I feel my wife has untreated Borderline Personality Disorder but she would never admit to it or accept help. She has all the symptoms though. How can I navigate still having a successful marriage and bringing kids into the picture?

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By having her agree to go to therapy as a condition for staying in the marriage, even if you go together at first or the entire time.

This is a touchy, not-to-be-taken-lightly diagnosis (should she actually receive that) and has major negative implications for raising children without the skills and/or medication to support improvement and more consistently maintain stability. It will also continue to shred your relationship as spouses.

Assuming you have a strong health package, get yourself (literally you alone) some EAP sessions to initially start talking or a regular therapist to start hashing out a real plan on what to do. Nothing on Fishbowl will help you with this in real life.

Note: You can do as you wish but not only is my partner a trained psychotherapy clinician, I'm also a person who grew up with an adult that deliberately didn't seek any help for their severe mental health issues even though we had access to resources -- I can assure you that there will be major problems if neither of you do anything.

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I would suggest trying couples therapy first. It's likely that she is aware of these issues herself but doesn't know how to change or maybe she can feel like it's completely beyond her control. I fit some of these symptoms (especially around my period) but am very self aware and able to reason myself out of my worst fears/assumptions 95% of the time. That's due to therapy and being on Wellbutrin, and also working on sleep, nutrition, and exercise. If you try therapy together, it might open the door for her to do therapy alone and find out some of these things on her own. But don't take it upon yourself to diagnose her, that wont' be good for either of you.

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I cannot see a doctor with a million dollar education in this healthcare climate

Sounds like my mom! My dad (classic no-feelings boomer) just pretended there was no problem and the whole family (3 kids) has no fewer than 1000 trauma stories per person as a result.

BPD is a nightmare without regular family therapy and treatment. Your wife needs to become self aware but it could take years of couples counseling and individual therapy on both your sides. When your kids come around i hope you have good health insurance.

As my mom gets older the hardest part is seeing her struggle with loneliness and depression and be the maker of her own turmoil. She cannot hold friends because no one wants to be with her.

You are the critical person in the situation to normalize the family’s need for external support to become stronger communicators to each other and build trust. If you think you can’t do this I wouldn’t just consider not having kids but also divorce. My mother—untreated for decades—has wrought so much arrogant emotional destruction and my father has just absorbed decades of fighting and screaming as if it’s normal. We have never had a normal family gathering or vacation. Multiple family members are estranged. People have committed self harm. As the ghost of christmas future i hope this helps outline your worst case scenario.

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What symptoms?

I have already reported “Product Manager 1” but can others please as well. I have a sense of humor but either he’s trolling or he’s in the middle of a psychotic episode

Get help yourself. It's hard enough when you're "fine" but expecting someone else who is not "fine" to do get help is wishful thinking. A good therapist will help you navigate this because such things are rarely a one off.

Ask her to get help i.e therapy. If she refuses tell her it will lead to divorce.
If she has bpd she will have abondonement issues. She might agree for therapy that way

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