Took the Red Pill and woke up

[MayorMcCheesey]

Hello all,

My first post, and so glad I found this community.  I recently read the book "Stop Walking on Eggshells" and cried my eyes out.  I realized that my wife has many of the signs, symptoms, and behaviors that are characteristics of a person diagnosed with BPD.  Not being a doctor, I can't say that she has BPD for sure, but the events that have occurred in our seven year relationship with her lead me to believe that she might be diagnosed if seen by a professional.  Reading the book and doing additional online research I've tried to understand how to communicate bettter with someone that has this.  I'm also currently looking for my own professional help where I can learn more about BPD and have a safe outlet to express my needs and thoughts.  I'll get into a little history of our relationship together so explain why I believe she potentially may have BPD.

In 2012 I received a job offer for a dream job in New York City, I packed up my things, moved out of my parents house, and ultimately ended up breaking things off with a then girlfriend about 2 hours away to the City.  I had recently straightened out my life, lost over 100 lbs was, landed a job offer, and was swarming with confidence.

She was hired in 2013, and met her one night at work, I was starting my shift and she was ending hers.  She introduced herself, and somehow already knew who I was.  I thought she was cute, but had a goofy personality, and also there was some type of quality that I was attracted to but couldn't put my finger on.  We would talk once in a while when we would cross paths in the big building but I originally was not interested being focused on my work, and life, and had just recently ended a serious relationship. 

A few months later I finally had a rare night off due to a back to back night show(I worked at a music venue).   I decided to attend the show with a coworker who also had the night off and we got to attend amazing concert (Pearl Jam) for free.   After we went out for some beers across the street.  Standing there socializing, my friend happens to see my future wife walking by and starts to call her name and waving at her.  She decides to stop in the bar to say hello, one thing leads to another, I ended up having a good amount of drinks and she ends up taking me home to her place after insisting I wasn't able to make it home on the subway by myself.  We ended up having sex that night multiple times and thought it was some of the wildest and intense of my life. 

After that we casually started hanging outside of work on dates, and to just spend more time getting to know each other.  I thought she sexy, incredibly smart, focused, driven, strong at this time.  I was attracted to her and the relationship became more serious as time went on. 

Since then the relationship has had all sorts of up's and down's, times of pure joy and happiness love and effection and honesty and times of what I consider to be dangerous, vile, evil, deceitful, and manipulative actions and emotions.  She could be the most loving person or the down right meanest person.  In the Winter of 2015 she found out she was pregnant, and we had a son together toward the end of summer 2016.  He is an amazingly happy boy and is the brightest spot in my life, who I can't get enough of.  We got married in 2018 at city hall in a civil ceremony due to insurance reasons so she could be under mine at my new employer, and have had plans to eventually hold a fake traditional wedding eventually. 

At this point you maybe reading my post and saying why does he assume she has BPD?  I'll get a little deeper into that here. 
So over time as our relationship became more serious, she drove a wedge between my best friends, and also frowned upon me doing any type of social activity with out her.  Even when she gave me permission to do something, I eventually learned that I would have to suffer for it upon my return.  She even discouraged me from seeing my own parents 2 hours away by train, she would say its too expensive, or that I should be spending any time off with her. I didn't realize it but became alienated, along with continuing to work an overnight job, and getting left hanging multiple times about being promoted.  I started to become unhappy, with my job, who i was, my social relationships, and even with my wife.  Working night after night, started taking a tole me.  Things in the relationship were also getting bad, fights over nothing, me not understanding her thinking and logic, hating me one minute and loving me the next. I can go into even more detail, but things got so bad in my life that I became depressed, and started to abuse pain medication that she had a ton of left over from a serious car accident.  I ended up finding myself in miserable cycle.  One night I found myself taking 18 dilaudid in the span of about 10 hours.  I got home from work and passed out, I woke up that afternoon going through withdrawls with a fever, vomiting and, and diariaha.  At the time i thought I had food poisioning, but a few days later figure out it was withdrawl.  I remember her coming home from work and being nasty to me, saying I should be more happy to see her, and seeing her should be making me feel better.  Over time she began chopping down my self esteem little by little with comments, calling me stupid, getting angry at me for the wrong tone or facial expression, or wrong time to ask a question.  She said I was lazy, and fat, and had gained weight, and litterally broke me down.  One weekend we had an afternoon off and got into a regular fight about nothing.  I tried to leave multiple times but she blocked the door.  I find myself to be a person that does not like conflict, in fact trys to avoid it.  Most times when she is upset or angry my first natural reaction is to run because I just don't want to be around her.  So shes developed a habit of blocking the door or litterally grabbing onto me and biting my arm, scratching me to the point I have scars from her nails and engagment rings.  A few times I've sucessfully tried to excape she has destroyed my personal posessions along with flush my anti-depresents down the toilet.  Yes thats right... she drove me to the point of depression,  that afternoon, things got so bad and she wouldn't let me leave, I decided I had one option left,  I was tired of my life, her, my job, how i lost all my friends, my hobbies, ect, I wanted to die, so I strung up some rope in the apartment and tied a noose stood on a step stool and hung myself.  I woke up on the floor with the noose around my neck disoriented having had blacked out.  I started crying and walked to the bedroom and found her sitting in bed.  Her first words were "you were faking it" so I cut the rope".  In the coming weeks I ended up getting professional help, believing there was something wrong with me, and didn't know why I had become so unhappy and depressed when only a few years back, I had a great life, friends, hobbies, relationsips.  I got put on anti-depresents and was enthusiatic about therapy.  Over some time fights started to happen with her more and more to the point we had a blow out and she decided to try and kill herself by taking a handfull of klonopin she has a perscription for. She get scared right away and made herself throw most of it up but also became disoriented and angry from the medication.  That evening I even made her go to the ER and had her check in and then she decided to run out of the waiting room and walk back home.  (She was affraid they would commit her)  That evening I ended up calling her father and told him what happened, he drove out an hour to check on her since I had to go to work. She became enraged and violent not letting me leave to the point her father had to hold her so I could walk out the door for work.  About an hour later she shows up in the middle of the night at my work, disoriented on the meds, and is trying to continue the argument with me.  This ended up getting to upper management and ended up getting reprimanded from this along with her.  I continued to do therapy and improve my life but the relationship was suffering.  Miraculously I said I'm not staying unless you see someone also.  So she attended for a short time, refused medication, would talk bad about her therapist and insist shes fine.  Things didn't improve in the relationship and I started to believe that I may be better off breaking it off.  I believe she could sense this and that's when she somehow got pregnant while on birth control that she claims she was taking.  I love my son to death but I'm pretty confident that she purposely tried to keep me by getting pregnant(a few of my friends, and former therapist think this). 

Durring session my therapist mentioned to me that how I describe my spouse makes it sound like she fits the characteristic of someone with BPD.  Not having ever herd of it I went home an reasearched and thought hey maybe this is it.  Time went by and eventually I was kicked out of therapy for missing too many appointments.  My wife strategically scheduled baby doctor appointments around the times of my sessions each week and missed too many.  My depression improved towards the birth of my son, and my therapist had warned me that myself and my wife will be in a honey moon period where things will be good for a while and then things will start to fall apart again.  I found this to be true and over time back to the same arguments and encounters with her.  Now however I have a son that is getting older and older and I am fearfull to expose him to our back and forth.  A lot of times I want to just run away to save him from seeing an argument but can't since she won't let me.  She said she needs to hash it out and doesn't do well with abandonment. 

There's so many experiences and things I could talk about in this post I kind of feel like its everywhere but wanted to tell a little story of out relationship.  She can be the most amazing person and I do love her, and has even made my life better in ways, but she also has put my life through hell.  I also recently discovered she was talking poorly about me to an old coworker via txt message when he asked how our son was and if I was ever around.  She messaged him back that we are co parents when he's around which is rare.  Meanwhile we live together, I spend most of my free time with my son, and most friends and family members of me compliment me how I'm so involved and engaged with my son.  I confronted her and had screen shot and sent myself a photo of what she had said,  at first she denied it and calling me a liar for starting a fight and making it up, after I had enough and knew she wouldn't tell the truth I sent the photo and she called me crying apologizing. Also in arguments I've noticed she lies, a lot, and will change facts of what happened or what was said to fit her story.  I hear this regularly when she tells the same story to different friends over the phone.  She has a few best friends, but I noticed they keep her at a distance, she recently got in a fight with her best friends when the friend decided to book a trip to Disney after they had discussed doing one with the two families together. What was funny was I was on the chopping block all week, with her picking and angry at me until that happened and then suddenly I went to being the best guy in the world again.  Former co workers, friends of hers, friends of mine, her family, have all described her as "dramatic at times"  She always talk about how shes afraid to do things alone, shes worried a lot that people have alternate motives.  She's the person that would shame and confront someone who skipped a line but at the same time would be the person to skip everyone in a line.  She contradicts herself by her actions and what she says and does constantly, and will fit things to win her argument.  Since reading the book I'm realizing that I can't take it personal, there's clearly something different and wrong about her thinking. I've also worked a little on setting small boundaries and also saying no to her, I've been doing better diffusing situations but need more practice and help and think seeing a professional would be best.  It's been a good feeling realizing that there's a strong possibility to figuring her out and improving my relationship, I just need help!

One last thing I'll say, and I know none of you know me personally and you don't have to believe this, but I find myself to be a good person but no where near perfect.  I have been complimented as a good guy, trust worthy, friendly, good dad, friend, husband, son and believe this to be true.  But some times I can become mean rotten and nasty in an argument, and shes been literally the only person ever in my life to get me to lose it like that. I've never been a guy to get into fights, or look for trouble and generally dislike being rude or inconsiderate or mean, so I hate myself when I become so frustrated with her that I shout and become animated and say hurtful things I just want to be able to communicate with her and have a stable enough relationship. 


Sorry for the super long winded message but feels good to get it out there!

-Mayor McCheese

[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.

[Red5]

Welcome Cheese Man!

I've got only a second here, you've convinced me, your wife is a borderline… no doubt, I could've written a lot of what you have… it amazes me at how similar these persons are in their behaviors (traits)… and as well our own stories… wow!

I've got some more readings for you, will come back later and leave you a list… knowledge is power… STICK with the therapy, stay centered, keep learning…

One last thing I'll say, and I know none of you know me personally and you don't have to believe this, but I find myself to be a good person but no where near perfect.  I have been complimented as a good guy, trust worthy, friendly, good dad, friend, husband, son and believe this to be true.  But some times I can become mean rotten and nasty in an argument, and she's been literally the only person ever in my life to get me to lose it like that. I've never been a guy to get into fights, or look for trouble and generally dislike being rude or inconsiderate or mean, so I hate myself when I become so frustrated with her that I shout and become animated and say hurtful things I just want to be able to communicate with her and have a stable enough relationship.

#Me2!

Yeah… #Me2 Brother !  … wow,

There so so so much to learn about this… I got to go for now...

WELCOME !

Red5

[Harri]

Hi!  I want to join Red here in saying

You are in the right place for support and to learn techniques that will help *you* and can improve things in your relationship with your wife.  The first part of that, helping yourself, is a big focus on this board.  We have various tools that can help and coping strategies that when coupled with an understanding of what is causing some of the behaviors and how we feed into that process can improve things. 

One last thing I'll say, and I know none of you know me personally and you don't have to believe this, but I find myself to be a good person but no where near perfect.  I have been complimented as a good guy, trust worthy, friendly, good dad, friend, husband, son and believe this to be true.  But some times I can become mean rotten and nasty in an argument, and shes been literally the only person ever in my life to get me to lose it like that. I've never been a guy to get into fights, or look for trouble and generally dislike being rude or inconsiderate or mean, so I hate myself when I become so frustrated with her that I shout and become animated and say hurtful things I just want to be able to communicate with her and have a stable enough relationship.

I do believe you.  These relationships can bring out the very worst in us.  The relationship dynamics can be very invalidating, hurtful, stressful, confusing, frustrating etc.  That is where the tools come in.  Often a big source of those feelings is because we expect the pwBPD (person with BPD) to behave and respond in ways we are used to or that happen in healthier relationships.  that is not always the case.  Some people process things differently.  For example, sometimes we will say things with the intention of being validating but it is actually a very invalidating thing to say to a highly sensitive person.  So we learn to change how we speak and respond.  This helps the HSP and it helps us by not creating conflict where we will lose our cool and behave in ways we do not like.

We can all learn new ways of communicating.  Doing so helps all of our relationships: friendships, work relations, etc.

Anyway, I am glad you are here and posted.

If you had to pick one thing to work on first, what would it be?

[MayorMcCheesey]

Thanks for the welcome!

If I had to say what I want to work on first...  It might be that I'm programmed and conditioned over time to fear her reactions about potentially stressful situations and also automatically go into a defense mode.  Example, driving around the parking lot of Costco as a family trying to find parking.  She doesn't do well in those situations for whatever reason, and it usually involves an argument and turning into a fight literally about nothing. Now I go to the mall, store, concert or event, and parking like now has become a trigger for me because I'm fearful of how the situation will go.   

Does that make sense?  Another example is dropping her off at the train every morning for work,  I literally make her breakfast, get the kid ready, get myself ready, get him in the car with his bag, get her to the train, drop her off, the kid off at grandparents, and then go to work.  If something were to go wrong or be changed up somehow she would have a meltdown, and somehow take it out on me, and turn into a fight.  So now every morning I feel high-strung and with anxiety.

[Red5]

*I'm programmed and conditioned over time to fear her reactions about potentially stressful situations and also automatically go into a defense mode. 

*Example, driving around the parking lot of Costco as a family trying to find parking.  She doesn't do well in those situations for whatever reason, and it usually involves an argument and turning into a fight literally about nothing.

*Now I go to the mall, store, concert or event, and parking like now has become a trigger for me because I'm fearful of how the situation will go.   

*Another example is dropping her off at the train every morning for work, 
-make her breakfast,
-get the kid ready,
-get myself ready,
-get him in the car with his bag,
-get her to the train, drop her off,
-the kid to the grandparents,
-and then go to work. 

*If something were to go wrong or be changed up somehow she would have a meltdown, and somehow take it out on me, and turn into a fight. 

*So now every morning I feel high-strung and with anxiety.

Again… #Me2… as you study borderline, and I'll add covert narcissism, you will note that these personas cannot handle change, glitches, or minor; and or major mishaps… as you say, "meltdown.

One of the behaviors (traits) is to always want to control everything, as they themselves are out of control 'inside'… so controlling others, provides them with an 'element' of emotional stability… and then when things leave the rails, they freak out (meltdown)… and you, the 'non' get punished.

*Rage
*Blame
*Shame (the non)
*Chaos (resultant - "meltdown")

I read the other day, in a book I'm reading… "the borderline" (covert narcissist) must exist in a perpetual state of denial (blame to others) of their real emotions (covert)… in order to survive emotionally in real time, this is where the borderline rage come from.

Book~> The Object of My Affection Is in My Reflection: Coping with Narcissists:
By Book by Rokelle Lerner.

There are 'tools' presented and taught there, that may help you dial back some of this… for years, I myself enabled, incited, and poured fuel to the fire unwittingly, this is part of "JADE"… in an argument, we will 'justify, argue, defend, and explain" our position (JADE) acronym, you need to stop this… ie' try to win the fight, or else get the borderline to 'come round to reason'… that AIN'T going to ever happen, the more you press, the more explosive the borderline will get.

There is so much to learn M' Cheesey… knowledge is power, and deliverance from chaos.

…"from my own notes"
#at its core, dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) helps people build four major skills:
*mindfulness
*distress tolerance (this one is crucial)
*interpersonal effectiveness
*emotional regulation

A borderline, who is in full rage, and in "full bloom"… who has no idea that they are even borderline. full of anger, rage, shame, blame etc'… they cannot do any of these things, be mindful, handle stress, look inward, to see faults, regulate their emotions... as your describing your wife.

They cannot cognitively process anything, or else employ dialectic skills to curb their out of control emotions, the "distress tolerance" is at zero, they blow up over the most simple things, like finding a parking spot, .. my wife used to do the exact same thing… and in the Church parking lot no less!

The triggers seem endless, I know!… it wears you down.

*programmed and conditioned… this means your hypersensitive to her behaviors now… your "flight-fight-freeze" is always on isn't it… your at defcon 1, red alert when she is with you… your just waiting for her to blowup… this has to change, this is not good for either your mental, or physical health .. as you've so vivdly shared with us, as I said, stick with the therapy .. and talk to your "T about this… you may be developing cptsd… as she is triggering you.

Interpersonal effectiveness, is to me "introspection" or the ability to look inward, to self audit, reflect… and to not "project" onto other people, read about borderline and projection… your wife is doing this to you.

Lastly, emotional regulation, should occur after personal introspective… but with a borderline (covert narcissist)… again, no!… they have only on-off… talionic punishment / thinking, "ridged" eye for an eye, black and white… read about borderlines and "splitting".

Another book;
I Hate You, Don't Leave Me: Understanding the Borderline Personality,
Book by Hal Straus

Keep posting!

Red5

[Red5]

A couple more books Mayor Cheese,

Understanding the Borderline Mother: Helping Her Children Transcend the Intense, Unpredictable, and Volatile Relationship…
*Book by Christine Ann Lawson

Loving Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder: How to Keep Out-of-Control Emotions From Destroying Your Relationship…
*Book by Shari Y. Manning

Codependent No More...
*Book by Melody Beattie

Most of these are reviewed here on the boards, groups… look under "Community Built Knowledge Base".

I've found some have been uploaded onto YouTube as audio books as well.

Keep Posting, Kind Regards, Red5

[MayorMcCheesey]

Red 5,
 Thanks for the reading recommendations, will be surely checking this out... all in secret of course, just how I had to buy "stop walking on eggshells" in cash so she couldn't figure out what I purchased... yes shes this nosey, I have to private browse this message board because if she found out she'll lose it... it sucks that I have to be so sneaky and feel like I'm doing something on her level.

In the last week though I feel better personally, like I finally have a little clue whats going on with her, and that I figured out why I use to be depressed and also realized I'm not actually crazy, just crazy enough to listen to her B/S she was spewing towards me for so long and was buying it.

Reading some other peoples stories on here and keep seeing similar situations to mine, its refreshing that I'm not alone.  Some things in our relationship could have went really bad looking back...  I could have actually succeeded in killing myself, or her actually succeeding in doing it also.  She also cheated on me and was camming with other guys and texting them.  Luckily I'm an adventurous and open enough guy I was able to turn something negative into a positive. Also so many other situations/fights/ arguments/drama where I wish I had known more and could have handled them all so differently. 

I use to blow up and call her a dog, reason because she would get so fixated about something that was said or happened she would not let it go or would keep talking and talking and talking about it.  So I said shes a dog with a tennis ball, won't leave it alone.  I realize now she can't help it, just in this week alone I've heard her make a comment and just say to myself... she can't help it and don't take it personally, I CAN let it go, she CAN'T and I oddly take some pride in that and being a bigger person.

It's also so funny how things progress with uBPD person, she found out shes getting sent to China for a week for work... She was on me about some other stuff but that quickly was dropped and work was now on the chopping block, but I know by tonight somehow her going to China will become something I did wrong...  It goes full circle, I've come to the conclusion shes a very scared/terrified person deep down, and has this ferocious lion personality that covers it up because instead of expressing fear... anger is way easier...