I've learned that a birthday or holiday is almost guaranteed dysregulation. Remind yourself it isn't you or anything you did,, and no way you can fix it. Why is it hard for them? From what I have observed:
- They are expected to be social, and this causes anxiety in many pwBPD.
- They hear from people whom only contact them during holidays. They sense these people as "phonies", and often they would rather not hear from those people.
- They notice when people forget their birthday. And there will always be one or two and if not they anticipate there will be one or two and are grouchy as they expect this.
- In their mind, all their birthdays have been bad, so they expect another bad one.
- They are getting older, and that brings on the shame of having done nothing the past year.
- They didn't get the gift they wanted. But they didn't even know what they wanted, so don't put this on you.
My mom has a few BPD traits (but probably not enough to be diagnosed), and growing up my dad would get so much anxiety over my mom's birthday and Christmas. He'd worry so much about what to get her. And he would get her some very thoughtful things, and she would completely reject them. :)idn't matter if it was jewelry, clothing, some useful gadget, or something handmade. I felt bad for my dad, because the next year the anxiety would be worse for him. I remember one year he made reservations at a nice restaurant, had the restaurant reserve a special cake for her, and had it all planned out as a surprise. By late morning, she noticed there was no birthday cake in the house, and proceeded to bake her own cake! So my dad had to spill the beans that he had planned a surprise dinner for her. But she kept baking her own cake, anyway, went out on her own for fast food for dinner, and my dad had to cancel the dinner reservations. Gee, after recalling that story, maybe my mom is BPD!
I can relate to this.
I'm not a regular on this board, but I wanted to post here.
Don't know what made me look on this board. Guess I wanted to try and remember what made me leave my xhwBPD.
He ruined ALL of my birthdays, and every one of his were never good enough.
I threw a massive, MASSIVE party for him the year before I left him. 60+ guests, catering, the works. I saved up for over a year to pay for it.
He didn't like the guest list, it wasn't "A list" enough for him. The gifts were disappointing (he said he didn't want "anything", and he spent the entire night drinking with his dysfunctional family, only to get up drunk and announce that he wanted to thank his mother for putting him through school. He said it angrily, and later told me it was a response to an argument he was having with his sister.
He never thanked me, or the other guests, or anyone who helped work on the party.
Just some thoughts. He and his family ruined weddings, our honeymoon, holidays, pretty much every major event in our lives.
Last week I had a small weekend getaway with the new man in my life (also recovering from a failed marriage with a spouse who has a pers d/o).
In one weekend, I felt as though I had more of a honeymoon with him than ANY time I had ever spent with my ex.
I'm not writing this to discourage anyone, but just to put in my 2 cents. I know what it's like to try and make the person you love happy, to work hard and have so much anxiety, only to be let down because they live in a state of expectation and not appreciation.
So ask yourself this ... .are your expectations so unrealistic? And if they were met, would you be appreciative? I believe you all would be, just as I would, when I was married to my xhwBPD. I mean, you weren't expecting anything selfish, just to be able to give something meaningful to someone you love.
Think about it. Selfishness kills relationships.
