What would it take ...

[thisyoungdad]

I am really struggling again with feelings of sadness and grief over my ending relationship. Most of it is related to how sad I am for my little girl who just turned 3 and will never remember us as a family. The ex has and continues to go to great lengths to exclude me despite me going to the opposite so that she knows she is always a part of our lives when it comes to family things. I do that more for my daughter really. Needless to say my daughter being 3 now is starting to notice things are up and it is heartbreaking. I wish more than anything that my almost ex wife would get help for our daughters sake. I don't understand how wanting the best for our little girl wouldn't motivate her to seek help. She is aware she has BPD, although not specifically admitting it to me she is a medical doctor and has hinted she is aware of it (and then always projects it on to me of course) and so I have to wonder what if anything would motive someone to get help? What motivated me to finally say I could not go back even if she wanted me to was the deeply painful realization it was best for my daughter if I didn't go back. She never asked me to come back directly but in words and actions does sometimes... . and I have to resist that urge for my daughter. So if her daughter is not a motivator what would be... . anything? It is almost worse to be aware that she has a concept something is wrong and not doing anything about it than if she didn't know.

[Ironmanrises]

This young,

I can feel the pain in your words. I am so sorry you are enduring that.

What will it take?

She has to get past the denial.

Being even a little aware of her disorder... . still leaves her in denial the rest if time.

The distance between a little aware and admitting to disorder fully... .

Vast.

I witnessed my exUBPDgf flip flopping on denying she had the disorder to barely admitting to it in one sentence. Saddened me. The lengths she must have went to in her own head within nanoseconds to counter her position... . so fast.

She has to do that on her own.

[thisyoungdad]

Ironman,

I have read a few of your posts. Thanks for the thoughts, I had not really considered what it must take for her to stay in her denial. She must have to go to some extreme mental lengths, whether she is aware or not. Exhausting I would think. The effort she must go to in order to stay in denial now that I think about it are really great. She ditches people very close to her, therapists, anyone who may wonder what is up she has dropped in the past year all in the name of staying in denial. I just never thought of it that way.

[heartandwhole]

Thisyoungdad, my heart goes out to you.  Watching your little girl begin to understand what is happening is painful, and your feelings are very understandable.    You have made a very difficult decision, I commend you for thinking of the best interests of your child first.

Focusing on your emotional healing is a wonderful gift for your daughter, regardless of whether her mother gets help (and I hope she does).  

I remember the sadness and grief of separating, it was so difficult for me.  Feeling what is there is the beginning of our recovery.  We're here for you.

[papawapa]

I have spent many hours pondering the question of what it will take for my ex to get help too. For whatever reason she can only think of herself. She is entirely selfish. She ran off with her daughter's BF. I have been granted temporary full custody of our two kids. I have made it clear to her that as long as she stays in her current relationship she is only ever going to get supervised visitation. Her daughter has barred her from seeing her two grandchildren. She has only been able to see our kids for one hour in the last three months. Having lost her family seems not to matter to her.

I know that somewhere inside she has tremendous guilt and shame for what she did to her daughter. I know that she misses our kids. Her current relationship was on the rocks within six weeks. She has split him black a number of times already. A path to getting her family back has been laid out before her, yet she just wants to smoke weed, drink, have sex to mask her feelings. She cannot be reasoned with and she still blames me for her not being able to see the kids.

What will it take for her to wake up and get help?

I wish I knew. My guess is that she will have to lose everything. Her job, the means to buy drugs and booze, and my replacement are the only things she has keeping her going.

[Learning_curve74]

Oh man, I almost always feel bad about the stories on the forums about our pwBPD. It always seems like a tragedy to me, and especially so when children are involved.

What will it take for her to wake up and get help?

I wish I knew. My guess is that she will have to lose everything. Her job, the means to buy drugs and booze, and my replacement are the only things she has keeping her going.

I came to the same conclusion as papawapa. I think my BPDex has to hit a true extreme rock bottom. She is aware of her mental illnesses and has done therapy but quit, which seems to be a fairly common occurence for pwBPD. As long as there are people, basically enablers, who she can lean on, I believe she will be caught in the same cycle. I think she might have to lose everything (job, home, assets) before she "wakes up". Unfortunately it may be too late by then.

[thisyoungdad]

I was thinking more about this today. I am the second divorce in 6 years for her. We were together 5 of those years. She bought a beautiful house with the ex and the left the ex almost immediately. We lived in the house for 3 of the years, I refused to move in with her the first 2 years. She is in the medical field and so I calculated between both divorces it is costing her a quarter of a million dollars just in lawyers fee's, spousal support etc. and she sold the house and didn't make a dime on it and is now living in a tiny duplex she hates apparently. She has lost a majority of her or our friends now that they have witnessed this behavior twice because once she was able to get sympathy with her manipulative lies but twice and people start to wonder. So she has lost a lot really, and she wanted primary custody but has to settle for 50/50 and I know that is really hard for her (well me too of course) and so from my perspective short of losing her medical license I am not sure what else she could lose. She has lost almost all her retirement at this point and has a huge loan out from her first divorce she is still paying on for 3 more years. Just sad because that would wake a lot of people up so I wonder if she will ever be able to get help before she loses what little she has left... from my perspective. I know she is scared to death about losing custody of our daughter and she knows I have a lot of stuff on her that she did with or in regard to our daughter this past year that would look extremely poor in a judges eyes should I push that issue. So now I just feel sad with that realization.