change my mind and have the converation in person and that I didn't care about her because I was not willing to have the discussion over the phone.  Eventually I agreed to a phone call and it went poorly.  She was yelling at me telling me I was selfish and had no remorse.  That I should have removed myself from Christmas and they could have had it without me.  Or I should have dealt with my other daughter after Christmas.  I told her I was so distressed and was having heart palpitations and had to have an echocardiogram and she didn't even respond to that.  My boundary she said was a punishment and she started to scream and rage and told me to shut up.  Yesterday she met with my husband to pick up her Christmas gifts and she shared with him that she was pregnant. My heart was broken because that should have been a special moment for me too.  I feel so hurt that I can't enjoy the fact that my daughter is pregnant and I am afraid to even talk to her because nothing I say matters and I am the villain. My husband is also concerned but they still talk to him but not me and he is staying neutral with them, which leaves me carrying the emotional burden.  I am tired of being blamed for being human and having my boundary disregarded. My health is now being affected and I feel like I have no choice but to limit my contact with her.  Either way it's painful for me whether I talk to her or not. I don't know how to move forward with confidence in what I need to do to take care of myself without feeling guilty or being a bad mom.

I agree that an affair would be a problem and that kids would pick up on it but I meant - in my experience - when there was already issues- relatively if we were swimming in drama it would add another bucket of water to it, more drama rather than be the drama.  We were oblivious to her circle of friends and what they did.

What we were focused on was whether or not she was in a bad mood. We were afraid of her.

I think the reason Max’s wife is asking Max to agree to this is so she can avoid blame and shame. She could sneak out and have an affair but I think she knows that is wrong. What she wants from him is to discount monogamy and agree to an open marriage because that would make it OK. It’s more than permission - it’s absolving her. That also doesn’t mean she’d not react if he had an affair, but if he did - he couldn’t blame her for one.

I think she know that sneaking off and cheating is wrong. In her mind, agreeing to an open marriage makes it not cheating. Like seeking a loophole in the rule.

Hey, pwBPD always have this thing of pointing fingers, but we don't have to point fingers to solve a problem, and if a couple is united as a team, then that would not even make sense. So when my wife talks about blame, I tell her it does not matter, because we aren't supposed to be in a competition.

The fact that you triggered a reaction in them doesn't make you faulty. It could be about their interpretation of your body language, your eyebrow angle. But it is their choice on how they react to that trigger.

Honestly, I feel 100% non-faulty, and I have zero guilt. I'm not stating that I'm perfect. I know a few of my shortcomings, and knowledge on BPD can always help me to improve the interaction. But I'm completely sure that 100% of my wife's outbursts are to blame on the BPD.

One reason for that is that she is my 4th long-term partner, but each individual partner had their own different complaints. I can't think of a complaint or a trigger that is shared between two different of my wives. One acted out as if I wanted to cheat on her, even though I never did in the 10+ years of the relationship. The other one wasn't too jealous of other women but was of her stepdaughters. The current one loves her stepdaughters but says she is controlled, which none of the previous ones said. In other words, it is about them, not about me.

As it extended for hours, I realized that I never quite grasp the part where I supposedly triggered the reaction.  It’s like things have exploded and are on fire and I’m told I’m the one with the matches and I don’t remember lighting them. 

I know that’s not what gaslighting comes from, but every time I’m told I’m the one who started it, I feel like I’m not 100% to blame, but always feel like maybe I’m just a terrible person. 

The law of averages would seem to say that sometimes I’m not 100% at fault. 

I see.

Well, my takeaway from having been married to a likely pwBPD and a later relationship with someone who had different but also possible strong BPD-traits is that I need to be more guarded against behaving like "they" do, so I if I find myself thinking of a way to get something indirectly, I try to re-phrase it so I'm asking directly.  I don't want to think that they rubbed off on me! 

I suppose you should just say "It bothers me that your ex is around here as much as he is," and then propose what you think is fair and how you two together could make that happen.  Dragging your ex- into the equation is, if not triangulation, then definitely a bit manipulative. 

Hi used2baShyFilly, and welcome to the family!

I started reading books on BPD about 10 years ago because of my ex-wife, and I'm still learning more and trying to further understand it. I gave up on my ex, but not on my current wife, who also has BPD but is worth fighting for. That doesn't mean, though, that I can live with her. I can't. We now live apart.

I'll wait for the treatments to make her aggressive symptoms go into remission before bringing her back.

Things get worse when both partners are together all of the time. Have you or he retired recently or begun to work from home?

I do think kids are more sensitive to this than we give them credit for.  And they do not like at all to see one parent with another adult like that.  I think it's more instinctive on their part, even if they don't understand a thing about what an affair entails.   

And I think, being that pwBPD need to perpetually be the victim & are constantly playing games to drag in "allies" against their supposed perpetrator, in this case she'd be extra sensitive to the fact that this dynamic is going to flip against her dramatically if/when the kids find out that mom is seeing someone else.  Hence her insistence that he agree to her having an affair, to make him into an "accomplice" here, rather than the victim. 

And from my experience, a pwBPD would likely go even further than that, if confronted by the kids, pinning their whole affair on the other spouse for giving permission - even if they took the permission further than it was okay to go - and continuing to "rewrite the narrative" over time as much as they can get away with, to put all the blame on the non-, in order to preserve their standing with the kids. 

I do agree with you here.  I think Max needs to nip this in the bud; the more she keeps the conversation going, the more likely words will get misconstrued, or she'll succeed in trying to wear him down, and getting some sort of permission.

Like I said before, I think this is unusual in that it's such a "dealbreaker" kind of thing for a monogamous relationship, to see a pwBPD push for the right to have an affair, as their next thing to fill the bottomless pit.  It's almost like she's trying to push for such an extreme right that it will justify just about anything else she wants to do. 

I know there are lots of examples of the BPD spouse cheating on these boards, but I don't recall ever reading an account of them asking permission first.

Just found this site.  I recently read Stop Walking on Eggshells and FINALLY all the confusion and pain in my marriage makes sense.  No doubt my husband has BPD and NPD.  Forty years of the same arguments, highs and lows, mind games, feeling like I'm the only one trying to make sense of it all. 

Right now I am in the process, a lifetime process I'm sure, of changing my thinking and responses, trying to balance accepting that HE is the way he is and he's probably not going to change much,  (we are in our early 60s!)with what about the rest of my life?  We also have an adult daughter with PTSD, I know that's not what this site is about, but there are similarities and any coping skills and more I can learn will help life with both of them.

That's my short introduction.  I am excited to read other posts. 

Sancho/Confused,

I think you've got that right!  Validation might work during a emotional processing session, but probably not during an enraged blamefest.  I think EAR (empathy, attention, respect, right?) might help someone release emotions and better understand a difficult situation, with the objective of relieving pain and maybe coming up with some ways to cope, reconcile or troubleshoot.  But a blamefest is a verbal onslaught meant to punish, control and deflect responsibility.  I guess a conversation could start out as a venting/processing session, but quickly pivot into an enraged blamefest.

Win, what stands out to me is your daughter fixating on seemingly minor things that happened so long ago.  I could be wrong and she could be "traumatized" by her middle school wardrobe, but my bet is she is having current difficulties and disappointments that she just can't handle.  I guess that's why I'd try to shift the conversation to the present (if she's still listening to you).  You might say, Alas, we can't change the past.

There were a couple of times I was feeling fed up when my BPD stepdaughter tried to dredge up ancient history again.  That's when I said, Look, you've talked about this several times, and each time you only get madder.  We can't change the past, so what's the point of rehashing it again?  She might say, You deserve to be punished.  And you might say, So what if I'm punished?  Punishing me will not make you feel any better, now would it?  I actually said something along these lines to my BPD stepdaughter, and she looked shocked as she realized that punishing someone else wouldn't make her feel any better.