Help with wife

[How to communicate after a contentious divorce...]

Hi, I’m new to this and not sure how to start but thank you for listening whoever is out there.

I am in an extremely volatile marriage. I am constantly yelled at, called names, devalued, told I’m not good enough and being pressured into starting a family. I love my wife and I want to help and I want things to get better but I’m not ready for us to have a family when I am scared to come home every day. When she yells and curses and throws stuff and hits herself it scares the hell out of me and scares  our dog to the point of sometimes shaking.  I do not want to raise kids in that environment. But when I say I’m not ready or that I think we need time to work on us first she talks about how I am rejecting her and stopping her from having all of her dreams and threatens suicide and I will do anything to stop that from happening. So I have had unprotected sex that I am really not ok with.

She has also at  times threatened to lie to the police and say I hit her and that she will file lawsuits against my family.  I want to protect her, my family and myself and I don’t know how to do this. A crisis counselor recommended I reach out to this website after a couple  therapists have told me she likely has BPD.

I feel like this is slowly killing me day after day and I don’t know what to do. I just want her to be ok but I also want to be happy myself. I am miserable and I don’t know how to possibly get resolution or to make her happy without just sacrificing everything I want and need from life including my own sense of safety.

I’m not sure what I’m hoping for by posting this because I know there is no magic fix but I just need help.

Thank you.

[Falcon2437]

Hi, I’m new to this and not sure how to start but thank you for listening whoever is out there.

I am in an extremely volatile marriage. I am constantly yelled at, called names, devalued, told I’m not good enough and being pressured into starting a family. I love my wife and I want to help and I want things to get better but I’m not ready for us to have a family when I am scared to come home every day. When she yells and curses and throws stuff and hits herself it scares the hell out of me and scares  our dog to the point of sometimes shaking.  I do not want to raise kids in that environment. But when I say I’m not ready or that I think we need time to work on us first she talks about how I am rejecting her and stopping her from having all of her dreams and threatens suicide and I will do anything to stop that from happening. So I have had unprotected sex that I am really not ok with.

She has also at  times threatened to lie to the police and say I hit her and that she will file lawsuits against my family.  I want to protect her, my family and myself and I don’t know how to do this. A crisis counselor recommended I reach out to this website after a couple  therapists have told me she likely has BPD.

I feel like this is slowly killing me day after day and I don’t know what to do. I just want her to be ok but I also want to be happy myself. I am miserable and I don’t know how to possibly get resolution or to make her happy without just sacrificing everything I want and need from life including my own sense of safety.

I’m not sure what I’m hoping for by posting this because I know there is no magic fix but I just need help.

Thank you.

[kells76]

Hey Falcon2437, you're in the right place. We're definitely listening, and it's a good thing that you felt like you could open up a bit about what's really going on.

I agree with you, your marriage does sound extremely volatile. Can I ask, was it always this way, or was there a point where you can say "that's when it changed"? Have you been together for a while?

You're being wise to want things to stabilize and improve before having kids together. Sadly, bringing kids into a relationship where one partner has untreated BPD doesn't make things better. So, slowing that down as best you can makes sense. Yet it sounds like she is using intense pressure to get you to be intimate, when you're not OK with it?

I want to protect her, my family and myself and I don’t know how to do this.

We get it here. Nobody gets married hoping to have a volatile, unsafe marriage, and members here often want the best for their spouses wBPD (with BPD) -- of course you want her to get help, to get better, and not to hurt her.

One analogy that gets talked about is the airplane analogy: if the oxygen masks deploy, you have to put yours on first, before you can help anybody else with theirs.

So, as much as you want to protect her, if you don't take care of yourself and protect yourself, you won't be in a position to help anyone else.

Maybe that's a place to start -- you could let us know what your support system looks like and some ways you might be able to take care of yourself. For example, are there people in your family who you feel like you can trust and lean on? How about friends? Are you seeing a counselor right now, or if not, do you have some leads on someone you could see? Any hobbies or sports/activities you enjoy?

I'll wrap up there to give you a chance to write back. Really glad you're here, you're in good company -- this is definitely a group that "gets it".

-kells76

[SaltyDawg]

Welcome to the group.

I can personally attest that having children will make the dynamic much much worse.  So, please, please, please, follow your gut on this, and do not bring any children into this world with this kind of relationship dynamic.

I have two children with my uBPDw, one had severe anorexia nervosa to the point of being in the lethal range of BMI and required a several month hospital stay in order to recover. The other has oppositional defiance tendencies and has been in therapy for years. Both have other undiagnosed issues.  I feel that the major contributing factor to these other medical issues is my wife's undiagnosed borderline.

Lying to the police is very serious. I highly recommend getting yourself a recording device and start documenting your wife's behaviors, that way if and when she does lie to the police at least you have something to fall back on. If you have an Android cell phone, I've written up a piece on how to do this kind of recording. You can find it here at https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=354091.msg13181755#msg13181755.

Also, i highly recommend reading the following book “Stop Walking on Eggshells” by Paul T. Mason and Randi Kreger [3rd Edition], page 17 has a list of 10 traits that are extremely serious and lying to the police as one of them. This book will also give you a pretty good idea with a good assessment what you're dealing with. Along with some tools that may help you out.

I will wrap this up, with my number one piece of advice, and that is to do 'self-care' - make sure it includes individual therapy, exercise outdoors [as simple as a walk], among other activities that you enjoy doing to recharge your spirit while going through this abuse.

Take Care.

[Falcon2437]

Thank you both so much for the time and thoughtful responses.

Kells, things were always bad but I didn't realize it. I looked at individual events and instances, tried to help fix, learn from and make them better and then put them out of my mind. There were also a lot of elaborate lies that change the course of my life and some friendships/family relationships but I didn't know they were lies for a long time.

I realized over the last six months just how often the yelling, cursing, threats to leave, etc really were and that's a huge part of what made me want to take a step back. Things also did escalate after we had a miscarriage and a few other medical problems. Obviously we were both crushed when that happened and that's when she really started taking things out on me on a daily basis. The occasional yelling became daily. Weekly name calling became multiple times a day. The generic divorce threats turned into specific I am leaving unless you make more money, have different friends, serve a restraining order to your sister. And for a long time I took it because I will never truly be able to understand how she feels and I want to support her. But at some point I have given up the oxygen mask. I have stopped living for myself and only exist to try to help her be happy. We were intimate earlier today because again she needed it and had talked about having no reason to live without it. Now here I am two hours later writing this post and during it she called to yell about how the painter she wants to do our house is an hour late so she's going to cancel and pay an extremely large amount of money for a different one when I told her I don't think we should be painting the house right now in the first place. She yells loud enough to where I have to leave my desk because co-workers can hear her through my phone and this is just not a way to live.

I do have some people in my life who I talk to about this. Family and friends both know to an extent, and I do have a counselor as well as a DV advocate and a group I talk to. The group especially has been extremely helpful and informative.


SaltyDawg (I understand why we don't use names but real weird typing that name and then a lot of really serious stuff )

Thank you for sharing, I can only imagine how difficult that is for you to talk about and to be dealing with. Can I ask (and please do not respond to anything you are not comfortable with) before you guys had kids how was your relationship with your wife. Was this already apparent, better, worse than it is now?

I have been recording conversations on my phone for a while because frankly I am terrified that at any given moment she is going to sue me, my family, try to get me fired or arrested for things that never happened. I am trying to protect myself as best as I can because I know that stuff is extremely serious but I'm definitely scared because frankly I can't prove a negative. I can prove that she has lied about many things. I do have a recording of her saying she'll hit herself then lie to the police but that was months ago. Just because she said it in the past doesn't mean she won't do it now and say she was threatening before but this one really happened. I'm candidly just very scared.

Thank you for the book recommendation, I am currently reading a book by the same author called "Splitting: Protecting Yourself While Divorcing Someone with Borderline or Narcissistic Personality Disorder" and it has been helpful but it is definitely scaring me because it does talk about how in court even blatant lies can sometimes come off as the truth from someone with BPD because of how deeply emotional they can get in telling the lie.

Thank you for the self-care recommendation as well, I am trying to make sure I do carve out some time for myself but it's definitely difficult.

As I wrap up what turned into an extremely long response I again just want to say thank you so much to both of you for hearing me and responding. SaltyDawg (still weird to write) I know I'm new to this group and not all that experienced but if you ever want to talk I am more than happy to listen too.

Thank you again.

[SaltyDawg]

SaltyDawg (I understand why we don't use names but real weird typing that name and then a lot of really serious stuff )

I was a merchant sailor by trade before I retired, hence, the nickname.  I am an 'old salt', and I am a dawg [slang term for 'dude you hang out with'] when it comes to sharing our stories.


Thank you for sharing, I can only imagine how difficult that is for you to talk about and to be dealing with. Can I ask (and please do not respond to anything you are not comfortable with) before you guys had kids how was your relationship with your wife. Was this already apparent, better, worse than it is now?

Initially it was difficult; however, writing it out, is therapeutic for me, and it is easier each time that I share.  The more I share, the better I feel about it, and it also makes me think about how to go about making it better, or what I really need to do.  This is a 'safe space' to 'overshare' and 'vent my frustrations,' I encourage you to do the same.

Short Version.
2 years, 5 months - Total love bombing by her, she was the perfect woman for me, and was hypersexual [wanted it all the time] did everything I could possibly want, and then some.  We were married after 2 years 4 months from our 1st date, had a 3 week honeymoon, and 2 weeks after the honeymoon ended... boom, first major incident, a suicide attempt, and a bid to manipulate me to become her work slave, I told her I was 'baited and switched' and she backed off.
The following 3 years, [5 years, 3 months from 1st date], was mostly good, another suicide attempt, followed by mostly love bombing and continued hypersexuality [a manifestation of fear of abandonment].
The moment we became pregnant when I went from her lover to the father of our unborn child - and all hell broke lose, she went cold turkey on sex, 7 times in the following decade versus every day.  Became increasingly abusive for the next decade, now that she was certain I would stick around because there were children [Obligation].  Also became physically violent until the daughter witnessed an incident, scared her straight for a decade on that, but it returned.  If you drill down on my

You can see my abuse at https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?action=profile;u=122151;sa=showPosts, I forgot to mention the repeated 'divorce threats', I'm sure I am missing more, but it gives you an idea of a similar amount of abuse, some it is several times per day, others are few and far between, and two are one time incidents. 


I have been recording conversations on my phone for a while because frankly I am terrified that at any given moment she is going to sue me, my family, try to get me fired or arrested for things that never happened. I am trying to protect myself as best as I can because I know that stuff is extremely serious but I'm definitely scared because frankly I can't prove a negative. I can prove that she has lied about many things. I do have a recording of her saying she'll hit herself then lie to the police but that was months ago. Just because she said it in the past doesn't mean she won't do it now and say she was threatening before but this one really happened. I'm candidly just very scared.

I bet that is super scary for you.  I have recordings of my wife saying similar things [false allegations of child abuse, 3 out of the 4 she listed are in front of mandated reporters, so easy to disprove, and the 4th one can be disproved too, just a little bit harder to do. 

Keep duplicate copies, in case she finds out, one on the cloud if you can too, especially the critical stuff.

I want you to ask yourself this question - is this something that you can live with for the next 20+ years if you have children together?  Think long and hard on that one please.  I can't make any decisions for you, but is this something you can tolerate?  Also, if there are children, then allegations of child abuse are likely -- a very cringeworthy thought, can you live with the threat of this?  Other than politely asking her to stop making these threats, is there anything else you can do?


Thank you for the book recommendation, I am currently reading a book by the same author called "Splitting: Protecting Yourself While Divorcing Someone with Borderline or Narcissistic Personality Disorder" and it has been helpful but it is definitely scaring me because it does talk about how in court even blatant lies can sometimes come off as the truth from someone with BPD because of how deeply emotional they can get in telling the lie.

The scary part that I have observed, is that these lies is that they actually believe they are telling the truth, and can pass a lie detector test as they believe their false narrative.  Pretty scary stuff.  Again, I am going to ask you, is this something you are willing to deal with for the next 20+ years if you have children?  If not, how will you go about changing it?


Thank you for the self-care recommendation as well, I am trying to make sure I do carve out some time for myself but it's definitely difficult.


I was slowly going nuts before I 'discovered' self-care.  Make time for yourself.

Take Care.

[Cat Familiar]

I’ll echo the others in saying that this volatility is not a healthy home to bring children into. As a daughter of a BPD mother, I’ve spent years (and tens of thousands of dollars in therapy) trying to unravel some of my own mental health challenges related to the *programming* I received as a child. A parent with mental illness will impart a lot of damaging/dysfunctional concepts to a child, who will readily accept everything as truth, since it comes from mommy. I don’t believe what I absorbed was meant to be harmful, as I do believe my mother loved me in her own weird way, but that is irrelevant to the damage it caused in my relationships with classmates, and later in romantic relationships.

If you spend much time on this board, you will read countless stories about people regretting having children with mentally ill partners, and horror stories about custody issues. So please, trust your instincts here.

[thankful person]

Hi Falcon2437 and welcome to this amazing community. I am a married lesbian with 3 young children who are biologically my wife’s. I related very much to lots of what you said. Our children are ivf conceived but I was pressured into it. I’m ashamed to admit this even though I totally adore them and wouldn’t be without them. My wife’s behaviour got much much worse with all the screeching and occasional violence and constant criticism and threats to leave, after our first was born. My wife had slowly become more and more controlling over every aspect of my life and the people I loved. It came to a head when my mother was in tears over not getting any photos of our baby. I decided to stand up for myself and my wife said our marriage was over. Well shortly after that I found this forum. Things started to improve so much with everything I learnt. By the time our third child arrived I thought I had things almost under control with how calm my wife was most of the time with only occasional absolutely crazy behaviour which did sometimes affect the children. Unfortunately the last few months have been very hellish again so I’m having to backtrack a bit just to keep the peace. I am hopeful for the future. My children seem so emotionally healthy but they are still so small. I do fear for their mental health and hope I can help them and that they won’t need therapy in the future. I am so proud of everything I have achieved in recent years but have no certainty that our marriage will last. I highly recommend the book “stop caretaking the borderline or narcissist”. It has also helped me so much to take better care of myself and it was very important to me to learn to stand up for myself and do things for myself to be a better role model. Even if your wife takes no responsibility for any problems, you can do much to improve your relationship, and it may even seem things are so much better that you decide it might be time for a baby. That’s definitely the right order to do it in, but to an extent my wife will never be totally stable and is unpredictable with this last long term split. I wish you all the best.

[Couscous]

I just want her to be ok

I would like to strongly encourage you to consciously choose to withhold your empathy for her. Perhaps you could experiment with trying to feel pity for her instead. You do not have the power to save her or make her happy. If she is ever going to get better then she will need to take responsibility for this herself. If withholding empathy from her this makes you feel like a bad person, I suggest you delve into that with your therapist. Wishing you all the best.

[Falcon2437]

Ok I have a lot of people to reply to and first I just want to thank all of you. I haven't responded right away but I have been reading all of these and I cannot explain to you how much it helps. Frankly I probably don't have to explain to you how much it helps because one way or the other unfortunately you all understand exactly the type of thing I am going through and trying to figure out the best way to handle. Thank you all.

Salty, I can't tell you how much some of what you are saying scares me. It isn't the exact same by any stretch (I doubt any two situations are) but there is a lot of that same stuff. She was the (mostly) perfect woman for the first 18 months on the surface. Candidly I'm not an extremely sexual guy but everything was hyperthoughtful. I truly believed she knew me better than I knew myself. So I overlooked the lying, the threats of leaving and the occasional yelling (most of which has gotten much worse after marriage). Now it is extremely Jeckyl and Hyde where if she feels I'm listening to her and letting her heal she is a completely different person than the one who screams, curses, throws stuff and threatens me. I am very scared that if we get pregnant that is the only version of her I will get. She now wants me to tell my parents (who aren't talking to her) that them cutting her out is part of why she wants to kill herself. I feel like this is just trying to test my boundaries and see how far I'll go against my family in terms of blaming them for how she feels. The truth is I wish my family wasn't cutting her out but they for damn sure aren't responsible for her feeling suicidal and they are putting up their own boundaries because of how she constantly makes them feel. Tangent aside ok thank you I think I am going to create a second email account and keep all of my records there. I can't do this for 20+ years. I don't think I can do it for 20+ days and sometimes I feel like I can't do 20+ hours. But I have no idea how to remove myself in a safe way for everyone and that scares the PLEASE READ out of me.


Cat Familiar, thank you for telling me about your mother and the years trying to unravel things after it. I cannot overstate how important it is to me to hear from you because I do often wonder what life would be like for our potential children. I totally understand where you say you believe your mother loved you in her own way and I do believe my wife loves me and would love our children but yeah that exact type of this is what I am worried about.

Thankful, Thank you for sharing everything about your experiences. You said that things improved after you found this forum, can I ask what exactly changed and how that was able to happen? I'm sorry to hear the last few months have been hellish again. As you talk about backtracking to keep the peace what does that mean to you? Because to me when things get to the absolute hell point I feel like the only way to keep her alive and move forward is to just give in to whatever she wants and obviously that is not healthy. Thank you for the book recommendation I will definitely look into that!

Couscous, Thank you for your comment. I know I can't save her. I think subconsciously I thought I could for a long time, but I know at this point I can't. I will definitely talk to my therapist about it because honestly I kinda feel like PLEASE READ if I withhold empathy from her and then she tells me how I'm emotionally braindead and unable to give her what she needs and I jsut wind up feeling worse about myself. I will definitely talk to my therapist about if there is a way to do that where I don't then feel like crap. Thank you again for your suggestion I truly appreciate it!

[Falcon2437]

So I know no one can tell me whether to stay or go and I'm not asking for that, but for anyone who has dealt with this before is there a safe way for me to leave? Any time I remotely broach even a couple days of separation she talks about suicide. She has threatened in the past going to my employer and trying to get me fired as well as hitting herself so she has bruises then telling the police I beat her. She has also threatened suing my family. At this point I feel I have to leave, at least for now while she hopefully gets help, but I worry that if I leave my best case scenario is my life (and my family's lives) is ruined by completely false allegations and the worst case scenario is she actually does hurt herself.

I have talked to a few lawyers, advocates at local domestic violence areas, two therapists and the police but no one has a way to really ensure everyone's safety. I know there is no magic fix, but I'm hoping if anyone would have a suggestion it would be people in this group. I am open to literally anything.

Thank you.

[kells76]

Hey Falcon2437, it's smart of you to think through possible scenarios if you were to end the relationship. Like you said, nobody can tell you "you should stay" or "you should go", so all of this is just food for thought as you ponder ways to safely leave. In fact, don't hesitate to post this question on the Conflicted/Divorce/Family Law board -- lots of members there have "been there done that" and have experience with DV, the legal system, threats, etc.

I think you are on to something when you say that

I have talked to a few lawyers, advocates at local domestic violence areas, two therapists and the police but no one has a way to really ensure everyone's safety.

And the reason for that is that those people are advocating for your safety -- you're a fairly reasonable person that is talking directly to them. They aren't working with your W and so any suggestions they have will by default be about your personal safety. The kind of professional who could maybe come up with a safe exit plan for not only you, but your W too, would have to be a professional working with both of you at the same time. I am guessing that you guys are not in marriage counseling together at the moment?

The other, less logistical, consideration about safety is this --

It is really sad that your W would threaten suicide. Nobody wants that for someone else.

Yet it is not something you can control.

You could leave "perfectly" and she could still make threats and she could still follow through.

You could even stay "perfectly", doing everything she wanted, and she could still make threats and she could still follow through.

Because her threats and urges to harm herself come from inside of herself, and are her feelings, there isn't anything you can do to manage or control those.

Yes, if you were to leave, after prioritizing yourself and your safety, you could certainly ask one of her family members or friends to check on her as you "pass the torch". Or, you could request a crisis team well-check. However, it just isn't the case that "you're the only one who can stop her from suicide" or "if you just do it right/perfectly, she'll be ok".

Hard stuff... what do you think?

...

As regards your family -- how much about your W's threats and behaviors have you told them?

What is she threatening to accuse them of, that would be so ruinous?

It's very possible to "get ahead" of that kind of stuff, so if you're OK with sharing a little more about your family's situation, I bet we can come up with some ideas.

...

And about your work -- I've had to share some stuff with my managers in the past, when it got to the level of impacting my productivity/schedule (i.e. pending court date with the kids' mom, needing to support the kids more, etc). Often, if we give our employer a heads up, they can actually be an ally. You could consider letting someone in security or HR know: "Hey, I may be going through a high-conflict separation soon, unfortunately. It's possible that people connected with that separation may try to contact the site here and make allegations about me, my character, and my criminal record. I just want you to know that if you have any questions about that, I'm an open book -- I just want things to stay safe here. Also, I plan to let you know as soon as there are any ROs or POs in play -- those would likely apply to my safety at work. Anything else you need to know from me?"

That would be a pretty normal way to give your employer a heads up about possibilities.

...

Finally, about the police -- same deal as with your employer. You can head to the local station before anything happens and let them know that you may be in a high-conflict separation soon, and your W has threatened to make false allegations of abuse to them. You can ask them if you need to file a report, or if there is anything you need to do to get your concern (and maybe address) on the record.

...

Keep the questions coming -- we're here for you, and are happy to support you any time you're feeling overwhelmed or unsure.

[thankful person]

Thankful, Thank you for sharing everything about your experiences. You said that things improved after you found this forum, can I ask what exactly changed and how that was able to happen? I'm sorry to hear the last few months have been hellish again. As you talk about backtracking to keep the peace what does that mean to you? Because to me when things get to the absolute hell point I feel like the only way to keep her alive and move forward is to just give in to whatever she wants and obviously that is not healthy. Thank you for the book recommendation I will definitely look into that!

Hi Falcon, I will try and answer your questions. My wife’s “recovery” (or rather improved behaviour) was very real but always felt too good to be true, but now sadly feels like a long forgotten memory. The weird thing is I know how much thinks improved and how happy I was, because I know I was on this forum everyday telling everyone to help give them hope. Honestly things still are improved. There is far less shrieking or even shouting which is a massive improvement and my wife is generally more respectful of me despite feeling that my behaviour in the relationship doesn’t live up to what she wants (not that she will tell me what that is). I have posted on here so so so much so if you wanted to look back on some of my previous posts, 2021 when I joined was my biggest learning curve. I’m annoyed because I remember when things turned a corner I posted a topic on this board called, “thinks I’m doing differently…” (it was supposed to be things but I don’t think I worked out how to change it). I can’t find it at the moment but I’ll try again later. From what I remember it was about looking after myself better and treating myself with respect, including walking away from my wife during certain shrieking episodes. Doing a million things I “wasn’t allowed to” which was so liberating and a huge source of happiness for me. Validate validate validate. I don’t even have to really say the words like “I understand you feel ignored if I say hello to the children before you” (for example). I’ve actually found it effective to pretty much say nothing but “mmm” whilst making eye contact and in my case this has solved many of our problems where I’m not JADEing and this my wife feels validated somehow. I gave up JADEing (almost…) that is we are advised don’t Justify, Argue, Defend or Explain. Life got much easier then. By backtracking I mean I am being a little more “controlled” (bullied here and there) because I don’t want to go through the shrieking stage again and I’m trying to protect the children. It’s a very fine line. I hope some of that helps a bit. I posted another topic which I think was, “don’t try to be reassuring”. Because being positive is invalidating when they’re feeling negative. But I learnt much of all this from the stop caretaking book and the amazing team of friends on here.

[Couscous]

I just happened to have watched this video by the Crappy Childhood Fairy earlier today that is on the very topic of navigating a breakup with a suicidal pwBPD: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UWKmWQXjYVE

She went through this herself and I think her advice is absolutely spot on.

[SaltyDawg]

Falcon,

Kells has done a wonderful job, so I won't duplicate what he has talked about.

However, as my uBPDw has attempted suicide 6 times and 2 ideations since the last attempt, I will share what 'works' in my situation, this has very little precedence in articles so I am providing a disclaimer this may not work for you.

First and foremost, I know you have talked to therapists; however, you have not mentioned if you have talked to HER therapist(s).  If not, this is your first step.  Loop them in, so they can have appropriate conversations with her.  If they refuse to talk to you, send an e-mail, this will serve two purposes the first being that it will allow her therapist to become aware of the situation, even if she is already aware, you are reinforcing the need to have this conversation with her.  A secondary reason to do this is to document her behaviors (with a date/time stamp) should an issue arise in the future with you which leads into my next point...

The next thing to do is cover your $$ with a document trail, e-mails, texts, recordings, snail mail, journaling [in a bound journal, in indelible ink, with dated/timed entries].  Only you can take care of yourself.  You should be your first priority, and hers secondary.  Come up with a recording scheme so you can document your wife's threats, so if and when they come to fruition you have documentation to share with the authorities on the crap she is putting you through.  I use my cell phone to record my wife's irrational behaviors including false threats of child abuse, domestic violence, etc.  If you have an android phone, I will point you to my system that I documented here back in October/November.

Of the 6 suicide attempts my wife has done before me, all of them, 100% of them, were apparently about 'control'.  She wanted to control my actions, in your case it may be about controlling you not to leave as that is the number one core issue is the 'fear of abandonment' for borderlines.  

If she has an instrument of death in her hand [in my case a 10" kitchen knife, or a 12" pair of old school all metal scissors fashioned into a dagger, deadly pills if overdosed, or a vehicle keys threatening to drive off a cliff] ring up your local emergency number for your area, in the US/CAN it is 911, other locations could be 999, 000, or some other number and wait for the emergency personnel to arrive to deal with your wife.  If you have a gun in your home, make sure it is secure in a safe [that she does not have the combination to], or ideally totally out of the home [with a trusted friend/relative], as it is a far greater chance she, or you will be the victim of that weapon at her hand than from an intruder.  Except for my wife's most recent attempt last year, I did not report any of them.  I was able to remove the instrument of death with almost no resistance from her hand(s), so I knew she did not want to actually kill herself, but to get attention so I would do something I didn't want to do.

From what you have written, you want to 'leave', and she wants you to 'stay' and she is persuading you to stay under duress with the threat of her commiting suicide.  Has she ever actually tried to commit suicide in front of you?  If yes, can you share the specifics?  If not, has she expressed how she might do it?  If yes, can you share those specifics?  If not, then ask her to see how far she has thought this out?  Can you share those specifics?  If she has not thought it through -- this is the best case for your scenario if she has done no planning at all.  You need to gauge how serious she is about following through her ideation.  Basically perform a 'threat assessment' on how serious she has thought this through.

In my particular case, last year, when my wife's most recent attempted suicide, she was attempting to manipulate me after I informed her that I would be doing less to fulfill her impossible demands [she wanted me to do ~30 hours of work per day, in addition to sleeping, eating, and doing stuff for our children] and I would be taking about 4 hours per weekday to do self-care on myself.  That prompted her to threaten to take a whole bottle of pills of her heart medication which would have killed her.  

The "Seed Planting Tool", my example...

After the most recent suicide episode, I reiterated my desire to do self care.  I talked about it the day after.   I waited a few days, I talked about it a little more.  Two weeks later, I started my self-care without announcing it.

Guess what happened with my wife?  Absolutely 'nothing'!  There was no drama, there was no reaction from my wife [not even a displeased face].  Keep in mind, I had also reported this behavior to our couple's therapists, and they worked with her on how to deal with the situation as well - so this may have been a factor in the 'non reaction' from my wife.
 
A few weeks later, my wife came to enjoy my self-care [riding an e-bike with a damaged knee on hilly/mountainous terrain] to run errands for her at the same time.  Nothing like a good old compromise to get things done.

There is no guaranteed safe way to leave.  However, you can take steps to reduce the chances of her following through with her threat of suicide.  

1. Notify her health professionals [therapist, psychiatrist, or even her general practitioner].  Document everything, let her know that you are documenting without being critical [very important to NOT do it in a 'critical way' where she may become defensive, use the SET communication method].

2. Do a 'threat assessment'.  After you do your 'threat assessment', proceed with telegraphing your eventual intentions [so they can mentally prepare for the outcome in their own way], reaffirm your boundaries, and then execute your plan after she has had sufficient time to process what you are about to do, that will reduce the chances of her following through on her threat.  Also share with her what you have done [one piece at a time, I find that my wife can only process one issue at a time, too many will overwhelm her] with regards to your plan, take your time every step of the way.  

3. Also remove quick ways to die [any weapons in the house].  Most over the counter medications if there is an OD it can be reversible, you can leave limited quantities.  However, if there is tylenol, remove that bottle, or leave only a few pills, leaving only 4x the maximum recommended single dosage as tylenol (acetaminophen) can be a deadly overdose much more so than aspirin or ibuprofen.  If you know she doesn't need a medication, remove it.  You want to make extra effort to kill herself, which buys her time, and time saves lives.

4. Perhaps test her resolve to follow through, by picking another less threatening action she has done to you, apply the seed planting tool, and observe her reaction to gauge how she would deal with the suicide threat.

5. Follow through with your intentions.  When you do execute your plan [leave with a friend so they can see she was alive and well when you left - you don't want her staging her suicide to look like a murder you did, notify the authorities, her friends, her therapist(s), put a GPS tracker on yourself, so if something does go terribly wrong [statistically about an 8% chance of that happening] you got yourself covered.

If possible, notify her best friend or family members so they can be there to comfort her when you leave and make sure she doesn't do anything crazy.  Pass the torch from yourself to one of 'her people'.

Please remember, you did not cause it, you cannot control it, and you cannot cure it.

www.margalistherapy.com/articles/borderline-and-narcissism-issues/handbook-for-dealing-with-a-bp-np/ is a good summary on what to do.  It has a risk assessment section and I am going to quote to you the following, "If your minister, good friend, son or daughter were witnessing what is going on, how would they interpret the situation?"

What would you do to advise you on how to handle the situation that you are in?

What you do is your decision.  Decisions have consequences, both good and bad - you need to do a cost/benefit analysis on this.  You need to live your life the way you need to, and only you can do what is best for yourself.

P. S.

So I know no one can tell me whether to stay or go and I'm not asking for that, but for anyone who has dealt with this before is there a safe way for me to leave?

If you ask that question in a different forum, you will get an answer [hint:  it is the 2nd portion of your statement that I have just highlighted].  This is also what I would do if I were in your shoes knowing what I know about the borderline.

[Falcon2437]

Couscous,

Thank you for the video, I just finished watching it and took some notes as I was watching.

What she says about midway through scares the crap out of me. She says that she was with someone with undiagnosed BPD who threated to hurt himself. Eventually she left and he did ultimately commit suicide. She seems to be very at peace with knowing that it was not her fault and that staying doesn't necessarily mean anything would have ended up differently and logically I know if my wife makes that choice it is NOT my choice or my decision but I don't know how I could ever move on, trust myself, trust anyone else or be remotely okay with that knowing that a woman who I still love deeply blamed me for killing herself.

I do think like she talked about 15ish minutes in that some of why everything has escalated so aggressively is because my wife can feel that I am thinking about stepping away.

Her talking about the price you pay is it shutting down your living, breathing spirit was really hard for me to listen to because that is how I feel. I feel every action I take, everything I do is to help my wife and I leave nothing for myself.

The idea of packing up all my necessary belongings and then talking to my wife on the way out seems like a good mix of pre-planning without just disappearing in the night which I don't think I could do. That is extremely helpful, thank you.


Salty/Thankful/Kells thank you for your responses too, I need to take a few steps away from this even if it's just for an hour because this is all very overwhelming but I truly truly appreciate your notes and will dive more into them soon.

[Falcon2437]

Kells,

Thank you for sending me that message board I was having a bit of trouble navigating the page (and finding my original post) and couldn't find something like that board. I will absolutely go through that page and maybe post there as well.

We are kindof in marriage counseling. It took a whole lot of work for me to get her to see one but now she doesn't want to go back.

Thank you for saying that about leaving or staying "perfectly" and it still not guaranteeing any outcome. I do know that logically and I know logically it is not in my control and not my fault, I just don't know how to make my emotional side understand that too because I would be lying if I said I don't blame myself at times.

I do think "passing the torch" is something I would need to do I'm just not entirely sure how to do it. Her mom is the person she is closest too but frankly her mom is scared of her and scared for her. At times I've had some really good conversations with her mom about things and at times she's told me "you have her life in your hands" or just try having a kid and the worst case scenario is a split where both parents love the kid. She wants the best for her daughter and I understand that but at times it means disregarding what is best for me. It also could be a problem because I have called the police six times during suicide threats and during a seventh both her mom and I talked to a crisis response team. They took her for a few hours to what they called a version of a mental emergency room. After that my wife filed some form of temporary restraining order (wouldn't tell me exactly what it is) against her mom, but then saw her two days later. So I'm a little scared that if her mom gets the torch my wife will just shut her out too.

My family has some idea of the threats but not necessarily the specifics. She's threatened a range of restraining orders to full-fledged lawsuits for "emotional trauma" and harassment. I would imagine none of it would be ruinous because they are in my opinion so clearly false. Part of what she is saying is that my family is "harassing" her when my parents have done the literal opposite. They feel she has lied to them and through their own therapist decided to put up their own boundary of not talking to my wife. Candidly I wish they wouldn't do that, I think it makes things harder for me, but it is their boundary, their choice and I can't change it. Either way I'm not sure how they could be sued for harassment when they don't speak to her. Over the last few months the only real communication between the two sides has been my wife sending texts that are quasi apologies and quasi testing the boundary and her leaving a voicemail telling my mom she should be ashamed of herself.

My HR and direct bosses do know at work and have been very supportive so far. Candidly I work in local news and I am very concerned that any restaining order or allegation of abuse (no matter how clearly false they are proven to be) would stop me from ever getting a different job if I wanted one. After all if I was a hiring manager and had 300 applications I would throw out my application without a second thought if those type of allegations were attached to my name.

I did go to the police station yesterday and told them this might be coming. They obviously do know some of our past histroy from all the times I have had to call them over to the house and she has been overly combative with them several times. I didn't ask if I should file a report, do you think I should go back and do that?


Thank you again!

[Falcon2437]

Thankful,

I appreciate you sharing so much. I have definitely noticed that at times when I overly validate and at times ignore things that she says that I know are straight up not true it has temporarily helped and calmed her. I'm sorry to hear it feels like a long-forgotten memory now but happy to see you say things are at least a little still improved! Hopefully it will get back to the "recovery" period.

It is interesting for me to see you talk about how walking away and treating yourself with respect helps because at times when things get bad I feel like I have to go into validate validate validate mode and just stop thinking about or worrying about what I need and just do everything I can to try to help her in that moment. I will definitely try to focus a bit more on myself and what I need. Thank you.

JADE seems like a really good idea and something similar to what we were told to try "non-defensive listening and understanding." When you gave up JADE did you find that it helped at all with her behavior? I have been a bit frustrated that when I started trying non-defensive listening it felt like she didn't change a thing and now there was no one standing up for me it was just a free for all of what she wants goes and what she says is the truth (no matter how much of a lie it is) and once that started happening I could feel myself not really being able to be truly non-defensive anymore.

Thank you again.

[thankful person]

Hi Falcon, yes I think the invalidating and JADEing were my worst mistakes before becoming bpd educated. My wife is generally much calmer when I follow these. There is also a useful tool called SET, which stands for Support, Empathy, Truth, where you make one statement of each. Some of this stuff seems a bit complicated, but in its simplest terms the Truth statement is my favourite because I get to make one JADE statement then I tell myself that’s it, you know arguing is only going to make things worse. Tbh I find it so much easier not to shout back because the children are nearly always around so I stay calm for them. The problem is my wife recently has been getting even more angry if I don’t react or seem angry or upset enough to her.

I have also been reflecting on the backtracking that I mentioned. Obviously everyone has different relationships and us non-bpds are equally responsible for the relationship dynamics. Many of us on here for years were making things worse without realising it and that was certainly me. Giving up the “caretaking” was absolutely key to my journey to improve things. The caretaking for us was several forms: giving up things and people I enjoyed because my wife didn’t like them. She told me not to play the piano even though I’m a professional. She’s said, “it’s not fair that you can play the piano and I can’t.” She didn’t want me working in schools as she was jealous before we had kids. There were other things that she didn’t exactly forbid, like me having more showers than her, but she was so difficult whining about it that I did what she wanted. Another example was we used to go ten pin bowling lots and I usually won. My wife often got in a mood if I kept winning and would say, “how can I enjoy this when you always win?” So I’m ashamed to say I purposefully and secretly became rubbish at bowling and she ended up winning most times. Funny story, today we took our kids for the first time and I came last not on purpose HA! I need to get better at it again because I’m never losing on purpose again, not even for the kids.

Another little example was last night she texted me whilst putting the kids to bed, “what are you doing?” I was browsing Quora which is an app where you answer questions and connect with other people. She doesn’t like me on there so I deleted it and for months I didn’t have it but then with a new phone it appeared and so I started using it again. But my notifications are off. Anyway, I responded to her text, “just browsing Pinterest” which is a mindless app where you don’t connect with anyone or discuss anything. So I told her a little white lie. And that is an example of caretaking. Manipulating circumstances or missing out information or not telling the truth, so as not to anger or upset the pwbpd. I became so so good at challenging myself to not protect my wife from harsh realities. It was so good for her. I let her face her own problems and realised how often I stepped in to say, “ooh let me do that, you might find it a bit stressful…” etc. The reason I am sharing these things is because I don’t know if that is in any way reflective of your situation or anyone reading this… But in my circumstances it made such a vast improvement to drop the caretaking.

[Couscous]

…at times she's told me "you have her life in your hands"

Oh my! That was messed up on so many levels and incredibly manipulative. I truly have no words… So now you have to contend with not only your wife blaming you for her choices, but her mother too.

I am so very sorry to hear that someone would be willing to stoop that low. But I guess the upside is that at least now you know that she is most certainly not your ally.

[Falcon2437]

Salty,

She hasn't had a therapist (who is real and not the one she lied to me about for a while) for much longer than one or two sessions and the current one I don't know who it is. I did talk to our couples counselor who definitely believes she has BPD.

I do have a lot of logs, journals, pictures and recordings that I am in the process of sharing to an additional email address. Through about six months of recordings they range from 30 seconds to a few hours and range from her saying she'll lie to the police about me hitting her to just her yelling and sometimes conversations that didn't turn aggressive at all. I think I need to do a better job organizing it all so that I know what is relevant and what isn't but candidly it is very difficult to listen back to some of the recordings.

Yeah I believe all of the attempts or threats to this point have been about control. She told me yesterday that I needed to tell my parents (who currently have a boundary of not talking to her) that them cutting her out is making her want to kill herself. I'm not really comfortable putting the blame on them like that. Of all the times we've talked the worst by far came when I went to see my family alone. While I was driving back she told me she was going to take pills. When I got home she was non-responsive in the locked bathroom. I busted the door open and she wasn't responding/seemed unconscious. When I tried putting my fingers in her mouth she started to somewhat be alert and fight it a little. By then the paramedics got there and I stayed out of the way. They left about a half hour later when she was more responsive and telling them she didn't want help and wouldn't try to hurt herself again. She told me later there were no pills, she watched a youtube video on how to knock yourself unconscious so that she could escape the pain for a few hours. I guess I will never know if that is true or not, but it sure seemed real and that's part of what scares me too is even if she isn't trying to kill herself and she's just trying to get my attention she easily could've done it accidentally there. All other threats have been when I've been with her and have ranged from generic I have nothing to live for I'm going to kill myself and it's your fault to more specific of trying to get to knives or a few times she's hit herself over the head until I've gotten there to stop her.

We do not have any guns the only real weapons we would have are kitchen knives. She went for those once and threatened to stab me (despite not having a knife at the time) if I didn't let her get to them. That day de-escalated once the police got there...eventually.

II think I answered most of your questions in the above sections but yeah most of the time she isn't extremely specific but some times it is.

Ok seed planting seems like a very solid way to proceed if we stay together. I hadn't heard of that before, thank you!

As far as removing quick ways to die I think I can limit the medication in one place for sure but how do I remove the kitchen knives? She will know exactly what I am doing and why I am doing it the second I do.

How do I turn a GPS tracker on myself? I kinda figured my phone does that anyway but I absolutely would want to do that if there is another step I need to take.

Thank you again Salty, I really appreciate all of your extremely well thought out help. It means a lot to me. Thank you.

[Falcon2437]

Couscous,

For what it's worth I really don't think my mother-in-law is trying to stoop or anything like that I just think she is terrified for her daughter and willing to say or do anything. You are right that because of it I probably can't look at her as a true ally but I do think at the end of the day she wants what's best for her daughter not necessarily to hurt me.


Thankful,

Thank you for sharing, yeah that is pretty reflective of my situation. Reflective enough to where we actually went bowling on one of our earlier dates, I won by a lot and we went about four more years before we went again and that only happened when she was trying to keep me happy because she could tell I clearly wasn't. So when you dropped the caretaking type stuff I see that it made things better and when it comes to the things I step in and try to take her problems/stresses away I totally get that and I think if we stay together I can try to do that. But when it comes to lies, even white lies, about what you are doing or hiding things that you want to do like play the piano how do you feel when you do that? I have always been honest to a fault and never really great at white lies, I tend to feel a lot of guilt and shame on my own (before the relationship too) and lying makes that feel worse even if it is a minor thing.

Thank you again for responding.

[Couscous]

She told me yesterday that I needed to tell my parents (who currently have a boundary of not talking to her) that them cutting her out is making her want to kill herself. I'm not really comfortable putting the blame on them like that.

That’s good that you’re not willing to put the blame on your parents, because they are not actually the cause of your wife’s feelings. It’s a common misconception, but a person cannot cause another person to feel an emotion. While they may do something that stimulates an emotional reaction in another person, it is that other person’s thoughts and beliefs that generates the emotion.

What I’m noticing is that even by staying with your wife you aren’t actually succeeding in preventing her from making attempts. The bottom line is that no matter what your relationship status is, if she does succeed you, will feel guilty.

As for her mother, while I’m sure she’s not intentionally trying to hurt you, what she said was still manipulative and self-serving,  not to mention completely untrue. Your wife’s life is in nobody’s hands but her own.

I certainly hope you will find a way to convince your wife to get into some kind of inpatient treatment program. BPD is very amenable to treatment, and it can go into remission.

I wish you much strength and courage as you navigate this very challenging situation.

[thankful person]

But when it comes to lies, even white lies, about what you are doing or hiding things that you want to do like play the piano how do you feel when you do that? I have always been honest to a fault and never really great at white lies, I tend to feel a lot of guilt and shame on my own (before the relationship too) and lying makes that feel worse even if it is a minor thing.
.

Hi Falcon, yes I’m also a very honest person at heart, which is why I didn’t used to do anything behind my wife’s back, we were so enmeshed I didn’t get the chance really anyway, especially now we have 3 young children, I go out to work but she is nearly always at home. So when I was working through dropping the caretaking I realised, I can go on Quora and I don’t have to tell her… but then occasionally she saw me on there or asked and I’d tell her the truth…  and at that time she coped with it. It is openly  on my home screen but I’ve never had the notifications on, it’s definitely something I want to work towards.

One day last year when my wife was ranting about something I excused myself and said, “I’m going to have a shower” and she said, “I know you will. You always do what you want!” And I was so proud that this was now her opinion of me, even though it was by no means true.

I hated myself for many years because I left my ex of 14 years for my wife and I hurt him so badly, I wasn’t even sure that’s what I wanted but my wife already had so much control over me, believe it or not she was on the other side of the planet (in my home country I had left) and we met online! (That’s why she hates me talking to strangers online). Anyway I felt I could never be happy after what I did to my ex and that I didn’t deserve happiness. The good people on here also helped me to realise that I was also a kind of caretaker for my ex, which is why I felt so responsible even 7 years later.

The reason I am here on the forum so much is because I have not slept in the marital bed with my wife (for any length of time) over the past few years, partly because she’s had all our babies in the bed but now just the littlest one. I hated that with the dangers attached, but the children all seem so confident and secure (amazingly considering the shouting they endure at times). I do think the bed-sharing has helped them (I am a childcare professional so I’ve been surprised how secure they are, spending most of their first years at the breast and with mother, unlike the children I work with). Anyway I digress. What I’m trying to say is, my membership of bpd family has made such an incredible difference to my life and I think for it to be truly effective, people don’t tend to stick around here long if they are sharing the info about this site with the pwbpd (of course some people feel they have to share everything). At first I hated going behind her back, but it has helped me so much, and in turn her, and our children… it will always be behind her back so I’ve had to come to terms with that. I’m still getting support here and if I can help others then I want to.

Our littlest is nearly 4 months and I’m hoping things will change here soon re. my wife seeing me through her “black glasses”. Maybe she’s already changing (but wouldn’t admit it yet). I certainly don’t want to be lying about going on Quora or anything other than not telling her about bpd family. I’m trying to get back to where we were. I will win at bowling next time haha though it’s harder and distracting when you’re supervising young children that’s my excuse anyway!

[SaltyDawg]

Falcon,

   I am going to be straight up with you, your situation is quite severe, and I feel that you are handling it exceptionally well given the circumstances that you have described.  However, I feel that you should shift your line of thinking from a 'safe' exit strategy to one of 'damage control' as I personally can see no 'safe' way of extracting yourself from this situation - if anyone does see a safe way, please speak up.  The question now becomes, how do you get yourself out of this 'pickle' with the least amount of damage?

   The advice I gave earlier that I did for my wife, after doing some more thinking on it, since your wife has actually become non-responsive to her actions requiring medical intervention during a suicide attempt, I advise not to use some of the things I have found helpful to me, as your wife appears much more intent on ending her life than mine ever was.

   I know you are already following these, but call 911 if she is in the act [you have already done this], or if she is thinking about it call 988 in addition to the protocols that this site has setup for suicide:  https://bpdfamily.com/discussions/search-info3.htm

   It sounds like you have a good head on your shoulders and you are dotting all of your i's and crossing all of your t's.  One tip for documenting recordings, I rename the filename to whatever she is doing "e.g. suicide attempt, false allegation of ____, etc." shortly after the event transpired (going to the bathroom is a good place to do this), it is easy to forget with the incredible 'mind f**k' she is doing to your psyche.  Working in 'news,' I am sure you have seen your fair share of severe stories, and you have availed yourself to a lot of resources before coming here.  From the sound of things, you have yourself pretty well covered from a 'logical mind perspective'.  I would suggest drawing even more from your news background on documenting everything, and learning from others who have stories done on them on what was useful, and what was not, and utilizing sources that news organizations use [I am thinking the legal & hospital resources].

I come from a homeland security background and have had limited law enforcement training; I too draw off of my background for giving advice which is more technical/logical in nature than emotional - this is my set of strengths.  In my job, I was required to think outside of the box quite frequently, and I have been brainstorming your situation for several hours as I might have to do something similar in the not so distant future.  I have come face to face with terrorists brandishing machine guns and I can personally vouch that confronting terrorists is a lot LESS stressful than dealing with a borderline wife - your current situation is a bit more severe than mine ever was, I can only imagine the emotions that are going through your mind.  I personally cannot see a safe way of leaving; hence, my suggestion is to do a planned damage control scenario instead.

Reviewing the components of your borderline puzzle - please correct me if my perception is incorrect:
+ You have an individual therapist - talk to your therapist about this, and the best way on how to leave - if they balk at discussing this, ask to see their supervisor.  My previous individual T recognized he was 'in' above his head [with a PhD in psychology] and got his supervisor to deal with the situation as he couldn't handle my situation with my wife.
+ You have a couple's therapist, your wife has attended once or twice, but no longer does - go to couple's therapy without your wife, and ask the same question on how to handle this.
+ She says she has an individual therapist but doesn't see them, nor do you know who he/she is.  Ask her for the name of this therapist, and notify them of the situation if and when you obtain this information.  Unlikely from the sound of things, but follow this avenue if you can.
+ She has a psychiatrist(s) that is helping her - does she have a future appointment?  If yes, notify them of the situation.  If not, still notify them of the situation.  Obtain their advice.
+ You have rung up 911 one or more times to rescue her from attempted suicide or self-harm behaviors.  How many times?  How frequent?  Does your location support Smart911?  If so, fill out a profile at smart911.com, and get the app, listing all previous emergency calls to linked to your home phone, cell phone, and her cell phone too, that way the dispatcher will know in advance how to best handle the call.  Visit/talk to the emergency call center as they will be the ones handling the situation if it gets out of control.  Also learn and put in a speed dial to the non-emergency number to the communication's center [they will tell you if asked, but they will not volunteer this information as they want you to use 911], this will eliminate one step that the local 911 operator will have to do if you are in a different jurisdiction when your wife is having the emergency.  Every second counts when they are responding to this kind of emergency.
+ She has been institutionalized one or more times.  If so, avail yourself of the institution's resources.  Have you contacted the institution of her behaviors since discharge and seek out their recommendation(s)?  If not, this is a very good place to find help.  They can also possibly advise you on how to get her back into the institution.
+ Does she currently hold a job?  Most severe pwBPD [persons with BPD], cannot.  Know her schedule, so you can do your planning/preparing when she is not aware.
+ Your parents have estranged her, I am assuming she has mentioned suicide to them as the reason why, or is it some other reason?  What have your parents recommended you do with her?
+ Your MIL, is looking out for the best interests of her daughter, perhaps at your expense.  After you, your MIL is the next closest person in your wife's life.  You will likely need to involve her at some point in time if and when you actually leave.  Don't discuss your plan with her until you are in the process of moving out.
+  Your 'logical mind' tells you to run - I know how this feels, I feel trapped by my wife.
+  Your 'emotional mind' tells you to stay and be compassionate with empathy and to protect your wife at the expense of consuming you emotionally - I know how this feels, I am 'trapped' there now.
+   Your 'wise mind' is torn between staying and leaving, and is stuck on how to do this without causing damage, to do it 'safely' as you put it.  I have a different set of circumstances, a lot more manageable than your situation, but I still have the same feeling and can empathize greatly with your situation.

Speaking of "Wise Mind" it is a DBT skill, you can read up on it here, click the "tools" from the menu above and the first item listed is "wise mind", I recommend using 'wise mind' on figuring out how you are going to get out of this situation with the least amount of damage to yourself first priority, and a secondary priority to your wife.

With regards to the video of the woman talking about a guy committing suicide you commented on and how it scares you - it does happen, it is a very real possibility, after reading a recent posting on it, I too am very afraid for my wife, just as you are afraid for your wife.  It is so scary, whenever I personally think of this possibility it torments me to the point of tears - and I am a big burly sailor.

is advised before reading this link (Trigger Warning:  Suicide)
https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=354928.0

This is my thought process on this if I were in your shoes and may actually do this or something similar for my own scenario - this is not advice, but I put it out here for your consideration on how you might want to proceed, as this is what I am considering for myself.

1.  Contact and retain, an attorney that deals with 'high conflict' divorces, share your entire story with this attorney.  Do your homework for 'high conflict' attorneys, use your news resources at the courthouse for who has the best reputation, even if they are expensive, it will be well worth your investment.  Your video/recording will come in handy, have key examples of each type of behavior ready to share with this attorney.  Note:  be aware of wire tapping laws, so if you have a recording of her taunting you to record her [I do] this will put you in the clear.  Even if you don't, you can use the 'public safety exemption' which is found in most jurisdictions.


2.  Get all of your affairs in order, or as much as you can.  

Learn her routine when she will be outside of the home, figure out a period when you can pack-up and leave with your essentials, and to remove anything that could kill her quickly if she were to attempt suicide.  Obtain a place to stay, have it pre-arranged, preferably as far away as you can [opposite side of your work place by many miles].  Get the divorce papers ready, secure all of your important documents and keep them on your person or in your car [that you do not share].  Get copies of all joint accounts, hers too if she has any, etc. etc. etc.  Your attorney can guide you on this.


3.  Pass the care 'torch' to an unwilling recipient while minimizing chances of her commiting suicide as ethically as you can.

Plan A - File for divorce if she is in an institution, that way the institution can manage her behaviors if they become suicidal, you are in effect passing the torch to the institution, and she is 'their problem now' and they are best equipped to handle the situation.  However, if you cannot get her in an institution, then, you will have to dump her on her mother who knows what is going on and doesn't want to deal with it - I know that this is really low on your part and you will feel like crap; however, after you she has her daughter's best interest at heart - a mother's love (even if it is dysfunctional).

Plan B - File for divorce if she is out of the home for several hours, as soon as all of your stuff is packed and you are driving away, call her mom, and tell her what you are doing, and why you are doing it - don't let her talk you out of it, you may want to do a text and then block her if you think this will be an issue.  Coordinate her being served with her papers in a very public place, like her work where there will be less of a chance for her to create a scene and commit suicide - communicate this with her mom.

In either event, make sure you stay far away as you can [document your location at all times].  Also obtain restraining orders against her if possible.


4.  Damage Control - I know you worry about your professional reputation, consult with your attorney on how to best defend yourself on this.  Do a pre-emptive strike by posting on your social media, that you just filed for divorce, and your wife is irrational and may say some 'untrue' things in retaliation - while this won't stop her from doing this, it will temper what others think of you when she does this - kind of like the 'seed planting tool' to stop the worst of it.  Also express, that you care deeply for her; however, you cannot live with her, and wish her the best.  That way if she does 'go off' on you, you will be perceived as taking the high road, and her the low road.  You may want to consider blocking her from posting to your online profiles at the time the papers are being served.  I know you might be tempted to plaster all of her wrong doings on-line - don't do it as that will negatively affect your image.  Chalk it up to a 'vindictive wife', even if in the short term it will be an issue.  Let your attorney deal with the libel/slander aspect of this, if she can be disproven and he can do 'take-down' orders of any untrue statements.  You are NOT the only divorced person applying for jobs, about half of the people are.

Use a GPS tracker on yourself, so you can prove that you are not harassing her or worse, I personally don't use one right now, other than Google Timeline, which is chock full of errors.  Friends of mine use Life360 [android/iphone] with their children.  They have a free 2-day plan, and a paid plan for 30 days [do screen shots of your locations], there are other apps out there.  Again, leverage your news contacts at the court to determine what is best for your situation.  You could also call up your cell phone provider and ask them to keep tower information on you [same data used in court cases] for an extended period.  I am not sure how long they are required to keep this data, something your attorney should be able to answer for you.


5.  Rebuild - once the dust has settled, you will need to rebuild.  You will likely be emotionally scarred from this ordeal, hopefully the damage will be minimized, and you can stop further damage with your actions.  Continue individual therapy for yourself, to figure out what you need to do for yourself.


In any event do look after yourself, do what is right for you, only you can do that for yourself.

Also do self-care.  Ask questions, vent, and leverage any resource you can think of, as you need peace of mind.

Take care.

[Falcon2437]

Couscous,

Thank you yeah I definitely understand logically that if G-d forbid my wife does that it is not my parents fault and it is not mine. I know we as people all impact each other but we are not responsible for people's ultimate choices and decisions. It took me a while to get there logically because I have been told several times that it is "my fault she is going to kill herself" and obviously there's no way to just brush that off but I do know logically that I (and my parents) are not responsible for that choice if it ever happens. It's the emotional side of things that I'm not sure I will ever be able to reconcile because I do feel responsible (even though I know I'm not).

Yeah you are right me staying hasn't stopped some of the threats. When I talked to my therapist he told me a thought exercise is to think of everything as a drug addiction instead of BPD and my thought was that I feel by staying I can help calm the "drug use" and avoid a fatal overdose but the reality is that even if I'm there a person can overdose anyway.

I agree with what you said about my MIL. I hope I can find a way to get help too I just don't know how. She turns down any help from 988 and says she doesn't need that she just needs a baby to not feel broken anymore. I think she is seeing a therapist or psychiatrist now but she's lied about that before so I'm not 100% sure.

Thank you for your support and your help it means a lot to me.


Thankful,

Thank you so much for sharing. I can definitely understand what you mean when you talk about the impact that this forum can have. To anyone reading this right now thank you, this has meant so much to me and really made me feel like I am not alone. After talking to different therapists, DV hotlines, 988 and other support groups I can't begin to express how much of a difference this website has already had on my life and on my relationship.

I think what you are talking about with Quora is something I can work on where I don't need to lie but I also don't need to preemptively share things that will only escalate the situation.



Salty,
I have been off from work the past couple of days (which I why I didn't respond earlier) and don't feel comfortable checking this website when I am at home. I really really appreciate everything you said here and I will try to respond tonight before I leave work but if I run out of time I will answer tomorrow when I am back at work.

Thank you all.

[Falcon2437]

Salty,

Thank you for everything and thank you for being open and honest with me. I think a part of me is still hoping a magic safe exit will come up but logically I know at this point you are right, it is damage control. Like you said if anyone else reading this has any ideas please let me know!

Good call on renaming clips. Do you know with video recordings on a phone if there is a good way to do that? I have "favorited" a few of the more egregious ones like when she told me she'd hit herself so there are marks and call the police but as I look back on the rest of them I realize I have probably 50+ hours and a lot of them are not marked. If there is a way to rename a video clip that would be extremely helpful.

Holy crap I cannot imagine being face to face with terrorists and thank you for your service along with the hours of time you have spent helping me in this situation.

Yes I have an individual therapist. His main suggestion was for me to pack up when she is not in the house, leave and sever all contact. It is likely the safest option for me personally I agree but I really don't think I could ever do that as I don't think it is safe for her.

Our couples therapist seems to be more of a rip the Band-Aid type person but he can only say so much as he is also working with her obviously.

Yeah there is no way she will give me the name of her own therapist/psychiatrist, I have asked before. I don't know if she is keeping the name from me so I can't reach out or because she isn't actually seeing anyone but either way I can't get in contact with them.

I have called 911 and had the police come to our house six times and then a seventh time we had a mobile crisis team come out. They came out just to hopefully de-escalate the situation and lead to real help and change but once they decided they needed to chapter her the police came out to help with that as well. I don't really know much about Smart911 but I will look into it when I get back to work tomorrow. Thank you!

She was only institutionalized once and that time was extremely brief. I'm not sure how much they can tell me legally and I know she has already lied to me about what did and didn't happen during her time there. (She told me she was handcuffed the entire time and at the very least one of the crisis response people was able to tell me that definitely was not the case)

She does have a job. In the five years we've been together she's had I think six different jobs because there is always some major problem with management that pops up about six months in. At first I thought she just had horrible luck and really was being lied to in interviews and at work, now I realize that might not be the case... Yeah she mostly works remote but one or two times a week is in person and anything I do major such as talking to a lawyer, the police or packing a go bag has happened on those days to be safe.

My parents put up their own boundary because they feel she has consistently lied to them and been ungrateful and unwilling to participate in anything with the family. The final straw for them I think was when they saw me completely break down crying in front of them about how I don't know how much more of this I can take. My parents haven't explicitly told me that I should or shouldn't do anything because candidly when this all started to go off the rails I made it pretty clear to them that anything that happens needs to be MY choice. It is my life and I need to be the one driving it. That's something I've avoided in the past and that attitude is part of how I am in this current situation in the first place so it was very important to me that while I absolutely can get (and want to get) help, any decision has to be mine.

With my MIL I think she knows I am considering this. I don't want to project too much but I think her relationship with her ex-husband and my wife's father was very similar so I really do think she gets it but ultimately as you said regardless of whether or not she gets it her daughter is (and should be) her number one priority. I agree that I probably need to include her. I tried a bit of a test run today. I made the decision that I wanted to see my six-year-old niece's dance recital and I knew that decision would likely be a problem. This is the first time I've seen most of my family in two months since the time I had to call the paramedics but I decided ultimately I can't cut my family out and live my entire life in fear of what my wife MIGHT do. So I called my MIL yesterday to tell her this was a decision I made and there might be trouble the next day. Ultimately my wife did get very upset with me today and while there was some yelling and scolding I still went and her mom spent most of the night with her. It's weird to say I'm happy with how things went because I did feel scolded and demeaned, but I am happy with how that part of it went because I think it was about the best case scenario.


I do need to leave work now and go back home so that there aren't questions/problems about where I am if she wakes up but I will comment on the rest of this later. Thank you again so much for your support.

[SaltyDawg]

Falcon,

I am going to comment on each of your paragraphs in which I can add something I haven't already said individually.  I will quote you first in italics, and my response immediately after.

Good call on renaming clips. Do you know with video recordings on a phone if there is a good way to do that? I have "favorited" a few of the more egregious ones like when she told me she'd hit herself so there are marks and call the police but as I look back on the rest of them I realize I have probably 50+ hours and a lot of them are not marked. If there is a way to rename a video clip that would be extremely helpful.

I know how to do it on Android, but not iPhone.  For my Android write-up I did last fall look here:  https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=354091.msg13181755#msg13181755 for iPhone I found this website:  https://support.apple.com/guide/clips/work-with-videos-devd4d83329b/ios


Holy crap I cannot imagine being face to face with terrorists and thank you for your service along with the hours of time you have spent helping me in this situation.

Uncle Sam made sure I had the training, hardware, support network and the tools to deal specifically with these situations and scenarios.  Ironically this training included formal psychological training for a hostage scenario otherwise known as "Stockholm Syndrome" which is nearly identical to 'trauma bonding' experienced by the spouses/lovers of pwBPD - the only difference I was not expecting to be bonded this way with my wife for the past 2+ decades, so my defenses were down, and the bond I have is severe.  This site has a couple of good links on trauma bonding, that you will probably want to look at:

More information can be found here on the 'trauma bond'.

Signs/symptoms:
https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=229693.0

Treating:
https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=327131.0


Yes I have an individual therapist. His main suggestion was for me to pack up when she is not in the house, leave and sever all contact. It is likely the safest option for me personally I agree but I really don't think I could ever do that as I don't think it is safe for her.

I agree with your T [therapist] - this is a 'wise mind' scenario.  My opinion is to only Identify only irreplaceable possessions [photo albums, passport, account statements, social security card, credentials, licenses, etc], anything that is replaceable, plan on leaving - you do not want to arouse suspicions and telegraph your actions.  Possibly include a few high dollar items that are small and compact too as a secondary priority.


Our couples therapist seems to be more of a rip the Band-Aid type person but he can only say so much as he is also working with her obviously.

My suggestion is to establish a minimum boundary to stop the emotional abuse with the couple's T - I found this to be the biggest help in my scenario.


Yeah there is no way she will give me the name of her own therapist/psychiatrist, I have asked before. I don't know if she is keeping the name from me so I can't reach out or because she isn't actually seeing anyone but either way I can't get in contact with them.

This information is not needed if you are ultimately leaving the situation.  However, if you are going to stay, then it is advisable to find out her T and communicate your observations of the relationship.


I have called 911 and had the police come to our house six times and then a seventh time we had a mobile crisis team come out. They came out just to hopefully de-escalate the situation and lead to real help and change but once they decided they needed to chapter her the police came out to help with that as well. I don't really know much about Smart911 but I will look into it when I get back to work tomorrow. Thank you!

Get complete records for each and every '911 call' for your attorney.  The more legwork you do, the less expensive your attorney will be.  

The Smart911 system covers about 1/3 of US population.  When you call in with your mobile phone, or any phone number that you attach to it, the dispatcher's screen will fill up with previous details [that you control, including any pictures you pre-plan to share with emergency response which may include a floor plan of your dwelling (fire plan), health information on you and your wife including her past suicide attempts (including identifying photos), etc.] in addition to any additional details that their system has on you.  It will assist the dispatcher and authorities on what to send, and their response when they are on-scene - it could mean the difference of using LTLF (less than lethal force - e.g. a tazer) or LF to calm your wife down if she has a deadly weapon in hand on her next attempt.  This is more useful if you are travelling with her on to a vacation spot, my home doesn't use it; however, the area we vacation in does.


She was only institutionalized once and that time was extremely brief. I'm not sure how much they can tell me legally and I know she has already lied to me about what did and didn't happen during her time there. (She told me she was handcuffed the entire time and at the very least one of the crisis response people was able to tell me that definitely was not the case)

If she used your insurance, contact your insurance for records - see if there is a code that would indicate a diagnosis.  Use your newsroom detective skills to legally find out as much as you can.  This will also help your attorney once you obtain one.  I would still call the institution up, explain your wife's suicidal tendencies, and ask them for any advice that they can give you.  The worst they will tell you is 'no'.  The best is that they will tell you is her diagnosis without going into specifics.  Or somewhere in between where they can give you enough clues to figure it out yourself.

I am assuming that she was admitted by the 911 crisis team, if so, visit and talk to the responding supervisor, I find most responders take great pride in their work, and if you stroke their ego a little bit, it goes a long way to getting information.  Arrive with a dozen donuts to thank them for their service - you would be surprised on how well that works.


She does have a job. In the five years we've been together she's had I think six different jobs because there is always some major problem with management that pops up about six months in. At first I thought she just had horrible luck and really was being lied to in interviews and at work, now I realize that might not be the case... Yeah she mostly works remote but one or two times a week is in person and anything I do major such as talking to a lawyer, the police or packing a go bag has happened on those days to be safe.

Similar pattern with my wife, except it is every few years, not half a year.  If my wife paints someone black, there is trouble.  My wife has received warnings on her behavior, so I know it is 'not me' as she alleges.  Also, consider moving some critical stuff to your parent's house, or your work [if you have a lockable office]


My parents put up their own boundary because they feel she has consistently lied to them and been ungrateful and unwilling to participate in anything with the family. The final straw for them I think was when they saw me completely break down crying in front of them about how I don't know how much more of this I can take. My parents haven't explicitly told me that I should or shouldn't do anything because candidly when this all started to go off the rails I made it pretty clear to them that anything that happens needs to be MY choice. It is my life and I need to be the one driving it. That's something I've avoided in the past and that attitude is part of how I am in this current situation in the first place so it was very important to me that while I absolutely can get (and want to get) help, any decision has to be mine.

Yes, I agree, it is your life, and you need to be driving it.  However, I would highly recommend that you have a good conversation with your parents on this matter, especially if you need financial and/or emotional support for the divorce attorney and solicit their opinion for additional consideration.  My wife is an accountant by trade, and monitors all of my spending [yes, this can be seen as financial abuse].  Also, if you need a place to stay [however, if your wife knows this address, she can harass you there too; hence the need for a restraining order]


With my MIL I think she knows I am considering this. I don't want to project too much but I think her relationship with her ex-husband and my wife's father was very similar so I really do think she gets it but ultimately as you said regardless of whether or not she gets it her daughter is (and should be) her number one priority. I agree that I probably need to include her. I tried a bit of a test run today. I made the decision that I wanted to see my six-year-old niece's dance recital and I knew that decision would likely be a problem. This is the first time I've seen most of my family in two months since the time I had to call the paramedics but I decided ultimately I can't cut my family out and live my entire life in fear of what my wife MIGHT do.  So I called my MIL yesterday to tell her this was a decision I made and there might be trouble the next day. Ultimately my wife did get very upset with me today and while there was some yelling and scolding I still went and her mom spent most of the night with her. It's weird to say I'm happy with how things went because I did feel scolded and demeaned, but I am happy with how that part of it went because I think it was about the best case scenario.

DO NOT CUT YOUR FAMILY AND FRIENDS OUT!  This was my of my biggest mistakes, I cut out my friends due to my wife's irrational behavior - I will be having this conversation with our couple's T this upcoming Tuesday, as I lost my emotional 'support network' due to my actions of cutting them out of my life when my wife first started to go off the rails and did not approve of my choice of friends whom she perceived as a threat.  I need emotional support friends now, but I am not close enough to any of them for the support that I need.  And the one that I did get, was just taken away by emotional duress through my wife's action and the couple's T.  

Also, I recommend not to project any more than you need to.  You pretty much want to keep the same level of conflict until you are ready to execute your exit strategy.  You don't want to arouse suspicions more than you need to, as you don't want to burn bridges if you are going to stay, nor do you want them to prepare for you leaving when you do leave as that will be that much more difficult.

I think, if and when the time comes, you have established that your MIL will be there for her, so you can throw the proverbial torch at her as you are running out the door.  Hopefully your MIL will catch it, and run with it as much as she doesn't want to.  So 'Plan B' is the more likely scenario to reduce the chances of the worst possible outcome.

From your observation of your MIL and your wife's father history, there is an environmental factor correlation of a poor childhood that is more often than not the cause of BPD.

I know you have a lot to think about.  Remember self-care.  Even if you have an iPhone, there is a lot in the Android thread to read up on there too.

Take care.

[Falcon2437]

Ok I'm sorry I have been gone for a while. First of all, let me thank all of you again for your messages. I have spent I don't even know how many days, weeks, months talking to therapists, lawyers, crisis counselors, police, domestic violence hotlines, advocates, etc.

I finally decided to leave last week. I didn't plan to file for divorce I just wanted a week to think and have space. I worked out a plan with my therapists and the crisis counselor to leave and tell my wife on the phone so she couldn't escalate in front of me. I had three pages of notes for what to say and how to react when she said "I'm going to kill myself" "this is your fault" "I can't believe you are abandoning me" or a whole lot of other stuff. I was so proud of myself for actually doing it and holding relatively firm. She told me she couldn't do a week I had to come home, I said I can't come home right now. She told me I could do this but only if I guarantee that I will never leave again and will spend every night with her from then on out. I said I can't guarantee that. She said I can go but I have to tell her who I am staying with and where I am, I told her I can't do that. Eventually when she said I had to talk to her the next morning I caved. I knew in the moment I shouldn't have but I did. I wanted the call to last 10 minutes, it lasted three hours. After I hung up she called me three different times and texted me once. I didn't respond. The next morning she told me that she would've taken her mom to the hospital for a wrist injury but couldn't have done it because she would've had to leave our dog alone and how dare I do that. First of all, the dog is fine home alone from 1-7 AM, she'd be sleeping anyway. Second of all I found out later her mom had minor bruising on her wrist and that bruising was from HITTING A HOLE IN OUR WALL. But by that point I was already home and hooked by all of the threats of suicide. I have been living at home since (about a week) and I am just so scared. She has left or threatened to leave 7 of the last 8 days (after doing it on and off for three years) but always comes back and always talks about how I abandoned her.
I am still holding relatively firm on saying I will not have unprotected sex. Yesterday she talked/scolded/yelled at me about it from 6:30 in the morning until 10 at night. I had to call the police once after she talked about hurting herself while holding a knife. When the crisis team came I tried to leave with them but she said how she didn't know what she'd do if she was alone so against my better judgement I stayed. Of course once they left she said how she needed to leave because how dare I do this to her. She left and came back four times and told me if I didn't sleep in the bed with her she'd start to feel suicidal again. So I did it. We did not have sex. This morning I had to call the police again after she kept asking me about unprotected sex and trying to conceive. I said I want to work on our relationship but that is one thing I can not do right now. She said so you won't have unprotected sex? I said no. She said "Ok I'm killing myself."
When the police came she had already left but talked to them on the phone and lied saying that she never said that. I have a recording of it. I can guarantee you (and the police) that she said it. Once they were gone she called me on the phone and continued threatening herself until I said I will do whatever she wants. I am ashamed to say that I did say I'll do whatever she wants. When she got home I left for work and did not have sex with her and I really really really do not want to. I have done it before when she's demanded while suicidal but I can not do it again. Am I an asshole because I won't give her what she needs to heal?

As I was driving to work I found myself thinking about different ways I could break an arm or somehow injure myself to where I'd be allowed to stay at the hospital instead of at home. I would never actually kill myself and frankly I wouldn't ever truly hurt myself either but even the fact that I was thinking about it scares the PLEASE READ out of me.

I am at the point where I KNOW I need to leave. I have been verbally, sexually and physically abused in this relationship and as much as I want her to get help, as much as I need her to be safe and as much as I still to this day love her I CAN NOT DO THIS. I'm sorry I was gone from this thread for a while but I would love any advice anyone can give me on how to leave and how to leave forever and for good.

Thank you
Falcon

[Chief Drizzt]

Hey Falcon-

Sounds like a really tough situation you are in with your wife. I really don’t know what advice to give you as I am all-in with my wife and doing every thing I can to maintain a healthy marriage.

I will say though that when things get really rough I have contemplated/fantasized of just up and leaving - moving to another state - changing bank accounts - phone number - etc.  Literally cutting off all ties.  I’d never do it before - but now that all the kids are adults with the youngest heading off to college soon it’s something I still consider when things go haywire.  I think with my situation - going off the grid (for lack of a better term) would be the only way to do it. It’s just really hard when you have more than 30 years invested in a marriage and you really love the person with BPD.  I doubt I’d every really do it.

[Cat Familiar]

I’m posting what I just wrote on another thread regarding suicide threats. These threats work because we never know whether or not to take them seriously. I stayed in the marriage for far too many years, fearing that if I were to leave, he’d kill himself. It does happen, but apparently in his case, the threats were manipulation rather than real.

Around the time I was breaking up with my husband, the neighbor who lived across the road shot himself in his barn, and was found by his mother and his three year old daughter.

His wife told me she had left, taking their two children with her, because he’d been using meth—something that I was completely unaware of, as he seemed like a normal family man working as a contractor.

Within a couple of weeks of our breakup, my ex had paired up with a welfare mom. Months later I’d heard several reports from people in town that the two of them were dirty and smelled bad, and I certainly noticed that whenever he showed up to take things from the property. (It wasn’t until years later that I finally put two and two together: the erratic behavior—worse than before; the lying—typical, but more extreme; the grandiose delusions—wasn’t sure if I had finally woken up and was seeing the truth or if these were more serious crazy notions than what I was accustomed to. But ultimately it occurred to me that he was likely doing meth.)

Even though I didn’t realize what was going on with him at the time, I instinctively knew something was seriously *OFF* with him and the suicide threats he’d made throughout our marriage haunted me, especially after the neighbor’s death.

At this point, everything was in motion with the divorce, so I kept putting one foot in front of the other and persevering. I knew that there was nothing I could do to protect him or keep him safe, and if he was going to take his own life, that was on him, not me, though I did worry about his survival.

Fast forward many years later: I’ve been no contact for years, yet I’ve heard about many of his subsequent misadventures: arrest for domestic violence, fleeing the state and being on our county’s “wanted list,” living on the other coast and racking up bills for which creditors have called me, receiving a phone call from a woman tracking down her father (him) from a one night stand when he was married to me, learning that he had chosen not to visit his long-suffering mother at the end of her life (probably to avoid being arrested in this state), and other sundry details.

Obviously I had underrated his survival skills.  

Like you, throughout the marriage I had focused upon the good and kind parts of him and hoped to support those, while hoping the difficult and abusive parts would recede through my kindness and continued support. Didn’t happen. Apparently he’s been able to successfully latch on to a succession of women who were able to bail him out of difficulty. Turns out the threats were just that—manipulative threats.

We are only responsible for our own choices. We cannot save someone hellbent on destruction. Talk is cheap, but the fear it can elicit in us can keep us hooked—trying to right someone else’s ship, when we really need to pay attention to keeping our own boat afloat.

[Falcon2437]

Thank you Cat and Chief for your responses.

I think part of why it is so hard for me to just up and leave and leave for good is because of what you are saying Chief. The truth is no matter how horribly she treats me or what happens I still love her and I just want her to be happy. I just feel like right now I'm at the "all-in" point where I either have to decide to sacrifice my life (figuratively) and just give her what she wants or leave and risk that she will literally take her life. Earlier today she kept talking to me about how she is willing to compromise, and she'll have sex with a condom to prove it. I didn't want to do it but I felt I had no choice. I know from our past experience that if she feels she is "compromising" and I say I don't want to have sex right now it will go straight to you are rejecting me, everyone rejects me and I have nothing to live for. I then found a small hole in the condom wrapper and I hate saying this but I have no earthly idea if I am just seeing things because I'm scared and paranoid or if she is really willing to go that far. All I know is even with protected sex I ended up pretending to get there so it would be over and then just sat in the shower for a while before going to work.

Cat I'm really sorry to hear about everything that happened with your ex-husband and even with your neighbor I can only imagine how traumatizing that was. Thank you for sharing with me. When you were putting everything in motion with the divorce were you still living with your husband? How long did the divorce process take and when you told him it was happening how did you do it/how did he react?

Thank you both
Falcon

[uncleflo]

It’s just really hard when you have more than 30 years invested in a marriage and you really love the person with BPD.  I doubt I’d every really do it.

I hear you, Chief. The more time invested (and with kids involved), the harder it is to imagine actually indulging in that fantasy. I commend you for your love and dedication, my friend.

Lately, to be honest, I've been fantasizing about my pwBPD being the one to pull the plug and wondering what that would be like. The hiccup is the same though, as I love her to pieces, and either way you slice it, it would hurt.

[uncleflo]

I just feel like right now I'm at the "all-in" point where I either have to decide to sacrifice my life (figuratively) and just give her what she wants or leave and risk that she will literally take her life.

I feel for you, Falcon. My heart goes out to you and your wife, my friend. Sending you nothing but positivity, as well as to all those who are fighting similar battles here. We're in this together!

[Couscous]

Of course it’s your right to do whatever you want, but the bitter truth is that a baby will not heal her and your staying will not heal her. You just do not have that power.

And while it may be your right to sacrifice yourself for her, it’s most certainly not your right to sacrifice your future children. 

Here’s something from Jordan Peterson about self-sacrifice that I thought was brilliant: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aGEv4JwHZJc

[Cat Familiar]

. I just feel like right now I'm at the "all-in" point where I either have to decide to sacrifice my life (figuratively) and just give her what she wants or leave and risk that she will literally take her life.

I recollect feeling like that until one day I told myself that I was just waiting to die. At that moment, I realized that I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life *enduring* this marriage.

Earlier today she kept talking to me about how she is willing to compromise, and she'll have sex with a condom to prove it. I didn't want to do it but I felt I had no choice. I know from our past experience that if she feels she is "compromising" and I say I don't want to have sex right now it will go straight to you are rejecting me, everyone rejects me and I have nothing to live for. I then found a small hole in the condom wrapper and I hate saying this but I have no earthly idea if I am just seeing things because I'm scared and paranoid or if she is really willing to go that far. All I know is even with protected sex I ended up pretending to get there so it would be over and then just sat in the shower for a while before going to work.

We’ve heard similar stories on this board. I don’t think you’re being paranoid. Keep the condoms away from her.

When you were putting everything in motion with the divorce were you still living with your husband?

We were still living on the same property together but not cohabiting. He spent most of his time at the welfare mom’s place and then they would spend weekends away from her kids here. (We had multiple buildings at that time, but shared a kitchen.)

How long did the divorce process take and when you told him it was happening how did you do it/how did he react?

I dropped the ball with the divorce process because I was running my small business in addition to having another job, when my mother’s dementia became so apparent that I had to fly down to see her every couple of weeks and pack up her things, get her house ready to be sold, and buy her a house nearby. The divorce got put on the back burner. I had hoped we could do a collaborative divorce and had spoken with an attorney about property settlement agreements etc., as the land we owned was purchased through an inheritance I had received.

During the delay, my ex hired the most pit bull of divorce litigators in town, and had come up with a cockamamie quasi-legal theory about how he had an *interest* in my inheritance due to our marriage, despite the state law indicating otherwise.

When I told him I was done with the marriage, he didn’t believe it, and thought I’d forgive him for the umpteenth time. He tried to persuade me by being the husband he should have been always, but it was merely an act and a manipulation and I was no longer fooled.

It became apparent that I was not going to budge, then he immediately went into the *find a new woman* mode and even asked my opinion about certain prospects.

When he actually did find someone, I became public enemy #1 and he trashtalked me to her (I was told that by a third party who knew both her and me) and she soon hated me too. Ironically I was really happy at this point as he was mostly out of my hair and I tried to be friendly with both of them. When that didn’t work, I remained civil despite him breaking into my personal space and taking things that belonged to me.

The divorce got ugly and protracted with me trying to disprove ownership of things he claimed were his, and making me do deep dives into paper trails. Ultimately I basically paid him off to go away, and that was a bitter pill to swallow. In retrospect, it was a great deal as real estate prices have gone through the roof in recent years and I got away cleanly, with ownership of things that belonged to me.

My only regret was that I hadn’t ended the relationship years before.

[Couscous]

I thought this quote from the article below totally nailed it:

It’s Not Your Fault
You’re not a savior or a killer. It’s time to let go of this false narrative. You are not responsible for controlling the actions your partner takes.

We get to choose our narratives, and the narrative that you “saved” your abusive partner by acquiescing is as dangerous as the narrative that you “killed” your abusive partner by finally leaving. Before you buy into a narrative, ask yourself, “Is this helpful?”

The National Domestic Violence Hotline says that when a partner threatens suicide in order to control you, it’s best to maintain your boundaries and realize that their actions are not your fault: “Put the choice to live or die where it belongs — on your partner.”

https://betterhumans.pub/how-to-deal-with-coercive-suicide-threats-71a72e5cdab1

[Cat Familiar]

Awesome Jordan Peterson video, Couscous!

[Falcon2437]

This is going to be a lot, no worries if people don't read it I am just trying to leave for a third time and I need to write this stuff down and try to stay strong. I tried again yesterday and she somehow knew, called me to ask if I was leaving and when I said I was thinking about things all of the suicidal threats started and I spent the rest of the day trying to find her and calm her down. I know I can't keep chasing her like that. She has literally forced me into sex more times than I can count via threats including two days ago and I cannot live like this. I have started fantasizing about hurting myself (never killing myself and I wouldn't actually do it, but just the fact that I'm thinking about breaking an arm or something to sleep in a hospital bed is really scaring me) and I need to leave. These are some notes I wrote down over the last month or so.


Over the last four and a half years I have been lied to compulsively, threatened and abused nearly the entire time. I have been verbally, emotionally, physically and sexually abused in my relationship and in my marriage and I cannot take it anymore. As I sit here thinking about everything, any one of those sets of abuse should have been enough for me to run. Any one of the gigantic, elaborate lies to change my life should have been a red flag that scared me enough, but I either didn’t see it or didn’t want to see it because a happy marriage with the picket fence and wife and kids has been what I have wanted for so damn long. Well I see it now and this note is in a lot of ways to remind myself of what I have seen and been through when times get tough. And let me preface everything by saying what she has been through over the last two years with her dad, her health and the miscarriage is nothing short of hell, not to mention the type of abuse in childhood/teen years that she has told me about. But that doesn’t give her the right to treat me like this.


Sexual abuse

This is the most simple thing I will write here and it is also the hardest. No means no. It does not mean threaten, berate and scare until it becomes a yes. It does not mean keep talking for 20 straight hours until it becomes a yes. I have been extremely clear that I am not comfortable with having unprotected sex. She then threatens suicide until I cave and I say I will do whatever it takes to keep her alive. If I then don’t want to have unprotected sex I’m told I am a liar. So I have done it. Multiple times. I have done it and told her later that I felt taken advantage of and that I am not comfortable with it. Then the cycle repeats itself and she makes me do it again. I’ve struggled at times with how I can feel abused or raped when I’m a guy, I should be able to control what I want in that way and stop it if I’m not interested. The reality is I have been essentially held at gunpoint. But not with a gun to my head, with one held to hers, the woman that I loved and frankly still love. I have done everything I can to pretend to cum because I know us having a kid right now is not the answer. My wife is abusive and scary at worst, fake at best. She is a wonderful dog mom when everything is okay. But she also screams at me so much that our dog at times hides behind me or in corners and shakes. My kids will never see that. But I digress. Sex is not a bargaining chip. It is not an “I’ll go to therapy but only if you try to have a baby with me” it is not a “we have to do things we are uncomfortable with in a marriage.” No. If I say no that means no. And frankly if she says no to protected sex then that means no too which I have always respected. I don’t want to be having any kind of sex with her right now and I certainly don’t want to without protection. I have told her I don’t want to and she has told me “I need this” and threatened suicide without it. That is literally sexual abuse and I will not stand for it. Even if I do decide that we can try our relationship again that is a non-negotiable. When I say no it means no. Whether she thinks it is an overreaction or not I need to stop being scared of saying the word rape and be honest about how I feel. I feel like I have been raped. I have cried to myself in the shower after sex multiple times. I was forced into sex several times when I did not want to have it in a way I was not comfortable having it. That is rape. That is not okay. I don’t deserve that. No one deserves that.


Verbal abuse

I understand that different people fight or talk differently. I understand that in her house growing up there was a ton of yelling and name calling. I am so sorry she had to endure that and it is not my place to judge her for doing what she saw as a kid or doing what she feels she needs to in order to “be heard.” She has every right to yell or talk how she wants to. But I have every right to not be okay with it. I have every right to not stand for it or stay with it. I am at the very least scolded and at the worst screamed at nearly every day. I’m done with that. I deserve better than that. Over the last 4.5 years I have been called “asshole, piece of PLEASE READ, retard, PLEASE READ-up, idiot, stupid, dumb, brain dead, the biggest disappointment of my life, maliciously selfish” and many others. I have been threatened that I will be stabbed if I don’t let her get to the knives to kill herself and told to “rot in hell, PLEASE READ off, go PLEASE READ myself” and much more. I have been screamed at privately, I have been screamed at publicly in the streets, I have been screamed at in front of her family. That is not okay. I will not take that. I will not endure that. I will not live like that. She has also told me my mom is a “deplorable c*nt,” my sister is a bitch and many other horrible things about my family.


Physical abuse

Thankfully there has not been nearly as much physical abuse as verbal. I feel the verbal happens just about every day, physical only happens on bad days and it is rarely physical with me in the classic domestic violence from the movies sense. There are three times she has been directly physical with me. 1. She grabbed my arm breaking the skin to “demonstrate” how the police officer hurt her and grabbed her. I have no idea if the police officer really did that but if he did how in the world is it okay to “demonstrate” something that she calls traumatizing. She could have easily just told me he grabbed my arm and broke the skin. 2. She slapped my hand when I tried to put my arm on her shoulder to console her. This wasn’t super hard by any stretch and had no mark unlike the first instance but I will never forget how I felt. How scared I was. That is not okay even if it wasn’t all that hard of a slap. 3. She threw the rings at me. She missed and hit the wall but of all the times she’s thrown PLEASE READ that is the only time it was directly at me. That brings me to what most of the physical abuse has been which is not direct stuff but things intended to intimidate, scare or coerce me into doing what she needs so she’ll stop. Over the last year she has thrown and broken a drinking glass, a container of oats, broken a mirror on our bedroom door from slamming it too hard and broken her phone throwing it at the ground. I have watched her punch herself in the face at full force like the PLEASE READing movie fight club before I could stop her. She has punched the walls of our house, she has open hand hit my car several times. She has punched herself in the vagina. All of this she has done while telling me that this is how I make her feel. Telling me how I put her in so much pain that she needs a physical manifestation of it. I’m sorry I never want her to feel in pain and she knows that I will feel guilty when she says that but sitting here thinking about it that is NOT MY FAULT. She is the one making the choice to hit herself, not me.  
 

Suicidal threats

For six months I have been living under threat of death. Not my own, but hers. As I said when talking about sexual abuse I feel I have been living with a gun to her head. She has told me she will take pills, she has told me she’ll jump out the window, bash her head in, stab herself, drive into a tree, walk into traffic if I don’t “take the pain away” “help her heal” or flat out give her a baby. She has told me she’s watched a video on how to knock herself unconscious to get rid of the pain and then did it. That was the day I broke the bathroom door down and called the paramedics. And all of it happened because I went to see my family on Hanukkah. The truth is, she’s in unimaginable pain. She does feel cut out by my family and she doesn’t see her role in it. That is real. Her feelings and her pain are real to her. I will never tell her they aren’t. But I can’t live at gunpoint. After the Hanukkah incident I didn’t see my family for nearly two months because she told me not to and I was scared about how things would escalate if I did. Even now as I prepare to leave for a while I’m going to a friends’ place not my parents because I’m terrified of what she will do if she thinks I’m going to them.

The police have been to my house more than ten times now because it escalates to a point where I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to keep her safe. At this point I don’t know if me staying is even helping or if it is just enabling her. All I know is I can’t live like this. I can’t wake up and go to bed scared every day.

Other threats

Writing down the non-suicidal threats she has given me is going to be very hard to do just like the verbal abuse because frankly there are so many I will never get them all. I guess I’ll start with divorce/calling off engagement/ending relationship because those are the ones I have endured the most and the longest. Once I was hooked in the relationship, about a year in, that’s when the threats to leave began. They were almost always tied to something such as these examples that all happened: “make more money,” “make better friends,” “give your sister a restraining order for me,” “follow through on things,” “go to therapy” or else she will leave. Some weeks it happens every day, some not at all but on average over the last three years I’d guess it happens at least once a week, likely twice. She threatened an annulment on our honeymoon. She has threatened to book a flight home early and then a split during every vacation we have taken since the marriage (honeymoon, San Diego, New York/Jersey and Boston). She has packed a bag several times, she has told me I had to pack several times. She has told me she is never coming home several times. She has told me if I don’t leave she will call the police. That brings me to the non-suicidal threat that scares me the most.

She has told me that she will lie to the police about me hitting her. That she will hit herself so there are marks and then tell the police I did it. That could result in me literally going to jail for beating my wife who I have never touched. Not once. She has told me she’ll call the police and tell them I’m hurting her emotionally in her own home if I don’t leave. This is a home that we bought together and I had already told her I would leave. She threatened to call the police as I was trying to walk out the door.

She has also threatened to sue my family. This ranges from restraining orders/orders of protection against my mom and sister to suing them for “emotional trauma and harassment.” How they can harass her when they are literally ignoring her because of how much they feel she’s abused them I will never understand but I guess if she files a lawsuit that is for the courts to figure out.

She has also threatened my job. She has previously told me about sending in complaints about other reporters to try and get them fired and one time after saying she was going to the police station to “file a report” (I still have no idea what she wanted to file because she never explained what I did) she made a not so veiled threat of enjoy this day of work because I’m talking to your boss tomorrow.


Lies

I will never be able to sum up all the lies she has told me. Hell chances are I only know 20% of them anyway but the two biggest I don’t think I’ll ever fully be able to get over. She told me how because of our relationship and because I never follow through and give her what she needs she was in therapy with a woman named Debbie. The therapist told her how the way I was acting was not okay and how I am the reason she needs to be on antidepressants and that I should be in therapy myself. She then gave me an ultimatum/threat that if I don’t go to therapy she will leave me. So of course I went and have been going to Kurt ever since. All of that was a lie. Debbie didn’t exist. The antidepressants didn’t exist. None of it did.

She also blew up the two most important relationships in my life with C and K through lies. Starting with C she told me how she heard through two different people how C talked PLEASE READ about her and said all these nasty things about her in press boxes. How she bullied her and made fun of her. That made me a little hesitant around C and as soon as she knew I was backing off she went on the offensive telling me “how could you be friends with someone who treats your girlfriend/fiance/partner like that, you should never be talking to her, etc” So I eventually cut her out of my life. She was my literal best friend here and I never even gave her the benefit of the doubt of having a conversation with her to find out what was real because the thought that my girlfriend (at the time) was lying never crossed my mind. She later told me she made those lies up because she knew C was “into” me and thought I was too. At the time C was dating her now husband and father of her child and I was completely in love with my girlfriend (now wife). C and I have never done anything remotely like that, she was essentially my sister. But even if there was some romantic tension there (and there truly wasn’t) then have a conversation with me. Don’t make up a massive lie about her to end it for me.

She made up similar lies about K telling me later she did it because she felt that he was holding me back in my career and making me do a worse job because I stooped to his level of non-work. Again if that is a problem or something you want to say to me then say that to me. I might agree, I might not. But making up lies to blow up a decade-long friendship is not okay.


How I feel currently

Fear. I feel complete and utter fear all the time. I can’t count the number of days I have stayed in my car a block away from the house at night for 10, 20, 30 minutes because I am scared to go inside. How many times I have stayed at work with absolutely nothing to do because I don’t want to go home. That is not the way I should be living. That is not the way I will be living. I feel hope that things can get better but I can not do this the way it is. Something needs to change.

I don’t truly think that she will kill herself but I am terrified that I could be wrong. I don’t truly think that she will sue me or my family but I am worried that I could be wrong. I do feel this is the best thing to do for both of us but I feel guilty knowing that she has told me so many times it is my fault she is in so much pain and that she is suicidal. Logically I know it isn’t my fault but that logic doesn’t stop me from feeling guilty.

I am also scared that I am making a mistake. If I’m being honest I do believe that the person she was for the first year was a complete and utter fabrication to hook me. But I am scared that the kind, thoughtful

[Cat Familiar]

If you don’t object, I’d like to move this thread to the Conflicted Board. Here on the Bettering Board, we discuss strategies to improve relationships. I think your list of abuses prompts a fuller discussion of these issues than is appropriate here.

Reading what you so precisely described, I’d like to ask you to do three things:
1. Read what you wrote from the perspective that your best friend wrote it.
2. Write a detailed narrative about how you would respond if he asked for your opinion.
3. Get a consultation with an attorney and show them your list of abuses.

[Falcon2437]

I don't mind moving it there at all. To be honest I really have a hard time navigating this website, is there anything I should do or can you just move it there?

I will do 1 and 2 tonight, thank you. I have already talked to an attorney about some of this stuff, his advice was for me to leave, file and never look back.

[Cat Familiar]

It’s like you are living a news story. This seems very dangerous on several fronts.

[kells76]

Hi Falcon2437, thanks for sharing your update with us. It's good that you were able to organize your thoughts and memories so systematically. That sounds to me like there is a strong, capable part of you that can handle taking steps to keep you safe.

Cat Familiar and I are seeing it similarly. You're in a dangerous situation. And again, it sounds like part of you knows that.

Just a couple of questions from me right now:

Could you agree that your safety is the #1 priority? After all, if you aren't safe, you can't help anyone else.
Tell me a little bit about tonight -- what are some things you think you could do to stay safe?
What's on deck for tomorrow -- are you headed back to work?

Keep us in the loop. Again, really glad you stopped back to let us know what's going on.

kells76

[Outdorenthusiast]

I thought this quote from the article below totally nailed it:

It’s Not Your Fault
You’re not a savior or a killer. It’s time to let go of this false narrative. You are not responsible for controlling the actions your partner takes.

We get to choose our narratives, and the narrative that you “saved” your abusive partner by acquiescing is as dangerous as the narrative that you “killed” your abusive partner by finally leaving. Before you buy into a narrative, ask yourself, “Is this helpful?”

The National Domestic Violence Hotline says that when a partner threatens suicide in order to control you, it’s best to maintain your boundaries and realize that their actions are not your fault: “Put the choice to live or die where it belongs — on your partner.”

https://betterhumans.pub/how-to-deal-with-coercive-suicide-threats-71a72e5cdab1

Excellent!  This should be regularly recycled and reposted time to time.  A painful reality that is hard to let sink in and separate from emotionally, and one I finally had to come to peace with after many years of struggling and self blame of “if I only.”

Saving someone from a burning building (normal human response) vs trying to save someone intentionally running into a burning building (un healthy). How someone chooses to live their life is not under our control.  It is their life - not ours, and not our fault. 

Suicide threats are extremely common emotional manipulation tactic used on caretakers by people with BPD because it works on us - until we stop allowing it to work.

There should be a separate workshop thread created on effective boundaries examples non’s could reference as I am sure I am not the only one that this was hard to navigate on what to say/do.

[Falcon2437]

Hi Kells,

I have had a really hard time putting my safety first because to me it feels like with the suicidal threats her safety is much more immediate. It has taken me a long time to process just how much my safety and mental state are at risk because when you compare to the threat of suicide it always felt like my problems were so minor. I now realize that they aren't minor at all and just because she throws up the most dangerous type of threat possible doesn't mean that my safety concerns and my pain aren't real. So now I do realize my safety needs to be an important priority too but idk if I can see it as #1.

I definitely do know that I am in a dangerous situation. It took a very long time for me to admit to myself that it is rape, but at this point I do know it and I know I need to have an escape plan.

My plan for tonight is to stay at work until it is relatively late so she will be 95% asleep. She won't be able to get pissed at me for not coming home because I'll be there before she's asleep but she also won't try to pressure me into anything that late. Then tomorrow I will go straight from work to a new couples therapist where I will meet her. We will be taking separate cars and in that session I am going to tell her with a witness and with some security that I am leaving for a while. I need that time. I need that space. I need that distance. And then I need to stick to my plan. I know she will bombard me with calls, texts and anything else ranging from begging me to come back to talking about how she is actively killing herself. My plan is if she threatens her life I will call the police but not go myself. I have gone more times than I can count and it always ends with things getting worse. So I will keep my boundary and rely on the professionals to help. If she can not respect that I need time and I need space and escalates then the police will have to be enough. I can not keep going back. After those couple of days/weeks I will re-evaluate next steps but unless something DRASTICALLY changes I know in my heart and in my head I will need to file for divorce because at this point I have two options 1. Leave 2. Stay forever and know that my life is essentially over I only live to make her happy and I am NOT ok with point 2.

[ForeverDad]

I’ll echo the others in saying that this volatility is not a healthy home to bring children into...

If you spend much time on this board, you will read countless stories about people regretting having children with mentally ill partners, and horror stories about custody issues. So please, trust your instincts here.

Yes, it is typical for an acting-out disordered spouse to pressure and cajole you into agreeing to have children.  But be forewarned this can start a lifetime of regret.  What better way for a spouse to believe you're locked into a long term relationship if there are children?  If life with your spouse is difficult now, it will almost sure worsen in years to come, and even worse, spill over onto any children.

If you don't yet have children together, then don't.  If you already have a child with her, then don't have any more.  Be the one in charge of birth control, you don't want to hear "Oops I forgot.  Guess what?"

We're not cruel, we're trying to save you from increased agony in the future.  Been there, done that.

The reality is that many here, if the disordered perceptions and behavior are severe enough, have separated and divorced, not regretting that decision.

[Amina]

If what you say is all too true, she is damn lucky to have someone that gives a damn so much.

[Amina]

Also, saying that to her might be ok rarely sometimes, but as we know as community it may or may not register.  Sometimes BPD love can handle my appropriate anger expressions, other times they can't even handle something benign or seemingly fun or calm, but fun calm times do happen.

[Falcon2437]

Thank you guys all for the support. I know what I have to do. I really think that having an impartial third party there tomorrow to serve as a witness and a layer of protection for me will be beneficial and then once we leave the therapist's office I just have to have to have to stick to my boundaries and what I need. The second I crack she will come back in and I'll be right back where I have been for the last year and in some cases the last 4+ years.

[Outdorenthusiast]

Falcon - you got this.  You are important, valuable, and your feelings matter. 

Keep us posted…

[Amina]

My ex-husband had no red flags for 8 months prior to our wedding night when he went into his first irrational rage over seemingly nothing in public.  He had traits of psychopathy and a predator, and was physically abusive unprovoked.  My current on/off again partner exhibited splitting and panic at intimacy from fairly early on, and despite him being more high functioning than my ex-husband, others could see a dark/off/disturbed quality to him pretty quickly, also.  I think when BPD has the presence of more co-occurring empathy disorders, it is more likely for them to be capable of charm and manipulation for a long time or a "long time" before revealing they are disordered.

[Falcon2437]

Amina I'm really sorry you had to experience that and I wish you nothing but the best!

Outdorenthusiast thank you for the kind words they really do mean a lot as I am trying to build up all the strength I have for tonight and the support means a lot.

[kells76]

Hi Falcon2437;

Hi Kells,

I have had a really hard time putting my safety first because to me it feels like with the suicidal threats her safety is much more immediate. It has taken me a long time to process just how much my safety and mental state are at risk because when you compare to the threat of suicide it always felt like my problems were so minor. I now realize that they aren't minor at all and just because she throws up the most dangerous type of threat possible doesn't mean that my safety concerns and my pain aren't real. So now I do realize my safety needs to be an important priority too but idk if I can see it as #1.

I definitely do know that I am in a dangerous situation. It took a very long time for me to admit to myself that it is rape, but at this point I do know it and I know I need to have an escape plan.

My plan for tonight is to stay at work until it is relatively late so she will be 95% asleep. She won't be able to get pissed at me for not coming home because I'll be there before she's asleep but she also won't try to pressure me into anything that late. Then tomorrow I will go straight from work to a new couples therapist where I will meet her. We will be taking separate cars and in that session I am going to tell her with a witness and with some security that I am leaving for a while. I need that time. I need that space. I need that distance. And then I need to stick to my plan. I know she will bombard me with calls, texts and anything else ranging from begging me to come back to talking about how she is actively killing herself. My plan is if she threatens her life I will call the police but not go myself. I have gone more times than I can count and it always ends with things getting worse. So I will keep my boundary and rely on the professionals to help. If she can not respect that I need time and I need space and escalates then the police will have to be enough. I can not keep going back. After those couple of days/weeks I will re-evaluate next steps but unless something DRASTICALLY changes I know in my heart and in my head I will need to file for divorce because at this point I have two options 1. Leave 2. Stay forever and know that my life is essentially over I only live to make her happy and I am NOT ok with point 2.

Good to hear your update again, and then to hear more from you today. It sounds like your plan of staying late at work was something you were able to follow through on -- that's great that you can think ahead of time of what would be a good move, then do it, then see that you made it through. 

You're in a place of being ready to part ways, and it's good that you are being proactive about when, where, and how to make that statement to her. Different cars to/from the appointment, witnesses, and some options for alerting authorities about any threats are smart moves.

Besides the therapist, anyone else (family, friends, coworkers) know about your plan this evening? I'm guessing you have another place to stay lined up?

One step at a time...

kells76

[Falcon2437]

I do have a place to stay. My family, a few friends and key people at work all know about my plan (some know more details than others). I also talked to the police today to make sure I am covered on that front and that if she escalates I can call them without going in person myself. I am trying to write down notes about how exactly I want to phrase everything and how I want to respond. I would love any other proactive ideas anyone here has!

I did read through my notes from the lens of a friend reading it and it just further hammers home what I need to do. There is no world where the things I have been put through are ok. She has been through hell for the last two years and really for the last 20 years and that is important to note, but it does not make what she has done to me ok. If I stay I will be forced into sex that I don't want. If I stay I will be lied to. I will be screamed at. I will be called names. This stuff has not changed for a long time and it is not magically going to change tonight.

[Cat Familiar]

Something you’re probably already aware of is that you’ve been enmeshed in this relationship through a trauma bond.  https://www.forbes.com/health/mind/what-is-trauma-bonding/

That you have empathy for why she has behaved the way she does and have wanted to save her from self harm is indicative that you are a very compassionate person—just the sort of person that can easily be targeted by an abuser.

Those caring feelings won’t go away overnight, even though your rationality argues that your long term safety is preeminent.

There will be a lot to grieve: the dream of what your relationship could have been (had she been an emotionally healthy woman). But with time, your stress level will stabilize and you will emerge stronger, and will be far more alert to signs of dysfunction in new potential partners.

There is life beyond abuse. I say this without hesitation, even though I married another man with BPD. However, this one is kind and at this point his dysfunction is only mildly irritating at times—a vast improvement from my previous spouse!

Best to continue in a therapeutic relationship and discover why you were originally attracted to this woman and learn what are your priorities and expectations of how you wish to be treated in future commitments.

[Couscous]

I also talked to the police today to make sure I am covered on that front and that if she escalates I can call them without going in person myself. I am trying to write down notes about how exactly I want to phrase everything and how I want to respond. I would love any other proactive ideas anyone here has!

So, what I'm wondering is that if she is able to contact you and threatens S, that your resolve may weaken and you may cave in again. What would you think about blocking her on your phone, (and inform her that you are doing so), and tell her that if she feels suicidal to call a crisis hotline/her mother?

[Falcon2437]

So I did it...as best as I could. I said in the therapy session that I needed time and space and I wanted to stay somewhere else. She pretty quickly went into the suicidal talk that she has done for the better part of a year. Once we left therapy I caved more than I wanted to and told her I would meet her at home and we could talk more. At that point she refused to come home and kept talking about how she was going to kill herself. I called the police and met them at our home. They heard her talk about hurting herself etc and eventually when she heard a radio she knew they were there and hung up on me. She called her mom, told her mom that she was going to a hotel to kill herself and that she "had everything she needed."

The police were able to find her along with the mobile crisis response team while she was still talking to her mom. The crisis team took her to a version of a mental emergency room and hopefully she is getting meaningful help there. She went once before but was released pretty quickly and nothing really changed. I was at the house waiting with her panicked like I always am. But this time I am done having my entire life dictated by her threats. I took our dog and left the house. I am not just going to wait around for her to come home furious and cursing/throwing stuff. If she wants to have a monitored and rational conversation with me I can do that. Threats and expletives and abuse I will not do. What I need has not changed and what I need is time and space.

I really hope I am doing the right thing.

[Cat Familiar]

I really hope I am doing the right thing.

You cannot help or change her.

You are doing the right thing for you.

[Notwendy]

I also think you did the right thing for her.

BPD is on a spectrum so relationship decisions need to be individualized but when this includes threats and attempts of S- of this kind, I think the person needs to be in the care of medical professionals.

Clearly you understand that choosing to dedicate yourself to your wife's wishes is not good for you, but I don't think it's good for your wife either because, it's enabling her behavior. She essentially is saying "do everything I want or else" and this has worked for her- she gets what she wants. This reinforces her behavior and also keeps her from learning other ways to behave.

All threats for S need to be taken seriously, as they mean the person needs help. But to give in to their demands out of this fear may seem like the best thing in the moment, but it isn't the help they need as it may also reinforce the behavior, and not address her mental health needs.

Your wife has frequently threatened the unthinkable and this needs professional help You are not her mental health provider. In addition, your giving in to these threats enables the behavior. You have referred her to the help she needs and now it's up to her to decide to follow through with it. Change, if there is to be change, is slow and long term with steady work.

A sudden dramatic change on her part is motivated by the immediate circumstances, and if it is to "get you back" then once you do that, the motivation isn't there. I know you want to see your wife feel better, but it just might be that not enabling her, and doing what you did, has been more effective. The rest is up to her now.

[Cat Familiar]

Notwendy has summed this up perfectly.

[Falcon2437]

Thank you Cat and Notwendy I appreciate it and I know that enabling her as I have done for so long does not help and ultimately this is what I need to do.

Update for now is the crisis team/mental health professionals are keeping her for a few days. I talked to her last night breaking my boundary/rule about how I needed some real, true space and distance because last night I was just so scared and when the call came from the hospital I felt I needed to make sure she was okay. She of course used that time to tell me and her mom how she wants to get through this but she "needs to know we are working towards a family and a future together" to get through it all. I understand she truly might feel that way but to me it is again her putting all of her hopes, dreams, prayers and potential future squarely on me as if she has no options if I leave.

Once I realized she was doing that I was able to take a step back again today and respect my own boundaries even if she won't. She has called me five times so far today and I have not answered. It is so f*cking hard to not answer because I just want to hear her voice, know she is okay and make her feel better, but I know I can't. I know the second I open the window everything will go back to the way it was and I can't do the way it was. I need a separation. And yet even as I want a separation and very possibly a divorce I can't stop feeling like an a$$hole because she and her mom are telling me how much she needs me to be the "hope" to move on with her life. Am I wrong for not answering the phone? Am I wrong for not wanting to be "the hope" ? I go back to something someone posted on this thread earlier that I am not her savior or her killer and if I decide I want space or a divorce or to be "all-in" either way it is not fair for all her hopes to be pinned on me as my responsibility.

Falcon

[Couscous]

I think you did really well under the circumstances.

If they do release her, my thinking is that if they it’s probably because they have determined that, in their professional opinion, she is not intent on following through with her threats. Maybe you can ask your therapist about how that works. It might set your mind at ease if you had confidence that her threats are for purposes of manipulation and that she doesn’t truly desire to end her life.

[Couscous]

And yet even as I want a separation and very possibly a divorce I can't stop feeling like an a$$hole because she and her mom are telling me how much she needs me to be the "hope" to move on with her life. Am I wrong for not answering the phone? Am I wrong for not wanting to be "the hope" ? I go back to something someone posted on this thread earlier that I am not her savior or her killer and if I decide I want space or a divorce or to be "all-in" either way it is not fair for all her hopes to be pinned on me as my responsibility.

You are so not wrong. What is wrong is what both she, and especially her mother (?) are doing.

My hope for you is that you will find the strength to stop talking to either them and if need be, to block both of them on your phone. Her mother is clearly an extremely dysfunction person, and this likely explains why her daughter developed BPD in the first place. BPD gets passed on through the generations, so if you were to have kids with her there is a high probability that your kids will develop it.

You might find this therapist reaction to the movie, The Notebook, to be of interest. He says that a person who makes suicide threats should absolutley not be involved in a romantic relationship. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JzW3tQFV5M0

[Cat Familiar]

I know how difficult it is.    You are in a severely dysfunctional relationship and you ended up there one step at a time. Like most of us here, you likely dismissed some of the behaviors you encountered as *odd* and hoped that things would get better with time. But they didn’t. Things got worse, maybe incrementally, maybe quickly, likely at the point when she felt you were committed to her.

And now you are being put in the position by both her and her mother, that you are responsible for whether or not she lives or dies. Had this notion been presented to you at the outset of the relationship, I have no doubt that you would never have involved yourself with this woman.

You are fortunate to not have children with her. That she imagines that being a *family* will save her is illusory. Once children enter into the picture, the level of stress she will experience will far surpass what she feels now, and what you currently are experiencing will become your *new normal*.

You realize this intellectually, but your feelings lag behind. Yes, it’s very painful to disengage from someone who is mentally ill, who claims their survival depends upon your continued engagement with them. But she somehow managed to survive prior to knowing you, and it is very likely that she will continue to survive without you.

In fact, it’s very likely that she will play the same drama with the next guy should you decide to divorce. (My ex did the same suicide threats in his subsequent relationship. It was very strange to have his girlfriend confide in me and need to be supportive of her.)

No matter what you do eventually, it’s going to hurt. One type of hurt is short-lived. The other type is, as you know, giving up yourself to try and rescue someone who will purposefully, over and over, keep trying to drown.

[ForeverDad]

It took me quite a long time to come to an epiphany.  In a general sense, we cannot fix our disordered loved ones.  Support in effective ways, Yes, but fix, No.  Fixing is up to the individual and to a lesser extent the professionals.

All of us were in close relationships with our acting-out disordered ones.  Yet it seemed any attempts to fix were sabotaged.  Why?  Because of our close relationships.

BPD is a disorder most evident in close relationships.  The closer it is, the more evident it is, if not at first then over time.  And what is closer and more emotion filled than a spouse?  Someone in a peripheral relationship such as a brief encounter at a store or restaurant or even coworkers may notice something is "off" but they don't get the full brunt of the impact as we experienced.

This is why, if there is any real hope of recovery, it is a trained professional (counselor, therapist, focused intensive care team) who have the best chance.  They know they can never risk emotionally involvement or else the patient can wield emotional leverage over them.

Conversely, our emotional relationship is what has been used against us in the past.  Often we can't even be sure the person did it unwittingly, there will usually be Denial that the person did it purposefully... and refuses to change for the better.  We don't have the objective and emotionless stance the professionals have.

Maybe the trained professionals will have a measure of success, or maybe not, but we just have emotional liability rather than empowerment.  Rather than "trying to help" the other person we would do better to proactively "help" ourselves.  Yes, that old flight analogy, "Put on your own oxygen mask first before trying to help others."

[Falcon2437]

Thank you Couscous.

Very interesting video (and interesting idea for looking through many movies. Really like the idea) and it's probably right that someone suicidal shouldn't be in a romantic relationship. It's interesting watching that scene because the way that happens with the ferris wheel is obviously not as visceral or extreme as is happening in my relationship but then again... it is the same just without the cinematic backdrop.

Some of the stuff about the guy having to change everything about his personality being toxic resonates with me too because I do feel like I lost so much of myself just to be what she needs.

Also the "if someone says they need time to think, give them time to think" obviously resonates with me since that is literally what I am asking for and not allowed to have.

[Outdorenthusiast]

Falcon,

Your feelings are important.  Cat and Wendy are spot on - you are in a trauma bond and it is like a foggy drug - you need to detox with space.  Your life, your world, your feelings are the ones that matter - only you can save yourself.  You know what you have to do - you just need the courage and fortitude.  You can do this!

Tough love question:  challenge yourself -  do you feel that you are the one that is most qualified to save her?  Reality check -  no.  She has many more qualified people than you (doctors, police, hospitals, her mom) and what is wrong with her - NOTHING you do can fix it regardless of what she says.  Not with you giving her kids, not with coming home, not with answering the phone.  If you suddenly weren’t there and were hit by the proverbial bus - she would be ok with the caretakers around her. You need to remind this to yourself.  It is not easy - I know I had to do the same.  If feels awful and cruel, and sickening, and panicky.  You feel like you are an a$$ for ignoring her and will beat yourself up as you feel like it goes against everything you have been taught about being nice and helping others- but this is your emotions and the trauma bond talking - it isn’t the truth.

Step one complete - move out. . Congratulations - correct move.

You know what you need to do for the rest of your plan.  Every fiber in your body knows what is right and what is wrong.  - Stick to your plan.  It is yours - only you can do it.

Observation/recommendation - Your phone is a nemesis right now for both of you.  She won’t/can’t stop if you keep answering.   It is science - they proved it with mice hitting a food bar.  Food dropped intermittently just makes the mouse hit the food bar harder.  You are intermittently dropping food and she is hitting the bar harder.  Stop giving food, or make it planned food if you must (I.e. I will call you for 10 min on Tuesday at 7:00am.)

You got this!

[Couscous]

Also the "if someone says they need time to think, give them time to think" obviously resonates with me since that is literally what I am asking for and not allowed to have.

Fortunately, you don’t need their permission.  

Yes, they may (and probably will) accuse you of being mean, selfish, heartless, etc., but all that matters is that you know that you are not doing what you’re doing with the intention of hurting anyone.

And really, at the end of the day, their (alleged) opinion of you does not actually matter. Just because in their opinion your need for space means that you are a terrible person doesn’t make it so. I say alleged because because most of the time people with BPD make these accusations with the purpose of manipulating us and don’t even genuinely believe in what they are saying — so why should we?

[Notwendy]

She "needs to know we are working towards a family and a future together" to get through it all. I understand she truly might feel that way but to me it is again her putting all of her hopes, dreams, prayers and potential future squarely on me.

Once I realized she was doing that I was able to take a step back again today and respect my own boundaries even if she won't.  I need a separation. And yet even as I want a separation and very possibly a divorce I can't stop feeling like an a$$hole because she and her mom are telling me how much she needs me to be the "hope" to move on with her life. Am I wrong for not answering the phone? Am I wrong for not wanting to be "the hope" ?

Let's look at what she and her mother are saying- "YOU need to be the hope for her".

In any of these statements - is there any concern for you and what you are going through? Is anyone asking about your feelings or maybe what they can do to support you?

All I see is "you need to do this" which is to agree to her emotional needs and wishes (we can't change someone's feelings).

Yes, you will be the bad guy to her in her scenario if you don't do this. ( see the Karpman triangle). It's not a comfortable situation to be the bad guy, but that is how she's going to see it and you can not change her thinking. Keep in mind though that her thinking doesn't make it true.
 
You are not wrong for being concerned about yourself in this situation.

Of course her mother wants you do this too. She's possibly been enabling her daughter as well and it's hard for a parent to be objective about their own child. She wants her child to be OK but that is not your responsibility. You can not fix this.

What do you need? You have said it- space and separation. You are allowed to have your own needs as well.

[Falcon2437]

Hi everyone, thank you all for the suggestions, encouragement and support. I was off the last couple of days and trying to really detox (so to speak) as best I could with everything.

Outdorenthusiast I do know that I am not the most qualified person (or close to it) to help her but yeah the way you described it is exactly how I feel. I do feel awful, cruel and like an a$$ but I know logically I am just doing what I need to for myself to survive and be happy.

As for things with my wife wBPD she has been in the hospital since Thursday and is getting released tomorrow. She called me maybe 10 times in the hospital and for the most part I did a good job ignoring it. I did answer once and gave her five minutes and during that time she did talk about how sorry she was, how she is on medication now, talking to group, feeling better and realizing that the way she handled and approached things was not okay. I don't know how to feel hearing this. So much of it is exactly what I have wanted for so long but do I really think that after three days everything is magically fixed? Of course not. So I told her that I think we still need to be staying separate for now and she did tell me that she'll give me the time I need. I'm struggling with if I need to just pull the cord and say no you know what I'm done or if I should give it another chance.

I know this is not a "stay or go" page and I'm not asking for help on that but I will ask that for people who have stayed with their partners how do you trust them? Because as I think about potentially staying I really don't know if I could ever give it a genuine shot again. The last few times we talked before the hospital I couldn't even look her in the eyes. I see her as my abuser, my tormentor, my rapist and I don't believe a word she says. I don't know how to give us a genuine shot if that is how I feel so I was wondering with people on this message board who have been in relationships that improved how did you approach it?

Thank you

[Outdorenthusiast]

Falcon-

It is normal to struggle with a trauma bond.  You don’t have to know the answers immediately - sometimes you have to sit with the uncomfortable until it is clear for you.  However give yourself some space to think.  Someone on here once said it takes 90 days separation.

As to your question, I can only speak from personal experience.  My wife is high functioning and is easier than what I have read from others.  Less violent.  With therapy, there is a better chance of some of the extreme symptom remission (suicide attempts, yelling/screaming) with weekly counseling.  However the underlying dysfunction seems is always there - it is a part of them that can’t be removed or medicated.   For me at this point there is no trust, the only thing that is possible is radical acceptance that they are permanently broken and forever must be counter-measured.  I am sitting and marinating on that uncomfortable truth.  A 70+ year old posted on here and basically said as much.  Each person must decide if the good outweighs the bad, and accept that the bad will ALWAYS be there.  The only variance I am experiencing is the severity of her condition when she is in full time counseling.

[ForeverDad]

or if I should give it another chance...

The poor BPD behaviors typically are in cycles, sometimes referred to as an endless roller coaster ride.  In the middle it's virtually impossible to get off unscathed, but if the ride has pulled into the station, this is the right time to ponder getting off.  As some have noted, the best (or least bad) time to exit is when you have leverage to improve the outcome.

Do you really believe her promises to change for the better will last?  Therapists know that meaningful therapy lasts for years.  And even then they cannot promise how much it may help or for how long.

Is this the first time she's been hospitalized and assessed?  What leverage do you have for her to start and continue meaningful therapy?

Beware of making or accepting unrealistic promises.  Her promises today mean little, it's whether her behavior and perceptions - her actions - improve long term that count.

You will surely feel pressured to take her back.  Don't be driven by "FOG" - Fear, Obligation, Guilt.  It's okay if you've reached your limit.  It is what it is.  You're not Superman, nor are you an ogre.

[Cat Familiar]

Re: your question about people who’ve stayed in relationships with BPD partners…how do you trust them again?

My experience of two husbands with BPD leads me to believe that the disorder will always be present, despite promises of improved behavior. And those promises come when they feel the thread that binds you has become threadbare and on the verge of breaking.

Yes, they can improve their behavior for a while, but once the pressure is off (you’ve returned to the fold), that same behavior will once again emerge. (Think of it this way: imagine going to a job interview that’s high stakes and you put all your attention into putting your best foot forward. It’s exhausting, isn’t it? Then afterwards you relax with your buddies over a beer (or two) and you can be yourself again.) It’s the same with pwBPD (people with BPD). They can suppress the crazy for a while, but then they can’t and they let their guard down and once again, despite all the promises they might make, the BPD behavior returns in all its glory.

Regarding my marital history, my first husband apparently not only had BPD, but likely antisocial personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder. He, like your wife, was abusive in many ways.

My current husband has a good moral compass and though he can act petty, petulant, irritable, self absorbed, he never intends to be unkind and if he behaves that way and is called out, he feels remorseful. BPD exists on a spectrum and many of our members here have partners who only have traits, not fullblown BPD.

You have quite a history already of unkind and abusive behaviors from her, and as Maya Angelou said, “When people show you who they are, believe them the first time.”

[Notwendy]

I will second Cat's post in that I think the behaviors vary as it's on a spectrum and each person is weighing both the decision to stay or leave according to individual situations. PD's tend to be fixed, and while therapy is known to help, that is for people who are motivated to work at it for an extended time. I would imagine they are not on the severe end and must have some insight to the impact of their behaviors on others.

My own BPD mother is at the severe end. Her behaviors are extreme and she dissociates to the point where she doesn't learn from them. During her "feeling better stage" it's like a "dry erase board" as if her behaviors didn't happen. But they did happen.

She also externalizes the solution to her emotional distress. It's always the next thing, the vacation, the new this, if only so and so would do that. My father would provide this for her, and it didn't solve her emotional distress as that was not the cause in the first place.

From my perspective, my father was her caretaker and she requires a lot of care, both emotionally and in her daily tasks. I think you can assess your situation with your wife according to the behavior you have seen already, not promises made in the moment or the idea of a quick recovery. Yes, my mother can also hold it together briefly but eventually the other behavior happens because it's a part of the disorder.

[Falcon2437]

Thank you guys again!

Outdore and Forever - I definitely want to give myself the time to think and figure things out. I totally understand what you both mean about having no trust, there will forever need to be countermeasures and the endless roller coaster ride. I feel like if I go back that is exactly what the rest of my life will be like.

I don't know how much I believe her promises will last. I do believe she genuinely thinks that things are getting better and that she is willing to put in the work forever but after everything that has happened I don't know if that is what will actually happen or if she is just scared and willing to do anything right now.

She was taken in for a few hours before but this is the first time she's stayed overnight.

Cat and Notwendy - Thank you yeah I am definitely worried that the "crazy" can only be suppressed for so long. I definitely feel I have a similar relationship to your parents notwendy where she did tell me how we always needed the next new thing whether it was moving in, engagement, buying a house and ultimately having kids. She definitely does have a "dry erase board" too where right now she is thinking she'll come out of therapy/hospital, I'll have a few days apart and then everything will be forgiven. But that's where one of my main issues is, I want to forgive, but I can't exactly forget. The last time we talked in person she got upset with me for not looking at her in the eyes and having withdrawn body language. She was right. I was looking down and away from her but the reality is when I look at her right now I see my abuser and tormentor, not my wife who I fell in love with in the first place.


Unrelated to previous posts the newest thing today is she's being held one extra day because the person who signs off on releases isn't there. The doctors apparently told her and my mother-in-law that she is also dealing with PTSD (which given everything she has been through I do believe is a possibility). My MIL is now telling me that by ignoring her calls I am "adding trauma" because my wife just needs to hear my voice. I know that is manipulative at best but I guess I just wanted some reassurance that if I don't want to talk to her at the moment I don't have to, right?

[kells76]

My MIL is now telling me that by ignoring her calls I am "adding trauma" because my wife just needs to hear my voice. I know that is manipulative at best but I guess I just wanted some reassurance that if I don't want to talk to her at the moment I don't have to, right?

Your W is in a very supportive place. Her care team will be able to do what is best for her and to help her cope with what she feels. If she feels traumatized then she can turn to a team member for support with those feelings.

The dynamic of her telling your MIL how she feels, and then your MIL telling you to do something, is not healthy and I cannot imagine it is one that a MH care team would say is a healthy dynamic.

It just struck me that it might actually be a lot more about how your MIL feels than how anyone else feels, interestingly. If your MIL can't cope with hearing that her D is struggling, then that may make her uncomfortable, and it's actually her turning to you to have you make her (MIL) feel better.

It is OK for you to decline to take those calls and to decline to participate in an unhealthy dynamic that no MH professional would suggest is helpful.

[Couscous]

My MIL is now telling me that by ignoring her calls I am "adding trauma" because my wife just needs to hear my voice.

Your MIL is quite mistaken. While it may be triggering for her, it’s not adding trauma. If anything it’s a very good thing this is happening right now so that trained professionals can help them both understand this. (I also question if past traumas are really being triggered, or if it’s more that she’s enraged because she’s not getting what she wants, when she wants it.)

If I could make one small suggestion, it would be for you to stop communicating with your MIL.

[Notwendy]

No you don't have to talk to her.

Her MIL is not thinking in your best interests. Surely she knows her daughter is difficult, even if she loves her. If you don't take care of her, MIL might have to do that. Of course she wants you to do that! But that isn't thinking of you. If you don't think of your own needs, who will? Not your wife and not your MIL.

Her mother may also be her enabler. It was similar with my father whose focus was on my mother. I think he did the best he could for us, but my mother was his priority, and we kids were enlisted to be her emotional caretakers as well. In his elder years, Dad got ill and I went to help out. He was being taken care of, as he was in the hospital. I was home alone with BPD mother and her behavior was extreme, raging at me, verbal and emotional abuse. I know she was stressed but that didn't give her the right to be abusive to me. She didn't care if I got sleep or not, she didn't care that I had my own children at home that I needed to get home to. Dad was focused on her. I realized I needed to have some boundaries. As you can imagine, I became the "bad person" in their scenario for that.

Dad then sent me what I thought was the strangest email. "I just want to be a happy family again". Who was happy? What he meant was "come back and meet BPD mother's needs and tolerate her behavior"  but there was no concern for my own well being or if my children needed a mother at home with them. It was just "meet mother's needs". Parents with PD's see their children's purpose as meeting their needs, not the other way around, but it's a parents' job to meet the child's needs ( up to adulthood- they don't need to be caretaking me but my kids needed me to be home with them).  What your MIL seems to be saying to you is "come back and caretake my daughter again so I don't have to worry so much about her". I agree with Couscous- you don't have to communicate with MIL either.

I do care about my parents but realized that the concern for well being was not reciprocal. My mother's needs are constant. Our conversations are about her needs. When I visit, it's about all the things I can do for her. Saying no to her is difficult as she gets upset and I really don't want to upset her but I have learned to allow myself to say no to things I am not willing to do.

You feel at alert around your wife due to her behavior. Her mental illness is not your responsibility and you not calling her is not the cause of her trauma. You aren't being mean to her, you are protecting yourself.

[Falcon2437]

Thank you guys again. I decided that I am not going to be answering the phone or calling. Couscous I think what you said is true that while me not answering might be "triggering" it doesn't mean that I am causing trauma, I am simply doing my best and taking care of myself at the same time.

I did find out from a voicemail from my MIL that my W was released from the hospital today (idk if they were lying about it being tomorrow or if something changed, I guess it doesn't really matter, what matters is she is out). My W is staying with my MIL and I will be at home with our dog. I plan to lock the bedroom door just in case but I really really really want to hold to my plan of taking some time and not engaging and with the help and support of this group I am going to follow through on that as best I can. Thank you all again.

[Turkish]

she "needs to know we are working towards a family and a future together" to get through it all.

Given all that you've endured of threats and abuse, does this sound like a plan based upon rational thought and self-awareness?

[Notwendy]

she "needs to know we are working towards a family and a future together" to get through it all.


The Karpman triangle dynamics can help you to understand the dynamics here. You have been put in either rescuer or persecutor position, either blamed for the issues or expected to fix them.

This statement inappropriately puts the responsibility of her feelings on you. You didn't cause her BPD and it's not in your power to fix this for her.

[Emaanbillah]

Hi Falcon,
Others have given excellent input regarding your situation. My perspective will be a lot less experienced than theirs but I will provide my own thoughts.

- First, you have put a lot of thought into your plan which is a good thing.
Get therapy to explore your own strengths and feelings, to understand your own self and what you are capable of and what you can put up with. This will help you answer any questions you may have about decisions regarding the relationship.

- as was mentioned earlier, boundaries are for yourself. If you think of boundary being for others, then you will inevitably have to face the dismay when those boundaries are crossed or violated. That being said, it is okay to be flexible with some boundaries. Allow yourself to forgive yourself if you are not able to strictly uphold the boundary because the boundary is meant to protect you, not be a source of anguish or grief. Try to determine what are your red lines(non negotiable), yellow lines (negotiable) and green lines(preferences).

- dealing with an individual with BPD can be disruptive on many fronts and some people try to protect themselves from feelings of guilt by projecting onto others. What your MIL is doing is not unlike what my exMIL did by sending audio clips after I had initiated separation. It can be hard but I would suggest letting those calls go to voicemail and either having a person you trust screen them or you listen to them when you are in a better mental state. I tried some of the suggested techniques to escape the Karpman drama triangle but it led to an escalation of hostility.

-feelings of guilt, panic are not unusual(see F.O.G. on this forum). This is also not helped by others unloading their feelings of guilt and responsibility on you. I still struggle with guilt when thinking about my entire separation and divorce proceeding. However I am trying to just accept the feeling and move on, while acknowledging my own limitations.

- the constant criticisms and blaming behaviors of BPD was one thing. Ironically, it was my concern toward my family members (that ex dbpdw) also threatened and toward managing the crisis and providing safe space for my child that eventually pushed me over the edge to end the relationship, despite at some level, also caring for dBPDw)

- one other point I will mention is that BPD can have manipulative suicidal threats but in some cases can also have actual suicide attempts (especially with comorbid depression). That being said, you cannot take responsibility for the BPD or their actions. The most you can do, (similar to a parent), is guide them and pray they turn out okay.

- I will end with SaltyDawg's advice to me: make sure you engage in self care. (Last two years for myself were a constant state of crisis.) I, personally, also recommend surrounding yourself with close family and friends if possible to help you focus on self-care activities.

[Cat Familiar]

As ForeverDad often says here, “we are *good guys and gals*” trying to manage and make the best of finding ourselves in a relationship with a partner with mental illness.

And as Emaanbillah mentions, not only will our pwBPD try to make us feel guilty for choices that don’t fulfill their never ending needs, often we are also dealing with their family members who try and guilt us over not catering to those endless “needs.”

Lost in these supplications is the fact that we are human beings with our own wants and needs. That someone is mentally ill does not supersede the reality that we are important too; often that fact gets lost in the blaming and shaming of us when we are not doing 110% to serve our BPD spouses.

[Falcon2437]

I will just continue to say thank you all for the support and the understanding. I can honestly say I would not be in this situation where I am safely living apart from my wife with BPD without everyone's support. Instead she might be pregnant or have really killed herself. This site really helped give me the tools to understand and approach setting my own boundaries. Emaanbillah similar to your situation thinking about what my partner was doing to my family and what it would be like for kids was a major breaking point for me along with everything else. Thank you again for reaching out.

Update from my end:

Since my wife was released from the mental hospital she has been staying at her mother's apartment. Once we reached a week of (mostly) not talking I loosened my boundary but still kept one in place. I saw her for dinner and a brief movie at her mom's apartment over the weekend. She spent the first half hour talking about how sorry she was, how she didn't realize how manipulative her behavior was but does see it now and is trying to change it. How she is taking medication now and in IOP for a while as she tries to get better. She also talked about how scared she was in the hospital and how she was worried one of the other patients would rape her because she kept making comments and looking at her at night. I can only imagine how scary it was in there and I don't want to take anything away from her very real and very valid feelings but as she was telling me this I just kept thinking "I feel like the person who literally has raped me and taken advantage of me sexually is now trying to guilt me into feeling responsible for someone making sexually suggestive comments and looks at them, why am I even listening to this?" I then felt guilty because again I truly do believe she felt that way and her feelings are valid and mine don't trump hers by any stretch, I just am having a really hard time listening to her talk about that knowing what she put me through. I was also told how I saved her life.

I told her that I am really happy for her that she is taking the steps she needs to in order to work on her mental health (and the PTSD diagnosis) and I am ok with us talking a little more and with us setting up a time for dinner early next week but I am not ok with us living together right now. I told her how she had previously said she understands we might need to go back to square one and I said that is what I need. She didn't really respond to that for a while and we started watching a movie. About an hour into it she stopped it to tell me how she respects what I need but that being away from me is "traumatizing" for her and she doesn't understand why we can't be together while we take this slow. I am fairly proud of myself because I held my ground with what I needed while trying very hard not to de-value or discredit what she needs. I told her how I understand she feels that way and I'm sorry she does, but this is what I need for myself and my needs matter too. We do own the house together so I told her if she wants to stay there she is welcome to, but I will be staying with a friend in that case. She pushed for a little while on that but never really yelled. I appreciate that she didn't yell and it was much more tearful and calm than screaming, but at this point I kindof recognize it as her just trying to manipulate me into doing what she wants, just by a different tactic. I truly don't know if she is doing it on purpose, I tend to think she isn't, but it doesn't really matter, either way I did hold my ground and told her we can keep talking and see each other for dinner later in the week but we are not sleeping in the same house right now. After a while it died down and I left to go home. She followed me down the stairs to try one more time but I held firm.

The next day my MIL called me to tell me how, like my wife said, this is adding "trauma" and the uncertainty of things in our relationship is traumatizing my wife. I told her I'm truly sorry. I do not want to add trauma of any sort, but I also need to think about my own trauma and what I need. What I need right now is this space and if she really can't handle the "uncertainty" then she can file for divorce if she'd like and then there is a definitive answer. My MIL immediately shifted to "well I know she doesn't want a divorce." And that's ok, she doesn't need to want that, I'm still not 100% sure what I want because I do still love her. But you don't get to tell me I have to make a decision now because I am causing trauma when there are two people in this relationship (three if you count my MIL ) and she can make a decision too. My MIL also asked me to come to two family holidays/birthdays over the next couple of weeks and I thankfully have to work during both.

After that phone call I hid alerts on my phone from both of them. I can't take the step to block yet especially because my wife is in very real pain, but I can at least limit the exposure I have to it. I hope I'm doing the right thing, but I know I feel better.

I am having dinner with my wife tonight and I am hoping to learn a great deal about our future and how she is doing there. At this point it has been long enough to where any medication she is taking should be making its impact and I want to see how it feels with her. When we met up last week there was some good, there was some bad, but ultimately despite no yelling or swearing or threats I left feeling like sh!t. I left feeling bad about myself, bad about how she made me feel and bad about the chances of any potential future being truly happy. I want to see if that is how I feel again today or if that was just a rough night after what was an extremely difficult week for both of us.

Anyway I think I just wanted to get all of that off my chest, thank you for listening.

[Notwendy]

I am glad you are holding your boundaries.

One thing to keep in mind is that there's still blaming you for your boundaries, and saying you are traumatizing your wife.  This is victim perspective. It does not include being accountable for her own actions or any awareness of their impact on you.

You are NOT doing anything to traumatize anyone. You are keeping to the boundaries that you feel are important for your own emotional and physical well being. There's nothing wrong with what you are doing, yet the perspective is blaming you for your wife's feelings, not validating your feelings or supporting you.

To me this looks like "well I will behave in order to get things back to what they were". Not "I care about you in this relationship". There isn't any acknowledgement of your needs or feelings in these exchanges.

PwBPD can be externally motivated to behave but if it's to get you back to where things were, that motivation will not be there if you do that. Real change takes time and work. If she's serious, she will comply with therapy over a long period of time not just until she's back in the home and you will see change over time, not instantaneously.

Your MIL is also taking on "rescuer" role but you are not to blame here. You did not cause your wife's BPD.

[Falcon2437]

Yeah Notwendy I think I am doing better with my boundaries and most of all I think I am doing a better job of seeing through some of the BS. Seeing through some of the blame and conditions. I do really want to see how dinner goes tonight and go from there, but if that boundary can't be respected and if that will always be turned into blame and I always leave feeling horribly then maybe that's my answer anyway.

[ForeverDad]

I agree with Notwendy, there is a slippery slope here and if you're not careful you'll slip right back into the chaos you just barely escaped from.  You're not quite safe, not yet.

"He is most free of danger, who, even when safe, is on his guard." — Publilius Syrus

[Falcon2437]

Thank you foreverdad I know I am definitely not "out of the woods" yet and frankly even if I do decide to divorce and cut ties I know this is a long road regardless.

[Notwendy]

I think it's worth exploring that "feeling terrible" sensation. It's a warning. Our feelings are messages we send to ourself. If we feel uneasy, or on edge, it means something. Either someone is not respecting our boundaries, or we are not being authentic to ourselves. I think it's the ignoring these feelings that get us into disordered relationships and/or lead us to stay in them.

Soft boundaries send a mixed message and a part of this is that you also are not sure exactly what you want. Dinner can be a soft boundary. Dinner is potentially romantic, with the possibility of her coming home with you afterwards. If the intent is only to meet and talk- the less potentially romantic situation is to meet in park or coffee shop in the middle of the day with people around.

Think about what your boundaries are ahead of time. Boundaries are how you respond when you feel they are pushed.  If you pick her up, then bring her back home but she may not want to get out of the car and instead go home with you. After dinner, she might want to come to your  house "to get something she forgot", or "just for coffee" and you know that if you agree to any of it, and you don't want her to stay, you would have to actually ask her to leave, which is very hard to do, especially since the house is part hers. If you do bring her back and she insists on staying- you would then need to go to a friend's house or hotel if you don't want to sleep in the same  house together.

She's not to blame for this- she'd be acting on what she wants and every encounter with you is a chance for her to express this. If you don't want this, then you have to be the one to say no, and that is hard to do.

[Cat Familiar]

How did dinner go?

[Falcon2437]

Dinner/the night was hit or miss, thank you for asking Cat. I actually read your post a couple times before walking in NotWendy, so thank you guys again. I had already planned very intentionally of us to take different cars and just meet at the restaurant so there was no chance of me needing to drive her somewhere.

Dinner itself was mostly ok until the conversation turned more serious. She told me how she almost checked herself back into the hospital the day before because she was having suicidal feelings but talked herself out of them (which is obviously terrifying to hear but also very good that she was able to work through it). The rest of the talk from there was fairly intense about how she is falling apart and doesn't know how much more trauma she can take alone. About 90 minutes in she asked if I wanted to go somewhere else for a drink or something or go home. I told her that we can see each other again later in the week but if we are doing that then honestly this was a little intense for me so I think I'll call it a night. Maybe 30 seconds after I left she called me. I was an idiot and answered. She told me how she has never felt more awkward and worthless and how she just wants to feel wanted. Somehow that turned into me asking her to meet somewhere to talk more. She pushed for it to be at the house, I at least held firm on that boundary and said I will not do that. So we met at a bar.

At the bar she talked about how she is "tired of counting the minutes waiting to be loved" and how I have now turned into this cold person who she doesn't recognize anymore. When I told her that we could keep talking and see if there is something here but I am not comfortable with us having a physical relationship right now (that doesn't just mean sex, she was upset I hadn't kissed her) she straight up left. I didn't chase after her so of course 3-5 minutes later she came back. She talked about how for us to really try again we have to take down our walls and protections. I told her point blank that I felt like I was taken advantage of and I can't just turn off those walls/protections like a switch because that is not how feelings work. She pushed really hard for a timeline of when I'll be able to have us live together, when I'll know if I want to move forward, etc. I told her I can't give you a definitive timeline right now. She then talked about how she was getting older and biologically needs to move forward with her life sooner rather than later. At that point it was fairly late, she had me hug her a few times and kindof kept me there waiting for me to kiss her but again that is a boundary I will not cross so I did not do it and she eventually left.

She texted me that night about how we needed to have tough conversations like that to move forward and while I agree we would need to have some tough talks I also need to be able to have one night with her where I don't leave feeling badly. And I realize "feel bad" is a juvenile way of talking, but I agree with you NotWendy that my feeling is an important message to listen to.

As I type all of this out it reinforces how I felt in the moment which is that while the suicide threats and yelling are mostly gone it is the same agenda. It is just trying to manipulate me through tears and guilt instead of screams and fear.

We have a couples counselor session set for next week and I guess I will see how that goes.

[Cat Familiar]

Yes, it is the same agenda, and good that you’re aware of that. As you’ve experienced, she will keep on pressing you, hoping to get past your resistance. Slippery slope indeed!

You’ve mentioned that you love her. Hard questions: do you love the person you initially fell in love with? If you were to meet her now, would you love that person?

[Falcon2437]

That's a fair question. I have been trying to force myself to take some time every day to truly sit and think about where I am, where I want to go and what I want/need in my relationship. Tonight I'm absolutely using that as a prompt for myself, thank you.

[ForeverDad]

The rest of the talk from there was fairly intense about how she is falling apart and doesn't know how much more trauma she can take alone.

I see triggers and trauma as descriptive words of two different things.

I don't know how, at this point, you can reduce her (past) trauma.  Maybe a therapist can help with that.

I suspect that both being with you as well as being without you are triggers for her.  That too, at this point, is beyond your capabilities to handle.

[Notwendy]

I think it might help to share why I "feel badly" after visiting my BPD mother.

I don't think it's juvenile to say "feel bad"- it's something to pay attention to. I think it's also a mix of feelings that contribute to "feeling bad".

Reading about the Karpman triangle helps to understand the roles in dysfunctional dynamics. My mother (and I think pwBPD in general) take on "victim" perspective. This leaves other in one of the other two roles: "rescuer" and "persecutor". There's an emotional (and emotionally protective) benefit to taking victim perspective- and that is victims are not accountable for their actions, you don't blame the victim. This avoids shame.

I am not sure what your wishes are for the outcome of your "talks" with your wife, but I think the hope is for some sort of mutual understanding of feelings on both your part and a discussion of how to improve the relationship. When someone is in victim mode, the discussion is about their feelings and how you, or others, have wronged them or hurt them in some way. There isn't mutuality.

You don't want to be the bad guy in this scenario. I don't want to be the bad guy with my mother either, but no matter what my attempts are to do something nice for her when I visit, she will somehow focus on what I did wrong, or didn't do and that it has hurt her in some way. Admittedly, I am guarded around her, but that is due to her behavior. However, she can't or won't perceive that. To her, the issues in our relationship are because of me.

Projections of feelings- and past hurts. You didn't cause your wife's past traumas. I didn't cause my BPD mothers' either but she seems to play out and project her emotional sadness with people close to her. If we care about someone, we do feel badly when they are so sad and seem to be blaming us for that. I feel helpless because, even if I want to help her feel better, I can not control her feelings. Another result of projection is that, this is not a mutual relationship between two people. She sees her projections.

Being manipulated and enlisted as a caretaker feels "icky".

I understand the wish to "talk things out" but are they mutual or consist of your wife taking victim position?

It's understandable that she's concerned about the biological clock and wants you to have a baby with her. But your feelings about this matter too. Is this the person who you want to be the mother of your children? That's an important question as if she wants a child, and you do not want to father a child with her, then this puts the relationship in question. BPD may complicate the situation but still- you can choose who you wish to have a child with.

At the moment, it seems you are still not sure of what you want and so are continuing these talks with boundaries on your part but your wife doesn't want these boundaries and so your encounters are uncomfortable for you. It may help to have less one on one in places like restaurants and bars at night and keep your talks to counseling sessions, coffee during the day. These are conventional boundaries. They send an unspoken message. Coffee means just to talk. Dinner and meeting in a bar is more ambiguous.

[Falcon2437]

Thank you guys again and NotWendy yeah a lot of that resonates with me. At this point I pretty much know that things can never be what I truly want in our marriage, we had another really rough 24 hours. We met for a walk and lunch yesterday and for the first hour or so it was really pleasant. We didn't talk about anything real, but I didn't want us to either. I just wanted to see if we could actually enjoy each other's company and we really did. At lunch she started talking about the city of New Orleans. I am going to a family wedding there in two weeks that we were both originally invited to but obviously things have drastically changed since then. I decided about a week ago that I wanted to go to that family wedding and I would tell my wife when she was more stable and able to hear that. Once she brought the city up and things were a bit better I felt I had to tell her because keeping it from her would have been a lie at that point (and obviously she's going to find out eventually anyway when I'm gone in two weeks). The second I said it I could see the switch flip in her face. Everything about her demeanor changed instantly and she got very upset with me for making that choice without her and without talking to her. I didn't know what to say because she's right, that wasn't a "we" decision as she so often likes to say but right now "we" are separated and trying to figure things out. I made the decision I wanted to go to that wedding and I'm going to go. I did tell her I would talk to her about decisions like that in the future but ultimately it is my decision and if I want to go I am going to go. She then told me she wanted me to leave for a little bit so she could process so I stood about a block down for 10ish minutes while she processed. Honestly I felt a bit ridiculous just sitting there in public but I was proud of her. She didn't yell. She is trying to implement new skills she is learning and I genuinely appreciate that. She came back 10ish minutes later and said she wanted to leave but of course she didn't and we talked for a while longer. It crossed from just New Orleans to some of the greatest hits throughout our troubles.

She kept telling me things like "I couldn't feel more rejected by you if I tried and I don't know how much more I can take." "I have been banished from my house (again to be clear I've told her she can stay there if she'd like but I won't be there with her, it's not like she is banned from the house)." "I see how you make decisions without me and we don't live together and I have never felt this disregarded or like I don't mater in my entire life. I need a partner. I need someone who will go through it with me."

She then wanted to pack a bag to "go away for a while" because she can't keep feeling like she doesn't matter. I continued to tell her that you do matter and what you need does matter, but my needs matter too and while I want us to work through things I am not comfortable with us living together right now. I said how we can't even have a couple hours of talking without things going off the rails I'm not comfortable living in that situation. She then told me "it's time to say goodbye." In this case I think she was implying divorce not suicide, but I'm also living on the edge always uneasy that she is going to go into suicidal thoughts and I was scared.

She then came to the house and we talked on the couch. I was not ready for how hard that would be for me. I have been able to communicate with her better at times these past few weeks in different locations, but at home I was unable to look her in eyes. I just kept reliving all the times she screamed at me, cursed at me, threw things, hit herself or took advantage of me. I don't think I rationally had anything to fear in that moment she wasn't doing any of those things but whether it is rational or not I was terrified. She hugged me then left and a few minutes later called crying and telling me how seeing me that hurt was so hard for her.

It being hard to see me hurt quickly transitioned to how she can't do this anymore and she needs us to work through things together. She said she won't stay with her mom anymore and asked "should I have just killed myself?"

I immediately of course answered no. Maybe I'm an a&&hole but to me I feel like she is bringing up those suicidal words to try to manipulate me into saying "oh please honey come home" and I just can't do that right now. She told me how she has nothing to be alive for if she isn't "loved and cherished." I told her she is loved and I want us to work on things but I can't live together right now. Give or take a few minutes that was the end of last night's conversation.


Today felt like before the hospitalization and the medication. She didn't quite scream at me on the phone but at times it was close and the guilting was of the charts. These are some direct quotes from her I wrote down.

"I have never been more hurting than I am now. I got out and have felt abandoned and diminished and like I don't matter...I hate myself. I have never hated myself more. Being in the house with you yesterday and watching you I understand who I am. I know I'm a monster." (I of course then told her she isn't a monster and I don't want her to feel that way but yeah I was really strugging with my own trauma/memories of us together in the house yesterday).

"I have wanted to kill myself every day since I got out (of the hospital). Staying at my mom's I feel awful. I feel completely abandoned. I feel completely unworthy."

"You committed me (which I didn't commit her, the police took her because she was talking about plans for suicide) there and when I got home and was at my hardest moment I was completely alone."

"I didn't know I meant that little. Now that I know I mean that little to you it just hurts...I am having so much PTSD. I'm trying to not say anything because I'm trying to make it not about me."

"I wish I died! I wish I died! Every day I wish I died! The pain is so much and all I do is take more pain! And more pain! And more pain! (from me and my family)"

"Being alone again is too painful for me!"

She then threatened to leave the state and never come back because it is too hard to be in the same area as me but not be living with me.



So I just really don't know how to feel right now. She feels abandoned and she has every right to feel that way. I think I have been extremely available to her. I haven't blocked her calls or filed for divorce or told her I won't see her, I have just told her I can't live together right now. But on some level she's right. On some level she is alone and I am not there. I just don't know what to say when she gets like that other than that she isn't alone, she does have so many people who love her and I think things can get better, but right now I can't live with her. And at this point idk what to do. I don't want to live like this anymore. If that means a divorce I'm absolutely okay with that because this is literal hell. I cannot express just how scared I was when she was in the house. Just how scared I am and how I have to literally brace myself when her name shows up on my phone.

But as I've said before I do still love her despite all of this and I do want her to be 1. alive and 2. happy in her life. I just don't know how to help her achieve that because the way things are going in our relationship I can't be with her without sacrificing my entire life to fit her every whim and need.

[ForeverDad]

This is one of the reasons a halfway relationship and a halfway end to a relationship can't work with the disordered extreme pathways in her life and perceptions.

One the other hand, she did take time to process your decision.  Is this the "wise mind" concept they advocate so necessary to pause, reflect and ponder before jumping into overreaction?  But still there's the suicidal aspect still there, whether actual or manipulative.  After all this time with you, still a lot of sensitization to you and normal life.

[Falcon2437]

Yeah ForeverDad I think that is part of what is so hard for me to comprehend is on one hand I am miserable and some of this stuff is playing out very similar to how is used to be and I can not ever go back to that. On the other hand I can see her actively taking time to process and I can see her trying to implement stuff she is learning and I can see her trying. I'm just so lost and so confused. Like after all of this I heard nothing from her for hours. For all I know she did pack her stuff and leave to go to a different state. Then I get the "I miss you" text 45 minutes ago. I have no idea what to do with that. A part of me just wants her to feel better and to just say I miss you too, but the reality is I don't miss her. At least not the her that I've seen for the last two years. I am scared of that version of her and I feel a sense of peace when I am not with it. What I miss is who she was (or was pretending to be) years ago. And if I text back "I miss you" then it is misleading her. If I don't text at all she'll send something along the lines of "really? you don't even care about me enough to respond?" If I text back "I miss what we used to have" (which is how I feel) she'll say "wow you can't even say you miss me." There is no right answer with her, there is no good answer, it all just sucks.

(And you are right about halfway relationships)

[Cat Familiar]

This is a dangerous time for you. She’s playing with your heartstrings—alluding to suicide, speaking about moving out of state and never seeing you again, maintaining a modicum of self control, appearing to consider your feelings, demonstrating that she is learning new ways of being, trying to be perceived as a reasonable person, using ploys of *not mattering* to elicit your guilt, blaming you for being hospitalized, claiming that she misses you and cannot stand to be alone, so therefore you need to get back together.

She’s deviating from the “I’m sorry, I’ll do better” script, but at the same time is still blaming you and trying to make you feel guilty.

Right now, she is on her *best* behavior, hoping to manipulate you into giving the relationship another shot…right now!

Should this play out as we’ve often seen on these boards, you will believe that she truly is remorseful, has changed, is willing to do the work to *get better*

AND…soon, after a brief honeymoon phase, it will return to how it was, but worse. There will be demands for starting a family, to cement the bond between you.

But it seems that you are not buying into her *epiphany* and neither is she, as she’s not totally committed to playing the role of *repentant spouse*, as she’s still engaged in trying to make you pay for *abandoning* her.

[Turkish]

A neutral response might be, "how are you doing?" Maybe still invalidating to her, but not as much as no answer. Besides, you want info, yes?

[Falcon2437]

Thank you for the suggestion Turkish. Honestly at this point idk if I want information because while I really do want her to be okay and I want to know she is okay I also feel like what she is telling me isn't real information it is just a manipulation attempt to guilt me into saying we should try living together again. So if there is real information then yeah I want to know it. But if the information is just a version of "I feel horrible because you abandoned me and I will never be able to be okay without living with you" then I really don't want to hear it because I don't believe that everything is my fault but I know myself (and her) well enough to know that when she gets going I am just going to feel like PLEASE READ. I am just going to feel like this is all on me and I am ruining both of our lives and I should just do what she wants. And as I think about it now with a clear head, I don't want to get to that point.

Cat yeah I definitely do think this is a dangerous time too. I am trying really hard not to buy everything hook line and sinker and stick to what I wanted initially which is that if we are going to try again it is going to happen at a slow pace that I am okay with. And every time we see each other when things inevitably go to hell it just further proves how not ready we are to be living together. If we can't get through a phone call, an hour walk, a lunch/dinner then why the hell would I say "oh yeah let's live together!"

[ForeverDad]

This is a dangerous time for you. She’s playing with your heartstrings—alluding to suicide, speaking about moving out of state and never seeing you again, maintaining a modicum of self control, appearing to consider your feelings, demonstrating that she is learning new ways of being, trying to be perceived as a reasonable person, using ploys of *not mattering* to elicit your guilt, blaming you for being hospitalized, claiming that she misses you and cannot stand to be alone, so therefore you need to get back together.

This matches your own words.

Over the last four and a half years I have been lied to compulsively, threatened and abused nearly the entire time. I have been verbally, emotionally, physically and sexually abused in my relationship and in my marriage and I cannot take it anymore. As I sit here thinking about everything, any one of those sets of abuse should have been enough for me to run. Any one of the gigantic, elaborate lies to change my life should have been a red flag that scared me enough...

This is the most simple thing I will write here and it is also the hardest. No means no. It does not mean threaten, berate and scare until it becomes a yes. It does not mean keep talking for 20 straight hours until it becomes a yes... So I have done it. Multiple times... Then the cycle repeats itself and she makes me do it again... That is not okay. I don’t deserve that. No one deserves that...

I have been threatened that I will be stabbed if I don’t let her get to the knives to kill herself and told to “rot in hell ... and much more. I have been screamed at privately, I have been screamed at publicly in the streets, I have been screamed at in front of her family. That is not okay. I will not take that. I will not endure that. I will not live like that.

That brings me to what most of the physical abuse has been which is not direct stuff but things intended to intimidate, scare or coerce me into doing what she needs so she’ll stop. Over the last year she has thrown and broken a drinking glass, a container of oats, broken a mirror on our bedroom door from slamming it too hard and broken her phone throwing it at the ground. I have watched her punch herself in the face at full force...

For six months I have been living under threat of death. Not my own, but hers. As I said when talking about sexual abuse I feel I have been living with a gun to her head. She has told me she will take pills, she has told me she’ll jump out the window, bash her head in, stab herself, drive into a tree, walk into traffic if I don’t “take the pain away” “help her heal” or flat out give her a baby. She has told me she’s watched a video on how to knock herself unconscious to get rid of the pain and then did it. That was the day I broke the bathroom door down and called the paramedics. And all of it happened because I went to see my family on Hanukkah. The truth is, she’s in unimaginable pain. She does feel cut out by my family and she doesn’t see her role in it. That is real. Her feelings and her pain are real to her. I will never tell her they aren’t. But I can’t live at gunpoint...

The police have been to my house more than ten times now because it escalates to a point where I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to keep her safe... She has told me that she will lie to the police about me hitting her. That she will hit herself so there are marks and then tell the police I did it. That could result in me literally going to jail for beating my wife who I have never touched... She has also threatened my job...

About the police...  Imagine this scenario... The call comes in and a couple police are notified to rush to your home, domestic dispute, life or death.  One tells the other, "Don't rush, Falcon always calls then goes right back to her.  Why should we rush when all he does is take a revolving door to circle back to her later?"  Message is, Why should others feel impelled to help you when their impression of you is you won't truly do what you need to do to help yourself?

Yet here you still are, fretting about how to help her.  The blunt reality is you can't.  You can't.  You're torn between keeping only one foot in the tank of piranhas rather than two.  Either way you still get eaten.  Yes, it sucks that really, truly, sadly, you can't help her, you can only help yourself.  She's an adult, her life is up to her.  Reality bites.

Where do you want to be next year, or five years from now?  Where will you be?  Still mired here or off to live your life in peace and calm?

[Stephen44]

Thank you for sharing this, it really resonates. And thank you for all of the advice. I'm going through an almost identical situation. Stay strong.

[Falcon2437]

So update from my situation is I think things are better but I don't know what to trust. On the one year anniversary of her dad dying she moved back into the house so it has been about 2.5 weeks and there definitely is a difference now that she is taking medication and working on her mental health. The yelling has stopped, the cursing at me has stopped and the breaking stuff has stopped. I'm not sure how to trust that it will stop forever. There are still times when I know she is manipulating me and telling me how I (or my family) am adding to her trauma but she isn't threatening to kill herself anymore. I have had pretty strict boundaries since we moved back in meaning we will not kiss let alone have unprotected sex until I am ready for it. She has respected those boundaries but I'll be honest it's been nearly three weeks and I still don't really have any interest in kissing her and certainly not in going further. I still find myself scared and anxious when I hear her coming up the stairs even though I know it is very different from before. I'm trying to really give this one final shot to see if this can work or not but I wasn't expecting it to still feel this way. I'm not sure if that will ever go away and if it isn't ever going to go away then I don't know how I can live like this forever.

Mother's Day is obviously this weekend and I want to go home for a little bit to see my mom and grandparents (who are not in the best of health) but I know that my wife is not welcome and if I go without her she will be extremely upset that I am "enabling them" to cut her out of the family. On some level she's right. My family had plenty of reasons to cut ties with her in the first place but I wish now things would just be less freakin complicated. But whatever the reasons were and whatever happened the fact is I do want to see my mom and my grandparents on Mother's Day and I will not let fear dictate my life the way it did for so long. So I'm planning to go.

I just hope this works out. I have been trying so hard to take time every day to reflect on where I am, where we are, where I want to be and the person, husband, son and friend I want to be and I just have nothing definitive. Every time I feel like I KNOW I need to get a divorce and walk away forever something convinces me otherwise. Every time I feel like okay things really are different, this really is the woman I fell in love with in the first place and we can be happy together something happens on the other end of the spectrum to remind me why I'm scared to move forward now.

I'm not sure what I am hoping for writing all of this down, but it helps to get off my chest. Thank you for listening.

[ForeverDad]

Every time I feel like okay things really are different, this really is the woman I fell in love with in the first place and we can be happy together something happens on the other end of the spectrum to remind me why I'm scared to move forward now.

I had been married about 5 years.  Every few months she'd have a sort of melt down, wordless, almost cowering and crying.  Nothing I could really do so I became accustomed to it and afterward would hope it wouldn't happen again.  But it did.

Then something happened and she never felt safe anymore.  We moved and I thought we were back to 'usual'.  No, there was trauma, she didn't feel safe anywhere.  And in her periodic rants (I at first interpreted them as rages over past child abuse) she then would curse like a sailor.  I was shocked but as before I became accustomed to it and afterward would hope it wouldn't happen again.  But it did.

Then she became dissatisfied with her coworkers and we ended up moving several states away.  Fresh start and I believed with new jobs everything would be normal.  But she periodically had conflict with her coworkers - again.  I had become accustomed to it and afterward would hope it wouldn't happen again.  But it did.

Then I had a great idea, or so I thought.  If we had a child then she'd be happy seeing our baby grow ad discover life.  Bad idea.  She started reliving her childhood through our child.  That's when I realized a deeper truth... having children does not fix serious mental health issues.

It got worse.  Her suspicions focused next on my family, our friends, and finally me.  She refused therapy.  She started contemplating disappearing with our child, my very parenting was at risk.  The marriage imploded, as I look back it was predictable and inevitable.

All along the way, after every rant and rage to the point of her exhaustion - during some 15 years! - she would return to "normal" (baseline?) and my hope was that it was the last rant and rage... well, it was, for a while, until the next trigger.  Your quote I excerpted above is what reminded me of my experience.  It is a common pattern.  How many times have you told yourself, "I think this time was the last rant and rage" but it wasn't?

Many of us have "been there, done that" ("been there, hoped that") but that's not reality.  The experiences of myself and others here are likely your future unless either (1) your spouse gets meaningful therapy applied diligently in spouse's life for years to come or (2) you end the adult relationship and, if there are any shared children, concentrate on being a parent to your children.

[livednlearned]

Hi Falcon,

I'm catching up on your story and it's heart breaking. You are clearly a wonderful person with a lot to offer and a big heart. It's tragic what you've been through and I'm glad you reached out to get support from people here. You mentioned your wife had ptsd. It would be a miracle if you didn't also suffer ptsd too given what you've been through. Have you discussed that with your therapist?

I don't know what to trust.

I would trust that the pervasive thought patterns and adaptations your wife has learned in childhood and refined over a lifetime are still there. Her frantic efforts to avoid abandonment are likely to return and may get worse, mostly because she just learned how far she can take things and you'll come back.

Medication can help alleviate depression and stabilize moods but her pattern of thinking  can't be cured with meds or by making promises.

I do want to see my mom and my grandparents on Mother's Day and I will not let fear dictate my life the way it did for so long. So I'm planning to go

It's important that you go. Before you go, see if you two can work out a plan. For example, maybe you tell her you will check your phone x number of times, or at pre-planned times, or will call when you get there, whatever you are comfortable with. Then stick to that schedule. This can help her from going from zero to 100, making it easier for you to leave.

Be alert that she may be ok during the trip and then fully dysregulate when you get home. It might be worth thinking through under what conditions you will stay somewhere else. What behaviors might signal it's safer to stay somewhere else for the night? You demonstrated to her that you had a boundary, and now, because you're a reasonable person, you are softening that boundary. It's very likely she will feel the need to test to see where the edges are. She won't know because she lacks her own boundaries. Boundaries for many of us have to be demonstrated with actions. Words become meaningless pretty quick.

Every time I feel like I KNOW I need to get a divorce and walk away forever something convinces me otherwise.

Do you have to make this decision right now? Your safety and well-being seem more important. How about you start with small steps? Safety first. How about you make a plan that takes into account your safety, then hers? When you feel she's pressuring you to have sex, are there patterns leading up to those moments that might help you sense what's coming next?

At a minimum, it seems like you need to show your wife that you will leave her presence if you feel unsafe. Do you think she can work out the details with you together? Say something like: If you feel things are escalating and begin to feel unsafe, you will immediately call her mom, then you'll turn your phone off, and check your messages an hour later to see if she has returned to baseline. If she texts that she is suicidal, the agreement is that you will call 911 to make sure someone trained can check on her. Something that you know you can do.

You might have some leverage right now following the shock of experiencing the natural consequences to her actions.


Maybe while she is still processing, you can help stabilize the volatility that is bound to return. My guess is that her behaviors will escalate when you see your family, followed by sexual assault or talk of suicide when you return.

It might be worth having a plan about what you will do if she text bombs you with talk of suicide while you're on your trip.

If you try to discuss any kind of plan and she digresses into a rumination (about your family or whatever), prepare for that. Some of us have had success redirecting back to the topic by repeating the same sentence over and over, or holding up a hand and saying Stop, over and over and over and over. It can feel foolish but you are talking to someone who is flooded in emotion. Sometimes you need to use a gimmick to get through to the part of their brain that is actively listening.

I will be curious to hear how things go for you Falcon, rooting for your success and at a minimum, a completed trip to see your family.  

[Gemsforeyes]

Hi Falcon-

I too have just caught up reading through your thread.  I am deeply sorry for the terrible things that you have endured over the last 4+ years, and as I understand it, most intensely the last 2 years.  Extremely traumatizing for you, and G-D willing, I’m hoping your T (therapist) is helping *you* work through these issues.  I agree with Livednlearned that I’d be surprised if you have NOT developed PTSD after what you’ve experienced. 

I’ve also read that sometimes in a hospital setting, the assignment of “PTSD” (your W’s diagnosis) may at times be given, rather than BPD.  They may not have had adequate time or the proper expertise on staff to deliver the BPD or other Personality Disorder diagnosis.

I’m hoping my questions aren’t too insensitive or difficult for you to address.  Please know you don’t have to address them.

I’m wondering if you were able to attend the family wedding in New Orleans, how that went for you, and how your W reacted upon your return.

Prior to your most recent May 10th post (in April when you discussed the upcoming family wedding), your W did seem somewhat able to process the news that she would not be invited to attend that out of town wedding.  At that time in April you did not seem to be ready to have your W live with you yet.  If you’re comfortable, can you address what led to your decision to allow her to move back into your joint home?

Finally, Mother’s Day has just passed.  I’m hoping you were able to share time with your mom and your grandparents for the holiday, with NO repercussions when you returned home.  How did that go?  Again, if you’re comfortable discussing.

Falcon- I understand this is so very taxing… thinking about it, living in it and typing about it. 

We ARE here to support you however you need us to be.

Warmly,
Gems

[Falcon2437]

Hi Gems, Lived and Forever,

I hope you are all doing well. You guys all touched on some similar things so let me start with a brief catch-up. I DID go home for Mother's Day and my wife was surprisingly more than okay with it. I told her I wanted to talk to her about something (she had asked that when we have to have a serious conversation I give her a little heads up like that) and then when I told her I wanted to go home for the holiday she said something along the lines of "I'm going to be with my mom, you should go be with yours too" and really there were no repercussions. No threatening phone calls/texts or really even any manipulative I feel so horrible because you picked them over me language. I was a little worried about what Livednlearned talked about with things getting worse once I got home but that never happened either. ForeverDad when you talk about changes only happening if my wife gets meaningful therapy for years to come, she is doing that right now. She is also taking medication now. I can't answer if she will do it for years, decades, forever or if she is just doing it for now but I know for now she really is doing it and I can see a difference in her actions/behavior.

Livednlearned you are right I do not need to make any decision right now. I have made it clear to her that if things escalate or if she tries pressuring me into sex again then that is making a decision for me and I am out. So far she has respected that. But while I don't need to make a decision now I do feel like for my own sanity I have to do it at some point soon. I just kindof feel like I am living in limbo waiting for the next big problem and while that's okay for a little bit and life is never perfect I've now been thinking about a divorce for 8 months and only been married for 21 so at some point I do need to make a decision.

I haven't talked to my therapist about whether or not I have PTSD, I see him again tomorrow so I will bring it up but I think from talking to him more of what I deal with is a version of the avoidance and fear that I have dealt with most of my life.

To answer your questions Gem
1. I did attend the wedding in New Orleans and it went okay. There were times for me personally when I was just sad. Times when I was listening to my cousin-in-law talk about how much she loves her new in-laws and hearing my aunt/uncle talk about how much they view her as a daughter was extremely tough. It was also hard looking around at all of my cousins, half of whom are younger than me, and realizing that I'm the only one who isn't in a happy relationship/marriage and either have kids or are moving that direction. (I say that knowing that I am making a judgement here. The only people who truly know what is going on in a relationship are the people in it and it is possible some of them are not happy.) As far as things with my wife she was upset with me for going without talking to her or including her in the "conversation" about me going telling me that I set things in motion "behind her back" but other than that it was ok. She texted/called me a little bit but not much. When I got home she told me she felt like I was ignorning her but she didn't press it much. Overall I was fairly happy with how things went on that front.

I'm not sure I really was "comfortable" with her moving back into the house to be honest. This is probably what I am most upset with myself about because I know I did let her manipulate the situation to get what she wanted. Basically the day after I came back was the one year anniversary of her dad's death. I think I knew that day would end in disaster if she wasn't in the house so I caved. I've convinced myself a bit since then that really the only way to know if she changed for real or for show is to actually see for myself and as I'm trying to figure our relationship out I do think that is a major positive to us living together but if I'm being truly honest I wasn't comfortable with it when it first happened.

Mother's Day I hit earlier in this post but yeah I think it went well with no real repercussions.

Thank you all for your support!