uBPDw won't contribute to the household, what now?

[Depression = 72% of members]

All of our children are in school every day, I work full time (two jobs)  and my wife stays home. I leave for work before anyone gets up. She sends the kids off to school and picks them up in the afternoon. Other than that, she has the whole day to herself.  Recently, my wife has been on a real mission (to discredit something going on at the kid's school). She feels I do not support her in her mission (I don't). So she has painted me black and now I must pay. She won't do anything to contribute to our household. She won't clean up after herself. She used to cook dinner a couple time a week for the family, now it is 0 times a week. She only washes clothes when she needs something washed. She won't help out with anything. My son got sick recently and had to stay home from school. When I asked him what he and mommy did all day, he said "well, she spent about 3 hours on the phone and the rest of the time she was on the computer (Facebook). " I can't keep doing everything myself. I work two jobs to support everyone and I simply don't have the time to do everything around the house too. I know why she is doing it, so addressing it with her will simply give her an opportunity to unleash on me.

How can I get her to contribute?

[joe_schmoe]

All of our children are in school every day, I work full time (two jobs)  and my wife stays home. I leave for work before anyone gets up. She sends the kids off to school and picks them up in the afternoon. Other than that, she has the whole day to herself.  Recently, my wife has been on a real mission (to discredit something going on at the kid's school). She feels I do not support her in her mission (I don't). So she has painted me black and now I must pay. She won't do anything to contribute to our household. She won't clean up after herself. She used to cook dinner a couple time a week for the family, now it is 0 times a week. She only washes clothes when she needs something washed. She won't help out with anything. My son got sick recently and had to stay home from school. When I asked him what he and mommy did all day, he said "well, she spent about 3 hours on the phone and the rest of the time she was on the computer (Facebook). " I can't keep doing everything myself. I work two jobs to support everyone and I simply don't have the time to do everything around the house too. I know why she is doing it, so addressing it with her will simply give her an opportunity to unleash on me.

How can I get her to contribute?

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[downandin]

How can I get her to contribute?

I hate to be pessimistic, but, from my experience you can't.  My wife does what she wants, when she wants, and nothing more.  Oh, I can ask her to do something like make the bed, and she will usually do it.  But she will not continue to.  I would have to ask daily, and then she would eventually explode. 

She used to cook dinner for me and the kids every night.  Since her weight-loss surgery and its required diet, she has stopped this one thing as well.  She has tapered it off, I should say, to where she is now hardly cooking for the family at all.

You must remember that everything is about their needs.  Sad, but ever so true! 

[wishfulthinking]

My uBPDh works, but I never see a dime.  Occasionally he'll buy dinner and once he bought $150 worth of food... .mostly for his smoothie kick he is on... .all that fruit won't feed a family of 5 for 2 weeks.  He did give me $140 last week.  After 11 months together.  I've paid his truck payments, all the bills, his cell phone bill... .I stopped paying those that are his because I'm getting overdrawn doing it.  he's now 4 months behind on his truck and his cell is about to be shut off.  Last month, he stole a check from my purse and went in and paid the cell phone out of my account.  It overdrew me.  I couldn't make my car payment... .of $167... .that's embarassing.  We had to ask his mom and my best friend for food for 2 weeks.  Then I still had to get a payday loan.  If I mention a second job for myself, I'm apparently calling him a loser and belittling his manhood.  He will "help when he gets the money coming in"  Really?  Because I see your energy drinks, cigarettes, and you bought your friend and you beer a couple times... .I'm supposed to rely on you to be the provider?  It hasn't happened so far... .

[Hydroman]

My wife (Bipolar and BPD) doesn't do anything either.  No cooking, cleaning, laundry, nothing--phone and facebook or sleeping all day long.   She does get the kids off to school when I'm not teleworking.  Its very frustrating.   I'm up at 4:15 am every day, off to work at 5, and rush home to get the kids off the bus (can't count on her).     I know exactly what you are going through!  IF you figure out something, please let me know!  I don't understand it.  She comes into the house and sees the mess and the response is "I hate this house".  I guess the black and white thinking-if its not perfect, its all flawed.   I think its overwhelming for BPD's to see jobs to do and they don't know how or where to start-therefore they don't (and its you and I  doing them).   I agree with you it has to change but I don't know how.  You can't make someone do something.   I used to have horses and you can't make a horse do anything-they outweigh you 10 to 1.   You have to coach, lure, entice, reward.   I've tried this with my wife and get mixed results.   My wife is a very low functioning BPD.  I would feel a whole lot better if I saw her attempting to do things and trying.  I don't see this happening.  I worry about the impact on the kids.

I feel your pain.  Best of luck!

Hydroman

[Cloudy Days]

My husband doesn't work, is currently applying for disability due to his mental state and he does not clean anything either. He won't even throw stuff in the trash sometimes, he will set it next to the trash on the counter? The only thing I have been successful at getting him to do is to wash and dry the laundry, I still have to fold it and put it up and even that is something that comes and goes with his mood. The only way I can get him to cook for me is if we have charcoal he will grill. My husband also has this thing where he will not fix food for himself. If he can't throw it in the microwave or just eat it outright he won't eat. I've gotten to the point where I just buy melons and cut them up for him so he has something to eat that isn't crap. He won't even cut the melon up and the few times he has he doesn't finish it. He just cuts what he wants off of it and leaves me to cut up the rest. The only way I was able to get him to start doing laundry is because I am lousy at it and have ruined a few of my shirts so he took over for awhile.

[bombdiffuser]

My dBPDw hasn't lifted a finger other than laundry in months and that is because I don't/won't do her laundry (probably the only boundry I have success with). She always gives me the "staying at home with kids is a full-time job" line, yet on my two days off of work when I'm home with kids  (the 2 days she works) she comes home to a spotless house. The other 5 days of the week I come home to a disaster area. Mentioning that she just naps and facebooks all day just triggers her into a rage. 

[Highlander]

This is sounding very familiar.  My dBPDh hurt his back a couple of months ago, leaving me having to do everything that we had planned to do before Summer (ie:splitting & stacking 3 truck loads of wood, slashing the paddock, removing infestations of blackberries, painting the house, shed and roof [including balancing on the pitch and angle grinding the paint & rust off first]). 

This is has been hard going for a woman.  It became terribly frustrating for me to come in out of the sun for a 10 minute break only to have to make lunch for both of us!  It would be ok if he was bed bound but, once he was a little better, he was able to practice knife throwing at the same time!

Because he is low functioning, it is very difficult to tell him but I found the right opportunity and did so.  I simply caught him at the right moment and asked him how he would feel if he were in my shoes.  It worked and he made lunch for me for about a week and then it was back to normal again.  At least I was able to get him to do some light house chores.

Regarding money.  I have no choice but to keep it all locked up.  In the past, if he had access to even a few dollars, he would secretly buy alcohol with it.  If he drinks alcohol by himself and if not in the right mood, it has led to hospital visits in the past, so he agrees it should all be locked up.  I trusted him with a little bit of money to order his chewing tobacco over the internet.  A few weeks ago, I found that he was misappropriating these funds with an ebay addition.

His selfishness can gnaw at me at times, but I just suck it in, because I know that if I complain at the wrong times, then the situation becomes so much worse for myself.  What is astounding is that when I can get him motivated to do anything, his health improves dramatically as he then becomes proud of himself and motivated to do more.   There have been times in the past when I may round the corner and he is doing a job that I didn't ask him to do!  WOW!

It is a never-ending roller coaster ride, I am hoping that seeing his back is on the mend, that some high times are ahead.

[waverider]

joe_schmo

As you can see it is a common trait. Just to clarify, is this her normal behavior or is this simply her making a protest to try to entice you into conflict.?

My partners domestic contribution is practically nil also. It is a hard call whether to clean after her or not. The fact is she will live in a mess, decome overwhelmed and do even less. I wil also end up having to live in this mess so iyt affects my life. As a result I have stopped nagging as it doesn't work, and I dont wont to spend my life trying to create a mountain of boundaries of trivial issues.

So it is a bit of a compromise, i will just take on and do the things that are affecting me, and other areas I wont touch. I am not going to stress myself to the max trying to teach a duck to bark it becomes futile.

Is it enabling? To a degree, but I am focusing on what's better for my quality of life rather than trying to retrain her personality.

Any jobs that she does take on are purely those that great maximum effect/praise for minimum effort. She will drag them out for ever then carry on like she has just singlehandedly built the pyramids... That is just the way it is and for me it is just not worth the stress of fighting it as it pervades everything.

If we have created a calm and conflict free home environment she will do more (to please me rather than the real reason that it is a task that needs doing, so again ultimately self serving praise), if the atmosphere is one of having issues over not helping she will do less.

The phrase I hear the most is "I was just about to". Even if I do something I get "why did you do that I was just about to, you are disabling me". Of course she never was about to, she is throwing therapy speak back at me, which shows she is fully aware of her short comings