BPD and alcohol abuse

[Roderix]

Hello everyone,

This is my first post, so sorry for maybe not being in the good form.

I'm a gay man, 41, and I'm in a relationship with a 33 years old pwBPD.
The diagnostic of BPD is quite recent but not still validated, it is not something he has yet assumed as being confirmed.

He had a lot of problems since the childhood:
- He was adopted when he was 3 weeks, the natural father was alcoholic.
- He had a lot of problem with his adoptive family: the mother was physical violent until his 11 years, at his 13 he started a relationship with a man who had 30, finished by the parents through police threats and legal trial. At his 16 he has been sexual abused by his uncle under chantage over one year. His parents took the side of the uncle. My bf suited the uncle 10 years later , resulting in a non-lieu. His parents still says that "man justice has decided that there was nothing, so only god may judge now". His father still go out with the uncle... .
At the time of sexual abuse he started firmly drinking.

Today the situation is that he has a well paid job (financial manager), but he has no control of his private life. He drinks an average of 3 litres of beer (8,6% alcohol) each day, and he is not able to go out or to get a real conversation with somebody.

Sexual relationship is a huge matter between us. In the past he dated with men as if he was alone, even in my presence!, or by revenge if he thinks I deserve it... .

His worst problem is nevertheless alcohol abuse. He drinks a lot , to calm his distress. But it is so much that he gets almost in a coma state. He may fall down everywhere, at home or in the streets, hurting himself and getting vulnerable.
He recognises he has to stop, but I don't feel in him a real commitment to stop drinking, neither to seek for help regarding BPD. He barely goes seing a psychiatrist, he went to rehab 3 times in one year, but his drinking habitus has not changed.

Sometimes is really difficult to bear his emotional ups and downs. He may be very verbal agressif, or very sad, or in a physical distress that makes him having difficulties to breathe... .
Difficult in this situation to know the part of BPD or alcohol abuse. I suppose both are tied together.

I've learned about BPD no so long ago, so I have started reading, and I try to observe myself in order to be wisemind, alert and avoid to be invalidating.

We live together since december, but I still have my own appartment, so there is not too much things from me in his home and I have no pressure regarding the economy of living together.

Is there any advices you may give me in order to bear this situation?

I'm not intending to break up with him, but the situation seems unbearable.
He ask me to buy him some bears, since he has spent all his money in this moment... .We usually fight on this, sometimes I resist, sometimes I give some money for him to buy some cans.

But for me the real problem is how to influence him so he may assume publicly and above all to himself that he may have a BPD and also that he has to stop alcohol for good.
Also, when he is in distress, he almost always comeback to the sexual abuse and the situation with his father, since he love his father (more than the mother) but he wants his father to formally apologize, and this it seems that will never occur.

I understant that he has a heavy past in terms of suffering. But how can I help him to stop rehearsing? Lately he is depressive, he cries a lot, drinks a lot, don't do anything except watching some tv or movies. But sometimes I think he uses his past in order to justify his alcohol consoption, and his distress to justify this alcohol abuse... .

Hope you may help me!

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[pearlsw]

Hi Roderix,



Thank you for sharing the story of you and your partner. There is a lot here and it paints a broad picture of the many issues going on. I am sorry the two of you are having such a hard time!

First I want to start with you a bit though and ask, do you know much about codependency? It is one thing to want to support our partners, it is another to take on too much regarding their issues. Ya know? Have you seen this yet about Supporting Your BPD Partner ?

It is just important to remember that in order to deal with such challenging issues, we need to be in the best state that we ourselves can be.

Does he seem self-aware that he has issues that he is struggling with? Does he want to do any work on himself? Has he ever expressed an interest in doing something about his issues with alcohol?

warmly, pearl.

[Roderix]

Dear Pearl,

Thanks for your reply, and for the points you have mentionned.

I've read about codependency quite soon as I have started my relationship withmy bf. At the beginning I didn't know he had a BPD, I thought the problem was "only" alcoholism and his traumas. As about one year ago he had a huge alcoholic crisis, not goint to work for about 2 months, and almost dying at home for not eating and too much drinking, I started trying to react, in order to bear that situation and to give him a help without being the savior, so I discovered the concept of codependency. Since then I try to pay attention on it.
Since last year (we're together singe January 2017), I have refused several times to give him money to buy bear, and I explain that this is the last thing I would do for it.
Even if it may happens that sometimes I may help him with some pocket money, even if I stay with him, and try to help him with advices, even if I work on to bear his verbal violence or his moods, even if I try to show him that I'm with him, that I love him besides the huge problems, I don't think I'm in the case of codependency.
At least when I answer to the questionary about codependency, for most of the questions the answer is negative.
I don't need his approval to be myself happy, I didn't have before him other bf with problems, I have never felt like needing to make people happy in order to be happy myself. I don't fall in mood because he is in crisis, I don't feel at all responsible for his situation, and I know my help is hopeless if he doesn't accept to be helped himself.
Yes, I have to clean up the house sometimes, but I'm not there each day to do whatever he wants me to do. And indeed he most of the time ask me to not doing the house cleaning, because he doens't want me to be his houseboy. His home is most of the time dirty, with a lot of empty beer cans all around, and I just decide to clean a little when it comes unlivable.
I recognise I want to help, and that learning about his problems and disorder have made me understand that his alcoholism is an illness and that BPD is not his fault. So I look at him now with different eyes. I see him most as somebody that suffers and need validation and tenderness that somebody who has no willing or somebody that only tries to manipulate or deeply narcissistic.

Of course is difficult to know each time wich are the limits between being helpfull or being codependent, of course I know that if I concede sometimes to his willings it may create a dependency situation, but I try to be aware of what is his responsability for action, as well as mine.

From my side, I have started reading about BPD and addictions, and this gave me good answers in order to act or react differently, avoiding invalidations (and this is not easy!), and showing him patience and empathy even in moments of crisis.

In this moment I'm trying to focus on arguments, trying to leed him to think about his condition, and the bad consequences of his alcoholism. I'm not myself in crisis, neither in distress.

I think he is aware of the issues he is struggling with. He knows that he has a pending problem to be solved regarding the sexual abuse he had in his adolescence and the relation with his parents. He knows that alcohol is getting him to disaster, if not death. But it's true also that he has an ambiguous response to that. He doesn't affirm clearly neither that he wants/needs to look for a BPD specialist, nor stopping drinking. About drinking for instance, he says "I'll control it step by step, slowing down progressively by beer consumption", but he have never expressed it really publicly, nor explain me how he would do it. No methods are mentionned, no protocols neither methodology are expressed.

In this moment he's not working, and besides he does nothing else but drinking (he doesn't feed himself really since several days now), besides he feels really weak and fragile, besides vomiting each day because of drinking, he doens't want to see a doctor, or going to the hospital.
He cries a lot every day since, he sleeps a lot, but have changed his natural timing, so he wakes up early in the morning while I'm sleeping, so he can drinks without my pression, and when I come back from work, he will be sleeping, so we have only a few moments to really being together both awake.

He seems to suffer from distress, and according to him the beer is the only thing that helps him to calm down from it. But I really think that one important part of his distress (perhaps more than the rehearsing of his traumas in adolescence and childhood) is a distress that comes from a deep form of procrastination or powerlessness, from the fact the he knows he should do something to change his life, to take care of his health, but he cannot or is not prepared to.
He had passed in his past through lot of rehab centers, but I feel like each time he went there was only when his physical condition was really bad, and most of the time he stayed there only for one or two weeks, and never tried a post-rehab protocol. He says had passed through several psychologists and psychiatrists in his life, that it never worked. But at the same time is it the first time that a doctor says he may have a BPD.

I feel him as if he was trapped in his childhood/adolescence regarding the emotions, even if I know him as a very intelligent man.
About alcohol, he says it was, it is, his medication in difficult times. And I beleave this is true. I try to show him that alcohol is not only a soothing, but also a huge problem. Most of my friends beleave that if he had an "emotional shock", or a "real problem, ie, physical problem or illness" may he would start to react.
I'm not that sure, since as per his history, I know he have passed through the worst events possible (no money at all, sleeping in the streets for a few days, moto accident) and that had not helped him stop drinking.

So, I don't want to be defeatist, nor I think to be his savior, but I really want to help, and as I am really the only person he communicates with in this moment, I feel a bit responsible to help him. So I try to help though communication, validation, empathy and tenderness. But also with rational thinking, with reality clarification. I don't over help, I don't do everything he wants, I don't say yes to everything he wants nor apologize me for everything he may accuse me. I have not stopped seing my friends nor going out because of him, even if he begs me to stay.

But when the situation is really hard to bear, when he over drinks , when I see him physically and mentally knocked out, what can I do to help?

The problem of stablishing boundaries is very hard. Should I threat him of broking up, or not coming to see him everyday, if he doesn't do this or that (for instance, cleaning the house, taking a shower, brushing his tooth, or reducing the quantity of beers)? Or this kind of threat is useless?

Thanks in advance for your reading and advice.

[braveSun]

Hi Roderix!   

I'd like to join pearlsw in welcoming your to BPD family. It's a good place here. You'll find many other people have struggles similar to yours, in various degrees. Alcoholism in a loved one is a tough one for the heart.

       

There are many things I could say. But if I'd start with just one thing, I'd ask you how is your self-care these days?

I think that you have a good understanding of the concept of codependency. Your situation with your bf must have a lot of pull on you with all of his intensity.

The one thing I found out helped me with discouragement is to make sure I find support for myself first.  There may be groups who meet regularly in your city for people who love someone with addiction. I would check that out.

Another point is, you do not control your bf's actions. You cannot make him do anything. The only control you have is on yourself. Your actions, reactions, intentions. Whatever good habits you establish in your life for yourself, even though you may be sorta abandoning him a little, will in the end have an effect into nudging him towards more self-awareness.

What do you think?

Brave

[walkinthepark247]

Roderix, welcome. As I read your post, I'm wondering what boundaries you can put in place?

I'm also reminded of the beginning of the serenity prayer:

"God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference."

I’m not saying this to proselytize. There is wisdom in those words whether you are religious or not.