I feel guilty for making my uBPD husband move out

[VIDEO: "What is parental alienation?"]

Sometimes I feel very, very guilty about making my uBPD husband move out of our home this past January. We've shared this house together for nearly 10 years, live far from our families, and have created a network of friends together. My son and I are here, and I'm working on protecting him and getting emotionally stable and well.

How do I know if I did the right thing? Because I endured so much for so long in regards to abusive behavior, drunken stupors, nuclear rages... . I'm not sure if I waited too long to put up a boundary or if I did it too early/in a wrong way.

Doing drugs in the bathroom with strangers to circumvent his written drinking plan... . Being verbally/psychologically abusive to me in front of our friends, shattering the secrets of what has gone on inside of our home, and manipulating our son not to love or respect me... . those set the stage... . followed by a day of him taking 10 painkillers and muscle relaxers and drinking 1/2 case of beer... . Life or death I tell myself... . he's not going to get better with you enabling this behavior... . and allowing it to happen is passively enabling.

But, how do I know I was right in making him leave? He has such disdain for me... . I really though that the space and time would help him to heal. Quite the contrary... .

One of those nights... . of guilt and sadness. I keep reminding myself that my son and I are safe... . but I think of how lonely my husband is... . and that he thinks I'm out to get him.

[elizabeth716]

Sometimes I feel very, very guilty about making my uBPD husband move out of our home this past January. We've shared this house together for nearly 10 years, live far from our families, and have created a network of friends together. My son and I are here, and I'm working on protecting him and getting emotionally stable and well.

How do I know if I did the right thing? Because I endured so much for so long in regards to abusive behavior, drunken stupors, nuclear rages... . I'm not sure if I waited too long to put up a boundary or if I did it too early/in a wrong way.

Doing drugs in the bathroom with strangers to circumvent his written drinking plan... . Being verbally/psychologically abusive to me in front of our friends, shattering the secrets of what has gone on inside of our home, and manipulating our son not to love or respect me... . those set the stage... . followed by a day of him taking 10 painkillers and muscle relaxers and drinking 1/2 case of beer... . Life or death I tell myself... . he's not going to get better with you enabling this behavior... . and allowing it to happen is passively enabling.

But, how do I know I was right in making him leave? He has such disdain for me... . I really though that the space and time would help him to heal. Quite the contrary... .

One of those nights... . of guilt and sadness. I keep reminding myself that my son and I are safe... . but I think of how lonely my husband is... . and that he thinks I'm out to get him.

[corraline]

elizabeth

I took that risk and ended the dysfunction that i was enabling by being with my ex too.  My ex was drinking heavily and was hiding it from me for years. Near the end it was out of control. I too had the psychological abuse. I do not have a child with him.  I joined al anon myself and did my best to take care of myself and also do the things i thought were healthy in supporting him in his potential recovery.

Unfortunately the drinking got worse.  The abuse escalated. I had to get out of the way.

The main thing is that you are looking after yourself and your son.  He needs to get help for himself.

That is the loving thing to do i feel.  After reading much of the info with al anon, they sometimes need to hit bottom .  Not sure how that goes with BPD in the mix. But the fact still remains, we need to take care of ourselves first. 

My ex gave me an interesting gift near the end.

I had the three C's on post it notes on my wall a little out of sight.  He took one of them down the last time he was here and posted it separately on my light switch ,  It was the "I didn't cause it"

He couldn't say it to me directly but there was a part of him that didn't want me to take any blame.

I am thankful for this at least.

Please don't blame yourself either for your choices.

[Want2know]

One of those nights... . of guilt and sadness. I keep reminding myself that my son and I are safe... . but I think of how lonely my husband is... . and that he thinks I'm out to get him.

This is normal... . it hurts and can be confusing.   

It's never too late to set boundaries, especially with how you describe his behavior and the fact that you have a son to protect.  Don't beat yourself up over this one, even though he may show disdain for it.  He's not getting his way, and is reacting the only way he knows how.

[Stjarna]

One of those nights... . of guilt and sadness. I keep reminding myself that my son and I are safe... . but I think of how lonely my husband is... . and that he thinks I'm out to get him.

I have been here many times.  I am coming up on the one-year anniversary of my husband of 40 years taking a bottle of hydrocodone, a bottle of Xanax, and a bottle of tequila, made "goodbye" phone calls to all of the kids, and got in his car and eventually wrecked it.  He spent 10 days in the ICU but did recover.  He was addicted to prescription medications, and I felt exactly as you did - I needed to escape not only for me, but because he would have ended up dead on the path that he was on.  He had four serious suicide attempts in the last 6 months before I left, and that last one was the one that caused me to flee.  

This last year has been a mixture of peace/joy and hellishness.  Hang in there.  I am sad to read yet another story like mine.  I just keep putting one foot in front of the other, and have gratitude for the wonderful things that are still in my life.  I have to surrender the thought that I have any power at all to either cause all of the pain or soothe the pain in the mind of a person with such a disordered way of thinking/feeling.  It hurts, it does.

[corraline]

Mine did not ever present any suicidal tendencies. Altho his driving while completely intoxicated was pretty much suicidal. He was soo drunk at times i just cannot understand how he was able to even find his keys to turn the ignition on.   I would stay up late at night worried to make sure he got home safely.I would beg him to take a cab.  He would lie and say he was going to and then admit he didn't . I got angry at the bartenders for letting him leave like this. I sent him MADD adverts, i begged, i pleaded, i cried.  I lived 3 hours away and even if i didn't i couldn't do anything to stop him from putting himself behind the wheel like that.  I considered letting the local police detachment know that he did this regularly, i never did. I still feel guilty that i haven't let the police know  especially when a couple of friends of mine said that i could save his life or someone elses if i didn't. They said that it was partly my responsibility to stop a potential disaster. I just can't be responsible for him, i could not then and I still cannot. But it still concerns me.

[HappyNihilist]

elizabeth, those guilty feelings are completely natural.

You said it -- you have to take care of yourself and your son first. Your ex will never get better without working on himself first. You can't do that for him. It's OK to feel some guilt. Just don't let it eat at you. Feel it, then step back and look at it. You listed many things that are NOT ACCEPTABLE behavior in a marriage or any relationship. You know in your heart that you've done the right thing for everyone involved.

corraline, my exbf was never suicidal, either -- at least not actively. I firmly believe that, despite all of his identity and emotional issues, he still has too much ego to ever kill himself. Getting raging, stupid drunk every night (he didn't drive while intoxicated, thankfully for the other people on the road) and having unprotected sex with women all over the world is, I suppose, its own form of self-destruction. As is pushing away and hurting anyone who tries to support or love him.

Tell your friends to call the police or try to talk him out of driving drunk and see how far they get.   You're absolutely right: you are not responsible for his actions.

[Lucky Jim]

Hi elizabeth, You probably spent a lot of time in the FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) during your BPD r/s (haven't we all?) so its normal, in my view, that you are currently experiencing feelings of guilt.  That you have those feelings doesn't mean you need to act on them. To the contrary, it sounds like you did the right thing by asking your BPDh to move out.  Your focus on your H's feelings (his loneliness, his belief that you are persecuting him, etc.) suggests that you may have codependency issues that you might want to address.   Hang in there, LuckyJim

[Vindi]

yes, as one poster said *FOG* thats what you were in... . and i think you hit the "ah ha" moment where you said enough is enough! don't feel bad for kicking him out, feel good for you in having some peace now, trying to get your life back to the way you want it!

take all the space and time you need, and don't worry about him, he is a grown adult and will either accept this or make them better or make the worse, he has choices.

During this time you can decide what your next step will be... . take all the time needed and not worry about doing what you had to do for YOU instead of worry about how he will feel.