Help - I need serenety, ASAP

[maxsterling]

My dBPDgf has not worked since she went into the hospital at the end of September with depressions and anxiety and suicidal thoughts.  She's run out of money except credit cards and food stamps, and I have covered other expenses including car payments and phone bills.  I can't afford it.  I've done everything I can to pinch pennys, but I have been counting on her promise to take care of herself, counting on her disability payments that haven't come yet, counting on her to find some kind of part time money or ask for money from her family.  She's applied for jobs, rejected one, but mostly freaked out and stressed out.  I've run up my credit card to help make ends meet.  I can't afford to do anything for Christmas, have been riding my bike to work because I can't afford gas.  Sometime soon I will reach a point where this can't continue, and I need to talk to her about that and need her to understand that.  I thought this would be the day, because I gave her money to cover her car insurance.

So I transferred money to her account, and I realized that left me with only about 150 for the next week, and I have bills due, and I am really starting to stress about this.

When I got to work, I sent her a text message saying that I transferred her enough money to cover the insurance, but that I was sorry I cannot afford to pay for anything else right now.  She responded:

"thank you.  Now I feel terrible that I gained weight and had to buy clothes and run up my credit card.  Some of that stuff I Didn't need and I was just bored and felt entitled to it or something.  I am a terrible person.  I hate myself and now I don't want to do or go anywhere.  Nothing ever works out.  I am worthless.  Sorry I am just upset about how hard it is for me to find a nanny job... .and discouraged about my mood and money and how this is all affecting you."

I responded by saying she is not worthless or terrible and that we will be fine if we just are careful to only spend money on what we need for the next few months.  And then I went off to talk to co workers, walk around, try and walk off some stress, vent, etc.  I thought it best to let her face her own issues and ignore my phone for a while.  I fear I am enabling her, and she needs to face her own issues in order to get off the bottom.  Plus, I am just too stressed to handle it, and needed a break.

Big mistake?

I came back to my phone 20 minutes later with the following:

"I am really upset.  Don't you care?  My friend is visiting and I won't have any means to do anything with her!  It's Christmas and you can't afford presents for your family because of me. We can't even take rose and Sarah anywhere because of gas money.  You don't even care that I am upset, I knew it you resent me because of money and you are going to try and punish me now."

Me not care about HER because SHE is upset?  How about HER not care about ME that I am stressed out?  How do I even deal with this?  I am REALLY stressed out over money, and when I try and tell her that we need to be more careful with money, she freaks out, emotionally dumps more on me, turns it around to guilt me somehow, and I feel worse. 

I responded by saying that I stepped away from my desk for a minute, that I would never punish her, that I love her, and that we will be okay as long as we are more careful with money.  I then took a break and went outside to call (cell phone service is terrible inside my building), she was crying, and reassured her that this isn't the end, etc.  I'm hoping that she can calm down enough to take some steps and figure some stuff out.

But the reality is - I am worn out.  Literally feel like I am at the end of my options, and soon will be forced to break it off not because I don't love or care, but because I cannot caretake her anymore.  And it will be ugly.  I need to talk to her about money, and let her know this is crucial, but all I have to do is mention the word and she tailspins. 

Any advice or help would be welcome.

[living in the past]

 Hi, just a little advice, i do feel for you, i hate financial stress, and on top of that you have a BPD girlfriend, from my side i know you love her and care deeply for her, its the BPD side thats hard to understand,in reality we have to try to live one day at a time, pay what bills we can,i just sent money to pay two credit card bills for this month , now i let it go till next month, if talking to her about money is going to trigger her illness i wouldn"t,with my friend wBPD, it seems now anything i do or say could be a trigger,right now the friendship seems to be ending, which i kind of knew all along it couldn"t go on forever,even though i was in a fantasy that it could,easy does it... .

[karma_gal]

My dBPDgf has not worked since she went into the hospital at the end of September with depressions and anxiety and suicidal thoughts.  She's run out of money except credit cards and food stamps, and I have covered other expenses including car payments and phone bills.  I can't afford it.  I've done everything I can to pinch pennys, but I have been counting on her promise to take care of herself, counting on her disability payments that haven't come yet, counting on her to find some kind of part time money or ask for money from her family.  She's applied for jobs, rejected one, but mostly freaked out and stressed out.  I've run up my credit card to help make ends meet.  I can't afford to do anything for Christmas, have been riding my bike to work because I can't afford gas.  Sometime soon I will reach a point where this can't continue, and I need to talk to her about that and need her to understand that.  I thought this would be the day, because I gave her money to cover her car insurance.

So I transferred money to her account, and I realized that left me with only about 150 for the next week, and I have bills due, and I am really starting to stress about this.

When I got to work, I sent her a text message saying that I transferred her enough money to cover the insurance, but that I was sorry I cannot afford to pay for anything else right now.  She responded:

"thank you.  Now I feel terrible that I gained weight and had to buy clothes and run up my credit card.  Some of that stuff I Didn't need and I was just bored and felt entitled to it or something.  I am a terrible person.  I hate myself and now I don't want to do or go anywhere.  Nothing ever works out.  I am worthless.  Sorry I am just upset about how hard it is for me to find a nanny job... .and discouraged about my mood and money and how this is all affecting you."

I responded by saying she is not worthless or terrible and that we will be fine if we just are careful to only spend money on what we need for the next few months.  And then I went off to talk to co workers, walk around, try and walk off some stress, vent, etc.  I thought it best to let her face her own issues and ignore my phone for a while.  I fear I am enabling her, and she needs to face her own issues in order to get off the bottom.  Plus, I am just too stressed to handle it, and needed a break.

Big mistake?

I came back to my phone 20 minutes later with the following:

"I am really upset.  Don't you care?  My friend is visiting and I won't have any means to do anything with her!  It's Christmas and you can't afford presents for your family because of me. We can't even take rose and Sarah anywhere because of gas money.  You don't even care that I am upset, I knew it you resent me because of money and you are going to try and punish me now."

Me not care about HER because SHE is upset?  How about HER not care about ME that I am stressed out?  How do I even deal with this?  I am REALLY stressed out over money, and when I try and tell her that we need to be more careful with money, she freaks out, emotionally dumps more on me, turns it around to guilt me somehow, and I feel worse. 

I responded by saying that I stepped away from my desk for a minute, that I would never punish her, that I love her, and that we will be okay as long as we are more careful with money.  I then took a break and went outside to call (cell phone service is terrible inside my building), she was crying, and reassured her that this isn't the end, etc.  I'm hoping that she can calm down enough to take some steps and figure some stuff out.

But the reality is - I am worn out.  Literally feel like I am at the end of my options, and soon will be forced to break it off not because I don't love or care, but because I cannot caretake her anymore.  And it will be ugly.  I need to talk to her about money, and let her know this is crucial, but all I have to do is mention the word and she tailspins. 

Any advice or help would be welcome.

I wish I would have read this first because I just asked in the other thread if she was severely depressed.  The problem is bigger than I thought, even.  So I will ask my questions here.  Is she receiving treatment?  Is she compliant? 

So like we said in that thread, we are in charge of our life and the solution is often right in front of us.

What if you just... .stopped?  What if you laid her problems where they belong, i.e. with her, and worried only about your own?  Would you be financially strapped then? 

What is the worst that could happen if you don't pay her car payment or insurance?  Her car is repo'd and she can't drive.  But it doesn't sound like she's really leaving the house now, anyway, certainly not to work.  And we live in a world where if you can't pay for it, you don't get it.  Why are you killing yourself to allow her to be the exception?  I don't know if she's like my husband, but my husband has issues with entitlement and not understanding consequences.  If this were my situation, I would have issues with him raging because he felt he "deserved" the car and that the consequence of losing it shouldn't apply to him because I could just take care of it, couldn't I?  We went through that with a motorcycle.  He had to have it, but didn't want to stop spending to make sure the money for the payment was in the bank every month... .so he had to sell it so I could pay off the loan.  Lord was he mad at me for months (still brings it up even), and he broke down and cried, but I wasn't budging.  If you can't do what it takes to keep it, you can't keep it.  I didn't want a motorcycle and I wasn't going to work to pay for one. 

I know this sounds simplistic... .but I've been where you are, financially screwed to the nth degree, because of going behind him and taking care of his messes.  In fact, I posted in another thread how his spending keeps me working 80 hours a week.  The solution was in front of me:  Separate bank accounts so he can't access my money.  The arrangement now is I will pay my half of what needs paid, and he is expected to pay his half.  If he blows through his money and can't do that, he can't live here; living here costs money.  If he "forgets" to pay something and it gets shut off, that's his problem, not mine.  This is supposed to a joint effort, not me shouldering all of the burdens and him riding shotgun and enjoying the benefits.  It's not he makes all the messes and I worry myself sick and clean them up. 

Sometimes I think we create the very situation that drives us insane.  We start out taking care of their problems.  They like that and begin to expect it.  Their problems get bigger, so our responsibilities get bigger.  It becomes a vicious cycle until someone says "enough."  And you and I and everyone here knows they aren't going to be the ones to do that, so it falls on us, again.  In my case, my husband maintains a pretty good full-time job, so I know he's capable of handling things when he NEEDS to.  He just chooses not to here because the expectation is I should do it all.  I did that for a number of years, but I just recently quit that job.  It was doing nothing but creating stress and anguish for me that I don't need. 

So I get that you love her, but you aren't married which puts you in a much better situation than some of us where leaving comes with a whole set of issues.  What keeps you there?  Right now you are dealing with not only the financial end of things, but her crap on the other.  That is TOO much for one person to handle.  And she isn't capable of empathizing or offering up sympathy because she doesn't have that to give.  So you're doing this very selfless and awesome thing, and she's just taking it for granted.   What would happen if you told her, "Look, I love you, but I can't continue supporting both of us with no financial support from you.  Why don't we focus on getting you some solid treatment so that you can get a job?  Even anything at this point would help"?  Sometimes you have to love you more than to tolerate what you're putting up with.

Have you thought about how this is affecting you, health-wise?  What is going to happen when the stress becomes too much for YOU to handle, and you start having panic attacks, or your immune system takes a dive and you end up with pneumonia and can't work?  Think these things don't happen?  Ask my doctor to share with you what the stress has done to me medically.  She just offered to pay for my divorce last week because she says I'm too young to have all of these issues. 

So all of that was my version of "buck up" from the other thread.  Now, I will say this:  You need to take care of you.  Take time to breathe and to give yourself permission time-outs from all of this craziness.  Make sure you have a kick-a$$ support system you can lean on, people you can talk to and get advice from, because you won't get it from her.  Do not take on the responsibilities of the world because she refuses to help herself.  That is going to do nothing but create huge amounts of resentment you will not recover from and harm you health-wise as well.  She has a good man, but is she worthy of keeping him?  Does she not know how many women out there would kill to be with someone like you? 

[an0ught]

Hello Maxsterling,

it definitely sounds like you are the the end of the rope and at least financially are hitting rock bottom  . This must hurt incredibly especially at a time when others buy presents (although some on credit   ). There is little in terms of practical advice I could add to kama_gal except one very important aspect: If you make changes now to protect yourself it will get better! Not fast better but it will get better. Definitely financially and possibly also on the relationship side where it became impossible to sustain the unfair entitlements.

For you it is a very hard stretch right now. Wish you all the strength that fits through this board. Hang in there  

a0

[SweetCharlotte]

I wonder why she is looking for a nanny job in particular.

It doesn't seem to me that a pwBPD and other issues is suited to a nanny or childcare job. Of course, there could be exceptions, but the way you describe her, she would not inspire confidence in an employer for that kind of work.

I've employed nannies and I had my radar on for issues of this sort, in a way that I didn't have it on while dating. So why does it have to be a nanny job for her? I know her past job was teaching, and now she probably can't do that. Do you think you could coax her into looking for something in which it is more "okay" to have insecurities and some degree of instability?

Being entrusted with other people's children is at the very top of the scale in terms of the requirement to be trustworthy and reliable. For now, she could look for something less demanding, even though it may pay less.