Intimacy? Is There Really Any?

[joethemechanic]

Really is there any ever with a BPD? Mine is always either drunk or lying or both anymore. I really don't think she is ever letting me 'in".

Even the love making is starting to seem "mechanical" (for lack of a better term). No more wonderful meshing of souls. It's just a cheap feeling physical thing.

[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.

[Stalwart]

Good question. I'd like to hear from a lot of the other guys on this one. It would be interesting to know the differences.

Long before my wife's diagnosis I knew there were challenges and oddities with my wife with concerns to intimacy whether that included sex or not. I can honestly say that my experience with my wife is somewhat like Pinoyprides. Meaning relatively monotonous and typical me "doing all the work". The only time she would initiate sex after the first year is if "she had done something she perceived as being wrong." It seemed as though, regardless of what the 'offense' may have been, if she could initiate sex, well... . everything must be OK now.

Like most until I learned of her illness the behavior was baffling to me and became a 'turn off' actually to think that a person would actually 'use' sex as a tool. Bottom line is if sex only has the response of making her feel safe, it’s at least something positive or comforting she can feel. I’ve learned that you have a be thankful and appreciate any of the positives you can find in this situation because only focusing on and dwelling on the negatives is a recipe for ripping yourself to pieces from the inside out.

Intimacy? No! In talking to her now that she is more open about her feelings (and particularly her lack of them) I can certainly say I don't believe she truly even knows and has never experienced the feeling of closeness that comes with intimacy. Like most high-functioning she certainly has learned to pick up and imitate  all the right responses and statements but I can assure you they are actually hollow and not actually experienced by her emotionally or physically.

She does have the ability to orgasm and it's a pretty stringent set of rules and procedure to follow to accomplish that, but knowing that is at least one benefit to her performing sex except it's a real lengthy and somewhat difficult task so she definitely doesn't always have the patience or interest in going there.

"If she could say it, most times it would probably be more like: "Are you done yet?" but she doesn’t actually say anything like that.  She also has the full ability to turn a switch and not give one ‘hoot’ sexually or emotionally about  me if I’m painted black and she could carry that on forever probably as long as her thinking is shadowed.

I can certainly say she has an academic understanding of intimacy but does not have the ability to feel any of the actual feelings that accompany intimacy. She can feel brief moments of extreme joy and often over the strangest things: The dog lost ten pounds on its diet, but the only other emotion I’m really aware of is fear and ANGER.

Don’t mistake what I’m saying here though, my wife can be a wonderful person. I don’t envy her this illness one bit or the things she misses experiencing and certainly not the levels of anger she experiences either.

[joshbjoshb]

Stalwart, great post.

My wife doesn't orgasm at all. Only after many many long hours I managed to get her "close to it" - as she puts it. Of course when she is upset she says that her not orgasming is my fault. Never mind I tried like 100 different ways.

I 100% agree about the idea of being intimate. I think that intimate means that you have to give up your guards and trusts 100% the person with you. Well with her illness she can't do that. Yes she does like hugs and kissed but I agree that it's mainly to make her feel secure and loved, not about loving me.

In my mind, she has no space for anyone else at the moment. Not the children, not me, not her family. No one. She has one big circle and it's around her. Of course it's not coming from her being bad, but from not having the tools to break out of this.

What I have a very hard time is being intimate back. If you know you are in bed with someone who only pretend to be intimate, how do you deal with that? I am pretending too. Saying words that are pretty much meaningless and not being able to reveal my true feelings, of course.

This is the downside of being blessed with a BPD spouse: hearing their feelings all day, and keeping yours to yourself.

[joethemechanic]

In my case, physically it is great. But I feel like I'm wearing an emotional condom or something. I don't know, it could be me holding back so I don't get hurt. Or she has "walls" up.

Something is up. I know her drinking isn't helping things. It really seems to destroy communication

[MissyM]

Well, I am a woman but intimacy with my dBPDh has happened.  It has been rare and only when he has really been doing work on himself and is able to.  He has suffered from ED almost his entire life.  I noticed that when he was doing work on himself, he was able to be intimate physically without taking any meds.  He has only made the connection in the last month, although I have known for the last 4 years.  When he has been in intensive therapy and doing 12 step work, then things are good that way.  Problem is with the BPD after being very close emotionally and physically, he flips and pushes me away.  That certainly doesn't make me long to be close to him.  It seems to be a high price to pay.   Hoping that with him recently getting the diagnosis of BPD, this will progressively get better.

[ATLandon]

There really is a decided lack of both emotional and physical intimacy in my marriage that I have have a legitimate fear will never be what I have always wanted in a relationship. My wife's idea of love is me cleaning the house precisely how she wants it done, doing all the cooking, me doing the majority of the bread winning, and constantly providing a limitless supply of adoration and flexibility to her whims. Her idea of intimacy is purely sex, with  me doing all the work and it being only her getting off and not touching/kissing me any where other than my face. To say that our ideas of love and sex differ is an understatement. There is no emotional intimacy since I receive little validation or genuine interest in my hobbies, relationships with friends/family/coworkers from her. She doesn't like to hear about my long held dreams and aspirations, only rather try to define new ones for me that suit her likings. I dread sex. I avoid it all costs since she doesn't care about my desires, or needs for that matter (I have a medical condition that makes sex a little less pleasurable for me than the average guy). Most days I feel we operate on very antiquated gender roles, except that we're following footsteps in the opposite gender expectations when it comes to sex and intimacy.

[flatspin]

Intimacy is unfortunately either venal or a psychological crutch.

[Stalwart]

I feel for you ATLandon, I really, really do, but I can so see what you're saying all the way. I wish I had some encouragement for you. We all live such closely related lives with so many nuances to twist them around the same problem.

Missy: "Hoping that with him recently getting the diagnosis of BPD, this will progressively get better."

I can only say that was the absolute and only saving grace for my relationship of ten years with my BPD wife. We had come to crashing halt with all her goings on. But there was hope in that fact.

A year later after learning so much myself and her finally volunteering to go for diagnosis and subsequent treatment that was suited to her illness for a change (and actually liking her therapist) our lives are completely different on the best path ever.

Yup , so many challenges that still lay ahead, so many things of the past to try and put behind myself of rip my self to shreds if I can't and so many hopes for the future without totally being able to trust or depend on the present course that live is challenging.

And although I know it's somewhat condesending and also perhaps naive making excuses I always think how difficult it has all been o me, but what if everything I've experienced I would have experienced with ten times the emotion and difficulty. They certainly are strong. Although I despice the lack of moral compass and dread desregulation I have to admire the strength to even manage to cope.

[joshbjoshb]

In my case, physically it is great. But I feel like I'm wearing an emotional condom or something. I don't know, it could be me holding back so I don't get hurt. Or she has "walls" up.

Something is up. I know her drinking isn't helping things. It really seems to destroy communication

My wife drinks nothing, yet I have an emotional wall always up.

[Aria2014]

Hello,

I see what you mean. The thing is that a large percentage of BPDs have been sexually abused as kids. Actually the two are kind of linked in a way. If your wife has a history of cutting or burning herself, then it's pretty sure she was sexually abused as a child, whether she remembers it or sees it as abuse or not.

So intimacy brings back bad feelings I guess. Then the person disconnects herself from reality and the sex feels mechanical because she's not really there. Actually, I would say BPDs are not really connected to reality most of the time, especially when we are scared.

We live in our head in a very unpredictable place you might call 'borderland', where everything can seem like paradise and then turn to hell in a second. It kind of feels like the movie 'The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus' or 'Alice in Wonderland' in a way. We don't do it on purpose and it seems to us like what's in our head is reality, even if everyone else tells us it's not.

We don't see pink balloons floating around or anything like that, but we perceive things and their meanings very differently. We think we are living in reality but we are living in 'borderland' most of the time. It think it has more to do with changing serotonin levels in the brain than just craziness per say.

You see, most borderlines desperately want to run away from 'Borderland' when it looks like a dark pit of pain. So we try therapy, medication, suicide or we take alcohol, drugs, engage in reckless sex, self-injuring behaviour to ''snap out of it'' if I may say. But when it's bright and shiny in there, borderlines don't want to change because they are actually having a lot of fun. So that's why most of us don't change in the long run because there is a ''fun'' part in BPD (and also it's pretty much impossible to rewire our brains to become 'normal'. Often BPD is hell, but sometimes it's a like a natural high of ecstasy drug or something.

Many people are love struck by borderlines' flamboyance at first. What they don't know is that it's not their actual life and personality borderlines are describing, it's 'borderland', something that only exists in their head and that has a very dark side to it. So people think we're liars and manipulators, when we're just describing what we are actually experiencing... . in our heads that is.

Getting back to the intimacy topic, the interesting thing is that often we seek out intimacy to connect us back to reality. It does work if the lust feeling is very strong like at the beginning of a relationship (hence the large number of BPDs who cheat on their husbands just to feel 'alive' again), but when the lust isn't that strong, then we just drift away even further during intimate moments.

I would say the best way to make your wife a little more spontaneous during sex would be to make her feel as safe as possible, not so much in a nice talkative way though, but more in a physical display to show her you're a strong man who can protect her (from the phantoms of her past abusers).

Aria

[Climbmountains91]

Mines never really bothered about it to be honest which is really weird for me because I've always been with men in the past that want it, i suppose its a good thing in a way because in the past I've felt that's all they've wanted me for but i find it a bit weird at the same, i think i'm the one always wanting it all the time though i never get him to, i only have it when he wants it because if not i feel like i'm forcing him and i want him to "want" it aswell, its a deep thing to share ya know but its just sad at times, craving that intimacy with that person.

He never wants to try different positions because most of the time he just can't be arsed, sometimes its because his drunk or that he never has any energy. It gets a bit boring for me to be honest. After sex is horrible i just feel a bit used, he got his pleasure so after he doesn't cuddle me or anything. I read some BPD's use sex as a tool and that, he never has really. I guess it has its good and bad points and i'm going to have to put up with it because i love him to much. !

[Samuel S.]

My BPDw decided on her own and with no discussion with me whatsoever some 5 years ago that sexual intimacy was over. I have never abused her whatsoever. I do my best to please above and beyond the call of duty, if you will. Due to having her realization by a medium, she has chosen to focus on attending a university out of town 3 days a week to become an acupuncturist. Then, she studies by herself for 2 days in which she has very little communication with her daughter and with me. The other 2 days, she is working. So, intimacy of all kinds is non-existent.

When I remind her that she complained to me about her first husband doing the same thing she is doing now, she told me that she understands, thereby justifying her actions and negating our relationship.

She says that when she is done with her studies, she will devote some time to our relationship, but my gut sense says she is lying through her teeth. You see, even before her recent studies which will last for 4 years, she devoted several years at least to so many activities outside our house, that she was too tired to relate.

When I share with her that I wish to have more quality time with her, she skirts the issue by saying that she never has any time for herself.