You're probably not going to like my answer, but what you describe is not love...it's manipulation.

Dating coaches teach people to date using manipulative tactics.  Neil Strauss wrote an excellent book on it called "The Game".  In a nutshell, it showed that anyone could hook up with specific behaviors and tactics, but the relationships never lasted and the guys were even more miserable than before.  The reason is because they were trying to "game love" instead of simply building a relationship off of love, trust, and mutual understanding.  In the end it left everyone broken, depressed, and alone.

The dating advice stuff from the "hook-up gurus" is absolute garbage because it misses on the one thing that actually matters in a relationship- reciprocal love.


In another post you mentioned that things were going good with your wife at home until she drank your juice.  When you questioned her, she exploded with anger.  And I remember thinking to myself, "Your wife is home and things are good for the first time in months.  Why question her over juice boundaries?  It's the simplest compromise- she's happy and you go buy more juice once you run out."

In other words, this shouldn't have been "a condition" of being present.  She was thirsty.


With BPD, there's almost never a full recovery.  There is no "remissive state."  BPDs can get a better handle on their emotions and learn to take a moment before losing it, but the mental illness is still there and a successful relationship is still going to come back to mutual love, understanding, etc.

Here's the thing- as long as you view this as "her affecting you", it's a lost battle.  She's sick, she's suffering, and her emotions are all over the place.  When you showed love and compassion, things were instantly better.  When you showed ironclad boundaries over something that doesn't matter at all (juice), things instantly fell apart.

Can you see what I'm saying here?  You can have ego or your wife.  But you probably can't have both.

I understand the concern for the kids- just also be careful to not reinforce her interpersonal dilemmas with a lot of attention to them. I know you are keeping a watch for danger.

How do I effectively evaluate how dangerous a situation is?

Clearly this is a situation where W needs professional help, not my help. 

Also - clearly this is already a situation where there is a reasonable chance of self-harm or a suicide attempt - because this is a route she has taken before.  Normally, I might consider these as inevitable, but right now children are in the picture. 

It feels like I need to evaluate the course that is least stressful for me and the kids in both the short and long term.  How would I feel if I completely stayed out of it and let the worst happen and trusted the long-term outcome was for the best vs how would I feel if I let myself become emotionally invested now to ease the short-term drama some knowing that it sets me up for more long-term drama?

My T suggests I just focus as hard as I can on self-care and emotionally detaching from this situation.  I agree with that.  The problem is with kids, W's drama impacts my ability for self-care because it shifts the burden of parenting 100% to me.  The reality, though, is that burden is already mostly on me. 

The other thing to consider is that W is 50, and this same situation seems to be a common and nearly constant theme with her since she was a teenager.  I'd be a fool to think that completely emotionally detaching would allow her to process on her own and "learn".   The goal here would be to save my emotional energy, and maybe she would learn to not lean on me in the future with such issues. 

Perhaps the best course for me right now is when she approaches me with her issues to say something like:

"those are very intense and serious emotions and you need to work through them with someone who is trained to help.  I can help you find resources if you would like."

Also - I think it's a good idea to not discuss her relationship issues with her, or offer her advice- or try to soothe her with this.

This puts your attention on her issues. It's reinforcing to her. It makes her issue your issue.

What this other woman does and what the other woman's GF does has nothing to do with you.

Your wife still wants to do this, and I don't think you can control that. It's possible that the best outcome would be that she finds that her experiences are a big disappointment.

Not because these relationships are disappointing in themselves but because the common factor in any relationship she has is going to be her own issues with BPD. They won't be a solution for her because, no external solution exists.

Try to resist the urge to get involved unless a situation is truly dangerous.

Superdaddy -

I agree.  This cycle is how W views the world.  If there isn't conflict, emotions aren't intense enough, and it isn't meaningful.  Reminds me of the times when she is upset with me about not being upset enough.  She really isn't seeking out a stable loving relationship with a woman - she is seeking out the excitement and drama.

Wendy - I am doing my best to stay out of this one.  There are a couple complicating factors here:  1) the suicidal stuff and 2) the kids.

The suicidal stuff is very tricky as the way laws work, calling 911 helps nothing unless she is willing to ask for help.  In the past, she has talked about suicide and I have called 911, and when police/paramedics/crisis response come W says she wasn't serious or denies things, and they tell me there is nothing they can do.  I have looked at getting her involuntarily evaluated for in-patient care, but the information I got tells me this is not an easy route - I can describe what has happened, but certain criteria have to be met first before she can be taken for evaluation.  Me saying that she is severely depressed and mentioning suicide is not enough.  And if she were admitted for evaluation, she could still "put on a show" and then they can only hold her for 24 hours.  If we didn't have kids, I'd be willing to extract myself completely and let it hit the fan, but with kids there are other things to consider.  The best thing would be if others (such as her T) could persuade her to go in-patient or an IOP program.  I do feel somewhat of an obligation, not just as a spouse or friend, but as caring human, to try and persuade her into more intensive therapy.  Right now I am trying to help her see this is part of a pattern that she can choose to change without saying "I told you so". 

Hi Jazz, I don't think there's a solid case for him being violent or potentially violent.

I think he could sense your contempt for the shirt and for him. Taking the photo to remind you of who he is could be seen as crossing a boundary. It's his body and his shirt, and even if it's got a message that you think is obnoxious- he still can choose to wear what he wants.

One could say his motive was to stop the picture, not to hurt you. That he swatted it- yes but possibly he was trying to stop you from taking the picture, tried to grab it or just push it away.

Even though you are entitled to your feelings, you have chosen to stay and live with him. I think it will make things easier on you if you "pick your battles". This isn't for him but for your own peace, wherever it's possible.

Hi Max- IMHO- this is her problem and also her lesson to learn. Sometimes natural consequences are the best way to learn. It's your wife who wanted to explore the idea of open marriage and same sex dating and guess what? ( as predicted) she didn't find herself in a community of perfect people, who never have issues or drama, and it isn't the perfect remedy for her issues.

Because there isn't such thing as a community of pefect people with no drama. All groups of humans are varied.

And there's no such thing as the perfect external solution for your wife's discontent.

IMHO, stay out of this one - this is not your problem to solve. This doesn't have to be your crisis. If you step in to manage your wife's feelings- she won't learn from it.

 I hope your wife doesn't become suicidal but if this were the case- the approach is still the same for any time someone is like this- call 911, get her to medical care.

I think the behavior is not ruled by what she says (the conscious explanation), but rather by the unconscious desire to have relationship conflicts, to fail, and to be rejected. Only because this will give her the spikes of dopamine and endogenous opioids that she craves for. In other words, I think those relationships fail by design.

Hi JazzSinger,

When you say you took the picture to remind yourself of who he really is, it seems like you really didn't like his polarized t-shirt, right? That was understood as criticism. More than that, the action of taking a picture was assumed to be a combative action (in a way, it was). In this situation in which he feels judged and "attacked," he will tend to have quick negative interpretations, and he did the simplest one, that you would use that picture against him.

An update here.  Nothing that wasn't predicted. 

BpdW got into an argument with her new romantic interest about her other girlfriend.  When W told me what was going on, clearly there was some triangulation, not with me, but with W, and the two other women.  This started because W was feeling left out and decided to go back on the women's dating platform, where she was immediately messaged by her new romantic interest's new GF.  And then some weird stuff was said. 

Either the new GF was trying to cause friction or was emotionally playing games in some other way.  Wither way, I expected this, and this was my biggest fear.

So then things got ugly in BPD style (curse words followed by "i don't want to talk to you anymore").  Now W is clearly acting heartbroken, in a very unhealthy obsessive way.  In W's mind, she is trying to restrain herself from contacting this woman again (basically stalking), sad because this woman won't talk to her anymore, and feels that this happened only because she and her did not have a physical relationship.  I told her that if they had a physical relationship, the same would have happened, and she would feel much worse not only because she shared a physical relationship with someone who abandoned her, but because it also would have likely ended our marriage. 

That's the backwards BPD logic talking, and the root of most of W's traumas - doing things she feels uncomfortable with in order to get people to like her, getting rejected, and then feeling intense shame.  She feels that if she had a physical relationship with this woman, she would not have sought another girlfriend.  Yet, from the beginning, the other woman was very open about not wanting a monogamous r/s.   A huge emotional double standard.  Scary too that the other woman is a psych nurse and probably should have identified this right away. 

W's T says she can't meet with her until next week.  W now acts on the verge of suicidal, yet I can't force her to get help.