when is enough enough?

[Bluedarkblue]

i am currently reading stop walking on eggshells. i am on the part where it speaks of taking care of yourself.
i am having a hard time in finding how to let certain things roll off my back. in a social setting my husband will go from telling everyone to look at me because "she's so damn beautiful"  to " thats why our kids are going to hate you when i die. in fact you should just go" in a span of 5 minutes. i feel embarrassed, i have to go hide so i can cry. i cant look at him for the next few days because its not the first time hes done it and it wont be the last. i understand he says it because hes afraid but i cant handle the embarrassment.
also i have found several pictures of different women on his phone saved to his camera roll. i have found tabs open to escort pages, i have found texts from escorts, if i see he liked someones page and ask him about the girl he will flip it all on me. this has all happened in the span of 3 years and i still do not have an answer to any. he makes me feel like... ., like how dare i question him on something like that...
when he corners me in a room and berates me in front of my 3 year old how do i explain this to her?
i love him. i have come to a place where i am not sure if i want to be physical though. i am struggling to find a way to make this work. i want to. i really do.
the book says i cant tell him to go to therapy... .so am i just being submissive by staying?
i know i need to finish the book but its hard. its confusing me.

[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.

[AskingWhy]

Bluedarkblue, there is no right or wrong answer to what you are asking.  Everyone has a different threshold on how much he or she can tolerate in a relationship with a pwBPD.  

It's about what YOU have tolerated and your own personal tolerance level.   The mood swings of pwBPD can cause many people to give up in the first months of dating.  

BPDs have an enormous sense of entitlement.  Mine. Mine. Me.  It's like a toddler in a the body of an adult.

Some of us here, then again, have been married for decades.   It's normal to not want to be intimate with someone who seems to be from another planet, and with whom you are not emotionally intimate.  This often starts the cycle of blaming on the part of the pwBPD.  "You are not loving!  You are not affectionate!"  And then it sets off a domino reaction.

There is no right or wrong answer here.

And by no means tell your partner you are seeking therapy.  He will feel betrayed, and will not think of it as your trying to better the relationship.  It will only be perceived as you badmouthing him to the therapist behind his back.  BPDs are very emotional fragile.

You might also try the "Eggshells" companion workbook, which is a more guided approach to what you are learning.

[Bluedarkblue]

Thank you for replying. I have not been on this website for a while. A few things happened. I told my husband that I needed therapy for me. The following 3 days he broke down and for the first time in our marriage, admitted to a few things. He knows he pushes me away. That he puts up a “show” so that I see him as something greater. During these 3 days I felt like we were progressing. He told me he wanted a therapist for himself because he was done living this way. So we both found our own and had been going once a week since November. It’s been a lot harder than I expected and he mentioned that his were becoming “heavy”.
But even with that I felt we were making progress. It seemed like he was thinking before responding and being honest with his emotions. We sat down and made goals and one of them was that we would both go to therapy. Once a week until the end of the year. This was his idea not mine.
The week before his “honest days”, he came home and said “ I quit my job. Sorry it’s going to ruin your Christmas.” He is now working with his brother in law (his sisters husband) doing odd jobs here and there. ( I am now finding out that there is a word to describe his relationship with him, enmeshed. I’ve laughed and cried many times with the fact that my husband puts him first. Not me. ) He has now missed 2 therapy sessions. One of them I understand. He needed to be out of town to make money for Christmas. But now he is back to his ways of not coming home till 4 in the morning because his brother in law needs him for emotional support. I have kept seeing mine and I plan on continuing to go.
I feel deflated. I feel lost. I feel like I am back at square one. I have lost him once again.  No more eye contact. Smart ass remarks to things I say. Disappearing for hours. Has anyone else gone through this? What things did you do to cope with the feeling of disappointment?

[snowglobe]

Dear Bluedarkblue, I’m so sorry you freak frustrated, hurt and disappointed. All of those are normal feelings of nonBPD who’s been involved in a non stop rollercoaster with no objective. As a witness to husband life you are trying to rationalize his actions, in order to consolidate them with you reality. One of my “5 cents”, don’t! It will drive you mad, you are trying to hold him accountable to the promises he’s made, which is fruitless. PwBPD often Make promises, pledges and plans in the heat of the moment. Once the emotion passes, they seem to “forget” or devalue the importance of such promise made. Now to the second point of regression, of him coming home to you at 4 am and so on. Well, this one is a little bit tougher, it stems from the boundaries you enforced on. As one of the senior members explained to me, they are made to protect you, not to control him. You can’t bargain, put ultimatums or put conditions that you aren’t gonna follow through. If you ever practiced “bluffing” with him, now is the time to stop. You can’t control what he does, you can’t nag or sit him down to let him know how much he hurts you. This will only backfire at you, he isn’t able to process or accept his share of responsibility when it comes to your life together. Gentle little steps.
Take a deep breath, many of those, understand that you need lots and lots of patience and validation to get through to him. To improve things you need to start with yourself, stop adding fuel to the fire. You have to be balanced and cantered, unfazed, regardless whAt he does or says. You can let him know “how much you love having him at home at an early hour, so you can do abc (you were thinking of giving him a massage since he works so hard to earn money for Christmas, share his favourite dinner, etc). Think of an incentive to come home, and a quiet place so he can get stabilized.
Fidelity and his interest in women, that’s one I’m also struggling with. It’s also about pushing the boundaries and the trust. You can be very clear about your boundaries, as soon as you figure out where you would draw the line. In a way I communicate with my husband, I tell him “I love you so much, our relationship mean the world to me, I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Cheating isn’t part of my life, not because I’m afraid of you, but because I wouldn’t be able to live with myself. If you can live with yourself, then go and do it. All the while knowing that When I would find out there won’t be any fights, trying to figure us out, I will be done”. I don’t look for confirmations or suspicions, I just live and believe that this isn’t part of my reality. At the end, of he wants to do it, he will, and no amount of talking or begging or discussing will stop him.
Lastly, in order to understand him, you have to get down on his level. Kind of like you probably do with your son, getting down on his eye level when you are talking to him. He is the way he is due to something that happened to him while growing up. Nurture plays a big part in someone becoming BPD, dig deep into his foo, it will give you clues and patterns to his functioning. It definetly helps me to view my uBPDh as a victim with poor coping skills as opposed to a tyran. Good luck dear!