forums of this quality are rare and special.
It's beginning to look that way. I guess I was spoiled finding this one right off the bat.
Did CBT in 2015. Group sessions. Got me over that year's major hurdle. Oh, and the book... I bought that last year. But you're not going to like it when I mention that I haven't gotten through it yet.
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Since this is a forum about relationship BPD, I guess I should mention that side of things.
My wife has been on this site looking for posts that match us, which confirmed my former paranoia about that, and explains my latest forum disappearance. Since I stopped being paranoid about that... here are publicly available typed-out words.
She simply can't, or refuses to consider, attempting to stop lashing out at me. She lets anything that bothers her simmer until it comes out in an angry gush. Let's say the average/major ones are twice a year. They're normally major because I end up (eventually) yelling back at her, at then she shuts down and mentions that she can't talk to me because she's scared.
When I tell her that she scares me as well, because of how bad her surreal/out-of-the-blue hurtful comments affect me... well, she doesn't seem to care. I keep asking her to talk to me like she talks to her family. At first, the response was just a simple "nope" because she doesn't like censoring herself in her safe space.
Over the past nine months, she started throwing out these concepts-as-criticisms. "Tone policing" for the problem in the previous paragraph. Some of my compliments I was giving her are now tied to a "male gaze," and when I tried to tell her that I just love her and am excited by her, it's "gaslighting."
Basically, when she's at a low point, anything I do can be twisted in her brain to be a negative.
The first time I ever made her cookies was by her request one night. Her response to them was getting upset because I apparently spent too much time in the kitchen and missed some of our nightly TV time.
Years of this. She's pretty much given up on me, so I finally shut down maybe a month ago. I just let her do and say what she wants and keep my brain shut off. Like the old-timey comedy shows where the brow-beaten spouse just says "yes, dear" and shuffles off to canned laughter.
I essentially have a roommate now, but it's mostly easier than trying to sustain this relationship. The only downside is that I currently feel so incredibly confused and alone.
