Together We Rise: Towards Wholeness through Separation.
Our childhood wounds determine why we choose the partners we do, how we’ll behave, and what we’ll tolerate. If you are among the 50% that grew up with a secure attachment, you are fortunate. You have inherited a form of generational wealth not often talked about. Your brain was wired to look for “green flags.” Because of the trauma I experienced, red flags felt familiar. For those with trauma, love can be a battlefield. My work has been learning to put down swords and put up boundaries. It’s made me decide to walk away from my marriage.
I grew up desperately craving connection, but also fearing rejection and abandonment. It most likely started with developing failure to thrive after five months in the NICU and continued through thirty surgeries in childhood, culminating with the death of my dad just after my seventeenth birthday. Mix in the mental health issues in the household, and I can see now that chaos, or the threat of it, was my constant companion. As adolescence arrived, this carried over into my romantic relationships. I would rush in, completely lose myself, and then just as quickly, create conflict in an effort to retrieve my sense of self. It was a push, pull cycle. This caused me to sabotage relationships with all green flags. My subconscious mind craved chaos and conflict. So when I met my husband, I was drawn to him like a moth to a flame. “You don’t have to do this,” my mother had said, just before my brother walked me down the aisle. But each step down that aisle felt fated. There were lessons to learn and patterns to repeat.
The night of our wedding, my cousin broke my uncle’s nose. I went to grab a bag of peas for my uncle when my cousin stepped out in front of me. I smacked him across the face, I was so angry and hurt that they were doing this on our special day. Unfortunately, the police had been called, and they wanted to arrest me. My husband, a federal prosecutor at the time, managed to talk them out of arresting me on our wedding day. When we got back to my uncle with the peas, my aunt threw her arms out wide and announced to my new husband, with just a hint of irony, “Welcome to our happy family!” We all laughed, and life went on.
When we first got married, I was just as combative as he was, swords up all the time. I was easily triggered, quick to anger, and as one of my brothers said at our wedding, “Had a really nasty temper.” A few months into our marriage however, he had an explosive episode. I took him to Chapel Hill for a diagnosis: Intermittent Explosive Disorder. Not wanting to accept the diagnosis, the acronym of which is IED, the human version of a ticking time bomb, I took him to the Mayo clinic. The diagnosis was Bipolar 2. It was then that I realized that diagnosis was a subjective craft, influenced as much by the perspective of the professional as the statistical manual. Meds were prescribed, and they helped somewhat, so we soldiered on.
Looking back as a clinician, I also may have also met the criteria for a mental health diagnosis: high functioning borderline personality disorder. It is often seen in individuals with a significant amount of trauma. Swinging between fear of abandonment and engulfment and explosive rage are hallmark traits of BPD, which explains why, after rushing into relationships because of my anxious attachment, I then sabotaged them once intimacy began to be established. I never self-harmed, but I did have suicidal thoughts. There are four subtypes of BPD: petulant, impulsive, discouraged, and self-destructive. In my twenties, I would most likely have fallen into the impulsive category: spending sprees, speeding tickets, and drinking were the norm. When I met my husband, all my previous romantic relationships had ended at the fourteen-month mark. I married him fourteen months in, hoping for the best. Back then, I would have most likely fallen into the petulant category. I had a strong need to be in control. In the middle of one argument, my husband kicked a windshield out. In the next argument, I did the same. Gracefully, the guy at Glassdoctor pretended to be confused.
A few years into our marriage, I discovered energy healing. I finally had a tool to remove the layers of anger, sadness, and fear that had been stuck in my body, brain, and energy field for so long. After three years of healing, I was able to have my first biological child after being told I wouldn’t. He became my reason for healing. Ten years later, I am working on surrendering and releasing my need to be in control. These days, I would most likely fall into the “discouraged” category, which is also known as “quiet type.” It is the highest functioning of the subtypes. Ideally, the diagnosis is a tool to help therapists best understand how to support our healing, so my putting the puzzle pieces together matters.
My “therapy” has been energy healing, self care practices, and building my ability to introspect and reflect. I have not used meds to this point, but I am not opposed to them. Studies show that Borderline has about a 50% genetic component and 50% is due to environmental exposure or trauma. Women with BPD will show increased symptoms during adolescence and perimenopause, suggesting a connection to fluctuating hormones. Studies also show increased cortisol levels in patients with BPD. I suspect there is an underlying tendency to have high cortisol levels, and then trauma and stress elevate the stress hormone even more, creating the symptoms. Magnesium has been a game changer. It lowers cortisol levels and keeps my nervous system from going into “fight or flight” mode, eliminating my angry outbursts.
Within the container of my marriage, I’ve overcome fifteen years of chronic fatigue syndrome, cancer, walked through the grief of losing all four of my siblings, gave birth to two boys and helped raise two others, gotten a graduate certificate and masters degree, and navigated two careers. Through it all, my husband has been devoted to our family and me. I’m grateful for him and for our eighteen years together. However, we’ve stagnated. My father used to say that a relationship either evolves or it dies. I no longer want a relationship of codependent cycles, of sarcastic comments and mutual resentments. Ironically, this separation is a sign of how much healing we’ve both done. We’re not very compatible. Our marriage was a trauma bond.
A few weeks ago, I ran down to the river with my dogs. I was meditating on the shore when a symbol that looked like a Moravian star came into my mind’s eye. I asked my higher self what the symbol was here to heal, and I heard “ego death.” Ego death is a term that refers to the deconstructing of walls the ego has built to protect someone, but that have become maladaptive, either preventing the person from progressing on their path or connecting with others. I pulled the symbol into my heart with my breath while visualizing it until I felt the sweet relief of the shedding of pain.
Since that sacred ceremony on the shore, I am able to catch when I start to spiral into shame and stop it, then validate myself. I am able to acknowledge my role and responsibility in this relationship. I had just as much to heal as he did, if not more. I’m able to see the borderline traits in my history, my family’s history, and my husband's narcissistic traits. As a result, I have reached out to a therapist who specializes in cluster B disorders to be evaluated and get help with continuing the healing process. The boys have noticed a positive change in me since using this symbol. Since our ten year old is a Star Wars fan, we are affectionately calling this symbol the “Ego Death Star."
In the fall my husband will go back to work, and by the spring he will move into a cottage down the street, remaining a daily fixture in the boys' lives. Over the next nine months, as we birth this new beginning for our family, we’ll be focused on healing while we figure out the financials. We have added “W” for “walk away” to RAG (regulate, take accountability, acknowledgement, and gratitude), and we are all practicing it. In making this move, literally and figuratively, we’re burning down the life we built, but we’re creating fertile soil for new growth on our family tree. He has spoken publicly about his mental health struggles as a mental health advocate for the North Carolina Lawyer Assistance Program. After each program, people would come up to tell him that they felt less alone after listening to his story. We share a passion for mental health advocacy, and we’re hoping that our story will give others hope for healing.
From the ashes of our old life, we will rise as we grow together. We will still be a family, but separate spaces will give us the space we need to continue healing without perpetuating our codependent pattern. The boys’ dad and I are learning to coparent without being a couple. As we navigate this transition, the boys’ wellbeing is our top priority. Their peace comes from our peace. The other day I played Hungry Hippo with them. I won three times in a row, prompting our ten-year-old to say “See mom, you’re happy, so the universe is rewarding you with winning. That’s how it works.” Yes, son, that’s how it works.
