I so want things to change but

[sweetheart]

 :'( :'(

Hello all

I am crying as I write this post because I am so scared of being on my own with my son that I am willing to endure this. Ironically because I have changed and use the skills on this site there is a lot less dysregulation in our lives. I no longer engage in any aspect of this disorder, so there is little left at all.

Fear keeps me here and stuck, I still love him but I know without therapy and a degree of insight nothing will change for him.

For me I am trying to find a T, we don't have much money so it is difficult, I am desperate for someone to talk through how I feel with.

I am so useless at validation which is what he is looking for I can't seem to get it right. I know I am contradicting myself, my ambivalence is being typed out in front of me.

I feel sad and angry most of the time and then joyful for the little bits of normality that come my way. If money wasn't a really serious issue for us and we didn't have our son I would be long gone.

How can our day go from plans for a weekend camping to his complete paranoia at being followed whilst out this afternoon, and of course I put in place the surveillance! And then he just offs and leaves without saying a word. I tried to validate how he was feeling, I didn't argue, but I can't reach him when he feels this way. In the past I would have kept on trying, but now I stop and withdraw, hence this post

I want to stay, I want to leave. I know why I want to stay, I know why I want to leave, is this what is called " cognitive dissonance " ? Confusion works better for me, in my tummy I feel anxious and nauseous. Then when he leaves I feel really distressed, in the past I would have phoned him and asked him to come home at regular intervals through the night. I don't do that anymore I just go to bed and see what happens. I know I am insecure, I gave up so much for my marriage and apart from our beautiful son there doesn't seem to be much of a future.

I don't know why I feel so sad today, I don't usually cry, I cried years ago when I didn't understand what was happening, but not lately - but I feel so desperately sad tonight

[Forestaken]

My heart goes out to you. From 2004-2011, I lived in "Undecided" as this was my only therapy.

In 2011, I decided I no longer wanted the violence and chaos in my life and especially my children's lives. 

Are you being abused? Emotionally, verbally, financially or physically?  My kids are in college and in therapy for all of the years of living with a uBPD+dOCD parent.  Being a single parent was the best for me and for them.  You are a valuable person and so is your child.  Never stop believing it.

[sweetheart]

Thank you for your response Forestaken.

There is no physical abuse and never has been. In the past I used to think I had to absorb the verbal abuse in an attempt to make things better, and there sure was a lot of it. Now though thanks to the life saving skill JADE and timeout, verbal abuse doesn't get directed at me anymore, he sort of self destructs with pills and alcohol which of course add to the dysregulation.

Financially I manage our money because if I didn't we wouldn't have any, he gets plenty but it is never enough, never will be enough to fill that gaping hole inside him, again I have learnt not to justify our finances, they are as they are, and he has enough insight from past experiences to know that he is well off with the way things are, so he doesn't push this.

For me though it is the instability and now that our son is that bit older he can see the absence of his father emotionally, but the disorder in all it's ugliness has not been directed at our son, but then my husband has no responsibility for any aspect of our child's life because he is unable to cope with all that being a father entails for longer than 5 minutes. Since our son stopped drinking milk my dBPDh has cooked a meal for him twice, he is low functioning and can barely look after himself since we moved house just over a year ago. Something about the move triggered the disorder in such a way that he has never returned to the man I knew before. He has become everything that is written about on theses boards and then some.

I had to change,but in doing so I knew that I was no longer committed to staying with him in the same way I was before we moved.

It is hard though to be in this stuck place - my granny would have called it purgatory.

[Forestaken]

My XW was a low functioning BPD too.  I worked, she didn't. I also cooked, cleaned, helped with homework, sports activities, drove to music lessons, etc.  Plus she let her license expire so I had to drive her everywhere.  It always started out as 1 store then next thing she added more later.  Without regard to the work I had to do at home.  She folded laundry in front of the TV.

When I was with her, we fell behind in our bills, collection agency,etc... .

Now despite paying $1500 in spousal support (yup, she out and not working) I'm saving money.

I'm not telling you want to do, but I went through hell (and finally after all those years) I decided it was enough when I heard she physically attacked her younger sister.   My kids are less angry with me as I could've acted sooner but was too afraid.  Their T is helping them through it.  As for being alone with your kid, what are you afraid of?  Aren't you really alone right now? 

[OutOfEgypt]

My situation as like Forestaken's in many ways.  I did everything.  Confronting did nothing.  As a result our children are deeply bonded to me (for which I am thankful), but it is still awful.  They love their mother, as they ought to, but they know how she is.  Unfortunately, there's nothing I can do about how their mom is.  I can continue, now as divorced co-parents, to be their rock and to love them.

I, too, Forestaken, am actually getting myself OUT of debt even though I left the divorce with almost $20k in credit card debt, two car payments, my mortgage payment, child support, AND spousal support for her (because she didn't work).  I just paid off one of the vehicles.  I budget more carefully.  Things are very tight, but I actually have a plan that I can succeed with, Lord willing.

What my children see is that this is the reason mommy and daddy aren't together... . mommy is basically irresponsible, self-absorbed, and dumped everything on daddy.  My eldest daughter gets it, because her mom actually does the same thing to her at times.  She also understands that mommy would blame daddy's "unhappiness" for her own.  But she told me the other day, "Of course you were unhappy!  Why would anybody be happy when they have to do EVERYTHING?"  She's a smart girl.  And they are also aware of her rages and her utterly childish behavior -expecting the whole household to revolve and bend around her and her whims.  No rules applied to her.  None.  But what they don't know about (that I'm aware of) is her many affairs and the lying and gaslighting and the emotional abuse (and even sexually-related abuse, I might call it), that I endured.

I know that you say you are "insecure", and I believe you.  I also believe you when you say that you are afraid.  But I told myself that for years, too.  I heard my wife tell me that I'm "insecure", too.  What I didn't take into account is that all of my "insecurity" and fear of leaving was in large part due to (or at least added to and constantly supported by) living in that insanity for so long -the constant drama, the constant assaults on my manhood, tearing down any self esteem I had, with the numbness that comes from burying all of your feelings in order to just SURVIVE another day.  I seriously believed that nobody would want me and I was terrified of being alone.  So while my wife was telling me a partial-truth, she was doing so while throwing gasoline on the fire.

I always felt it was like being with someone who, in spite of their ability to be caring at times, constantly kicked you when your are down, told you and others that the reason they had to hurt you so much was because you were down there, on the ground, instead of tending to their needs, but then conveniently left out (and take no responsibility for) that you are down on the ground because they broke your legs and dumped a truckload of boulders on you.  Hmm... .

And don't underestimate that numbness -you think the decision is really that "Confusing?"  It is difficult, but not really that confusing.  That's the numbness speaking.  There is a fire in your belly, a voice in you, that has been lost because you've thrown a wet blanket over it in order to survive.  And my T told me that its like I have battered woman syndrome.  Too blind to be willing to REALLY look at things, face the loss, and salvage my life.  It paralyzes you.  You know things are very wrong.  You know you need to go, but you are paralyzed with anxiety, confusion, indecision, and even some fear -fear of "what it's" and "what will happen?"  And that will keep you stuck forever if you listen to it.  That is what it is designed to do.

The unfortunate bottom line, as you are well aware I'm sure, is that your children need ONE stable parent, at least.  And you need to really ask yourself if you want to find yourself like I did one day... . sitting, exhausted and numb, on your front step one night, after 10 years of dealing with it, saying aloud to God and the stars, "I don't even know who I am anymore."  And I thought it was because I was a loser, not realizing it was really because I had signed an unwritten agreement to be her constant emotional pack-mule and slave.  You lose yourself into them and handling all of their nonsense.  It is like having a second full-time job, but one where you are on call 24/7.  It consumes you, and you don't really even see it.  And you become so used to it, that it almost makes you feel alive and gives you purpose.  Even though it is insane, part of you likes it, in a sick way.

If money wasn't a really serious issue for us and we didn't have our son I would be long gone.

I believe you and said the same thing.  But if your life literally depended on it, wouldn't you find a way?  It sounds like you know what you WANT to do but you are just afraid to (and too "stuck" do it, so countless "excuses" and "confusions" come.  I totally understand that.  I was there for a long time.  I was told by a T that my wife had BPD probably 8-10 years ago.  :)on't underestimate the power of your own unconscious in sabotaging your plans to do something different and stay living in numb, fantasy land.  Part of you WANTS to keep the status quo.  Unfortunately, it is also the part of you that wants to destroy you.  

None of us here ought to tell you what to do.  I was told by many people, and it didn't help.  You have to be ready.  That said, don't let it be an "emotional" decision.  Let it be a rational resolve.  "I need to make a change because if I do not, it will continue to go the way it has been going."  Besides, you don't know what will happen.  Anything could happen -something wonderful.  But nothing will change if you don't make it change.

All I know is that in spite of the sadness of losing my wife, whom I still see and have to talk to because of our children, I feel like I have been freed from bondage in Egypt and am now walking toward the promised land.  I can breathe.  I can heal.  I can grow.  My therapy has progressed dramatically because it is not being constantly countered and overthrown.  I feel GREAT.  My aches and pains (from tension) are far less and less.  And I can actually enjoy life.  And far from being afraid of being alone for the rest of my life, I am at the place where I'm not sure I even want to be with anybody right now.  

Plus, my kids... . they see how their dad looks on the other side of things.  They see daddy finally saying "enough -I don't want to live under that kind of tyranny anymore!"  And they see that daddy no longer lives under mommy's rules.  :)addy writes his own rules based on what he thinks is best.  The kids actually get to see their grandmother again -God forbid!  Sometimes they are afraid of blowback from mommy about it, but they see daddy is resolute in making decisions NOT based on anticipating mommy's reactions.  And it is good, very good.  They feel like THEY are free now and have a way out, too.

[sweetheart]

Thank u so much to you both for your responses.

Being undecided is still new to me, before I was very much staying, and there is still part of me that wants to stay very much. Not to suck up the chaos, but to do something differently.

I am waiting for a call back from a therapy centre to see if they can offer me a low cost therapy place. It is psychodynamic therapy but they are aware that I am married to someone dBPD, they asked a bit about why I wanted a therapist:)

I know I am caught in amongst the FOG, and I am making excuses to stay including until recently tolerating really awful behaviours. I am changing though, i am able to walk away now, my dBPDh had an extinction burst at the weekend because I am doing things differently and instead of intervening whilst he was smashing his musical equipment to pieces because he couldn't direct all his anger at me, I called the police. I felt unsafe, and when he calmed down I told him this and that I would do this if I felt unsafe in our home in the future. I read on here that it is important to let the pwBPD experience the consequences of their behaviours. For many years I protected him from his behaviours so much so no one really knew what he was like. They do now.

You are right though that at the moment I am a single parent and have been this last year.

my dBPDh really does absolutely nothing apart from wash his own clothes ( too paranoid to let me do it ).

My fear of being on my own is not real world based it's kind of an existential fear, which is why I need to be in therapy:) I was in therapy for many years before I met my dBPDh and know I have lots of issues attached to being on my own.

I know I am a good enough mum, our s6 is just amazing, despite the limitations his father faces.

I sound like I am offering reasons to stay, or indeed defending myself for staying, I'm not but I am saying that this process is allowing me to explore all the contradictions inside of me and it helps loads when they are out of my head and in front of me.

[Forestaken]

Plus, my kids... . they see how their dad looks on the other side of things.  They see daddy finally saying "enough -I don't want to live under that kind of tyranny anymore!"  And they see that daddy no longer lives under mommy's rules.  :)addy writes his own rules based on what he thinks is best.  The kids actually get to see their grandmother again -God forbid!  Sometimes they are afraid of blowback from mommy about it, but they see daddy is resolute in making decisions NOT based on anticipating mommy's reactions.  And it is good, very good.  They feel like THEY are free now and have a way out, too.

OutofEgypt: Amen! 

I'm 51 - had a 24 year marriage, but I decided I wasn't going to die as I had lived. 

[OutOfEgypt]

Forestaken wrote:

I'm 51 - had a 24 year marriage, but I decided I wasn't going to die as I had lived.  

Yup!  I just got sick of it.  See, I have a very high view of marriage and a strong view of family, and as a Christian I know that sometimes we are called to suffer in order to love others and glorify God.  But you know what?  I did my time.  And I realized two things: 1) its not going to change, and 2) the amount of focus and devotion required to her and our relationship was downright idolatrous.  Nothing should consume a person so much and take me away from God and everything and everyone else so much.  It's just wrong.  There's a point where we must realize that much of our current suffering is continuing only because we are allowing it.

I used to try to compare this to having a wife with a long-term illness or maybe some kind of physical disability.  I would stay.  I absolutely would.  I would carry the load.  I would do it all for her.  But this *isn't* like that.  Whether they mean it or not, their behavior actually destroys you from within and dredges up terribly unhealthy and destructive things within you.  You lose who you are.  It combats your identity and your voice.  Maybe for some the situation is workable.  It was not for me.  Finding out about her sexual interactions with her affair partner once again AND the 18 year old friend of our son put me over the edge.  I listened to everything I saw and stopped listening to her lying and downplaying and minimizing and gaslighting.

[sweetheart]

Oh OutOfEygpt what a heartbreaking post. I am really sorry that your experience was so awful. Thus far the person that my dBPDh has hurt the most is himself. Your faith is clearly very important to you, and it sounds like this has helped you through.

Unlike you however I do believe that this disorder is like having a permanent disability or a long term chronic illness. That said though without a therapist I will go under and have to leave. I realise that without support for myself it is not possible to move forward.

[OutOfEgypt]

Sweetheart, from what I've read in your posts, your situation may be somewhat different from how mine was.  For me, I saw that there's a part of her that likes being the way she is.  She gets some kind of pleasure out of dominating people -she looks down on them, and it makes her feel good.  I was privy to some of her private emails and things over the years -a few of which she "accidentally" forwarded to me- and I got to see behind the mask.  It was pretty shocking, but it confirmed what I always *sensed* was behind the mask.

[Forestaken]

I do believe that this disorder is like having a permanent disability or a long term chronic illness.

It is, but you shouldn't become a victim if they don't admit their problem and refuse treatment.

[sweetheart]

I agree to a certain extent, but for my dBPDh it is complicated by a diagnosis of Paranoid Schizophrenia also. He has limited insight, for instance he believed over the weekend that our entire neighbourhood were chanting that he was a paedophile, which triggered an overdose to escape from how awful he as feeling. When asked does he experience auditory hallucinations by his P he will say "no" because what he hears is real to him. A lot of his Dysregulation this last year has been informed by his paranoid thinking and acute feelings of anxiety and fear.

I don't feel in anyway like a victim ( and I don't think for one moment you were suggesting I was), but I am at times overwhelmed by the relentlessness of it all this last year.

A lot of how I feel has been made worse by a seriously,inadequate response from mental health services. Even though my husband lacks insight and does not want therapy, he has asked,on numerous occasions over the last year for an informal admission to hospital. There is no such thing as a informal admission anymore, in the past as part of crisis intervention he would have spent a few days to a week in hospital, now unless he is detainable there is nothing. I was told last week by our family doctor to expect nothing other than firefighting and crisis intervention if we're lucky because services have been stripped away to nothing over the last few years. There are no staff, no acute crisis beds, so it is left to families to struggle alone. Case in point my husband needed Crisis Intervention over the weekend and there was none.

I received some seriously constructive feedback from a range of posts over the weekend which have really help process my feelings and manage my anxiety. Also they helped me check my priorities were in order and I have come through the weekend feeling positive in a way that I haven't for a while.

For me coming to the undecided board is about putting in place a whole range of measures that will help me manage me better, that is exactly what happened at the weekend. I did what I needed to do, I didn't absorb the chaos and I feel calmer coming out the other side today than I have for a long time.

If I can bring my panic and fear here in an attempt to hold myself through the dysregulation I come away stronger which for me is win-win, rather than no-win.

[KateCat]

he believed over the weekend that our entire neighbourhood were chanting that he was a paedophile

My goodness, sweetheart, I am so familiar with this and so sorry you are in this situation. . . . . Can you explain to me how you keep your son from hearing this?

[sweetheart]

Hello KateCat,

He dances all day Saturday which is when this took place. It is worth saying that my husband will remove himself from my son when he feels unwell, as he says he doesn't want what is in his head to taint our son. Last year when he was very ill and felt unsafe he slept rough for two weeks, checking in with his team daily and texting me. He felt volatile and didn't want to be in our home around our son like this.

He may not have insight, but if he is not seriously dysregulated he is able to minimise the impact of his negative feelings on us by withdrawing.

I am sure that you will know that just because someone is experiencing auditory hallucinations it doesn't mean they are out of control in a chaotic way, neither does someone taking an overdose.When my husband is distressed in this way he usually becomes isolative and takes himself upstairs to our room or he leaves the house.

[sweetheart]

I just want to add that for the thousands of families living with someone who has chronic and enduring mental health issues that it can never be possible to intercept or screen every aspect of what is being said. If this were the case, people facing these issues would be living alone and they would certainly never have any children. What I believe and know to be important is how a child's experience of this is heard and validated. DW Winnicott child psychotherapist said that the relationship a child has with it's parents does not have to be perfect, but it does have to be 'good enough' to help a child feel safe and secure with whomever their caretakers are regardless of a diagnosis.

[KateCat]

So, am I understanding correctly that your husband has understanding that it is not good to say upsetting things around your son? He has, maybe, the will power to wait until he can say them just to you?

Has he verbalized his approach to protecting your son's emotional health? If so, then it seems to me you do indeed have a "safety plan" for your son.  

(Does he also only break things in the home when your son is away?)

[sweetheart]

KateCat,

I am going to leave you with your questions, you are either understandably misinterpreting things between three posts, or you are working from your own issues here, which are not mine. Your questions do not accurately reflect what I have posted.

I respect that we all bring to these forums issues from our past and present relationships, and in responding to others this can influence and colour our responses.

[KateCat]

I apologize, sweetheart, for being upsetting and unhelpful.

[Forestaken]

I agree to a certain extent, but for my dBPDh it is complicated by a diagnosis of Paranoid Schizophrenia also.

I have to admit out of my league with this. My Xw was dOCD+u-low-func-BPD.

Are you sure about the BPD or is his behaviour part of the Paranoid Schizophrenia?

I understand the FOG part though.  You want to escape the madness but feel you need to help.  BTW: I didn't feel like a victim with my X while we were together rather I felt like the rock that grounded the family.  However, it wasn't until I decided "No more violence" (she beat up her youngre sister) and following years to therapy (me+kids) did I realize I did my children no favors by staying with her.