Site Areas
Wedding Centre
Health Club
Marriage Clinic
Chapel
University
Citizen's Centre
Coffee Shop
Admin Centre

Contents
Articles
Books
CDs / Videos
Tips
Services

Resources
Forums
Membership
Contact Us
Site map
Link to Us

Search

Take the Couple Check-up!

Marriage Week UK

Marriage first aid

Online support for your marriage

Free Tell A Friend from Bravenet


Home > Forums
2-in-2-1 Discussion Forums  
Old 24th June 2010, 01:47 AM   #61
mdmquincy
Registered User
 
Join Date: Feb 2010
Posts: 125
Re: I want to understand

I would help if I could, but I am here with you. I am in exactly the same place right now.

Love,
J
mdmquincy is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 24th June 2010, 05:18 AM   #62
Downtown
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2010
Posts: 58
Re: I want to understand

SoAlone, your H's behavior sounds like that of a man suffering from strong traits of a personality disorder (i.e., the source of his depression). Indeed, his behavior sounds almost exactly like that of my exW, whom I took to six different psychologists nearly every week for 15 years -- at a cost of over $200,000. She suffers from BPD (borderline personality disorder). Below, I will discuss how BPD traits may explain all of the strange behavior you are witnessing in him. And, if what I say sounds familiar to you, I will encourage you to read more about BPD.

Significantly, all human beings have all nine BPD traits, albeit at a low level when they are emotionally healthy. Hence, as you learn to identify those traits, it will not be difficult for you to recognize a strong pattern of such traits when they occur. After all, you experience them nearly every week at a low level. What we cannot do, however, is determine whether the traits are so severe as to warrant a diagnosis of "having BPD." Only professionals can do that. You nonetheless are able to recognize a strong pattern of "BPD traits." Before you left high school, for example, you likely could recognize a strong pattern of selfishness and grandiosity in some boys you dated. And you could do so without being able to determine whether those traits rose to the severity level of NPD (narcissistic personality disorder).
Quote:
I think the one person who has never let him down is me. This is what I deserve, is it?
BPDers always treat their loved ones -- especially the spouse -- the very worst. The reason is that they have a great fear of abandonment. 70% of them, like your H, report that they were abused or abandoned in early childhood. That abuse destroyed their ability to trust anyone, i.e., to trust that they will stay around.

Importantly, BPDers often treat casual friends, work colleagues, and total strangers with great kindness and generosity. Those people pose no abandonment threat because there is no close relationship that can be abandoned. Heaven help them, however, if they draw near and become a close friend. Then they will pose a threat and will be subject to the verbal abuse that has been infllicted on you. This is why one of the most popular books on BPD is called "I Hate You, Don't Leave Me." And this is why your H likely has only casual friends and does not have any long-term close friends. He has driven all of them away by endlessly testing their loyalty.

My exW, for example, would repeatedly do things to offend her closest friend so as to determine if the woman would abandon her. With me, she did the testing a thousand times. She gained 60 pounds right after our wedding, for example, just to see if I would stay with her -- which I did. No matter. That test was quickly followed by another.
Quote:
He isn't that concerned about the careless driving he was caught at ... so, someone tell me, doesn't this sound like a manic phase?
No, it doesn't sound like mania. Because my foster son has bipolar disorder (which causes mania) and my exW has BPD, I know there are several clear differences between the two disorders. One difference is that bipolar mood swings typically are very slow because they are caused by gradual changes in body chemistry. They are considered rapid if as many as four occur in a year. In sharp contrast, four BPD mood changes can easily occur in one day. BPD rages, for example, typically last about 5 hours and rarely as long as 36 hours. Your H's moods, for example, sometimes changed several times a day.

A second difference is that the onset is very different. Whereas a bipolar change may occur over several weeks, a BPD change typically occurs in less than a minute -- often in only 15 seconds -- because it is event-triggered by some innocent comment or action. You have described at least two dozen examples of your H being loving and then suddenly flying into a rage over some little thing you said or asked about.

A third difference is that, whereas bipolar can cause people to be irritable and obnoxious during the manic phase, it does not rise to the level of meanness you see when a BPD is splitting you black. The difference is huge: while a manic person may regard you as an irritation, a BPD person can perceive you as Hitler and will treat you accordingly. That is, manic people do not rise to the level of absolute meanness that you have seen in your H -- a level of hatred that is only outdone by his brother, who said he would like to kill you if you don't leave.

A fourth difference is that a bipolar sufferer -- whether depressed or manic -- usually is able to trust you if he knows you well. Untreated BPDers, however, are unable to trust because the ability to do so was destroyed in early childhood -- even though they sometimes may claim otherwise. This lack of trust means there is no foundation on which to build a relationship. Moreover -- and I learned this the hard way -- when a person does not trust you, you can never trust them because they can turn on you at any time -- and almost certainly will.

And, finally, a fifth difference is the type of treatment needed. Because bipolar is caused by body chemistry changes, the vast majority of such cases are successfully treated with medication. But, because BPD is a thought disorder carried since early childhood, treatment -- in the unlikely event you can get them to stay in therapy -- may take many years. With BPD, then, medication can help some by treating the depression or bipolar that usually accompanies it, but medication cannot touch the underlying disorder itself.

Yet, despite these five clear differences between the two disorders, many people confuse the two. The primary source of this confusion, as I note above, seems to be the fact that many as a third of BPD sufferers also have the bipolar disorder.
Quote:
He was very complimentary about how I look and told me he loves me .... I then make the quite clearly foolish mistake of asking him what he wants from us. He leaps up always from me and [says he] doesn't want to be with me anymore.
Due to childhood trauma (and heredity to some extent), BPDers had to rely so heavily on their primitive childhood defenses to survive that they held on too tightly to those emotional defenses. Sadly, they never moved on to learn the more sophisticated defenses that the rest of us learned. Hence, their defenses are frozen at the level of a four year old. Without years of treatment in therapy, they will go through their adult lives using childesh defenses like magical thinking, denial, and splitting (i.e., dissociation). The splitting is most evident in the black-white thinking they tend to do when stressed -- which is most of the time. That is, they perceive people to be all good or all bad.

This means that, with a spouse, a BPDer will flip back and forth between idealizing her and demonizing her. There is no gray area in the middle that a BPDer can see. Importantly, it takes only an idle comment or innocent action on your part to trigger the BPDer into flipping from one view ("I love you babe") to its polar opposite ("I hate you and want to leave"). As is evident in your quoted statement above, that flip from love to hate can occur in only 15 seconds because, as I explained earlier, it is event triggered.

Quote:
I then get to the hospital and we waited and finally saw a psychiatrist .... who diagnosed nothing. Not even depression. No mental health issues at all.
This is why therapy is worthless for BPDers unless they want it badly for themselves. Otherwise, they just play games like my exW did for weekly sessions over a 15-year period. And they are excellent actors. The reason is that a BPDer's sense of self identity was nearly destroyed in early childhood, leaving him not knowing who he is. Because that unstable, fragile sense of self cannot center or ground him in various social situations, a BPDer gets very good at acting in a way that meets peoples' expectations of how he should behave. My exW, for example, could transform in 15 seconds from a raging wild person into a calm lady-of-the-house as soon as the police arrive. Moreover, because casual friends never trigger their rage, those friends (and your psychiatrist) will find it extremely hard to believe that your H has any emotional problems whatsoever. This is one reason why you need to see your own psychiatrist to obtain a diagnosis of what is wrong with him.

Another reason is that his Psych likely will not give him such a diagnosis -- even if it is warranted -- is that insurance companies typically do not cover BPD treatments. A third reason is that BPDers tend to drop out of treatment immediately on hearing that dreaded term.
Quote:
What on earth in the world is the matter with him? Who on earth is this man I am speaking to?
As I discussed above, your H likely has the emotional development of a four year old. Like a young child, he loves mommy when she meets his every need but will flip, in 15 seconds, to hating mommy when she withholds the tiniest thing. Consequently, the reason that you have been so utterly confused is that you mistakenly think he should be behaving like a rational 40-year-old adult. Everything will become very clear to you, I believe, when you start thinking of him as a person who is emotionally impaired -- being stuck at a very young age, which gives him a childlike warmth that you find attractive when he is splitting you white -- and gives him childlike tantrums when he is splitting you black.

That said, this is not just any child. Rather, it is one with the intelligence, cunning, and body strength of a full grown adult. He therefore likely is capable of physically hurting you. Certainly that is true of his brother, who has already threatened to kill you.
Quote:
Where is the man I married?
As I mentioned above, a BPDer is great at acting -- not because he is manipulative but, rather, because he wants to be accepted and loved just like anyone else. Hence, when a BPDer is infatuated with you, he pulls out all the stops and actually mirrors your personality -- appearing to like all the things you like and enjoying all the same people you enjoy. With my exW, this mirroring was so complete and perfect that I was convinced I had met my "soul mate." Sadly, the mirroring takes enormous focus and energy. Moreover, as the months go by, the BPDer becomes increasingly resentful of having to visit people he does not enjoy and go places he does not want to see. Typically, then, this mirroring and the infatuation do not last longer than six months (unless you have a long distance relationship). Yet, because the partner is convinced at that point that he is a soul mate, the partner will spend a long time (15 years in my case) trying to reconstruct the conditions of the honeymoon period. Of course, that cannot be done because the BPDer is the only person who can heal himself.
Quote:
He says I can be horrible and nasty, I ask how and who to?! He says to his family!
One of the hallmarks of BPD is projection. Because BPDers hate themselves, the last thing they want to hear is one more thing that must be added to the long list of things they hate about themselves. To avoid the extreme pain of acknowledging that they made a mistake, they project it onto someone nearby who is safe (i.e., who loves them). This is why your H blames you for everything wrong in his life.

Importantly, projection is successful at avoiding the pain only if the conscious part of his mind really believes it. It therefore is done subconsciously, allowing him to believe much of the outrageous things he says about you -- while he is splitting you black. This means that, if you were to tell him you believe he has strong BPD traits, he likely would project it right back onto you, believing that you are the sick one.

Please understand, however, that this is not done to deliberately hurt you. Rather, it is done because -- given his childlike emotional defenses -- he finds it far too painful to take responsibility for his own mistakes and flaws. It therefore is rare for a BPDer to find the strength to cross that pain threshold into the self awareness necessary for seeking and remaining in therapy.

This is not to say, however, that he believes all of outrageous things he blames on you. To avoid emotional pain, BPDers will lie to get out of a bad situation. So how can you tell which allegations are lies and which are projections? Don't even try. You will go crazy trying to tease them apart because BPDers are just as convincing when lying as when projecting. With my exW, I simply gave up trying to tell the difference.
Downtown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 24th June 2010, 09:17 AM   #63
dazed and confused
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2010
Posts: 110
Re: I want to understand

Downtown I have to say WOW Thanks so much for posting that on SoAlone's thread.I learnt so much from that.

Thanks Again

Val
dazed and confused is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 24th June 2010, 01:37 PM   #64
Downtown
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2010
Posts: 58
Re: I want to understand

Quote:
Originally Posted by dazed and confused View Post
Downtown ....I learnt so much from that. Thanks.
Val -- the gal from Canada -- I am glad you found the information helpful there in Australia. When I joined this forum for the first time yesterday, I read all of your posts here in SoAlone's thread as well as many of them elsewhere. I have been concerned that your H, like SoAlone's, sounds so similar to my exW. I was especially concerned by your statement in early May that "I never know which H I'll be talking to -- one day he's so sweet the next time he'll be evil." That Dr. Jeckyl and Dr. Hyde behavior is so much more indicative of BPD, not depression.

I nonetheless was hopeful, when reading your statements posted in mid-May, that the medication he started taking would solve the problem. Yet, within 3 or 4 weeks, you were seeing the meanness return. I remain hopeful that you are correct in saying that he must have discontinued his meds for a week. The other possibility, of course, is that he has strong BPD traits that the medicine cannot treat. For your sake and his, Val, I hope I am proven wrong about him having strong BPD traits.

If he has those traits, the problem is not that he cannot tell the difference between your being good or bad. Rather, the problem is that good or bad is all he can see. He cannot see the gray area in between where you -- like any other individual -- are both good and bad at the same time. That is, because his emotional development was frozen at a young age, he finds it too confusing and uncomfortable to sustain the perception of paradox (i.e., where a person is two contradictory things simultaneously). He cannot consistently hold the paradox in his mind of you being both good and bad or happy and sad at the same time. Being able to do that -- as you and I are able to do -- is what Linehan calls "Wise Mind."
Downtown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 24th June 2010, 02:23 PM   #65
Downtown
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2010
Posts: 58
Re: I want to understand

Quote:
Originally Posted by So alone View Post
I think my H is behaving so selfishly ... that he can't love me nor care for me.
SoAlone, BPDers typically are very caring individuals. Their problem is not being uncaring but, rather, being unstable. Another serious problem is that they typically are incapable of loving you in a mature way.

I therefore believe your husband loves you but not in a way you would ever imagine a 40 year old doing. The one question that the non-BPD partners ("Nons") most want answered is "Does he love the real me?" The answer, I believe, is he is capable only of loving you like a four year old does: an immature form of love wherein he is incapable of meeting your needs.

As to whether he can see the "real you," I believe he may be able to do it occassionally. He cannot do it consistently, however. Indeed, most of the time, he likely is splitting you white or black. It would be a big mistake to think that his perception of you is less distorted when he is splitting you white. Instead, it likely is equally as distorted as when he is splitting you black. I say this because, when you are being split white, he is idealizing you -- projecting onto you all sorts of wonderful attributes (i.e., an ability to make him happy and fix him) that you cannot possibly have. He uses such "magical thinking" to temporarily escape his pain and feeling of emptiness.

Hence, the most important question is not whether he loves you but, rather, why you are willing to settle for such an impaired form of love. This is exactly what you get when raising a young child, who is incapable of seeing the "real you" and is in a constant state of splitting, i.e., either adoring mommy or hating mommy. And how bad can that be? You don't see mothers and fathers run screaming from their kids because the kids cannot see the real people that constitute their parents. Not so awful, is it? After all, the parents are perfectly willing to settle for "I love you" knowing full well that it really means "I desperately need you and don't know how I would survive without you." Yet, that immature quality of "love" is not at all desirable in a relationship between two adults.

With my exW, for example, she "loved me" only when she was able to sugar coat me with projected qualities that no human being can possess. Whenever she got a glimpse of the real me, she would immediately be triggered into disliking, if not hating, me. Hence, I was lovable only as long as I hid much of myself by carefully "walking on eggshells."

You likely have been doing that too -- not acting yourself for the two years that you have been married. Indeed, you probably feel that you have become a different person and are not your "old self." You will be surprised, I believe, to find out how quickly your old self returns when you learn to establish stronger personal boundaries and stand up for yourself. This is why the most popular book on BPD (that is targeted to the "Non" partners of BPDers) is called "Stop Walking on Eggshells."
Downtown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 24th June 2010, 02:59 PM   #66
So alone
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Re: I want to understand

I'm trying to take it all in one step at a time.

With regards to walking on eggshells, I don't think I have for the past 2 years, I certainly have since this shock announcement. However, you are right, i don't deserve this and don't want it either.

I can't seem to get it into my thick (and therefore naive) head as to why doesn't he just say he doesn't want to be with me anymore? Why on earth put me through 2 months of this utter disgraceful treatment and still say he doesn't know anything? Tell me he wants to be with me? But then is it because he is treating me bad so I will eventually just leave therefore he takes no responsibility and perhaps might even play the victim - 'oh she left me' utter cr@p???


And why be on the prowl for other women and more to the point how and why are his family and friends condoning any of his behaviour?!

He surely could have just written a letter, email or just said so. I'm a nice person and that's the decent thing to do. But again I hear you say that he is a child so therefore won't behave like an adult. That then brings me to why on earth doesn't he want to be with me in the first place?? !! What is it about me that is so terrible an that he can't stand? (
  Reply With Quote
Old 24th June 2010, 11:25 PM   #67
dazed and confused
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2010
Posts: 110
Re: I want to understand

Thanks SoAlone

Our H's seem to be acting so much the same in everyway. So I do know how confusing it is to you also.For the first 6 weeks I walked around in a daze wondering what happened. The more I tried to be nice to him the meanier he got. So be ready for that. Derrick hates me like your BIL hates you, so they seem to gravite to them more to justify what they're doing. Dave will say everyone likes me but you,but as Downtown said they're nice to those people.So that's why your H's family can't see anything wrong. Mine did this 5 years ago so maybe I've always been ready for this to happen again and I'm not as shocked by it all.
I'd like to ask Downtown how long ago did his marriage end? What was she like when he left? And what made him finally leave after 15 years.

Big Hugs

Val
dazed and confused is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 25th June 2010, 02:07 AM   #68
Downtown
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2010
Posts: 58
Re: I want to understand

Quote:
Originally Posted by So alone View Post
What is it about me that is so terrible that he can't stand?
If he has strong BPD traits, the thing he cannot stand is himself. BPDers have low self esteem and little sense of who they are. They have a chronic sense of emptiness inside -- a deep hole of neediness that you cannot possibly fill. This is why BPDers generally do not like to be alone. Moreover, because they never learned the more advanced emotional defenses like self soothing, they like to have someone around who is a soothing object, i.e., who helps to calm them down.

As I explained above, anyone who loves your H poses a threat of abandonment. This means that you easily serve as a trigger for the inner hurt and rage he has carried since childhood. Hence, the cause of the terrible anger is the abuse he experienced as a child. You are not the cause of his anger but, rather, only the trigger that prompts him into releasing his inner rage. The irony, then, is that he needs you to help sooth him but you end up triggering his rage, thus contributing to what is a toxic relationship.
Quote:
With regards to walking on eggshells, I don't think I have for the past 2 years.
SoAlone, if your H actually suffers from strong BPD traits, it is hard to imagine that he showed none of the traits for two full years. Perhaps I am mistaken. As I did earlier, I encourage you to read about the nine traits and decide for yourself whether he has a strong pattern of at least five of them. They are listed at http://www.palace.net/llama/psych/bpd.html#dsmiv . If your H has such traits, he is high functioning and therefore likely would not exhibit the self-harm trait in #3 in that list. If I were you, I would also seek the opinion of your own psychiatrist -- not his -- so you know what you are dealing with. Incidentally, how long did you date him before the marriage two years ago?
Quote:
I can't seem to get it into my thick (and therefore naive) head as to why doesn't he just say he doesn't want to be with me anymore? Why on earth put me through 2 months of this utter disgraceful treatment and still say he doesn't know anything?
If he has strong BPD traits, he doesn't know who he is -- much less know today what he will want next week. With my exW, for example, she was forever buying things that she loved, only to lose all interest in them a week or two later. Her mother was the same way. Moreover, his perception of you is distorted by his illness -- to the point that he flips within seconds from loving you one day and hating you the next day. Indeed, you have seen him flip that way several times in one day.
Quote:
Why are his family and friends condoning any of his behavior?
If he is a BPDer, your H likely has no long term friends who are close enough to really know him. And the casual friends do not see the part of him that abuses you. This is why, when a BPD relationship breaks up, the non-BPD partner typically loses most of the mutual friends -- they are completely snowed by the vicious stories told by the BPDer.

When my exW left, I not only lost mutual friends but also five step kids and five grand kids -- all of whom I had adored for 15 years. Indeed, I had helped put two of the youngest step kids through college and had bought two cars for one of them. Like I said, BPDers usually are excellent actors. Most of them had to develop that skill to survive a terrible childhood.

As to his family members, are you really surprised that they support him? If your H has strong BPD traits, he had to have gotten it from someone -- and the most likely candidate is his mother, whom you describe as having such atrocious mean behavior. Moreover, you describe his brother as being even more vicious than the mother. I would not be surprised, then, if all three of them are BPDers -- with you H being the healthiest one of the bunch.

BPD tends to affect many members of a family. My exW's father, for example, was a sociopath who molested all of his four children. He molested my exW until she grew big enough to push him away. Then he started beating on her until she escaped by getting married and leaving home. Of her five children, four have emotional disorders (but none has BPD). Of five grand kids, the oldest has bipolar disorder. The other four are too young for anyone to know yet whether they will have a mental disorder too.
Downtown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 25th June 2010, 02:27 AM   #69
Downtown
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2010
Posts: 58
Re: I want to understand

Quote:
Originally Posted by dazed and confused View Post
I'd like to ask Downtown how long ago did his marriage end? What was she like when he left? And what made him finally leave after 15 years.
Val, my wife and I separated about three and a half years ago -- and the divorce was final two years ago. While reading online about BPD, I found a statement by a therapist who claims that he has treated numerous couples who were in a BPD relationship. He says that such relationships typically last either 18 months or 15 years. They last 18 months, he explains, when the Non has strong personal boundaries. The Non enjoys the 6 month honeymoon period of mirroring and then is willing to spend up to a year trying to reestablish the honeymoon conditions. Then she bails.

The relationship lasts 15 years, he explains, when the Non has strong codependency traits and thus has low personal boundaries. Such a Non typically never bails. Instead, the BPD leaves him because, as the years go by, he becomes increasingly resentful of her inability to make him happy or fix him. Also, he may become increasingly fearful of abandonment as the years go by.

This explanation struck a strong chord with me because my relationship lasted 15 years, at which time my wife had me arrested on a trumped up charge and filed a restraining order barring me from my own home for a year and a half (when the divorce was finalized). In hindsight, I realize that being arrested was the best thing that could have happened to me. Without her locking me out of my home for 18 months, I never would have left her because, as a caregiver type of guy, the notion of leaving a sick loved one went against my values and every fiber of my being. At that time, I had no understanding of BPD and had no idea what I was dealing with.

I mention this to you because, if you are thinking your H will eventually become thankful for your years of self-sacrifice, please think again. Exactly how long does he remain appreciative of anything you have done over the past years of your marriage? In my case, my wife would be thrilled for a few days -- a week tops -- when I would spend a lot of money on her.

For example, I bought her $5,000 worth of sewing machines and spent another $6,000 on fabric. Over the 15 years, she made one dress, a vest, and a cat collar. Similarly, I bought her a piano and massage chair, both of which she dearly wanted and begged for. She played the $3,500 piano five times and sat in the $3,000 chair maybe four times.

The problem, of course, was not my wife but rather my foolish willingness to do those things. Untreated BPDers cannot appreciate anything for very long. For one thing, BPDers like my ex have an unstable sense of who they are, so they don't know today what they will want in two weeks. For another, strong emotions sweep through them, pushing aside feelings they had before. BPDers never learned how to regulate their emotions very well. This is why, with untreated BPDs, you cannot build up a reservoir of good will on which to draw during the bad times. Like a sand castle built next to the ocean, the next emotional wave washes away all vestiges of the good will you tried to build up.
Downtown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 25th June 2010, 10:39 AM   #70
dazed and confused
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2010
Posts: 110
Re: I want to understand

Downtown you hit the nail on the head with Dave. He's forgotten everything I've ever done for him and has changed so many things in his mind.
Yes I guess I do hope he'll ring one day and say he was sorry for everything.My birthday is next friday I want to see if he even makes an effort to call.I was like you always buying things for him to make him happy. He's never even bought me a wedding ring I used my ex husbands ring.Only on here have I said that because he always had a reason not to get one.I know I'm stupid ,but things don't mean much to me.I know he doesn't love me like I want him to, but I do love him and wish I didn't.I'm at the point of wanting to move on but he gets mad if I bring that up. How do you deal with someone who just runs and hides??
THANKS FOR ALL YOUR GREAT INFO Sorry SoAlone I'll do all my replies to Downtown on my thread from now on.

SoAlone I really know how you feel.It's hard when we know we love them and they don't know what they want. Also after this how do you trust them again?? It's so so hard to know what the right thing to do is.We feel so much and they feel nothing. You are lucky you have your parents to talk to.Don't feel to bad about his family of coarse they'll side with him they're blood.

Take Care Val
dazed and confused is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 26th June 2010, 12:26 AM   #71
So alone
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Re: I want to understand

Thankyou Downtown, what you have said has really got in and even though it is truly ghastly and painful it is the only way to dig out of this horribleness.

If they are living in some childlike world of their own then what is he thinking to convince him that to leave me is definitely for the best because the grass is greener on the other side?
I can't seem to get what makes him believe he will be better off without me? Or, if they are childlike, then in the not too distant future are they going to start crawling back with all sorries, more tears and the like?

I am in a very lost place.
  Reply With Quote
Old 26th June 2010, 01:26 AM   #72
Downtown
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2010
Posts: 58
Re: I want to understand

SoAlone, I will be glad to answer all your questions as best I can. That is what I do on several different web sites, with the intent of helping younger people avoid going down the path I took (i.e., vainly trying to rescue a loved one who does not want to be rescued).

I want to take care, however, that I not lead you astray. I am still concerned about your statement that all was well during your 2-year marriage until the last two months. Assuming you two dated for a year before getting married, that means the BPD traits I talk about did not show themselves for three years. While that is possible, it is highly unlikely.

I therefore encourage you to follow the link I provided and read about the nine traits. Because all of us have them (at least at a low level), they will be easy to identify with. You know ten thousand times what anyone else knows about the man. You therefore are in a good position to know whether he strongly exhibits at least five of those traits (but, of course, you cannot determine whether they meet the diagnostic level -- nor can I). Once you've done that, tell me which traits he has and we can proceed from there.

Remember, this is not rocket science. It is all about basic human traits that we all share and which are very exaggerated in those folks suffering from a personality disorder. So, if you really mean "I want to understand," this is logical way to proceed. You can do this. I believe that, once you see how his hateful and strange behavior is explainable, you will be motivated to see a psychologist to get a professional opinion about his behavior.
Downtown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 27th June 2010, 09:29 AM   #73
So alone
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Re: I want to understand

I've read the ten forms of twisted thinking and think that he fits within.

1. All or nothing. He is a perfectionist and can't bear anything less. he does exactly the whole 'oh i might as well not bother' kind of thinking if its nothing short of perfect.

3. Mental filter, he certainly sees in his eyes criticism and totally ignores all other points made. If there has been no criticism at all he cant' take compliments it's as if he has to down play them. this has happened when I've reiterated what a great job he did and quote what someone said about it that was good, he just mumbles negative things and put downs about himself.

4. Discounting the positive. Very similar to above and very rearely sees the positive about things.

5. Jumping to conclusions. Especially towards me. Especially since all this stuff began. He has been accusatory in his tone and content like this week he sent me an email effing and blinding because he has found out I bought a games console. Calling me a hypocrite with money as we don't have any. I calmly wrote back that there is no hypocrisy because I didn't pay for it - my parents bought me it.
He tends to do this a lot. Come to an assumption, then get mad about it and take it as fact and so then act upon what he believes to be fact, before even considering any other point or context.

8. Should statements. He always does this when he is talking about himself and what he hasn't achieved in his life. He can't isolate incidents he brings them all up and puts them together as if to prove to himself what a failure he is. (although i am now starting to think that actually yes he IS a failure because I cant see he has achieved very much as he seems to have spent his life drifting about and blaming others for his lack of achievement)

9. Labelling. Towards me he has often called me really bad names in an argument and says we are incompatible all the time now.This is a confusing one.

10. Blame. This is the biggest offender. He blames me in every single way. From saying so to his behaviour towards me. he has told me he blames me for his debt, even though his debt was there before we married. He took a 12k loan out without my knowledge before we married. We have had a very tight existence financially because we have had nothing. I dont mind that because i've been brought up to valure what you have and work hard. He blames me for his business as he says I was supposed to be helping him more and now he cant' do it. Yet in the beginning he blamed me for not helping enough (I have helped him beyond anything, from actually helping grind metal til the early hours, to helping him out in his workshop, organising him, to booking car exhibition shows to keeping him company, to ordering all his business marketing, to getting his website done the list is endless, yet he blames me). He blames me for our sh*t marriage yet can't provide any real specific details, he just says I'm unreasonable and arrogant!1 I dont' think I'm any of those as I'm sociable, jolly, happy go lucky, like to share. I'm sure I may be those things sometimes, but I dont' think that's very fair. he blames me for our lack of sex life, blames me him being miserable in himself. He then takes it all back and says 'not that he is blaming me but they are facts'. What cr@p

His mother is also a big offender of points: 3,5,8,9,10 definitely the blame one - she has always blames me for him, saying I drag him down, yet everyone I know says that I 'pull him up' and he is far better since he has gotton with me. Oddly he used to say this too. He's never felt so confident and he feels like he is a somebody now, although this hasn't been for nearly a year.

He now has said he is a very good looking man - especially for his age and doesn't want me. Why would he abandon me if he is the one with the abandonment issues?

other past 18 months of marriage, he has been very depressed, the drinking heavy started before christmas and his rages started then but equally I have been very ill and that has been an immense strain so perhaps it has always been there (with the amazing gift of hindsight) but it has been hard to spot because it could be put down to a whole lot of other things. He did lie to me and has done that throughout, but again just one thing is not necessarily indicative of something else however now I see it is because I can see a bigger picture.


why doesn't he want me anymore? I'm a pretty sexy confident smart girl and even he has been pointing that out when he has seen me. (Although, I have not been up until recently because of my being ill. I used to dress dowdy, had no confidence, felt rubbish and down a lot of the time, was often miserable most days and crying). No make up and jogging pants were my staple look.

But why not be fair and decent to me? It's like he is going out of his way to 'make me suffer' and he has chivvied up all his friends and family to do the same - it's like a witch hunt to try and get me to look bad or something and i cannot understand that at all.
  Reply With Quote
Old 27th June 2010, 06:04 PM   #74
Downtown
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2010
Posts: 58
Re: I want to understand

Quote:
I've read the ten forms of twisted thinking
SoAlone, that is helpful. As I said, however, what would be really helpful would be for you to tell us which of the 9 BPD traits you believe your H exhibits strongly. These traits are the nine criteria that are set forth in the diagnostic manual (DSM-IV) which psychologists use to diagnose BPD. I gave you the link to a page listing these nine criteria. The link is shown above in my June 24th post to you. Because your H is high functioning, he likely will not have trait #3, which is self destructive behavior (unless his drinking gets self destructive).
Downtown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 27th June 2010, 10:46 PM   #75
So alone
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Re: I want to understand

Ah, I see and have read through the DSMiv....


traits involving emotions:

1. shift in mood can be a few hours - well I'm not too sure if I think this applies as he doesn't remain shifted onto a different mood for long enough. He is generally depressed all the time (well he was)

2. Anger that is inappropriate - yes definitely. Total overreaction to things, even on the tv, calling people really bad things, aggressive and has rages for the smallest of things


traits involving behaviour:

3. self destructive acts - nope, no suicidal type things at all

4. two potentially self damaging impulsive acts - yes totally! Drinking to oblivion to the point of blacking out. reckless driving, compulsive sexual behaviour - he has told me he finds it addictive and doesn't think it wrong at all. tells me he used to be a bit of a 'tart' (!)


traits involving identity:

5. marked identity - yes very much so. He is very vague in all areas of himself. Says he doesn't know who is is but a failure, yet doesn't really try to achieve things for himself so he blames everyone and everything else. seems non committal. Doesn't really know who he is. He has no long term goals. Doesn't ever think anything will ever come to fruition and hates to 'plan' things.

6. chronic feelings of boredom - yes totally. He doesn't stick to anything really, picks things up and has never finished anything. Has great ideas but never completes them. feels like he's always 'missed out' Doesn't have what i would describe as true/real friends who know the real him inside and out because he always hides and omits parts of him to other people. It's like he is on his best behaviour to other people. He has told me he likes to help others as it makes him feel like he has a purpose, yet he will do this at the expense of anything (especially himself)


traits involving relationships:

7. unstable chaotic, intense - yes it's either intense or he is off with me (like now) (but he was not like this before I married him)

8. frantic efforts to avoid any abandonment - yes he pushes me away so he doesn't get 'too close' has told me he prefers his own company and doesn't understand why we have to be close. Said he can't trust me (but the excuse he gives is utter nonsense as I have never ever ever broken our trust or anything) He rather has told people my and our private business. He has said that when he first saw my gp he said he liked him(see my previous post for confirmation of what he said) then last week said my gp was cr@p. he does do this black and white thing with a lot of things in his life. Getting space away from me. Well here I am and I haven't heard from him and it's been a week now since we last spoke. He told me he want's me to go away from him for a month because I am some sort of reminder of all the sh*t in his life and he can't cope when I am around. (I don't get that at all, I actually think I am the reminder of truth and that's why he doesn't want me about). he doesn't and cannot seem to trust anyone at all not even me yet I don't' know why. he is highly sensitive to criticism and is very hurt by it. However, he does not show any signs of 'needing others' he has never appeared to need attention at all in fact rather the opposite, apart from what I mention above about being a 'pleaser' at the expense of himself.#

9. traits involving paranoia, stress disassociation- yes he does do the disassociation thing with lots of areas of his life. He very often cannot remember or recall things that have been said (see my previous posts for examples) it's on purpose too. He has learnt to do this because he has told me he has. He does this 'lining things up' thing where he focuses on an object in the room and then tries to line it up with another object in the room until they are parallel. all this without moving the object, it is with his eyes and total focus. tells me he has always done this since he can remember ( i notice he does this more frequently when a conversation is happening that he can't handle, i.e emotional points or requires him to commit to something). He also tells me 'if you think hard enough about something else those other thoughts that are uncomfortable will go away, see, tada, it's all gone and I can't remember what you were talking about'


miscellaneous points of BPD:

yes he does have a background of child emotional trauma and chronic stress. (see my previous post for examples).

However, on the other points I don't find anything fits as he generally likes to be alone, he is more of an introvert, prefers his own company apart from recently where even though I left the house and he was going to stay in it, he said he couldn't bear the same four walls so had to get out. Although saying that, I think really deep down he hates it, it's like he learnt to be alone from when he used to shut himself away in the workshop when he was a young man. He does have a bit of a chaotic landscape of his own history when it comes to cr@p previous relationships, vague and being a bit of a drifter.

so there we go. The thing I can't get my head around is why if everything is true, why would he want to abandon me? Is it because the novelty has worn off? Or is it because I have had needs that he couldn't cope with?

I just can't get why everyone else is treating me so bad. My mum points out, it's like they don't even have basic compassion. That really really hurts deep to my core. it's bad enough him being a total ar*e and behaving so appallingly but all his supposed friends and family? How on earth are they justifying treating me this bad too? What on earth could he be saying?

Thanks downtown., I just want to heal and not feel so sad and lost. Want to share my garden wiht a glass of wine in the evening and enjoy silly things. Be with someone who wants to share lifes ups and downs and know that no matter what I have dignity and respect. Those things are earned so how is it I am not being treated with any? I can't see how I have given him any reason to treat me with anything less?

I want to understand, I truly do.
  Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT +1. The time now is 11:17 AM.


Powered by vBulletin®
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.


Top

Copyright ©1999-2024 2-in-2-1 Limited. All rights reserved. Disclaimer