Telling excuses from facts

[crusty]

I've been with my BPD for nearly eight years now. About this time last year I started having an affair and in February this year I decided to leave. I have DPD which makes leaving without somewhere to go hard, but that's my own cross that I am learning to bear and deal with separately through therapy.

The day I moved out I came back to the house to collect some of my belongings only to be cornered and challenged. I was quizzed about why I was leaving and told I had to explain. When I refused she backed me literally into a corner and was right in my face. I asked her to back away and she refused so I held my hands up open palms faced outwards and asked her to step back and give me some space. Her response was to shove me twice and punch me twice, and I do mean punch, she didn't mark me but it certainly hurt. She justified this at the time by saying she thought I was going to hit her, a thought that had never gone through my mind, and has subsequently justified this to me and others by saying it was due to difficult circumstances, the fact I had cheated on her and the fact I was leaving her.

On two subsequent occasions we were considering recconcilliation and conversations descended into an argument she took my key and locked the door. She then refused to let me leave the situation until some resolution could be achieved.

This is on top of various other events that had happenned previously like sharing a deeply personal rant about me on Facebook, listing a bunch of confidences and gaps in my personality and behaviour that I had shared with her in confidence as we tried to work through things. Again, this was justified as being understandable as I had put her under personal stress.

There have been many other things where I can't quite understand the logic. For example, I complained that she took no interest in my children, which she in turn blamed on the fact my parents would always visit when my children did. Yet, on those occasions when my parents didn't visit the extent of her interest was to switch the TV and tell them to find something to do.

Worse still I found out recently that after one visit to the house to collect my belongings, where there was a confrontation with her son - he refused to let me in, she went on to ring the police, and have witness statements taken. As if I had done something wrong by demanding access to my property at a time that had been previously agreed.

She still claims she loves me and now my diagnosis with Dependant Personality Disorder seems to give her a convenient excuse for why everything that ever went wrong was my fault. Why it was my fault for not standing up to her and telling if she was doing things wrong. She has used this as good grounds to get back under my defences but now I find myself reviewing at length the things that have happenned. As much as she admits she has done many things wrong, somehow she manages to justify to herself that they were understandable under the circumstances or someone elses fault.

I do love her but something about the whole situation feels dangerous to me and I can't decide whether to slowly drop my defences and try again or to be satisfied that I have built some space and put myself in a good position to move on so it would just be foolish to expose myself to further damage.

[Validation78]

Hi Crusty!

You have a lot on your plate both with your own illness and hers. It sounds like the relationship has been very difficult. You have a great deal of time invested, so I can see why deciding to reconcile or not will be understandably hard.

The site is filled with good information about BPD. We spend a lot of time talking about changes we can make in ourselves to improve the relationship. Have you checked out the links to your right, Choosing a Path and The Lessons on The Staying Board? Those are good places to start. First to help you make your decision, second, to learn more about BPD and the impact you can have!

Best Wishes,

Val78

[crusty]

Hi Val,

Thanks for your reply. Yes I've had a thorough read through, I think what I find most difficult to decide is whether or not I feel what I have tolerated already is too much. It's very difficult looking back to understand what was acceptable and what wasn't, what was justifiable and wasn't, and also what of those behaviours should I be accepting responsability for as obviously those are the things I can have most influence over versus what are things that are down to who she is.

What I am finding most difficult to deal with is the fact that I was never physically violent or threatened physical violence, when she hit me I just turned away and let her rather than defend myself, yet she then rang the domestic violence unit of the police when I had not threatened any violence whatsoever. It's very difficult to deal with and I can't help but feel that I have put up with too much already and that my dependancy issues are just trapping me. Equally I don't a miscontruction of fear in my own issues to lead me to do the wrong thing.

Everything is very candid and civil at the moment but I am not living in the same house as her, I see her a few times per week and feel like I am in control and can withdraw should I need to, my big figure is that if I go back properly at some point I have to take my safety net away and will that be when I can expect to get another backlast or am I just being unneccessarily fearful and mistrusting based on previous behaviours. Someone once said to me that the best indicator of future behaviour is past behaviour and I can't help but think that was a fairly reasonable statement.

[musicfan42]

How did you get diagnosed with Dependent Personality Disorder? I think that I may have some traits of it-it's not that I want the diagnosis per se however I'm wondering what things you've found helpful to treat it. You mention that you're in therapy-what type of therapy? If you'd rather not discuss it, then of course I respect your wishes.

[Validation78]

Hi again Crusty,

What your friend says about past behavior has some truth. However, if you commit to making changes, you can impact the future. If you simply go back to the way things were, of course, the outcome will be the same.

Is she getting T for her BPD?

Have you both explored DBT? It may be helpful for both of you.

If you feel the situation is dangerous, maybe it's best to live apart, while working on the relationship. You can read up on something called therapeutic separation.

I'm glad you have been reading through the information on the site. There's a lot of good information here! In particular, you may want to review more about setting boundaries. Your reference to tolerating unacceptable behaviors makes me think that you are weak in that area, as many of us are, and could use some help!

Best Wishes,

Val78   

[crusty]

No problem, I'm happy to discuss it.

I've been seeing a clinical psychologist weekly for about four months. It's been an interesting process with an awful lot of talking and self exploration. It's also been quite helpful to go through all of what has been happenning with some one there who can help me understand at that level what is happenning.

My understanding is it's an itterative process and I guess he was getting close to identifying issues anyway but I think it was some of the problems I have around getting space in a relationship, standing up for myself and sabotaging a relationship in the early stages before I get rejected led him down that path. It's quite interesting because it share's fear of abandonment with BPD but is then very different in many other ways.

It's also quite disconcerting because you feel slightly that you aren't in control, not that you are exhuberent and impulsively out of control but that there are things you know you want to do or don't want to do but someone how can't steer yourself to exert your desires on your own life. It's also a perfect fit for a BPD because you will very conveniently let them get there way most of the time and generally put up with bad behaviour.

In terms of treatment I'm very very early on that part of the process so I think the short answer is that I don't really know yet. So far my psychologist has suggested that I need to spend some sustained time I'm on my own so that I can grow confidence in my ability to be emotionally sufficient without the need to be actively in a relationship . . . that conversation is yet to be discussed with my wife however. It has slightly left me wondering if I get that confidence how likely am I to want to stay and if so would it be better just to go and move on in peace or is it better to stick it out on the off chance that it's worth it in the end?

[crusty]

Hi Val,

Yes my therapist has already suggested theraputic separation, although he didn't call it that as such, he just said that we should be completely apart for an extended period of time. My psychologist has also begun discussing boundry setting with me so that is certainly something that I will be reading up on.

She has had a lot of counselling but I'm not sure how much help it has been it just seems to have re-enforced her belief that her actions were justifiable. I have suggested seeing a psychologist and offerred to arrange to pay for it but she has been resistent on the grounds that it is just me trying to make our problems all about her. Where as for me it's more that I am investing in fixing my issues but I don't see the point in investing in the relationship if she isn't going to invest in hers. We went to marriage counselling earlier in the year and she somehow managed to make everything about how badly I had treated her and how much I didn't care about her and it became incredibly difficult for me to actually raise my concerns against that back drop. She would start to complain to the counsellor that I was just making excuses or bringing up old issues rather than understanding that it wasn't the past I was concerned about but the potential repitition of those issues in the future.

Crusty

[Validation78]

Hey Crusty!

I'm glad to hear that you are working on your side of the problems! That's the only place you have any control, as you already know.

The general theory here is that MC doesn't work with pwBPD. MC requires that both parties accept responsibility for their parts, and as you have already experienced, she wants to shift the blame to you. That doesn't mean that the T doesn't see right through that though! An astute T knows that it can't all be  your fault! I often wondered how our T could tell who was telling the truth, and she assured me that it wasn't so much about that, but more about how we each reacted to situations and emotional displays. Since you've been reading, you've probably come across mentions of DBT and Schema T. Both are highly regarded for treatment of BPD. In fact, with much success. Perhaps you can find someone who practices DBT and you can both learn together. There's also a great book called The High Conflict Couple that talks all about DBT that may be helpful as well! If you choose to work things out, it will be a long road, and only you know if it's worth it!

Best Wishes,

Val78

[musicfan42]

Thanks Crusty.

I think that it's great that you're willing to go to therapy With regard to your relationship with your pwBPD, I feel like your psychologist has given you some really wise suggestions. It sounds like you're in good hands there. What type of therapy does your psychologist do? (e.g CBT, psychodynamic etc). I've heard that CBT (Cognitive Behavior Therapy) and assertiveness training are helpful for DPD as they encourage the person to be more independent and emotionally self-sufficient.

I had issues with not wanting to be alone and I found that I just had to do it-I just had to feel the fear and do it anyway. I know that sounds cheesy however the fear lessened the more time I spent on my own. It is hard at first however I honestly got used to it after a while. Are there any goals and/or hobbies that you could partake in on your own? 

[crusty]

He certainly does CBT but we are only just coming out of the phase of identify what the problem is so i guess I will find out over the next couple of weeks what we're going to do about it all.

It's all a bit weird in some ways because I've always been a very self sufficient person and very content in my open company, I never actually have any problems being on my own, playing video games, going to the gym or the driving range. None of them cause me any problem and I'm living on my own at the moment and quite enjoying it for the most part.

What I find harder to figure out is whether I actually want to be with my BPD or the DPD is just driving me to want to stay and fix things when really there is no point. It's quite a dangerous combination when you look at it because as a DPD I will naturally do whatever she wants and go to the ends of the earth to keep her happy, believe what she tells me and always let her have her own way. Put that in combination with how a typical BPD behaves and the potential for things being messy is massive. Sort of makes me wonder if any amount of treatment could ever make me strong enough to deal with that and if really I'm just conning myself into staying because I'm desperate to keep her happy and to not be on my own . . . tricky stuff