Are those common future objectives realistically possible. Having children can be initially everything a pwBPD wants and yearns for... complete control over something that needs them for everything but most importantly doesn't answer back and invalidate them... but the terrible 2s, 3s, 4s... >> >> > 18s bring a world of pain, invalidation, stress and anxiety. It's bad enough for a healthy adult. I'm sure from other threads you might have read you'll see the problem people have co-parenting with a pwBPD traits and that's often excluding additional complications of substance abuse and suicide attempts. You might want to consider what effects those kinds of behaviours have on the multi generational transfer of this disorder.

https://bpdfamily.com/content/why-we-struggle-in-relationships   ---- parenting section

It's not that these objectives are impossible for you as a couple. They are possible, it's just that she has to go through some significant therapy before else the probability of a later problem is significantly higher.

This isn't my choice, it's yours, I'm all for giving people an opportunity to thrive, but when it comes to small people that's a huge responsibility and one not to be taken lightly... and I know you wouldn't.

Enabler

 

Thank you both for your replies.

Perdita, it's lovely to meet you and you're not alone, that's what's great about this place, we recognise so much of our own struggles and it's so validating to realise that others have been in our shoes.

I woke up having had weird dreams and nightmares all night. Horrible dreams of finding her dead in bed surrounded by pills, running around a weird empty building shouting her name and not being able to find her. I felt at a low ebb and feeling even more conflicted than ever.

No I wouldn't bring children into this relationship as it stands. That's why it's a potential area of looming conflict. I won't even propose to her, much to her disappointment, but why would I propose to someone that breaks up with me more than a handful of times every year?

---

I found a note from her in the kitchen this morning. It was attached to a letter I had written to her about 18 months ago. She said "Just thought you should see this and how much you've changed towards me. I used to be someone to you...guess it was all lies"

I read the letter I had written and it really brought home to me how my prior actions and beliefs have fed into the dysfunction of this relationship. I cringe reading it now because yes, I absolutely thought that this was how relationships worked and how one person should be completely willing to sacrifice everything about themselves for their partner. I had no boundaries, I was my dad.

I remember the events leading up to me writing the letter very well. We'd gone out for a meal, it had been going wonderfully. The atmosphere was romantic, the food was delicious, conversation was flowing. She looked on her phone and said "Oh! Your friend has invited me to take part in a photography competition". Some context to this, I love photography and had recently taught my friend how to use her new SLR camera and we both enjoy this hobby. My response was a little bit of surprise and a little bit of faux outrage, I said "ooh charming, she's not invited me, the one who taught her how to use her fancy camera, haha! How rude, the cheeky  " I'd had a couple of glasses of wine and was feeling rather "loose". I wasn't really that bothered but felt a little ruffled.

Her reaction to this was to become really upset, she said I'd never get that upset about her and it was clear that I cared a lot more about my friend than her, that she wished she was even half as important to me than everyone else and that I clearly didn't think she was good enough to be interacting with my friends.

Horrified, I spend the rest of the night trying to convince her she was wrong and JADE'ing like it was an Olympic sport. She was still upset, silent treatment, threats of breakup the next day and I wrote her this dratted letter. Silly G1B8oN!

Here's the parts of my letter that she "helpfully" highlighted for me


Who was that person? What a mess!

I have no idea how to negotiate this. No wonder she's upset, this must be so confusing for her. She still clings to romantic fairy-tale notions of relationships, I don't any more. This is probably partly due to our age difference; she's 8 years younger but I think it's a common BPD trait too.

Here's my truth now...

• I don't feel so all-or nothing about relationships any more. Being in a relationship with a PD individual has made me question why I'm willing to tolerate abusive behaviour. Despite the song, love is not all you need!
• Things in this relationship have gotten so bad that I can no longer tolerate or ignore the violation of my values
• Reading around BPD and codependency has made me more aware of my own disordered beliefs and thinking
• I do not believe that a person should abandon or sacrifice friends or family to please their partner
• My brother has been in therapy for a year now. We've spoken about things a lot and together, we have been able to better understand and reframe our childhood experiences and identify "fleas" we inherited from this environment

I need to think of a way I can convey my "truths" without invalidating her or her feeling like my personal growth towards better mental health is a rejection of her. So far I left her note saying "I see how this must be very confusing for you. I have taken the note to  read and consider further"

How on earth does a person begin to undo this kind of damage of their own making?

Thanks for your input Enabler.

I broadly agree with your overall assessment, particularly that love in chosen relationships, particularly where there are no children involved should not be unconditional and there should be a difference in the way we love our partners to the way we would love our children. I set up a lot of future traps and landmines for myself by establishing some very unsustainable and unrealistic relationship paradigms.

I also agree that if she had not been merrily hacking away at my bonds of love and trust for her, I would probably still be head over heels in love with her rather than the hyper-cautious emotional wreck I am now. I don't believe however that I would still hold to the notion that I should be willing to cut off my friends or family just to reassure or please my partner or that it's right or healthy to make your partner your *whole* world.

I don't think it's gonna go down great though if I respond to her by saying

"I used to think I loved you like that but I don't anymore, I was delusional and mentally not quite right in the head. That way of loving is not realistic, you are a grown up, not a child so to expect me to love you unconditionally is a fantasy. It turns out that yes, my declarations of unconditional love were a lie. Your awful actions and behaviour have eroded my love for you and all my trust and faith in this relationship to the point where I'm pretty sure I can't go on any more despite the fact that I do still love you deeply and truly wanted a future with you."

She tends to take things very literally. To her if I say something like "I'll love you forever" or even "I'll always be there for you" she takes it utterly literally. I think this is a BPD trait but there is also ASD in her side of the family so who knows! I just really don't want to fall into a JADE trap but I also don't want another trip to A&E!

I'm sorry to hear that your wife is having an extramarital affair. That must be really hard on you and put an incredible strain on your marriage.

I felt like I owed her some sort of response. I know it's JADEing but I really do feel responsible for the unhealthy behaviours and actions that contributed to our problems but like you say, she's played her part too.

I simply told her that when I wrote that letter it was my honest truth. I had no way of knowing what the effect of repeated breakups and silent treatment would have on my faith and trust in a future for us. I know she's said her actions were designed to hurt her but that she was not the only one hurt. I am a different person to when I wrote that letter and that I have come to understand that relationships have to be built on a strong foundation and that foundation must be maintained by both people or the relationship will fall apart. I believe we should both be extremely wary of re-entering a dysfuntional relationship.

I tried to take yours and FF's advice by writing out what I had to say, halving it and then chopping it down again! Whatever her response I won't JADE any further.
 

Yeah absolutely, I think it is about me and my feelings. I hate being thought of as a liar even though logically I know that people are entitled to their opinions and so am I.  I also hate the waify air of her note and she successfully pushed a button by making it seem like mean, nasty G1B8oN was breaking my word and abandoning poor helpless her.

She'll probably twist my words but whatever, this was all I have to say on the subject.

I know that the things I said in the letter were said with the best of intentions at the time, still, I'll not be making any sweeping promises of undying love and loyalty any time soon. It's still bends my brain how pwBPD can demand such things as trust, loyalty and respect from their partners from the get-go without thinking that these things are earned or that they should maybe return the favour 

I'm also emotionally abusive, manipulative and controlling apparently too...hmmm it describes one of us but it ain't me! Saying that, early on in the relationship, I was quite controlling in the sense that I always tried to be helpful and plan stuff. I was far too interfering and even though it was done with the best of intentions it was actually disempowering and invalidating of her. She still complained when I stopped it though because that meant I didn't care about her any more 

Well, she didn't exactly respond to my reply as I expected.

She left me a much longer letter. I think to her it was about us and how she acknowledges (at least a teensy bit) that her behaviour has contributed to the problems in the RS.

I resisted the urge to reply immediately. The letter was huge (2 sides of A4 and written in size 6 font) and I knew not to fall into the trap of JADE-ing. Instead, I sat down with a couple of highlighters and looked for consistent messages and themes. It was immediately clear that the letter had almost no empathy, it was all about her feelings. The main theme seemed to be that she was feeling hurt I hadn't met her deadline and that I'd carried on with my weekend plans to see my friend (in her words I had abandoned her when she needed me most).

After her most recent thwarted suicide attempt the hospital staff had asked me if I would be "around" for the forseeable future. I took this to mean that they were worried about her being at home alone for long periods. I replied that I was going to stay off work for a couple of days and would support her in getting better mental health as much as I was able. In her letter she implied that I'd made a promise to her and the hospital to support her and that I wasn't doing that because I'd been downstairs reading a book or watching TV and that she'd come home really late a couple of nights and I hadn't even bothered to get in touch.

The reality of this is that I had taken 2 days off work and returned to work when she did. I had asked her a few times if she was OK and explained to her that I was just downstairs if she needed me but that as we were broken up I wouldn't be constantly checking on her or going into her bedroom if the door was shut and she was clearly moving about. She came home from work at 7pm one night and 6pm another night...hardly going to ring alarm bells if a 27 year old is an hour or two late home from work! She'd been eating, drinking (too much beer but nothing like when she's in crisis), listening to music and singing along and keeping herself nicely washed and dressed.

After reading the letter I decided not to reply in writing. I went upstairs and said to her

"From reading your letter it seems like you're feeling hurt and that you feel like my going away for the weekend was the wrong thing to do. It must have been really hard to want me to stay home for the weekend and for me to continue on with my plans instead. I wonder if there were some things you might have done that weekend that could have helped you cope like going to see your family or friends? I made those plans well in advance and we had been broken up for two months at the time. Also, you seem to imply in your letter that I am not worried enough about your potential to hurt yourself. I have been worried about you but I do not want you to feel smothered or overwhelmed by me and from what I've observed, you seem to be less in crisis right now. Am I wrong? Should I be more worried that you may attempt suicide again?"

She seemed a bit taken aback that I'd responded to her long, detailed letter with such a brief response. She said, no, I was right, she wasn't currently feeling suicidal. She started on at me about the weekend I'd gone away and I responded that I hadn't really got anything more to add at that time and didn't want us to go round in circles and upset each other. She said that I'd changed and it wasn't only her that thought it. Her friend (who we unfortunately live with) had told her that she liked my partner's ex better than me. I told her that her friend was entitled to her opinion of course but ultimately the only opinion that she should listen to was her own and that I was no longer going to continue the conversation as it had become very negative.

The next day she came to talk to me, we started discussing things that had happened in the past and she yet again brought up her ex. This time it was about the lack of sex and intimacy in the relationship and I just totally lost my temper and blew up. I shouted that I didn't give a flying ****** about her ex and that if she missed her so much she could **** off back to her. I then pointed out that she'd have a bit of trouble with that seeing as how her ex got sick of her games and hurting her and had blocked her in every way possible. I asked why she thought that was? And then before she had a chance to reply I yelled "it's because you hurt people, you *****ing hurt them". I then went on a brief rant about how she'd disregarded every need and boundary I'd ever tried to set, how she'd denigrated, shamed and shunned me and how angry and hurt I was. I then said I think we should go no contact and only discuss things by email and only keep it to the topic of moving out and sorting out the bills. She got a scary glint in her eye, said fine and stormed off.

After yelling I felt both great and horribly guilty. I felt like a huge weight had been lifted and so much of what I'd been repressing and not speaking up about had finally been released. I did regret the way I'd expressed myself though, shouting and yelling at her was not exactly my finest moment.

The next day I went out early in the morning, she saw me driving off and gave me a sad little wave. Later she sent me a text saying she acknowledged what I'd said and that she wanted me to come home and discuss things. I ignored her but then she sent another, more pleading this time. I was a bit worried for her safety so I sent her a message saying that I didn't think talking was a good idea, that I was ashamed for yelling and shouting and that if she sent me questions by email I'd do my best to answer them. Instead she sent me another text pleading for me to come home. I said if she was in danger of hurting herself that she needed to contact the numbers the hospital had given her or a friend or family member.

A few hours later I came home and she came to talk. She begged me to try again with the relationship and said that it wasn't fair I was giving up on the relationship right at the point it might be about to improve. She had a point. I'd also been thinking all day that a lot of the *really* awful stuff was confined to the first 12-18 months of the RS. The last year had been an exhausting grind of me setting boundaries and her fighting against them. Having let off some steam and told her how I felt about stuff I'd come to realise that a lot of resentment had gone. I finally felt like I was thinking more clearly about the RS as a whole rather than just focusing on all the hurt. We talked for hours, the end result being that I agreed to try again.

We've established some ground rules; we go to couples therapy, I go to bed when I'm tired, she does individual therapy, I don't throw the past back at her any more and neither does she (we are allowed to bring it up in therapy) and we work on our communication and the next time one of us tries to break up, that's it (kind of like cold war mutually assured destruction...step away from the big button!). Finally, her friend does not move to the new house and can no longer live with us (it's been hell for me and I hate having this stranger in my home).

We've had a pretty good two weeks so far. A few tricky moments, it's a stressful time with moving house, work issues, big looming life decisions so it's inevitable that she'd dysregulate occasionally but we've not had any major fights. I'm under no illusion that this is a honeymoon period that won't last but I really do feel better in myself having taken a break from the RS and that the time allowed me to reflect and build on more skills and boundaries. We'll see what happens...

Haha, don't worry about it, I've been thinking of it as a recycle too. I'm determined it will be the last...well not counting the other day when she was really drunk and said she was going to break up with me because I wouldn't let her eat her messy takeout in my car 

I have already laid down some things that I would consider essential for having kids or marrying...
1. No kids if she uses unhealthy coping mechanisms like alcohol or drugs to manage her emotions
2. No kids if she is still a smoker and there would need to be a minimum of 1 year demonstrating this (no way are my kids lungs getting damaged by passive smoke)
3. No kids or marriage if we are still engaging in disrespect, raging, physical aggression or shaming

We've said that we would use our couples counselling to further refine these.

I've never been good a keeping a diary but a journal is appealing. What sort of things do you put in it? Do you write it every day?

I will fully admit that part of my decision is insecurity and fear as well as a twinge of jealousy but I'd like to think that a greater part of my decision making is based on love, fond memories of good times, hope for myself to be able to improve my own situation and hope for my partner to improve hers too.

My advice to myself is to give it a year and honestly decide if things are any better. If not, there really isn't any more I can expect of myself or her and it's time to walk away with my head held high.

Yeah, that's a good point. I suppose that there's always a chance someone might revert to maladaptive coping mechanisms. I really don't know to be completely honest! I picked a year for smoking because the first year is always the hardest according to ex smokers I've asked.

I think I'm more hung up on smoking because it would directly affect my children's physical health. It's also something I can more easily attach a number on to because I have spoken to many ex-smokers. Genetically, my family are very prone to lung cancer on my father's side, my granddad died of lung cancer at 45, my uncle who hadn't smoked for 25 years at 50 and my grandma also had lung cancer when she died and had never smoked.

Number 1 and 3 are important too, I wouldn't want that behaviour modelled or normalised for my children but I can mitigate it by not engaging in that behaviour myself and making it clear that it isn't OK. I can't mitigate cigarette smoke by sucking out of my children's lungs. I still wouldn't contemplate kids if she was engaging in 1 and 3 but I'm less clear on an appropriate timeline. For example it's been a year since she physically assaulted me but I still don't trust her. I don't know how much time I'd need to be sure it was in the bounds of extreme unlikelihood.

Thanks for the guidance on the journal. That makes sense. I did use a mood tracker app once to see if I could see patterns in her moods but they changed so fast it was hard to keep up! How do you keep your wife from finding the journal and snooping?

I knew she was just being a drunk idiot with the take out. She was blind drunk after being to a birthday party with her friends who are big drinkers and even emotionally regulated people do things like that in that state, I actually found it quite funny at the time and the memory still makes me laugh a bit. She didn't even remember saying it in the morning. My brother once told me his partner once broke up with him whilst she was very drunk after a work party because he clicked the light switch too loudly in their bedroom. They've been together for 15 years and are really happy, a rock solid couple. I would take it very differently if she'd said anything about breaking up whilst sober or even just a bit drunk.

You can't "suck words out of their brains"..or images either.

I think the research is solid that abusive words, images and actions have a direct impact on physical health.

I'll give you a personal health example to illustrate how I'm on the "other side" of your example.

During my military service I've been in several fires and inhaled quite a bit of lovely toxic smoke.  There is some lung damage there.  I monitor it with twice a year breathing tests and a daily inhaler.  If I get an actual sickness in my lungs I usually "pre-load" (start taking emergency inhaler even if I don't feel like I need it).  That keeps me from getting my lung function knocked down.  My doctors have determined that's the best way to keep my function up.

I also swim a lot to build lung function.

So...with all of that I usually test in the normal range and rarely "notice" my lung issues.

If you gave me the choice of snapping my fingers and my lung issues went away...or snapping my fingers and my relationship issues went away (take away BPDish stuff).  I'd pick BPDish issues...in a heartbeat. 

Not saying you are wrong or trying to be argumentative...it has more to do with my perspective as a parent (of 8)...rather than impact on me. 

Best,

FF

When considering a timeframe, maybe the litmus test will be, if you have any thoughts about seriously needing to leave the relationship in a period of 6m or a year... it's not the right time. If you think you need to leave, a child probably SHOULD have left some time before that.

Don't worry, there'll be plenty more meals, eating out is our achilles heel, no wonder we can't ever lose weight! I was thinking that I would take her out for meal next week, there's a couple of places we keep saying we'll visit in our current city and it would be nice to visit them before we move.

I'm definitely getting there, I'm holding out on making new friendships until we move as I want to join a sports team there.

I'm definitely getting better at the small battles like last night. I need to build on that. I certainly wouldn't share my list of boundaries with her, I think I'll keep it at work with my new journal. It would probably be helpful; sometimes she crosses boundaries or I do something under pressure that violates them and I don't even realise until after and then I feel angry and disappointed in myself for allowing it to happen.

Yes!  Very proud of you!

I've had a dodgy stomach since a bout of food poisoning last week so in this instance the RS was not 100% to blame but it was partially.

My IBS always flares up badly when we're in conflict. The chronic effects of living in fight or flight mode all the time are a large part of my desire to improve things!