Supporting my wife who lives with Borderline Personality Disorder while maintaining self care

[Faith-and-Hope]

Agreed @Smc @Determined ❤️

[Determined]

Back in crisis here at the moment

Darling and S1 both engaging in self harm and threats of permanent type.

No real risk with S1 juat venting emotions but the risk for Darling is real. Expect I will be in trouble tomorrow but I have arranged supervision for while I am at work. 

It is either that or take the day off and I have no leave so 🤷 

[tyme]

Hearing you @Determined .

I'm sorry this is happening. There is really a lot placed on you.

If you don't mind me asking, what does 'supervision' look like, and how does your darling feel about it?

[Determined]

@tyme 

Supervision is my mum visiting for the day. Just so someone is around and can call for help if needed.  

Darling is going to hate "having a babysitter" (as she calls it) but has made threats  demonsting she is not safe to be alone so what am I to do.  Darling does not know mum is coming over yet, if she did she would avoid being at home. There will be a short overlap of home alone. 

She really should be in hospital but that can only happen on a voluntary basis so it is on me to keep her safe.  

[Determined]

On a more positive note...

Father-in-law has made a remarkable recovery over the past week. Even from my last update. We have seen healing we were told was never going to happen. Still hard not to focus on when the next crash may be but thankful for the reprieve. 

[tyme]

With my BPD, I used to hate having a 'babysitter' too. It made me SH even more - hence I was asking you the question @Determined .

How's the boundary-setting going? I vaguely remember you telling us that early on, your family told you to set boundaries, but you didn't... and now it's much harder? (sorry if I'm mixed up).

As for your father-in-law, good to hear the good news!

[Determined]

*edited* 

Thanks for that perspective @tyme 

It is a risk I know having someone here increasing the s.h. but in mind the risk of having no one here would be a bigger risk.

Based on the threats and behaviours over the past couple of days. 

Re the boundaries

That seems to be part of the problem more than the solution at the moment. Inflexible boundaries... they did serve to de escalate when the threshold for calling an ambulance was reached.

The only thing *stopping* me making that call was the risk  of darling ending up with charges for aggression towards paramedics or being t@sered or worse by police who feel threatened as has been seen in the media 😳 it was that bad 😰

[Determined]

The other boundary is me goimg to work and arranging my mum to visit. In the past I have stayed home and put my life on hold. 

So that is a boundary in that if darling is not safe she needs someone to be around to call for help if necessary to keep her safe. 

[Shaz51]

 your father-in-law is doing ok @Determined , good to hear the good news!

how are you going today my friend 

[Smc]

Hi @Determined, me checking in too.

So hard when you really don't have any guarantee you can keep her safe. Know what that's like... And yes, the news stories add another level of scary to it. They do highlight the worst case scenarios, but we can't quite put those into the "couldn't happen to us" bucket because they're a bit close to home. It's waaaay to easy to put our own near and dear into the position of the MI person suffering harm.

On the positive side of the balance, our Older Daughter has had police attend on numerous occasions without it going pear shaped, so we can attest that they do try to be sensitive to what's going on.