Salty dog, I had heard of these different types of bpd, but my wife doesn’t fit either really. She was suicidal, self-harming and eating disordered when we met so she also has bpd diagnosis. She went through dbt therapy to help bear the self harm and eating disorders which she did so she Diane think she had bpd anymore and I see no point at all in mentioning it. As I have low self-esteem and a lot of self anger, I thought we would be continually apologising to each other for everything when we got together. WRONG. My wife has never apologised for anything. She has also been violent in the past though thankfully not in the past 1.5 years. How did your wife realise she could be a better mother and person? My wife seems thoroughly unaware of the effects of her behaviour on the children. Though I know it is a shame disorder and I do understand that when she feels ashamed she doesn’t ever share it.
It sounds like your wife may have additional comorbidities, and have a combination of the different types of borderline.
Low self-esteem, I have had that too as a result of the abuse, but I am working on that with self-care. It is better now that I know what I am dealing with, and with therapy it is getting better. However low self-esteem also entraps you in codependency.
Until just last month, my wife never sincerely apologized for anything either.
I am pretty sure that I have identified the turning point, even though I was the cause, I am not the reason why my wife is turning herself around. I was sending a text to my new therapist on the letter that I had written to my wife and recited in front of my wife's individual therapist and I only listed the issues that my wife was aware of [6 suicide attempts, physical violence then and now, projected violence, raging, etc.]. However, I accidentally sent it to my 15yo daughter. I asked her to delete it, she did, but the damage was done as she had already read it. My wife absolutely freaked out when my daughter told her about it. Our daughter correctly observed that my wife and I had a very toxic relationship with each other. Our daughter also called my wife a 'monster' after my wife confirmed my accusations of her. I am almost certain that this is the event that caused my wife to reach 'her rock bottom' on the issue - it wasn't me, even though I was the catalyst with the act of a misdirected text to my daughter. Something dramatically shifted inside my wife's head and her mind changed in a good way as she is now capable of things she I had never observed her doing before - neuroplasticity I believe is the technical term for it.