Wife back in hospital - Part 2

[sweetheart]

There comes a point in caring for someone who is on the lower end of functioning with this mental illness when it’s about what you do, not what they are doing or will do.

I completely get being in a place where your partners illness is just not visible to professionals in the same way it is to you. My husband did what your wife did for years, I wasn’t living separately from him. He masked and manipulated healthcare professionals and the police every time I involved them in his suicide threats, attempts and dysregulated behaviours. The minute they would turn up, or assess him at the Emergency Department or even in the psych ward he would always convince them he was ok and turn up home again.

What changed was me. I realised that I was not responsible for his actions and did not hold the key to his life by being their for him every time he threatened suicide. I remember driving back from a weekend away with our son because he was threatening to take an overdose after drinking too much, getting him in the car and took him back to the holiday home with us for the rest of the weekend. I should have called the police but I thought what’s the point!

Your wife knows that you will answer and engage in conversation with her every time she contacts you.
So my suggestion is that you start with some small boundaries to protect you from what is happening. Decide on an amount or a time limit where you won’t engage in a phone conversation or answer texts from her more than...what could you manage?

If your wife threatens suicide call the police every single time and ask them to do undertake a Welfare Check. Keep her texts as evidence, and record her phone conversations so you have proof of her behaviour when she then denies it to professionals.

She may feel like your responsibility, but she is not. If she can be found drunk at the side of the road by the police and sweet talk them to get back home then there is a large part of her behaviour that is premeditated, manipulative and coercive; knowing that this behaviour keeps you in her life.

Every time you answer a text, or engage in a conversation about her life being over you unintentionally reinforce the behaviour. She has you where she wants you talking about the one subject that she knows keeps you attached to her.

It is a terribly sad, sad dynamic to be caught up in, but you have the power to change your part in this behaviour. I am not suggesting for one minute that you have to be unkind or dispassionate, but decide what might be a reasonable amount of contact with your wife looks like and start to put that boundary in place.

If you decide to make some small incremental changes in how you deal with her texts, threats, phonecalls, she will notice the change and very probably ramp up all her threats. It is at this juncture where you must use the police, her therapist and anyone else who might be in her life.

I want to say this one last thing,, there is every possibility that your might kill her self on one of her attempts. Combining alcohol and pills is a lethal combination. My husband was on life support after such a combination, he didn’t die, but this was luck not judgement, and it didn’t stop him. A short time after this he walked out drunk into the path of a lorry. It was never ending, but I knew/know I couldn’t be his saviour. And believe me I tried and tried and tried.
We had a young son and this forum that brought me to my senses.

Slow incremental steps that place boundaries around your behaviours and responses  will help you find some emotional breathing space in the suffocating very scary position that you are in.

[formflier]

Did they deny requests for a plan or instructions for further suicide attempts?

Best,

FF

[sweetheart]

I just want to add that I do not use the words, coercive, manipulative in a pejorative way, but in ways that are part of the maladaptive coping responses for pwBPD.

Also getting bogged down with chasing your w’s therapist, psychiatrist and other healthcare professionals when they are either not available to you or don’t see your wife as you do keeps you caught in her dysfunctional cycle.

By all means let them know via email, not a phonecall what has/is happening, but chasing them down can be exhausting and will add to that feeling of frustration and burnout when they are not on the same page as you.
You cannot make others see things as you do, that is one of the tragedies of this illness.

Take care of yourself by handing over your wife’s threats to the police EVERY SINGLE TIME she makes the threats.

Also might I suggest that you see if there are any DV helplines that you could call for support. Coercive control is a criminal offence here in the U.K. and there is help and support for people like you who are on the end of extreme behaviours like your wife’s. A DV centre/helpline will know about coercive control and support you by helping you find a better way through this.

[GaGrl]

Turning these situations over to the police is the y but course of action.

Call the police and tell them each time she threatens suicide or harm. They will check and, at first, probably determine she is safe and not in need of emergency care. So she threatens again -- a few days (?) later -- you call the police, they check, she is determined to be safe. So she threatens again -- a few days later -- you call...see where this is going? How many police visits will it take for the police to decide she needs hospitalization for an assessment of safety? They sure don't want to keep going there -- they would like to resolve the situation.

[formflier]

I'm also wondering if it is time to discuss with your T whether or not it's time to change your response to SI. 

Yes to calling police EVERY SINGLE TIME.

I'm wondering what other responses can be changed.   

Best,

FF