Conflicted about contacting a lawyer

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

Hey ya'all. I've posted on the other boards quite a bit. Trying to work through different issues, scenarios. It seems the longer I go the more this happens, the more things escalate. my wife is uBPD and we've been together for 25 years. Its sad but this isn't getting better. I am trying, really to change myself but no matter what I do she keeps getting enraged to the point of threatening divorce/separation, hating me, the verbal insults and emotional abuse is becoming intolerable. And I get more and more worried she's going to do something. I want to protect myself and my kids.

we've been in another bad bout for over a day now and tonight she again moved all my clothes out to the spare room. Says we're done, says we're going to find a lawyer tomorrow. It's been 24 hours of being berated, swore at, yelled at, told how horrible I am. So definitely in the middle of a crisis.

I can't count how many times she's threatened divorce/separation but it's been worse every time and this time it feels more. I just wonder if I shouldn't talk to someone to be proactive. I don't even know what my rights are.

We barely scrape by financially. I can't pay for all of our finances right now so I'm a little scare of what a separation would look like. But my uBPDw just got a job and does consulting on the side so that would enable us to be okay (or possible pay for another living residence if separated). She doesn't pay any bills right now, just her car payment.

She's lying to friends and family about what's happened. I really wish this would work. I'm a christian, I don't want to be divorced, I really do love her but I get more and more discouraged. She doesn't know she has a mental health issue, she dropped out of couples therapy, I'm still seeing a therapist. Her rages haven't gotten better, in fact worse over the last couple of years.

Would anyone recommend a separation? Or do you just file for divorce? At this stage I really question what it would accomplish unless she was willing to get psychiatric care. 

My mind isn't made up but I've never thought more about divorce then then past 6 months.

[campbembpd]

Hey ya'all. I've posted on the other boards quite a bit. Trying to work through different issues, scenarios. It seems the longer I go the more this happens, the more things escalate. my wife is uBPD and we've been together for 25 years. Its sad but this isn't getting better. I am trying, really to change myself but no matter what I do she keeps getting enraged to the point of threatening divorce/separation, hating me, the verbal insults and emotional abuse is becoming intolerable. And I get more and more worried she's going to do something. I want to protect myself and my kids.

we've been in another bad bout for over a day now and tonight she again moved all my clothes out to the spare room. Says we're done, says we're going to find a lawyer tomorrow. It's been 24 hours of being berated, swore at, yelled at, told how horrible I am. So definitely in the middle of a crisis.

I can't count how many times she's threatened divorce/separation but it's been worse every time and this time it feels more. I just wonder if I shouldn't talk to someone to be proactive. I don't even know what my rights are.

We barely scrape by financially. I can't pay for all of our finances right now so I'm a little scare of what a separation would look like. But my uBPDw just got a job and does consulting on the side so that would enable us to be okay (or possible pay for another living residence if separated). She doesn't pay any bills right now, just her car payment.

She's lying to friends and family about what's happened. I really wish this would work. I'm a christian, I don't want to be divorced, I really do love her but I get more and more discouraged. She doesn't know she has a mental health issue, she dropped out of couples therapy, I'm still seeing a therapist. Her rages haven't gotten better, in fact worse over the last couple of years.

Would anyone recommend a separation? Or do you just file for divorce? At this stage I really question what it would accomplish unless she was willing to get psychiatric care. 

My mind isn't made up but I've never thought more about divorce then then past 6 months.

[ForeverDad]

My lawyer, nearly two decades ago, stated that in his 17 years of practice he had handled just two legal separations.  Only two and those were relatively amicable (compared to mine)?  One was so that the ex could remain on the health insurance.

So, realistically, legal separation is not a practical option if there is substantive conflict.  After all, if you're separated, you are still married.

Yes that means a lot to those of us who have spiritual commitments in mind, but sometimes even those efforts fail.  My background was that I spent over 25 years as a religious volunteer (which also means with less income then in those years I have less money now for my retirement).  I too could never imagine considering a divorce, yet life grew so difficult and even distressing that I accepted the entirety of our problems had grown so immense that divorce was a foregone conclusion.  What 'helped' me to accept that was when I had no choice but to call emergency services and two police officers responded.  That's how bad it had become, a not uncommon event in the lives of many members here.

So for the first several months we were separated - not a legal separation - until I finally had no choice but to file for divorce.  Our child was a preschooler and at the time that was my driving concern, my ex was blocking my access to be a parent.

I do recommend you determine what your state and local standing is from a legal standpoint.  Most of us - including our ex-spouses - had assumptions that were totally out of sync with the laws, policies, procedures and expectations of our family courts.

So when pondering seeking consultations with family law attorneys (lawyers), you must do this independently of your spouse.  There are a few reasons why.

• If you were trying to salvage and repair the marriage, then yes you would share information to rebuild trust and cooperation.
  But if the marriage has failed then you share only the basics for financial information and parenting in case you still have minor children.
• Therefore your consultations with lawyers as you try to determine how best to proceed must be private and confidential.  Repeat, do not feel obligated or guilted (F.O.G. = Fear, Obligation, Guilt) that you have to 'confess', no matter how intensely you are interrogated into the wee hours of the night.  You have a right to privacy and confidentiality.
• Unless you are doing collaborative or amicable divorce - almost unheard of in our sort of cases - then family court probably requires you each to have separate counsel.  Sadly, divorce is an adversarial scenario, often it is petitioner versus respondent though court supposedly does not give petitioner preference over respondent.
• Sharing the wrong information, such as strategies and legal advice from your lawyer, can easily expose you to harm, enabling the other to sabotage you.

[ForeverDad]

My wife has has uBPD, I thought I was the problem for 10-15+ years (not doing enough, saying the wrong things, making the same 'mistake' again and again, not supporting her, not hearing her. I kept thinking I could do something to stop her from getting so angry). The past 6 years the rages have really exploded (no pun intended). It used to be only directed at me but increasingly over the past 6 years my pwBPD has directed at my daughter more and more.

This was one of your first posts.  What developed over the years is almost predictable in a general sense.

In my marriage, my then-spouse was becoming increasingly troubled with her mental health, particularly with her perceptions of relationships.  But it was when we had a child that life became even more distressing.  It seems your circumstances worsened after your daughter arrived too?

Many here have noted that at first having a child wasn't so disastrous, it was only as the child predictably started growing up and seeking more independence that conflict with a controlling parent (such as with BPD) rose as a bigger issue.  That's similar to your experiences with your daughter, right?

Understand two things pertaining to family court:

(1) Your daughter is nearly an adult.  By the time anything gets filed in family court, there will be no need to determine custody and parenting schedules.  Your daughter will be considered by the court to be an adult and able to make her own decisions... where to live, whether to spend more time with one parent rather than the other, etc.  Basically it will be her life to choose to live how and where she is most comfortable.  Hopefully she will be inclined to seek stability and constancy with you rather than the likely pressure and manipulation of a parent exhibiting Borderline traits.  All this takes time, becoming "a work in progress" so be prepared for some rough sailing for a while.

As one book from the mid-1980s quoted, As the saying goes, "I'd rather come from a broken home than live in one."

(2) Court is unlikely to want to get involved with whether one or the other (or both) of you would benefit from mental health therapy.  In general terms, as my lawyer explained, "court loves counseling" but it won't force it on either of you.  It deals with both of you as you are.  It gave up long ago the idea of "fixing" anyone.

It might be wise for you to take to heart one truism with BPD... BPD traits can cause the sufferer to dismiss or resist your good intentions because of your long history (or emotional baggage) of a close relationship.  BPD is a disorder most impacting the closest relationships.  Maybe an emotionally neutral therapist can make progress with her but the reality is that your ex would have to want to improve, a tough option for the pwBPD.

Finally, let me explain something about how you're probably inclined to approach everything. We all here pride ourselves in being "fair" and "fair-minded" people.  You may imagine that gains you points with divorce court.  Sadly, it doesn't, or at least not much.  You may behave much better than your stbEx (soon to be ex-spouse).  Court doesn't care, at least not at first.  Eventually it may get peeved with your ex, but beware that court really doesn't care.  Yes, you always need to behave decently but our sense of "Let me show how fair I am, I will be so magnanimous by Gifting Away more than I should" will likely fall on deaf ears.

So beware your otherwise commendable sense of "fairness", leaning over backward to show your inner inclination of goodness, may just make you more vulnerable or weaker in a system that doesn't notice.

[EyesUp]

There are many common elements in our stories.

My relationship with my uBPDxw lasted about 25 years. We were married for 14.
We've got three kids, and the kids' wellbeing weighed heavily on me when thinking about D.
Our finances were strained, in part because my xw had quit her job 3 years prior to the D, which introduced some budget constraints that she reformulated as "financial abuse."
We churned through multiple marriage counselors, each time she quit.
Like you, I was walking on eggshells for years - however apparent resentments and anger continued to amplify.

Some other notes:
My uBPDxw was seeing an individual T for years, but I don't think that she was a reliable narrator of her story, and I don't think the T challenged her or supported her victim narrative. 

After our second child was born, I think my xw experienced some sort of post-partem depression - which she attributed to me. She frequently threatened to D. At one point I told her point blank that if she continued to make D threats, I would take her at her word and we would D. That made the threats stop for a few years.

As the emotional disfunction intensified and rages, etc., escalated, I withdrew a bit. At one point, I called her an "anger artist" because she could and would find ever more creative reasons to be angry (I don't recommend using this term with your W - speaking from experience, it did not help to illustrate the point)...

I learned about Gottman's "Four Horsemen" of the relationship apocalypse: "According to couples therapist Dr. John Gottman, the Four Horsemen, behavioral predictors of divorce or break-up, are criticism, defensiveness, contempt, and stonewalling."  I realized that all four were present in my relationship - and that no amount of "love languages" or "golden ratios" would resolve what had become deeply-seated resentments - for both of us. This was part of my journey from "conflicted" to "detaching" - ymmv.

Which brings me to my suggestion: Do your diligence. Read the Gottmans. Interview some attys, if only as a prophylactic measure. There is no harm in this - in fact, you can and should view it as important work to protect your marriage, and/or yourself.

When I was in your position, learning about the D process was so terrifying that it did motivate me to try new things and leave no stone uncovered. In my case, this activity initially postponed D, but ultimately also enabled me to learn a bit more about my relationship, which did, ultimately, allow me to feel like I tried everything to avoid a D.  It was a path through analysis paralysis... 

In the end, I reached a breakthrough of sorts: I came to understand that "radical acceptance" did not mean that I had to unconditionally accept my uBPDxw's behavior. Rather, I had to accept certain things about myself - that I could and could not change. One of those things was about D - in my case, this thing that I had been afraid of suddenly became possible, achievable, survivable, even preferable.

I encourage you to keep a secure/ protected journal of what you read, and any attys you interview. I used a password protected app called Evernote, accessible via web browser or phone app.

Good luck with your journey.

[zondolit]

I remember the heaviness and scariness of beginning to see divorce as the best possible way forward.

I am a Christian and never expected to divorce. I came to learn that Jesus seeks our healing, and I was not able to heal while married to someone who continually harmed me. I imagined going to a doctor for a dog bite with the dog still attached. What doctor would clean the wound and send me home with the dog still attached? No! The first thing is to remove the dog biting me. Only then can I start to heal.

I concur that lawyers these days rarely work with legal separations and generally will discourage this.

The option of living separately, however, is something you could do on your own. My therapist recommended it as a way, in part, to adjust the children to the coming divorce. (My children are younger than yours.) I felt immediate relief upon separating from my husband.

In my case, I first asked my husband for a therapeutic (or healing) separation overseen by a therapist. When that did not work out, I asked him to see a divorce mediator with me. When that did not work out, I hired a divorce lawyer.

While I was open and transparent about the therapeutic separation and divorce mediator, I kept my cards close to my chest once I'd decided to hire a lawyer; my husband knew nothing until he was served with the divorce papers.

Prior to that I'd also been pulling back financially (I was the sole wage earner): I opened my own bank account, I told my husband he needed to get a job and to start paying for his own health insurance or I wouldn't keep him on my plan, etc. I was being honest about the financial things necessary for me to feel a sense of financial fairness in the marriage and I was also trying to prepare us (him) for living separately.

[campbembpd]

Thank you all, that's a lot of great information and advice. It's really eerie how similar so many stories are.

I am worried of course about the kids. My daughter is almost 18 and I think she'll be okay. I really don't know what she would choose to do. I know my uBPDw would make it hard for her to live with me as you can imagine.

The other factor is our 20 year old special needs son who we have guardianship over. He's great, largely unable to understand the dynamics but knows mom gets angry sometimes. She threatens that he would be with her when she divorces me. However, she has repetitive frequent complaints about having to take care of him. She frequently complains that we don't have the freedom other parents do and we'll always be stuck with him. We can leave him alone for the day so he doesn't need constant care but overnight would be concerning without his sister around or a family member. I'm not saying it's not valid, but she's been saying this for years and years. It really has become off putting and internally it really upsets me. He has other little behaviors that are just a part of who he is, those things start to upset the wife and she'll bubble up emotionally and snap, get angry at him for it. It's just ongoing. So she talks often about how he's such a burden but then threatens 'taking' him when she leaves. Sometimes I'm screaming inside my head for her to just leave finally and leave us all in peace. I personally wouldn't want to have my son living with my uBPDw alone if we got divorced but that's a lawyer discussion I suppose.

Foreverdad - Thanks for all your comments, very relatable and makes sense. Yes, it wasn't as much of an issue when my daughter was first born but as my daughter started getting older and more independent either by causality correlation my wife's behaviors escalated. Part of me wishes I really came upon all this 6-10 years ago, had the courage to make changes I'm now trying to make and leave if needed to protect my daughter and children.

EyesUp - thank you. Yes we've been through a couple therapists that she's quit. She's had a couple individual therapists, also quit. And I've thought about it a lot and am pretty certain my wife would not be a reliable narrator either. Her memories and interpretations are very distorted or at least exaggerated. It was only during couples therapy where we both explained situations that T was able to start pointing out that borderline traits were there. Sessions where she was enraged she would tell the therapists things that were false that I would have to clear up later during a one-on-one session. I laughed at the term anger artist! My wife is a Picasso as well. and yes my documents and journals are hidden and secured/password protected.

Zondolit - thank you as well for sharing. Yeah I don't think a separation would really help at all. I don't see the point because she doesn't understand there is a mental health issue and doesn't think anything is really wrong with her. All roads lead to me (or sometimes another family member) being the cause of her episodes. That's a big similarity for me as well. I've been the primary earner as well. For the past 6 years wife works consulting and takes care of some of her personal expenses (hair, makeup, vitamins and personal vacations/girls trips) and some odds and ends - buying our daughter clothes, will pay for some dinners out for us etc. But most of her money has been hers while mine is ours. I don't even have $50 to myself a week unless I want to put it on a cc. I was going to have that conversation with her about getting a job and contributing a certain amount. She now has a regular p/t job with some meaningful income so next up is having a conversation about financial fairness and contributing. I'm really dreading it, I fully expect a disaster. It's actually causing me extraordinary anxiety because I'm going to be doing it in the next week or 2.


As a general update it got worse after I wrote this, an onslaught of cruel texts, she moved all my stuff into the spare room where I slept. Then she 'snapped' or split back. In the middle of the night she came into the spare room, was sad and apologized, said she didn't want to sleep apart and I went back into the bedroom. (was that a mistake). She went from texting me that we were going to be discussing divorce in the morning, she hates me, etc to us waking up together, her telling me she loves me, sending funny texts and being complimentary. The more I stand back and look at this the more my mind is really blown away.

[campbembpd]

The option of living separately, however, is something you could do on your own. My therapist recommended it as a way, in part, to adjust the children to the coming divorce. (My children are younger than yours.) I felt immediate relief upon separating from my husband.

I meant to comment on this as well. It makes me sad to say it, really sad but I usually have the most relief and feel the most relaxed when my wife is gone, especially when she goes to visit family or girlfriends and is gone for a few days or a week.

[ForeverDad]

It makes me sad to say it, really sad but I usually have the most relief and feel the most relaxed when my wife is gone, especially when she goes to visit family or girlfriends and is gone for a few days or a week.

Even my son, a preschooler at the time when we first separated in 2005, noticed.  When I felt I ought to be "fair" - Warning, Will Robinson! - and mention her, he redirected me back to the chocolate chip cookie batter we were mixing.

I too recall when my spouse was gone.  I recall writing here that the silence was deafening.