My partner (34/F with BPD) went almost no contact, I'm feeling lost and confused

[confusedpartner9]

TL;DR My partner of 3.5 years went almost no contact. She still says that she loves me, but she asked me to not contact her for a week so she can clear her mind. What's going on here? (full story below)


I apologize for the length of this post, I couldn't figure out a way to make it shorter. As I'm feeling so lost, I'll deeply appreciate anyone's effort to read through it and provide me with some insights.

I [35/M] have been in a relationship with my partner [34/F] for more than 3.5 years, and we were planning to get married next year. Throughout our relationship, we had our ups and downs the way only pwBPD and their partners can understand, but we always loved each other truly and deeply (and perhaps madly). In recent months, I felt a burnout in our relationship as a combined result of my workload and feeling traumatic from several times when my partner lashed out at me extremely harshly (even by her own standards). But even if I was a bit too tired to work as hard as usual to show my love, I didn't love her less, I just needed to recharge my energy.

Two weeks ago, we had some bad fights, but just as we always do after a bad fight, we talk it through, forgive each other and go back to normal. I thought that was the case then, and we even had sex after that. But then, half an hour after the sex while we are still cuddling in bed, she starts claiming that I don't really love her and that she wants us to take time off so I can think whether I really love her. The next two days are an emotional rollercoaster where I keep going to her apartment, cry my heart out about how much I love her, begging her to give me a chance to prove my love. It seemed like each time, just before I was going to convince her that I do love her, she would force herself to say "you don't really love me". All this time, she would keep insisting that she loves me insanely, "perhaps too much" in her words.

And then, after those two days of emotional rollercoaster, I arrive at her apartment in the morning to find out that she disappeared. Her phone is off and nobody knows where she went. After a day of searching for her in every possible place, her family decided to call the police. She went missing for more than two days, in which her family and I have started to prepare for the worst. Then she suddenly made contact with her family, refusing to tell anyone where she went, and not even seeming to acknowledge what she has just put everyone through.

She would spend the next few days with her family. After her telling them so many awful things about me over the years, they now blame me for her disappearance, see me as a monster and try to prevent her from being in touch with me. I would spend the next 8 days trying to contact her non-stop, pouring my heart over endless texts, just to get the silent treatment.

Eventually, she would pick up and insist, again, that she truly loves me while she doesn't think I love her. I went to her family's house to see her, knowing what their reaction would be but not really caring about it. And so we spent 4 hours together then, hugging and touching each other with affection.

She claimed that she is confused and overwhelmed by the love I'm showing her now contrasted with what she perceived a month ago as lack of love. We decided to proceed gradually from there to not make it overwhelming for her, and we made plans for things to do together the next day. I left after we said "I love you" to each other. The next day, it's a half-silent treatment again, with her eventually saying that she's not feeling well and can't meet me, but also her saying again that she loves me, and this time not denying my claim that I love her.

And then she disappeared again and went to stay with a friend, with silent treatment all over again. When we finally got to speak over the phone, she said again that she loves me, but she's overwhelmed by my display of love and everything that happened recently, and that she wants me to not contact her for a few days so she can clear her mind.

Now I'm confused as hell. Did she just split on me? but then, wouldn't the "I love you" be replaced with "I hate you" or just "I don't care"? Is she trying to force herself into not feeling love for me? Can it be that she genuinely loves me and want to get back together but really just need some time to relax and clear her mind? What's going on here? I feel completely lost. Respecting her request not to contact her, this is what I'm doing at the moment. Any advice on what to do next?

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[Cat Familiar]

I cannot give you much help about what’s going on in her mind, but I wonder if it has something to do with your plans to get married next year. As more intimacy develops, people with BPD tend to display more troubling behaviors; they feel safer acting out when in a committed relationship.

Could it be possible that, on the verge of marrying you, she might be checking out other potential relationship partners?

[confusedpartner9]

I cannot give you much help about what’s going on in her mind, but I wonder if it has something to do with your plans to get married next year. As more intimacy develops, people with BPD tend to display more troubling behaviors; they feel safer acting out when in a committed relationship.

Could it be possible that, on the verge of marrying you, she might be checking out other potential relationship partners?

I was wondering that too. But then, she always seemed even more excited than me to get married. She actually wanted to get married already a year after we started dating, but things got delayed due to career considerations on my end and then due to covid. Even on the night before she went missing, she brought up some of her plans on how to raise our future children. As I wrote earlier, I'm just extremely confused.

[Cat Familiar]

Since in BPDland feelings = facts, trying to understand it from a logical perspective is bound to be fruitless.

[NotAHero]

 Either taking a break because she felt too close ( push and pull cycle) or you are being recycled ( “friends” can be a replacement partner or someone on the back burner).

 Both are possibilities you will find out soon. BPDs are very unpredictable. Your best bet is to be “neutral”. Not passive but not too passionate either. Being passive will reinforce abandonment or make her bond more with the replacement ( if the second scenario is viable). Being too passionate will make her devalue you or possibly paint you black and push her closer to the replacement.