First Steps - will any steps be easy

[Before you can make things better, you have to stop making them worse...]

Hi Everyone,

I'm at the end of week one in my discovery that my wife likely has Un-conventional BPD. 

Two months ago, I was in serious decline and had a complete loss of sense of self.  With no answer, I took a 5 month lease (thanks covid for making rentals easier to get) to get some distance and began searching for answers to why I was walking eggs shells for much of my 25 married years!

I have two kids, one with serious mental health issues related to gender issues so our situation is delicate.

I don't blame my wife for BPD, and I want to help so she does not feel completely abandon. My dream is that she will get help as she has voluntarily admitted to a few symptoms (although I felt it was not given up willingly).

I have these quick question to start me off:

• 1. Is it possible to help from a distance or will this ultimate provoke the situation?
• 2. My wife does not know that I suspect something, but she has confirm she is aware of co-dependance, people please and passive aggressive manipulation. Is this a good sing, and is there a soft approach that has work to suggest an evaluation?
• 3.Do I make kids aware to protect them from manipulation... or is that manipulation? 
• 4.Do you enlist their family to help? 
• 5.If you think divorce is your only option, do you make them aware of this right of, or try to persuade them to get help, and use the hope to help motivate? Does that have lasting effects?  Does that will have to be theirs entirely? 

Thanks,

A

[AlexanderDS]

Hi Everyone,

I'm at the end of week one in my discovery that my wife likely has Un-conventional BPD. 

Two months ago, I was in serious decline and had a complete loss of sense of self.  With no answer, I took a 5 month lease (thanks covid for making rentals easier to get) to get some distance and began searching for answers to why I was walking eggs shells for much of my 25 married years!

I have two kids, one with serious mental health issues related to gender issues so our situation is delicate.

I don't blame my wife for BPD, and I want to help so she does not feel completely abandon. My dream is that she will get help as she has voluntarily admitted to a few symptoms (although I felt it was not given up willingly).

I have these quick question to start me off:

• 1. Is it possible to help from a distance or will this ultimate provoke the situation?
• 2. My wife does not know that I suspect something, but she has confirm she is aware of co-dependance, people please and passive aggressive manipulation. Is this a good sing, and is there a soft approach that has work to suggest an evaluation?
• 3.Do I make kids aware to protect them from manipulation... or is that manipulation? 
• 4.Do you enlist their family to help? 
• 5.If you think divorce is your only option, do you make them aware of this right of, or try to persuade them to get help, and use the hope to help motivate? Does that have lasting effects?  Does that will have to be theirs entirely? 

Thanks,

A

[Rev]

Hi Al-DS

And welcome ...

Boy that is a lot to process.  And I am sorry that you are needing to process it. You've come to a good place and there is lot's of help here without judgement.

Would it be okay if I asked a couple of questions for clarification?


How is your wife's relationship to your children? ( I am assuming she is their mother? It's not clear as you say "I have two children")
Are you in counseling for yourself?

Again - welcome - and try as best as possible to take things one issue at at time, even though there's lots. Good for you to get some space from this to get it sorted out. These are big decisions you are making.

Hang in there.

Rev

[AlexanderDS]

Hi Rev,

Yes they are my kids, one is 16, and the other 12.  Her relationship is ok with them, but has a lot of expectations on them, so I'd say lightly strained. In the past few months I am not sure, and the kids are splitting time between the two, and not showing signs they don't want to be there.

Yes, I have have seen therapist personal for the past couple of years on an off, and not reluctant at all to more. I have not had a chance to see them as he was originally for our famiy and is reluctant to touch this. I do a lot of self-reflection, discovery, processing, and repeat so I have developed some skills to help myself in the meantime. 

[Rev]

Hi Rev,

Yes they are my kids, one is 16, and the other 12.  

Sorry to be obtuse, but I am still not clear. Maybe I'm the one not being clear.   Your current partner is the mother of these two children aged 12 and 16?  The only reason I ask is to get a better picture of the family dynamics in terms of coming and going.


So.. otherwise, I think I get the general picture.  

I am wondering if the BPD issue isn't a distraction of sorts.  Many marriages hit the skids after 25 years for all kinds of reasons.
My first thoughts on the matter are that your children's intuition will tell a tale, in the sense that regardless of why your wife is acting the way she is, an important question is: (a) what impact is her behavior having on them , (b) what impact is her behavior having on your ability to parent them , (c) what impact is the tension in the marriage having on them ?

What do you think?  If you erase the BPD part of the equation, what are you left with?  

What does your therapist say?  Or rather, what hasn't your therapist said that you are hoping to get answered here?

Touchy situation this is - lot's of moving parts to it. You are wise to get some distance.

Looking forward to hear back.

Rev

[ForeverDad]

Yes, I have have seen therapist personal for the past couple of years on an off, and not reluctant at all to more. I have not had a chance to see them as he was originally for our family and is reluctant to touch this.

One question I learned is okay to ask a lawyer, I would think the same goes for a counselor... "If you were personally facing a situation in your family matching mine, who would you turn to for representation/counseling?"  Lawyers, counselors, etc know, or should know, that they may not be the right fit for every person walking in their door as client/patient.  Does that perspective make sense?  Surely your therapist could point you to someone more experienced in what you're facing, right?

As regards your other questions, here are some general responses, probably too brief to be specific.

Counseling is good.  (1) Good for you.  (2) Good especially for the kids, so they have additional resources to help them keep a good perspective.  (3) Good for the spouse too, though with BPD behaviors/traits there is likely an intense Denial of culpability and a pattern of Blame Shifting.  Hard to get meaningful therapy started and continuing long term with all that deep resistance.

Also, you did good to not mention your specific thoughts on personality disorders to your spouse.  This is best left for a relatively emotionally-neutral expert to handle.  Sorry, she wouldn't view you as emotionally neutral, not after 25 years of history together.  Your life history with her made her resistant to listening past the huge emotional baggage of the relationship.  BPD perceptions are more evident and persistent in close relationships, and what is closer than a marriage?

Sharing your thoughts with her family could be risky.  Though some may be favorable to the reality of what you're dealing with, many will side with their blood relative, "blood is thicker than water".  You should ponder any such actions very carefully, we are remote and can't advise you how that would turn out in your case.

After 25 years, your efforts to improve things met little success, as evidenced by your separation to regather your equilibrium.  The fact is you can't 'fix' her.  She has to want to change and success, if any, is usually with an emotionally neutral expert.  Have your heard of the 5 stages of grieving a relationship loss?  The first step is Acceptance... that it may not be recoverable.  Sadly, it is what it is.

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