The pain of the breakup

[gtrhr]

Excellent thread.  So many common experiences and feelings we all share.  I'm currently going through giving up hope of ever being with her again, implementing no-contact and imagining she has the best-possible new relationship in spite of the fact she tells him she misses me, and tells me her dream is to come to my house and hear me play guitar for her again.  A cue that she acknowledges means wanting intimacy.

She's in a fantasy world there and my attempts to bring our shared fantasy to life have almost always been met with resistance since things went really badly for us.

[kiwimitch]

I think we all wish our borderline partners would die... I think that if quite normal,  I often had those thoughts, in my moments of torment and despair, Our problems would all be over... .  But, with my easy going character, I would never act on those thoughts... . 

Nothing to feel guilty about... .     

[charred]

I don't wish my exBPDgf would die, or anything like that... just wish I had never met her... she brought so much pain and suffering to my life.

This last go round with her a few years ago at least lead to insights about my own issues. BPD and NPD are considered pre-oedipal disorders, they are at the level of the real self developing... and are cases where the real self didn't develop. I now suspect that SPD is even more prevalent and that since SPD (schizoid PD) people tend not to leave the wake of destruction that BPD and NPD can, and SPD people are quiet/withdrawn/introverted ... .that they are pretty much ignored. Also wondering how common a BPD-SPD r/s is, and how many of us are SPD.

The latest I read about how someone gets to be SPD... is so simple to grasp that it is scary. When baby's start venturing out and trying new things... they need positive feedback from their mothers... encouragement to do real self activities... they try something new... it induces what is called abandonment depression and they need encouragement that they did well and to keep at it. As minor/simple as that sounds... it doesn't happen a lot of the time, and if that is combined with treating the baby as an object... like NPD/BPD parents typically will do, the kid learns to act instead of being themselves, finds it very hard to make decisions or act on their own... basically most the co-dependent symptoms. Simple encouragement and being paid attention to is all that is needed apparently. Whole lifetime of indecision, self doubt, lack of creativity, frustration... and from such a simple FOO thing.

I think my pwBPD was the first really encouraging person I was around, and it made me feel like I could do anything... the breakup... regressed to feeling like I could barely do anything. That depth of hurt doesn't happen during a brief r/s... .it goes way back somehow.

[Narellan]

Kiwimitch I don't wish my ex would die. I don't have any negative feelings towards him. It would cause me great pain if he died. I'm grateful to have met him, he put me through lots of pain and destruction but I'm better for it. I'd been walking around dead for years before I met him, and he " slapped me awake" I've changed for the better because of knowing him.

He's not a bad/ evil person, and he will always be in far worse pain and torment every day than he ever put me through... .

[BorisAcusio]

I think we all wish our borderline partners would die... I think that if quite normal,  I often had those thoughts, in my moments of torment and despair, Our problems would all be over... . But, with my easy going character, I would never act on those thoughts... . 

Nothing to feel guilty about... .   

In Freudian terms, death wish is completely normal, but not to feel guilty about that? Well, that's where pathology comes into play.

[charred]

I think the very fabric of how I perceive a cohesive reality was torn apart and every hidden repressed emotion of my entire life has come into my present consciousness and will not be ignored. It is felt as a physical feeling in my chest and gut and has been in control of my life for months now.

I think during the devaluing they push you further and further down the hole of the core traumas though which we filter reality and at the bottom is the threshold beyond that breaking point you are literally hallucinating and your world becomes the repressed emotions. 

Same here... the pwBPD unlocked repressed stuff from long ago... like the demons in Pandora's box.

That the bad stuff... and good too, was repressed... seems to indicate that a lot of what went on in my life (in the mean time ),was not as mature and real-self driven as I thought, but rather a lot of egoic role playing. ... reason I think that is that the intensity of the experience was so great... and unwarranted... that something else was up. I know that I accomplished a lot of things and felt very little joy or pleasure from them over the years, and that it may well have been pursuing some childhood image of what I thought I should be/do... rather than being my real self.

Losing touch with reality from the breaking point you described would be schizophrenia... but everyone has some degree of schizoid behavior... it is required of us ... being nice and agreeable at work (to keep a job)... sociable with relatives (we can't stand)... etc. We act differently than what we believe deep down... play a role instead of express our real self. The r/s with the pwBPD... it is ego driven role playing combined with melodrama and pleasure and horrific abuse.

I am thinking a lot of it is abandonment depression... which... would mean that we are devastated as the pwBPD was like a primary r/s ... and started to give encouragement for our real self (inadvertently ... along with puffing up our ego)... then withdrew the badly needed support ... .leaving us really regressed/devastated. I went from planning my life 10 yrs ahead... to doing my best to make it through the next hour... like some very simple, early abilities were stunted for a while. Even normal depression isn't like that. Suspect that getting past the BPD r/s... then doing real self activities... will bring back some depression and require someone external (the environment or a T, or SO)... to encourage us... to get back to normal.

Sounds weird... but its what I have been experiencing.

[Emelie Emelie]

That's where I'm at right now.  Just trying to get through the next hour.  God this is hard.

[charred]

Kiwimitch I don't wish my ex would die. I don't have any negative feelings towards him. It would cause me great pain if he died. I'm grateful to have met him, he put me through lots of pain and destruction but I'm better for it. I'd been walking around dead for years before I met him, and he " slapped me awake" I've changed for the better because of knowing him.

He's not a bad/ evil person, and he will always be in far worse pain and torment every day than he ever put me through... .

Slapped awake is exactly what happened ... .same thing.

My pwBPD had given up, turned in to a quiet wallflower, let herself go... gained weight. We both were rejuvenated physically... lost weight, looked about 10 yrs younger... became active. It wasn't all bad... the intense emotions... felt alive again. But the bad stuff was horrible and I back slid a bit after the breakup, but regaining ground again... exercising, dieting, seeing a T, and more alive than before the BPD r/s... but less than during it... though much saner I think.

[LettingGo14]

This is a great thread, and lots of good information. However, it has reached its 4-page limit and it is being locked.  Please start a new thread to continue the discussion.