Advise please Am I wrong?

[Flexion]

HI, I started posting last week. Since, my wife and I have been in a whirlwind of arguments that range from absolutely nothing to petty.

I got up yesterday and got our son up and took him out to breakfast, as I do every Sunday. This week, she texts me to get her some breakfast. So, I get her a breakfast sandwich and take it back. ONce I come in,  I had the bag in one hand and my son in the other. She asks me "did you get me coffee?" NOw, I know that one simple thing like that sets her off.  I said  and I quote " You didn't ask me to get coffee, babe!"  WOW!  So she starts yelling and cussing because of my " body language.'

SO I leave and go to Walmart to get bulbs. WHile gone, she is BLOWING up my phone with awful personal attacks. Constanly downing our relationship, me... .everything.

I can't take it so I text a buddy to meet up. I NEVER EVER EVER do anything that is not with my family. Anyhow, I tell her at 2 I am meeting up. she immediately tells me to hurry so she can go tanning. I know what she was trying to do... .get away to drink.

let's not forget she left me at home last Sunday to go to tan and Bahama Breeze to have drinks.

Anyhow, as the day rocks on, she is personally attacking with the most cruel crap. I text her back and tell her "just know that I love you and I am not mad!"

that was followed up with more cruelty.

I stay gone until around 7 pm. I know I know. But, it's damned if I go home and damned if I don't. I never do that but have expressed my stress with my business. She just adds to it.

So, I come home last night to the wrath of the beast. . She finally cooled down and come out of the room and was actually talking to me and figuring out what to watch. it was just ok.

So this morning, she wakes me up and says "you can get up with Landen since You left yesterday." I really don't mind, but damn. I Never get a sleep in day. SHe slept in as long as se wanted yesterday. In fact, every SUnday.

ANyhow, we got into a heated fight. she yells and screams personal attacks relentlessly. downed me for anything and everything. I went to walk out with my son to just get away. She grabbed my shirt and ripped into it. SHe wouldn't let me go but I seen another side of her craziness! I don't even know how to deal with this.

She honestly thinks I am the one. when I came home yesterday, she told me how mean I am. I told her to please tell me what  I done so mean to her. I told her we had NOT talked so every text message is there. She was personally putting me down and being mean and  was saying "just know I l love you." sO, there is NOwhere I was mean. But, she truly believes I have done something.

Is this really how this stuff goes?  I mean, I've offered to wire our house with mics or whatever to get her to see how she is doing. She won't go back and read the texts when  I ask her what I done. Usually if I ask her 'tell me what I done, " she responds "its just you... .I hate who you are! I get along with everybody but you." from that, even worse personal attacks .

Please help. Maybe I m not clear in writing this but if not, ask questions. Was  I that wrong? I feel like I do everything wrong. I am a good guy and trying my best to save my marriage.

. She is truly a "brain ninja!"

[Skip]

Please help. Maybe I m not clear in writing this but if not, ask questions. Was  I that wrong? I feel like I do everything wrong. I am a good guy and trying my best to save my marriage.

. She is truly a "brain ninja!"

This is a cycle of conflict.  I might suggest looking at how to deal with that.  The notion of "right and wrong" is probably not the best focus.

Have you seen this?

https://bpdfamily.com/content/ending-conflict

[waverider]

First impression is that whens he abuses you, you are going into appeasement mode. You try to justify,you question yourself. This puts her into position of control,of value. It just fuels it.

No1 boundary is don't stay for abuse. It is hard when there are kids there, but they alos need to see that you wont stay for abuse. They learn the values of having boundaries by how you enact them.

Appeasing abusing makes it o as a communication tool. Kids will learn this and adapt it as part of their relationships.

As Skip says you need to reassess the idea of right/wrong and fairness when dealing with BPD. It is more about your values and what you will allow yourself to be exposed to. Even if you did do something wrong, abuse is not warranted.

You are at a high risk of being forever trying to hold postmortems about whether you did, or did not, handle things appropriately. This will lead to serious issues of self doubt and lack of self confidence, while you are left in the wake of chaos.

You need boundaries around chaos regardless of any blame laying and culpability

[Notwendy]

Appeasing abusing makes it  as a communication tool. Kids will learn this and adapt it as part of their relationships.


Kids not only learn this and do this in their future relationships, when they are old enough, they will mimic you in how they relate to their mother as this is how they have learned to gain their parents' approval. Then, this is what they will consider "normal " in their relationships.

This is exactly what I learned from my parents and brought it into my relationship, where it contributed to dysfunction.

Consider that your situation didn't happen over night. It likely developed over time. What you would like to do is turn this into reverse. The lessons on the side of this board are helpful. The first step is to stop the conflict.

Personal counseling for yourself can help. I had to undo a lot of habits that I thought were the right thing to do.

Also, yes, she may think that you are all of the problem, but that is a part of the dysfunction. You may not be able to change her point of view, but you can take steps to more peaceful interactions when you can change how you respond to her behavior. Also - you don't have to become a mean person- you can still be nice, but understand that acts of kindness are not necessarily acts of appeasement. You can also learn that it is Ok to say no sometime and also take care of yourself.

It is hard when you have a child as you wish to protect him from conflict, but consider that you are the role model for your child, and modeling healthy boundaries can be a gift to that child now and in the future. This board can help you learn relationship skills.

[Flexion]

First impression is that whens he abuses you, you are going into appeasement mode. You try to justify,you question yourself. This puts her into position of control,of value. It just fuels it.

No1 boundary is don't stay for abuse. It is hard when there are kids there, but they alos need to see that you wont stay for abuse. They learn the values of having boundaries by how you enact them.

Appeasing abusing makes it o as a communication tool. Kids will learn this and adapt it as part of their relationships.

As Skip says you need to reassess the idea of right/wrong and fairness when dealing with BPD. It is more about your values and what you will allow yourself to be exposed to. Even if you did do something wrong, abuse is not warranted.

You are at a high risk of being forever trying to hold postmortems about whether you did, or did not, handle things appropriately. This will lead to serious issues of self doubt and lack of self confidence, while you are left in the wake of chaos.

You need boundaries around chaos regardless of any blame laying and culpability

I do understand, with her, there is no right or wrong. I do get that. I am trying to find ways to 'escape' when she goes into that mode. But, I have noticed that nothing works. IF I leave, it's bad. IF I stay, I have to listen to her. IF I walk out of the house, she blows my phone up with the cruelty. There is just no right answer.

Basically, my last post was trying to understand if leaving for an afternoon (which  I don't usually do... .or even want to) was the wrong approach.  I Know each case is unique, but she seriously makes me put every situation "under the microscope." SHe makes me feel bad for any way I do things.

here's an update on the above fight from Monday... .

It got so bad yesterday. She just storms around angry! she got so mad and angry I couldn't reason at all. she was blasting assaults and yelling relentlessly. I was holding my son. I went to walk out( to just remove myself) and she grabbed me by the shirt and started ripping it off me saying "give me my fu**ing baby.

Absolutely out of control.

Now fast forward 2 hours.

My former nanny, who we both love as our own, has moved back in our town. SHe planned to come by yesterday afternoon(Monday).

WHen it was time for her to show up, Dr  Jekyl came back with pristine manners. I mean, we had an amazing evening. 

and even had sex! We haven't ever had any sexual issues. in fact, our sex life is probably what holds it together. it's  Sad for me! Does that happen?

[Skip]

No1 boundary is don't stay for abuse. It is hard when there are kids there, but they alos need to see that you wont stay for abuse. They learn the values of having boundaries by how you enact them.

Appeasing abusing makes it o as a communication tool. Kids will learn this and adapt it as part of their relationships.

Flexion,

Pull up a chair and stay a while.  This is not a simple problem or fix.

As Waverider says, you don't want to enable abuse as a communication tool - and you don't want to be passive aggressive by walking out every time she wants to be heard.

One way to deal with this is in time of calm - explore what she thinks is a way to "put it on the shelf" and try to use that.

Others will have fine points on all this.

Skip

[waverider]

Keep in mind that when she is 'going off' there is a genuine emotion under there, the problem is that it is probably being tagged to the wrong issue, and being expressed in an inappropriate way. So the aim is not to get dragged into the issue, yet at the same time to acknowledge that she has strong feelings that she is struggling with. ie she is not just being nasty for fun... something is driving it.

Hence it is better to remove yourself BEFORE you loose it . It is prevention of escalation rather than payback.

It is a long process to address as Skip points out. Even then you are unlikely to always get it right. But you can avoid a lot of the drama more of the time. The times you can't you will learn to repair any damage done far more easily