overwhelmed2
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What is your sexual orientation: Straight
Who in your life has "personality" issues: Romantic partner
Relationship status: Married
Posts: 26
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« Reply #30 on: May 28, 2024, 03:49:54 PM » |
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@ompluscator:
Thanks much for relaying your experience. That is super interesting, re your prior relationship and the effectiveness of medication and treatment. It is definitely a hopeful thing to hear.
To date, I've honestly never had any expectation for my wife to be open to the idea of treatment/therapy. From her perspective, she is the only person who is in their right mind, everyone else is a mess/inconsistent in her eyes...
She will tell you she is a 'straight shooter', 'direct', etc with pride, in her mind she is one of the few people willing to speak unvarnished 'truth'... but seeing what this means in practice basically means she will give someone her direct (unsupported by evidence) opinion to their face without any regard for their feelings when she is splitting on them.
Even for a physical illness, she will make claims about not trusting "doctors" (she'll go to the dentist but has not been to a regular doctor for nearly a decade)... often says they say things and schedule follow ups for profit or other motives, etc. Anytime anyone brings up a mental health concern its immediate eye rolls. It's like that is for people who just don't have the courage to do the "right" things in life...
But more to your key point: As the partner of someone with issues like this, and someone who has been in a committed relationship for close to 30 years with this person, *I* clearly have some issues to work on that are in my control. I need to get my self esteem sorted and understand what I am willing or should tolerate and how I can draw boundaries. I have a fear of abandonment myself.
I also still hope there is some way I can get her to improve; but as noted, I would be surprised if I am ever able to get her to admit she needs to and am not going to make "hoping for a miracle" my plan.
The biggest problem is that it is getting much *worse* much faster rather than better as we head into our retirement years and her threatening to leave me all the time is triggering MY OWN problems/weaknesses. I am pretty certain, I cannot live like this long term, I suppose the anxiety will just do me in at some point even if I manage to stay/keep it together without improvement. I am freaking out myself at the possibility of a lifestyle change and cannot deal with these episodes.
I am conflict avoidant... It takes me weeks to recover emotionally from a blow out, it is getting to the point where tiny stuff is setting her off on me all the time and she is taking absolutely no ownership for anything of the things she is complaining about and will not even acknowledge the possibility that she may not be reading my mind correctly...
For like the first 25 years, we would have like four or fewer of these kind of crazy meltdowns... I could recover and the great times have been *amazingly* great. But the last 5-10 years has been a ramp to where we are now, where I am daily in fear of her being triggered and we can have four or five blow outs in month. Just crossing paths with one of the neighbor women is enough to put our entire week at risk. I'm less willing to leave the house, etc.
Anyway, sorry, I guess I am kind of spiraling myself here (has some issues this weekend); but, in principle, I agree with the wisdom here: my own emotions and issues are what I can control and as a partner for someone with this kind of set of issues, I need to be the one to draw lines because I am the one who is self-aware enough to know what is rational and what is not...
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