Does your partner co-opt your stories?

[vortex of confusion]

Vortex, what you are coming to terms with is that you should be focusing more on you, and your life, including preventing yourself from being frustrated like this.

Yep, that is very true. I probably would have been okay if he hadn't wanted to talk this evening. He put me on the spot and wanted me to tell him what to do and how to do it. He wanted me to tell him what I need. I told him that I cannot do that for him. I told him that he has to figure it out for himself. And, I also pointed out that he has done this in the past. He will ask me what to do and will get my input and then not follow through. I told him point blank that I cannot trust him to follow through with anything. Sure, we can talk all day long but that is the substance of our communication. I told him that I get really confused at times because his non verbal communication will say one thing but then when I ask him about it he will tell me that I am completely wrong. I told him that I don't know what to think about anything any more. But, I did refuse to tell him what to do. I stuck to the fact that he has to figure things out for himself.

Having "the chat" to try and get them onto your plan is all very well, they may even "get it", but they can't live it, the cloud of delusion carries away that moment of sunshine. You are left disillusioned and frustrated, because you yet again thought you had a plan, you were both on board and making progress, only to find yourself all alone on that path your partner having disappeared off into the mist again.

He seems to be the one that initiates the chats. I have tried to stop talking about our relationship. I have tried to sit and listen to him talk about where he is at in his life. I have tried NOT to say too much because he tends to get rather fatalistic about things. I told him that I was frustrated and his response was, "I wish you weren't frustrated." I was floored because I think being frustrated is a very natural reaction to what I have to deal with on a day to day basis. I said that I had a lot of thoughts and feelings but wasn't sure where to even begin and that I didn't even really want to go there because I don't want to set him back or create more problems. He told me, "I bet I already know what you think and feel." I told him to tell me. So he says, "I think you hate me."

Whaaaaaa? I have dinner cooked or available every night when he comes home. I try not to interfere with anything that he wants to do. I don't ask for hardly anything from him. I have supported him through all sorts of things yet he thinks I hate him. I don't have it in me to hate anyone let alone the father of my children and the man that I used to consider was my best friend.

If you view yourself as only being responsible for finding your own path forward life will have fewer let downs. Your partner may then have a desire to follow your path, or not. You cannot control this, and the more you try to coerse the more they resist, anything that is not their idea doesn't have the required determination to follow it through

I guess I wonder why people think that I am trying to coerce my husband into following my path. In all honesty, I have been trying to find ways to create my own path. He is the one that wants to talk about things to death. He is the one that wants to talk about this stuff ad nauseum while I sit there and listen to him and give input when appropriate. When I do something, it seems like he wants to do it too. He even applied for a job at the place where I work. He interviewed with them and did really well but has not heard back from them. He is obsessing over whether or not he got the job. The interview was close to two months ago. A reasonable person would simply let it go and assume that he didn't get the job. Not my husband. There isn't a day that goes by that he doesn't wonder about that job. On the days when I work, he asks me if I have found out anything. He won't let it rest.

[PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES]

PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members may appear frustrated but they are here for constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[JohnLove]

Hello vortex of confusion. I feel you really need to have a greater appreciation that you are in a relationship with someone with a severe mental illness. Your friend sounds rather healthy and focused. He sounds like he has your best interests at heart... .while getting his own needs met.  . I don't believe you can "get" your husband to be like that. He is what he is.

I agree with the post with wave rider above except I am uncertain if your husbands insights are really that. A pwBPD will tell you what you expect to hear or what they believe you expect to be told. They are not completely stupid. They can be very manipulative in getting their own needs met or the disorder itself can be percieved as manipulation. The situation where your husband condoned the your affair and wanted to be part of it really blows my mind. That's not how affairs work but I am not one to judge if if you feel it is working for you. Problem is... .it's not. You have explained that he wanted it to be about him. Affairs are selfish actions. I am gobsmacked that he was able to twist it to be about him. This is BPD.

I read through this thread and in the beginning you were explaining that according to your husband he didn't care who you were or what your life experiences were that bought you to this place. Someone else called it projection but I believe it is very different to that.

Your husband wants you to be what he wants or expects you to be, not who you really are. That is confronting. When you reveal something about your history he is making up your life story according to his own expectations... .no doubt like he does with himself according to his Facebook posting.

Remember that to a pwBPD feelings = facts.

We are spiritual beings. No question about it. I believe that when a person develops BPD that their spirit is destructed. How do you feel when your true spirit is ignored?.

He has made you feel like an object... .again this is BPD all over... .and that's what has left you continually feeling detached and asking yourself "What's the point?".

I would like you to continue to ask yourself that question... . 

[JohnLove]

I just read your update after I posted.

He is engulfing you and after reading your last update I am not a doctor but I will use the term runaway engulfment (yes I just made that up). He is out of control. I think you need to focus on yourself and his extreme engulfment of you. He seems to be trying to consume you and your identity because he has none of his own.  Your home, your personal life, and now at work?. You will have no peace. I feel this is a very bad idea... .for many people... .but especially in your situation. This enmeshment is too extreme. I feel you should not be encouraging it. The feeling is if you could just give enough of yourself things will get better... .this is true to an extent but you are giving too much of yourself away. It will never be enough. He needs to get himself together or get help. It is as simple as that.

The comment you made in an earlier post about being invalidated while speaking to him about your own life... .even before you met him... .confirms this. I think you termed it co-opted... .whatever you want to call it, it is mental illness and just plain wrong.

My heart goes out to you. You might need more help than this forum or your friend. Do you have a life experienced person to talk to?... .or a counsellor?... .or even a T?.

[vortex of confusion]

I just read your update after I posted.

He is engulfing you and after reading your last update I am not a doctor but I will use the term runaway engulfment (yes I just made that up). He is out of control. I think you need to focus on yourself and his extreme engulfment of you. He seems to be trying to consume you and your identity because he has none of his own.  Your home, your personal life, and now at work?. You will have no peace. I feel this is a very bad idea... .for many people... .but especially in your situation. This enmeshment is too extreme. I feel you should not be encouraging it. The feeling is if you could just give enough of yourself things will get better... .this is true to an extent but you are giving too much of yourself away. It will never be enough. He needs to get himself together or get help. It is as simple as that.

I completely agree with you John! I have been trying to focus on myself and my kids. It can be confusing for me because it is like he is engulfing me but ignoring me all at the same time. My boss did take me aside the other night and let me know that my husband is NOT going to get the job but he asked me not to tell my husband and just let him find out from HR. I am more than happy to do that. I can sit and listen to my husband talk about the job and be at ease because I am no longer worrying about it. I love my boss. I jokingly told him it was a relief because I did't want to have to share my coworkers with my husband. He totally got it. I think he told me about my husband not being the candidate because I had told somebody else that I was concerned that it might ruin my chances for working with them full time in the future.

The comment you made in an earlier post about being invalidated while speaking to him about your own life... .even before you met him... .confirms this. I think you termed it co-opted... .whatever you want to call it, it is mental illness and just plain wrong.

It is weird how little things like that seem so normal when that is what you live on a day to day basis. I didn't notice it for the longest time. I think it has always been there but it has gotten a lot worse over the years.

My heart goes out to you. You might need more help than this forum or your friend. Do you have a life experienced person to talk to?... .or a counsellor?... .or even a T?.

I am slowly rebuilding my networks. I have a good friend whose father is a therapist. He won't talk to me but my friend knows a lot of stuff from having grown up with her dad. For now, I am using this forum as a way to just get some of this stuff out. Every time I write out new details or rehash things, it is becoming more real. The more real it gets, the easier it is to set boundaries. While I was normalizing completely abnormal behavior, I didn't see how screwed up my boundaries had become. I didn't see just how screwed up everything was. I have always had a nagging feeling that something wasn't right but I chalked it up to the fact that I can sometimes be a bit paranoid because of things that go back to my FOO. And, his pristine, picture perfect whatever didn't help either. High school football, private schools his whole life, very religious family, small town in the Midwest, and so on and so forth. Me, I grew up a "heathen" and had a family full of very interesting people. Even now, I think that people would look at what is seen on the surface and complete side with him and think that I am bat crap crazy because he is just so nice. He rubs my feet for me. He will sometimes have dinner ready when I get home from work. And the list goes on. Oh, and I don't hide stuff or pretend to be anything. Him, not so much.

Oh, and some of this goes way back. I wanted to go to grad school and get a master's degree in a certain field. The recruiter came and talked to me and I asked for a packet for my fiance. Anyway, we got married and went to grad school together. He had one master's degree that he was finishing but opted to go to school with me too. He is still using my bosses (the professors) as references. I worked for those professors yet it feels like he is riding my coat tail. The job that he lost because of looking at porn at work was actually at a place that I had worked at for 4 years. I knew all of his coworkers and many of them were at our wedding. When he quit out of the blue, my old boss called me and I was put on the spot and had to reassure her that nobody there had done anything wrong. And, one of his coworkers (the one that turned him in) was on an alumni board with me. I dropped off the board because I was so ashamed and embarrassed.

[vortex of confusion]

Affairs are selfish actions. I am gobsmacked that he was able to twist it to be about him. This is BPD.

The affair was his idea. I started it because I answered an online ad one time. After talking to the guy for a day or two, I felt bad because the conversations went places that I didn't intend for them to go. I got swept away because it felt really nice to have a real conversation with a man. I told my husband and he got all excited and used that as an excuse for both of us to see other people. And it got worse because my husband and that guy were actually emailing each other about me. It was twisted. After meeting my husband, the guy stopped emailing him all together. I went to see the guy one or two more times after that. When I refused to give my husband details, he told the guys wife and the guy sent me an email telling me to keep my ___hole husband away from him and he could never talk to me again.

It didn't stop my husband from wanting me to do stuff with other people and then come tell him about it. The friend that I have now has been talking to me for over a year now. As long as I am willing to tell my husband details, my husband is okay with me having a "friend". If I refuse to give him details, then he tells me that he doesn't want me talking to my friend. What is even more twisted is that my husband would take pictures of me and have me send them to my friend. If he found out that I sent my friend anything without his knowledge, then he would become unglued.

And that is why I am currently refusing to give up my friend. I know it isn't right. Not one little bit. But I don't really care at this point. I am trying to find as many people as I can to talk to and support me so that I can regain some sense of normalcy. In the past, I was so isolated that I would just fall back into old patterns because I did not have any kind of support. I put on a happy little face and pretended to be the perfect little wife and did whatever necessary to take care of my husband. And when I write it out, it sounds so completely horrible.

[waverider]

His attempts at initiating these discussions is a way of holding you in place. This is likely to increase as you attempt to me autonomous.

You will need to either find a way to avoid these discusions or let them wash, as they are unlikely to abate.

In short working on ways to prevent frustration and resentment building as a result

[MissyM]

I am trying to detach and set boundaries but as I detach I am having a lot of feelings of "What's the point?"

I think that is normal. Detaching feels really unnatural at first.  The detaching with love is harder to get to.

[Moselle]

Part of my recovery has been to set boundaries and detach with love.  

I'm afraid I detached rather abruptly, and with less love, though I have been  careful to be kind and generous to her for the whole 7 months of separation. Even through the rages. I felt that if I could do that I'd have some sense of pride that I can be competent husband. I've also been practicing giving her emotional safety.

How did you do it with love?

We are spiritual beings. No question about it. I believe that when a person develops BPD that their spirit is destructed. How do you feel when your true spirit is ignored?.

This is profound. Mine has degenerated spiritually, to the point where there has none. I'm not sure she ever had any spiritualty. I knew this intuitively, but to see you write it has confirmed my suspicion around this.

Oh, and I don't hide stuff or pretend to be anything. Him, not so much.

Ha, ha had to laugh about this one. Ditto!

[JohnLove]

Affairs are selfish actions. I am gobsmacked that he was able to twist it to be about him. This is BPD.

The affair was his idea. I started it because I answered an online ad one time. After talking to the guy for a day or two, I felt bad because the conversations went places that I didn't intend for them to go. I got swept away because it felt really nice to have a real conversation with a man. I told my husband and he got all excited and used that as an excuse for both of us to see other people. And it got worse because my husband and that guy were actually emailing each other about me. It was twisted. After meeting my husband, the guy stopped emailing him all together. I went to see the guy one or two more times after that. When I refused to give my husband details, he told the guys wife and the guy sent me an email telling me to keep my ___hole husband away from him and he could never talk to me again.

It didn't stop my husband from wanting me to do stuff with other people and then come tell him about it. The friend that I have now has been talking to me for over a year now. As long as I am willing to tell my husband details, my husband is okay with me having a "friend". If I refuse to give him details, then he tells me that he doesn't want me talking to my friend. What is even more twisted is that my husband would take pictures of me and have me send them to my friend. If he found out that I sent my friend anything without his knowledge, then he would become unglued.

And that is why I am currently refusing to give up my friend. I know it isn't right. Not one little bit. But I don't really care at this point. I am trying to find as many people as I can to talk to and support me so that I can regain some sense of normalcy. In the past, I was so isolated that I would just fall back into old patterns because I did not have any kind of support. I put on a happy little face and pretended to be the perfect little wife and did whatever necessary to take care of my husband. And when I write it out, it sounds so completely horrible.

Thank you for sharing so much vortex. It helps me to understand BPD and to comprehend my own situations.

I noted that sharing in this forum and the advice received helps but I did not miss that even when you just write it down you process it differently mentally and that helps enormously with clarity and perspective.

The affair was your husbands idea but... .you ran with it. I can understand why. Pushing and pulling behaviour is typical of a pwBPD. Controlling behaviour is written all over this as well as it is about your husbands needs. (BPD again). I suspect he would like to have another partner... .someone more controllable perhaps?. If you started it... .and if he also had an affair then that would be "acceptable" in your relationship wouldnt it?. You couldn't blame him then.

Many people in these forums complain of infidelity. It is just classic BPD behaviour. He goaded you in a sense. You know in your heart it isn't right but you have the longing for understanding and true love as we all do. Did you let him get the better of you?. Will it backfire when you make a deep connection with someone else?. He will have no one to blame but himself. Blame is so BIG in BPD.

The guy and your husband emailing about you is triangulation. Another nasty behaviour not limited to but especially deleterious in a relationship with someone suffering BPD.

Your second paragraph is all about control and the objectification of you. Problem... .you are not an object. This is classic BPD again.

Your friend is quite obviously supportive and an emotional lifeline. I don't question that and it is fine... .the problem is in a healthy monogamous relationship being intimate with someone physically or emotionally other than your partner is cheating.

The overriding problem is that BPD makes a dog's breakfast of a healthy relationship.

I would encourage you to seek outside help and continue to post and study the tools on this site.

More power to you. You said your husband had gotten worse with time. I hope for you that you can reverse this deterioration but it will be slow and hard if you can

I sincerely hope you can work through this and find happiness.  

[JohnLove]

I completely agree with you John! I have been trying to focus on myself and my kids. It can be confusing for me because it is like he is engulfing me but ignoring me all at the same time. My boss did take me aside the other night and let me know that my husband is NOT going to get the job but he asked me not to tell my husband and just let him find out from HR. I am more than happy to do that. I can sit and listen to my husband talk about the job and be at ease because I am no longer worrying about it. I love my boss. I jokingly told him it was a relief because I did't want to have to share my coworkers with my husband. He totally got it. I think he told me about my husband not being the candidate because I had told somebody else that I was concerned that it might ruin my chances for working with them full time in the future.

I am slowly rebuilding my networks. I have a good friend whose father is a therapist. He won't talk to me but my friend knows a lot of stuff from having grown up with her dad. For now, I am using this forum as a way to just get some of this stuff out. Every time I write out new details or rehash things, it is becoming more real. The more real it gets, the easier it is to set boundaries. While I was normalizing completely abnormal behavior, I didn't see how screwed up my boundaries had become. I didn't see just how screwed up everything was. I have always had a nagging feeling that something wasn't right but I chalked it up to the fact that I can sometimes be a bit paranoid because of things that go back to my FOO. And, his pristine, picture perfect whatever didn't help either. High school football, private schools his whole life, very religious family, small town in the Midwest, and so on and so forth. Me, I grew up a "heathen" and had a family full of very interesting people. Even now, I think that people would look at what is seen on the surface and complete side with him and think that I am bat crap crazy because he is just so nice. He rubs my feet for me. He will sometimes have dinner ready when I get home from work. And the list goes on. Oh, and I don't hide stuff or pretend to be anything. Him, not so much.

Oh, and some of this goes way back. I wanted to go to grad school and get a master's degree in a certain field. The recruiter came and talked to me and I asked for a packet for my fiance. Anyway, we got married and went to grad school together. He had one master's degree that he was finishing but opted to go to school with me too. He is still using my bosses (the professors) as references. I worked for those professors yet it feels like he is riding my coat tail. The job that he lost because of looking at porn at work was actually at a place that I had worked at for 4 years. I knew all of his coworkers and many of them were at our wedding. When he quit out of the blue, my old boss called me and I was put on the spot and had to reassure her that nobody there had done anything wrong. And, one of his coworkers (the one that turned him in) was on an alumni board with me. I dropped off the board because I was so ashamed and embarrassed.

Engulfment is not so much about you. It is about the engulfer (if that's even a word). Ignoring you or your needs is par for the course unless there is an aspect that fills their need.

Your boss so obviously has your back, is sympathetic to your situation, and values you highly.

This is good. It is validating. It would seem he also has very healthy boundaries. He doesn't need this crap in his life so he doesn't. Emotion doesn't factor into his decision.

I am glad to hear you are rebuilding. Interesting people make the world go round... .isn't that how we end up in relationships with a pwBPD. They can be charming and attentive and affectionate and... .

Yes. PwBPD have masks... .that they show to the world... .so that they will be accepted. Stay true to yourself. It is the path to happiness.

The realisation this goes way back are huge red flags. Finishing a masters degree only to jump ship into your course?. Enmeshing behaviour right there. You weren't to know what was to come. This would have been normalised in the early stages of an intimate relationship.

His behaviour was unacceptable to others?. No wonder he jumped ship!. A pwBPD cannot accept blame or even being wrong. On some level they know that they are "not right" but they cannot be held responsible.

I am so sorry you had to endure the shame and embarrassment of this and the humiliation as well... .really... .it was all his.

He owned it. He was responsible for it. Not you.

Stay strong. Stay focused on yourself and your children. Our thoughts are with you.  

[vortex of confusion]

The affair was your husbands idea but... .you ran with it. I can understand why. Pushing and pulling behaviour is typical of a pwBPD. Controlling behaviour is written all over this as well as it is about your husbands needs. (BPD again). I suspect he would like to have another partner... .someone more controllable perhaps?. If you started it... .and if he also had an affair then that would be "acceptable" in your relationship wouldnt it?. You couldn't blame him then.

Yep, I totally ran with it. The problem was that he wanted to know everything that I was doing and who I was talking to at any given time. I talked to a whole lot of people. When I would set boundaries with those people or tell them things they didn't want to hear, they would disappear. My husband would get mad because he couldn't find anybody. He would post and post and post but not get any responses. And then, there were a couple of times when it was pretty clear that the person he was talking to was trying to pull one over on him. He became so obsessed with one woman that he would talk to her on the phone at night and even sat and texted her when we were sitting on the couch cuddling. I got really, really mad because I tried to remain respectful of him through the whole ordeal. I never let anything that I was doing interfere with my ability to take care of the kids, the house, or him. If I would try to bring that up, he would get mad and tell me that I had a double standard. He would throw what I was doing in my face. Then, he would delete his ads and his email account and would be "good" for a while until something upset him and then he would be right back to looking again. There were two or three women that he was talking to that I emailed because I found out he was lying to me. Part of our agreement was that there be honesty. He lied about everything. To make matters worse, he was telling one lady that he was into things that he has never ever been interested in his life. When I got to digging, I found out that she was just a female version of my friend. When I told her what was going on, she dropped him. He had already unfriended her and blocked her and she had no idea why. She was rather perplexed until I explained what was going on.

Many people in these forums complain of infidelity. It is just classic BPD behaviour. He goaded you in a sense. You know in your heart it isn't right but you have the longing for understanding and true love as we all do. Did you let him get the better of you?. Will it backfire when you make a deep connection with someone else?. He will have no one to blame but himself. Blame is so BIG in BPD.

He goaded me. That is for sure. I already have a deep connection with my friend. My friend blows me away sometimes because he knows when it is that time of the month, he seems to know when to stay away and when I need him. We didn't talk for 6 weeks one time. I was getting really frustrated and down and he sends me a message out of the blue. The few times we have actually gotten together in person, he can sense by discomfort with some things and will stop and we end up just sitting and talking. It makes it really difficult for me because there is a part of me that feels madly in love with my friend. But, I know that my perception of him is very skewed because of the nature of our relationship and how it began. I am not kidding myself at all.

Your friend is quite obviously supportive and an emotional lifeline. I don't question that and it is fine... .the problem is in a healthy monogamous relationship being intimate with someone physically or emotionally other than your partner is cheating.

Oh yes, I am well aware of this. When I have tried to bring it up with my husband, he keeps telling me that I didn't cheat because I had his permission to do it.

More power to you. You said your husband had gotten worse with time. I hope for you that you can reverse this deterioration but it will be slow and hard if you can

In all honesty, I don't know that my husband will ever change because he does not see things. This morning, he asked me if he should go to the Saturday meeting. In the past, I would encourage him to go. Today, I told him, "That is up to you. It isn't my decision to make." Then, I decided to take our younger three to the mall and to have lunch. He was wishy washy about going with us. One of the girls asked him not to go and then confided in me that she didn't want him to go because he yells too much and gets too grumpy. He has a tendency to micromanage them with stuff like, "Stay close. Don't do this. Don't do that. You are in people's way." It is all very nitpicky and it makes the girls anxious and they end up acting out or fighting and our trips suck. Today, the girls and I had an awesome time. I did get irritated though because there is all kinds of things that need done around the house. He rewashed a load of laundry and put it in the dryer for me and that was it. He was able to make a video of himself playing an instrument and post it to social media. And when we were sitting outside when we got home, he was so proud of his video and he was so proud of the fact that he didn't spend the entire time on the computer. From the time I got up this morning, I was on the go making breakfast, starting laundry, and doing stuff with the kids. He has a tendency to disappear and it feels like he has no real interest in his kids.

He will deny this and say that he loves his kids but we tend to feel like we are just an inconvenience to him.