My pain is so deep but it can't compare to the pain my BPD Ex is experiencing

[Boyo73]

I'm not sure where to even start.

I'm heartbroken, confused, angry, sad, and feel like I'm watching my life from the outside. I love and care for a person with BPD who has hurt me so much emotionally, and recently physically, that I should want to push them as far away from me as possible, but I can't stop thinking about their pain and their suffering, even though everyone else in my life (family, friends, therapist, even family of my BPD partner) tells me that I've done the right thing and need to concentrate on "me" for now.

Up until a week ago I didn't even understand why the person I loved was the way that they were. After a slew of what I now understand to be BPD related episodes and exasperated behavior by my partner, my therapist (who I later found out specialized at one point in working with BPD patients), recognized the behaviors and patters, and recommended I read Walking On Egg Shells.

Ironically I started the book on the night where my relationship finally crashed and burned with my BPD partner. I only really started to truly understand the "why" of it all an hour before the police took him away in cuffs for assaulting me and trashing our home.

Now, I am left with the pieces, the pain, and the guilt at the reality of the person I love more than anything else in the world, is now going to have to nobody to love and care for them, nowhere to go, no resources, no family, and a small group of friends who will quickly tire of the BPD traits I know he will bestow onto them, as the only people left in his life trying to help him.

I am an emotional wreck. I can't stop crying (and I'm not a cryer), I go to sleep worrying about him, I wake up worrying about him. Based on his arrest release and the order or protection I had to put in place, we won't be in contact for some time, if ever. This is so hard but as I understand it, is necessary for my safety. I want so bad to hug him, to pull him in close and tell him it will be OK, we can get him help, he can live a regular life again... but I know that's not an easy path, and is probably not one he can embark on until he battles other substance and alcohol issues he has. I don't know if he can do that honestly. The prospect of never having him in life again feels like more than I can bare, but I also know I can't be the one to help him. He has too much intense love for me, but also so much distrust and anger towards me, that until now I couldn't understand.

He brought me so much happiness but also so much pain. He made me feel like the best person in the world, he also made me feel like the absolute worst person in the world too. Over the past 12-18 months a slowly tightening noose was put around my neck that dictated what I was allowed to do, who I could be around (without being accused of having an affair with them), and where my life/time focus was allowed to be. Because of this, I distanced myself from almost every non-essential person and part of my daily life, to be able to give my BPD partner the attention he felt he needed from me.

Now, this has all come crashing down, I find myself without a solid network of support because of the distancing I'd been forced to do with those close to me. Many I've reached out to now understand my distance and change in behavior and are a mix between feeling bad for me, asking me "what were you thinking, you should've gotten out of that relationship years ago", but are generally just not able to fathom how I could have let things get this bad for me and the other person.

My therapist thought this group may be a good place to find some comrades who will sympathize with my situation and may be able to help. I hope that's true. Nobody I've talked to (save for my wonderful therapist who's been a life saver) understand the scope of what I've dealt with and am now dealing with in the aftermath.

I thank you all in advance for allowing me into your community.

[SinisterComplex]

Well you picked good place for support. When I say we get it and we understand here I really do mean it. Welcome to the fam  . In the meantime please feel free to share as much as you want to and ask as many questions as you need to. Please be kind to you and take care of yourself.

Cheers and Best Wishes!

-SC-

[Pook075]

My therapist thought this group may be a good place to find some comrades who will sympathize with my situation and may be able to help. I hope that's true. Nobody I've talked to (save for my wonderful therapist who's been a life saver) understand the scope of what I've dealt with and am now dealing with in the aftermath.

Welcome to the family Boyo...I wish we were meeting under better circumstances.  It really stinks what you went through and with everything so fresh, it must be difficult to know where to turn.  So let's talk about that.

Truth #1- This was not your fault, and there's nothing you could have anticipated to make this turn out differently.  I'm sure you made mistakes just like we all do, but you can't beat yourself up over that.  You did the best you could and had no idea what you were dealing with.

Truth #2- He's sick, and instead of getting therapy he's using drugs/alcohol to wash away the pain.  That's no way to live and it never ends well.  He has to choose therapy though, choose to actively get better, for a chance to overcome BPD struggles. 

Truth #3-  If might hurt like mad since the band-aid was just ripped off, but going no contact is generally a good tactic to escape the never-ending cycle.  If you did reach out to him, he'd blame you for all of this, then he'd beg you to take him back, then he'd blame you some more.  They call it a push-pull dynamic and because he's highly unstable at the moment, you'd surely get his absolute worst.  So as much as this hurts, it's a blessing in disguise.  Block him on everything ASAP.

Where do you go from here?  Get busy!  Dive into your favorite hobbies, lean on friends/family, and get in some regular exercise (which helps balance out our mental health too).  You don't have to tell folks he's BPD and all the complicated stuff; you can simply say he's mentally ill and refuses to get help.

Right now, your job is to focus on you and you only.  You probably have to work, we get it, but your free time should not be on Netflix and social media.  Get out of the house, live life, and figure out what matters to you today.

I hope that helps a bit.  Please feel free to ask questions, rage vent, or anything you need.  It's healthy to get this out as you're processing it.

[tina7868]

Hi Boyo  . I join everyone in welcoming you to the boards. Thank you for sharing your story with us. I`m really sorry for the circumstances that brought you here, but glad you found us. You are far from alone here. You will learn, you will grow, and you will heal. Be kind and patient with yourself.

Looking forward to reading your future posts! 

[jaded7]

I'm not sure where to even start.

I'm heartbroken, confused, angry, sad, and feel like I'm watching my life from the outside. I love and care for a person with BPD who has hurt me so much emotionally, and recently physically, that I should want to push them as far away from me as possible, but I can't stop thinking about their pain and their suffering, even though everyone else in my life (family, friends, therapist, even family of my BPD partner) tells me that I've done the right thing and need to concentrate on "me" for now.

Up until a week ago I didn't even understand why the person I loved was the way that they were. After a slew of what I now understand to be BPD related episodes and exasperated behavior by my partner, my therapist (who I later found out specialized at one point in working with BPD patients), recognized the behaviors and patters, and recommended I read Walking On Egg Shells.

Ironically I started the book on the night where my relationship finally crashed and burned with my BPD partner. I only really started to truly understand the "why" of it all an hour before the police took him away in cuffs for assaulting me and trashing our home.

Now, I am left with the pieces, the pain, and the guilt at the reality of the person I love more than anything else in the world, is now going to have to nobody to love and care for them, nowhere to go, no resources, no family, and a small group of friends who will quickly tire of the BPD traits I know he will bestow onto them, as the only people left in his life trying to help him.

I am an emotional wreck. I can't stop crying (and I'm not a cryer), I go to sleep worrying about him, I wake up worrying about him. Based on his arrest release and the order or protection I had to put in place, we won't be in contact for some time, if ever. This is so hard but as I understand it, is necessary for my safety. I want so bad to hug him, to pull him in close and tell him it will be OK, we can get him help, he can live a regular life again... but I know that's not an easy path, and is probably not one he can embark on until he battles other substance and alcohol issues he has. I don't know if he can do that honestly. The prospect of never having him in life again feels like more than I can bare, but I also know I can't be the one to help him. He has too much intense love for me, but also so much distrust and anger towards me, that until now I couldn't understand.

He brought me so much happiness but also so much pain. He made me feel like the best person in the world, he also made me feel like the absolute worst person in the world too. Over the past 12-18 months a slowly tightening noose was put around my neck that dictated what I was allowed to do, who I could be around (without being accused of having an affair with them), and where my life/time focus was allowed to be. Because of this, I distanced myself from almost every non-essential person and part of my daily life, to be able to give my BPD partner the attention he felt he needed from me.

Now, this has all come crashing down, I find myself without a solid network of support because of the distancing I'd been forced to do with those close to me. Many I've reached out to now understand my distance and change in behavior and are a mix between feeling bad for me, asking me "what were you thinking, you should've gotten out of that relationship years ago", but are generally just not able to fathom how I could have let things get this bad for me and the other person.

My therapist thought this group may be a good place to find some comrades who will sympathize with my situation and may be able to help. I hope that's true. Nobody I've talked to (save for my wonderful therapist who's been a life saver) understand the scope of what I've dealt with and am now dealing with in the aftermath.

I thank you all in advance for allowing me into your community.

Ohh I can feel you Boyo. You've found a great community that will always be 'there' for you. We all get this and understand.

I can really sense how much you care about him. Like many of us in relationships with BPD we have a lot of heart and care so deeply for the person, which makes their behavior toward us so hard to understand.

Keep posting and reading. There are some very knowledgable people here.

[Boyo73]

Truth #1- This was not your fault, and there's nothing you could have anticipated to make this turn out differently.  I'm sure you made mistakes just like we all do, but you can't beat yourself up over that.  You did the best you could and had no idea what you were dealing with.

Truth #2- He's sick, and instead of getting therapy he's using drugs/alcohol to wash away the pain.  That's no way to live and it never ends well.  He has to choose therapy though, choose to actively get better, for a chance to overcome BPD struggles. 

Truth #3-  If might hurt like mad since the band-aid was just ripped off, but going no contact is generally a good tactic to escape the never-ending cycle.  If you did reach out to him, he'd blame you for all of this, then he'd beg you to take him back, then he'd blame you some more.  They call it a push-pull dynamic and because he's highly unstable at the moment, you'd surely get his absolute worst.  So as much as this hurts, it's a blessing in disguise.  Block him on everything ASAP.

Pook your reply to my post was like getting a lungful of air after holding my breath as long as I could. Someone got me. I feel so isolated and alone right now with my pain because others in my life can't fathom why I am worried about him, and why I miss him so much, while also being so relieved he's gone that I feel like I'm finally living in the "real world" again. The two emotions are in such conflict, they are why I tear up when I think about it.

Truth #1 - I know this deep down in my core. I've just been in survival mode for so long. Survival for me, for him, for the relationship, for everything. Just getting through each day was sometimes a knock down, drag out, battle. It got worse recently but it was just getting piled on so hard that each new day felt harder than the last, so you lose perspective on how bad things are getting.

Truth #2 - As I've read on here from others, it's very hard to get someone using substances or alcohol with BPD to understand how much worse it's making things. He was drinking a lot behind my back, having "a few beers" in the open but slamming 3-4 when I wasn't around in between. Up until the very end, I had no idea BPD was what he was facing, so I just took it as he was changing due to the constant intoxication, but mainly because of me, because I was the reason for all good and bad things to happen to him. I asked, begged, pleaded, put my foot down, and all that about the drinking, he wasn't having it. He leaned into it harder the last few months, pushing me to drink with him, and not just a beer but to drink heavily with him. When I explained to him each time that I have no desire to do this, I don't enjoy being drunk, he would just belittle me, insult me, call me a "pussy" for not wanting to drink. I hope he can get help. His release after being incarcerated for the final blow up we had, mandates he enter a drug/alcohol program, and get a thorough psych evaluation. He's been a steady marijuana user for as long as I've known him so getting off that and the alcohol is going to be tough, for his sake I'm hoping he completes the program and doesn't go to jail.

Truth #3 - This is the hardest one for me. Luckily he has yet to reach out or try to contact me. Part of his release/plea deal is he cannot have contact with me or come to our home. I extended that with an order of protection which caries a heavier penalty for initiating contact. This insures he won't reach out to me, and if I reach out to him, it negates the order (to my understanding) so I'm motivated to not do so. It's so hard because I am so worried about him and want to make sure he's OK. This is sadly the same theme that kept me with him for so long, my need to protect him and make things "OK" because he's had such a hard life. I am painfully realizing that nothing I was doing, could've done, or would do in the future, would've fixed any of this. He was always headed down the destruction path, I kept prodding him in the right direction to leave that path but he was just drawn back to it no matter how hard I tried.

My biggest fear is not him, it's myself. I am worried I'm going to miss him so much that I will break and contact him, reach out to him, try to fix him again or try to "make it better for him". Today, that is not something I want to do. I hope tomorrow it's not as well. I struggle with wanting to know how he's doing but also not wanting to have this back in my life. I hope with time that feeling of needing to "be there" for him will lessen.

[Boyo73]

Hi Boyo  . I join everyone in welcoming you to the boards. Thank you for sharing your story with us. I`m really sorry for the circumstances that brought you here, but glad you found us. You are far from alone here. You will learn, you will grow, and you will heal. Be kind and patient with yourself.

Looking forward to reading your future posts! 

Thank you Tina, knowing there are others who lived on this weird alien world I inhabited the last decade is such a welcomed surprise. I thought I was the only one trapped on that hostile world.

[Boyo73]

Ohh I can feel you Boyo. You've found a great community that will always be 'there' for you. We all get this and understand.

I can really sense how much you care about him. Like many of us in relationships with BPD we have a lot of heart and care so deeply for the person, which makes their behavior toward us so hard to understand.

Keep posting and reading. There are some very knowledgable people here.

Thank you Jaded. It's so hard to care for someone who is also doing damage to you and themselves. He had my head so tied in knots I'm still untangling them in real time. The more I read others experiences on this board, the less isolating it all feels. This is truly a wonderful place, I'm so glad to have found it.

[Pook075]

My biggest fear is not him, it's myself. I am worried I'm going to miss him so much that I will break and contact him, reach out to him, try to fix him again or try to "make it better for him".

Hey Boyo, I'm so glad my message resonated.  Everyone here gets it and a great thing about a community is that we all have different experiences and different mindsets.  That's a good thing since we can support each other from all angles. 

I completely get the feeling of being my own biggest enemy...I went through that when my 24 year marriage to a BPD wife abruptly ended two years ago.  Our oldest daughter is BPD as well and I have a decade of experience figuring that out.  So please understand that the stability in my words comes from being on this path quite a long time.

For now, focus on what you can directly control- work, hobbies, family, and friends.  Let the relationship go for now because this isn't about you.  I know that sounds strange since you're dealing with it and going through it, but his problems are due to mental illness and substance abuse.  You can't fix that- only he can. 

But here's the thing.  Let's say you called him today, told him to come home, and you jumped right back into everything.  That's telling him, "There's no need for you to get better- I'll take care of you and put up with the abuse!"  The last thing you want to do right now is to enable him, because that's what you had been doing. 

You are doing the right thing, and even though it may be painful...it's for his own good in the long run.  Rejecting the bad behavior and forcing him to get help are the kindest things you can do for him right now.  Is he struggling?  Definitely.  But that's a good thing, he has to struggle to realize he needs help.  And once he reaches rock bottom, he'll see life differently.

Again, I'm so sorry you're going through this, but there's a light at the end of the tunnel...I promise.  Get through these first few weeks by leaning on others, by keeping yourself busy.  Everyone heals at their own pace and that's fine, take all the time you need to process this and move forward. 

Who knows, maybe he'll get treatment and be a different person in six months.  That would be a fairytale ending to all of this.  You just can't accept any more abuse though, regardless of what he does.  Remember that- you can't rescue him no matter how badly you want to.  Only he can rescue himself.

[Boyo73]

Thanks Pook. Your perspective is appreciated as is your advice. Getting through a slow month in what is usually a very busy life for me will be a challenge. I'm attempting to use this calm period to try and focus on a new routine and examining my priorities. I stopped doing things for me a long time ago, everything was about him and trying to appease or placate his needs. More than anything I'm trying to embrace solitude, to replace the chaos and constant feeling of needing to be on guard with the knowledge that I control my time now, and I can do what I want, when I want, even if that means doing nothing. Every day is a little easier than the day before, I will keep remembering that when it seems overwhelming.