Starting Marriage Counseling - Advice?

[WorldTraveler]

Hi All,

After a rough patch with my wife where we didn't speak for several days, I made an appointment with a marriage counselor for this Tuesday. My wife and I have since made up and are on good terms. Still, this isn't the first time we've fought and made up, and honestly I think we still feel a bit raw.

I'd like to ask for your advice on entering marriage counseling, and what kinds of things you think are productive to bring up. My wife hasn't heard of BPD, and I don't want to mention it to her at this point. I'm not sure if that's relevant to my question but I thought I'd mention it.

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.

[sad but wiser]

Hello,
That's a tricky situation.  Maybe focus on what triggers her?  If you go in blaming, she will surely just shut down, so perhaps finding out what is making her feel threatened will help.

[Sunfl0wer]

Probably best to go in with an open mind and listen for or ask: what You can do to help the situation.  Could help to express frustrations in terms of how you feel and such vs calling wife out on behaviors you don't like.

In my couples counseling, it was clear that BF just wasn't listening and was used to being yelled at by his ex before he would give something his attention.

We did not focus on:
How to get BF to listen

We focused on:
How can Sunfl0wer speak in a way to best capture/maintain BF attention?

Then it was his job to respond and notice I was trying, therefore take attention.

If BF ever clued into the idea we were there to "fix him," he woulda run fast.
In reality, it IS couples counseling and we really ARE there to assist both parties anyhow, not to fix one of us.

-I guess my best advice is enter with low expectations.
-Expect that you may end up being the main target for changing even if you feel she is the one demo most difficult behaviors.  (Seems often the therapist finds the pwBPD not possible to confront on stuff, or with limited capacity for growth, so a lot of the work falls on other partner by default.)

Oh, and sometimes the therapist may start with last fight, or most recent issue that drove you to seek treatment.

Often we were discussing how we could both feel ok with conflict existing.
Not run, not avoid, not feel like it was the end of the relationship, not have it cause greater anxiety, etc.

[Lockjaw]

I would see if you could get a one on one session with the therapist and share your concerns about her having BPD. Let the therapist tell her she has it, if she does.

I have been to many marriage counselors, and there are a bunch of them that will give terrible advice. I have gone in to see one in a good mood, and left in a bad mood.

My experience also is they sit on the fence, and try to get each person to understand the other. While good in theory, that doesn't tend to resolve issues. There has to be more.

[WorldTraveler]

Thank you all for your input. I would indeed like to know how I can be a better husband. In my mind, many issues are legitimate issues, but my wife doesn't handle them well. Of course, there are some things that I think she can improve as well, and my secret fantasy is that the therapist will back me up on this. But I heed your advice of not expecting too much.

[Lockjaw]

The therapist may back you up one on one. I have had very few take a stance of backing me up in counseling.

With my last wife, we had an issue where our son, who was around 30 months old told me her middle son from a previous marriage "bites his pee pee". He kept repeating that phrase in the car seat on the way home from daycare. It took about 2 or 3 times of him saying it for it to register, and I literally drove my truck straight off the road and stopped, turned around and asked my son point blank, does so and so bite your pee pee? He said yes daddy.

He also kept saying something about biting his butt, but I couldn't ever get that clear, so I just told him, ok daddy will take care of it.

Mind you this kid, who was 12ish at the time, begged me and my wife every weekend to let my son come upstairs and "sleep" with him.

I took him to a play therapist who said there is NO POSSIBLE WAY HE MADE THAT UP. Couldn't have been clearer than that, right? Wifey was there. Wifey said our son made it up. Then she said I just heard what I wanted to hear. Like any parent wants to hear their child has been sexually assualted. Then she said I made it up because I didn't like her son and wanted him out of the house. He was already out. The court date was scheduled, he was telling the judge he wanted to go live with dad.

So I said absolutely no contact between your son and our children. The counselor we were seeing backed that up, in front of us both. Said it absolutely positively was the right decision.

Did it help our marriage? NOT ONE BIT.

So even if you get backed up. Even if you are right, don't just think it will make things better. If I have learned one thing with my BP GF, its that their ability to rationalize and justify what they do is a skill that they possess that is unmatched, even by the most crooked politician out there.

[ANewPlace30]

Councillor sat on fence and blamed me for not making her feel secure, despite the fact there was nothing I could do that would fix that problem.

UBPDw now has same jealous thoughts as before, she just vocalises them less as she knows I'd leave her if she ever accused me of cheating again. Now she simmers in a silent rage until she can find something else I've done wrong.

Very unproductive and gave some truly dreadful advice. Included suggesting I should be a more jealous person - thus validating to my wife that this is a Healthy emotion.

[Lockjaw]

I had one tell me that I should pay for my now ex wife's kids to have cell phones, when both she and her EX were making more than me, and her EX had bought a 700K house.

I was like, you think I should pay for cell phones for kids that aren't even mine, and both parents have a job?

You know, because cell phones are a right in our country now.

[Lockjaw]

I had one tell me I should unconditionally love my stepson, even though his behavior was awful. He was a stone cold liar. I figured out how to get his attention, and that was make him wait. He never ever got an immediate response from me, no matter how much he demanded it. I told her, I have these 5 issues, and if you look at who I associate with, you will not find a single person who possess these charactoristics. I do not have to do something with him when his behavior sucks.

She goes, so your love is conditional? And then proceeded to tell me how I was wrong. I was like, so his behavior sucks, but I should just do whatever he needs or wants?

Sad thing is, I had his number, and it was working. He was turning around, and she blew it up.

Everyone's love is conditional. You can unconditionally love your child, but that is it. Other people, not so much.

[sad but wiser]

My ex had a good therapist.  I attended a session at my ex's request.  My son (then 18) went along, mostly to try and figure out for hinself what was real. (My ex could make alien invasions of D.C. sound reasonable... .until you got away for 5 min.)  We all talked of this and that, nothinf special.  The session was almost over when my ex went into a quiet rage and started blaming and asking the weirdest questions, getting louder and louder .  Then he asked if I was going to answer because he had about a thousand more.  He said, "Are you going to fix this, or am I moving on?   I just was dumbstruck for a second or two and said, "You're moving on."
  On the way out, the therapist leaned near and whispered to me, "I understand."   Those were the most confirming words ever
My ex dropped him a week or two later.  He had failed to fix me.

[Sluggo]

I felt I learned a lot about myself and how I was contributing to the problems- conflict avoider, difficulty expressing my feelings, etc.    As there were truths in what my wife said.  However therapy broke down  when the tables started focusing on my soon to be Ex behavior (4 different times with different MC).  Overall, it seemed like my wife was looking for someone to take her side and use MC to hit me over the head.  When they stopped doing it then she wanted to leave.

It took some time before the MC saw the 'real dynamic' play out.  What helped us is that MC encouraged us to take a video of our arguments (discussions) which we both knew we were being recorded.  We played them back in our joint sessions and MC started to see what really was happening. 

1st therapist who diagnosed my wife with Paranoid PD with BPD characteristics after a battery of tests and said I had depression.  He said you both need long term individual therapy.  But let me warn you he said, you both have complementary dysfunctions and the work like a hand in a glove.  If one of you starts to change and the other one doesn't (or cant) then you probably will end up in divorce.   

2nd MC therapist said:  You guys are just wasting your money coming here until you get help

3rd therapist After about 30 hours of sessions about her complaints of me and me trying to work on them which I learned quite a bit, the therapist challenged my wife and said 'what is your part in all this'.  In the next 6 sessions my wife was kicked out 4 different times when she dysregulated.  Then wife wanted to stop going and said she was going to sue the therapist about breaching confidentiality with the primary care physician (who we both signed waivers).   

 

[flourdust]

On the way out, the therapist leaned near and whispered to me, "I understand."   Those were the most confirming words ever

Heh. Yeah. Our MC asked me to record an argument once. He met with us individually to review the recording. He told me that it sounded like I was a hostile witness on the stand, with the prosecution (my wife) trying to break me. That was validating.

Later, he said we were beyond our help, and he said we needed to see someone several times/week. I was already prepared to serve divorce papers by then.