She seems to be seeing some big picture items

[How to communicate after a contentious divorce...]

It was interesting and good to read her homework today.

She acknowledges and understands, that she has not been letting me lead.  She JADES a bit saying that I won't lead so she has to.  Then says that lots of her actions were based on fear of what would happen if she doesn't act.

Basically, she wants stuff done NOW and when I don't "jump" at what she defines as an issue, she handles it.

Somehow I gently need to make the point that step 1 of decision making is to know when a decision needs to be made.  Making them early or late can be just as disastrous.

She seems to want to jump past gathering data and "shoot", let's worry about the aim later.

I was initially suspicious of doing lots of this in writing, but it is letting me be less "reactive" in my answers, because I can read, process, step away, come back to it and answer.

She also acknowledges that she screwed up with the baby in the road and social services incident.  She acted out of fear that I wanted to take her children and that is still how she views it, that I wanted to take her children away.  This is huge because this is first time she has acknowledged having even 1% responsibility.

My big picture view is to go along with the counseling and gently nudge in the right direction.  In my list of differences I am staying "big picture" theory with only a sprinkling of examples.  If I sent in a halfway "honest" or "full" list, I think it would be like tossing a nuke hang grenade.

My hope level is up.  

FF

[formflier]

It was interesting and good to read her homework today.

She acknowledges and understands, that she has not been letting me lead.  She JADES a bit saying that I won't lead so she has to.  Then says that lots of her actions were based on fear of what would happen if she doesn't act.

Basically, she wants stuff done NOW and when I don't "jump" at what she defines as an issue, she handles it.

Somehow I gently need to make the point that step 1 of decision making is to know when a decision needs to be made.  Making them early or late can be just as disastrous.

She seems to want to jump past gathering data and "shoot", let's worry about the aim later.

I was initially suspicious of doing lots of this in writing, but it is letting me be less "reactive" in my answers, because I can read, process, step away, come back to it and answer.

She also acknowledges that she screwed up with the baby in the road and social services incident.  She acted out of fear that I wanted to take her children and that is still how she views it, that I wanted to take her children away.  This is huge because this is first time she has acknowledged having even 1% responsibility.

My big picture view is to go along with the counseling and gently nudge in the right direction.  In my list of differences I am staying "big picture" theory with only a sprinkling of examples.  If I sent in a halfway "honest" or "full" list, I think it would be like tossing a nuke hang grenade.

My hope level is up.  

FF

[Sunfl0wer]

It was interesting and good to read her homework today.

She acknowledges and understands, that she has not been letting me lead.  She JADES a bit saying that I won't lead so she has to.  Then says that lots of her actions were based on fear of what would happen if she doesn't act.

Basically... she wants stuff done NOW and when I don't "jump" at what she defines as an issue... .she handles it.

Sounds like in her own way, she is recognizing the impulsivity in her choices to act on things guided by her anxiety, well, at least this is what I suspect/'hear' she is referring to.

Somehow I gently need to make the point that step 1 of decision making is to know when a decision needs to be made.  Making them early or late can be just as disastrous.

She seems to want to jump past gathering data and "shoot"... .let's worry about the aim later.

Trying to educate ffW on a hierarchy of a decision making process, while well intended, may have the potential to turn out to seem extremely invalidating to her.

Thus far, has she taken direction from you and recognized a sense of headship dynamic yet? Or would this be introducing a new dynamic from you? 

How would you imagine approaching this?  -maybe talk this one out here?

I was initially suspicious of doing lots of this in writing, but it is letting me be less "reactive" in my answers... .because I can read... .process... .step away... .come back to it and answer.

It also sound like being in a more observing role vs responder/reactor is serving you well.  It also sounds that the act of journaling for her is serving as a healthy coping mechanism and possibly feels validating to her, helps her to be mindful of her behaviors and may cause her to think before she acts as she is now accountable to MC.  Is this about close?

My hope level is up.  

Awesome!

[formflier]

I think I will reserve the "lessons" in decision making to my homework.

We went over the lists of differences and I was asked if I could look at her list and find "low hanging fruit" to sort out or provide solutions for.

Basically separating the lists into easy and hard.

Was a good session.  Some hard things were discussed, but there was no acrimony. 

The one blip occurred when the MC pressed her if she was "good" or ok on an issue that she brought up and I agreed to.

He didn't rub it in her face but he stayed after her until she said she was good and there was nothing else, that the issue was over and put to bed so to speak.  I have no idea why she was hesitant, because there was complete agreement with not modification from me.  Perhaps she was expecting a big deal or , who knows.

Once she definitively said that she was good, the issue was dropped.

I stayed out of it and just listened.

FF

[Sunfl0wer]

He didn't rub it in her face but he stayed after her until she said she was good and there was nothing else, that the issue was over and put to bed so to speak.  I have no idea why she was hesitant, because there was complete agreement with not modification from me.  Perhaps she was expecting a big deal or ... .who knows.

Once she definitively said that she was good... .the issue was dropped.

I stayed out of it and just listened.

Wow, all of this sounds like a great direction for her!  For you both actually!

My guess, feel free to correct, is that while the pragmatic part of the issue was resolved, she likely did not feel completely emotionally validated and had some unresolved feelings she wanted to reserve the right to revisit.

It sounds like MC did well to hold her accountable for 'resolving' the issue.  It also sounds like she did well in her judgement on what would be well received and how to appear progressing in the process.  Also credit to FF for discerning 'just listening.'

A general (unrelated?) side note:

What strikes me though, or occurred to me as a common thing with pwPD is their need for external validation is strong, yet they often lack in intrinsic motivators.  Just saying this because many of us wonder why our SO can maintain behavior for a certain period and then seemingly fall apart.  I am pondering the correlation of existence of sufficient extrinsic motivators. 

[formflier]

What I think the counselor has picked up on from me and from his contacts with previous Biblical counselors is that my wife likes to leave herself "wiggle room" to become "ungood" on a topic and use that topic for her purposes again, when the only thing that has changed are her feelings about the topic being solved.

She has no wiggle room left on this issue. 

FF

[Grey Kitty]

The one blip occurred when the MC pressed her if she was "good" or ok on an issue that she brought up and I agreed to.

He didn't rub it in her face but he stayed after her until she said she was good and there was nothing else, that the issue was over and put to bed so to speak.  I have no idea why she was hesitant, because there was complete agreement with not modification from me.

What I think the counselor has picked up on from me and from his contacts with previous Biblical counselors is that my wife likes to leave herself "wiggle room" to become "ungood" on a topic and use that topic for her purposes again, when the only thing that has changed are her feelings about the topic being solved.

I've got a guess why she was hesitant.

She was hesitant because her feelings weren't really about the issue in the first place.

Perhaps her feelings weren't coming from anything you could act on to fix.

Most likely she didn't realize that the issue she raised wasn't quite what was bugging her... .but whatever she was feeling that she tried to fix by asking you to do something on that issue... .didn't get better from it.

And this is likely why things became "ungood" in the past too.

Perhaps you can validate more at a time like this? (I know that in this case, the MC was kinda running the show)

One thing I learned about my wife was that she is fairly intuitive, and would often jump to a good conclusion... .but express a truly bizarre and impossible reason to justify it. And when I pointed out how bad her "reason" was, she would come up with another one... .which was different but no better. I learned to watch for this, and not shoot down her second "reason" but instead say something about this, stating that I did want to respect her intuition... .

[formflier]

One thing I learned about my wife was that she is fairly intuitive, and would often jump to a good conclusion, but express a truly bizarre and impossible reason to justify it. And when I pointed out how bad her "reason" was, she would come up with another one, which was different but no better. I learned to watch for this, and not shoot down her second "reason" but instead say something about this, stating that I did want to respect her intuition,

We have the exact same dynamic.  

Sometimes it's so outlandish that I don't ask for further explanation, just listen and validate if possible.

It's the ones that "are just a little off" that are tough for me, because I get it in my head that she is "almost there" and that a little nudge or "reality" from me will get her where she needs to be.

FF

[Cat Familiar]

Similar to what Sunfl0wer said, something I learned in a graduate seminar was that when people get what they want in a negotiation (such as martial counseling), they often don't recognize that they've truly gotten agreement for their request and may still be angry, disbelieving, frustrated, whatever. So it is the mediator/counselor's job to get them to realize that they've achieved what they want and to not unravel the agreement with leftover emotions.

[formflier]

 

Yep,

The next MC will be interesting.  It's my job (homework assignment) to find "low hanging fruit" in her list of things that we are not in agreement on and write out what can be done to satisfy those, if I am onboard, etc etc.

The list is reasonable and I think I can be onboard with 100% of it.   There are somethings on there that I will kick back to her for clarification or an actionable plan.  Such as "I want to have family devotions".

I'm onboard (and I kinda think we already do this some) so I'm going to say that I agree in principle, what do you want (how many days a week, times, etc etc, ). 

My guess is that she is "girding for a fight or argument" and I wonder how "Ok, sure" will be received.

Even more interesting to see what she does with my list.  She has read it and realizes (although she hasn't verbalized it) that it is the equivalent of turning the car around and driving the other way.

All of the materials that we have been reading have been describing the role of the wife as about the opposite of FF wife. 

She has said things like "I didn't realize how far off I was, but since you weren't leading, I had to"

Reality, she wanted it now (it being whatever she wanted) and I felt that process and consideration was needed (ready, aim shoot) and she wanted to send rounds downrange, we'll worry about aiming later.

Who knows.  We've been through the classes before and read similar things, we used to function much more like the model, but I guess I can get my head around people knowing things in an academic way and not being able to "see" or "apply" that in their own life.

My list is honest my guess is that the most controversial piece on their is boundaries around who she discuss

es our marriage with.  I didn't use the term BPD or "toxic people" but said something like "angry divorced woman that know how to put a man in his place based on their knowledge of that man's evil thoughts"

I'm not asking her to have no contact with these people, they are family.  If they ask about the marriage, she could ask them to pray that we both follow God's word and then give no further details or listen to no advice.

FF

[Grey Kitty]

We have the exact same dynamic.  

Sometimes it's so outlandish that I don't ask for further explanation, just listen and validate if possible.

It's the ones that "are just a little off" that are tough for me, because I get it in my head that she is "almost there" and that a little nudge or "reality" from me will get her where she needs to be.

There have been some studies about how people have good intuition/judgement in many cases, but when asked "why" they think that, it goes south badly, and they give really stupid answers... .and even doubt their original good intuition, and change that to a bad answer. So I really tried to respect that for some reason she couldn't/wouldn't articulate, she had a strong opinion.

Note: At times, she got caught up in mental illness, negative feelings about herself, what would come out as paranoia in your wife... .these times felt very different than times when she had good intuition and went grasping for bad reasons.

[Grey Kitty]

(cross-posted my last one)

It's my job (homework assignment) to find "low hanging fruit" in her list

[... .]

I didn't use the term BPD or "toxic people" but said something like "angry divorced woman that know how to put a man in his place based on their knowledge of that man's evil thoughts"

I'm not asking her to have no contact with these people, they are family.  If they ask about the marriage, she could ask them to pray that we both follow God's word and then give no further details or listen to no advice.

Dude... .did you put her contact with toxic people in her FOO in the "low hanging fruit" section? Please say it isn't so! This sure doesn't sound anywhere near easy to me!

Yes, it is important. I'm sure that they have a bad impact on your wife.

That said... .I see one spouse telling the other spouse who they can talk about their marriage to as controlling and abusive, outside of extreme circumstances... .and extreme to my mind is something like the person they were cheating with before, or somebody who is a child molester... .not just somebody who is a bad influence.

[formflier]

 

No, that is in my section.  We are addressing her "requests" first. 

Basically in a Christian marriage there is an effort to become "one flesh" in marriage.  There is a physical part to this and also the way you approach the world, issues, raise kids, etc etc

I think I titled the section:  "Who it is appropriate to get marriage advice from"  I say that obtaining and following professional advice or the advice of those that that have been successful at Christian marriage.

I'm an "earwitness" to advice that she has been given and followed (for the most part).

It went something like this, "FF wife, you know that he (ff) is just like his mother and will never change.  You know what he is planning to do (paranoid ideations) and it's your job to protect your children and tell them about him (ff).  Don't let him get away with this, put him in his place.  Don't let him have the kids."

She went on to tell a story, with my wife cheering her on about how she chewed out her current husband for wanting his secretary, even though he denies it (wanting secretary), she saw through it.  The lady laughed about how "twisted up and upset" her husband was after she "was through with him"

 

Similar things from other female family members.  All multiple divorced.  Any doubt why they got divorces?  sigh,

In the big scheme of things my wife is a "wannabe" compared to her relatives.  My wife is minor league and they are major. 

For any long term success of this change to "stick" we need to be deliberate about boundaries about our marriage.

The behavior she was engaged in was sinful in several ways.  One of the ways to address it is to be deliberate about creating boundaries/barriers to it doesn't happen again.

To flip it around, if it was a guy that was truly repentant about using prostitutes, it would be unwise to be ok with him still going to the whorehouse "just to talk".  A deliberate erecting of boundaries/barriers would be a plan to not even go in the door.

Not a perfect analogy, but close.

FF

[Sunfl0wer]

Sounds like the move and close proximity to her family played a huge part in her losing herself (her old identity that had been somewhat stable for a time) and turning into 'the bad ffW.'

Makes complete sense to address this.  You sound well thought and clear on things.

(You sound much better.  I feel like you are changing too, in your language, you seem more comfortable begininng to be a lead.  Maybe I'm reading into it, I don't think so.)

Like the sleep issue, it appeared that adressing sleep actually helped allieviate other indirect stresses on the marriage.

I imagine adressing boundaries with her family may have a similar affect?

[formflier]

 

I feel different, better, able to process things.

I'll have to check my sleep numbers when I get home, but my guess is my 7 day average is going to be between 7 and 8 hours per night.  I'd have to go back and look, but comparing that to numbers between 4 and 5 hours for a 7 day average, I mean, that's just huge.

Sleeping:  I think she has spent every nigh in bed with me for about two weeks.  I thought she was going to skip last night when she fell asleep putting kids to bed.  I was fine with it.  Everyone was tired.  I remember someone gently getting into bed and snuggling up during the middle of the night.  No "firm" doorshuts or anything.


Leadership:  It's not really about what I "want".  Personally, I would rather live somewhere else and attend a different church.  My wife and kids are thriving there.  (although my wife is still avoiding new connections with women)  Yeah, that is her number 1 thing on her homework, to speak to a different pastor to make introductions and get her involved in Bible study with mature (in their faith) Christian ladies.

I can tell the MC "got it".  A long time ago he had asked me to contact a pastor (it's a big church, big staff) and get info about his Bible studies.  I got in touch with him, went and met a bunch of the guys, basically jumped right in.  He commented about me "exceeding the homework" but said he was fine with it.  So, fast forward to this past Monday and he asked how it was going with my "connections", making friends.  I rattled off guys names and what I had been doing and that I was really enjoying it. 

Well, he asked my wife and she had dear in headlights moment.  No connections, zip, zero, nada. 

When I am in listening mode I also try to observe.  He pushed a bit and she JADEd about it.  He directly asked if there was any reason not to and her words of "no, no reason" and body language were at complete odds.  She was very uncomfortable.

How do I validate her as she tries to make new female friends.  She often thinks people are judging her, think bad things, etc etc (pretty standard BPDish stuff, with an every so often paranoid bit thrown in)

Anyway, back to leadership.  I have clear view of what my family needs to take some jumps towards healthier relationships.

For instance, one of my things is that when kids get disobedient, parents need to get quieter.  Quiet, whispering parents equals "i need to calm my a$$ down and see what's up"  Right now kids blow her off (and me too because they know mommy has their back) until she yells (that means she is serious). 

Anyway, when I wrote the list I was careful to "check myself" and make sure it was not "about me" but "for" my family.

Seriously though, I need ideas and guidance on validating and listening while my wife does uncomfortable stuff in regards to relationships with other women.

FF

[Grey Kitty]

Seriously though... .I need ideas and guidance on validating and listening while my wife does uncomfortable stuff in regards to relationships with other women.

Both these issues--getting your wife to find acceptable female friends, and getting her to reduce toxic contact with the women in her FOO (or at least stop talking about her marriage with them) are tricky ones.

I absolutely agree that both would be very good for her. You get that. The BMC gets that. Your wife might even realize this in some part of her head.

Just the same... .judged on the standard of getting advice about your marriage from trusted sources, a group of anonymous people on the internet who are unified by a claimed belief that their partner has mental illness doesn't sound very good. In other words, you would be hard pressed to justify the advice you are getting here with your wife and perhaps the BMC. Especially because many of us (  ) aren't really proponents of Christian Marriage as you understand it. (Yes, I'm trying to support you in it despite that.)

My take is that your wife is entitled to pick her influences, and her company--good, bad, or none, and (for the most part) you should let her do so. Your right to be involved only comes up when she starts acting on those influences (i.e. doing the crap women in her FOO suggest).

It is hard to watch her stuck making poor choices. But I'm finding that it is the best choice most of the time--Pushing her too much changes the dynamic in a bad way--Without the push she is fighting with herself about what to do. If you get too involved on one side, she (effectively) puts one side of her internal battle on you, and starts fighting YOU on the other side of it. This adds conflict in your r/s, AND makes it harder for her to resolve the conflict inside herself.

If the MC pushes her too much instead of you, that is still a better outcome.

How do I validate her as she tries to make new female friends.  She often thinks people are judging her, think bad things... etc etc (pretty standard BPDish stuff, with an every so often paranoid bit thrown in)

Well, she was obviously terribly uncomfortable when the MC was talking about it. If the topic comes up, you could validate that she looked uncomfortable. Do it in a way that includes an invitation or opening for her to share how or why it was uncomfortable, or what other feelings she had at the time.

Also remember to look for things to validate that AREN'T about any conflicts between the two of you.

With the reduced conflict and the increased quality of sleep, your reserves should be doing better--you are more able to avoid taking things personally, not be reactive when she has issues. And validate.

[Sunfl0wer]

Well, she was obviously terribly uncomfortable when the MC was talking about it. If the topic comes up, you could validate that she looked uncomfortable.

I'm not so sure about validating this.

It is possible her discomfort stems from feelings of guilt.  She may feel defensive if you bring up her discomfort.  She may not want to be reminded of feelings of guilt.

[Sunfl0wer]

When thinking of validating about friends, this is what came to my mind:

Bad Motivational Interview

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_VlvanBFkvI

Good Motivational Interview

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=67I6g1I7Zao

So while you do not want to take a role to be acting like her therapist in anyway, I have found watching the two approaches helpful in figuring out how to approach the same scenario and hear different options for validation.  So maybe this is helpful if you just listen to the differences of validation and remove the therapist role stuff where he is guiding her to change.

Idk, I think there is some neat validation stuff in it... .if you fix it to pull out just the validation. 

[empath]

FF, I'm not comfortable with the 'issues' related to who to seek marital advice from either. There has to be some ability for each partner within a marriage to have control over their own relationships without being judged by their spouse. This is coming from a fellow believer whose spouse is being influenced negatively by his chosen group.

My husband has been attending a Celebrate Recovery group for the past 5 months or so, and there have been increases in his divorce/separation threats. It also doesn't seem to be helping much with his other issues. I am not telling him that I think this group has had an influence on him because I think he needs to be able to monitor his own thoughts and emotions. I am intentionally being very careful about anything that could be considered to be controlling on my part. It is also invalidating for a person to be criticized about their choices of relationships. Some of our relationships are not chosen, and present problems for our marriage. I also have this type of thing in my own life, and it seems to me that pwBPD are highly susceptible to influences of others. I'm also not telling my husband that he should not speak about our marriage to his family because that would be trying to control him.

Recently, he told me that he really wants people to just tell him what to do sometimes (especially when he is having difficulties with something). It makes it easier for him to blame the other person for the problems if things don't work out. He can also have a checklist of things to do to 'make it better'.

[formflier]

 

Just to be clear, I'm not "telling" my wife anything.

I was responding to a request on areas where we are not one flesh (have common agreement/vision on what is good for our family).  She believes and has stated that these people are good influences on her and on our family.  I don't.  We are not one flesh.

This is also under a general heading or area of using a "boundaries" point of view to approach life and our parental and marital responsibilities.  She believes it appropriate to take my medical records and other private documents and distributed those to these same women and then have a weird interpretation of what those documents say as they harrumph and plot about how to "correct" me. 

This will be one of the more entertaining things to discuss and work through.

I've made my list, I will MC work with how that will be addressed.

FF

[Sunfl0wer]

Idk, maybe this is more blunt than should be.

What I hear is that it sounds like you are only requesting some limitations on interactions with others that support her persecutory delusions against you.

Maybe that is a leap.  Maybe that is right on target.

I think it best that FF trust FF as this has been effective.  Your instincts and abilities to question, self introspect and incorporate new understandings have apparently been spot on.

[formflier]

 

Yep, that is pretty much it. 

And, sometimes when she is on the fence, they push her to the other side, the bad side.

There is a bigger point, that just those people. 

Using boundaries to ask yourself, is this information appropriate to share with others, do they have a role here.

FF

[Fian]

Personally, I agree that this is something worth talking about.  Ever since you moved to your new location, her behavior became worse due to outside influences.  While ultimately it is up to her who she chooses to associate, she should be aware that you think it is harming your marriage.

[formflier]

Yes, and she can explain to the biblical counselor how this type of influence affects her walk with Christ.

And how it is good for her family.

And how it affects my leadership of the family.


FF

[Fian]

Did this come up in marriage counseling?  How did the discussion go?

[formflier]

 

Counseling went great.  This didn't come up.  Spent a lot of time on a discussion about disciplining children.

This is on the list, we'll get to it,  

FF

[Sunfl0wer]

It sounds like all three of you have adjusted to the new dynamics of how MC is going to work and seem to now be just doing it without much resistance to the process?

(Or u are just pleased enough to not need to focus on conflict occurring?)

[formflier]

It sounds like all three of you have adjusted to the new dynamics of how MC is going to work and seem to now be just doing it without much resistance to the process?

(Or u are just pleased enough to not need to focus on conflict occurring?)

I'm please with how it is going.  The last couple conflicts, well, I just didn't get involved.  I enforced a boundary and kept it simple.

FF