Setting Limits With Silent Treatment

[coyote87]

Hi everyone, first post here. I'm just approaching dealing with learning what my personal limits/boundaries are and what I am struggling with is how to set them and how to respond when they're broken. I'm currently reading Stop Walking On Eggshells and I just don't know how to enforce my boundaries without making arguments worse.

One of my fiance's favorite things to do when we're in an argument is give me the silent treatment. If I call him out on it, he accuses me of being the one doing the silent treatment (classic projecting from what I've learned from this book so far). On a normal work day, we're texting each other every couple hours about something we heard or thought of. Just a casual chat through the whole day. But on those silent treatment days, I will get no response the whole day. Maybe a couple words here and there. And when we're finally both home, he just sits at his desk silently with tense/frustrated responses to anything I say to him.

As I type this out, I realize that in these moments I am also very angry that he's even doing this so I definitely need to work on depersonalizing how he acts. But I was hoping for some advice on how to act in this moments, and how to set limits for myself so that I can feel confident in my responses.

[PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES]

PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members may appear frustrated but they are here for constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[coyote87]

One thing to add is that this weekend we had a very serious argument. I left the apartment to cool off and drove around aimlessly for two hours. Trying to set a boundary for myself and letting myself get out of the apartment when he is enraged. When I got back, he had locked himself in the bedroom and did not unlock for 12 hours, except to use the bathroom and go right back in. So me trying to do some self-care and get myself out of that situation led to him escalating the argument even farther.

[DanniGirl75]

Hi Coyote87,

Unfortunately, I don't have any advice for you.   I'm replying because I'd like to follow this thread.  I'm a non-BPD, but my current boyfriend is a pwBPD (diagnosed).  I'm also interested in learning how to set limits/boundaries with him. 

I don't live with my BF, so I don't get the face-to-face silent treatments, but he will go MIA with his phone - no responses to calls or texts for hours or even days at a time.  It's frustrating. 

The weird thing is, he never admits to being upset or angry.  I never know what triggered it.  He'll just disappear out of the blue and when he does resurface (hours or two days later), I get some elaborate story about his phone getting lost, or being left at a friend's house, or the screen freezing so he can't access his phone.

Anyway, I'm sorry to hear that you're going through this and I hope you (we) can find resources to assist.  The folks on this board are very generous with advice and I find them helpful.  Good luck to you!  Hang in there..

~D

[coyote87]

I ended up finishing Stop Walking On Eggshells yesterday, but I feel like I need to read it over again because I still don't know how to respond and talk to him. I am learning that I have to come to terms that I can't force him to get better, especially if he won't admit he has a problem. He admits he has BPD but he won't admit he NEEDS to see a therapist. I feel like I'm in a whirlwind of emotions right now, also coming to terms with the fact that I am in an emotionally abusive relationship.

After being with him for 10 years now, working towards getting married... It's hard to accept the fact that my fiance is abusing me. That I am in this abusive relationship of my own accord, and that I will have to deal with his BPD for the rest of my life if I go through with this marriage. What makes it worse is that I still doubt myself. He never punches walls, he never acts out in public, he never calls me names. He just makes me feel like everything is my fault in the relationship, that I am not allowed to be angry over anything. That I "blame him for everything", which leads me to stop talking about my problems. Then it turns into my fault for never talking about issues I have in the relationship, so he can't know what to fix. Back and forth forever...

I feel like I can't even think straight, I've been having panic attacks. Took a couple days off of work this week, which doesn't even make me feel better because I'm stressing about him getting annoyed at me for taking time off of work the whole day if he finds out. What a train wreck.

[DanniGirl75]

You're not a train wreck, you're just dealing with a pretty heavy realization and a lot of emotions.  I understand and I'm so sorry.  I wish I had the magic words to help alleviate your anxiety right now.

Do you have any relatives or friends that you can talk to about this?   They know you better and, after being with your BF for 10 years, probably are well acquainted with him, too, and maybe they can help guide you.

[coyote87]

I've purposely not talked to my family/friends about this. A huge sore spot in our past arguments has been me doing this and he gets enraged at me for a very long time because I've tainted their image of him by bringing up our problems to them. From that time forward, anytime even slightly bad happens with my family, its my fault because I told them our problems. Or if I act on advice from them, its bad advice because they don't have both sides of the picture, they don't have HIS perspective on things. So I've resorted to making anonymous posts on Reddit for help, but even then I've internalized his thought that they can't get both sides of the story so any advice I get from there is no help.

I've started seeing a therapist, had my first session a couple days ago. I'm hoping to see them every week until I come to a solution that makes me happy in the long term.

[ColdKnight]

Hi Coyote,

I’d like to recommend another book. “I hate you, don’t leave me”
Some good communication advice in that one.