Why Do They Want Them Back?

[Think About It...]

I've read LOTS of posts.  I don't respond to most because I don't feel like I've "been" where they are.

In SO many, I see a trend.  The writer talks about all the awful things that happened in the relationship...the rages, the abuse, the lying, the cheating, the rude letters, texts, emails and phone calls...

And then talks as if they miss them terribly and want them back!

Why is this?  Are they still enmeshed?  Still in the FOG?

I think of myself and what happened with my uBPDexbf and uNPDexH.  I "taught them how to treat me" (to use a Dr. Phil-ism).  But there's no way I'd go back!

I wish there was a way I could do a two-tiered poll. It would go something like this:

Select the choice that applies to you:

1.

a) My BPDex left/broke up with me.

b) I broke up with my BPDex.


2.

a)  I want to get back together with my BPDex.

b)  I do not want to get back together with my BPDex.


I would be VERY interested to see the results of such a poll...and to see if my theory is correct, that most of the people who want to get back with their BPDex feel that way because their ex left/broke up with them and they feel confused/like they have had no closure.

Thoughts on this anyone?

Moderators:  I completely understand if I've put this in the wrong place.  Move it all you like.  

[~C]

I've read LOTS of posts.  I don't respond to most because I don't feel like I've "been" where they are.

In SO many, I see a trend.  The writer talks about all the awful things that happened in the relationship...the rages, the abuse, the lying, the cheating, the rude letters, texts, emails and phone calls...

And then talks as if they miss them terribly and want them back!

Why is this?  Are they still enmeshed?  Still in the FOG?

I think of myself and what happened with my uBPDexbf and uNPDexH.  I "taught them how to treat me" (to use a Dr. Phil-ism).  But there's no way I'd go back!

I wish there was a way I could do a two-tiered poll. It would go something like this:

Select the choice that applies to you:

1.

a) My BPDex left/broke up with me.

b) I broke up with my BPDex.


2.

a)  I want to get back together with my BPDex.

b)  I do not want to get back together with my BPDex.


I would be VERY interested to see the results of such a poll...and to see if my theory is correct, that most of the people who want to get back with their BPDex feel that way because their ex left/broke up with them and they feel confused/like they have had no closure.

Thoughts on this anyone?

Moderators:  I completely understand if I've put this in the wrong place.  Move it all you like.  

[busybee1116]

I think it's part of the fantasy that somehow that person (in my case my mother) will somehow act normal and love me and/or behave like a normal person.  Wishing for what you don't have I guess.  And unlearning things in my case--growing up a certain way makes some things normal and even though I know it's not healthy, it's familiar and easy to back into those habits or to feel comfortable with craziness.

I also found it interesting in a thread that had a whole bunch of different types of personality tests with graphs for how members of the forum responded that there were a lot of narcissistic and BPD traits amongst us members...so probably some fleas and drama-lovers amongst us

[1989]

I can say with all honesty that no one (parents, friends, ex bfs) had ever loved me like he did when we were first together. (In my two previous relationships I had been the one who loved them and they sometimes wanted to be with me.) My ex w/BPD never tired of me, he never criticized me, he adored me.  I felt so safe and secure in his love that I finally allowed myself to love him very deeply with no fear of abandonment.  I had never loved like that before or since.   Losing him has been the MOST painful experience of my life.  Wanting him back was just to make that pain go away.  

My mother was Borderline and treated me exactly the same way.  I was either adored or detested, so his treatment of me was perfectly "normal" to me.  I thought he would eventually come to "love" me again, if he would just allow it to happen.  

I know my logic at the time was so twisted, but I did not know what a healthy relationship was until just a few years ago.  I nearly threw away a sixteen year marriage because although I loved my husband, I never felt intense feelings for him (because he never once put me through hell; he never once put me on a pedestal and then knocked me off it).

It took over a year of therapy for me to learn what "love" is and how it is supposed to feel. 

[GettinStronger]

C -

I broke up with my BPDx and I dont want him back.  I wish he was the person he portrayed to be in the beginning.  But he's not and now i'm not the same person and I have no desire to go back down that road with him.

[GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENT: Are you on the right board?]

GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENT: Are you on the right board? This board is for members with failed or failing relationships that want to detach from their relationship and relationship wounds. If you are still analyzing the decision to stay, please post on Undecided: Staying or Leaving All members living with a pwBPD should learn to use the Stop the Bleeding tools - boundaries, timeouts and other basic tools - to better manage the day to day interactions with your partner. If you have questions on any of the tools, feel free to go over to Staying: Improving a Relationship with a Borderline Partner and ask for help. :-)

[soul]

I loved her and left.

I never want to see her again.

[patientandclear]

I had never loved like that before or since.   Losing him has been the MOST painful experience of my life.  Wanting him back was just to make that pain go away.

I think this is the core of it: the pain of this loss is excruciating and there is no clear way out of it; it is hard not to hope to fix the pain by reversing what caused it (the loss of the loved one).

I also think many who write about the feeling of wanting the pwBPD back don't mean that literally, in the sense that, if we were given the choice, we would say "sure, let's try again."  Instead, we are using "I want him/her back" as shorthand to say they (we) want to have again the feeling that we had when we were happily together with that person.  It is not that strange to want to return to a place and situation that was the opposite of painful.  Even if we know intellectually that that is not possible.

[Mauser]

"When she was good, she was very very good, but when she was bad, she was horrid."

I don't want my total-package ex back. I want the Dr. Jekyll part of the ex back. The illusion back. The Mr. Hyde half I want to drop-kick across the globe.  And it isn't even the Mr Hyde "half". It's the Mr. Hyde 20%. The 80% Dr Jekyll was something I would trade my eye teeth for.

Intellectually, I know they are forever intertwined. And that's a pity.

[~C]

So to all those who want their BPDex back (who haven't mentioned it in their post)...

Did they leave you, or did you leave them?

It seems that those of us in the most pain (or who dealt with the most pain after the r/s ended) are those who were left; who did not choose the breakup.

As a followup question:  Were you completely taken by surprise, or did you know, based on their previous patterns, that it was coming? 

"When she was good, she was very very good, but when she was bad, she was horrid."

I don't want my total-package ex back. I want the Dr. Jekyll part of the ex back. The illusion back. The Mr. Hyde half I want to drop-kick across the globe.  And it isn't even the Mr Hyde "half". It's the Mr. Hyde 20%. The 80% Dr Jekyll was something I would trade my eye teeth for.

Intellectually, I know they are forever intertwined. And that's a pity.

I understand that the 80% was great...it was in my r/s too.  But for me, that 20% poisoned the rest.  It ended up outweighing all the good stuff.  I resented him, even in the good times, because I knew that those good times always cycled back to the crappy stuff.  It was just a matter of time before he went all waif-y and pathetic again. 

[patientandclear]

First, I was left -- out of the blue.  I didn't remotely see it coming.  According to him, until that moment, "everything is and will be great!"

If I had had accurate information about his romantic history, I would totally have seen it coming (and would never have plunged so quickly and deeply into a relationship of trust & confidence with him).  But he made sure I didn't have an accurate picture.

Then a few months later, we discussed getting back together.  He wanted to.  I did too, but had pre-conditions (he needed to figure out what happened the first time, not just assume or hope it wouldn't happen again).  Not sure if it was because of that condition, or because the same feelings that had caused him to push away the first time re-emerged as soon as I told him I loved him ... but after a few days, it was clear he was pulling back.  He said it was on the advice of a therapist who was concerned that he would hurt me again and who urged him to explore whether he should not be in a relationship at all.  I simultaneously said I didn't want the low-level engagement he was still offering me without commitment or much intimacy because we had gone too far before for that to be anything but sad and hurtful.  I thought we agreed to be apart and be friends while he worked on his relationship issues in therapy.  But a few weeks later, I realized he was reaching out in a significant way to a former gf, and I ended contact firmly but warmly.  We've been basically in that posture since (& he is back together with the old gf).

So that's a long way of saying he left ... but I did enough limit-setting and line-drawing that I also feel guilty and perpetually second-guess whether, had I just remained connected with him, maybe it could have played out differently.  And the pain comes from both, unfortunately.

[rickstone]

no (at least not for me)

its not whether they broke up with you and theres no closure.
its not looking back at all the great moments (there werent that many) and hoping they'll come back.
Its not hoping theyll turn into something great or suddenly come out of their illness.

its the letters and notes she wrote.  im a writer and words is what touches me.  they werent eloquent.
they werent grandiose.  they were just simple and heartfelt sentiments of joy and love.
ive had them from other girlfriends but they didnt quite touch me like hers.
even if they were fleeting moments.  there in her head for an hour, gone the next day.

its like shangri-la.  you know its there.  youve heard about it. youve seen glimpes of it and talked to people first hand about it,
but then someone shows you all this evidence that it doesnt and even didnt exist.  it was all in your head.
but you dont beleive it.  did I see it, or didnt I?

and like an obsessed searcher for the fountain of youth...you cant let it go

[1989]

Completely out of the blue.  Still lying in bed in his arms.  He said he didn't want to be in a relationship anymore; he was too young to be that serious about a girl (this was after his mom pulled him aside and told him that he was too young for what we had).  He had only been distant twice that week for a moment's notice, the second one right before he told me.

He NEVER (and still hasn't) raged at me.  He just goes distant, cold, detached.

In the last two weeks of our relationship he snapped at me twice and then made some comment about my legs had gotten heavier.  That was it!  No warning, nothing!

THAT is why I still miss him.  I wish he had turned into Mr. Hyde.  I wish the bottom had fallen out.  I would have been able to forget him and move on.

Exact same thing last year...just a lack of emotion in his voice, and he was gone again!  

However, he starts up with someone the very next day.