Trapped

[jmycal]

Hello, I am not even sure where this post belongs, as it touches on many points. First, I have known my wife for 9 years, we have been married for 3. Summer of 2024 is when things really started to go south. Out of the blue, my wife starts accusing me of cheating on her with my counseling clients. Telling me that I go visit them, stalk them, and download photos of them to fantasize about. I am double neurodivergent and the one hill I will die on is defending myself when I know I am right. I have since learned, all that did was make me look more guilty. Same with providing evidence or reasons that showed my innocence. In her eyes, that just made me more guilty. My wife claims my natural neurodivergent behaviors - difficulty looking people in the eyes, paralysis when triggered, plus feel anxious and nervous because I already knew she would simply tell me I am guilty of whatever she feels I am guilty of with no possible way that I could be innocent.

She got violent in the past and that is the primary reason why we are estranged and live apart. Ever since I did that, it has been a non-stop deluge of assuming I am cheating every minute of the day. I have offered to put tracking devices on my phone, car, a vid cam for my car so she can see where I go, share my google timeline with her so she can verify where I am and have been, and put accountability software on all my electronic devices so she would know I am not doing what she thinks I am doing. She categorically rejected everything and said that I must know how to "hack" the gps devices, my google time, the accountability software, etc., all because I worked customer service once at AT&T, in her mind that means I know how to manipulate electronic devices and erase data, which I do not.

She already had a history of severe betrayal trauma when I met her. I thought if I could make her feel safe that she would know she could trust me. I feel like all that did was make her anxiety and insecurity worse. I would talk with her about things like gaslighting and darvo - I specialzied in the treat ment of sex addiction and these were things I commonly had to deal with, and she now weaponizes them against me. If I disagree, she gets angry, tells me I am gaslighting her, and starts to get increasingly more angry when I stand my ground. When I explain that she is actually gaslighting me by  trying to force me to accept her narrative of events and it is not so much that she doesn't believe me, I am not allowed to have an opinion different from hers or I am gaslighting her and that is when the problems really begin.

some people might wonder why I am still in the relationship. I don't know how to let go of her and I don't want to be alone. I still love her but love isn't enough. There was a time when she accused me of cheating, I defended myself, and she later said what I was supposed to do was apologize - for something I didn't do, hold her, tell her I am sorry and that it will never happen again. When you accuse a person on the spectrum of being dishonest, they will die on that heal proving their innocence. She also found a bunch of my old journals and this is where I realized she also has some pretty severe retroactive jealousy.

I used to love going to coffee shops. not anymore. she ruined it. she once saw that I had a crush on a barrista at a coffee shop about 20 years before we ever met. She combined that with the belief that I stalk people and started telling me that I go to coffee shops to have sex with men, stalk the barristas, snap photos of people - to fantasize to later. All because I once had a crush on a barrista, that must be the reason I went to coffee shops was to harrass and stalk people. She also learned I had previously been to strip clubs - before I met her - and she reacted like i was doing that in real time. I mistakenly said once the only time you would see my phone location anywhere near a strip club is the one we pass on the freeway to get to her parents.

She took that and said so that is where you go act out. Thus, in addition to cheating on her with clients, i was going to strip clubs everyday. We had 2 bunnies that needed lettuce everyday. I would run to the store at night, usually took about 30 minutes. mind you, the strip club in question was 15 minutes from where we lived, but in the 30 minutes i was gone, I must have gone to the strip club, had a lap dance, and then came home.

mostly, she complains about how I took her husband away from her and it wasn't fair what I did to her. She of course won't get counseling. Since I am a counselor, she decided all counselors were assholes who were not trustworthy. We likely have a trauma bonded relationship and we both hang on for most likely unhealthy reasons. I thought that if I physically removed myself, she would see everything I did for her and realize I am not the monster she makes me out to be. All it seems to have done is convinced her that I am acting out non-stop and cheating on her. She says she can read my thoughts and body language as proof of guilt. When I explain that I am on edge because she doesn't believe me, she tells me I am wrong and that my body language indicates I am guilty of whatever she decides at that moment.

She doesn't understand why I get upset when she starts asking me the same questions she has asked a thousand times before, "who are you dating", "who have you had coffee with", "how have you been acting out", "oh, you just got paid so you are definitely acting out" and then no matter what I say, the answer is I am guilt and a lying sack of _____.

She also doesn't understand that I use language with specificity, precision, and intention. an example. I struck up a friendship with a guy at the club I worked out at. We both went to soak and started talking about spirituality. We met once for coffee. This was never a dating relationship. I once said I had seen this person less and less as in literally, I have not had interactions or seen this person at the club as much as I previously had. She took that line to mean that I was having sex with him and then she became convinced I was a closeted gay person and was using her to "look normal".

I know that most likely this relationship will never be salvageable, I just needed to vent. It isn't as easy as divorcing her, neither of us can afford attorneys, her family won't support her, she also has some significant health issues that she can't work, and I did make a promise to support her. She questions everything I tell her and honestly, I don't think there is anything else I can do to try and salvage this relationship.

I felt like I had struck gold when we met. She seemed to genuinely care about me and seemed like a nice person. She took care of me, wanted to make sure I looked my best when leaving the house, etc. Above all, she has never stopped to consider how her violence impacted me and she is confused as to why I have trouble relaxing and why I don't always want to spend time with her.

We had actually been having a better relationship of late and we were intimate this week. When I didn't pick up on her cues - once again autistic - she took that as I didn't care for her and then the questions started and I had to leave because of how angry I was starting to get. There is only so much you can take of being accused of being a liar.

I don't think I will ever want to have anothe relationship ever again. At this point, I just want peace and a chance to heal.

[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.

[PeteWitsend]

...

I don't think I will ever want to have anothe relationship ever again. At this point, I just want peace and a chance to heal.

Well, overall, I'd say it sounds like you're in a pretty lousy relationship.  I take it that if you want a chance to heal, you're looking for a way out (?) or considering ending it?  Why do you feel trapped? 

[ForeverDad]

In much of your post I note that you've repeatedly tried appeasement.  Sadly, most here have found that you can never appease a person with BPD traits (pwBPD) enough.  It seems appeasing just enables more problematic behavior.

Separation is one way to avoid much of the conflict but there are at least a couple downsides to that.

One is that distance apart may tend to make you feel the other is getting better when they are in fact unchanged.  BPD is a disorder most impacting to the closest of relationships.  People on the periphery can notice something is "off", shrug and move on with their life.  It's totally different if you are a spouse, sibling or child.  Close relationships are the most triggering and the most impacted.

Another is that being separated still leaves you connected by marriage.  Financial complications can result, especially if the other is irresponsible in finances.

It may seem hopeless but the fact is that you are in the midst of a bad situation.  Try to look positively, step outside the box and view your life from another's objective perspective.  A couple ideas...

• If you had a friend come to you and explain his life is like yours, what would you objectively tell him?
• Imagine yourself 5 or 10 years from now... what would you look back and advise the today you to change?

[CC43]

I have known my wife for 9 years, we have been married for 3. Summer of 2024 is when things really started to go south.

Out of the blue, my wife starts accusing me of cheating on her. . . the one hill I will die on is defending myself when I know I am right. . . . I have offered to put tracking devices on my phone, car, a vid cam for my car so she can see where I go, share my google timeline with her so she can verify where I am and have been, and put accountability software on all my electronic devices so she would know I am not doing what she thinks I am doing. She categorically rejected everything.

She already had a history of severe betrayal trauma when I met her. I thought if I could make her feel safe that she would know she could trust me. I feel like all that did was make her anxiety and insecurity worse.

I used to love going to coffee shops. not anymore. she ruined it. she once saw that I had a crush on a barrista at a coffee shop about 20 years before we ever met. She combined that with the belief that I stalk people and started telling me that I go to coffee shops to have sex with men, stalk the barristas, snap photos of people - to fantasize to later.

Hi there,

Welcome, you've come to the right place.  I can see there's a lot to unpack here, but I also see a familiar pattern that seems like classic BPD.  First off, a history of severe past traumas.  I wouldn't wish trauma on anyone, but with BPD, there ALWAYS seems to be a history of past traumas.  Some might be true, but some might be perceived or completely fabricated.  For example, I bet your wife thinks you traumatized her, when you've gone above and beyond to be loving and supportive, right?  Yet she'll tell everyone how your marriage has been traumatic, and probably that you left her and cheated on her, while twisting fact patterns and conveniently leaving out critical details like her own violence towards you.  Anyway, a pwBPD typically perceives life as an endless series of traumas.  A consequence of that is a victim mindset.  She's always a victim, which means that other people are to blame for her troubles.  The huge problem with this mindset is her inability to take responsibility for her own life and behavior.  You see, she's so busy blaming you that she can't solve any of her own problems, making her tremendously unhappy.  Worse, she thinks she's justified in acting out, and that you deserve to be hurt and/or punished.  Does that sound about right?

Secondly, things started to go south exactly when you fully committed to the relationship.  The summer of 2024 was around the time that you got married, correct?  You were legally and morally committed to each other, and you were presumably living together, thinking about a shared future together.  At first, she probably bought in to the "fantasy" version of marriage.  Given a pwBPD's black-and-white thinking, her vision of marriage was probably idealized, as white as her wedding dress.  She finally felt "secure" in the relationship, and able to show her true self to you.  But once married, the wedding dress came off, the honeymoon was over, and the attention wasn't squarely on her 24/7 anymore.  She likely started to experience some daily stresses, disappointments or need to compromise, and her fantasy started to unravel.  She might have harbored second thoughts; she didn't see everything as perfect anymore, and she was suddenly extremely insecure, seeing everything as black.  It's one of the paradoxes of BPD in my opinion--only when she feels secure enough in the relationship does she show her true, insecure self.  I think this relates to a pwBPD's distorted, unstable sense of self.

Finally, the false accusations.  This is mainly projection of your wife's insecurity onto you.  It seems to me that she's insanely jealous, of you spending any time with other people (including colleagues, clients, family or friends), because she sees that as stealing attention away from her.  PwBPD tend to have a high need for attention, reassurance and emotional caretaking; they might fabricate constant "tests" of your loyalty, too.  They generally expect too much devotion from friends and family.  Anyway, since your wife appears to be extremely jealous and insecure, she'll ruminate about your devotion (or lack thereof), convincing herself that you have to be cheating to make her feel so neglected and unworthy.  Worse, she hurls these accusations at you constantly, to reclaim your attention which she thinks is rightfully hers.  Your natural reaction is to engage and JADE (short for Justify, Argue, Defend and Explain), but that's using logic when your wife is in an illogical, emotional state.  The more you JADE, the more she feels invalidated.  She even flips the script and deems your arguments as PROOF that you're guilty.  You see, you can't "win" arguments like this, because the basis is all emotion (insecurity, displeasure, alienation; feeling neglected, unworthy, unloveable, unattractive, unsexy, etc.).  That's why she'll refuse to entertain any evidence, and why she'll turn any evidence of your innocence into something else--namely proof that you're a hacker who manipulates data and erases electronic records.

Anyway, that's my attempt to explain the situation.  What to do about it though is complicated.  Here the general advice is to take care of yourself first.  That includes doing your job, keeping your friends  and staying close to family, because that's what healthy adults do.  Keeping friends and family close is especially important, because they help keep you grounded.

As for the unfair accusations, how I react might depend on the situation.  My main advice is not to JADE when her emotions are running high, because emotions are hijacking her brain, and she can't process any logic or defensiveness from you when she's all riled up.  If she's upset, you could try to be reassuring (I love you, I married you and I choose to be with you every day).  But if she's being mean/disrespectful and hurling insults, my advice is to calmly exit the situation, in effect putting her in an "adult time out."  You give her time and space to calm down, while you protect yourself from abusive or disrespectful treatment from her.  Only engage when she's being respectful.  If you can't exit the situation, for example if you're riding in a car together, my advice is to "gray rock," as in, sit as quitely and still as a gray rock.  The idea is not to react, not to lend any emotional energy to the conversation, in the hopes that she'll calm down.

[Notwendy]

Since you are a counselor- you probably know a lot about BPD. We aren't professionals here but can share our experiences.

For pwBPD, feelings can feel like facts. You aren't cheating but if your wife feels it she thinks it's true and then accuses you. For much of this, you seem to be defending yourself against a false accusation. While to you, self defense is the "hill"- this behavior- defending what you didn't do- is also something you are doing repetitively. As you see, it doesn't change her thinking or feeling- because we can not change another person's feelings.

The concept of not JADE-ing- don't defend the invalid may help. If it isn't true, then defending yourself isn't necessary. This isn't the court of law where you need to prove your innocence. You know you didn't do it and your wife saying it doesn't make it true. Now, if she were to go to court with false accusation- there you would need to prove innocence but this is her words at the moment.

One mental exercise that helped me to decrease JADE is to substitute something absurd for the accusation. If your wife told you that you were a pink elephant, would you try to prove you are not? You know you aren't one. Her saying it doesn't make it true.

This is about boundaries. Talking to a client, going to coffee, having a male friend to hang out with sometimes. None of these are cheating. Having a crush on someone 20 years ago before you met your wife isn't cheating. In fact, going for coffee could be a sanity activity if you need some time to yourself to think when there's tension at home.

You can validate the feeling but not the fact. If your wife is upset you can say, "I see you are feeling upset about when I went for coffee yesterday", and yet don't defend what is invalid- follow with "it's just coffee, and something I like to do" and be done with it.

Be prepared for an extinction burst. These false accusations cause you to shift your focus on to her and managing her own feelings. She may escalate to get this back.

This is a small change in your behavior- and may not address all the issues you are dealing with but the less you defend what you didn't do- perhaps it can help.

[CC43]

Be prepared for an extinction burst. These false accusations cause you to shift your focus on to her and managing her own feelings. She may escalate to get this back.

I agree that escalation is a common tactic.  If yelling worked to get you to do something she wanted in the past, now she'll scream like a banshee.  If accusations of infidelity worked before, she might amp it up and accuse you of sleeping with men, or maybe committing incest or rape.  If historically she got her way by slamming doors and storming off, she might take it up a notch and spend the night away without telling you where she's going, throw things around, break things or threaten violence.  I think that sort of over-the-top behavior is a sign that she's teetering on the edge, becoming more and more delusional and maybe headed for a breakdown.  With the pwBPD in my life, seeming completely unhinged is a clear warning sign.  I think you know it when you see it.

But sometimes I think there's a fair amount of manipulation with these tactics.  Oftentimes, to me it feels like she "indulges" in her negative thinking and outbursts, mainly to try to get YOU to break.  She either wants you to grant her a concession, or she wants you to retaliate, so that she has a real reason to feel victimized, to blame YOU for messing everything up.  So you have to be on the lookout here, not to let her outbursts convince you to do something you might regret--say something mean, admit to something you didn't do, agree to be punished, agree to be isolated from others, or worse, stoop to her level and fight back the way she's fighting.  She doesn't fight fairly, and you need to avoid "dignifying" her behavior with a like response, tempting though that may be.  That's why I usually recommend to exit the situation when she's riled up.

Maybe I've been too harsh with these examples, but I can give you another one.  Let's say your wife forbids you to go to coffee houses because she's convinced you're attracted to baristas, given your history.  You might agree to this, thinking it's a small sacrifice to console your wife; besides, you can make coffee at home.  But in my experience, the pwBPD won't stop there.  If you give an inch, she'll take a mile, and before long she might escalate and try to prevent you from going to the gym, frequenting restaurants or hanging out with friends.  After that, she'll try to prevent you from visiting with family, even talking with them on the phone.  By isolating you, she's controlling you, while demanding that you focus 100% of your attention on her, which isn't healthy for either of you.  There are some posters on this site who say their jealous spouse tries to prevent them from going to work to earn a living, and these posters are so distraught that they actually contemplate quitting and financial ruin, to assuage their spouse's fears.  But none of that is healthy--not financially, not socially, not for your own sanity.  You should not be subject to house arrest, constant surveillance or living under a presumption of guilt.  You are not a slave, and you don't deserve to be treated like one.

My advice?  You model for your spouse what a healthy adult's life looks like.  That starts with taking exquisite care of yourself--eating right, sleeping regularly, getting exercise, being financially responsible.  You do your job, pursue your hobbies and stay close with your longtime friends and family.  You get therapy if you need it.  If she has a fit over you hanging out friends from time to time, you let her have a fit.  I say something like, "I'm grabbing coffee with my dear friend in town and will be back at 10:30 am."  I'm not justifying it or defending myself, because it's NORMAL to catch up with a friend over coffee from time to time, because that's what healthy adults do!  And if she doesn't have a fit when you do something healthy, you say something like, "Thank you for supporting me when I visited with my friend.  It's so nice to be married to someone who is supportive (of a healthy lifestyle)."  Similarly, whenever she does something fun or healthy, you might say, "I'm so glad you enjoyed your afternoon / I'm so glad you had a good workout / I'm glad you called your parent/sibling to check in."  In other words, you're showing that you support one another in creating a healthy, happy, socially connected life.  I've found that the more I say, "I'm so glad you practiced your hobby / worked out at the gym / saw your friend," it's like I'm reinforcing the value of a healthy life, and that I expect the very same for me.

[ForeverDad]

I agree that escalation is a common tactic.  If yelling worked to get you to do something she wanted in the past, now she'll scream like a banshee.  If accusations of infidelity worked before, she might amp it up and accuse you of sleeping with men, or maybe committing incest or rape.  If historically she got her way by slamming doors and storming off, she might take it up a notch and spend the night away without telling you where she's going, throw things around, break things or threaten violence...

But sometimes I think there's a fair amount of manipulation with these tactics.  Oftentimes, to me it feels like she "indulges" in her negative thinking and outbursts, mainly to try to get YOU to break.  She either wants you to grant her a concession, or she wants you to retaliate, so that she has a real reason to feel victimized, to blame YOU for messing everything up...

But in my experience, the pwBPD won't stop there.  If you give an inch, she'll take a mile, and before long she might escalate...  By isolating you, she's controlling you, while demanding that you focus 100% of your attention on her, which isn't healthy for either of you...

In the final year of my marriage, my then-spouse did both, promising concessions that didn't happen and egging me into responding similarly.