Possible BPD husband

[gladiolus]

I've posted a few times about our problems. Long story short, I left him six months ago because I could no longer live with him, he begged me to at least continue our relationship in different houses if he promised to get help for his anger issues. I agreed and since then we have been together but living apart. He did see his GP and is waiting for an appointment with the mental health team.

Anyway, yesterday we were talking about the issue of women-on-men abuse in soaps. He started looking something up on my iPad and he must have found something which caught his interest as, after about half an hour of thoughtful surfing he asked me if I had ever heard of Borderline Personality Disorder. I said I had and asked him why.

"Because I think I might have it," he said.

Cue several hours of looking into it and half a dozen online tests which all seemed to point the the strong possibility that he might have moderate to severe BPD. A lot of the websites we found contained 'typical' descriptions of the way people with BPD act, think, behave etc and they are him to a tee, especially the whole Mr Nice/Mr Nasty thing, which his ex-wife told him as well.

One of the tests gave results for ALL personality disorders and he scored highly on Borderline/Antisocial/Histrionic, but very low on Narcissistic (which was a relief) and the others.

So now he's a bit scared about this and what it might mean. Personally I'm relieved as I had suspected he might suffer from some kind of personality disorder a while ago but I didn't like to present him with that thought as he would probably deny it extremely vocally. So for him to come to this by himself is very interesting and encouraging.

So, what do we do now? Obviously he needs to bring this up with the mental healthy person he eventually sees in the hopes of getting a firm diagnosis, but how can I help him? How can I support him? It doesn't help that I have suspected Asperger's and am awaiting my own diagnosis so, in his words, "We are both nutjobs."

Despite my last thread, I am not prepared to give up on my marriage, even though we currently cannot live together, but I want to help him with this. I want the nice husband back.

gladiolus I have spent my entire working life helping people, most of whom are men. Offenders, homeless people, addicts, people with MH issues. Believe me when I tell you that I have met more people with PDs than you have had hot dinners.

I think he deserves support, I think he needs MH resources. I don't think he needs a DW who minimises, puts herself at risk and enables him. He may actually have been abusive to your child. Maybe not but it looks like it. He has certainly been verbally abusive to you.

We all have friends and family with challenges. We all have people we support with AS, depression, addiction and the like. Boundaries are incredibly important so I am not being blithe when I say get therapy. I am saying that you desperately need to understand your motivation. He needs to see if change is possible BEFORE you risk any more of your well-being on his possible, undiagnosed, difficult to treat even if it's real and even if he has it disorder.

You don't think it exists, Wallison? Want to live in my head for a day?

FFS. Can you imagine the uproar if someone was saying ''Autism isn't real'' or '' ADHD doesn't exist''? But because its just a personality flaw in your eyes, its okay to say that.

This is the kind of stigma and lack of understanding people like me endure every single freaking day. Educate yourself.

What you are saying is precisely the reason why many psychiatrists don't like the label of 'personality disorder' - how can someone have a personality that is disordered? That is, as you say, a terrible thing to say to someone. It's also, to my mind, nonsense.

Yes, there are diagnostic criteria for diagnosing it, but then there used to be criteria for diagnosing someone as homosexual, and that was viewed as an illness as well.

Sometimes, in fact most time, psychiatry just doesn't have the answer.

And I think it is utterly dangerous to suppose that it does when you are dealing with a person who is violent or abusive.

Yes Glad the closer you are emotionally to someone with this diagnosis the harder it is to set your boundaries and stick to them. Or even to want to have boundaries at all. The closer you are the easier it is for the person with BPD to move those boundaries and to excuse bad behaviour with the disease label and to be "let off".

If you are a caring person (as you obviously are) setting those boundaries in appropriate places is well nigh impossible...they will feel unreasonable to you. Being self sacrificing in your support is your starting point whereas actually to do good to him, yourself and your DC you need boundaries that maintain your health and well being first.

(I would also sound a note of caution that BPD diagnosis has always been highly controversial professionally. My own observation is that people who present in very different ways are labelled with the condition and there is a huge variation in the level of engagement and response to treatment even in therapeutic communities)

I agree santa, it is a very difficult diagnosis to deal with. When I've told people about BPD in the past they've looked at me like I'm the devil or something. Really hurts when people can't see past the diagnosis.

See, I don't know if my instant reactions are helpful to him. I know they're helpful to me. When he starts to get arsey I just walk away. If we're in his house, I walk out and leave. If we're on the phone or facetiming I cut him off.

One time when we were in my house it was more difficult. I asked him to leave and he refused, saying he would only leave when he was good and ready. However, from that moment on, he did modulate his responses so I no longer had the necessity to ask him to leave.

Please note, that was ONE time in six months! Before you all get on your high horses about that. And he did improve.

That is certainly helpful to me as I have an aversion to confrontation.

But is it helpful to him?

I guess I need strategies that will help HIM, but not harm ME.

SantaFlashes, perhaps I'm not making myself clear (we have had a couple of crossed posts now). I have no doubt that mental distress exists. I just doubt that psychiatry as it currently is can deal with it, categorise it, or cure it. I don't know what the answer is, but what we have right now isn't working, hence the 'shunting-off' of people to the 'disorder' diagnosis.

FWIW Santa I think the fault is being attributed to the disorder but is actually the fact that in psychiatry and MH in general we are trying to repair a Switz watch with a hammer. We actually have no idea what causes most MH issues and PDs, a lot of misdiagnosis and bad treatment goes on.

You know there is a MH disorder you are struggling with. However, the labeling is poor, the diagnosis is poor and the treatment is poor. None of which is the fault of the people with MH issues. I'm sorry if you feel people are having a go at you.

gladiolus you have no idea what is going on with him at the moment. Let's assume he doesn't have a PD (because none has been diagnosed). What boundaries do you think are appropriate? For me, he would not be allowed in a house he had refused to leave, even once, ever again. Once is enough.

If it exists? WTF? A common set of factors which certain people suffer from. Yes, it doesn't "exist" in the way that cancer or a cold does, but there are symptoms, grouped together, for ease of treatment. It is the same for any mental illness that is not caused by a chemical imbalance.

Anyone on here doubting BPD's existence is welcome to come and take my symptoms off me any time they feel like it, because I sure as hell don't want them any more.

Or maybe look at it from the other direction...things that will helpyou, and will be clear to him so he can always be sure of the reaction he gets: if he does X then Y follows.

Sounds cold but you really have to build yourself up, you have to be there for your DC (and cat and dog!)...you only have to approve of HIS work to change HIMSELF and observe and maintain your clarity.

Would you rather be told "You have a sore foot" or "You have broken your third toe in two places"? Telling me I have ''mental distress'' is not only patronizing but pointless. Telling me, however, that there is a name for my condition, that there is a reason for my behaviors, that there is an explanation to why I feel emotions in the way I do, means that I can process it, and move on with it.

BPD might not be treated with a box of pills like some illnesses, but with therapy, knowledge, patience and time, a lot of sufferers get to a point where they no longer match the criteria to be classified as Borderline.

I am just over halfway through STEPPS. I am not okay. But I am improving. Without the use of a diagnostic label, the course would not be around, and I would have been treated as people twenty years ago were treated; "You have this condition. There's nothing we can do. Goodbye."

The mental health system needs to improve, but what needs to improve more is the reaction to conditions like personality disorders, and the understanding amongst the general public surrounding them. The system may not be perfect, but it is better than it is. So please, do not tell me my illness is not real. Because it is very damn real to me.

Look at the actual diagnostic criteria, FromEsme. They are so broad, they could mean anything.

It's a con.

Actually, SantaFlashes, I would say that the MH system needs to improve as a matter of absolute urgency - it is far more damaging than societal attitudes (which also need to improve but which do not forcibly medicate people against their wishes with harmful and toxic substances and lock them up etc).

Ha. Yeah I've never taken a look at those criteria in all my 10 years of having this diagnosis, thanks for the advice, I never thought of that.

When you suffer from it, believe me, they mean something. You might think "need to avoid being alone" is broad, trust me, it is utterly, horrifyingly meaningful when you have it. It means something very specific in a BPD sense, a meaning that anyone I know with BPD can identify with.

Anyway, this is way off track and I can't be fucking ARSED defending this illness that I do not want that has destroyed my life, so will leave. Some of you might want to consider your sensitivity when you're talking about something you don't have to live with.

But I will stop now, because I'm losing the real reason to be on here which is to say to you, OP, that if you feel uneasy with someone, if you are not comfortable with how they are being, then regardless of what an internet site says about how he is, you need to consider yourself and your children and how you want your lives to be and how you can be safe.

Would you like my broad range of symptoms that affect every second of my life Wallison, seeing as they could mean anything?

I really don't think you have any idea what you are talking about. Or you are forgetting that you are talking about individual human beings.

But Santa do you think the DSM is perfect? Do you think the diagnostic tools we have are good enough? Because I don't. I think we are very very poor at diagnosing even the MH illnesses which are very defined and have better diagnostic tools. We have come a long way but I think we are still feeling around in the dark. I don't doubt your symptoms but I do think people are routinely misdiagnosed and not diagnosed.

I think the diagnostic criteria are fine. They make sense to me for BPD, and for many people I know who suffer. I can see myself in them exactly. "Frantic attempts to avoid abandonment" for example - yes. I know what that is, exactly. That is precisely what I do.

Of course people are misdiagnosed and left without a diagnoses, but I'd say that's down to lack of training and funds, rather than a poor set of criteria.

Some pretty awful stuff on this thread now - I'm sorry BPD sufferers you've had to read it. Wallison, stick to talking about something you actually know something about.

And now I have revealed far more about myself than I would like to and will go out into the yard and smoke a fag and try not to think too much about how shit it all is.

wow, this is all getting a bit much now

Yes, greeneyed, because I know nothing about psychiatry.

I am the world's expert on psychiatry. I know all of their little tricks and games. I know about it because I've been on the receiving end of it and it isn't pretty.

Did you know, for example, that loads more people were diagnosed with anxiety disorders when barbiturates suddenly became available? And that people presenting with the same symptoms suddenly were diagnosed with depression when prozac made an appearance?

I know plenty about this. My thoughts may not concur with the mainstream, but you can never accuse me of lack of knowledge.

frillynat - for shame. You were all too keen to parade yourself around - why can't I do the same?

Wallinson, why not report your posts and get MNHQ to remove them if you are worried?