Holiday season exhaustion

BPD Behaviors & Traits

I’m new here, and reading many of the posts it’s uncanny how similar our experiences are.

Is anybody also dreading the upcoming holiday season?

We are planning to spend a couple of weeks in another state where my parents and most of my extended family live. My pwBPD wife is an only child and seems to have enormous difficulty accepting that in a larger family not everything revolves around her. This often leads to enormous conflict.

She is in major dysregulation mode today because we are supposed to be staying with my parents but because they are in the process of selling their house the timing of our visit has become a bit tricky (they got an offer and will need to be packing up while we’re there). It’s also unclear if we can stay with my sister because they have visitors too, but it’s a solvable problem.

This is of course an outrage to my wife. Apparently my family is “totally fucked up” and they don’t care about us or want to see us. So she’s now saying she’ll cancel her ticket and doesn’t want to go. I’m getting text bombed all kinds of abusive nonsense about how her family would never do such an outrageous thing and so on and so on.

And now the usual dread about avoiding World War III when I have to go home later with the kids.

Why do we put up with this?

Posted Nov 4, 2022, 1:39 AM UTC

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Welderboy18broken engagement •4 yr. ago

I did and then I left when I finally realized by acting the way she did she was trying to isolate me from my family and friends

Aussie_nomad1975OPMarried•4 yr. ago

Well done. That’s the result, whether they intend it or not. Having to walk on eggshells about spending time with one’s own friends and family is no way to live.

nihilistrealityDated•4 yr. ago

Why do you put up with it? Likely codependent traits/ people pleaser personality/ martyrdom syndrome/ rescuer/ etc.

codependent people learn to put the needs of others ahead of their own and will sacrifice their needs and principles in order to maintain relationships. People who are codependent feel a strong pull toward validation and self-worth from others. When they don’t receive it, they can become anxious. One can unlearn these patterns. It starts with building your self-concept outside of and apart from others. To be able to have healthy, mutually loving relationships, we need to be able to put the parts of our brain seeking safety at ease by cultivating that security within ourselves, rather than externally. IF you put their needs/wants above your own, it would self abandonment. In these kinds of relationship, it’s the person with BPD receiving/ taking. They are emotionally exhausting to deal with.

If you are dealing with someone who is displaying BPD traits for long-term (which you and I have), you likely have serious codependency traits. It’s two sides of the same coin.

The only difference between the 'co-dependent victim' and 'BPD victim' is that the BPD person devours the codependent in that dance, and sometimes KNOWS they do that, but do not care enough.

Both of them have the same original wound, but they 'solved' it in opposite ways. Codependent gives all, and BPD takes all in the end. Neither of them gain the love he or she needs, but the person with BPD is recovering fast and moves on to the next person. They are low on empathy. The codependent needs sometimes years to recover if they don’t get out fast and ignore the red flags.

Aussie_nomad1975OPMarried•4 yr. ago

Lots of food for thought here. Thanks for the response.

knogueraDated•4 yr. ago

Go without her. She sounds exhausting and lame af. If you can’t have a good time with your SO with your fam then rethink things.

Jonabc5Dated•4 yr. ago

Good luck man. Holidays were always just terrible.