Don’t engage - good advise?

[Hope4Joy]

Hi everyone, it’s been a while since I have been here. I am seeing a new counselor who I have informed that I might be dealing with a BPD spouse and that an exhausting part of life is when he becomes so disregulated that he can talk at me for hours (up to 12)  going around and around wanting resolution to some problem but refusing possibilities I suggest and providing no specific solutions himself. At the end of our last session the new counselor says I need to not engage….and I have been wondering about it for a while now. How does that look? Is it even good advice? I do have some boundaries now about when my frustration level gets high during these episodes that I take a break. He doesn’t like it but has gotten more used to it. Thanks in advance for your insight.

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[waverider]

It is good advice however there are a lot of steps to getting there.

You kind of need to become selectively deaf, as actually taking in what they are saying and not responding is very stressful over a prolong time. It needs to become like background noise.

Even to get to that stage requires them to be used to it and have gotten themselves into a state where they can get it all out without requiring a response. pwBPD biggest fear is of being attacked/criticised (that is their perception of disagreement). This is what happens if you engage with them using reason and logic. It just escalates, as reason and logic are means of invalidating crazy. They want you onboard the crazy train, not trying to stop it.

Not engaging will at first feel like a passive aggressive attack to them. so they have to get used to you not engaging, yet not take it as such. Not engaging is not the same as a "stony silence". It has to feel like not disagreeing, and not a challenge.

This changing of the landscape takes time. The catch 22 is that it takes you being genuinely calm to do it. You gain calmness by doing it, so its a cycle that takes some time to shift into

[Hope4Joy]

Thanks. This is difficult to wrap my brain around. I’m definitely a logic and reason person (uBPDh is too most of the time…) and I can see how that has never helped during an episode.
Do you have any good phrases to use?

[Cat Familiar]

If I want my husband to get off a tangent, I ask questions. “How specifically____?” “What would happen if ________ didn’t?” “How did you come to understand that?” “What are other alternatives?” etc.

I’m not really interested in the answers. I just ask questions as a way of redirecting the narrative.

Sometimes he will think I’m planning on attacking him, but I just play dumb and say that I don’t understand and want to get a better idea of what he’s thinking.

What typically happens is that my questions pin him down to specifics and he’d prefer to keep to generalities, so he becomes disinterested in continuing the dialog, which is a win for me 

[Cat Familiar]

My best strategy is not to participate at all. If I can exit quickly, I’ve got a number of go-to strategies: I’ve left water on in the garden, the cat needs medication, got to feed the horse, let me get the clothes out of the dryer, I’ve left something on the stove…

[Hope4Joy]

I will say as we are so busy that often does provide enough distraction, but when it’s bad for him it can’t wait and wrecks our day. Nothing gets done. There is no way out until … enough time had passed is honestly my best guess. There is nothing to say or do that will make it better.

[GlennT]

Nothing will get better than what you have now. Your choice to stay in it, walk on eggshells forever and suffer through it until someone stops the rollercoaster and you get off or thrown off..

[Pook075]

I agree with Cat, saying, "I understand and I want to fix this.  What do you suggest?" forces resolution in a non-combative way. 

While we both know that their resolution will be to rant for hours on end and that they have no solution, that's when you can ask the question a few more times and eventually say, "I've listened and I'm taking this seriously, but it seems like we don't have an answer.  Why don't we both take the rest of the day to think about it and talk about it again in the morning?"

Most of the time, they'll forget about it by then because they're more regulated and feel foolish for making such a big deal out of nothing.

[FarDrop77]

It is good advice however there are a lot of steps to getting there.

You kind of need to become selectively deaf, as actually taking in what they are saying and not responding is very stressful over a prolong time. It needs to become like background noise.

Even to get to that stage requires them to be used to it and have gotten themselves into a state where they can get it all out without requiring a response. pwBPD biggest fear is of being attacked/criticised (that is their perception of disagreement). This is what happens if you engage with them using reason and logic. It just escalates, as reason and logic are means of invalidating crazy. They want you onboard the crazy train, not trying to stop it.

Not engaging will at first feel like a passive aggressive attack to them. so they have to get used to you not engaging, yet not take it as such. Not engaging is not the same as a "stony silence". It has to feel like not disagreeing, and not a challenge.

This changing of the landscape takes time. The catch 22 is that it takes you being genuinely calm to do it. You gain calmness by doing it, so its a cycle that takes some time to shift into

I wish there were a way to bookmark posts like this.