Not sure what to do

[Trony]

My husband has been in pain for a while,  since our second child was born 3.5 years ago. Our relationship has suffered. He feels like I don’t care about him and he is unable to get things done. He feels like his life is being wasted and I don’t care about him enough to notice and help. I am not sure how I can help him. I have been trying to help by setting time aside to just focus on him, which is hard with kids. And he frequently just pushes me away then, fights and so on. When he is upset he starts berating me on chat. I feel like I must respond or else he will feel abandoned and he is derailing a bunch of my job commitments this way. He frequently says he wants a divorce. I am not sure if he has BPD but it feels like a fit. He has an adhd diagnosis and when he takes his meds he is better but still not great. My confidence is being destroyed and my parenting is suffering. He is good with the kids, spends an hour in the evening with them reading books. But I do everything else: getting them to school, doctors appointments, groceries, cooking, laundry, soccer, gymnastics. It really feel like he is in pain but he gets so angry that I don’t give the attention and help he expects and feels unloved and then justified to be quite cruel to me. I don’t know what to do. Any boundaries I have tried to set he has annihilated. Maybe I am doing it wrong. I feel like I am out of ideas.

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[Pook075]

Maybe I am doing it wrong. I feel like I am out of ideas.

Hi Trony and welcome to the family!  I am so sorry you're going through this and I wish there was one magic phrase I could share that would make everything okay.  Unfortunately, there's not because this is a process that both of you need to work through.

First off, is your husband in therapy at all?  What's he doing to deal with the mental health aspects?  And what about you- have you considered therapy to learn better ways to deal with this?

For your husband's part, he feels immense shame and frustration for struggling so often.  He sees himself as a burden and instead of making adjustments, he gets so caught up in his own emotions that he lashes out at those closest to him (you). 

So please understand, when he's blaming you for not making enough time, it's because you "make him feel better" when things are going well.  But when he's off, and you don't magically fix things, then he blames you for something that has absolutely nothing at all to do with you.

The only person who can "fix" your husband is your husband.  That's not your job or anyone else's.  He has to want it though and be willing to work with a therapist until he's in a better position to deal with those overflowing feelings.  Until then, there's nothing anyone can do...it has to start with him.

For the boundary part you mentioned, what have you tried?  Hopefully you realize that boundaries are for you and you alone.  For instance, if I decide that I'm not going to argue anymore and someone starts an argument, it's up to me to enact the proper boundary for myself.  That could mean walking away.  That could be staying silent.  That could be changing the conversation entirely or showing compassion and asking what is really going on.  Or I can yell back. 

Regardless of what I do though, the boundary only works if I stick to it to avoid being in situations that I no longer wish to be in.

And when someone is used to arguing and complaining about everything, of course they're not going to like it when I refuse to participate.  The boundary doesn't "fix things" and of course others push back.  That's expected even when mental illness is not involved.  Again, it's simply there for me- if you yell, I'm trying to calm you down and then walking away 100% of the time.

Does that make sense?

[ForeverDad]

Many here in peer support, myself included, never learned of a diagnosis of BPD or other personality disorder.  There can be various reasons for this lack of knowledge.

• A person has a right not to seek out or be forced to use mental health resources.
• Some countries have privacy laws for patients, privacy even from spouses.
• Therapists or counselors may choose not to offer a diagnosis, being aware that identifying such a label may make the patient more likely to resist further therapy.

So what we can do is to be aware of the behavior patterns, consider whether they fit certain disorders, and ponder the various ways to deal with those behaviors in time-tested ways.

We are advocates of Boundaries, but with a twist.  Since people with BPD traits (pwBPD) are known to resist boundaries, we therefore can choose to make our own Boundaries are for us, not for the other but for us, which is how we respond to poor behavior.  That perspective is not intuitive but it works more or less.  Family court's version of boundaries are named "orders".

As an example, the other person may start ranting, raging, blaming us, making demands, virtually taunting us to respond similarly.  However, we can have a clearly stated Boundary that we won't sit by as a willing target, appeaser or whipping boy.  Rather, one possible response is that we can decide to exit and go elsewhere such as to the park, to a restaurant or the supermarket, stating we will return.  That gives the other time to reset.  Will it work?  Perhaps not so much at first.  Hopefully over time at least part of our boundary will become the normal and accepted policy.

[Trony]

Thanks for responding, this means a lot. My husband is in therapy but is right now switching to a different therapist because he feels like his problems come from his adhd. My therapist is just trying to make me see that he is abusive and deal with that. I worry she does not quite understand the subtleties of this disorder even though in her opinion it is more than adhd and most likely Bpd. In any case, in her opinion I should take care of myself and the kids and not engage in the abuse. My trouble with that is that whenever I try to just be boring and not engage, he just escalates and escalates until it becomes too scary to not give in: “this a choice your making, this now means you are ending our marriage, etc”. The few times I tried to stop responding altogether to his chats he felt like I am abandoning him and threatened to drive the car into our living room then threw the car keys into the bushes and we searched for them for months. His mother’s recent visit seems to have activated his disregulation and yesterday and today he was adamant that we should divorce because I don’t care about him. Sometimes we have a month of getting along but recently every other day he is fighting and says I ruined his life, am a monster, toxic, cold, etc.

[CC43]

. . . recently every other day he is fighting and says I ruined his life, am a monster, toxic, cold, etc.

Hi there Trony,

You've come to the right place.  The situation must be really hard on you, simultaneously trying to manage your husband's BPD outbursts, taking care of the kids, and on top of that, probably over-functioning for your husband on many fronts (housework, finances, scheduling, paying bills, etc.).  That can lead to burn-out and resentment, too.

Though your husband is prone blame you for his woes--calling you a monster and toxic--my guess is that there might be other things going on his life making him feel bad, maybe inferior, unloved or unimportant.  A possiblity is that he's jealous of the attention the kids are getting.  What does he do?  He basically acts like another kid, in a vain attempt to get your attention.  But it doesn't work well, because he's not a kid, and deep down he feels ashamed.

I'm not sure from your post if your husband is working, but maybe he feels emasculated by you, because he knows he's not pulling his weight on the home front, possibly financially.  So rather than appreciate everything you do, he might try to trivialize your contributions while claiming that he does "everything."  Does that ring any bells?  It could be that he's plagued by insecurity, and he might be trying to put you down, in your proper place, because you're upstaging him all the time.  Thus he'll call you a "monster," "toxic," or maybe stupid/narcissistic/lying/ugly/lazy.  Typically those are projections of things he thinks about himself.  Maybe he's threatening divorce because he knows he's letting you down, and he wants to beat you to the punch?  Or maybe a divorce threat is an attempt to blame YOU for causing all the trouble in his life.

If you want to know what's bugging your man, I'd advise to listen for the feelings behind his outbursts, not so much the facts (which can be highly distorted).  As an example, the pwBPD in my life was preoccupied with feelings of inferiority and living like a child.  She ruminated about these feelings so often that they tended to bubble up as projections and accusations:  "You're condescending / You're controlling / You treat me like a baby / You can't tell me what to do / I'm an adult, I can do whatever I want!"  That was really code for, "I feel inferior, I'm lagging behind my peers, and I'm mortally ashamed about that.  I can't do what I want in my life because I feel powerless.  I'm stuck like a kid."

I think you're doing well to enforce your boundaries and not get drawn into his meltdowns, which would only feed the fire of his ire so to speak.  Sure, he'll try to egg you on, by being nasty, berating you and threatening you.  He doesn't fight fair, so you're better off not engaging in my opinion.  Only engage when he's calm.  In the meantime, you can think it like giving him an "adult time out," not dissimilar to how you'd deal with a kid having a meltdown.  When having a meltdown, a kid (and an adult with BPD) is overcome by emotions and can't process words or logical arguments anyway.  In short, they are NOT listening to you, so it's better to stay silent in my opinion.  You give him more time and space to self-regulate, a skill that he hasn't learned yet.  But if your husband is a threat to himself or others, you need to call 911 in my opinion.  You have yourself and your kids to protect.

[ForeverDad]

Think about the meaning of the word "abuse".  Yes, the obvious evidence are bruises, cuts, etc.  But more insidious are the long term emotional damage from endless criticism, insinuations, belittling, subtle and obvious threats.

We often comment here on the obvious Blaming and Blame Shifting, among other behavior, which in themselves don't carry much indication of outright abuse, but given enough time and repetition its impact can easily be as devastating as physical abuse.

The reason others warn you of abuse is that they are considering more than just the physical risks and impacts.

[cynp]

. My trouble with that is that whenever I try to just be boring and not engage, he just escalates and escalates until it becomes too scary to not give in: “this a choice your making, this now means you are ending our marriage, etc”.

I can relate as I am sure others here can as well. Behaviours therapists have suggested to set boundaroies have resulted in some truely frightful episodes including self-harm. I am not permitted to leave the room, certainly not the house. My only option is to listen as calmly and emotionless as I can while pwbpd rages and hopoe they tire out eventually.