hi Olinda!
I haven't always done the best job of disengaging, but I've become so much more aware of the dynamics of what is happening.
There was a specific time where I had stated my thoughts at the beginning of the "discussion" and when my H pushed and pushed I stated "I already said what I thought in the first 5 minutes of talking about this." I think I even said that again after a few more pushes from my H to engage. Then I said, as he kept pushing, "you know what I think, and I'm going to go for a walk now." and left the house for a walk.
I'm a fan of compassion too, and I'm glad you are. Sometimes we just have to be very straight up and neutral in our communication with our loved one with BPD, so they have nothing to latch onto. If we don't give them anything they can grab and throw back at us and then remove ourselves, they may still try to engage us but then we remove ourselves for our own personal time-out since we can't put them in one. (no matter how much we might want to!)
I don't know if that's the best way, I know it's not the only way, but that was how I could maintain some sort of control over my own life in that moment.
Another time when my H was getting way agitated I realized that what I was doing was invalidating his feelings. It was one of those holiday dysregulations and I have always had a hard time with his negative view of everything and everyone, so I caught that I was doing my Old thing and starting to say, "why do you have to look at things that way?" because he was being so unkind about our grandson. Then I stopped, realizing "You know what--you get to feel exactly how you want to feel about him!" and that seemed like a huge gift to my H the way he seemed so relieved. I didn't really need to defend our grandson, all my H wanted was to know he could have his feelings even though I didn't like them.
I'm looking forward to when the more experienced members weigh in on this question!
Great question Olinda.
df99