I never heard haltlose before. I would assume this is love bombing but this perfectly describes the aftermath of lovebombing. I've lived through this with my late dBPD mom. As a child I took it as her turning over a new leaf. She would finally be nice to me like other mothers were to their children. It never happened. I ignored it by reading, listening to music constantly and watching movies on TV.

I am looking forward to the MJ movie. I love the music. I'm interested in seeing how they handled the father's abuse. I read his children called him Joseph and not dad.

I thought of a movie I saw in a college film class which centers on a character who has bpd - Catherine (Jeanne Moreau).  It's an old French movie called Jules and Jim (1962) which gets a lot of love from film critics for it's revolutionary editing techniques. I tried to watch it again recently when trialing the Criterion Channel. It was too much to bear. She displays all the symptoms.
The trailer:
https://www.criterionchannel.com/videos/jules-and-jim-trailer

Wendy -

What I am recognizing is how much the marriage has drained all my energy.  The status quo is okay until I recharge.  And no - I have zero interest in finding someone of my own.  I have much to do for myself before I even think about that.

The new GF has been around the kids - and I am totally OK with that.  I would have issues if W found a girlfriend that I did not feel comfortable being around my kids.  The kids like her, she is fun and energetic and pays attention to them.  I do see this as a potential conflict between W and GF, but there really is none between GF and myself.  She is actually someone I have a lot in common with.  Her attitude reminds me of myself before I got married (interesting...)

GF is away for the next few weeks, and W is house sitting.  That has benefited me for sure.  W now says she wants her own space/place.  I have no issues with that (I'd welcome it), but today I got the same old broken record complaint:

- she has no money and can't afford her own place
- she has no credit, only debt, and nothing to her name (In a divorce, we would not be dividing assets, we would be dividing only debt)
- she claims she put aside her career to raise kids.  Not true.  It's her way of blaming the situation on me/marriage/having kids.  The reality is that she had nothing when we met (not even a stable job), has had numerous opportunities to work before kids and did not keep a job, has had numerous opportunities to work after having kids, and did not keep a job.  The irony here is she describes herself as a "feminist", yet is unwilling to take control of her own life and instead leans on me for everything.
- she feels hopeless.

I need to keep my response to this simple and in the present: 
"There is no way of having two places of residence without another income." 
"What do you want and how can you get there?"

I don't think she is capable of achieving this without help.  For purposes of peace and quiet in my own house, I'd be willing to help if she is willing to get a job.  I can't pay her rent, but I can do what I currently do - cover all the other bills and insurance.  Financially, it is a win for me if she moves out and pays her own rent and personal expenses.  The thing she needs to understand is that where we live, it is a "community property state", and divorce not only means divide the assets, but divide the debt.  If she wanted to get divorced, she is then legally responsible for half the debt payments.   

Foreverdad - that is the wise thing to do, for sure.  There are endless witnesses to my favor, if that matters, including the kids themselves.  And W is not the type to do more than threaten because she has an intense fear of her own life being put under judgement.  Nonetheless, I am keeping track of what I do, and keeping documentation of things she has said. 

Very helpful. Thank you.

Feeling sad about the pain your ubpd sibling is in is a healthy response to her disordered behaviors. Debilitating anger is often a coverup  for underlying sadness that the person is not in touch with. I have often noticed how the healthiest people feel sad for a person who is acting badly.

I have been no contact with my sister with Narcissistic Personality Disorder for several years now. I often feel sad that this is the case, yet I know I cannot go back to being around her because of how she has emotionally and physically abused me.

This may be tedious, but please continue documenting that you're doing the lion's share of parenting.  Try to be involved with the doctors, schools, parent-teacher meetings, etc.

Let the other continue at her own comfort level of minimal parenting.

Why?  You cannot depend upon your spouse to admit in a divorce that you are shouldering most of the parenting.  Especially if she is not working, her lawyer will tell her to claim she is the Mother and needs spousal and/or child support.  As strange as this sounds, court most likely will ignore much of the obvious mental health issues and behavior.  As father and a man you need every iota of majority parenting history on your side should the marriage end, otherwise many courts will default to automatically assigning the Mother equal time if not much more.

Hi all,
It's been almost three months now since I separated from my pwBPD. It hasn't been easy; actually it's only gotten harder. This is sort of a brain dump, so I can see my own muddled thoughts a little more clearly, and get any reflection y'all might think is helpful.

At the beginning of the break up, I thought we could stay friends, or stay in each other's lives in a friendly way (I have this relationship with a couple of exes, as is sorta common for lesbians). But as time has gone on, she seems to pull on any thread in common between us. Friends and family say she's using control and manipulation. Every conversation we have, she accuses me of doing just the things I feel her to be doing. Even after separating, I still find her communication to be extremely confusing, miserable, and upsetting. As someone on this forum said, I try to remind myself that I just don't want to feel like this. Huge motivation.

We met yesterday to discuss some divorce details and it went horribly. Though I've already spent countless hours trying to give her my reasons for wanting and needing to break up, and though I take great pain to do that with as much care and clarity as I can, she always says that I just walked out and didn't even tell her why, still haven't now. Has anyone else experienced this? I guess it leads me to wanting to defend myself, to show that I'm responsible and caring, but we know that leads nowhere.

Amyway, this has been immensely painful, in a way I never fathomed. I feel pretty panicked and hopeless, every day. I don't doubt my choice, but now I see that for at least a while, I need to go no contact, no matter the repercussions. Talking with her results in mistreatment, belittling, bullying, all sorts of unimaginable behavior. I can't do it. I wish I'd been a little more prepared, but if you'd told me at the beginning that I'd need to cut off contact, I don't know that I would've been able to start the process. I'm more heartbroken than I've ever been.

In a manner of speaking you are seeking a reasonably normal person's response.  But you're not dealing with a reasonably normal person and any success is difficult and likely of limited duration.  In addition, with BPD traits involved in a close relationship, it's an uphill struggle to find ways for effective communication.  BPD is a disorder most impacting to the closest of relationships.

You may be trying to speak as reasonably and as normal as possible, a credit to you, but often using JADE (Justify, Argue, Defend, Explain) doesn't work since logic has little connection versus feelings and perceptions.

If you were here speaking of an already ended relationship, I would suggest you to not try to seek closure from the other person, but rather to Gift yourself Closure.  Does that perspective help?

I had only partially "addressed my concerns".  I had not consulted a single lawyer or solicitor.  I did try to record when a ragefest was starting.  But when I did call the police for the first time, two vehicles arrived and they spent more time interviewing her.  Then one officer asked me to hand our preschooler, quietly sniffling in my arms, over to his mother and "step away".  He shrieked and clung tighter to me.  There was a long pause as the officer looked at me, then he said "work it out" and both left.

Later my then-spouse smirked as she told me she was given a DV pamphlet and kept disparaging and belittling me and my manhood.

What about my recording?  This was before the days of smart phones and my digital recorder's speaker didn't work.  Once I downloaded it, an officer came and made a report.  She was charged with Threat of DV and that started our separation.  After a few months of court delays, the judge ruled that since no one testified she had a weapon in her hands, local case law (where a drunken man was not found guilty for making threats without weapons) enabled the judge to declare her Not Guilty and dismissed the case.

Smart me, no going back for me.  My divorce lawyer, a former policeman, was surprised I wasn't carted off, if not also arrested.  He said policy is to separate the couple when responding to domestic disputes and it's always the man who is carted off.  Looking back, my preschooler's response saved me that day.

Do not ignore the rising level of discord and violence.  Be aware.  Beware.  Be prepared for nearly anything as best you can.

Hi!  I am so sorry that you are going through this.  Unfortunately, I have been there, and its horrible.  My H and I have been married for 8 years, and while some days its horrible and I want to scream, looking back overall, it has gotten drastically better with me setting strong boundaries and working the tools.  I have 2 kids from a prior relationship, my uBPDh had one child from a prior relationship and we have 2 together.  My oldest son, who is the oldest of the 5 kids, took the brunt of my uBPDh's crap early on in our relationship.  If my H wasn't coming at me, he was going at my oldest son.  I always did everything that I could to protect my son, but it wasn't enough as the crap still kept going at him and I think that it was even harder on him to see someone who he had looked up to, hurting his mom.  Same as you, my H was sure that my oldest was trying to harm the other kids.  Though reality was that he was a kid being a kid.  To this day, the rest of the kids love and look up to my oldest.  But...it was really hard on my son, to the point that one day, I walked in on my son cutting himself.  He had hit a wall and couldn't take it any longer.  At this point, my uBPDh and I were living separately, but were still seeing each other close to daily.  I took my son to my therapist and we agreed that he didn't ever have to be in the presence of my H.  I followed that agreement, and even told my H that my son needed space.  I think that event made me realize how much this effected the kids and that I needed to do something.  I dove deep into myself, thought I set boundaries and started to understand the tools, but while I believed I was doing everything to "walk away" during the crap onslaught, I was still engaging, yes to a lesser level, but not where I needed to be.  Thus, we continued on the roller coaster for a bit, but with the ups and downs not being so big.  My thing at the time was to walk away whenever my H would start in.  One day that escalated my uBPDh and an event happened and I screamed for someone to call 911.  My oldest did without question. Long story short, this was the catalyst for me to realize that I needed to put me and my children first.  I set strong boundaries, worked the DBT tools, set up a great life for my kids, did all I could to continue normalcy for them and encouraged them to be around friends often.  I truly walked away from the drama and will not allow it to come anywhere near my kids.  My H and I are still married, though he has a townhouse he can go to when needed, and things are improving.  He is in mandated therapy.  He knows that he can not cross my line or I will follow through with what I have said/shown.  I do text his mom and sister at times, but it is only to send happy pictures of the kids or wish them a happy holiday.  I got them involved in the past and it never proved to help me, it only hurt the situation.  I have decided that that portion of our lives is in the past, he tries to go there, and I will not join.  I will put on a smile and ask the kids if they want to go get ice cream.  This hasn't happened in a while, but if he wouldn't let me take the kids, then I would get out a board game or play peek a boo with an infant, anything to distract my kids, and in turn myself.  What I have realized is that I love my husband, I love my kids and I need to love me (my husband's wife and my kid's mom) so that I can be there for them.  I will not allow screaming, accusations, violence, etc around me or any of the kids.  Start in and we will leave, I will ask you to leave or I will call 911.  I do forgive way more of my husband than I probably should with time, but in the moment it is not acceptable.  With this, I have been able to protect my kids.  My oldest is in high school and is taller than both my H and I.  He and my H have a relationship that they have created on their own.  They don't interact much, but they do have moments where they will joke around together or one or the other will ask if the other wants to do something.  Its evolving, but that never would have happened if I hadn't put my foot down with true boundaries.

Remember that confirming a mental illness exists is much different from her actually being ready to deal with what she's learned.  If you can, hold off on sharing your feelings in depth because nothing good can come of it.  Why?  Because it confirms every fear she's ever had related to the mental illness- she's not good enough, she's a problem, etc.  That's exactly why she lashes out in the first place, because of the way it makes her feel and she wants to blame someone else instead.  So confronting her directly about being a "lousy wife" will not lead to where you think it will lead...it would likely be the exact opposite.

 

This sort of play straight into what I was just saying.  In two instances, your wife thought one thing while you meant something else.  I can see how frustrating that would be.  I think you need to see it a level deeper though about what's actually happening.

For instance, you paid your wife a compliment "You're one of my favorite people."  Somehow, she took that the wrong way and it really hurt her feelings.  I think you did the right thing, you took some space and talked about it calmly later on.  And I also think you're right for not apologizing if she's really one of your favorite people.  You paid a compliment and she just didn't get it.

However, you should always apologize for hurting her feelings...that's a different thing and that's tied directly to her mental health problems.  With the BPDs in my life, I say in every conversation at some point, "I'm really sorry if that upset you and I didn't mean it that way at all.  What I meant was that I really like spending time with you (or whatever)."

Can you see the difference?  If you're not trying to insult your wife and she gets insulted anyway, what's the harm in saying, "I'm so sorry, that's not what I meant at all.  I would hate it if someone else made me feel that way."  That diffuses the situation directly.


Don't feel guilty and don't placate either.  You're dad, she's mom, and both of you have a child to care for.  That's just something she has to get over and you should not feel guilty.

At the same time though, given what we've just talked about, can you see where an apology here might help?  Not for her having to be a parent, not for her having to do something outside her normal routine, but for her feelings being hurt over something that's pretty silly.  Again, this all comes back to feelings- we soothe feelings to keep things from going to extremes.

I hope that helps!