New to this need advice

[Rlamf]

 Hi, my story is long so I just give the cliff notes. For almost a year and a half my wife  has been accusing me of having an affair. This went on for several months where she would confront me with these wild accusations and say she had evidence or received phone calls things that never happened. As time progressed we have separated and her accusations are getting more more outrageous. She showed up at my house two weeks ago with a random picture she found on the Internet  that was an advertisement for a website and had this long convoluted story that the girl in the picture was a girl that I was spotted with also never happened. I am now hearing that she tells people I beat her. whenever we talk all she can do is bash me tell me that she can't believe a word I say because I'm a liar when in just the past two weeks alone she's been in caught in  to many lies to count.  it has reached a point where we almost can't even communicate but we have a daughter together so unfortunately just walking away from her is not an option. We've been together 17 years and this is only started about a year and a half ago. There we we little signs here and there throughout the years but never anything this drastic. Any advice on how to deal with this type of situation would be a huge help. Thank you

[RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING]

RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members are welcomed to express frustration but must seek constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[Turkish]

Hello Rlamf,

It sounds like she may be a little out of touch with reality here. Being accused of cheating is one thing, but making up fanciful stories is something else. Is there any history of mental illness here, or she being on any type of medications? 

Whether physically together or not, you have a relationship due to your child. Take a look at the lessons to the right of the board to start (Lesson 3 covers communication tools which can help reduce conflict). They can help you start to make sense of this.

How old is your daughter, and how much does she stay with each of you? I'd love to hear more and how best we can help.



Turkish

[Rlamf]

Our daughter is 10. And  I have her pretty much half the time. As far as my wife goes she has some past trauma and some issues with her mother all she was a kid. She's always been a bit rough around the edges but that was one of the things that drew me to her.  What has me concerned is the level of conviction she holds onto these belief that she has despite all the evidence to the contrary. Some of the stories she tells about me are so ridiculous that when anybody hears him most of the time they  laugh, if she wasn't so adamant I wouldn't be so concerned whenever we try to discuss it she goes on these rants about  how she thinks I am so crazy that I carry on all these affairs and block him from my mind, and at no time did she realize how ridiculous that sounds. I've tried with everything I could to try and hold it together and get us into  as much counseling as I could to try and keep this family together for our daughter. Unfortunately it seems to have run its course. I've tried over and over again to get her to see the error in her judgment but whenever we talk about it she just goes on about how I'm a liar and I'm crazy and by telling her that maybe she should look into why she's having these  awful thoughts she just leaves or hangs up and says she's not crazy. Like I said in the above post this is been going on for quite some time but the last couple weeks has came to ahead.  Since we've been separated we have been making every effort to reconcile but she keeps coming up with these crazy crazy scenarios that she thinks I'm doing. The day before she showed up at my house we spent the day together and she went on and on about how much she loved me and was excited that things were looking good and then I don't know where right back to coming up with all these and now she hates my guts and can't wait to get divorced. Like I said I'm no expert I'm just trying to make some sense of everything

[Rlamf]

One more thing to add, about 10 years ago she was in therapy and she was on zoloft.  Things at that time were pretty good. Once you came off the Zoloft and really wasn't going to counseling anymore she always seem to gravitate to the most negative thought process she could have. And as of late One thing I've noticed is all the lies she tells it for no reason and when she gets caught in some of the lies she just tries to lie her way out of it.  I wouldn't be so concerned for behavior wasn't so out of character and it's only getting worse as time goes by. She almost never has a good thing to say about me or anybody associate with me, but anybody else she  comes across can do no wrong. She's never been formally diagnosed with BPD and I am in no way qualified to make any kind of judgment i'm just going on what I'm reading and past experience

[leggomyeggshell]

Is it possible that she is knowingly making up these lies as a conscious effort to gain an advantage against you in a divorce?  Or she feels threatened by you divorcing her and is coming up with a storyline to defend herself.  I can't think of another reason she would devolve into this behavior, especially when she said the model in the ad was the woman you were supposedly cheating on her with, unless she really believes it, which seems unlikely since she should be able to see that it came from an ad.

[Rlamf]

 I really don't believe she's knowingly line. Last night she called me to tell me how much you love me, and nobody else Can or will ever love me as much as she does. She keeps insisting she knows I have issues but won't tell me what he's issues are and keep saying all she wants to do is help, but really I'm the most boring normal person  I know. Then she goes on to tell me that that model in the picture will be at court and she knows her name and where she lives and when I asked well then who was it she just doesn't tell me. Some counselors have mentioned delusional disorder and stuff like but at this point I really don't know as far as trying to gain an advantage in the divorce where we live is a no-fault state and she's the one that initiated it so I really don't know what to make of all this.

[leggomyeggshell]

Issues like cheating can still be relevant for issues like custody, but it does not sound like that is what she is doing.  I dunno, my (possibly) BPD wife only makes things up like that in order to get me to admit to something.  Occasionally it works if I have done the thing she has accused me of, other times she comes off as paranoid.  Maybe she originally said this to get you to admit you had an affair, but then now has to save face by continuing the story?  If she truly believes it then she probably needs to get help for that as I can imagine it would be hard if one is experiencing delusions.  Maybe she really wants you to proclaim your love for her and is trying outlandish things to get you to display some passion.  Sometimes it seems like women stir the pot to try to provoke a reaction.  I don't know, I am just guessing.

[Rlamf]

 Thanks for all the advice, as far as stirring a pot or just wanting me to proclaim my love I've done that more times than I can count since this whole thing started. If she was just trying to provoke a reaction to get me to admit to something I didn't do I would think at some point she would realize she was wrong and just move on from it. Some of the stuff  is just so out there that I have no idea where she comes up with it. If she knows she was saying these things to try to get me to admit to something at this point I thought she would've just given up by now and realized she was wrong and we can move on from it but she's just relentless and won't let it go, on top of loving me to death one day and then not looking at me the next I just feel like my head is spinning.

[Cat Familiar]

I'm so sorry you're dealing with all this Riamf.    Crazy accusations are impossible to defend against and when you do, they start believing that they're right.

My BPD husband is very rational most of the time, but there was a time when he thought I was having a secret boyfriend. I'm very outdoorsy and I ride horses several times a week, but always with my female friends. Somehow he got this idea that I had some cowboy boyfriend that I was keeping secret. When I'd have time to do that didn't enter into the equation.

I just laughed and said, Oh yeah, right. At least he didn't accuse me of being a lesbian. That would have made more sense considering that all my friends are women, but would have been equally crazy.

[dacoming]

One thing I've learned dealing with my wife is they don't care about facts, everything is based off of their feelings.  She feels like you are cheating so she doctors the scenarios to fit what she is feeling.  So when she tells the story to someone else, they are probably going to believe her.  I also believe she could be throwing stuff out there to get you to admit to something.  My wife claims to have all this evidence of me cheating but never produces anything.  The accusations get crazier and crazier by the day.  In addition to the cheating, now I try to annoy her on purpose, hide and break things in the house to upset her (even though I'm the one who works and has to replace everything), act like I never understand what she's saying to upset her, etc etc.  These things make the cheating accusations easy to deal with... .

[Rlamf]

You almost hit the nail right on the head. I found whenever she's presented with real facts that prove her claims are false she just ignores it and digs her heels even deeper. We don't live together anymore so I don't have to worry about her saying I break things. However I seem to be the source of all her problem and all that's wrong with her life whenever we talk. Like I said we don't live together anymore and are headed for divorce but I would give anything to have the woman I married back