# Nearing The End - Or saved???



## SadSamIAm (Oct 29, 2010)

This is going to be long.

My wife and I have had issues for a number of years. I need affection/intimacy and she needs communication. If you have read my other threads, there is more to it than that.

The last few years, we have been dealing with teenagers. My wife is very strict. She expects the kids to be perfect. My wife in many ways is perfect (cooking and cleaning the house).

My wife grew up in a home with an alcoholic father. My FIL was very strict and verbally abusive. He was narcissistic in that his way was the only way. The kids were told what to do and were made to feel bad about themselves. My MIL admits she had no backbone. She lived her life doing whatever her husband wanted, in order to keep peace. My FIL passed away a couple of years back. 

My wife has been doing the same thing to our kids. We agree on the rules (the big ones anyhow) but have a different approach. When my 17 year old daughter wants to go out, all I really need to know is who are you going with and when will you be home. On weekends her curfew is at 1:00am. When her mother talks to her, she asks many more questions. Her mother's tone is one of distrust. What are you doing? Who all is going to be there? You better not do this .... or that? My daughter has told me she feels like going and sleeping with a bunch of guys and doing drugs because her mom already thinks she is. 

My daughter has told me that she feels like she is 'walking on eggshells'. That when she gets home and sees mom's car in the garage she starts to get anxious. She doesn't know who is going to be in the house. It could be kind and nice mom or mean mom. And even if mom is in a good mood, the slightest thing could start a war. Some days mom brings the kids a snack in the basement and then next day, when they take a snack to the basement, they are screamed at. If they left an apple core in their room, there is hell to pay.

I feel the exact same way when getting home. Walking on Eggshells. When I walk in the door, and hug my wife, I might get pushed away, I might get nothing or I might get hugged back. Things might be going fine for a while and anything can happen to change the entire mood. If it looks like we might be heading to being intimate, the greater the chance of some small thing changing the mood.

This past weekend, it came to a head. We had fights before where I had left and gone to work for a couple of hours. On the weekend, we had a fight and I left with the idea that it might be forever. I left on Saturday morning and got back home last night. The last couple of days, I was in another city for work. I was texting with my kids and with my wife. My wife was calling me a coward for running away and leaving her to deal with the problems with kids. 

Saved Part ???

As I was 3 hours from home, driving in a city of about a million people, the car next to me honked their horn. I looked over to see my wife's sister and her mother. We pulled over and they asked me to come to my SILs for lunch. They asked how things were going with our daughter and I talked about what was going on, just giving minimal information. As far as I knew, nobody understood the depth of the problems. 

As I described the issues, my SIL kept saying, "That is exactly the way it was when we were growing up." She said that when they were young, that her and my wife always talked how they wouldn't do that to their own children. At one point my MIL said that when she visits us, she feels like she is "walking on eggshells" around my wife. Then she looked at my SIL and said "That is how I USED to feel at your house". My SIL looked at me and her eyes weld up with tears. She told me that a couple of years back she had a breakdown. Her husband was ready to leave her. Her kids were rebelling. She felt like the world was against her. She felt all alone and was contemplating suicide. She said that she knew exactly how my wife is feeling. She said her house was the same as ours as everyone was walking on eggshells around her. She said it was the same growing up, fearing their father.

My SIL went to a doctor. She got put on an anti-depressant. She told me that it changed her life. It has saved her marriage. She said she would probably be dead if she had not gotten help.

I then told them how far our problem had gotten. That I had actually left and didn't know what to do anymore. They told me that they want to help. We decided that I should tell my wife about our conversation, knowing that she would get angry. That my SIL and maybe my MIL would then try to reach out to my wife.

I got home last night, it was my oldest daughter's birthday. The kids were pretending like nothing was wrong. My wife was very cold to me. This morning I told my wife we had to talk. I told her how I ran into her mom and sister. I told her how we talked about some of our issues and how her sister broke down and told me her story.

My wife got very angry. She told me our troubles are nothing like her sisters. My wife said she isn't depressed. That all our problems are because I don't do anything. I don't discipline the kids and I don't support her. I don't do anything around the house. She accused me of setting up the meeting with her mom and sister and that I was poisoning her family against her. That I have poisoned her kids and now her mom and sister and how she is totally alone. That she has no choice but to move far away. She called me a coward for running away from our problems. I told her I wasn't running away. I was walking away. That I had tried all I could. She told me I ruined our family and to get out. I told her that I was trying to save our family and I left. This happened an hour or so ago.

I told my SIL about the fight this morning. She said that she has to work, but that she was going to think about what to say to my wife. That she will either call her or write her an email.

Thoughts anyone? Is there anything I should be doing or not doing? Any help would be appreciated.


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## scione (Jul 11, 2011)

I don't really know the full story, but have you done the things that she said you didn't do?

She may have a bad temper and can blow up anytime. Comparing her to her sister won't help. It looks like that she's thinking nobody is on her side. Not her husband, her kids, or her family.

You need to show her that you are on her side, even though sometimes you are not. Show her you appreciate what she does. What happen if when she's angry and yell at you, you just go and hug her, what would she do?

What I think is, she feels alone and frustrated, but she doesn't know how to express it. It looks she's angry at the world.

When she's angry, don't fight fire with fire. Don't argue with her. Let her vent and be nice to her. Try this and see if anything changes. Also don't walk out on your family.


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## SadSamIAm (Oct 29, 2010)

I work full time, running a business. She is a SAHM (for 20 years now). The kids are 19, 17 and 15. We have a large house, four cars, a vacation property.

I do help out around the house some. But there is little to do, because my wife keeps it very clean. I do discipline the kids, but she doesn't agree with 'how' I discipline them. I think I am doing what she wants and then she changes the rules. 

I have been dealing with this for many years. I have asked her to go to counseling with me multiple times. She refuses. 

If I was someone who just walks 'out on your family', I would have been gone years ago. I think the end of a relationship usually involves someone walking out.


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## scione (Jul 11, 2011)

Looks like there are 2 leaders in the family. She like things to be whatever she wants, and you want her to follow your lead. Someone's got to give. If you want her to lead then you should be on her side no matter what she's decided to run the house. If you want to be the man of the house, you need to put your foot down. If she told you to get out of the house, why do you have to leave? She's not your boss; she is your wife, and it's your house. It seems like you don't like conflict and you are trying to avoid it as much as possible. Counseling may help, but if she won't go then you have to fix this. Don't let your family fall apart. Don't wait for somebody else to fix your problem. If what you did, didn't work then do the opposite. What happen if you tell her to leave instead of her telling you? Maybe she'll understand what she is doing to you.


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## Uptown (Mar 27, 2010)

> I sometimes think she has a mental problem. [Your 12/22/11 post.]


Perhaps so, SadSam. The behaviors you describe -- verbal abuse, always being "The Victim," having a double standard, rapid flips from loving you to devaluing you, emotional instability, inability to trust, cycle of push-you-away and pull-you-back, and black-white thinking -- are classic traits of BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder), which my exW has. Whether those traits are so severe as to satisfy 100% of the diagnostic criteria for having full-blown BPD is a determination that only a professional can make.

This does not imply, however, that you cannot spot the red flags, i.e., strong occurrences of such traits. There is nothing subtle about traits such as verbal abuse, temper tantrums, and black-white thinking. It should be easy for you to spot the red flags for such traits. I therefore suggest that you read more about the red flags so you can see how many sound familiar.


> My daughter has told me that she feels like she is 'walking on eggshells'. ...I feel the exact same way when getting home. Walking on Eggshells.... My MIL said that when she visits us, she feels like she is "walking on eggshells" around my wife.


Significantly, the #1 best-selling BPD book (targeted to family members of BPDers) is called _Stop Walking on Eggshells. _I strongly suggest you read it.


> When my 17 year old daughter wants to go out.... her mother's tone is one of distrust.


If your W has strong BPD traits, she has so much self loathing and is so unstable that she is unable to trust HERSELF. Until she learns how to do that, she will be incapable of trusting others for any extended period.


> I never cheated on her either even though she thinks I did and still brings this up at times.


Like I said, your W is incapable of trusting you if she has strong BPD traits. The underlying problem is her inability to trust or love herself.


> [My daughter] doesn't know who is going to be in the house. It could be kind and nice mom or mean mom.


That is exactly how it feels to be living with a BPDer (i.e., a person having strong BPD traits, regardless of whether they are above or below the diagnostic level). It feels like you are living with a person who is half-way to have a multiple personality disorder (not that they do but, rather, this is how it feels).


> If it looks like we might be heading to being intimate, the greater the chance of some small thing changing the mood.


BPDers often create arguments out of thin air to push the spouse away. Indeed, the very worst arguments will often occur after the very BEST of times. Because a BPDer has a weak, fragile sense of who she is, she will experience intimacy as suffocating and engulfing, making her feel as though she is losing her identity by merging into your strong personality. It is a frightening experience where she feels she is vanishing into thin air.

She therefore will feel that you are somehow "controlling" and dominating her (never mind that she is the controlling one). Because intimacy is so painful for her, it is impossible to convince her of your love by loving her. Trying to heal a BPDer by loving her is as futile as trying to heal a burn patient by hugging her.

Yet, as you back way to give her breathing room, you will eventually trigger her great fear of abandonment. It may take days or weeks for that to occur but, unless the BPDer has split you black permanently, it will occur. At that point, she will return behaving extra caring and sweet to pull you back into the R. 

This is why one hallmark of a BPDer relationship is repeated cycle of push-you-away and pull-you-back. Sadly, there is no Goldilocks position midway between "too close" and "too far," where you could safely avoid triggering both of the fears. I say that after having wasted 15 years searching for such a position.

The problem is that a BPDer's two great fears -- engulfment and abandonment -- _lie on the VERY SAME spectrum_. This means that it is impossible to back away from triggering one fear without, at the same time, drawing closer to triggering the other fear.


> When we have our moment together (once a month or so after a battle) she tells me how much she loves me and that she wants to spend the rest of her life with me. But a couple of days later, she treats me like dirt.[11/2/10]


I'm surprised you get a couple of good days following a great intimate evening. Consider yourself lucky. Typically, a BPDer will feel so suffocated that she will create an argument the very next morning to push you away, giving her breathing space. 

With my exW, for example, I had a less than 50/50 chance of having a great vacation like you two did in Mexico in 2010. Usually, by the third day -- if not sooner -- my exW would start an argument over something so minor we could not remember what it was a week later. That's why I stopped taking her on expensive vacations. It was silly to be spending $500/day for a temper tantrum I could get at home for free.


> What amazes me is how my wife can be so rude and thoughtless and mean towards her family, but so perfect with other people. I am sure that 99% of our friends thing she is the perfect mom, housekeeper and wife.


If she is a BPDer, that disparate treatment of friends and family is easy to explain. The vast majority of BPDers are high functioning, which means they interact very well with total strangers, business associates, and casual friends. Significantly, NONE of those folks pose a threat to either of a BPDer's two great fears. The is no close relationship that can be abandoned. And there is no intimacy that can trigger engulfment. Lord help those folks, however, if they make the mistake of trying to draw close to her.

This is why BPDers typically have no long-term close friends (unless they live a long distance away). And this is why it is common for a HF BPDer to treat complete strangers with caring and generosity all day long -- and then go home at night to abuse the very people who love her.


> Some days mom brings the kids a snack in the basement and then next day, when they take a snack to the basement, they are screamed at. If they left an apple core in their room, there is hell to pay.





> I just was flabbergast that she ... was so adamant about what a jerk this guy is. So is she a hypocrite or just oblivious?[12/22/11 post.]


If she has strong BPD traits, she is BOTH. As Enginerd said, she seems to be an "oblivious hypocrite." A BPDer's emotional development typically is frozen at the level of a four year old. A BPDer therefore is stuck with the ego defenses that young children must rely on. These include projection ("Sis did it"), denial (lying), black-white thinking, temper tantrums, and having a _double standard_. BPDers therefore have a feeling of entitlement to apply one standard to themselves and another to everyone else.


> The problem is the double standard. If someone is busy they have to drop it to come and eat. But if my wife is busy, it is OK for her to eat when she wants.[12/22/11 post.]


Like I said, a BPDer -- if that is what your W is -- won't bat an eye when using double standards.


> For 26 years, she has blamed me for making her bulimic and not telling me until now.... I don't think she will ever forgive me for this one comment I made 26 years ago that I can't even remember making. [2/14/11 post.]


SadSam, if she is a BPDer, you likely never made such a comment. BPDers are notorious for rewriting history. Because they do a poor job of regulating their emotions, they frequently experience intense feelings -- which they accept as "truth" instead of challenging the feelings intellectually. Because the feeling is so strong, they are convinced it MUST be true. Their subconscious minds therefore will create the most fanciful and absurd rationalizations to explain why the feeling accurately reflects reality. And, because they are convinced they are eternal "victims," they have a strong need to blame their spouses for every misfortune to befall them. It therefore is not surprising that you would be blamed (for a current weight problem) by her citing something you never said 26 years ago. 

My BPDer exW often did the same thing. She was convinced, for example, that I was lying to her nearly every week. Whenever I would call her out on the allegation and ask her to identify one thing I had lied about, she inevitably would fall back to claiming I had something 15 years ago -- something that neither of us could have remembered -- and it had proven false. Yet, despite the lack of any proof of recent lying on my part, she remained convinced that I was doing it nearly every week. She felt it so strongly that she believed it must be true.


> She expects the kids to be perfect. My wife in many ways is perfect (cooking and cleaning the house).


If your W has strong traits of OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder), you may be interested to know that there is a strong association between BPD and OCD. For women, 18% of those with OCD also have BPD. Moreover, 24% of those diagnosed with BPD also have OCD. These are the results of a study of nearly 35,000 American adults (pub. 2008). See full results in Table 3 at Prevalence, Correlates, Disability, and Comorbidity of DSM-IV Borderline Personality Disorder: Results from the Wave 2 National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions.


> My wife grew up in a home with an alcoholic father. My FIL was very strict and verbally abusive. He was narcissistic in that his way was the only way. The kids were told what to do and were made to feel bad about themselves.


Strong BPD traits are believed to be passed down from one generation to another partly due to genetics and partly due to environment, i.e., being invalidated in childhood. The study mentioned above finds that 70% of the BPDers report having been abused or abandoned during childhood.


> I have been married for 21 years....Life was great before marriage and during the early years.


I caution that, if there were no strong BPD traits appearing for several years, your W almost certainly DOES NOT have a persistent pattern of strong BPD traits. As I said, BPDers suffer damage to their emotional core in childhood, usually before age 5. 

Their BPD traits typically start showing themselves in puberty and, except for the courtship period, they do not lie hidden for several years. Indeed, the only reason these traits are so completely suppressed during the courtship period is that the BPDer's infatuation with you will hold her two fears at bay (i.e., she really does believe you are perfect during that period).


> Is there anything I should be doing or not doing?


I suggest you read more about BPD traits to see if there were many red flags appearing -- all through your marriage -- that you may have ignored in the early years. If so, I suggest you see a good clinical psychologist -- for a visit or two by yourself -- to obtain a candid professional opinion on what it is you likely are dealing with.

If you would like to read more about BPD traits, an easy place to start is my brief description of them in Maybe's thread at http://talkaboutmarriage.com/general-relationship-discussion/33734-my-list-hell.html#post473522. If that discussion rings a bell, I would be glad to discuss the traits with you and point you to good online resources. Take care, SadSam.


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## SadSamIAm (Oct 29, 2010)

Thanks Uptown!

I have read your posts before. It always makes me think that about how my wife is.

I believe she has BPD traits. She also doesn't have a bunch of them (suicide, promiscuity, etc.). We have actually talked about this as she figures I have problems. Interestingly enough, we found a personality disorder test on the internet. When she answered the questions, she came up low on every disorder. We talked about her answers and she agreed to change a few. She came up as moderate for Borderline. 

When I wrote the test, I came moderate for a couple of disorders (not borderline). 

I have to be aware that she has these traits. I have to support her better with our teenagers. I believe my one teenage daughter is taking advantage of the fact that we are different and is intentionally doing things to cause issues. I need to support my wife better in dealing with the kids.


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## SadSamIAm (Oct 29, 2010)

scione said:


> Looks like there are 2 leaders in the family. She like things to be whatever she wants, and you want her to follow your lead. Someone's got to give. If you want her to lead then you should be on her side no matter what she's decided to run the house. If you want to be the man of the house, you need to put your foot down. If she told you to get out of the house, why do you have to leave? She's not your boss; she is your wife, and it's your house. It seems like you don't like conflict and you are trying to avoid it as much as possible. Counseling may help, but if she won't go then you have to fix this. Don't let your family fall apart. Don't wait for somebody else to fix your problem. If what you did, didn't work then do the opposite. What happen if you tell her to leave instead of her telling you? Maybe she'll understand what she is doing to you.


We have both been very close to leaving. Neither of us really want that.

I think you are correct about two leaders. She doesn't really want to do the leading. She wants me to do the leading. But the issue is she wants me to do the leading, the way she would do it. 

There are a couple of things at play. You are correct that I don't like conflict. But another issue is that my wife is very controlling when it comes to the kids. Not taking action on something could be viewed as avoiding conflict or it could be viewed as the issue wasn't bad enough to require conflict. For example, our kids rooms may have a couple of pieces of clothes left on the floor. To me, that isn't enough of a problem to warrant conflict. For my wife it is, and she expects me to sometimes say something instead of her "always having to be the bad guy".

Bottom line is my wife and I need to communicate better. I need to support her more and I need to take action more often. She needs to lighten up some and not let the small things affect her so much.

I think we will get there because we are both very committed to our family and to each other.


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## angelpixie (Mar 2, 2012)

SadSam, when I read your OP, it brought back a lot of things for me. I felt like your daughter. I was a really dorky straight-A goody-two-shoes, but my mother didn't trust me and always treated me like I'd end up pregnant if I left the house. Even the apple core in the bedroom thing was the same! My dad wasn't perfect, but looking back years later (my dad finally left while I was in my senior year of high school) I think a lot of it had to do with living with my mom. He spent a lot of time working on himself, but I was always puzzled as to why he never tried to reconcile with my mom. I think it's because he realized how disordered she was. 
She passed away in 2010, but right up to the end, had very strong BPD and/or NPD traits. Traits that very negatively affected me and that I'm still working on in therapy in my mid-40s. If your wife won't get help, please get help for yourself and your kids. They need to know that she is the sick one, and they are OK. When you are growing up in that kind of atmosphere, even if you are supported elsewhere, the negative effects of living with a PD mother are devastating to your adult life. Take it from me. The longer they live in this environment without intervention, the harder it will be to deal with the aftermath on their adult relationships and possibly with their own kids.
I'm sorry your family is going through this. I hope you can all find some help and peace.


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