# How to help my wife please



## howtohelp (Feb 25, 2012)

Hello, first I must apologize for two things: this might be long story because I want to explained everything. Second, I am French so my English writing I hope makes perfect sense.

Ok, my wife had very rough childhood. Her mother had bipolar disorder and her father was very very cruel person to her and abandoned her. Her mother was very violent to her, emotionally and physically. When she was 5, a boy in her neighborhood tried to rape her. She was also molested by a family member, although she does not remember detail about it exactly, this happened at least twice, once at age 4 and then at age 10. Then when she was 16 years her mother died and she was left to take care herself because her father wanted nothing to do with her since she is 2 years old.

My wife says when she was little girl all she wanted was to marry and have children and to have the family she did not have. Before she met me, she was engaged to a man who was very mean to her and treated her like her mother had done, except maybe not as violent in physical way, but very cruel treatments. She told after she called off their wedding she had what she thinks was a nervous breakdown because of how he treated her and she thought she would never have a family.

She said she has always suffered from a depression, but in the last year, it has gotten worse and I don't know hows to help. We met in Europe, but she is American and I move here to be with her. My wife will be fine at one time and then any thing will happen and she will be very depressed again. She had a job last year that she really loved but her boss was very mean to her and she left the job, since then, it has become much worse, she is not happy with anything anymore. She had to take a low pay job she hated and this made it worse. Now she is has an ok job now, but she is still unhappy. She think everyone at work hate her and everything she does is "stupid and annoying to others". She keeps telling me she "doesn't belong anywhere or with anyone, she doesn't fit in." My wife is a social worker/therapist herself and she said she become one because she likes to work with the people who society "throws away, because I am a throw away, too." My wife has such a good heart, she is very sweet woman and I love her very much, but she does not think I should love her. She tell me that eventually I will see like everyone else has that she is not worth loving. She is on xanax and trazadone, which help, but not with very much. There is a new girl where she works and the other day when I pick her up she said the new girl is beautiful and she is ugly so maybe I would be sorry I married her when I see women who are beautiful and not "messed up" like me. I not understanding why she think she is ugly, because my wife is beautiful and people say to me a few times "your wife look like Angelina Jolie!" She does not believe she is worth anything, she think she is ugly, stupid and not worth loving. She thinks constantly people are make fun of her. She is so good with the people she counsel, they love her because she is so compassionate with them, but then she come home and say "if they only knew what a mess I am too." I not know how to help her anymore.

I really wants to have children but before this she to feel better. She is a very good, loving wife, she always stand by my side, she care about other people so much and best person I ever known, but she does not see this. She is afraids to have children because she said she does not know how to be a mom because she did not have one and she is afraid to bring anyone in the world if they will suffer as she did.

I need to know how to help my wife please.

Thank you for listen to me.


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## Complexity (Dec 31, 2011)

Keep constantly reassuring her in both words and actions. She has to feel loved because words are simply not enough for a person who's been through what she's been through. Do spontaneous things like sending her flowers to work, treat her to a spa, massages and footrubs when she gets home. Perhaps write her a romantic letter conveying why she's all the qualities you listed. Above all if you can afford it, she should definitely seek therapy to address all the demons inside her.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

Has your wife ever been to counseling or therapy for herself? I think she badly needs it. I also think she should have her medications adjusted. Do you go to her doctor appointment with her? Perhaps you should at least for a while to make sure that she is telling her doctors and therapist the entire story of what is going on with her.


I have to do this with my husband because he tells them that 'everything is ok'. And might mention a thing or two but not go into detail.

Was your wife like this when you dated? Or is it more recent? If more recent when did it start and what was going on at that time?

You do not say how long you dated her and how long you have been married. This can be important.

One thing that comes to mind is that your marriage might be settling in as many marriages do and she might not be getting what she needs from you to feel good about herself and the marriage. This can be especially true with a person who has the self-esteem and depression issues your wife has.

So a question to explore this, how much time a week to the two of you spend together doing date like things … just to two of you. (Watching TV & movies do not count).


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## howtohelp (Feb 25, 2012)

Hello,

Thank you both for comments.

We met in October, 2010. We marry exactly one year later, so we only married since October, 2011. The marriage is very good except in the way she is feeling. She did always deal with depression, yes. But since the issue where she left the job she loved, it has gotten much worse. That seem to trigger her off more.

I try to do nice thing for her, like send flowers to her work, cards and thing like that. I try to be very sweet with her, but it seem that lasts a while and when she becomes upset again after, it is back to the same. She don't become upset with me, but with life it seems. I ask her what I can do to make better and she says I do all I can, I do make better and she need time to come out of it herself. 

I also told her tell her doctor all about her past because she leave a lot out. She said she is afraid doctor will think she is bipolar because her mother was. She said she think more she has depression, anxieties and since this issues with work, she think she have some social phobia now.

She is scared to have children, she think she will pass the depression or her mother bipolar to them. She is scared she will be like her mother, which I never see it could happen. I know she went through very bad time with her mother especially and is scared to be a mom for this reason. She tell me stories and I just feel so bad for what she went through, her mother drag her by her hair when she was just a little girl, lock her in room for a long time, broken wooden spoon on her back when she was only 2 years, tried to stick her face in pot of boiling water...it goes on and on and I tries to explain to her her depression is normal after all this, but she blame herself for feeling that way.


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## howtohelp (Feb 25, 2012)

Also, we is very close and are always together except when at work. She does not like to go out as much as she did a few months ago, but I try to take her out when she feel up to it.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

Your wife remembers what her mother did to her when she was 2? It's unusual for a person to be able to remember what happened when they were 2 years old.

What kind of doctor is your wife seeing for her depression? She needs to see a psychiatrist. Not a family doctor and not a counselor. She needs a psychiatrist. She needs a proper diagnosis. Her case seems to be complicated and thus she needs a much more complete assessment then most people would need. It’s very hard sometimes to distinguish between depression, bi-polar, and other disorders.
If your wife is bi-polar and she is being treated only for depression she will get worse. Think of this, she avoids making sure that she gets the right diagnosis because she might not like the diagnosis. So instead she only tells the doc what she wants him/her to know so that she gets the diagnosis she wants. Does this make any sense to you?

There is a good chance that her problems are because she’s on the wrong meds for her illness. If her mother was bi-polar, there is a very high chance that your wife is bi-polar. 

Your wife is right that she can pass bi-polar and depression issues on to her children. Her history of being abused also makes it more likely that she will be abusive to any children she cares for. The way we learn how to raise children is by how we were taught by our parents. We are taught by how our parents treated us. However, I think that stats are that about 30% of those who were abused become abusers themselves. So there is hope. But she has to have a handle on her state of mind before she can move beyond her abuse conditioning.
All of this is why she needs to go to see psychiatrist for her meds and some deep therapy. 

People with depression, bi-polar and other mental illnesses do much better if they first recognize and accept that they have the disorder. And then they need to accept the necessary treatments and therapies. I know that there is group counseling available for people with disorders like bi-polar and schizophrenia to help them recognize their episodes and deal with them.
For example both bi-polar and schizophrenia can entail elements of psychosis. If the person can learn to recognize that they are entering a psychosis phase they can realize that what they are experiencing is not reality and thus not get carried away with it. My understanding is that as the person matures they can learn this and learn to deal much better with their illness.
The same goes for depression and the manic/depressive phases of bi-polar. It’s hard but the person can learn to recognize when an episode is coming and act on a plan to deal with it
This is going to be hard for you to deal with since your wife is not facing the reality of her own situation. If she is on meds and she is at the mental place you say she’s at, there is a problem with the meds. Either they are the wrong meds or the wrong doses.

Has she given you an indication that there are times in her life when she is very ‘manic’ and other times very ‘depressed’? Have you seen any of this?


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## howtohelp (Feb 25, 2012)

I have not seen anything manic. She has gone through her DSM Manual and she does not have symptoms of mania, but only the depression, but she fears with her family history the doctor might label her as her mother was as a stigma. She is going to regular family doctor, so maybe yes to see someone else. 

Yes she does remember her mother hitting her in the kitchen at that age. She doesn't have full memory of being 2 years, but she remember running away and being hit and seeing the spoon broken on the floor.


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## howtohelp (Feb 25, 2012)

I must say I do not believe my wife would be abusive to her children. She has never shown any violent behaviors nor does she ever act in a manic way, racing speeches, spending excessively etc. etc., unusually elevated moods


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

howtohelp said:


> I have not seen anything manic. She has gone through her DSM Manual and she does not have symptoms of mania, but only the depression, but she fears with her family history the doctor might label her as her mother was as a stigma. She is going to regular family doctor, so maybe yes to see someone else.
> 
> Yes she does remember her mother hitting her in the kitchen at that age. She doesn't have full memory of being 2 years, but she remember running away and being hit and seeing the spoon broken on the floor.


I am assuming that her mother was diasnosed bi-polar. Does her father have any mental illness?

If she is concerned about the stigma, perhaps she could go to be evauated and not say anything about her mother's diagnosis. Instead only talk about herself, how she was treated and how she herself feels. Let the diagnosis be based on herself only. 

But she does need to deal with the abuse and her low self esteem. 

she's in a pretty deep depressive phase right now. When was the last time she saw someone about her medication? And did she tell them about he depth of her current depression, her low self worth?


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

howtohelp said:


> I must say I do not believe my wife would be abusive to her children. She has never shown any violent behaviors nor does she ever act in a manic way, racing speeches, spending excessively etc. etc., unusually elevated moods


How much reading up have you done about bi-polar? I'm not trying to push the idea that your wife is bi-polar. It's just that I've read, or been told, that some bi-polar people never have real strong manic episodes. But I'm not clear as to all of this.

My two step children are bi-polar and I have a nephew who is schizophrenic. These are my main personal experience in this area.

My major concern from what you are saying here is that your wife is clearly not benefiting enough from your medication. And she really does need therapy for all that she went through. These are the two areas that I would focus on where I you.

There is a book that your wife, and even you, might benefit from… “The Dance of Anger”. It’s has a lot in it about abuse and survivors of abuse. One thing I recall from it is that those who seem to get beyond their own abuse usually have a “sympathetic witness” that helps through thru it all. 

A ‘sympatric witness’ is someone who can tell the abuse victim that what they are suffering is not right, that they are being mistreated and that they are not responsible for it. It sounds like our wife did not have a sympathetic witness in her young life. But you could be her sympathetic witness now. Sounds like that is what you are doing.

I also grew up with an abusive mother and a father who was gone much of the time and when he was home he did nothing to protect us children. I recall once when I was about 13 I complained to him and asked him to make her stop the abuse.

He told me that my mother was sick and we just had to put up with it. That was all we could do. That is the last time I talked to him about it because I knew he was useless. At least he got to be gone most of the time.

After reading that book I became my own sympatric witness. What I mean is that something clicked in my head and I saw all of the abuse from a very different light. I no longer bore the weight of it. The fault was with my mother and my father. It was very healing. 

Another good book by the same author is “The Dance of Intimacy”.


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## brendan (Jun 1, 2011)

sounds like my wife, its sad....i tried everything but i think its best to leave it to the counsellors..


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## Uptown (Mar 27, 2010)

HowToHelp, welcome to the TAM forum. I'm so sorry to hear that your W is suffering so much. I agree with EleGirl that she could benefit from treatment by a psychiatrist or clinical psychologist. The behaviors you describe for your W -- i.e., the self hatred, depression, feeling rejected by all co-workers, lack of "object constancy," and inability to trust you -- are classic traits of BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder) and AvPD (Avoidant PD). 

If I had to guess, I would say your description is closer to BPD. More specifically, it is closer to the traits of what is called a "waif borderline" (aka, "quiet borderline"). I therefore encourage you to read about these traits and see if they seem to strongly apply to your W. 


howtohelp said:


> Ok, my wife had very rough childhood. ...She was also molested by a family member, ...once at age 4 and then at age 10.


Most abused children do not develop strong BPD traits. The experience, however, GREATLY raises the risk of doing so -- and this is especially true when the abuse was partly sexual in nature. Significantly, 70% of BPDers (i.e., those having strong BPD traits) report that they were abused or abandoned in early childhood.


> Her mother had bipolar disorder and ... was very violent to her, emotionally and physically.


Perhaps so. Your description of her mother, however, is consistent with BPD traits, not bipolar traits. Violence, temper tantrums, and vindictiveness are hallmarks of BPDers. People who suffer only from depression do not behave that way. Their biggest crime is not wanting to get out of bed. 

Moreover, the incidence of BPD in the general population (6%) is four times that of bipolar disorder (1.5%). It therefore is more likely that your W's mother suffered from strong BPD traits. She may also have had bipolar because 25% of BPDers also have bipolar. More likely, however, her therapist misdiagnosed the disorder as being bipolar -- an error which happens a lot because, during a 50-minute session, a BPDer is easily able to hide her dark side.


> I have not seen anything manic. [My wife] has gone through her DSM Manual and she does not have symptoms of mania, but only the depression.


Like I said, your description is not consistent with bipolar but, rather, with BPD and/or AvPD traits.


> Her father was very very cruel person to her and abandoned her. Her father wanted nothing to do with her since she is 2 years old.


As noted earlier, 70% of BPDers report having been abused or abandoned in early childhood. Moreover, this disorder is believed to be caused partly by a harmful childhood environment and partly by genetics that was passed down by the father or mother -- or by both.


> She said she has always suffered from a depression, but in the last year, it has gotten worse and I don't know how to help.


You cannot help. She has to be willing to help herself by seeking treatment. Moreover, it is unclear whether she is suffering only from depression. This is unclear because, if your W suffers from BPD or another PD, the depression is a side effect of that disorder. BPDers, for example, usually suffer from depression because they have low self esteem, hate themselves, and are unable to trust their loved ones. Anyone with those problems has got to be depressed much of the time.


> My wife will be fine at one time and then any thing will happen and she will be very depressed again.


Because BPDers carry enormous anger inside, you don't have to do anything to CREATE the anger. It is already there. Hence, you only have to say or do some trivial thing that TRIGGERS that anger, which always lies just under the skin. This is why a BPDer can flip in seconds from adoring you to fearing that you will never love her. Moreover, if she is a "waif" or "quiet" BPDer, you will not see the anger itself. Instead, you will see quiet withdrawal.


> Now she is has an ok job now, but she is still unhappy.


If she is a BPDer, she has an emptiness inside that can never be filled up -- never can be satiated. I learned the hard way -- and it took me 15 years to do it -- that it is impossible to make an unhappy woman feel happy. That is something that only she is able to do for herself.


> She thinks everyone at work hates her and everything she does is "stupid and annoying to others". She keeps telling me she "doesn't belong anywhere or with anyone, she doesn't fit in."


Because BPDers are unable to control their emotions very well, they frequently experience intense feelings that distort their perceptions of other peoples' intentions and motivations. For that reason, and because they have low self esteem, they frequently take offense at remarks and actions that never were directed at them.


> My wife is a social worker/therapist herself and she said she become one because she likes to work with the people who society "throws away, because I am a throw away, too."


The vast majority of BPDers are high functioning. It therefore is not unusual for a HF BPDer to become a psychologist (or other therapist) in order to obtain a better understanding of other people, if not of herself. Significantly, HF BPDers usually handle complete strangers and casual friends very well. The reason is that none of those folks pose a threat to her two great fears: abandonment and engulfment. There is no close LTR that can be abandoned and no close intimacy that can cause engulfment.


> She does not think I should love her. She tell me that eventually I will see like everyone else has that she is not worth loving.


BPDers and AvPDers live in fear that the loved ones will abandon them as soon as they discover who the real selves are. Because they cannot love or trust themselves, they are unable to trust the loved ones. Ironically, with a BPDer, the more you do to prove you actually love her, the more insistent she will become that it is not true. Proving your love, then, is a fool's errand. It simply cannot be done to her satisfaction.


> I not understanding why she think she is ugly, because my wife is beautiful....


If she is a BPDer or AvPDer, she was made to feel that way at about age 3 or 4 and has felt that way ever since. To think otherwise, she would have to have at least several years of intensive, weekly therapy from a professional.


> I need to know how to help my wife please.


If your W actually suffers from strong BPD or AvPD traits, there is absolutely nothing you or a team of psychologists can do to fix it. She must want very badly to fix herself and, to get very far, she likely will need professional guidance for years. 

Sadly, the nature of the disorder is such that it is very unlikely she will have the self awareness and ego strength needed to accomplish that. I therefore encourage you to see a clinical psychologist -- on your own for a visit or two -- to obtain a candid professional opinion. If she has strong BPD traits, it is highly unlikely that her own psychologist will tell her, much less tell you, the actual name of her disorder. 

Moreover, her psychologist is ethically bound -- just as an attorney would be -- to protect his sick client (even if you occasionally attend the sessions). Hence, relying on HER _psychologist's_ advice during the marriage would be as foolish as relying on HER _attorney's_ advice during a divorce. It is important to find a psychologist who will speak candidly to you and be protective of your interests.

While you are waiting for an appointment with a psych, I suggest you read more about the BPD traits to see if most of them accurately describe her behavior. I caution that, although perhaps 90% of BPDers direct their anger outward in temper tantrums and verbal abuse, a small portion of them direct it inward -- punishing and controlling you not by being verbally abusive but, rather, by becoming cold and withholding of affection. They use passive aggression, pretending to be needy, vulnerable victims of life -- always "the victim." 

I mention this because nearly all descriptions of BPD you will find online describe only the outwardly hostile, abusive form -- which contradicts your description of your W's behavior. Hence, if your W has strong BPD traits, she would be called a "waif" BPDer (aka, "quiet" BPDers).

Moreover, most people having a PD at the diagnostic level actually have two or three PDs, not just one. This is because psychologists created too many PDs, a mistake they are correcting in the DSM-5 which should be released in 2013. The current draft combines many PDs, reducing them from 10 PDs to only six, one of which is BPD. I mention this because the behaviors you describe sound like they may partially overlap with Avoidant PD, which also is being retained in the new diagnostic manual. 

I therefore would suggest that, if what I've said about BPD traits does not sound familiar, you read about Avoidant PD traits. To me, your description so far sounds more like the traits of a "quiet borderline" (aka, "waif borderline"), whose anger and self loathing is more inner directed. One important difference between the two is that, whereas a quiet BPDer is emotionally unstable, an Avoidant is stable. 

The best article I've seen about waif BPDers is therapist Shari Schreiber's description at BORDERLINE WAIFS AND UNSUNG HEROES; Rescuing The Woman Who Doesn't Want To Be Saved. Finally, I suggest that you read my description of BPD traits in Maybe's thread at My list of hell!. If that discussion of BPD traits rings a bell, I would be glad to discuss them with you and point you to good online resources. Take care, HowToHelp.


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## CantePe (Oct 5, 2011)

I don't know if anyone mentioned yet (I didn't even skim much for answers) but bipolar has a genetic component. If a parent is bipolar it's quite possible your wife is as well.

It used to be referred to as manic depressive which was renamed bipolar 1 or bipolar 2 (depending on symptoms, acute or chronic, length of symptoms, hypo vs hyper cycling) in the DVM.

Elegirl - I remember things from being 3 yrs old, though rare as it is, I really do.


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## diwali123 (Feb 17, 2012)

She needs to be treated for post traumatic stress as well. I think she needs a good therapist and a psychiatrist. If she thinks she is bipolar, she needs to accept it and treat it. All you can do is focus on getting her professional help because that's all that is going to work. She should know that in her field. Good luck. If she won't get help, I'd suggest you get it for yourself.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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