Hey guys, been a long time reader on this forum but now I need advice. Genuine advice. Throw away account, fake names.
I (25F) have been married to Kyle (31M) for 5 years. We have two babies (22mo and 8mo). Overall we’ve had a happy, strong relationship, but we’ve had our issues. Kyle got diagnosed with BPD a year into our marriage after multiple incidents that finally led him to get some counseling. Long story short, he’s a great guy when he’s doing well, and a toxic, manipulative, abusive alcoholic when he’s in one of his lows. I get a lot of people asking why I stay—and for those of you who understand BPD, you know that it’s one of the few disorders that CAN fade with time and healing. He has been through hell in his life, and I would hope someone would give me the same chance I’m giving him.
Anyway, he struggles with drinking, it’s his outlet for when he’s feeling insecure. He gets like this whenever I do anything without him. So today I went out to dinner with my sis, did some shopping, etc. nothing crazy. I got home around 10pm as I had previously communicated with him and he said it was fine. However, when I got home, he was passed out in the bedroom with the baby, while the toddler was unsupervised in the living room (locked in with a baby gate) watching a movie. There was evidence he’d been drinking (empty bottle of hard lemonade) which is a violation of our agreement to not drink around the kids. I was furious but remained calm, I let him sleep so as not to start a huge blow up. Now I’m debating whether or not I should leave with the kids temporarily until he actually gets real help? I know he left the toddler alone for an hour because of when he texted me he was putting the baby in bed. Also, it was just one drink. WIBTAH?
Comments
an this hit too close. my mom stuck around for way too long hoping things would get better and all it did was mess me up more than it helped him. it’s okay to take space. doesn’t mean you don’t love him, just means you love yourself and your kids too. you’re not wrong for needing a break.
They are his kids too, so if you don’t mind lawyers getting involved, go for it.
NTA, You husband is NOT safe to be left with his children. Whatever his good qualities when he is in his right mind, this is a bridge too far. You need to get your kids to a safe place. Then, deal with your dude. He needs to prove to you that he is making progress, and not drinking, before you can ever even entertain the idea of going back.
Passed out drunk at 10pm with kids in the house? Not something to gloss over.
Uhh, it’s completely, utterly, absolutely unacceptable to leave two children like that unsupervised and you are extremely lucky nothing worse happened.
Is he getting treated for his mental health issues? You say he was diagnosed but is he going to therapy? Is he taking any medication?
Mental health issues can explain our idiosyncrasies to a degree but they do not define us and they are not valid excuses for destructive behaviors. Drinking is not an adequate or appropriate response to any sort of mental health episode in any situation, drinking while alone with your two infant children is unconscionable.
For the sake of you and your children you need to separate from this man until he deals with his issues appropriately and responsibly. NTA.
“it was just one drink.” He knows he has a problem with alcohol and even agreed not to drink around the kids – which he did while he was solely responsible for their care. You now know that you can’t trust him to take care of the children.
Your plan to leave until he gets proper treatment is a good one. NTA.
You can’t leave him with the kids. And he’s not likely to accept that, or he’ll try to turn that into ‘so don’t go out without me’.
So, given that, what’s the alternative?
I think you know the answer. The children’s safety must come first.
NTA
Total empathy for you and for him. I know BPD and the awful damage a hard life lived can do.
That said, s’pose you got home and he’d fallen asleep next to the baby then rolled on top of her…..maybe the toddler figured out the baby gate, went into the kitchen, and found some interesting blue liquid from under the sink to drink…..
how would you feel about his issues then…….? Same level of empathy and understanding….?
Do you think your KIDS, who are innocent in all this, utterly vulnerable – and have NO choice as to whether they get (un)supervised by their drunken irresponsible father putting them at risk because he’s upset – have any rights to the same empathy you’re giving him…..?
You’re using his BPD as an excuse to let him drink, be irresponsible, immature and downright dangerous around his own children…..the outcome could be, well, devastating.
If you choose to enable that by tolerating it and leaving things as they are, staying, hoping for the best because he’s a nice guy sometimes, and something happens to the children on his watch, you will be equally responsible and never forgive yourself……a sobering thought.
Your husband needs professional help, and if you leaving him will make him seek it, then by all means. BPD can be treated and probably should be if he is to be the father of two very young children.
But most of all, your loyalty should be with your kids. So NTA, and if you have the strength to do it, do it sooner rather than later!
You are kinda of answering your own questions…..BPD, arrested quite a few times, drinking, and.poor decision making with kids. I think it’s time you move forward away from him till he gets his shit together. You have two little ones who will grow up to be messed up adults if you stick around. NTAH
OP I need you to hear this and listen to this. BPD is a serious collection of symptoms and presents uniquely in each individual. But the one thing that is commonly found is that the person suffering from BPD will promise to change and promise you the earth but will rarely be able to deliver consistently.
You can love this man and have complete empathy for what he’s suffering from . But you have to understand that he is suffering from a chronic condition.
And you are a mother . You have to put your children first and putting them first means putting your welfare first.
Yes, some people with BPD do improve overtime and sometimes their symptoms disappear . But in the meantime, you have to keep yourself and your children safe because he cannot.
Please, please recognise that is sad and tragic as this is you have to make the right choice for you and your children .
He could live separately and come and see you guys if you don’t want to end it completely but he cannot ever be alone with the children and you cannot allow him to discipline the children. You have to see if he ever emotionally or physically harms them – if that happens once it’s done
You have to take charge of the situation
He left the kids unsupervised after only 1 drink?! Imagine if he had half a dozen. He’s clearly not safe to leave the kids with.
You’re NTA.
NTA. You take those kids, you get out of there, and you file for divorce. I grew up with an unstable alcoholic father. I wish mom had left him.
Drinking and BPD are two different things.
One can of hard lemonade passed him out though ?!?!?!
Obviously it’s scary as hell to cone and see your two defenseless children without defences.
On one of his good days explain this calmly to him. What you saw happen. If he’s a good man he’ll be horrified and sick.
Tell him he gets no more chances with drinking when he’s alone with the kids. It’ll be divorce. He has to want to peotect his babies. If he can’t muster that then he can’t be around putting them in danger.
Easy. NOR
>Long story short, he’s a great guy
oh sure, lets see how you immediately prove that otherwise.
>toxic, manipulative, abusive alcoholic
>struggles with drinking, it’s his outlet
Stories are always the same. Just leave and dont go back. This isnt even worth asking.
NTA but does he get fall down pass out drunk off one Mike’s hard
Is it possible he just fell asleep? Or do you suspect he actually had much more than the one bottle of hard lemonade and was drunk?
If he’s drunk around the kids, that’s a five alarm fire. But at the same time, one 5% beverage in front of the kids would be acceptable to most people. Minus the part where a child was left alone, obviously.
Obviously this situation is bad. But knowing if he’s actually inebriated around the kids is the difference between there being no excuse to discuss staying vs possibly trying to make some room him to fix this.
It’s up to you and what matters to you. If your vows don’t keep you in it what does. It’s all what all that really means to you and only you know that answer
NTA but can I make a suggestion? If he’s not getting much treatment now (and even if he is) try to get him to a psychiatrist for meds, and into DBT (Dialectic Behaviour Therapy).
DBT was created by a person with BPD for people with BPD, to help them manage their strong emotions and impulses without resorting to the behaviours that create problems in their lives. It is designed to help target things like drinking, self harm, binge eating – any impulsive behaviour that’s common to BPD. It was life changing for me, and I don’t even have BPD. If you want him to get to a place where he’s a responsible adult that you can leave your children with (which I’m assuming you are as you’re framing this as a temporary measure) this might be a good step in that direction. I wouldn’t usually advise women to take on responsibility for making their partners get the help they need, but I do want to give you information that aligns with what you’ve stated you want.
Also please be aware (if you’re not already) that one of the diagnostic criteria of BPD is making frantic attempts to avoid abandonment or perceived abandonment. Which might explain why he struggles so much while you’re away. If you do decide to take the kids away for a while, be 100% certain that that’s what you’re going to do, and stick to it: don’t go back and forth because that will be hell for you and the kids, as well as deeply cruel to him. And be prepared for a possible certain degree of backlash and mental illness decline as a result of it. Make sure you have a safe place to stay indefinitely, that you have support systems in place, and you’re financially ok to weather whatever happens with him as a result.
Hopefully he can get the help he needs to be the parent you and your kids need him to be. But this is not a process that happens quickly, and often the process of being left, even temporarily, adds a significant amount of time to the recovery period.
I’ve got more experience with alcoholics than I ever wanted so I’ll try and share some experience.
No one passes out after one drink, especially when their body is used to processing vast amounts of alcohol.
Alcoholics are not dumb. Even when intoxicated they can easily hide the evidence and expense of a habit.
Because of constant consumption, they can get to a point where they’re far above the legal drive limit or higher. They can appear completely sober while at this level. This is however where ‘one drink’ can suddenly push them to be passing out.
It’s important to remember that this isn’t really them. Addictions are very complex, especially when paired with other conditions. But it’s still their responsibility to manage and deal with. It’s not an excuse for bad behaviour.
Regarding your own sanity, you’ve got to protect yourself and your kids as a priority. You can only help someone that wants to help themselves. Be there for when he needs that help, but don’t hurt yourself or your kids to become a crutch or enabler.
Sorry that you’re going through this, good luck.
Yep. You need to get out of there and figure out coparenting
NTA – this is a case where the safety of your children should be top priority OP. You say it was just one drink. Would you be making that excuse if your children had been injured? Or worse?
The BPD is less of an issue here. It’s the alcoholism that’s the threat. You can’t help people who won’t help themselves. You know how on planes, the flight crew always say to put your own oxygen mask on first or you won’t be able to help others? That’s what you should do here. Help yourself so you can help your innocent children, and then maybe in future, if your husband puts in the time and effort it takes to get sober, then you can look at helping him.
It’s good you want to support him but you have 2 children now. They have to come first. If they don’t you risk them ending up with the same issues as there dad. Look into children of BPD suffers and children of alcoholics. You can help him change but you cannot force him. You need to prioritise your own and your children’s welfare first.
You’re going to get a bunch of judgmental reactions. But here’s the truth. (I’m an alcoholic. Legit) He’s too ashamed to get help. But he wants to quit. Unfortunately for non-alcoholics this dichotomy is very difficult to understand.
We alcoholics are two different personalities. We have to kill off our alcoholic personality. Silence it. Learn to recognize who’s who.
This requires therapy. Rehab. Before you break up the family (even if temporarily) and punish his shame, maybe talk about potentially leaving him and suggest rehab. But you have to do this when he’s sober, in the morning, when he’s most full of shame and open to defeating it.
You have to remember that he’s embarrassed that he doesn’t have control. If he feels attacked for that, he will double down that he does have control and then that voice in his head “you can just have one drink dude, you’re in control.” will reawaken that other personality again. This is our battle.
They say that admitting you’re an alcoholic is the first step. It should be reworded to admitting defeat, and acknowledging that we’re not in control.
All that said— I find it hard to believe that one drink would cause him to pass out. Alcoholics hide the other six. And they don’t suffer from hangovers. They suffer from withdrawals. If he’s waking up at 3am, unable to fall asleep, heart racing, high bp, sweating, he’s in withdrawal and he’s an alcoholic.
But if he’s having one drink and falling asleep next to his kid, he’s just a guy who upset his wife.
State your concerns. Talk. Good luck. Choose your timing based on what I wrote.
NTA. BPD is a personality disorder.( If we are talking borderline and not bipolar) Yes, there Can be improvement but BPD will always be there, and any improvement can only be maintained by ongoing committed actions and a willingness to be uncomfortable on an ongoing basis. People with BPD have to act against their instinct in ways that feel like life and death; the bottomless pit of feeling disconnection can’t ever be fed enough to be satisfied, but they can learn to behave in a way that respects boundaries and self regulates mood some of the time. It’s particularly hard for people with BPD to change when actually in a relationship because the relationship itself pushes all of the buttons regarding perceived abandonment and result in knee jerk reactions. If he’s not seeing a counselor and psychiatrist and trying really hard to change day to day habits, he most likely won’t actually change anything.
i wish my son’s mother would level off. i couldn’t be in a relationship with a Borderline person. fucking and impregnating one was a fucking task itself.
Bipolar has to do with brain chemistry. If your brain is lacking a certain chemical it won’t just magically appear after a certain amount of time.
It’s a lifelong illness. He needs to take his medication as prescribed if he wants a normal life.
Also alcohol can have negative side effects when combined with certain medications. Get him into alcoholics and emotions anonymous meetings.
If you won’t do that to make sure he gets help. Then yea consider divorce.
This isn’t really an asshole situation.
This isn’t his borderline personality disorder. This is alcoholism/binge drinking and being dangerous around children.
He did this deliberately to punish you so you wouldn’t go out again.
You need to take your babies and get an emergency custody order. I’m being serious.
My friend has diagnosed BPD. She’s never neglected her children like this. She’s in also treatment and is medicated.
NTA you put you and your kids first. Just because someone has BPD doesn’t excuse horrible behavior.
BPD can take years of treatment and hard work to get better, and some people never get better. There’s no guarantee he will get better in a short time frame or even get better at all. Take the kids and don’t go back.
Luckily, your kids were OK, but what if they weren’t. What if they’d injured themselves.
You need to take the kids somewhere safe. He violated a rule you both made, there needs to be consequences.
You are not reacting enough here.
Updateme
NTA. Most people have good sides and bad sides. Your husband is lovely at times, but absolutely awful at others. For the sake of your children you need to remove them from the situation.
and it’s never “just one drink”. It’s always “I only say evidence of just one drink”. An alcoholic isn’t always someone who needs a swig of vodka when they wake up before they can function. Most alcoholics can go weeks without a drink, but once they have one they keep drinking till they run out of money, alcohol or pass out. In his case he passed out.
I’m not liking what the ages are suggesting when y’all met.
31 is way too old to be that emotionally immature, it’s probably not going to improve at this point.
Leave permanently, he isn’t going to get help. This is also what a full blown alcoholic looks like.
Is this what you want to teach your kids a relationship looks like?
NTA
The safety of your kids come first.
But also: you mean Borderline Personality Disorder right? Because that shit does not fade with time and healing
!Update me
I have BPD myself, this kind of behaviour is inexcusable.
You can struggle with yourself and still choose to be responsible.
However, leaving him and taking the kids temporarily seems like a drastic move unless it’s done right.
He needs long term, extensive therapy.
More than likely group therapy (DBT or MBT). Temporarily taking his kids away from him, even though it’s probably for yours and the kids immediate best interest, can make him spiral.
He might even spiral so hard he never gets therapy, and never gets better.
Because he has to seek therapy to get better. It doesn’t fade on it’s own. Unchecked BPD does not improve, it festers and rots. There are tools you need to learn and drill in order to function properly. Just assuming it’s going to get better without putting the work in is a foolish and immature move.
The better, more stable move, would be to have the kids live with grandparents/appropriate guardians for a few weeks as he gets set up in therapy. If you leave him, without the intention of actually leaving him, he does not sound responsible enough to do what he needs to do.
One of the key trigger points of BPD is an irrational fear of rejection/abandonment.
If you just suddenly leave, even temporarily, it can function as a trauma he might never get over.
Even percieved rejection/abandonment can be enough to be traumatic.
If you want to stay in his life, you have to make it unoquivically clear you’re not going to leave.
If he’s forced to deal with your abandonment, as he’s supposed/forced to seek therapy, it might be too much for him. He sounds like he’s going to choose to drown his sorrows in alcohol and ignore therapy. I speak from experience, when addicts with untreated BPD are forced with hard decisions, rationality doesn’t win.
You’re gonna have to hold his hand unless you want to eventually, or possibly quite immediately, give up on your marriage.
But for any of it, absolutely any change at all, he has to want to get better on his own and for himself. You cannot force him into therapy, rehab or any of it, unless he wants to.
Would you be the asshole for leaving? No, probably not.
Would it be proactive, effective and legal? More than likely not.
But unless you’re ready to give up on your marriage forever, and give up on him being any kind of stable parent for your children ever, leaving him now would not be the way to go about it.
So make him realize, it’s therapy or nothing. Because eventually it’s going to be therapy, or nothing. And the sooner he goes to therapy, the easier it’s going to be for all of you.