Hi formflier,
My one reservation is that the BPD traits surfaced 4-5 years ago after a natural disaster. For the 15 years of marriage before that... I never saw anything consistent.
well, it could always be PTSD but unless one is a professional it is hard to figure out as a constantly very anxious/stressed person is not so different from a pwBPD. Then it can well be BPD with her marginally coping and for whatever reason loosing that ability and all the other factors that promote this dysfunction becoming more dominant.
In any case validation and boundaries will help you to bring some stability and calm into the situation over time.
you can see more of my story in my other posts... . hopefully those are easy to find.
It it really trivial for those who have enough posts: Click on the posters name and then click "show posts"
My wife stormed out of marriage counseling in December. Swore she would never be back. The triggering event seemed to be the counselor "enforcing reality". After a claim that I never let my wife speak and interrupted her all the time... . the counselor calmly said that she had spoken for 5 minutes straight and that I had only spoken for about 30 seconds and that she had a watch as reference. This was taken to mean that the counselor was "for" me and "against" my wife.
Yeah, most people would say oops, did I really do that and may blush. She blushes so much that she has to tell everyone they are guilty and then has to storm off. Typical overreaction to invalidation. That is one reason why marriage counseling is so problematic. The T can't sit by and tolerate abuse but stopping abuse is seen as taking sides.
I was in military (now retired)... . so we did spend time apart. Could that have lengthened the idealization stage?
Distance is a natural boundary. Can't blame a person that is absent for dirty dishes in the kitchen can she? So she had experience accountability for a lot more and that helps to stabilize.