4 months post breakup with undiagnosed BPD

[Jw2111]

Hey guys,

Spent 5 years with an undiagnosed BPD and brought two beautiful happy healthy children into the world.

The first 2 years of our relationship was pretty good, some ups and downs but she truly fought for me and loved me like I've never been loved. Got the news she was pregnant, her BPD mother interjected herself into our lives and that's when things went down hill quickly. They are toxic and feed off of one another.

3 days before our first child was born, her and her mother started a big fight with me and told me I wasn't going to be a part of our daughters life and I wasn't allowed to be there for the birth. Over the next couple days we patched things up and I was there for the birth of my daughter. I will admit this is where everything  went wrong in the relationship and I became co-dependent.

A couple months later her and her mom started a big another big fight with me and I ended up moving out of the house. My daughter was kept from me for over a month and I ended up hiring an attorney to establish paternity and shared custody.

We ended up getting back together, she promised she would never keep my daughter from me again and things seemed to be getting back to good.I ended up dismissing the court case.  She ended up pregnant again and during the pregnancy we had some ups and down and her mother was still heavily involved in our lives. I was completely miserable and with the two of them constantly starting problems and being toxic I couldn't stand to be home with them all the time so I was working a lot.

Me being gone and working caused problems in the relationship and it was taken as I didn't support her during the pregnancy. I was paying the bills and she was taking care or the house stuff. 3 days before our second child was born, she told me she didn't want to be with me anymore and I wasn't going to be there when our son was born. I again moved out and got my own place. A couple days later I got a phone call that my son was born which was the most heart breaking difficult phone call I ever received. The day she was leaving the hospital she did text me and tell me that she wanted me to meet our son as soon as she got home; however, I politely refused as I wasn't going to get emotionally attached to another child to be used against me, like my first child was. At this time she started keeping my daughter from me again.

I hired an attorney again and he filed another court case for paternity and joint custody. About a week later, she called me crying telling me how bad she messed up and how nothing feels right and wants her family back. We had some discussions and I decided to give things another try. I assured her that I would not be moving back into her house, I had a hear lease at my new place and I would not be canceling the court case as I needed to protect my relationship with my kids. We got into therapy together she set up boundaries with her mother and things went pretty well for about 6 months. On multiple occasions she made mention that I should dismiss the court case as we could work things out on our own. I told her I would not consider doing that.

I got in a bad business deal with her mom about a year prior  and ended up having to sue her mom. This caused some strife in our relationship as she was living in her mom's house for free and financially dependant on her mom. We had a couple ups and downs over a few months.

We spent a couple days together around Christmas and things were wonderful and seemed like we were going to get back on track. She told me her mom bought her a car and was bringing it from out of state over the next couple days. Her mom arrived with the car and told her that her and I were going to work things out, her mom took the car back, left and told her she was selling the house that she lives in.

She broke up with me a couple days later, became completely cold, began keeping the kids from me for weeks at a time. She would let me keep the kids for the weekend then refuse to pick them up making me late and miss work.

When I moved out after our second child was born she racked up close to 30k in credit card debt and planned to file for bankruptcy. We had a vehicle together that I was making the payments and paying the insurance on. She picked it up one day and turned it in for voluntary repossession. Luckily I was able to get ahead of then and get rid of the vehicle with our ruining either of our credit.

We finally got an emergency relief hearing for child custody. I got 50/50 custody at the heading and things didn't go her way. An hour after leaving the court hearing someone called DCF for a frivolous complaint with ended up being unsustained.

A couple days later she went to my work, accusing me of stalking her, telling them she was scared of might as well as a bunch of other made up BS. My work conducted and investigation and determined all of this was BS as well.

This is part of my story that I wanted to share and I wonder every day if this is over going to end.

She says I'm emotionally, verbally and financially abusive. I've always done right by her and was always there for her even when I shouldn't have been.

I've been in therapy for a few months and I've learned that I've been being abused for that past couple years and was conditioned to think everything was my fault and I was the problem. Sadly enough, I began to believe this and questioned my own sanity for the past couple years.

[ForeverDad]

You are to be commended that despite the tough struggle to parent, you did manage to obtain or maintain decent parenting status.

In my experience - this varies greatly depending which country, state or province you reside in - having equal or 50-50 status is good since it means you're an involved father but... many jurisdictions default to presuming the mother has preference in rulings.  Those unwritten patterns favoring mothers are quite difficult to overcome, especially in cases like ours where substantive mental illness are likely but ignored factors.  Unfortunately many courts avoid seeking diagnoses or don't follow up in cases where obstructions are still continuing.

How has it been for you?  If she has been using 50-50 status to still obstruct, sabotage or delay your parenting, can you seek to have custody adjusted so you have Decision Making or Tie Breaker status?  Or perhaps custody altogether, or at least some aspects of custody such as schooling, medical and mental health aspects.  While this can't stop all conflict, it can shift things overall in your favor, where you can listen to her perspective then you proceed with what you decide is best for the children.  Then she - not you - would be the one having to go to a mediator, parenting coordinator or court to contest your parenting decisions.