Wanted to introduce myself properly and share my story…

[Depression = 72% of members]

Hi all, just to be clear I am a lesbian with a bpd wife and two children who are biologically hers but ivf conceived together. I think my story is quite extraordinary and I don’t know how I’ve survived the past eight years… but here goes:
I had emigrated from my home country to the other side of the world with my boyfriend. We set up home together and were  together for nearly fifteen years in the end. He was a good man, but his downfall was that he didn’t want children and refused to discuss it with me. It broke my heart, I always wanted to be a mother and felt it would give my life some meaning.
I was 35 when I met my wife online through our shared missions to save the world.. She is fifteen years younger than me. She was from my home country, actually my home town and we met very randomly. She was suffering severe mental health issues, self harm, eating, disorders and has recently had a bpd diagnosis. I now know that she told me many lies during the following months (most of which she’s never admitted). But I do know that she was raped and severely abused. I have seen her nightmares and they could not be faked. She started dbt but never completed it. I just desperately wanted a friend, but I fell for her instantly, soon  we were messaging all the time and we started to Skype for hours and hours, all the time my befriend was out. She was always extremely controlling, threatening suicide if I didn’t reply quickly to messages etc. I adored her and the amount she adored me. I wanted to save her, help  her, give her a reason to carry on. Of course, how could I do this without giving up my entire life for her? Eventually I knew I had to make a choice. When I told my boyfriend I wanted to leave, he was devastated and I was very surprised. I really didn’t realise I meant that much to him. He spent the next six months trying to win me over. I believed him when he said he did want children but was just scared to discuss it with me. I couldn’t stop talking to my wife online and on Skype though. I was well and truly addicted to her. Eventually I left. I felt forced to break my own heart because I loved my boyfriend so much. But to stay with him was never going to be fair, because I was in love with someone else, completely obsessed with her. The rest is history. My wife does not identity herself as bpd as she no longer self harms. Our relationship has been tumultuous, but we have stuck it out for nearly eight years, married for nearly four years and have two young children. I have spoken on here about how my wife is jealous of the children, jealous of me. I sometimes feel like she is jealous of everyone. I don’t regret my actions. It was the only choice I could make to leave my ex. I feel sad though when I think he would be so upset to see how I get treated by my wife. He knew she had “some kind of hold” over me. He was absolutely right. But I desperately just wanted someone to need me because he wouldn’t give me children. I’m so happy to have our wonderful children and I want to raise them with my wife, but I do want to stand up for myself more and learn how to communicate with her better. At the moment she is struggling with breast feeding because she relies on meds to help with this but have to come from abroad and they got lost in transit. She is devastated but feels I don’t support her. She just cancelled a family get together and thought my mum would be angry but I said mum’s only upset she’s been treated to badly, not even being sent photos of the children let alone seeing them. This was the wrong thing to bring up of course. But my mum doesn’t care for a party, she just wants to see the grand children. It’s very difficult because my dad is disabled with Parkinson’s. Anyway, just wanted to share my story and be honest about it for the first time ever. Baby ducks suggested I post on here more often and I do intend to. Thank you all. I truly think it’s wonderful how you give your time to help others.

[thankful person]

Hi all, just to be clear I am a lesbian with a bpd wife and two children who are biologically hers but ivf conceived together. I think my story is quite extraordinary and I don’t know how I’ve survived the past eight years… but here goes:
I had emigrated from my home country to the other side of the world with my boyfriend. We set up home together and were  together for nearly fifteen years in the end. He was a good man, but his downfall was that he didn’t want children and refused to discuss it with me. It broke my heart, I always wanted to be a mother and felt it would give my life some meaning.
I was 35 when I met my wife online through our shared missions to save the world.. She is fifteen years younger than me. She was from my home country, actually my home town and we met very randomly. She was suffering severe mental health issues, self harm, eating, disorders and has recently had a bpd diagnosis. I now know that she told me many lies during the following months (most of which she’s never admitted). But I do know that she was raped and severely abused. I have seen her nightmares and they could not be faked. She started dbt but never completed it. I just desperately wanted a friend, but I fell for her instantly, soon  we were messaging all the time and we started to Skype for hours and hours, all the time my befriend was out. She was always extremely controlling, threatening suicide if I didn’t reply quickly to messages etc. I adored her and the amount she adored me. I wanted to save her, help  her, give her a reason to carry on. Of course, how could I do this without giving up my entire life for her? Eventually I knew I had to make a choice. When I told my boyfriend I wanted to leave, he was devastated and I was very surprised. I really didn’t realise I meant that much to him. He spent the next six months trying to win me over. I believed him when he said he did want children but was just scared to discuss it with me. I couldn’t stop talking to my wife online and on Skype though. I was well and truly addicted to her. Eventually I left. I felt forced to break my own heart because I loved my boyfriend so much. But to stay with him was never going to be fair, because I was in love with someone else, completely obsessed with her. The rest is history. My wife does not identity herself as bpd as she no longer self harms. Our relationship has been tumultuous, but we have stuck it out for nearly eight years, married for nearly four years and have two young children. I have spoken on here about how my wife is jealous of the children, jealous of me. I sometimes feel like she is jealous of everyone. I don’t regret my actions. It was the only choice I could make to leave my ex. I feel sad though when I think he would be so upset to see how I get treated by my wife. He knew she had “some kind of hold” over me. He was absolutely right. But I desperately just wanted someone to need me because he wouldn’t give me children. I’m so happy to have our wonderful children and I want to raise them with my wife, but I do want to stand up for myself more and learn how to communicate with her better. At the moment she is struggling with breast feeding because she relies on meds to help with this but have to come from abroad and they got lost in transit. She is devastated but feels I don’t support her. She just cancelled a family get together and thought my mum would be angry but I said mum’s only upset she’s been treated to badly, not even being sent photos of the children let alone seeing them. This was the wrong thing to bring up of course. But my mum doesn’t care for a party, she just wants to see the grand children. It’s very difficult because my dad is disabled with Parkinson’s. Anyway, just wanted to share my story and be honest about it for the first time ever. Baby ducks suggested I post on here more often and I do intend to. Thank you all. I truly think it’s wonderful how you give your time to help others.

[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.

[kells76]

Hey Bp, proud of you for sharing your story!

    

How are you feeling after typing it all out here?

[thankful person]

Thanks Kells, I guess it feels good to be honest, even though I feel I am betraying my wife by going behind her back, I have been wanting to discuss these things for years and can’t tell anyone I know..  sometimes I would discuss things in the comment section on Quora (I’m not really allowed on Quora at all but it downloaded automatically onto my new phone so I went back to it!) To answer your question.. I just feel so sad. I feel like I don’t deserve to be happy. I have never been happy, since a very young age. I always believed having children would make me happy. And I was so right. I am happier than I have been in years to be a mother. But I can’t really be happy, I do still feel guilty for leaving my ex. And I can’t be happy in this current relationship the way it is a lot of the time, when things are going well my wife and I get along really well, but I do wish I could make more choices for myself etc, I am trying to make small changes. I remember when I was with my ex and before, as I say, I’ve never been happy, but I would have some days when I felt really happy about my life. Those days have been no more since I left him because I don’t feel I deserve to be happy when I destroyed the person I loved who loved me so much. I have no idea how he is. I hope he’s happy and has his own family too.

[kells76]

Hey BP, nice to hear back from you.

Glad you could be honest! This is a safe place to be open and real about what's going on. The more we practice being honest, the more we do it in our lives.

As Lucky Jim might say, we need to be our "authentic selves". Being honest is part of that, as is seeing and valuing that spark, sometimes buried deep within, that tells us "I am me, and I am a chooser and decider with a life of my own".

Feeling deeply sad after writing all that out makes sense. I hear a lot of grief and guilt. Many of us here have felt similarly; I remember times in my life when I told myself "there is nobody who will comfort me now... I'm alone in my loss". It really hurts.

BP, when you feel that sadness, and that feeling of "I don't deserve to be happy", what do you usually do with that?

When your kids are feeling sad, what do you do, or want to do, for them?

I hope that tonight or tomorrow, you can be a chooser and decider who chooses to do one thing, even if it seems "too small", to give yourself a moment of happiness. I wonder if it could be making your kids smile, or lighting a candle, or something like that. I would love to hear from you about what you chose and how it went.

kells76

[thankful person]

Kells, thank you for your kind words. I certainly felt alone in my loss of my previous relationship. I left him. But I felt like he’d died. And actually it was like I stuck a knife in his heart and twisted it. I couldn’t talk to my wife about it of course. My mum and brother thought I was nuts though my dad was pleased I was coming back to my home country. Friends couldn’t understand how I needed to talk about him all the time she wasn’t around. They just wanted me to move on. And I was totally alone. What people don’t get is that I loved him when I met her and I loved him when I left. I know I did the right thing, to set him free.. but why would I ever stop loving him?
I will have a think about what you said. My wife is so jealous of anything making me happy so I really have given up a lot of things. I really want to get to a place of more normal taking photos of the children when I want to. And with me. I feel so silly to keep going on about it.