Question About Parenting...

[expos]

Some of you might know me from the "leaving" board.  If not, I'll introduce myself briefly.

Was married for almost three years.  My ex-wife seems to have all the characteristics of BPD... . and our relationship developed exactly how it's described in the sections of this site.  Intense Idealization during our dating and engagement period, Devaluing after we got married, Splitting and painting me black after I asked for a divorce and after I tried to talk her and I tell her how much I still loved and cared about her (long story - she told me she doesn't want to talk to me ever again).

Anyways, one her dreams was to have a children, and we never got to that point.  She felt having a kid was the key to happiness.  She had self-esteem problems, depression, jealously, and raged in most of our arguments... . and I was skeptical in having children with someone like that. 

I know this is a broad question, but how are Borderlines as parents?  Do you they split their children and devalue them?  Does the husband become even more hated? 

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[zaqsert]

Hi expos,

There are some great articles and resources on the topic on this site.

As to my personal experience, although I would not trade my D2 for the world, at the same time I feel like you made the right choice.

My uBPDw and I had had only 2-3 blow-ups before we got pregnant.  In hindsight (I only really learned about BPD in the past couple of months), they were probably classic splitting, cognitive distortions, etc.  Having children had become the one thing she really wanted, and it was supposed to make her happy.  In hindsight again, the same had been true of other things like getting pets, moving into a house (fortunately rented, not bought), quitting a job to find another one.  None of these things ended up giving her the happiness she expected.  To the contrary, many of them just added more stress.

In the 2+ years that we have had our daughter, I've now been split and painted black many, many times.  Over time it seems that her abusive behavior has gotten worse.  But then she seems to cycle back out of it for some period of time.

What feels even worse though, is that ever since our daughter started developing her personality, my uBPDw has started to clash with her.  Some of the actions and behaviors include:

• Ignores things that D2 says or asks for because she "can't understand what she's saying", rather than asking her to repeat or otherwise trying to understand



• Gets visibly annoyed when D2 asks for things that to others would be totally reasonable (e.g., read a book, play with her, change her diaper instead of having someone else change it)



• Expects strict obedience, immediately, otherwise she is likely to yell at D2



• Puts her down for things that she can't do well, even though no kid would be able to do it until they are older



• Gets angry and bullies her and repeatedly asks things like "Why did you do that?" even though there's no way a normal 2 year-old can answer the question



• When she is angry or feeling particularly invalidated then she goes to another room, sometimes storming off, not just for a minute but sometimes for half an hour to a few hours



• When angry, gives our daughter the hostile/silent treatment that I know too well



• On a few occasions split her black and even said "It's not that you don't want to listen, it's just that you don't care!"



• Interestingly, she keeps commenting about how much she misses when our daughter was an infant

I worry a lot about the long-term consequences that all this can have on my daughter.  Because of my wife's uBPD, at times it can be difficult to impossible to discuss parenting concerns with her.  Sometimes the conversations go well.  Often, however, they seem to come across as attacking everything that she is and does as a mother.  Coincidentally, wanting to find a solution to some of it, earlier today I posted a co-parenting question that I would love to get help on:

https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=197589.0

But that's a different topic.

[Mara2]

My H splits one child white and one child black.  The one can do no wrong, the other no right.  The other two are sort of neutral.  Now that they are heading into teen years the abuse became physical, at which point I took the kids away.  We came back, but it has been rather downhill and he is in the mental health crisis house at the moment.  Not one of the 4 kids want to see him. 

[yeeter]

I think it would be tough to have a BPD as a parent.  The projections.  The inconsistenties.  Eggshell walking.  Blame.  Spliting.  Rewriting history.  And children don't have the same choices, because the parents by definition hold the power over them. 

Look at what the grown adults struggle with here.  A child has no chance.

There is an entire board dedicated to children of BPD, might get some insights there as well.

[Somewhere]

Our daughter avoids being "trapped" alone with her -- especially in the car.

Ala-teen is teaching our daughter how to avoid and not listen to the crazy stuff.

So other than screwing up kids -- all super! 

[committed]

I have two daughters from my previous marriage. But, I would NEVER have children with my BPDbf (I'm too old any way  ) after seeing how he responds to them. For the most part, he is very loving and protective of them and treats them as if they are his own. But, there are times when he paints them black over the littlest of things. They are both old enough to understand that he has some issues and I've been very open with him about his illness. And, they know that I always have their back when he gets that way. And, he knows because I've made it very well known that I and their dad make the decisions involving my kids. That is the one thing that saves things from getting bad... . the kids are not his. I don't think it would go well if he were their father. Interestingly, he does have a son from a previous relationship. She took the son and fled with him when the son was about 6 years old. I'm pretty sure I understand why... .

[LetItBe]

There is a book suggestion here called Understanding the Borderline Mother.  It sounds like something that might be very helpful.

My mom was bipolar and very, very likely had BPD.  I have pretty serious attachment issues myself from her push-pull, loving, then abusive, the loving, behavior.  I also have most of the symptoms of PTSD.  I've gained more clarity about my mom and myself through my current, tumultuous r/s with a pwBPD.  I would likely not be so attracted to a disordered man and willing to tough it out for so long if not for my early childhood programming by my uBPDm.

I know 2 sisters and their mother who likely has BPD.  They are having such a hard, challenging time w/her as she has the same issues she's always had (very dramatic) and is in her 90s now and totally dependent on them.

Trust me, it's hard on the kids.  You made a wise decision.

[Althea]

my uBPDh is a loving father, excellent provider $, and very affectionate.  However, I have to do some damcing and distracting when he rages at me, or has wild mood swings.  He loves these boys so very much, that he now admits to having rage issues and poor mental health and has vowed to save his sweet, little family.  We are doing better than ever, in almost 7 years of marriage.  He is currently, as in this week, reviewing a list of therapists he made, to pick one.  This all during a time of health, and not a time of crisis.  That is pretty cool.  All and all, I am glad I had children with this man. 

Conversely, we are the exception, not the norm.  I would never advise anyone to have children with an abusive partner, verbal and emotional in my case.  It doesn't make things better; it makes them worse (except for us).  This man LOVES his children, I mean his greatest reward in life is this previldge, of raising them and it shows.

[zaqsert]

My uBPDw and I went through a really rocky time right when we were trying to get pregnant.  There were a few threads of things I had seen before, but I thought it was really exacerbated by the fertility drugs, hormones, etc., which I had heard could wreak havoc on the poor woman's emotions.

At the time, I agreed to continue going forward with trying to get pregnant because she was going to go into therapy.  She had given me an ultimatum of not seeing my family for at least a few months until we worked through our things (she felt my family was horrible to her and I allowed it -- now I realize they probably just trigger something in her that's hers, not theirs.)  I told her I can't continue to live with "brick walls" going up whenever problems occur and with shutting people out at most anything.  I said it will take a lot of work, and a lot of it will be difficult.  She agreed to start marital and her own therapy.

Unfortunately, her own therapy didn't last long and she "never got anything out of it".  When our marital therapist would ask her to try it again, she would for just a session or two.  A few months ago I started learning about BPD, and it all started to make much more sense.

Now we have an amazing 2 year old daughter, who means the world to me and I would not trade for anything, ever.  But I feel guilty for having brought her into such a dysfunctional home.

Now I find myself trying to learn approaches to help protect her from what I believe is emotional abuse.  My therapist mentioned (paraphrased into my own lay terms) that kids are especially susceptible until about age 3.  Then less so until age 5.  And after that they tend to be more resilient.  I feel guilty for having started her off with such an uphill battle.

[allibaba]

My uBPD husband is a very good father to our toddler.  The issue that I worry about is our son's exposure to the rage towards me.  Its confusing to him.  I try to be consistent and strong.  Only time will tell what the long-term impact will be.  I tell him I love him as much as I can.  When daddy isn't functioning well then I take him off and we do our own thing.

My mother is uBPD too.  She painted my brother black and I was white.  30+ years later its the same.  I feel bad for my brother.  His dad left early in their relationship because he "just couldn't deal with" my mom.  It was only recently my brother learned that his real dad is a properly functioning human being - not a drug addict on the street (as my mom told us).  My dad adopted my brother and he fought the good fight but never established any boundaries with my mom.  He ended up losing it and almost drinking himself to death.  Its a sad story these BPD.  My mom's mom died in a plane crash when she was a little girl and something snapped inside of her and she was never the same.  My husband's switch flipped when his dad left.  I kind of wish I had known about all of this before I met my husband. Maybe I could have avoided the pattern.

[momtara]

I think it's different for women and for men.  I have two young kids with my husband, who I'm now divorcing.  He wasn't good at taking responsibility for the kids.  He wanted to still be treated like a kid himself.  He could be good with the kids, or he might just ignore them, depending on his moods.

So it's really a crapshoot.  But no matter what, you are stuck sharing parenting decisions with a BPD person for the rest of your life - and slugging it out, perhaps, over custody.  So you may have made the right choice.

There are also men on this board whose wives or exes have filed false charges against them and they can barely see their kids.  That's the worst.

Your wife can always go get inseminated and be a single mom.  It's all the rage these days.