I don't know any statistics but years ago it was often said that therapists with BPD patients often needed their own therapist.  PwBPD are not just trying patients, they're the most trying patients.

*is NOT going to change their perspective*

“But you know, we can't accept everything. There are things that are completely unacceptable, such as cheating or doing something that is dangerous for the kids. Is it possible to reframe anything that we don't accept/approve in a way that won't trigger them? Should we just shut up for a while and wait for our negative emotion to disappear before talking?“

Hi SuperDaddy. No, this is a bad move IMO. As you mentioned, I was discarded. There were behaviours that I wanted to discuss with my wife but didn’t, because I knew it would trigger her. Maybe if I had a discussion with her then the outcome would have been different….. who knows.

What I will say from my own personal experience and other peoples accounts on here, is that changing your approach after being in a relationship for a significant amount of time is going to change their perspective. I would never question her behaviour, or pick an argument or say anything that could trigger her for probably the last decade of our relationship, but if she wanted to start an argument she would bring up any possible slight I’d said against her 20 years ago. If I’d done something she didn’t like even before we were in a relationship that could be brought up. Or if she perceived I looked at her funny, or if I’d breathed out slightly louder than normal, if I’d slightly raised an eyebrow, or rolled my eyes.

Once in that zone, I don’t think there is anything you can do to stop the drama until it has been played out in their own head.

To add- consequences can be of many kinds, not only divorce. One might be that the spouse would be hurt- which could deter someone from infidelity, or the financial aspect of divorce, or effect on family and children, and even the feeling of remorse, low self esteem from the act. There are many reasons people don't violate a monogomy.

One difference is that they choose not to. They don't see this as being "forced" into it. They value it and they don't wish to have consequences for it. They don't do it and don't want their spouse to do it.

Where you are possibly feeling confused is thinking your wanting monogomy in marriage is doing something wrong to your wife- like imposing this on her, not being empathetic to her wanting to explore her orientation rather than knowing your values and boundaries and choice of monogamy. There is nothing wrong with wanting a monogomous marriage.

The consequences at the moment are your feelings. You are feeling uncomfortable with what your wife wants to do. It may be that the choice of consequence becomes tolerating your discomfort rather than have your wife experience consequences of her actions.

You may want some time to weigh pros and cons, but that would be your choice to do so. She's going to do what she chooses. You don't really need to ask her for permission for you to think about this. Your thoughts and feelings are your own.

Likely neither you nor I nor many here ever had a realistic ability to stop the pattern of attacks (outbursts).

While that sinks in, we do have practical tools, communication skills, time-tested strategies, and more to help us address the other person's outbursts, rants and rages.  One approach may work for a while, until it doesn't.  Then other approaches can be included.  And so on.

Some of us have had people with BPD traits (pwBPD) that were relatively mild.  Perhaps described as quiet Borderlines.  They probably are more receptive and responsive to long term therapy.  Our better boundaries and communication skills may help, distance apart may help, meds may help, but the key is focused therapy.  And not just for the other, we too can benefit from therapy.  Partly it is us finding ways to address the issues better but in the final analysis it's in the other's hands as to whether they will face their core issues and truly seek recovery.  (And some therapists don't even try to name a disorder or name the therapy since even that can trigger denial and resistance.)

I hope that's the case because some who arrive here don't stay long enough or return to share their long term outcomes.

Just as all the members here can't be lumped into one neat category, the same goes for our loved ones, none of us have identical personalities.

My wife (stay at home mom) and I have been together for 23 years, and married for 15 year.  We have 2 kids (13 and 11 years old).
My wife has exhibited BPD traits for most of our relationship.  She has had pharma drug abuse/addiction issues in the first half of our togetherness (vicodin and suboxone).  She is no longer taking pharms (rehab), but now drinks regularly in the garage by herself.  She doesn't really have any friends (her last BFF died from a drug overdose ) and not a good relationship with her family - they have trouble being with her because of her BPD issues).
I was unfaithful to my wife with a co-worker in mid 2015 into 2017 (about 1.5 years).  My wife suspected the affair, but I lied and never admitted it.  That continued until fall 2023, when she started to have serious BPD/paranoia blowups every few days.  Yelling, screaming, spitting in my face, sometimes physically pushing or hitting me, sometimes destroying items around the house.  This caused me to leave the house in Nov. 2023, we lived separately for 6 months, and she filed for divorce.  During the separation, I admitted my affair to her, and fortunately (for me) we reconciled in April 2024. 
During our separation, I went to a lot of counseling, and my therapist informed me that my wife likely has BPD based on the symptoms I described.   The symptoms are:  at least since late 2023, she thinks I am stalking her, tracking her phone, controlling her car, the television, listening in on her phone calls, changing settings on her phone.  Alot of off-the-wall paranoid thoughts.  She splits, then verbally and physically lashes out at me, accusing me of doing those things, so that I know where she is at all of the time, so I can continue my affair(s).  The blowups are unprovoked by me (she gets triggered by all sorts of odd things). 
My wife is undiagnosed.  She refuses to seek therapy or treatment of any kind.  She says I made her this way, and that I'm the one who needs treatment.
I would appreciate any help or guidance on how to finally get my wife into treatment (for her, for us, for our kids).  Especially since she doesn't trust me because of my past infidelity, and no relationship/reliance on her family or friends.

You see now that her sexual orientation and her use of drugs are not in the past.

BPD affects all relationships. It's not a surprise that it impacts this new one too.

More importantly, you know how you feel about a third person in your relationship and can pay attention to that, because this actually is a third person in your relationship- whether it is male or female.

Take away the additional descriptors. These are not the main issue in the relationship.

At the core of this is monogomy. You can't control any one else. You can be empathetic to someone's gender confusion, and be an ally to someone who is LGBTQ and in addition, want to be in a monogomous romantic relationship. Regardless- if one person wants monogomy in a romantic relationship, and the other one doesn't- it's a problem whether it's a same sex orientation or not.

One difficult aspect of the kind of dynamics in your relationship is losing focus of your own feelings and thinking while buying into the pwBPD's emotional thinking. Your wife is not going to own her part in this situation. She will "rationalize"  it from her own victim perspective. ie, she isn't breaking the marital agreement- she will instead say you are forcing her to be monogomous and keeping her from discovering herself.

Fact is- she can do whatever she chooses, but there are consequences to actions. In a monogomous relationship, someone can stray- but the consequence may be the loss of the relationship. She wants the freedom and not the consequences. Why not? If people could do whatever they wanted with another attractive person and not have any consequences- maybe more people would do it? But that's not how a monogomous marriage usually works. There are consequences.

Truly- it's up to you to decide what your feelings are and what the consequences of your wife having outside relationships are going to be. That's a difficult situation.

SuperDaddy, something just occurred to me: he took a certain antidepressant for a few months. During that time, it was sometimes possible to catch him! He was in a completely different mood, with significantly less tension in his body. It was really noticeable.
Unfortunately, his doctor switched him to a different medication at some point because it allegedly caused abnormalities in his ECG. Since then, everything has been back to normal and he is impossible to catch when the dysregulation starts.

Hi SuperDaddy,

That's interesting. When you say that you said no clearly from the outset in your relationships, does that mean that your partners knew that about you from the start?

For a while, I had the theory that a ‘no’ from me became increasingly difficult for him to tolerate over the course of the relationship because I was so co-dependent at the beginning and really went out of my way to please him and avoid dysregulation at all costs, and only started to set boundaries over time – and this boundary setting was simply unfamiliar to him.

Just to mention it: trying to please him didn't help either. He still became dysregulated – because it could also have been the outside world that triggered him and I was only being used by him to regulate his emotions.

To answer your question: no, I never criticised him and I also made a conscious effort not to use ‘you’ messages.

But of course I had to say no from time to time. For example, when he wanted to meet up with me at a time when I simply couldn't because I had to be there for my son or had an important appointment, etc. That was enough to make him feel rejected. And no matter how lovingly and compassionately I told him that I knew it made him sad and that I myself thought it was a shame, but that it couldn't be changed and we would make up for it, it didn't help.

Weeks later, he often told me the exact wording of HOW I should have communicated my rejection or my ‘no’ to him, and every time I felt really cheated because I had said it almost exactly that way. BUT - in his dysregulated state, it clearly did not come across that way to him.

The situation in which I gave him the above answer was after he got drunk on New Year's Eve. Since he is a binge drinker and I have already experienced bad situations with him when he is drunk, I communicated to him a long time ago that I would have no contact with him as long as I could not be sure that he was sober. I need a clear, honest statement from him: ‘I'm sober again.’ He knows that.
Nevertheless, he contacted me drunk on New Year's Eve via text and tried to call me. I did not respond and stuck to my boundary.
After that, he sent me photos and jokes for days and wished me a happy new year. I replied to every message with my standard text saying that I cannot have any contact if I cannot be sure that he is sober. I wanted to signal to him that I am there, but that he has to position himself for any exchange.

This caused him to freak out and shift the blame: I had withdrawn over Christmas, he had had crises that I hadn't responded to (I didn't know anything about this because HE had withdrawn over Christmas), HE had contacted me on New Year's Eve, but I hadn't contacted him (of course not – he was drunk and my boundaries apply)...


I haven't yet had a situation where he left things at my place and wanted to use that as an excuse to come over to me. But I have had a situation where he wrote to me saying that he had gastroenteritis and was feeling sooo ill, and he wanted me to drive the 50 km to him IMMEDIATELY, even though he knew full well that I couldn't because of other commitments that day. I didn't have a car that day either because it was in the garage. I had already texted him early in the morning that I would cook him some soup and bring it to him first thing the next morning.

So he knew I was thinking of him and cared about him, and I told him that he could of course call me in an emergency and we would find a solution.

I wrote to him in an incredibly loving and empathetic way, saying that I could imagine he was feeling awful.

It didn't help. He insulted me, accused me, played the poor victim that nobody loves... He didn't want the soup anymore, and he didn't want me to visit him the next day either. Instead, he started drinking.

To be honest, I don't think you can counteract a dysregulated state if it was a strong trigger.

Maybe someone else has had different experiences. I'm curious to hear about them!

Triangulation - didn’t think of it that way.  Yes, this is what I feel is happening, and why I feel an open relationship would not work with a pwBPD.  The two romantic partners woild never be on equal footing.  One is always white, the other black.  If she got into an argument with me, she runs to her.  And vice versa.  I don’t see how there would not be constant drama. 

It’s already happened.  She got really upset that the woman she is interested in had a date with another woman.  In other words, upset that this woman did not want to be monogamous.  I knew W was somewhat bisexual when we got married, but she hd basically told me that was in her past (the drug use part of her past).  I was trying to be empathetic to W’s confusion here, but the jealousy and double standard toward her new romantic interest was a a real eye opener.