3 weeks out after splitting episode which ended the relationship

[Before you can make things better, you have to stop making them worse...]

Hi,

I came to these boards last year after what was turbulent 9 month relationship with my partner. It was the classic BPD relationship in which she left me and came back 5 times. We had 2 months apart last summer where I realised my partner likely suffered from BPD. I did a lot of reading, research and soul searching in our time apart and I looked for ways I could have dealt with devaluation stages better and set firmer boundaries.

We decided to give it another go in September and I made it my purpose to show her that I understood and really loved her. The second honeymoon phase lasted for about a month, and things quickly turned back into how things were. She would become aggressive, delusional, and quite mean. I could do 100 nice things, but one thing she didn’t like would make all my previous efforts vanish. It was so frustrating.

Her mental health started to badly spiral just before Christmas, with suicidal thoughts, self harm, and verbal outbursts being a regular thing. I was starting to see her triggers, which were me disagreeing with her (she said invalidating her), me not putting her first, me choosing not to see her on a night when I could have done, finances, and her staying over at my house (she stated she felt as though she wasn’t in control unless she was at home). We had talked about her moving into my place (a four bedroom new house in a really good part of town), but whenever she came to stay for a week, she would cause a fight and leave on the second day. She recently told me she could never live in my house and we would have to each sell up and buy a new one so she thought it was ‘hers’. I understand why she’d think that.

She has started therapy where she was told it was likely a combination on BPD and bipolar. She has discussed abandonment as a child (her parents would leave her in the house alone whilst they went out drinking as an infant/they ignored her and regularly put her down), being sexually assaulted by a stranger as a small child on holiday (her parents didn’t believe her), and being raped as an 18 year old. I sat and listened to her talk about all this and went with her whilst she reported the rape to the police.

Recently I had been really struggling with her when she had a drink. She became flirtatious, aggressive, defensive, and would storm off home. A few weeks ago she got drunk and told me she found women attractive. As the night went on this escalated to her telling anyone who’d listen to her at the bar she was gay, her partner (me) wouldn’t accept this, she felt as though she was lying to herself, she was missing out, and her next relationship was going to be with a girl. Naturally this all came as a bit of a shock (I think I was most upset because it seemed as though she was already planning her next relationship) so I calmly asked her why she was announcing all this to random people. She stormed off and started to swear when she couldn’t really give me an answer. The following morning she was sheepish but not overly apologetic. I let it go.

A week later we went out again and as she got drunk she started to flirt with a group of men to try and get a cigarette. I thought it was a little embarrassing but it didn’t really bother me. When I told her it was home time (the bars had closed) she accused me of being jealous and embarrassing her. Not really sure how she got to that but it resulted in her shouting and screaming again. By this point I had had enough so I made sure she got home ok but went back to mine alone. The following morning I sent her a strong message saying I’m not accepting being screamed at anymore. This caused a huge argument in which I was accused of breaking up with her over text (I didn’t).

The following day I tried to draw a line under it and apologised for being so forceful over text. It was a boundary, one I think I knew would trigger her. I thought we had moved past it as the next few days were fine.

After about a week she started being ‘off’. I asked her if anything was the matter and she stated she was still disgusted with my text message. I tried to explain that I thought we had moved past that. She said she feels as though I ‘stopped loving her’ and ‘she deserves better’. I found that pretty hard to take as I’d spent 8 months taking care of her whilst she was off work due to having a break down. I had ran myself into the ground trying to make her feel supported and loved. I physically couldn’t have done anymore (taking her on holidays, taking her to appointments, picking up her child from school, constantly trying to ‘prove’ I love her). I was exhausted. I told her I wasn’t going to apologise again for the message as I already had, but ultimately it was her behaviour that caused me to send it. I accepted that I should have spoken to her face to face rather than send it via text, I was just so angry.

The following day she turned up at my house and said she couldn’t be in a relationship with ‘someone who can’t admit fault’. I just sat there in silence, total disbelief. I accepted her desire to split up and wished her luck in life. I was heartbroken to think I could be tossed aside so easily for trying to enforce a boundary. Since then I have been in no contact, other than to respond to a ‘checking in’ message last week. Im so hurt and confused by it all. I know I can’t continue to allow my boundaries be trodden all over but it still sucks. I just feel so disposable. I’ve spent almost a year now learning how to navigate a BPD relationship and it was all for nothing. I know I deserve someone who values me for who I am and the love I give, it’s just hard. She could be absolutely amazing, but constantly living in fear of the next devaluation meant I was never comfortable. I never felt safe in the relationship.

Sorry for the long post. I just needed to vent

[PhoenixKnight]

Hi,

I came to these boards last year after what was turbulent 9 month relationship with my partner. It was the classic BPD relationship in which she left me and came back 5 times. We had 2 months apart last summer where I realised my partner likely suffered from BPD. I did a lot of reading, research and soul searching in our time apart and I looked for ways I could have dealt with devaluation stages better and set firmer boundaries.

We decided to give it another go in September and I made it my purpose to show her that I understood and really loved her. The second honeymoon phase lasted for about a month, and things quickly turned back into how things were. She would become aggressive, delusional, and quite mean. I could do 100 nice things, but one thing she didn’t like would make all my previous efforts vanish. It was so frustrating.

Her mental health started to badly spiral just before Christmas, with suicidal thoughts, self harm, and verbal outbursts being a regular thing. I was starting to see her triggers, which were me disagreeing with her (she said invalidating her), me not putting her first, me choosing not to see her on a night when I could have done, finances, and her staying over at my house (she stated she felt as though she wasn’t in control unless she was at home). We had talked about her moving into my place (a four bedroom new house in a really good part of town), but whenever she came to stay for a week, she would cause a fight and leave on the second day. She recently told me she could never live in my house and we would have to each sell up and buy a new one so she thought it was ‘hers’. I understand why she’d think that.

She has started therapy where she was told it was likely a combination on BPD and bipolar. She has discussed abandonment as a child (her parents would leave her in the house alone whilst they went out drinking as an infant/they ignored her and regularly put her down), being sexually assaulted by a stranger as a small child on holiday (her parents didn’t believe her), and being raped as an 18 year old. I sat and listened to her talk about all this and went with her whilst she reported the rape to the police.

Recently I had been really struggling with her when she had a drink. She became flirtatious, aggressive, defensive, and would storm off home. A few weeks ago she got drunk and told me she found women attractive. As the night went on this escalated to her telling anyone who’d listen to her at the bar she was gay, her partner (me) wouldn’t accept this, she felt as though she was lying to herself, she was missing out, and her next relationship was going to be with a girl. Naturally this all came as a bit of a shock (I think I was most upset because it seemed as though she was already planning her next relationship) so I calmly asked her why she was announcing all this to random people. She stormed off and started to swear when she couldn’t really give me an answer. The following morning she was sheepish but not overly apologetic. I let it go.

A week later we went out again and as she got drunk she started to flirt with a group of men to try and get a cigarette. I thought it was a little embarrassing but it didn’t really bother me. When I told her it was home time (the bars had closed) she accused me of being jealous and embarrassing her. Not really sure how she got to that but it resulted in her shouting and screaming again. By this point I had had enough so I made sure she got home ok but went back to mine alone. The following morning I sent her a strong message saying I’m not accepting being screamed at anymore. This caused a huge argument in which I was accused of breaking up with her over text (I didn’t).

The following day I tried to draw a line under it and apologised for being so forceful over text. It was a boundary, one I think I knew would trigger her. I thought we had moved past it as the next few days were fine.

After about a week she started being ‘off’. I asked her if anything was the matter and she stated she was still disgusted with my text message. I tried to explain that I thought we had moved past that. She said she feels as though I ‘stopped loving her’ and ‘she deserves better’. I found that pretty hard to take as I’d spent 8 months taking care of her whilst she was off work due to having a break down. I had ran myself into the ground trying to make her feel supported and loved. I physically couldn’t have done anymore (taking her on holidays, taking her to appointments, picking up her child from school, constantly trying to ‘prove’ I love her). I was exhausted. I told her I wasn’t going to apologise again for the message as I already had, but ultimately it was her behaviour that caused me to send it. I accepted that I should have spoken to her face to face rather than send it via text, I was just so angry.

The following day she turned up at my house and said she couldn’t be in a relationship with ‘someone who can’t admit fault’. I just sat there in silence, total disbelief. I accepted her desire to split up and wished her luck in life. I was heartbroken to think I could be tossed aside so easily for trying to enforce a boundary. Since then I have been in no contact, other than to respond to a ‘checking in’ message last week. Im so hurt and confused by it all. I know I can’t continue to allow my boundaries be trodden all over but it still sucks. I just feel so disposable. I’ve spent almost a year now learning how to navigate a BPD relationship and it was all for nothing. I know I deserve someone who values me for who I am and the love I give, it’s just hard. She could be absolutely amazing, but constantly living in fear of the next devaluation meant I was never comfortable. I never felt safe in the relationship.

Sorry for the long post. I just needed to vent

[Snowy20]

Hi,
I am new to the forum. I can relate to all you’ve said about how your feeling. I am having my first separation of 10 years. After 4 month my husband is currently in therapy for newly diagnosed bpd. I can’t see a way forward for us right now as I know about bpd and don’t think I’ll be able to put myself back in  Relationship/marriage that I know has a high chance of not working or working for so long then getting hurt again and I can’t go through what I have been for the past 4 month again.
I think when you give it your all and your a selfless person it’s very hard to accept you deserve better. I think it sounds like you have given everything you have and you have to work on yourself now to overcome the abuse as unintentional as it is the fact remains it’s  abuse . Take care

[PhoenixKnight]

Thanks snowy, I appreciate your time in responding. It sounds like you are going through a lot too, and have invested so much more than I have. Credit to you for the strength you have shown getting to this point.

It’s ‘only’ been 18 months of a relationship for me, but I put so much in, it’s disheartening to see how quickly it can all be forgotten. The silver lining for me is that it’s taught me that I am able to give so much. I’m content with how I carried myself, in really difficult circumstances. So however much I regret it not working out, I know I couldn’t have done any more. I gave it my all.

Good luck with your healing journey and thanks again.

[Hopeful81]

Hi all,

It is amazing how these stories are similar. Three months ago my fiancée moved out of our shared home for the third time in a year. A week later she broke up with me. We were in a 5 year relationship.

Some of the things PhoenixKnight mentions are almost to the letter my negative experiences:
- she said that she wants to be “number one”
- she said that she understands lesbians and may be lesbian herself
- she did mock break ups frequently and expected me to beg and plead to stay with her
- she raged and it scared me when she did
- she acted passive-aggressively until I got irritated or withdrawn and then the real drama would begin
- she blamed me for everything
- she took any dissenting statement as rejection
- she said “I” and not “we” or “us”
- she threatened suicide if I would “hurt her again”

Moments later, she would be loving and give compliments. Over time, things got worse. At the end, it was like living as circus clowns.

The first two months that she was gone were tough on me, tougher than any prior heartbreak. I think there was some trauma bonding I needed to get over.

I can now say that I am starting to feel better. I am dating a psychologist (of all people

[Hopeful81]

(cont'd) I do not think that the time we spend in these relationships is wasted per se. You learn a lot about yourself and people in general and know what to avoid going forward. 9 months is not too bad. 5 years or 10 years is probably too long.

Looking back, I would have wanted myself not to accept bad behavior and to set firm boundaries. The relationship probably would have ended anyhow, but I would have known sooner and I would have avoided some/most of the trauma bonding.

[PhoenixKnight]

Hi Hopeful.

Yup, the things you mentioned all fit with me too. The one I struggled most with was the wild reaction whenever I tried to show any emotional ‘weakness’. If I was ever slightly bothered by anything she did (for example, I was a little hurt she didn’t come to visit me once during my covid 10 day isolation, but I went and sat in her garden with her every other day), she would call me pathetic and spoiled, devaluing me for weeks. ‘Pathetic’ was a word she used often, probably because she knew emasculating me was something to make me feel bad. As a man, I’m quite comfortable being emotional, the polar opposite of her male family members. I think she saw this as weak, but I proudly denounced that I avoid conflict when I can. I think it bothered me more that she could see me as weak for something I saw as strength.

I think I have come to realise the last couple of days that she has left the relationship for fear I would leave her. The suggestion is that they are quite aware when people pull away. I was clearly feeling exhaustion and I’d be lying if I were to say I wasn’t at least part-considering leaving. When she offered it I grabbed it and ran. Now my trauma-bond is pulling me back in.

Congratulations on your own healing in starting a new relationship. I would love to be in such a position. The thought however scares me a little. I have much healing to do first. I need to stop ruminating and making excuses for something that is never going to happen. Thanks for the reply and good luck.

[Hopeful81]

Thanks, like you I am also someone who helps others and I also tend to show my emotions. Unfortunately, I read somewhere that this is exactly what folks with BPD do not need in a relationship.

They need someone who is stoic, someone who does not feed into their emotion, who stands their ground when provoked, who allows them to fail when they mess up. And even then it is difficult for them to maintain a relationship. It is what it is.

Try to limit your ruminating to a specific time of day. Try not to think of it the rest of the day. I think that you will much feel better in a couple of months.