Anyone else struggling with feelings of patient-carer instead of a relationship?

[KimCoco]

I've been with my partner for six years. We had an extremely intense start to our relationship - didn't spend a night apart and were living together after about two months. She is still the absolute love of my life and my best friend - we live and work together so are always in each other's company.
 
However, what I DIDN'T experience until about 3 years ago is her anxiety and depression (she's bipolar). This was shortly after we immigrated overseas together. Then about a year ago she was diagnosed with BPD, and started DBT recently.

She's six years older than I am, and our lives have been revolving around this recovery - there have been suicide attempts, cutting incidents, she had to stop working for a while. We have one or two mutual friends, but mainly it's the two of us completely intertwined in this one life of "getting better".

My issue is that our sex life has suffered a lot along the way - sometimes it feels more like a patient-carer relationship than an intimate one.

Her therapist (who is excellent) is really promoting that my partner must not rely on me, and must learn to self-soothe. That's fantastic, but I don't know how to set boundaries. For example:

She has never gotten her drivers licence, so I need to drive her everywhere. There's no reason she can't get a licence, but the idea of learning makes her anxious so she wont because I'm there to drive her. If I take a sick day off work, she needs to take public transport which makes her anxious. So I try not to take sick days. If she wants to go ANYWHERE on the weekends (shops etc) she won't take public transport because she doesn't like it, she'll ask me to take her. If I make the slightest indications that I don't feel like it, it hurts her feelings. She isn't a "rage" type, she just gets quiet and and sad and gives up and makes me feel guilty. So I drive her. If I suggest she gets her licence, she acts like I'm being insensitive about her anxiety. She says "I can't" a lot. If I show any encouragement that she can, she implies I just don't understand how debilitating the anxiety is.

I love this woman with my whole heart. I don't want to see her sad. But I DO want to see her grow, and push herself, and achieve things in her life. And she won't if I'm there to do everything. How do I set boundaries and let her feel like her own person again? She has lost so much self-confidence because of growing more and more helpless, and as she grows helpless I take on more of the responsibility, making it worse.

[RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING]

RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members are welcomed to express frustration but must seek constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[WifeOfProbableBP]

Can you see the therapist as well, so they can work with both of you?

[isilme]

If I make the slightest indications that I don't feel like it, it hurts her feelings. She isn't a "rage" type, she just gets quiet and and sad and gives up and makes me feel guilty.

So she gets you to enable her to not learn to drive.  It's okay for her to be upset.  This is a hard lesson.  We feel we need to protect our loved ones from feeling hurt or upset, but if the cause of their being upset is we enforce a boundary, then you do not have to feel bad about it.  This is hard and takes practice.

If you want to set a boundary of only driving her places when it is convenient for you, or only when you are not tired/sick.busy, that is okay.  And setting a boundary is not about proclaiming it to the pwBPD.  It's about picking something you will not allow anymore, and then standing by it.  After some time, the pwBPD gets used to the "new normal" and acclimates.  There will be cranky times over it.  Ignore accusations based on irrational requests.  It is not rational to expect you to play chauffeur all the time.  It's rude.  It's selfish.  But if you keep doing it, it won't stop.  SHE'S not going to stop it.  YOU have to.

Yes, I feel like a caretaker sometimes.  And that's a hard place to be when you want an equal adult level relationship instead of a child/parent/patient/caretaker feeling.  But we have to step back and see what we do that allows things to continue, and change ourselves.  We can only change our own actions.  So see if you can step back from the driving so much.  Don't make a big deal out of it.  Be busy.  Be absent.  Make her learn to rely on herself to get from A to B.  It's another step like self-soothing.  If you are always there to do it, she will never HAVE to learn otherwise. 

I've had to step back and let H fail at some things so he'd learn to do them.  It did teach him a little more self-reliance, and made him motivated to get past some hurdles he'd built for himself.  He fixates on negative things, he make excuses all the time for not doing what he knows he should.  I can't stand being a nag, so I just do thigns that bother me if they are not done, and ignore what I can't do, and let him complain if that's the case.  He seems to be learning that he has little right to complain about some things when he knows it's because HE won't step up and do them.