What happened at counseling?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anyway, I've totally hijacked this thread and I didn't want to - I just don't like hearing the "abusive behavior" tossed around lightly.

This is OP, and you have totally gotten on my nerves AND highjacked my thread. Maybe my DH is abusive, maybe he isn't. I don't actually take the term lightly. It's actually a very complicated situation because life is complicated, it isn't as easy as me saying "Oh, he's abusive and I have to leave." There are children involved, our very intertwined lives, etc. Plus, people change and go through all kinds of changes in their life where they aren't on their best behavior. There's a lot more than that, and I didn't want to get into it because that's not what I wanted the thread to be about, so I changed my wording. But I take it back.

Also, I agree with the pp who said that you didn't go into counseling in good faith and you basically railroaded your fiance and the therapist. You just wanted validation for leaving. I now wonder how self-aware you are at all.

NP here. I'm a little surprised you're so hostile towards that PP. Obviously, his situation was different than yours- at least I'm assuming your husband isn't borderline. He simply stated his experience in therapy. And if you've never been in a relationship with someone who's borderline, I don't think you can understand the level of manipulation and chaos they need in their relationships.

I get it- you want to hear stories from couples who went to counseling together and fixed their relationship together and then rode into the sunset on a unicorn farting rainbows. But that doesn't always happen. Especially for folks with BPD.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Curious to know what kind of things were on that list

It rubs the lotion on its skin. It does this whenever it is told.

You know, that makes me laugh. It's frighteningly close to the truth.

There was very little physical violence - only one or two outbursts where she attacked me - and the size/strength differential meant that there wasn't much physical damage inflicted. However, it did scare me, because I knew any conflict could then escalate, and I wanted no part of that, ever.

It has been over ten years now, and I long ago purged my life and got rid of everything, so I don't have the list and honestly, I've tried to forget I ever let this happen to me - it's humiliating and you feel like a complete fool - and your mind cleans up the past. Most of the items centered around how I was cruel, abusive and exploitative of her, with detailed examples of what exactly I'd "done" (literal actions in each case) that was cruel or abusive; none of it made any sense. This is part of how an abuser keeps you feeling Fear, Obligation and Guilt, which is what they use to control you and keep you around and under their thumb (also: sex). It wasn't that she loved me - it was just that she was terrified of being abandoned. Once it was clearly over, for good (and I literally ran away on foot), and she was out of my house, she never said another word to me. I found out about a year later that she'd moved onto another guy in about two weeks.

Anyway, I've totally hijacked this thread and I didn't want to - I just don't like hearing the "abusive behavior" tossed around lightly.

Why do you think the OP has "tossed around lightly" any topic of abuse. Her OP was pretty vague. It's interesting that you immediately think she's just tossing it around lightly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's a great story- thanks for sharing.

I'm curious, did the therapist ever acknowledge that he'd been hoodwinked in the first two sessions? Kudos to you for documenting the craziness but damn, that could have gone really badly if you hadn't been so proactive.

I'm glad to have shared.

No, he absolutely didn't admit it. I do not think this is terribly uncommon however, particularly with BPD pts. I didn't bother going back - the setup was for couples therapy, so you see that T together. I was already seeing someone on my own and continued.

To the people saying "that wasn't what the OP was looking for": the OP said "emotionally abusive". I offered an example of what couples therapy worked out like where abuse was involved. Either OP shouldn't be so casual about using that term, or she should heed the warning. You post, you get an answer, not just the cheerleading confirmation you want to hear.

And to the person who says I went in with an ulterior motive: no, I went in and played it completely straight. And I followed - in good faith - exactly what the recommendations were and worked the steps...I didn't skip anything or manipulate...I managed to stop being manipulated. Way to blame the victim though. If I ever encountered a situation where the gaslighting left me feeling like I needed to write things down or tape record them again, I wouldn't bother with therapy, I'd just leave. I did do a lot of therapy on my own to see why I was drawn to the crazy, and I recognize it a lot of faster now, so there's no way I'm getting into that position again.

What a complete load of crap. You're telling everyone that you actually sat there, and intently listened to everything your former fiance said, and IN GOOD FAITH wrote down TWO PAGES of things that you had to work on, and then dutifully presented them to the counselor under the assumption that you were actually going to commit to working on those issues?! Bullshit. You went in there with your two pages of crap to stick it to her (as you should have, based on what you said). But don't come on here and act like THAT'S COUNSELING. That's nothing close to counseling. That was you needing a third party to see what was going on to exit in a way that made it safe/validating for you. That's fine, but that's not counseling.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anyway, I've totally hijacked this thread and I didn't want to - I just don't like hearing the "abusive behavior" tossed around lightly.

This is OP, and you have totally gotten on my nerves AND highjacked my thread. Maybe my DH is abusive, maybe he isn't. I don't actually take the term lightly. It's actually a very complicated situation because life is complicated, it isn't as easy as me saying "Oh, he's abusive and I have to leave." There are children involved, our very intertwined lives, etc. Plus, people change and go through all kinds of changes in their life where they aren't on their best behavior. There's a lot more than that, and I didn't want to get into it because that's not what I wanted the thread to be about, so I changed my wording. But I take it back.

Also, I agree with the pp who said that you didn't go into counseling in good faith and you basically railroaded your fiance and the therapist. You just wanted validation for leaving. I now wonder how self-aware you are at all.

LOL! I bet if every marriage counselor had a dime for every time they heard that one...

Look OP, do you really honestly believe that you are the exact first person ever in the entire world to face the situation you are in? Your situation is a dime a dozen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anyway, I've totally hijacked this thread and I didn't want to - I just don't like hearing the "abusive behavior" tossed around lightly.

This is OP, and you have totally gotten on my nerves AND highjacked my thread. Maybe my DH is abusive, maybe he isn't. I don't actually take the term lightly. It's actually a very complicated situation because life is complicated, it isn't as easy as me saying "Oh, he's abusive and I have to leave." There are children involved, our very intertwined lives, etc. Plus, people change and go through all kinds of changes in their life where they aren't on their best behavior. There's a lot more than that, and I didn't want to get into it because that's not what I wanted the thread to be about, so I changed my wording. But I take it back.

Also, I agree with the pp who said that you didn't go into counseling in good faith and you basically railroaded your fiance and the therapist. You just wanted validation for leaving. I now wonder how self-aware you are at all.

LOL! I bet if every marriage counselor had a dime for every time they heard that one...

Look OP, do you really honestly believe that you are the exact first person ever in the entire world to face the situation you are in? Your situation is a dime a dozen.

To be fair, most of the time by the time couples end up in counseling it is a very complicated situation. It may be a dime a dozen but that doesn't make it less true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anyway, I've totally hijacked this thread and I didn't want to - I just don't like hearing the "abusive behavior" tossed around lightly.

This is OP, and you have totally gotten on my nerves AND highjacked my thread. Maybe my DH is abusive, maybe he isn't. I don't actually take the term lightly. It's actually a very complicated situation because life is complicated, it isn't as easy as me saying "Oh, he's abusive and I have to leave." There are children involved, our very intertwined lives, etc. Plus, people change and go through all kinds of changes in their life where they aren't on their best behavior. There's a lot more than that, and I didn't want to get into it because that's not what I wanted the thread to be about, so I changed my wording. But I take it back.

Also, I agree with the pp who said that you didn't go into counseling in good faith and you basically railroaded your fiance and the therapist. You just wanted validation for leaving. I now wonder how self-aware you are at all.

LOL! I bet if every marriage counselor had a dime for every time they heard that one...

Look OP, do you really honestly believe that you are the exact first person ever in the entire world to face the situation you are in? Your situation is a dime a dozen.

Where did I say my situation was unique? It's definitely NOT unique. I am annoyed with the pp who highjacked the thread by assuming that I am "tossing around" the term emotional abuse lightly, when you can't really determine that based on the two sentences or whatever that I wrote. But I didn't want to talk about that,

I just wanted to hear about what other people are doing in couples counseling! Really!

[Anonymous]

There are two problems with couples counseling. One is that people rarely, if ever, both go into it with good faith intentions of doing what they can to make the relationship better. They are going to plead their case and have an authority figure tell the other person how wrong they are. Second, establishing rapport is the cornerstone of effective therapy and it can't be done with two people who are at odds with each other.

I had a bad counseling experience that the wise list maker's story brought back to me in vivid detail. For the first couple of sessions dh rambled on and on about how terrible I was and brought up example after example of the horrible things I had done. It was almost incoherent and consisted of little snippets of things I had said either during an argument or after putting up with some weird bs from him. He didn't ever explain anything in detail, like we disagreed about x, she said y, then I said z. It was all she said this, and she does this, and she told me this, with no context whatsoever. It was hard for me to figure out what he even was referring to and some of the things were just plain made up. The therapist's response was to say, "wow, that all sounds very terrible; if everything is as bad as you say, why have you stayed in this relationship for so long?" To me it sounded like she was mocking him, but he took it very seriously and claimed he didn't know why he had put up with me for so long.

At the next session, I scrambled to take notes while he was on his diatribe in the hopes we could discuss each specific comment in detail. Well, that really ticked him off and made me look bad because his response was to complain that he couldn't concentrate while I was taking notes and I wasn't paying attention and hearing him out.

So how stupid was I to sit there and pay money to listen to him tell someone what a horrible person I was. I wish it had occurred to me to use wlm's strategy. What I should have done was walk out and keep walking.

[Anonymous]

The marital counselor in my case was hoodwinked too, but it was for months and months and more than $10k in out of pocket therapy bills.

EX ended up being diagnosed as NPD, possible sociopath many years later.

[Anonymous]

Ok, so...

did anyone not married or engaged to a psycho person go through marriage counseling? Did anyone go into it in good faith and have a decent experience?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ok, so...

did anyone not married or engaged to a psycho person go through marriage counseling? Did anyone go into it in good faith and have a decent experience?

No.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are two problems with couples counseling. One is that people rarely, if ever, both go into it with good faith intentions of doing what they can to make the relationship better. They are going to plead their case and have an authority figure tell the other person how wrong they are. Second, establishing rapport is the cornerstone of effective therapy and it can't be done with two people who are at odds with each other.

I had a bad counseling experience that the wise list maker's story brought back to me in vivid detail. For the first couple of sessions dh rambled on and on about how terrible I was and brought up example after example of the horrible things I had done. It was almost incoherent and consisted of little snippets of things I had said either during an argument or after putting up with some weird bs from him. He didn't ever explain anything in detail, like we disagreed about x, she said y, then I said z. It was all she said this, and she does this, and she told me this, with no context whatsoever. It was hard for me to figure out what he even was referring to and some of the things were just plain made up. The therapist's response was to say, "wow, that all sounds very terrible; if everything is as bad as you say, why have you stayed in this relationship for so long?" To me it sounded like she was mocking him, but he took it very seriously and claimed he didn't know why he had put up with me for so long.

At the next session, I scrambled to take notes while he was on his diatribe in the hopes we could discuss each specific comment in detail. Well, that really ticked him off and made me look bad because his response was to complain that he couldn't concentrate while I was taking notes and I wasn't paying attention and hearing him out.

So how stupid was I to sit there and pay money to listen to him tell someone what a horrible person I was. I wish it had occurred to me to use wlm's strategy. What I should have done was walk out and keep walking.


Yes, I can completely relate with this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are two problems with couples counseling. One is that people rarely, if ever, both go into it with good faith intentions of doing what they can to make the relationship better. They are going to plead their case and have an authority figure tell the other person how wrong they are. Second, establishing rapport is the cornerstone of effective therapy and it can't be done with two people who are at odds with each other.

I had a bad counseling experience that the wise list maker's story brought back to me in vivid detail. For the first couple of sessions dh rambled on and on about how terrible I was and brought up example after example of the horrible things I had done. It was almost incoherent and consisted of little snippets of things I had said either during an argument or after putting up with some weird bs from him. He didn't ever explain anything in detail, like we disagreed about x, she said y, then I said z. It was all she said this, and she does this, and she told me this, with no context whatsoever. It was hard for me to figure out what he even was referring to and some of the things were just plain made up. The therapist's response was to say, "wow, that all sounds very terrible; if everything is as bad as you say, why have you stayed in this relationship for so long?" To me it sounded like she was mocking him, but he took it very seriously and claimed he didn't know why he had put up with me for so long.

At the next session, I scrambled to take notes while he was on his diatribe in the hopes we could discuss each specific comment in detail. Well, that really ticked him off and made me look bad because his response was to complain that he couldn't concentrate while I was taking notes and I wasn't paying attention and hearing him out.

So how stupid was I to sit there and pay money to listen to him tell someone what a horrible person I was. I wish it had occurred to me to use wlm's strategy. What I should have done was walk out and keep walking.


Yes, I can completely relate with this.

Sorry, meant to write I can completely relate TO this. Marital Counseling is a dream come true for manipulative spouses.

[Anonymous]

Wow. This is discouraging. Take note, pps who are always encouraging counseling!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For us, DH has been somewhat emotionally abusive and the counselor is not afraid to call him out on it, which was a relief for me and makes me feel less crazy. I waver between thinking things are fixable and thinking that this is my last step in this marriage and that it is likely we are going to separate, but I'm glad we're doing it anyway.

I'm the "hijacker". I came back to see what else was posted. I'm sorry I POed the OP.

Re-reading the OP, I remembered that before I went off on my original rant, I had meant to respond to this PP. I had meant in my response to be supportive (feeling less crazy) and say:

1) It's actually really great the T called your husband out on his behavior, and I hope that did give you some validation that it's not all in your head and you might be dealing with someone who is manipulating you.

2) My point in my story about my ex was that some things aren't worth fixing and there's no point in putting yourself through therapy. For therapy to work, both people have to honestly want to make changes and to be engaged in the process.

Despite people thinking I was sandbagging my ex, I was the one who asked for us to go and was not so much trying to get someone else to tell her what was wrong, but to try to nail down a lot of very slippery issues - to get to the heart of them and resolve them. It might have actually worked with me doing exactly what I did if the issues weren't so confused and contradictory...I actually wanted the therapist to help me (and her) untangle them and get to the heart of them. I'd spent three years jumping through hoops and trying all sorts of things - turning myself inside and out - to try to fix things and make her happy.

My original point to the OP was that she should be circumspect and take care of herself - not get sucked into months and thousands of dollars of therapy like a PP for no good reason. Clearly my original response went off on a tangent and didn't express this part clearly. The add-on about casual accusations of abuse made this even worse. My apologies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm the "hijacker". My apologies.

You don't need to apologize if your ex was truly BPD. People who have never been involved with Axis II folks don't understand. OP wanted tales of sunshine and rainbows, its okay that you didn't have one to share. Although in a roundabout way, yours is.