LauraJanae
New member
My partner’s partner was diagnosed with borderline a couple of years ago. My partner and I are preparing for a civil partnership for visa reasons. Naturally I have questions.
I met my partner 5 years ago on tinder. We hit it off instantly and had an amazing time together. But I was just passing through on my way to Oz so I didn’t think anything would come of it. Fast forward to now and we couldn’t be happier. We have an amazing relationship and we have built something truly beautiful. It is something I want to protect too.
Which brings me to the bpd partner. She was already on the scene when he and I met. They weren’t poly at the time but open. A few months after us meeting (and staying in contact), she decided that she wanted a poly relationship. The agreement was that all relationships would be equal in validity and would be allowed to progress and be whatever we wanted it to be. No primary/nesting partners.
However, about 8 months into our relationship, things went bad. I’m American and all this was happening in the UK for context. I was on my way to live in France to be closer to him but I had a whole thing with my passport which grounded me for over a month. This meant that what should have been 2 weeks together turned into a whole lot more. Now, we made sure that he and her spent time together. We shuffled me around to various friends while they did. Pretty complicated but we wanted it to be fair. Near the end of my time, we decided to go to an event in London that was a one weekend only. So he let her know that he and I were going to this thing. It was the first event she hadn’t gone to with him.
Well, that didn’t go down well for her. She called him, yelling at him and threatening to break up with him and telling him he was a bad partner all around. It devastated him and broke him down mentally. This happened again I believe. Both times, I was the one picking him back up and reassuring him and giving him a boost so he could confront her about it. It took some convincing but she finally took responsibility. But that was only the beginning. Over the next few months she would just fly off the handle for every little thing and again I would pick up the mess and send him back in to deal with it. Essentially I was carrying the weight of everyone’s trauma. He even let her move in with him thinking it would calm her down. It didn’t.
I grew up in an abusive home but hadn’t really delved into my feelings. Essentially my brain had separated my memories from my bad feelings so I could cope and thrive. After watching him go through that even once, things started to crack. Pretty soon I was in a full on mental breakdown because my brain wasn’t separating anything anymore. I started having all kinds of horrible effects and struggled even being functional. For a while I will admit I wasn’t a good partner. I was so triggered that I was sending him big long texts about how this was a dangerous situation and he needed to get out. He eventually communicated that that wasn’t good for him and set some boundaries.
I won’t bore you wit details but the March after all this started, I ended up without a job and a place to live in France so I came to the UK to regroup a bit. That ended up lasting a year and a half. I got myself a living situation where he could be with me. What started out as a few days a week turned into one week with me and one week with her. Over the course of that, she made some noise. It seemed that every little change would trigger her to get angry and then he’d get the brunt of it. However, over time her focus of contempt shifted from him to me. He’d still get the brunt of it but it was always about me. She even yelled at him for 4 hours about how he and I were “breaking the rules” because his other partner couldn’t live in the Uk according to her. This was of course not true. She blamed me for certain mutual friends distancing themselves. She even left me out of her plans for his 30th. We were going to do our own parties but she didn’t even check on dates with me. When I told her I wasn’t happy about tha, she just brushed me off. I felt disrespected to say the least but I didn’t have any fight in me so I just told her I wasn’t happy and moved on. Afterwards, she tried to tell my partner I had been awful to her. He obviously didn’t buy it but that stung. These are just a few examples of about a million others.
Finally I couldn’t take it anymore and after one time of her promising to never yell again, I said I wanted to talk to her about how her behavior was effecting me. So I was hopeful since she seemed open to it now. I laid out for her what had happened and how it had effected me. I admit I was blunt about it. It was a disaster. She owned up to the fights last summer, proceeded to trauma dump on me, and then refused to take responsibility for anything else. And me telling her that I didn’t want to talk to her about her trauma at the moment made her rage quit. I was able to try again but nothing came of it. And she was telling my partner all the while (the conversation was happening on messenger) that I was being “toxic and abusive” to her. Now I’ll admit that at the end I kind of lost it. I was so over her justifying being awful to and about me and I acted in anger. Something I deeply regret.
A month or so later, my partner had a come to Jesus talk with her about everything and told her that if I broke up with him because of her, they were over too. She agreed to apologize to me as a result. It was very disappointing. She essentially listed off a bunch of things like a child apologizing to their friend because their mom made them. I didn’t really accept it but took a “wait and see” approach. Maybe it was just the beginning.
Once Covid started we ended up stuck in a holiday let of one of our clients who let us rent it for cheap. Time was split evenly between us and we got into a routine. I even was able to have a very restrained chat with her about a few boundaries she’d been violating. She was diagnosed and medicated at this point so I think that helped. I also made a real effort to communicate as positively as I could.
For a few glorious months we had some level of stability. I was actually starting to think things were turning around. But then my visitor visa was running out and we needed a more permanent plan. We talked to a lawyer and decided that we would get a civil partnership so I could move over full time. You can imagine she didn’t take that well. Thankfully because of everything that happened, my partner made sure she didn’t unload on him but she still made a stir in an already stressful time and trying to butt in where she didn’t belong. He finally talked to her about it, calmed her down as usual and that was that. I was massively triggered though which took time away from us. Time that was precious.
In the end, I came stateside while we saved up for the visa which has taken a much longer time than we wanted. Things were pretty bad there for a while and my mental health took more hits just because of my unstable situation and not seeing him much. I finally was able to get some help this year from a psych. I’ve been on meds which have changed my life. I am emotionally regulated, I am losing weight, and my executive functioning is so much better. I got a remote job which means I can spend more time overseas now that Covid is dying down. We’re actually starting to save up for the visa and cushion money to start us out. Things are good. And on the poly front things have also been good. She hasn’t really kicked up a fuss about anything and things have been pretty good.
Here’s my issue though. She is sing ok according to my partner and is getting therapy but it is limited due to the NHS being under funded. I am concerned because I know personally how one really bad incident can set you back ages. Without her therapist, what happens when a massive trigger happens? There will be so many triggers happening for her: I see a land mine if triggers coming up and it makes me very nervous. I feel like the peace we have is because I’m not living in the country so he and she has mental health support for now. I worry that when she loses that, it will be harder for her to maintain stability.
I plan on trying to have a conversation with her about things-everything. One on which she has no pressure to agree with my POV. I want to know where she’s at, and what I’m looking at going forward.
My question(s) are: what am I looking at going forward? How likely is it she might have a bad enough trigger would set her back? Does anyone have any experience in this? Am I just catastrophicing?
I met my partner 5 years ago on tinder. We hit it off instantly and had an amazing time together. But I was just passing through on my way to Oz so I didn’t think anything would come of it. Fast forward to now and we couldn’t be happier. We have an amazing relationship and we have built something truly beautiful. It is something I want to protect too.
Which brings me to the bpd partner. She was already on the scene when he and I met. They weren’t poly at the time but open. A few months after us meeting (and staying in contact), she decided that she wanted a poly relationship. The agreement was that all relationships would be equal in validity and would be allowed to progress and be whatever we wanted it to be. No primary/nesting partners.
However, about 8 months into our relationship, things went bad. I’m American and all this was happening in the UK for context. I was on my way to live in France to be closer to him but I had a whole thing with my passport which grounded me for over a month. This meant that what should have been 2 weeks together turned into a whole lot more. Now, we made sure that he and her spent time together. We shuffled me around to various friends while they did. Pretty complicated but we wanted it to be fair. Near the end of my time, we decided to go to an event in London that was a one weekend only. So he let her know that he and I were going to this thing. It was the first event she hadn’t gone to with him.
Well, that didn’t go down well for her. She called him, yelling at him and threatening to break up with him and telling him he was a bad partner all around. It devastated him and broke him down mentally. This happened again I believe. Both times, I was the one picking him back up and reassuring him and giving him a boost so he could confront her about it. It took some convincing but she finally took responsibility. But that was only the beginning. Over the next few months she would just fly off the handle for every little thing and again I would pick up the mess and send him back in to deal with it. Essentially I was carrying the weight of everyone’s trauma. He even let her move in with him thinking it would calm her down. It didn’t.
I grew up in an abusive home but hadn’t really delved into my feelings. Essentially my brain had separated my memories from my bad feelings so I could cope and thrive. After watching him go through that even once, things started to crack. Pretty soon I was in a full on mental breakdown because my brain wasn’t separating anything anymore. I started having all kinds of horrible effects and struggled even being functional. For a while I will admit I wasn’t a good partner. I was so triggered that I was sending him big long texts about how this was a dangerous situation and he needed to get out. He eventually communicated that that wasn’t good for him and set some boundaries.
I won’t bore you wit details but the March after all this started, I ended up without a job and a place to live in France so I came to the UK to regroup a bit. That ended up lasting a year and a half. I got myself a living situation where he could be with me. What started out as a few days a week turned into one week with me and one week with her. Over the course of that, she made some noise. It seemed that every little change would trigger her to get angry and then he’d get the brunt of it. However, over time her focus of contempt shifted from him to me. He’d still get the brunt of it but it was always about me. She even yelled at him for 4 hours about how he and I were “breaking the rules” because his other partner couldn’t live in the Uk according to her. This was of course not true. She blamed me for certain mutual friends distancing themselves. She even left me out of her plans for his 30th. We were going to do our own parties but she didn’t even check on dates with me. When I told her I wasn’t happy about tha, she just brushed me off. I felt disrespected to say the least but I didn’t have any fight in me so I just told her I wasn’t happy and moved on. Afterwards, she tried to tell my partner I had been awful to her. He obviously didn’t buy it but that stung. These are just a few examples of about a million others.
Finally I couldn’t take it anymore and after one time of her promising to never yell again, I said I wanted to talk to her about how her behavior was effecting me. So I was hopeful since she seemed open to it now. I laid out for her what had happened and how it had effected me. I admit I was blunt about it. It was a disaster. She owned up to the fights last summer, proceeded to trauma dump on me, and then refused to take responsibility for anything else. And me telling her that I didn’t want to talk to her about her trauma at the moment made her rage quit. I was able to try again but nothing came of it. And she was telling my partner all the while (the conversation was happening on messenger) that I was being “toxic and abusive” to her. Now I’ll admit that at the end I kind of lost it. I was so over her justifying being awful to and about me and I acted in anger. Something I deeply regret.
A month or so later, my partner had a come to Jesus talk with her about everything and told her that if I broke up with him because of her, they were over too. She agreed to apologize to me as a result. It was very disappointing. She essentially listed off a bunch of things like a child apologizing to their friend because their mom made them. I didn’t really accept it but took a “wait and see” approach. Maybe it was just the beginning.
Once Covid started we ended up stuck in a holiday let of one of our clients who let us rent it for cheap. Time was split evenly between us and we got into a routine. I even was able to have a very restrained chat with her about a few boundaries she’d been violating. She was diagnosed and medicated at this point so I think that helped. I also made a real effort to communicate as positively as I could.
For a few glorious months we had some level of stability. I was actually starting to think things were turning around. But then my visitor visa was running out and we needed a more permanent plan. We talked to a lawyer and decided that we would get a civil partnership so I could move over full time. You can imagine she didn’t take that well. Thankfully because of everything that happened, my partner made sure she didn’t unload on him but she still made a stir in an already stressful time and trying to butt in where she didn’t belong. He finally talked to her about it, calmed her down as usual and that was that. I was massively triggered though which took time away from us. Time that was precious.
In the end, I came stateside while we saved up for the visa which has taken a much longer time than we wanted. Things were pretty bad there for a while and my mental health took more hits just because of my unstable situation and not seeing him much. I finally was able to get some help this year from a psych. I’ve been on meds which have changed my life. I am emotionally regulated, I am losing weight, and my executive functioning is so much better. I got a remote job which means I can spend more time overseas now that Covid is dying down. We’re actually starting to save up for the visa and cushion money to start us out. Things are good. And on the poly front things have also been good. She hasn’t really kicked up a fuss about anything and things have been pretty good.
Here’s my issue though. She is sing ok according to my partner and is getting therapy but it is limited due to the NHS being under funded. I am concerned because I know personally how one really bad incident can set you back ages. Without her therapist, what happens when a massive trigger happens? There will be so many triggers happening for her: I see a land mine if triggers coming up and it makes me very nervous. I feel like the peace we have is because I’m not living in the country so he and she has mental health support for now. I worry that when she loses that, it will be harder for her to maintain stability.
I plan on trying to have a conversation with her about things-everything. One on which she has no pressure to agree with my POV. I want to know where she’s at, and what I’m looking at going forward.
My question(s) are: what am I looking at going forward? How likely is it she might have a bad enough trigger would set her back? Does anyone have any experience in this? Am I just catastrophicing?