John's gloating post about a project REQUIRING a new tool purchase gave me an idea. Since my strange and estranged wife of 14 years is divorcing me and since she ran away in a psycho-panic (she absolutely and literally did run away in a psycho-panic when she went nuts in the schoolyard and assaulted a kid. I caught her and took her to her shrink and that afternoon she was gone and I didn't hear from her for three days), and since she has a separation agreement that requires us to share equally the costs of preparing the house for sale, it's a good time to do some preparing for sale that absolutely requires me to get a new table saw and the mandatory accessories. She will have to pay half and I will also bill her for my time.
I got me a shark who wants to put her on the stand and make her go into one of her "states". He could do it easily because her psychological balance is highly unstable.
Anybody out there ever have experience with what the shrinks call "Borderline Personality Disorder"?
If I was the judge presiding over the case and if you and your counsel did that, you'd be lucky to leave with the clothes on your back. I'd pity the poor woman. Where did you say your located?
Don't count on your "shark"s ability to predict or control the behavior of a mentally unstable person. If this goes the way such plans usually go, she'll sit there on the stand cool, calm, and collected, and eat your shark for lunch.
If you're willing to settle for "multiple personality disorder", then yes.
A couple of things for you to consider:
You should assume that her attorney will read this thread - and everything else you have posted or will post to newsgroups. It's probably not in your best interest to say any more than you already have.
You have experienced (or at least witnessed) human breakage in one of its most tragic forms. It's entirely possible that the damage was done long before you met her. It's almost certain that she didn't choose to be broken - and any attempt of yours to hold her responsible and/or punish her for that breakage may affect the way you see that face in the mirror for the rest of your life.
Your compassion and senses of fairness and justice are under test. You still have the rest of your life to live; and you will find it beneficial to yourself to not bring about more damage than has already been done. This other person in your life is as worthy of your best now just as much as she was when you married.
True. Having had a similar family--not marital--experience (and an earlier experience with a friend), I can attest to the fact that there is a great deal of difficulty being the recipient of one-sided and unjustified abuse for years, though. That one feature makes it particularly difficult to be fair and just to the person who is tragically ill, but exceptionally abusive. The threats, the name calling, little things like having a .357 Colt Python shoved halfway up one nostril with a threat to pull the trigger, all tend to make one less sanguine than would be fair.
It's a damned difficult position to be in.
Charlie Self "Bore, n.: A person who talks when you wish him to listen." Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
Actually, I would never allow the attorney to do that to her. In fact, I only had an hour consult with the guy and that's just the way he struck me. I am not even going to have an attorney but try to negotiate an amicable settlement. I will, in fact, give her more than she is entitled to, especially if she agrees to some minor concessions on her part that will cost her nothing.
-- Regards, Doug Miller (alphageek-at-milmac-dot-com)
For a copy of my TrollFilter for NewsProxy/Nfilter, send email to autoresponder at filterinfo-at-milmac-dot-com You must use your REAL email address to get a response.
"I got me a shark who wants to put her on the stand and make her go into one of her "states". He could do it easily because her psychological balance is highly unstable."
Did you just make that part up or are you a compulsive liar. I wonder which one of the two of you has the real reality problem.
Actually, as I responded to another person, I am not even hiring this guy. He is too aggressive ... maybe somebody else who is being really ripped could use such a defense but I will not do it to her. I can't afford him anyway - he's the costliest divorce attorney around these parts.
As for her breaking down, I really know her quite well (for thirty years including the pre-nuptial days when she and I were students) and I know that unless she's on some pretty potent anxiolytics, pushing the proper buttons will create a mess... but I refuse to do it and have told her that on many occasions. Unfortunately, refusal to trust, more accurately, an inability to trust, is a characteristic of Borderline Personality Disorder affected people.
I used a bit of hyperbole in opening this and I regret it. I really feel empathy for her and I regret all the crap that she had to contend with in her upbringing, previous marriage, and other relationships. Nevertheless, her behavior has been utterly out of control and utterly abusive all too often for me or her to continue. She may well be the kind of person for whom marriage should be a no-no. She will get even more than she asks for in settlement with me if she agrees to continue her therapy. Emotionally for me, I can't afford to have her stop and revert to the raw Borderline state. Who knows? A miracle could happen.
I think you have already showed your true colors with your initial post. The cards have been played and changing the angle of your comments does not erase what you first said.
You might consider running on the John Kerry ticket as VP.
They seem to be related according to the diagnostic criteria I've read.
I have no interest in hiding anything from her attorney. She already knows what she's dealing with.
It certainly was. There were a number of warning flags and showing of the yellow card but... well, you know how love is....
An issue is the origin of BPD and when it appears. I've read a few books on it lately in an attempt to understand what was happening and so many of the etiologic characteristics were clearly in her childhood experience and in her previous relationships with men. I sure as hell wish I had taken a course in abnormal psychology but, at the time, I didn't believe that psychology deserved the status of a "science". Only the hard sciences were really sciences at all to my right brain dominant mind. I had a case of "physics envy".
I understand that. I wish she did. She blames herself for being BP instead of the real culprits, a possible genetic predisposition to the behaviors and the interaction of her genotype with an invalidating and, sometimes abusive world. She is also a scientist (a better biologist than me - up to a point) and she was in the same frame of mind vis-a-vis psychology and psychiatry lacking scientific validity as I was.
Thanks. I think I have made it clear that the first post was an unintentional troll. I hyperbolized and went on to new nadirs because ... well, because I believe this was so unnecessary and so disruptive as I prepare for retirement in 7 months. She will be treated more than fairly.
Quite the way I feel. Even if one recognizes that the abuser is sick, it doesn't remove the hurts. You may understand where they come from and why but as far as being unscarred by it is concerned... no way can a person be. Unless he/she is a saint.
I've been through all of it but the Python... there was a knife, though.
Acknowledged, Captain.
Look up "witch" in that same dictionary. It's revealing.
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