I am supporting and caring for her but she is so distant

[Amber London]

We met 6 months ago, we live together, I am supporting and caring for her. We were briefly romantically involved but she is increasingly distant. I don’t have a problem emotionally with that (not 100% true, but close)
I am trying to open up communication to get improved healthcare for her.
Right now she isn’t prepared to discuss anything and communication is only that which is absolutely necessary for day to day living.

[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.

[Pook075]

We met 6 months ago, we live together, I am supporting and caring for her. We were briefly romantically involved but she is increasingly distant. I don’t have a problem emotionally with that (not 100% true, but close)
I am trying to open up communication to get improved healthcare for her.
Right now she isn’t prepared to discuss anything and communication is only that which is absolutely necessary for day to day living.

Hello and welcome to the family!  I'm sorry you're going through this and it doesn't sound like a lot of fun.  Hopefully the community can help.

Great communication is literally 90% of the battle when it comes to BPD, and it's often counter-intuitive at times.  In general though, we want to be validating and supportive about the BPDs needs from their viewpoint, and suggesting we know better can often have the opposite effect of what we're trying to accomplish.

For example, the better medical care- did your partner ask for that?  If not, it could be taken from her viewpoint that you see something seriously wrong with her.  Something that simple could be the divide, and treatment is not going to make much of a difference until she's ready for it.

So if she doesn't want to discuss it, then find other things to bond over and get back the closeness you once had.  That will only make future conversations easier when it comes to medical care.

I hope that helps!

[Amber London]

Hi and thank you for the welcome,
Regarding wanting her to get better healthcare, I have not said anything to her for the very reason you’ve pointed out. She does have a therapist but the sessions are at best irregular and she does not confide in me any more about the content of their discussions. I don’t think it’s DBT, I think the therapy she’s getting (if any now…) may have been more useful to her in the past but not so much now. I have never met the therapist or even heard his voice, he may not exist at all for all I know by actual evidence… she talks to him via video call online.

I am just being there for her right now, basically I am the housekeeper, go-getter, that’s all. I’d like to open up dialogue but I don’t want to push her further away. She is intelligent and articulate, so can communicate if she wants to. It seems that she doesn’t want to. Sometimes she at least says ‘hi’ in a normal enough voice. Other times she either blanks me or replies in a very vulnerable sounding voice. So this is the current dynamic since she ended the romantic relationship we had about a month ago. She has the means to leave any time she wants to go, on the other hand I have told her she can stay as long as she likes, which is fine by me. So she has stayed, but could leave today, tomorrow.. I don’t know. I am keeping an open mind about how things will play out. It’s entirely up to her as right now, my feelings for her haven’t changed. I was surprised the relationship had an end point. I thought it would evolve, may be into something different, but not end.

[Pook075]

Maybe by staying there but no longer being together, she feels safe and validated.  It's good of you to let her stick around and it's great that you're going at her pace.  But I can also imagine how frustrating that can be at times.

Instead of trying to get "facts" out of her like what her plans are, why not try to focus on her feelings instead?  Is she generally happy...upbeat...sad...stand-offish?  That alone reveals a lot and can give you somewhere to start.

[Amber London]

Thank you so much for your reply. What you say makes a lot of sense. In a way I don’t want her to have plans, I want her to stay as long as she wants to stay. I want her to have stability and be happy, safe and well, the same as I want for my grown up children. More than anything else, I don’t want her to leave into chaos which is what I fear most.

It’s been about two months since she ended our romantic relationship which she told me she had faked and she has become increasingly distant emotionally. We can communicate on purely practical matters, e.g. her immediate needs, food, groceries, personal care items, etc. Her mood is: down, depressed, aloof. She does contact me in times of distress, such as when her spectacles broke, she came directly to me in a very distressed state, grabbed my hand, put the broken spectacles into my hand, and strode off back to her room. She appears to be spending almost 24 hours per day in her room. Anything she asks for, I get for her. I provide money that I don’t ask her to account for and she knows that I would buy her a ticket (one way or return) to any destination she chooses. But she stays. We seem to be stuck in the devaluation cycle (maybe?) or she simply doesn’t want to have or can’t have an emotional relationship with me. I am not sure which?

She has said that she would rather die than be close with me and that she doesn’t even want friendship with me and that there can never be any kind of “us”. I offered friendship because I care about her beyond a romantic relationship. I want her to have a stable life where she can get any treatment or therapy that might help her have her best life, with or without me. But right now our communication effectively begins and ends with groceries. My only option is to give her time, but for practical reasons (that are hers, not mine) there is a need for us to talk about the future at some point soon in the next month or so. On my side, she can stay with me as long as she wants to, even if I am just ‘the grocery guy’.

[once removed]

On my side, she can stay with me as long as she wants to, even if I am just ‘the grocery guy’.

are you prepared to live with this arrangement indefinitely?

is there a particular way youd like to see it play out?

[Amber London]

Hi and thanks for your reply. I don't think it will stay that way indefinitely but I don't know how it will develop.

I can't think of any action to take. I don't want to ask her to leave, I don't want her to leave, and I have not asked her to stay. I have simply said she can stay as long as she wants to.

She is not causing me any new grief, only the sadness of losing a romantic partner when I still wanted her. I was further saddened when she also rejected friendship.

However, I am a firm believer in letting people go, you can't make them love you and you can't make them care. Only she hasn't gone, it is unusual maybe but if she is going to go I would prefer it to be when she has a plan. Hopefully a good one.

Maybe that hope will be in vain but I can't be without hope. I remain concerned for her welfare and I have a lot of love and compassion for her. I've seen her suffering.

[once removed]

we live together, I am supporting and caring for her.

is she contributing to the household? like, is the place hers?