[Prozac1964]

Hello to all. I'm interested in learning about a lot of stuff and have been trying to recover from the separation between my wife who has borderline personality disorder and myself who has bipolar disorder.

We have two children together 8 year old son, and 6 year old daughter - both autistic. The children and my wife are living in Holland. We moved there in 2006 from the US, because she is Dutch and we wanted to see if we could have a better life over there. And I moved back to the U.S. in 2007 a little over 2 years ago as my wife asked me to leave Holland because she wanted to end our marriage.

Anyway there's far more to come on this story, so ask away. BTW - please understand I'm not here to complain....I have a very soft spot for both people with borderline or bipolar and have done extensive research and reading over the past 12 years to try and under stand these illnesses more. I have not been able to get over my wife and would like to be able to discern how much of the love we have left is real, or due to her BPD. She has expressed that, now, after 2 years have passed, that she'd like for me to come back to Holland......honestly, I'm afraid. I was abused by her to the point of insanity, and though she seems better, I'm have a big trust issue in being with her again.

I look forward to helping and being helped to everyone here at the forums.

Prozac

[Michah]

Hi Prozac,

The first question I ask, is......what kind of help is your wife getting to feel better about herself?

Before you make the transcontinental leap, she must help herself before you make an investment like that emotionally.......afterall, you must look after yourself as well.

Strangely, and I have no idea if this has any relevance.......but after 16 years of dealing with BPD and being relatively successful at doing it, I have recently been dx with Aspergers after much nutting out of symptoms.......your children, how long have you known of the Autism dx and what help are they receiving? Has your wife been tested for Aspergers or High Functioning Autism?

My sincere apologies if I sound like I am prying.......I tend to see "lines" in things.......to make myself feel better, I call it "deductive reasoning"

I also wonder what kind of support you are receiving through this?

The flipside, please also feel free to pick my brain.......

Take good care Prozac.......know that you are doing all that you can, you are a good man and father, and you are loved

Keep talking and let us know how you go......

In stillness,

Michah

[Prozac1964]

Thanks Michah for your kind reply. I'll try to answer your questions.

1. My wife has been in therapy of some sort for at least 20 years - she's 45. Plus she takes her meds.

2. True I have to think about myself, and I am, because none of the therapy or meds have helped her.....her borderline behaviors remain the same.

3. Strangely my wife also after dealing with years of borderline has recently been diagnosed with Aspergers. However, since she hated the stigma related to BPD, she is all too happy to say that she never had borderline, and is only autistic.

There is no way that this is the case. I believe she probably has Aspergers, but it would have to be a secondary diagnosis to BPD. She meets all of the DSM V manual criterion in the borderline category, and only 4 or 5 of the symptoms for Aspergers.

She is a high functioning, yet textbook, diagnosis of borderline personality disorder. As you know there are certain symptoms that are very specific BPD and she has them all. So when she tells me she doesn't have borderline anymore, I can't take her seriously, because I know that is not the case. She also has alternate personalities and periods of disassociation and extreme irrational rage, all of which were targeted mainly at me.

4. My children have only had the autistic diagnosis for 1 to 2 years. And they are textbook within their categories. They are both living in institutions and coming home on the weekends to be with their mother. I think that this is where her desire for me to come back lies - she knows I have an absolute gift with children, and mine love me to death. However she is impatient and doesn't do nearly as well with the kids as me. In the past she has taken advantage of this, and disappeared a lot leaving me to tend to the kids an everything else, while she is absent.

5. For my support I've been in therapy, and take my meds religiously. But, I still suffer a great deal of depression due to the seperation. Being away from my children and wife and all has been like tearing my heart bleeding from my chest. Words cannot describe it.

There you have it. Do you think it's possible to have a dual diagnosis of BPD and Aspergers? I do. But my wife was diagnosed repeatedly with BPD over about 22 years time and extensive therapy, and I lived the borderline life with her for 10 years of that, trying to research it, and help her any way that I could--------->there's no way she's not borderline. This is one subject that I'm pretty educated on.......but who knows.

[Michah]

Originally Posted by Prozac1964

Thanks Michah for your kind reply. I'll try to answer your questions.

1. My wife has been in therapy of some sort for at least 20 years - she's 45. Plus she takes her meds.

2. True I have to think about myself, and I am, because none of the therapy or meds have helped her.....her borderline behaviors remain the same.

3. Strangely my wife also after dealing with years of borderline has recently been diagnosed with Aspergers. However, since she hated the stigma related to BPD, she is all too happy to say that she never had borderline, and is only autistic.

There is no way that this is the case. I believe she probably has Aspergers, but it would have to be a secondary diagnosis to BPD. She meets all of the DSM V manual criterion in the borderline category, and only 4 or 5 of the symptoms for Aspergers.

She is a high functioning, yet textbook, diagnosis of borderline personality disorder. As you know there are certain symptoms that are very specific BPD and she has them all. So when she tells me she doesn't have borderline anymore, I can't take her seriously, because I know that is not the case. She also has alternate personalities and periods of disassociation and extreme irrational rage, all of which were targeted mainly at me.

4. My children have only had the autistic diagnosis for 1 to 2 years. And they are textbook within their categories. They are both living in institutions and coming home on the weekends to be with their mother. I think that this is where her desire for me to come back lies - she knows I have an absolute gift with children, and mine love me to death. However she is impatient and doesn't do nearly as well with the kids as me. In the past she has taken advantage of this, and disappeared a lot leaving me to tend to the kids an everything else, while she is absent.

5. For my support I've been in therapy, and take my meds religiously. But, I still suffer a great deal of depression due to the seperation. Being away from my children and wife and all has been like tearing my heart bleeding from my chest. Words cannot describe it.

There you have it. Do you think it's possible to have a dual diagnosis of BPD and Aspergers? I do. But my wife was diagnosed repeatedly with BPD over about 22 years time and extensive therapy, and I lived the borderline life with her for 10 years of that, trying to research it, and help her any way that I could--------->there's no way she's not borderline. This is one subject that I'm pretty educated on.......but who knows.

Hi Prozac.......

Well, the first thing, you are doing ALL that you can. You have everything in place that you can have in place. And having a 14 year old of my own, I can only imagine what it must be like to feel so far away from your children.

Can you happily move overseas to be closer to them, and maintain some distance from your wife while she sorts her stuff out? Can you afford to live apart, but in close proximity overseas? Can you emotionally distance yourself from her and be there for your children in a fulfiling way? In other words, can you protect yourself while your wife has some time to get better and reflect?

The thing with getting better(from my experience) is that a lot of it requires wanting. Even in the times when destruction and mayhem has been on my mind, I dragged myself to therapy and ran around like a banshee. No matter how much it hurt and I did not feel worth it, I knew I had to get better one day.......and find my way out of the darkness. Granted I was extremely fortuitous and had an excellent T provided by the State which helped immensely. I also had a lot of hospitalisations. So, I wonder where your wife is on this scale.......

And yes, I believe you can have BPD and Aspergers......I have a nagging suspicion that the neurological impacts of AS directly impact on the fundamentals of BPD. Abusive childhood + AS impacts of processing emotion, learning difficulties etc perpetuates the terrible lack of self-esteem and confidence which then overlaps on the external info being given to us as children and so on. Like a double whammy if you will.......for me to deny that I have ever had BPD while it was frighteningly clear (like your wife, I was textbook BPD), is to say that the sky is red, not blue. I do not question the past dx, but I am more aware now of what is AS and what is Borderline, or getting there at least It has not been easy.

Take good care Prozac......keep talking.......you are very insightful.

Michah

Just a PS......here is a link to a list of common Aspergers traits in women......I found the issues with identity an interesting parallel with a common feature of BPD......hope this helps http://help4aspergers.com/pb/wp_a58d..._a58d4f6a.html.