Emotional Blackmail

During my separation from my now XBPW, I was subjected to tremendous emotional blackmail. Probably the worst of it was when she threatened that if I were to divorce her, she would commit suicide, and that she would take our children with her when she did so. She talked in detail about driving the car off of a high cliff and surfing the net for ways to commit suicide.

Obviously, since suicide has a high incidence amongst people with bpd traits, I took this threat very seriously. It slowed me down a lot, probably delayed the inevitable divorce for nearly a year.

I didn't have enough proof of this emotional blackmail to take to a judge, so I was stuck dealing with it the best I could on my own. It was truly terrible because I love my children very much and didn't want to see them sucked down with their mother on her death spiral.

Was I wrong in allowing my ex to blackmail me in this fashion? Maybe yes, maybe no. I guess everyone has to decide for themselves. Because of the seriousness of the consequence, I felt justified in allowing this to partially succeed, at least for a while so she could pull herself together just a bit.

Since then, I've thought on many occasions that I should have drawn a line and said, "I will not be subjected to your emotional blackmail. I can't prevent what you might do. It won't be my fault and I'm sorry that you feel so much pain that you think that's a viable option. Would you like some professional help?" But I simply don't know what she would have done. I do know that I'm very glad to have my children alive and in my life at least some of the time. I can't imagine what I would have felt like if she had delivered on her threat.

In most cases, where the blackmail is of a fairly minor nature compared to this, I think giving in to emotional blackmail is a lot like a government negotiating with terrorists. It's a bad idea, that can lead to higher and higher levels of emotional blackmail. I do wish that I had been aware enough of this phenomenon to have seen it coming, and stopped it before it got to such an elevated level. Maybe some of the pain could have been avoided.

-A Recovering Non

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