Breakup and co parenting

[Divorced2019]

Hi my soon to be ex husband has BPD. We have an 18 months baby together.
We were living apart because of his work and he started to get depressed. Also he lost a lot of money in the stock market which didn’t help.
After a couple of rough months trying to work things out in a distance relationship he said he wanted to divorce me and started seeing other people immediately.
Now he is with a 25 yo gf saying she’s the love of his life. We had been together for 5 years, they’ve known each other for 2 months and they’re moving in together.
He said he wants to pick up his daughter and take her to spend the weekends with them, which he never did before. He never cared for his daughter or payed for anything. I’ve been doing it solo since she was born.
How am I supposed to take this all in such a short period of time? In my mind we’re still married, but he was dating her and not taking my phone calls.
They broke up for a few days and he started texting me again and sent me an intimate picture out of nowhere.
I’m NC for now but we still have our daughter. I can’t cope with meeting the gf and pretending this is all ok. Plus, I want my child to have the least contact possible with a BPD father who will do to her the same he did to me.
Please help

[GaGrl]

Welcome!    We're glad you found us, even though the reason behind it is difficult. There are a number of members here who have been through separation and divorce from a BPD spouse and can offer help and support.

Let me make sure I fully understand your situation --

You did not initiate the divorce conversation -- he did.
He is living somewhere else.
He has started a new relationship.
You do not have any legal agreement yet regarding a divorce or child custody.

Is that correct?

Is your STBX living in the same state as you are, or is he in a different state? This makes a difference in a divorce action.

Is your STBX formally diagnosed with BPD? If so, what type of treatment has he had?

[ForeverDad]

He said he wants to pick up his daughter and take her to spend the weekends with them, which he never did before. He never cared for his daughter or paid for anything. I’ve been doing it solo since she was born.

It may be that he wants to appear like a father to his GF.  He also may be expecting she will join in on the feeding and care.

This is where you need to have documentation on how frequent (or rare) his parenting time has been — a calendar, diary or log.  Don't make a scene, as in exclaiming "I'm writing this down!", rather, just quietly add to your logs.  If it ends up in court for a custody or parenting dispute, claims of "he always..." or "she always..." are generally viewed as vague and unsubstantiated hearsay.  If you have logged how rare his parenting has been, the court will be able to determine how strong a pattern it is.  He may claim and insist he wants to parent now but once the urgency is past then he'll almost surely drift back to to his old patterns.

In my mind we’re still married...

They broke up for a few days and he started texting me again and sent me an intimate picture out of nowhere.

You know what he's like.  He has to have someone to latch onto.  BPD is often described as a disorder with feelings of abandonment as well as Blame Shifting.  Be aware, don't fall for these recycle attempts.  It's so sad but that's the way it is.

You probably feel you'd like some Closure.  You probably won't get any insight from him.  Better to Gift yourself Closure, Let Go and Move On.

He's a big boy, you don't have to feel you must be super-fair or super-nice to him.  Advocate for what is best for you and your child, let him fend for himself, so to speak.  Be proactive for both yourself and your child.

[Divorced2019]

Let me make sure I fully understand your situation --

You did not initiate the divorce conversation -- he did.
He is living somewhere else.
He has started a new relationship.
You do not have any legal agreement yet regarding a divorce or child custody.

Yes that’s correct! He sent me a text message saying he wanted a divorce right after he learned I’d be interviewing out of State for new job positions. And then, according to him, he started seeing other people until he found this girl and now they’re “serious” after 2 months and already one breakup.

We live in the same State of California

No custody agreement whatsoever.

He was never formally diagnosed with BPD. I’m a doctor but not a psychiatrist, and that’s my diagnosis. He is a textbook case, but he was never open to seek for help, so I also don’t know how much I can use the BPD in court if that’s the case, for example.

[GaGrl]

You don't have a court order, so you are not obligated to give him unsupervised visitation in another city with his clear indication that care will be provided by a new partner you have not yet met. You might offer him visitation in your home or a nearby park, with you supervising.

Remember, without a court order, he has as much right as you go take -- and keep -- the child.

Documentation is critical.

Even if the final result is not divorce, you might consider filing and getting a temp order to splurge your parenting position.

I'm so sorry -- this is an unsettled time.

[Divorced2019]

Thank you so much for clarifying all that for me!

Do you have any other group/thread that help people coping with separation and being suddenly discarded by a BPD?

[Panda39]

Hi Divorced2019,

Do you have any other group/thread that help people coping with separation and being suddenly discarded by a BPD?

You might want to check out the Bettering your relationship Board here is the link...
 https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?board=6.0

Hang in there,
Panda39

[kells76]

Hi Divorced2019, and welcome;

Oof - that all sounds sudden, though I'm curious if you guys had some issues in the time leading up to now.

I'd like to reinforce what the other members have suggested - start to document the specifics of when and how you care for your daughter. Maybe add to your documentation specifics of when and how often your D's dad asks for parenting time. This can be a Google calendar, handwritten journal, Word doc, receipts, or some or all of these, etc.

In addition to the "Bettering..." board that panda39 suggested, you can also try "Detaching" - it sounds like you are not interested in getting back together? There are members there who juggle emotionally detaching from a former S.O. with coparenting the kids together.

How's your kiddo doing?

We're here for you;

kells76

[Divorced2019]

Hi friends,

I’d like to thank all for the replies and suggestions. It’s been comforting knowing that other people understand what I’m going through.
My friends that are not familiar with BPD already got to the point that they don’t wanna hear it anymore. They tell me to move on and forget about it. It has been roughly a month since he told me he was seeing someone else and literally less than a week since the bomb that he’s in love and they’re moving in together!
We had a lot of issues of course, as in any other BPD relationship. Everytime he did not get his way he would threaten me with separation. And I would beg for him not to leave. We did that dance all these years, but after I got pregnant he stopped. When my baby was 7 months old he moved out because of work but he reassured me we were still together. We would phone/text almost on a daily basis.
He came here one night and I was having problems putting the baby to sleep (I live in sort of a studio so there’s no doors to separate the crib from everything else). I asked him to leave early so I could put her down. I was exhausted and he came here to see a car dealership without any notice, so I wasn’t prepared. He left and said he would never come back. And never did.
We saw each other again two days later, he had a long face and was not talking to me. We got him the new car, instead of being happy he started the blaming and said he would not come here again.
After that, according to him, he started seeing other people, without me knowing. We would still talk but a lot less. One month later he sent me a text talking about divorce. I asked him to calm down and that we should sit down and talk.
That was exactly the time I started getting job interviews all over the country. I was away for a month. He would text me here and there to check on me. One day he started talking about buying houses together as an investment and about sex and sent me intimate pictures. I was going back home the next day and I assumed everything would be ok. That was the weekend before Thanksgiving.
On Monday he texted me but briefly. Next day he said he was dating someone else. I invited him over for Thanksgiving but he didn’t reply.
He would still text me asking for favors - documents, doing things for him. I assumed we were gonna work things out.
I texted him one night saying how much I missed him, that I loved him and really wanted to work things out. I knew he had been with other women but that was not an issue.
Next day he calls me with his gf by his side and starts yelling at me. He said he is in love with her, they are moving in together and that he NEVER loved me, even before I got pregnant he knew we would not be together. That she’s the one, she listens to him and does everything for him, she has done for him way more that anyone else in his life. And that was it.
Now it’s out in the open, social media, his family, friends, everyone.
He told his mom his in love, he’s fine now, and he wants to live with her.
He asked to see his daughter and I said I needed some time. He said that if I ever texted him again to talk about us he would disappear from our lives until she was 18 years old.
I’m thinking about moving out, getting a new place, changing my number so he cannot find me, and filling for divorce. I cannot talk or see him rn, I’m still very shocked and fragile.
I don’t believe he will fight for custody bc he doesn’t want the responsibility, but he does want to pose as the loving father to his new gf.
I don’t know how long I can keep this situation but I don’t see any other way out for me rn than going NC.
I’m desperate, not sleeping or eating, and I dream about their perfect life constantly.
I don’t want to get back together bc deep down I know I’d go back to suffering. I’ve been in the devaluation phase for a long time now, I don’t remember the last time he has treated me well. Plus, he’s not even thinking about me anymore, it’s like he turned off a switch and that was it.
I feel I’d need about a year to get back on my feet. But there’s my daughter. He never changed one single diaper, provided any food or clothing, he doesn’t even know which day care she goes to. He was never here when she got sick, went to the doctor or couldn’t sleep at night.
He has another son that lives abroad. He is meeting him for the first time. The kid is 6 years old.
I just want him to disappear as he said and do the same to me, but like I said, it doesn’t look good on him. That’s the only reason why he’s asking about her now.
I have no friends or family support here. I text my friends but they take days to reply now. They’re not taking my calls anymore. I’m living a nightmare with no help whatsoever.
I am desperate. I don’t know if I can make it.

[Baglady]

Dearest Divorce,

 

I truly understand your pain (I've worn your painful shoes before).  Like you I didn't have any family support (I'm an immigrant to this county) but I did have plenty of friends (although they, like yours, can only understand so much and be only so patient with us because they just don't get the level of hurt and pain that we are in).

Can I suggest two action items to you?   Find a therapist and find a lawyer.  The therapist is for you (keep shopping until you find one that understands personality disorders - maybe look for one that offers DBT as this might narrow your search).  The lawyer is for your daughter.  You will need to figure out custody arrangements of some kind (if only to establish full legal custody for yourself).  (I also found a support group that helped me tremendously but that is likely down the road for you).

I know how hard and difficult this is and how overwhelming it all seems but you CAN get through this.   Reach out for support - it is there but you are going to have to seek it out.  Keep on posting here - all the stuff that you want to text your friends about - tell us all about it here - this community is always listening 24/7.

Warmly,
B

[Divorced2019]

Hi B,

Thank you for your reply.
Today has been a hard day for me. I can’t keep my mind off of them together.
Even though we were physically separated I regret I didn’t see the signs he was gonna discard me. He complained about feeling lonely and that the place he was living in was a dump.
I’d always ask him to come over but then he would say he was busy. But we were always talking to each other.
When he basically kept the communication to a minimum I should have done something. I asked his mom to call him and see what was really going on. He wouldn’t pick up the phone.
Now that he’s finally feeling secure in the new relationship he comes out telling everyone how much he loves her and wants to be with her.
I feel like I could have avoided it.
On the other hand he began the process after learning I would be moving out of State soon for a new job. Maybe that triggered his abandonment issues.
Sometimes I think there’s nothing I could have done.
And it’s a 24/7 loop in my mind.
The only thing that makes me feel better is thinking that’s just who he is having BPD. That he would leave eventually for one reason or another. That our relationship was horrible, he left me emotionally the minute he learned I was pregnant, complained constantly about how much time I spent with my daughter and not with him. He was literally competing with a baby.
It’s really hard to take care of my daughter and work this hard in this state of mind.
We will have New Years in a couple of days and he will be happy with her and I’ll be by myself crying.
What did I do to deserve all this?

[Baglady]

Honey - you and I did nothing to deserve being devalued and discarded - NOTHING!

Our failing, so to speak, was that we likely entered our relationships with low self-esteem and/or came from homes with dysfunctional family relationships and we just didn''t understand that our relationships with our BPD partners were completely dysfunctional from the get-go.  We likely made mistakes in the way we responded to our partners but we did the best we could with the information we had!  And we likely didn't engage with them in a malicious way but we were just uninformed about how disordered our partners truly are.

In hindsight, I can see that the first cracks with my exBPDh also started with the birth of my son.  My ex was extremely jealous of any attention I gave to my child (seriously - but how dysfunctional is this!)

I think, like me, you were on a one-way train to nowheresville with our relationships with our partners.  I don't believe that there was anything that we could do to derail the BPD train once it left the station.

Warmly,
B

[Divorced2019]

Hi B,

What happened to him? Did he find someone else? How’s the co parenting going? How long did it take you to get better (did you ever recover?) Do you still have feelings for him? Did you find love again?
I know it’s different for everyone, I just want to hear your experience and try to gauge what’s out there for me.

Again thank you for the support

[ForeverDad]

Find a therapist and find a lawyer.  The therapist is for you.  The lawyer is for your daughter.  You will need to figure out custody arrangements of some kind (if only to establish full legal custody for yourself).

Also, safeguard yourself legally and financially.  He has a new car.  The critical question there is how much you are at risk financially.  Did you sign anything - some obligation to repay if he defaults on payments - for him to get his new pacifier?  I mean, car?  What if he fails to make the payments, are you stuck with the loan?

Going forward, don't add to your financial risks with him, instead reduce them.  Anything co-signed such as car, apartment, house, mortgage, loans, etc needs to be resolved in a divorce or legal agreement.

Beware of assuming a court order resolves all legal obligations.  There have been cases where the ex defaulted on a mortgage or other loan and the lender refused to accept the court's order that only the ex was responsible.  Courts are notorious for not enforcing the terms of a financial decree.

[Baglady]

Hi Divorced,

I was actually away on a mini-getaway so not able to answer your post until now.  I'm two years out,  I'm just starting to do the online dating thing but I'm ambivalent.  It's hard to reengage and start something new after an almost 3 decade relationship.   

I co-parent but actually what this means is that I parent and my ex gets to be a bro and hang with my son like a same-aged peer.  I do all of the actual hands-on parenting and to be honest, I prefer it this way.  My exBPDh is very childish and irresponsible.  If I parent, things get done right and on time etc. 

My exBPDh has had several overlapping relationships since the divorce but he has finally found "the one"  .  In truth, I think that he has sown his wild oats and now wants to actually recreate the stability of the relationship that he had with me.   She is "the love of his life" supposedly.  I feel so sorry for her - she has absolutely zero clue about how deeply disordered he really is.  She is completely and utterly infatuated and I notice now that she is starting to spend most of her time with him - she is losing herself in the same way that I did.  It's so hard to watch his tactics being employed on another innocent victim.  Our mutual friends can't bear to watch the fiasco/the act/the show/the fakery and are drifting to being my friends only.   My exBPDh is somewhat stable now as a result of this new relationship but he has burned so many bridges at this point.  He is self-employed but almost broke, clients are abandoning him left, right and center due to his anger management issues.

His family are in deep denial and have just attributed his behavior to a "mid-life crisis".  They don't know a fraction about the many countless fights, broken relationships, temper tantrums, anger issues and the extensive drug use of my exBPDh.  Honestly, they CHOOSE not to know.  I have huge boundaries and do not engage with them any more which is a huge source of grieving for me.  I loved his family members deeply.

I have zero feelings for my ex now.  I haven't spoken in person to him in more than a year.  We just exchange very factual emails about expenses/logistics regarding my son.  I don't know when this will ever not seem surreal to me.  This was my best friend, confidente and the father of my child and now - nada.  It still boggles my brain how our marriage collapsed in a matter of weeks after almost 3 decades together.

So there you have it - it's not a tale of unmitigated success or failure.  The saga is still ongoing.  However, as tough as it has been and I'm not gonna lie, the divorce almost broke me body and soul, I've finally, finally begun to find myself and to understand and like who I am.  I've never had such a high level of self-esteem and self-regard in my life (extremely low self-esteem was the reason why I ended up with my ex in the first place).  I'm determined that this situation will not break me but will make me and from where I'm sitting right now - this is definitely what is happening.  It's very foreign to me to put myself and my needs first in my life,  it's something that I have to work on every single day but it's been the secret to moving on and getting past this horrific event in my life.

Warmly,
B

[worriedStepmom]

I'm so sorry that you're in this position.  My (non-BPD)ex left when our youngest was about 18 months old.  You WILL come out of this a stronger person and you and your daughter WILL be okay.  It's just going to be hard for a little while.

I second baglady - find a therapist to talk to.  You're going to need to grieve - your marriage, your dreams of an intact family for your child - and you're going to need to work on your self-esteem (it takes a nose-dive when your spouse cheats).  Therapy really really really helped me work through things.  Self care is also important.  Find time to do something every day, just for you.  (I made a list of all the things that made me smile - from vacations to painting my nails to bubble baths - and made myself do one thing on the list every day.)

A lawyer is also IMPERATIVE.  You live in a community property state.  That means you are responsible for half of all debts that either of you have incurred - or will incur - while you are married, and he is entitled to half of the joint income.  A lawyer can help you get temporary orders.  Those will protect your finances (e.g., make it clear that you aren't responsible for any new loans he takes out, make him pay child support, and make sure he can't take your paycheck) and your daughter (by clarifying that you have primary custody).  After you get your temporary orders, you don't have to push for a quick divorce if you don't want to.  It is really important, though, to protect yourself right now.

I don't recommend that you go completely no-contact as long as you don't have parenting orders. You can, however, set up a parenting communication app.  We use TalkingParents, but there are others on the market.  We blocked my H's uBPDex from our phones and email, and she has to communicate through the app.  We don't respond to any messages that aren't specific questions about SD12.   If you set up an app like that, you can get someone else to monitor it for you, or you can make the choice to only look at it when you're feeling strong. 

You can do this.

[Sluggo]

D2019,

Divorce was the hardest thing I ever went through.   I filed for the divorce after 18 years and 7 children

This is what helped me:
1.  Weekly Therapy
2.  Exercise routine
3.  A couple close guy friends,
4.  This website
5.  Journaling...  much of it was writing my story on this message board.  I have 6 years of posts on this board. 
6.  Reading about codependency
7.  A lot of time in church praying.
8.  A lot of grieving.
9.  Divorce retreat through our church.
10.  Family support

I am at 4 years post leaving relationship.  I finally feel better.  First 2 years were AWFUL, sad, lonely, what ifs, and hanging onto false hope and false dreams.  Last 2 years were hard but now I feel things are about normal.  I am feeling normal. 

We're here for you