The Best Advice for Leaving the Right Way

[Randi Kreger]

I am writing a chapter for a book about the best way to leave a relationship (not legal advice, which I have from Bill Eddy, but everything else).While I've done a lot of research I thought it would be a great idea to compile the very best suggestions for those who come after us, especially newcomers who would otherwise have to comb through a lot of posts.What is the best advice you would give to a leaver on the two topics above? What helped you? What would you have done differently? What mistakes did you make others could learn from and avoid? How did you tell the person? What did you prepare beforehand, or what SHOULD you have done? I will give a free book to either the person with the best advice or just randomly choose someone. I will give people until April 18 to reply. Would your story be a good example to use as a way to do it right (or a way to do it wrong?) Were there any books that helped? Whatever you want to say.

[livednlearned]

Randi,

I think the best way to leave might different depending on whether the person is BPD, or whether he or she is a genuine high-conflict personality (HCP). And the type of BPD. The way I prepared to leave might be different if I felt my ex had a history of attempted suicides. Or if he had a history of DV. Or if he had a history of making false allegations.

I think it's also different depending on whether we are the ones leaving, or whether the relationship is headed for a cliff (false allegations of DV, or false allegations of child molestation, or infidelity. That's a type of leaving, whether you want it or not.

It also seems that being leaving is different when there are kids involved, regardless of whether the partners are married.

I'll think about a response. What makes this challenging is that I was in such a different place when I left, and I have learned so much. I think most people who leave are in a very vulnerable place with very weak boundaries, often exhausted and demoralized, and often scared. So my healthy self wishes I would have taken care of myself in the relationship, and really understood what that meant. And I'm not sure how many people are able to do that when they are in the middle of the crisis. 

It's a good question. Glad you're asking.

[ogopogodude]

This is a great idea, ... .

Detaching & leaving a BPD relationship is a very important and critical decision making process for the non-BPD.

It is not just for escaping the exhaustion of being associated with the BPD person , but the financial implications are potentially devastating.

The ideal way of writing such a chapter is KISS (keep it simple stupid).

Livenlearned is right on with whether a relationship is volatile, or physical , kids involved and so on.

Here is my suggestion (and it comes from my university studying days of simplifying things):

A FLOW CHART.

It is soo much easier to follow a flow chart with little balloons, like a shortened version of the written word. 

Yes, ... it's nice to read chapter after chapter, with lots of clarification and long winded sentences that start with "Furthermore"s and "however"s, and "In Addition" s ---> but there comes a time to have simplicity.

A flow chart is certainly simplicity.

People like simplicity such as fast food, ... .and a flow chart is like fast food.

[rarsweet]

Prepare for the worst, not hope for the best. strategize, plan, prepare, execute, move on.

[Waddams]

realize you're going to lose everything financially and be starting over when your finally out and free.  so go on a spending spree with big vacations and what not first, might as well get your value out of the cash instead of it going to lawyers.  burn down the house so to speak so there's nothing to fight over.

oh wait nevermind.  i'm just being a cynic. 

[livednlearned]

What is the best advice you would give to a leaver on the two topics above? What helped you? What would you have done differently? What mistakes did you make others could learn from and avoid? How did you tell the person? What did you prepare beforehand, or what SHOULD you have done?

I had a very clear goal when I left, and this helped me have a compass bearing that guided everything I did. I wanted to raise an emotionally resilient child. I didn't have that language to describe what I was doing when I left, but looking back, that's how best to summarize. I felt that the whole family was on fire, and even though my ex was seriously disordered (I didn't know it was BPD at the time), I recognized that I didn't have the skills or self-awareness to raise my son to be emotionally healthy. Leaving was a massive reset so I could create the environment where both of us could heal.

To raise an emotionally healthy child, I had to figure out what it meant to be emotionally healthy.

My advice to someone leaving is to focus on that question -- what does it mean to be emotionally healthy? This actually gave me a tactical advantage, although I didn't realize it at the time. My therapist and lawyer even talked to each other at one point about my tendency to appease. In order to get the conflict to just end, I was prepared to give away everything if that's what it took. Without the help of a therapist and a lawyer who was very psychologically minded, I would've done that, thinking it would make things better.

I don't think many of us can fully grasp the dysfunction of our own thought patterns, particularly when we are gripped with fear or have been living in volatile, stressful, and chaotic homes for so long. It's important to recognize your own dysfunctional thinking, otherwise you may leave the relationship and end up stuck there, whether it's anger, depression, or anxiety. I didn't want to just minimize the conflict in my life, I wanted to be healthy.

Being in a women's support group was helpful, although at the time I didn't fully appreciate how important it was to get peer feedback and support. I was so acclimated to the level of conflict in my home, that it wasn't until hearing (very bluntly) what my peers thought that I fully grasped how dangerous my situation was.

To summarize, I would say:

1. Tell someone you trust what is happening. Ideally, this is someone who will not judge you, and is a good listener. Ideally, this is a therapist, a good one.

2. Gather information so you have facts to help your decision-making. Too many people have assumptions about how family law court works. You need facts. And if your BPD sufferer is a high-conflict personality (HCP), find out if its legal to record with one-party consent. Contact the local DV shelter or DV hotline, or call law enforcement to find out if you live in a mandatory arrest state or dual arrest state. This is important. A lot of people here who have experienced abuse in the relationship don't know how their state deals with DV. This is as much for false allegations of DV as it is for being a victim of DV.

3. Get the kids into counseling while you're married. If you have to, make up an excuse. They desperately need an adult they can talk to who isn't a parent, and they are going to need help with the split, as well as coping with the reality of having a mentally ill parent. You can't provide the sounding board they need, unfortunately, and it can get tricky to get counseling or them after you leave.

4. Get a PO Box, a credit card in your name only, a prepaid phone, a safety deposit box -- things to protect you from becoming entirely vulnerable as the relationship comes to an end. This includes keeping a journal or calendar where you keep track of what you do, where you go, activities with the kids, strange behaviors. Leaving is a high-stress event and it will be difficult to remember the chronology of what happened and when. If your BPD sufferer is also a high-conflict personality, keep receipts to help offset potential false allegations.

Be careful about email or browsers where your partner can track your behavior. Not all BPD sufferers are dangerous, but most have trouble regulating their feelings and any hint of abandonment can be very triggering. It's best to plan for this. If your BPD sufferer acts inward and has attempted suicide, have a crisis management plan in place so you know exactly what steps you will take.

5. Have a plan in place. Leaving abruptly can be a shock. Plan for a year -- photocopy important documents, remove memorabilia or items that have nostalgic value, get a storage locker and have important items stored in case things end abruptly. Look at how much income you need to rent an apartment. If you know you're getting divorced, find out how different family law courts work in counties surrounding you, in case this could make a difference. I moved to a county that had a better reputation and it made a world of difference.

6. Understand BPD. Don't assume that living with someone who suffers from BPD means that you understand it. There is probably no way to determine this, but in my observation, people who take the time to understand the mental illness, and learn tools to stop the cycle of conflict, do much better managing the divorce or custody battle, and transition to a healthy life after the split. There are people here who manage to get out of the relationship, but they don't seem to understand the illness, and don't use skill to minimize conflict, and they seem stuck.

Leaving a BPD relationship should blow your world wide open -- it should be the reset button that makes you look closely at yourself so that you can heal and recover and go on to feel whole and worthy and capable of having a close intimate relationship with someone else. And raise kids who are emotionally resilient, so they can break the family script and have secure, intimate partnerships with someone special.

[Randi Kreger]

This is a great idea, ... .Detaching & leaving a BPD relationship is a very important and critical decision making process for the non-BPD. It is not just for escaping the exhaustion of being associated with the BPD person , but the financial implications are potentially devastating. The ideal way of writing such a chapter is KISS (keep it simple stupid).Livenlearned is right on with whether a relationship is volatile, or physical , kids involved and so on. Here is my suggestion (and it comes from my university studying days of simplifying things):A FLOW CHART. It is soo much easier to follow a flow chart with little balloons, like a shortened version of the written word.  Yes, ... it's nice to read chapter after chapter, with lots of clarification and long winded sentences that start with "Furthermore"s and "however"s, and "In Addition" s ---> but there comes a time to have simplicity. A flow chart is certainly simplicity. People like simplicity such as fast food, ... .and a flow chart is like fast food.

What would the flow chart look like? What would be in it?

[Panda39]

SES, welcome to the board.  I am sorry to hear that you are going through this difficult time, however have faith that where you come out on the other side is so much better than what you have been living in the past few years.  It sounds like you are approaching it from a pretty logical and level line of thought.  As Panda already suggested,  I would really encourage you to visit the law board, where we have many veterans of breakups with pwBPD who might better help you prepare for what lies ahead.  In the meantime I am posting a copy of my little list, which was cobbled together with suggestions from other on this board as well as couple other forums.  I would encourage you to read it and least be open to considering acting on some of the suggestions.

1) Get a therapist for yourself.  Not a marriage counselor, but someone whose job is to help you get your head on straight in this incredibly stressful time. 

2) Get an experienced divorce/family law attorney.  This is also not a job for new attorney. If you interview an attorney and he or she says they always settle and you will not need to go to court, that is not the attorney for you.

3) Be prepared for the false restraining order.  This is a very common reaction from the BPD playbook. 

4) Get a digital audio recorder or two.  You should never be around your stbx without a recorder running. 

5) Don’t be afraid to tell family and friends.  Too often we try to hide what is happening in our relationship from a sense of embarrassment, pride or fear.   

6) Have an emergency escape plan.  This often dovetails with beginning to reach out to family and friends.   In many states if there is a domestic violence complaint, one of the parties is leaving the house for the night.  Even if you are innocent it could be you. 

7) Videotape the house.  There is a very real possibility that your stbx will lock you out/ destroy things/ sell things, etc

8) Document, document, document - If you have kids, you are likely their best connection both to reality and stability in the chaos of the BPD.  Once of the best tools at your disposal costs nothing but a bit of your time.  A simple journal of what you do for your kids each day.  If you can add pictures and mementos, even better. 

9) Don’t take legal advice from your stbx.  You may find yourself at the end of a stream of threats from your stbx about what the courts are going to do when they report all your transgressions.   Tune it out. 

10) Don’t expect the process to be cheap or fast.  Remember that pwBPD usually feel very entitled and in fact if you quiz them they often have a very distorted sense of what it really costs to live. 

11) Take action to separate your finances.  Redirect your pay into an account into which only you have access.  Cut off joint credit cards.  This does not mean stop paying the bills, it simply means you control how they are paid.

12) Avoid face to face or telephone communications whenever possible.  pwBPD live for the conflict of these and you have no documentation of what was said.  Email is always preferable.

13) Practice radio silence.  You communicate only about what issues are essential to get through the day, such as kid’s schedules, etc.  Your job is not to look out for your stbx.  Preferably via email.

14) Make copies of all important documents you may need and store them in a secure off-site location.

15) Do not expect a neutral playing field when dealing with custody evaluators, guardian at litem, friend of the court, etc.  Do not get drawn into bashing your stbx.  The goal is to show how involved you are with your kids. 

16) Don’t be in hurry, especially with a high functioning BPD.  Time provides a chance for you to document your pwBPD unstable behaviors, which they might hide over a short term.  The goal is not to have them diagnosed, but simply to show patterns of behavior.

Best of luck and come back and visit some more, we are happy to hle.

The above quote is by another member from another thread I was part of and I thought it was full of good ideas.

[Panda39]

Preface: I'm on this site because my SO has an uBPDxw.

I did not leave someone with BPD but I did leave an alcoholic.  I planned for 3 months before I finally told him.  I investigated all kinds of things how to get divorced... .turned out in my state you could do your own for about $250 (money was an issue for us so this was good news), I looked for a place to live, talked to my credit union about getting a used car, talked with family and friends, made copies of paperwork, investigated the sale of our townhouse, started doing maintenance projects on the townhouse to sell it, started weeding out stuff I didn't need and tossing it, took my valuables to work and locked them in a file cabinet.  I also told my son what I was going to do right before I talked to his dad.

This was my exit... .preparation... .(but not married to someone with BPD)

[livednlearned]

If I had only a sentence or so to sum it up, I would say: Gather information. Treat leaving like a fact-finding mission -- getting information is not the same as making a decision! So many people think that gathering information is the same as making a decision. So they do nothing. Until things hit the wall, and then they are unprepared and in a far worse place, on the defensive and a few steps behind. You don't want to be a few steps behind when you're dealing with family courts, although it is possible to turn things around if that happens. It just takes more emotional toil and expense.

For example, people won't go see a lawyer because then they think that means they are getting divorced. So they stay in abusive relationships, thinking that they will lose custody, never checking to see if it's actually factually correct. They might poke around online and pick up misleading information. Some states default to 50/50, for example. Or, men might not learn how DV laws work. They assume that if they call 911, the cops will arrest them. They don't call because they assume they know how things work where they live.

It took me a long time to just understand custody. Most confusing thing ever! You go from thinking you're dealing with these very personal experiences, only to discover parenting is this intensely legal thicket.

[momtara]

Randi, first, question - do you do phone consultations? Or do you do email?

Please don't quote me directly, in case he ever sees this. You can kind of summarize if you ever need to... .

I left in a slow, step by step way. My exH got easily angered and I was worried about our young children. He understood the reasons for my filing for divorce but kept wanting to reconcile and was getting therapy. I did it in slow steps. For some that might be a bad thing, though. If he *could* have completely changed I might have taken him back, but he didn't change enough, so I continued with the divorce. I did this slowly, in steps. I never argued with him, never called him names, never said I would never talk to him again, etc.

I didn't actually feel emotionally ready for divorce and maybe I held out too much hope too. Maybe it's better to have a clean break.

I don't know that what worked for me is good advice for everyone. BPD's are so different in some ways. Mine is high fujnctioning and actually go therapy, but not enough.

[ogopogodude]

This is a great idea, ... .

Detaching & leaving a BPD relationship is a very important and critical decision making process for the non-BPD.

It is not just for escaping the exhaustion of being associated with the BPD person , but the financial implications are potentially devastating.

The ideal way of writing such a chapter is KISS (keep it simple stupid).

Livenlearned is right on with whether a relationship is volatile, or physical , kids involved and so on.

Here is my suggestion (and it comes from my university studying days of simplifying things):

A FLOW CHART.

It is soo much easier to follow a flow chart with little balloons, like a shortened version of the written word. 

Yes, ... it's nice to read chapter after chapter, with lots of clarification and long winded sentences that start with "Furthermore"s and "however"s, and "In Addition" s ---> but there comes a time to have simplicity.

A flow chart is certainly simplicity.

People like simplicity such as fast food, ... .and a flow chart is like fast food.

What would the flow chart look like? What would be in it?

I just googled flow chart balloons (images).

I suppose it (the flow chart) would start with (if it is a romantic relationship) a balloon stating either "Have U decided to stay or leave a BPD spouse/significant other".  Then it bifurcates with arrows into:  "is the BPD person high conflict or low conflict?"  and then bifurcates again, etc... .

And so on, ... .

[momtara]

Also would depend on how dangerous the person is, is there a possibility of change, etc.