Illinois Divorce Lawyer Blog
I was reading a social networking site that had a thread on Borderline Personality Disorder. It can be very helpful to read the DSM for the diagnostic criteria for BPD, but it can be also quite insightful to read the stories of people affected by a relationship or marriage with someone with BPD. Here are a few examples, below:
“Get out as fast as you can, don’t look back.The only reason to stay with a BPDer is if you are a parent who has a child with the disorder. I was married to someone with BPD. The horrors.
The non-BP has been sucker punched. When you are in a relationship with a BPD you both share a private, intense world of ups and downs. 3 AM screaming matches, stomping, acting out, and in some cases, self harm and violence. This brings you both together in a co dependency. Each time there is a blow up, the couple is drawn closer together in the resolution phase, when the BPDers devaluation episode subsides. This codependency is insidious. I call it being sucker punched.”
“I dated a borderline for 2 years, the 1st few months were great and it was mostly downhill from there. BPD is an illness that prevents the person from truly loving anyone, not even their parents, their spouse or their children. They are often self abusive and are a physical and mental threat to themselves and to those who love them the most. BPD is often passed from parent to child. My advice to you if you want the loving husband, children and family thing is to cut your losses and move on. I know it is easier said than done but for your own mental health you need to do it. I hear and fully understand your reasoning and thinking as to not wanting to leave someone because they are ill, I felt the same way. The one thing a borderline fears the most is abandonment yet the truth is they almost always end up abandoning the relationship themselves within 2 years. Often the people that are willing to stick with a person with BPD are usually suffering with their own co-dependency issues. I wish I could say be patient with them and love them unconditionally and they will get better but it is just not the case. About the time you think things are getting better their illness will cause them to destroy any progress that has been made and sabotage that progress. I can not imagine the personal hell a borderline lives in but have witnessed it and had a taste of it by loving someone with this illness. Now knowing and understanding what BPD is I will always feel strongly for anyone with this illness but will never let myself fall in love with someone that suffers it. Suffering with BPD makes for a long hard lonely life for the one who suffers with it and equally as hard for those that love them.”
If you feel you are in a marriage with someone with the traits of BPD, please see my friend Randi Kreger’s site, www.BPDCentral.com. If you are in a failing marriage with BPD issues, please feel free to contact my firm to set up an initial consultation.