Separation thoughts

[Family Court Strategies: When Your Partner Has BPD OR NPD Traits.]

I'm not sure where this is going but I guess I need to let it out.

I always think about separation when we fight. Then later I think that maybe I can make it, but it's mostly obligation and guilt that makes me stay, I rarely anymore want to spend time with her even during the good times.

Is there something I can do to stop switching between wanting to leave and to stay?

As long as I keep switching like this I don't trust I will stick to one decision. I seem to forget the feelings but not the facts. I know there will be bad moments almost every day but I somehow think I will tolerate it. Even an hour after being convinced I can't continue, I think that maybe I can. And a few days later, small feelings of happiness and hope is emerging and then I can't imagine leaving (I still remember the facts though).

The cycle is so fast and irregular I'm not following.

[15years]

I'm not sure where this is going but I guess I need to let it out.

I always think about separation when we fight. Then later I think that maybe I can make it, but it's mostly obligation and guilt that makes me stay, I rarely anymore want to spend time with her even during the good times.

Is there something I can do to stop switching between wanting to leave and to stay?

As long as I keep switching like this I don't trust I will stick to one decision. I seem to forget the feelings but not the facts. I know there will be bad moments almost every day but I somehow think I will tolerate it. Even an hour after being convinced I can't continue, I think that maybe I can. And a few days later, small feelings of happiness and hope is emerging and then I can't imagine leaving (I still remember the facts though).

The cycle is so fast and irregular I'm not following.

[BigOof]

You appear to be exhibiting symptoms of gaslighting.

https://www.healthline.com/health/gaslighting

[ForeverDad]

Understand the limits of separation.  While it will give you a reprieve of close contact with your problem spouse, you're still married.  You'd still be under your spouse's influence, though of course lessened by the distance.

When I first hired my divorce attorney and I asked about only doing a Legal Separation, he said separation isn't a solution, though a separation can be a first step, give you an opportunity to think things out and later be shifted to a divorce process.

I had separated for a few months already.  The distance helped.  But this left the custody and parenting unresolved and of course she was a terror on steroids.  This is why I didn't then seek a Legal Separation...

Are you pondering Divorce or Legal Separation?  When I first met my divorce lawyer, I said I was pondering which path to take.  He said in his then 17 years of practice he had handled only 2 legal separations and they had health insurance reasons, no custody conflict.  He warned me that if I tried Legal Separation and it wasn't enough to address our custody issues, then switching to Divorce might be possible but may cause delays.  He told me one case he handled where the H was looking very good in the Custody Evaluation, there was only his signature needed but the H went silent.  Lawyer called but the W answered the phone, they had reconciled.  Well, six months later the H called back and wanted to restart his divorce.  But the second time around the (with a second Custody Evaluation) W knew which poor behaviors to avoid and this time she came out on top for parenting.

[OutofthePain]

I left (sort of) my BPD wife for approximately 9 months then moved back.  I strongly considered divorce but never really had the strength.  She became ill and passed away. I am very sorry that she is gone and I miss her terribly; however, one year after her death I started  a relationship with a lady that has been wonderful.  We have been dating for more than 2 1/2 years and are very happy.

If you can find the strength to get yourself out of the mess, you will find that life is very good. You will remember that relationships don’t have to be hard.

[sterlingblue]

15years, I relate to your post.  I was married to my stbxw for 15 years (coincidence?).  Each year was a roller coaster, but as time went on, the highs seemed less pleasant and the lows more painful.  My W would say she wanted divorce during the bad times, and 6 months ago after a fight, I took her up on that and moved out.

Predictably she tried to get me back, but by that point I had finally made my decision.

Things have been difficult since the separation, mostly because of parental alienation on her part, but I am glad I decided to leave.  Her behavior since the separation has confirmed that our marriage was not a healthy situation for me or my kids.

[15years]

About making a decision about staying or leaving, is there some particular method that works to speed up the process a bit? I have heard that setting boundaries might work to see if it's at all possible. How about making pros and cons lists? Posting on the conflicting board, how much does that help? I'd hate to look back later and think I've wasted years. Any suggestions?

I had my first real thought of divorce in November 2021 so 5 months ago. In January-March 2022 I was more or less convinced I would want to continue but now I'm once again thinking about divorce. I think one or two years of figuring out what to do would be OK, but more than that would be awful, I don't want to be stuck in a loop. I'm guessing she will push for a third child sometime in the next 12 months so I would like to decide my future before that deadline comes too close. I could of course simply tell her I'm not ready for a third child but IF I'm going to stay, I too would like a third child since that has been my goal.

What I do know is that I'm moving forward all the time, I'm not at all the same as one year ago and it has not only been a loop since that (in the past though, I think it was going nowhere). One example - I'm not panicking when she cries anymore but I do feel for her when she is vulnerable and tells me how scared she is of different things. But it does take a toll on my empathy when it goes from that vulnerability to me not being able to breathe normally out of fear and my heart beating so intensely. I guess my point is I'm struggling with the fact that the vulnerability and the rage is the same person. I wouldn't wanna hurt that poor girl any more than she is already hurting, but at the same time that poor girl could actually cause even bigger damage to my life. Thoughts?

[zondolit]

As long as I keep switching like this I don't trust I will stick to one decision. I seem to forget the feelings but not the facts. I know there will be bad moments almost every day but I somehow think I will tolerate it. Even an hour after being convinced I can't continue, I think that maybe I can.

I feel for you. I think this is part of what makes BPD so insidious. When our partner is regulated, they really are the person we want to be with. When they are dysregulated, we can hardly stand another moment with them much less the thought of a lifetime. This is all to say, I think your vacillation--and your unease with this vacillation--is a really normal response in a situation like this. It is a hard place to be.

[orders4946]

Hi 15years,

Our situations are very similar - including the number of children and the fact my wife will similarly soon push for a third (current children are aged 3.5 years and 9 months).

I just wanted to reach out to say I understand precisely how you're feeling.  My marriage is stuck in some strange limbo because I am disengaged (by making mental plans to leave) whilst not really moving forward with anything (like future plans because of my current state of mind).

I have started reading a book called 'Too Good To leave, Too Bad To Stay' which seeks to apply some logical structure to the decision-making process.  I have found it helpful to bring some order to my thoughts and you might find it helpful too.  However there is still fear of the unknown and whether I'm making the right decision holding me back.  I am also finding it difficult as we're currently going through a relatively 'calm' period at the moment because my wife senses I have checked out.  All is not well though as we're struggling to even have a conversation at the moment - it is like the fire went out in our relationship ever since I stopped caretaking her and setting my boundaries

Do you find your thoughts fluctuate depending on her mood? 


where I am mentally planning to leave

[ForeverDad]

One fact... 15 years with her and you didn't make her less dysfunctional or disordered.  Ponder that.  BPD is a disorder most evident in close relationships.  If you haven't "fixed" her by now, you won't in the future.  (Maybe a professional can, one who is not emotionally connected to her, but it would take years and even that would be iffy.)

Another perspective... Which would you prefer, being from a broken home or living in one?

A few decades ago the book Solomon's Children - Exploding the Myths of Divorce had an interesting observation on page 195 by one participant, As the saying goes, "I'd rather come from a broken home than live in one."  Ponder that.  Taking action, as appropriate, will enable your lives or at least a part of your lives to be spent be in a calm, stable environment - your home, wherever that may be - away from the blaming, emotional distortions, pressuring demands and manipulations, unpredictable ever-looming rages and outright chaos.

In short, you can choose to make the best of a lousy situation, whether you stay with demonstrated improvement, "stay for now" pending improvement or whether you go.  The reasonable best.

Your decisions of course will be affected by your spouse's actions and behaviors.  But it's always up to you to decide what boundaries you will set in your life, what you will do or not do, etc.

My story, I was married for 15 years before I separated and divorced.  Though it was increasingly bad, it didn't get really bad, comparatively speaking, until we had a child at about the 12 year point.  However, by the time the divorce was final over two years later, her alimony was based on 18 years of marriage at the time of the final decree.

[15years]

All is not well though as we're struggling to even have a conversation at the moment - it is like the fire went out in our relationship ever since I stopped caretaking her and setting my boundaries

Do you find your thoughts fluctuate depending on her mood?  

Yes I too find it hard to have a conversation right now - she will get irritated/angry/worried after a while if we talk about neutral subjects.
I have stopped thinking I'd have to bring up the serious subjects she would want to talk about, I have tried it and it leads nowhere.
And I'm not anymore trying to say neutral things all the time to escape the tension - I have learned to accept silence and tension and that makes me more confident.
But that leads me straight to what you describe as "the fire went out".

And to the question, yes. My thoughts fluctuate depending on her moods. But not as much as it used to.

[orders4946]

And to the question, yes. My thoughts fluctuate depending on her moods. But not as much as it used to.

I hear you.

When we were at 'war' my mind was pretty much made up and I started making plans to leave.  The anger and poor treatment from her made me feel like leaving would be an escape/relief.

I am now 2 weeks away from being in a position to actually leave (I have taken important possessions to my workplace, waiting for a property owned by a family member to be vacant etc) so I have been setting 'tests' for my wife to see whether she would be able to tolerate how I would like our life to be (small things such as me seeing friends and family more, less caretaking of her emotional issues etc).  I now have nothing to lose because of these plans I have made, but her reaction has made me really confused.  She is now working hard to change so my 'reasons' for leaving have diminished, so I'm becoming confused on whether I should still leave.  I never would have had the confidence to set these tests without my backup plan in place but I'm finding it hard to trust that she will keep this up because it is a complete 180 from her previous behaviour.  I don't want to give up my backup plans in case she can't keep her 'new' behaviour up.

[15years]

I hear you.

When we were at 'war' my mind was pretty much made up and I started making plans to leave.  The anger and poor treatment from her made me feel like leaving would be an escape/relief.

Check out this thread, the post about the three roles "Queen", "Witch" and "Waif" makes a lot of sense.

https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=352629.0

However, I have heard people here who have witnessed major positive effects from changing their own behavior. Maybe your increased confidence is a relief to her. The key factor here being that you changed your behavior, you didn't change her behavior.

How long have you tried to set "tests" like this?

[orders4946]

Check out this thread, the post about the three roles "Queen", "Witch" and "Waif" makes a lot of sense.

https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=352629.0

However, I have heard people here who have witnessed major positive effects from changing their own behavior. Maybe your increased confidence is a relief to her. The key factor here being that you changed your behavior, you didn't change her behavior.

How long have you tried to set "tests" like this?

Thanks so much for linking me to this thread.  It is incredibly helpful.

Like you I feel much empathy for the 'waif'.  Maybe it plays upon our intrinsic masculine (or maybe co-dependent?) trait to want to protect and rescue.

I have been setting these tests for around a month.  The main one has been access to my family and friends - when we avoid these triggers our relationship is mostly fine (although now devoid of any real passion or love) so I am now engineering these tests to see how she reacts.  I have found she raises problems or reasons why we should not do these things but it stops short of her saying outright 'no' like she used to.  I worry I am perhaps too focussed on engineering these situations.  I am finding it very difficult to let go of my resentment towards her and she is arguing that I should for the sake of our children.  It is very hard.

What are your plans for the near term?

[15years]

What are your plans for the near term?

I think I should lay low with this forum over the weekend, it has been an intense week and I think I need to let things sink in. Next Tuesday I have an appointment with my therapist which I'm looking forward to.

Sad to say but I live in the moment right now without short term plans.


So are you saying she knows about your resentment towards her and she argues that you should let go of that resentment? Or is she only sensing that you resent her?

[Notwendy]

Staying or leaving is a major decision and may be too big of a step to decide on right now. We don't post stay or leave messages as it's an individual decision, in its own time. But you also don't have to do nothing- you can decide to work on your part of the dynamics- a boundary, some self care, not to JADE. The benefit of learning better skills is that you keep the skills, no matter what direction the relationship takes. Change takes motivation- if you are the one who is motivated, you can change some ways you are adding to or enabling the dysfunction. While we can't change someone else, if we change our part, then it's possible they might adjust to that.

For Orders4946- the idea of testing her seems a bit in reverse to me - it's looking to her to change. One way of looking at this is that these are tests for you. You want to have a certain boundary. She's going to respond however she does to that- the test is- can you stay calm and not JADE ( disengage if you need to) however she reacts- and hold your boundary?

I think the response to waif is a part of normal empathy and also due to you probably being in the role of rescuer. From my own observations, my BPD mother sees things from victim perspective. I can not change that, but I can try to be empathetic and still hold a boundary. She doesn't like boundaries.

What I can not do is explain so that she understands my point of view. So when there is a boundary, it's inevitable that I am the "bad guy" to her, it's how she sees me. Waif is hard because we don't want to be seen as the bad guy. The male part is that it goes against your ethics to hurt a woman and you don't want to be seen as doing that. On my part, it's a horrible thing to me to consider hurting my own mother, and any elderly person. I'd have to be some kind of ogre to do that.

I think when we JADE, we are defending our intentions and our self image, but that just feels invalidating to them and likely escalates the situation. Validating the feelings " I understand you are feeling hurt right now because I want to see my family, but I do want to see them" and then let it be, if you can. You really have to hold on to your own self image -that you aren't an ogre, even when she feels you are. It's not easy.

[Cat Familiar]

Even women get hooked when their partner suddenly turns into a helpless little boy. It’s human nature to want to protect the vulnerable.

But…this *vulnerability* can be a well worn strategy they’ve developed over time that is frequently successful and therefore often implemented.