Hello, I am so glad I found this place.

[Odin72]

My wife of two and a half decades is bpd/alcoholic, diagnosed 15 years ago. She is currently in treatment for the 8th time and I think i don't want her back. When she drinks she becomes violent and harms herself and others. My children are both adults now still living with me and their childhood has been an absolute nightmare. My youngest asked me for the insurance card a year ago and started edmr therapy. My older one is on the spectrum. She was removed from the home over the course of their child hood several times. She's been arrested a dozen times.

Before Thanksgiving all hell broke lose, some situationally inappropriate reaction to one of our sons being busy to help her ended up with me waking up on the couch at 2 in the am with a fortunately unloaded firearm against my head. She fired it and then threw it at me. A few weeks later the Sheriff hauled her off. The last 6 weeks have been the best 6 weeks in our lives. The house is safe, we have adult conversations and we help one another and love one another.

I found an attorney who deals with pd spouses and retained services. She gets out on the 20th and is being advised to go to a sober living place. I am filing a protective order to protect the safe space we have now and force her hand because she wants to come home.  I feel really guilty about taking this action but i know its the right thing to do. I started therapy a week ago, I cannot believe i told this story in detail for an hour without pause. Hearing myself tell it i realized how much suffering my children and I have endured. I still feel bad for her and feel bad about the entire situation. I also realized a gun to my head didnt shock me, it's hardly the worst thing that has happened. Other people seem shocked by it, my son who saw it was shocked. I guess that is what i am trying to figure out.

The place she is at wants to do a family zoom thing, and i don't think i can do it. She has tried and failed so many times and the violence in relapse is always worse. The last time she got out of therapy she tattooed an ambigram on her neck that read the name of her roommate in treatment. When i found out about her affair with this woman she cut it off and said she just wanted a friend. Its been a few years and if i ask about it for closure, she flips because she is the victim. Its been an unbelievable journey  to this point and i am glad to be here. Thank you!

[SonofThunder]

Hello Odin72,

I want to offer up a very warm welcome to Out of the FOG!  We are very glad you are here and have introduced yourself.  Im so very sorry to read about the hardship your entire family has endured.  You are apparently a strong, calm, patient and loving person, to have cared for your bpd/alcoholic wife for 15 years, and also suffered through the terrible conditions and experiences in which you described.  I tip my cowboy hat to you in respect. 

Im also sorry to read that your children suffer the effects of living in the home with their BPD/alcoholic mother.  I will keep you, them and your wife in my thought and prayer for positive moves forward, in whatever form that takes for all of you.  The fine folks here at Out of the FOG are from all over the world, and are a bunch of kind, caring, calm, respectful people from a wide array of experiences.  I want to tell you Odin72 that you are not alone in your experiences.  There are others here who have lived through very harrowing ordeals of the worst traits of BPD, other disorders, alcoholism and many-many other things that can make life so very difficult.  Im sure many here have lived a similar life to your children, so please know (all of you) that you are not alone. 

Since we all walk this PD trail together, scattered all over the parts of the experience trail, I invite you, now that you have joined our group of wonderful people, to rest your weary feet, slip off your hiking boots, and pull up a chair around the many warming fires of the forum boards.  At these gathering places, we all relax and have fruitful, friendly discussion.  Also, while you're exploring the campsite here at Out of the FOG, check out the toolbox in the upper right section of this page. That tab will surely be a place you may benefit from the further education and wonderful tools you can put into your hiking backpack for the journey forward.  They are powerful tools.  Knowing about them, how to use them, as well as honing your skills in practice with them, is highly beneficial. 

Lastly, before I go, see the resources tab to the right of the toolbox. There are some contacts there for you and your children, should any of you decide you need to reach out to some specific services, or even need some emergency contacts as well. 

Again, so glad you are here Odin72,  and I look forward to chatting with you around the many boards. 

SoT