Dear Sean:

You wrote that there are two sides to every story, suggesting that she may be in the right after all. But it is impossible, absolutely impossible (0% chance) for her to be in the right for hitting her daughter, saying nasty things to her, raging at a three years old. There are no two ways of looking at this: child abuse is wrong from any and every angle you look at it.

What an abusive person does is to blame the victim for feeling anger at the abuser. This is further abuse because it is only natural for a victim of an attack (and here a series of ongoing attacks) to feel anger. It is an automatic reaction. Blaming the victim is part of the abuse. I hope that through your therapy you will finally see it as it is.

You wrote that you are weak. Acting weakly is not a life sentence. I was weak and I am getting stronger. So can you. In spite of the fear, in small steps, take reality in, relax into it the best you can. You have to SEE reality as it is, accept it before you see how to move forward.

Her behavior is classical Borderline Personality Disorder, but the diagnosis is useless unless she was interested and willing to enter psychotherapy. It is useless, means nothing. She was not born with the symptoms fitting the diagnosis, she became who she became, a tool of destruction.

Stay away from any effort to reconnect with her as a wife or such a partner with this one exception: the two of you attend psychotherapy where her BPD behaviors are addressed, while she takes responsibility for her behavior and STOPS abusing her children, immediately, before anything proceeds. No waiting until she heals before she stops abusing her children. Stop first, be given the tools to manage her distress without abusing.

If that happened, then there would be hope. Otherwise, you can walk on egg shells all you want, all you can, be an expert of how not to trigger a crazy person- and you will fail. Guaranteed.

anita