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I remember a post that 2010 had put up a while back.  It is something that i refer to alot when i want to reconnect.  If i get out of my own way and needs i reflect on this.  Mostly because it rings true for our relationship.

"the best thing you can do for a person with BPD is to let them go"

I was not functioning well and triggering him all over the place too in the end. He was becoming more and more hostile and angry.  I know letting him go is what was the right thing to do, no matter how painful for me. 

I love this. I love a single line which you can cling to when you need that conviction. No matter how hard the relationship is to tolerate, you have a point when you say that breaking up was 'painful for you'... . Because continuing is often the path of least resistance, right?

Especially when the FOG makes you feel selfish, it's great to have a reminder that this isn't just about what benefits us. I think that we have all spent long enough feeling like we have participated in behaviors which hurt us and benefited our partner. But we tend to perceive our partner's needs and desires as the superficial action, and not the underlying motive of being free of pain.

I feel I was functioning well, and she was still triggered.

This disorder takes over/wipes out everything it can.

Letting go is our best chance of making it through.

yah myself

maybe i was functioning better than i give myself credit for considering everything that was going on.

Yes, write me down in the functioning well category -- I was a BPD whisperer -- still not enough to avoid him sabotaging everything good between us.

But here's what I don't understand about this quote.  I want it to be correct! so much.  It makes me rest easier if it is true that the best thing we can do is leave.

But -- if they are just going to connect with others who know less and are easily seduced, preventing them from ever "hitting rock bottom" or whatever the better metaphor for a BPD decision-forcing crisis might be -- is it actually better that we are gone?  There will just be someone else, right?

I get that in many instances it is better for US that we are gone, and I am now putting myself in that category.  But the notion that it is better for them ... . I don't know.

I imagine my ex feeling more and more alone as he gets older.  He isn't going to do a wholesale reexamination of everything that's happened in the half century plus of his life so far.  He's basically going to use the coping tools he has.  Is it really better for HIM that I am gone?  I doubt it.

Again, that doesn't mean I should be in touch.  I've chosen not to, for my own health and on principle, because the terms suck and don't have much integrity.  But the idea that it will help them ... . I need help understanding that.  It COULD help them.  But how many stories of that happening do we actually know of?  In all the hundreds of stories I've read here, I can't recall one in which the pwBPD hit rock bottom, sought help, got it figured out.  I see many stories of partners adjusting their expectations and behaviors to achieve a tolerable life with some pwBPD who are dependent for some reason or rage but don't leave (mine is not in that category).  But I don't see any rock bottom recovery stories.  So I have trouble deeply believing it is best for my ex that I step away. I think he is very very lonely and feels deeply flawed because he keeps losing people like that ... . period.  No big lesson.  Just very sad, very bad feelings.

this is bringing up a question for me about do we really know whats best for another person.

A BPD whisperer... . For some reason that was exactly the thought that this thread triggered in me. It just occurred to me that I even instinctively knew how to feed the need for positive attention: eg asking her for advice on things where I really didn't need input, making her feel that I valued her input. (That is kind of sick, when I think about it... . Even as I walked on eggshells, I actually played her. I guess that's the kind of intuition that you gain from putting up with a narcissist.)

I can say that I think in my situation it WAS better because I actively triggered her. I couldn't do the act forever and when it broke down so did the relationship. As far as I know she still has a support structure involving friends she has known for many years who don't seem to trigger her (or cope if they do?) But patientandclear, you do raise a good point. If fundamentally, if what is good for a pwBPD is to get rid of the pain caused by the disorder, what helps but therapy? Is it a moot point?

Also: my ex actually wrote an article on the topic of leaving vs not leaving... . A mutual friend sent it to me the other day and it was actually interesting and well thought out. I'm not breaking NC as a result - but I actually am surprised by how well she is dealing with it. Does anyone mind if I post a bit to show what is apparently going on in her head?

I just became a trigger and an enabler.  It was a destructive cycle.  Me trigger.  Me fix.  Me take responsibility for the Disorder.  My ex gets deeper and deeper in the Disorder... . because I trigger it and enable it simultaneously.  I didn't want that to be the case, but it was.  

PnC:  I ask, with all the time and energy that you spent with your ex,  how much did he change?  How much did he gain.  Has he learned to self soothe?  Is he self aware of his Disorder?  Can he apologize and change.  Can he take responsibility.  :)oes he have some impulse control and free will in decision making.  :)oes he know the truth?  Has he stopped disassociating?  In essence... . How is he better off having met you and interacted with you?  And would he have been better off if he had never met you.

These are honest questions.  I asked them of myself and don't know if my ex would have been better off having never met me.   I forced my ex through DBT, and don't even know if that had any long term help.  Maybe it pushed her farther away from sanity and deeper in the Disorder.  Maybe if she didn't meet me she would have found some awareness, but I was there to "rescue" her away from the truth.

The only way a pwBPD gets better is if they are willing to go through the therapy by themselves.  Without rescuers or enablers.  

But yes, the odds are not good for them.  But the chances they get better while with us is even less.  We just stay in the Disorder.  The best thing we can do is let them go... . for both our sakes.

But they do deserve our compassion because theirs is a living nightmare of an existence with almost no hope for redemption.

Of those who do try, how many who have this disorder overcome this disorder? It's a very small percentage. That's with the best treatment/ understanding available. Which most of us here would not qualify for, no matter how much we love and offer. No matter how many times we bend over backwards or turn the other cheek. We let go to break negative patterns. One question many of us ask ourselves coming through this is, Why did that mostly come about as what seems like a last resort?  

I am at war with myself about this one.  I recognize where it is best, rationally, I know it is and I understand why.

Some of the last words my ex ever wrote to me were "you'll kill me with your love... . I'm so sorry... . I have to let you go." And these words haunt me every day. He cried for help so loudly, but silently. I could feel his internal suffering, and it tugged too strongly at my caretaker tendencies. If he is so afraid of abandonment, then I struggle to abandon him as well... . regardless of the fact that it is his own self-fulfilling prophecy and he never actually gets better if I stick around. My rational brain knows this is a silly thing to even consider, but my emotional mind, and my heart, thinks that I can help him in some small way. And this kind of thinking that kept me trapped in that relationship in the first place. I'm on my own borderline where he is concerned... . on the one hand, due to now being a trigger, I make him "sicker" if I remain in his life, but I also reinforce his abandonment issues when I leave for good.

These are thoughts that I struggle with these days. I'm sure they'll change in the future as I grow further away from him and his personal purgatory. But as of right now, I am stuck in my own need to not completely abandon him just yet. I am my own worst enemy, I know. Time will do its work and I will move to a place within myself that is less focused on him. I am getting there.

RedSky, I'd love to see that if you're open to sharing.

I really appreciate this discussion, everybody.

Tausk, well, no.  I don't think he learned or got better as a result of knowing me, except possibly for one thing: he did spend about 18 months without being in a romantic r/ship [we were together as friends after the breakup & a period of NC] and I think because I was around in a boundaried "friend" role, he got practice having his primary person (me) be someone he was not enmeshed with and not trying to enmesh with.  I do think that knowledge may be useful for him.

But basically, no.  And the basic patterns of the disorder are still fully, flagrantly present.  And very destructive, so much so that we no longer have that close friendship I was describing, because I am choosing to remove myself from patterns that feel exploitative and tawdry.

But along the lines of Corraline's point above, where she asked "can we know what is best for another person?" -- I don't think the issue is whether knowing me made him "better."  That wasn't my goal and it isn't my job.  But I was keeping him company.  I do have a fair degree of understanding of what goes on in his head, a lot of tolerance for many of his odd habits and behaviors that most people misunderstand, and it is comfortable for him to know me and be with me, because I don't judge him with regards to most things (I do judge his management of relationships), and I like him.  And he likes me.  We share a part of our life history, you know?

I do think him losing that is a significant loss.  Just the "keeping company through life" aspect.  Constantly re-making your cast of characters has got to be destabilizing as well as exhausting (though he also finds it exhilarating sometimes) -- having people to touch who know you more deeply is an asset, it seems to me.

I definitely trigger him, there is no doubt (and by this point, vice versa).  But we were learning to live through that, by not overreacting, being patient, waiting it out.  Being gentle in our communications with each other (me more than him, I will say).  It was survivable.  I think the benefits outweighed the downsides -- for him (he seemed to think so).  There were different downsides for me and ultimately, they were too harmful and I needed to step away, for myself.  But I wasn't doing it for him and I think it is quite hurtful to him.

If it were going to be the domino that started a chain reaction leading to a Major Life Lesson and a drive for healing ... . maybe it would be better for him.  But I see no sign of things happening like that.  I think he just feels more confirmed in his view that all people leave and all people disappoint, a viewpoint that feeds his destructive behaviors.

I have edited this down because it was very long... . I am the friend in question. >__<

I have lost count about the number of friends I have lost due to my mental illness. People say it’s not my fault and that they are selfish to walk away like that and for a while, I believed that. But my view started to change. I recently had a friend who stopped all contact with me and it devastated me. Yes, due to my condition, I would automatically assumed the guilt [she assumes she is always in the wrong] but it’s just still time around there is some truth to it. Our love ones around us were always told to support those who are going through mental health issues, but at the same time, they are also told to generate some space in order to take a look after themselves.

Now in ABSOLUTELY no way I’m trying to say, it is our fault that we drove our friends away. We are trying to get help but we don’t know how to or understand our emotions. Thus, it creates a whirlwind in our bodies which explode massively in front of our love ones and we don’t want that. I don’t want that and that is why I look to myself and ask:

"What can I do to stop this from happening again?"

Friends are obviously there to help us. If they tired out of things to do or to say, they wouldn’t know what to do next. Therefore it stresses them out which is obviously we don’t wanna do. I love my family and my friends. I loved them dearly and I want them to know that they mean a lot to me. I know they are there to help, to listen when we are down etc but I don’t want to continuously put all my burdens on them.

When [a mutual friend of ours] heard about my friend cutting off all contact, she immediately called her a “deserting b____” to which I quickly refuted. She believes what the majority believe, you stay with your mates no matter what. I believe that too, but I also believe you need to look after yourself before you are able to help others. Otherwise, how are you going to help anyone?

See, what interests me is the fact that she CAN actually admit that she knows the effect she has on people. She has had years of therapy, though. She can acknowledge that she has a destructive effect on relationships... . And yet this doesn't change her actions enough that people stop freaking out, including myself.

That's where I get stuck. I really admire the degree of self-awareness she has, but I don't see it carrying forward into actions. She still tried to recycle me, and I think unless the neediness is gone she will always have this effect on people... .

PnC:  Agreed it's a spectrum and it's impossible to know what is good for someone else.

That is why the real question is:  "Am I truly benefiting myself by being in this interaction."

For me, a big part of the interaction was to live the fantasy life of a rescuer and to avoid actually growing up.  I could tolerate the insanity and abuse, because it was what I was used to as a child.  I could tolerate the need to be a rescuer, because as a child, caretaking was what I was told to be my worth as a person was based upon.

And I tolerated insanity in the present, tried to fix as best as I could, I lived in the fantasy for a better day in the future... . because that was the only way that I could survive my childhood without going crazy.  I couldn't even kill myself because there were too many people who were dependent on me or would be harmed by that action.

So, my interaction with my ex was familiar.  But not good for me... . and as a result not good for my ex.  I became trigger and enabler simultaneously.  I didn't want to be.  But in the end that's all it was.  

It was best that I left.

I admire the degree of self awareness in that statement.  And as I state, I admire the courage that any pwBPD has when she is doing the self exploration.   But do the word stick in everyday life for your ex?   For me, my ex's moments of lucidity were part of the problem.  At times, great insight and awareness, and the honest desire to change were present in my ex.  But in the end, the capacity to follow through on the desires always fell short.

Do not gauge anyone by their words, but rather by their actions.  

And I try not to necessarily judge my ex as evil or bad based on her inability to change.  Change is something that is beyond her.  She don't have the capacity.  She never developed the parts of her brain and neuropathways that are needed for change and real self awareness.  

A person with Down Syndrome may know he's different.  But no amount of effort will bring him into the same reality as you or me.  

Or exes or not that much different, other than they hide their differences better.

As far as I'm aware, the desire to change is there all the time. Her last suicide attempt was the first time, to my knowledge, that she had backed down on her own, without having to be physically restrained by someone else.

The thing which still gets me is the fact that she feels ENTITLED to the help. It's a bit like a car. You don't drive your 1970s Beetle at 200mph because the engine will drop out and it has no use to you then. You don't give your friends enough space, and they will run away and they can't support you any more.

Do I think she will get there in time? I'm not sure. I think her therapy has tried to address the big issues, suicide, self harm, that kind of thing, but doesn't seem to take into account her dependency on other people. She is very much the waif profile.

And what is the best thing to do for a the BPD Waif?   Very possibly, and in the right manner, leave them to learn to self soothe.  PwBPD have limited sense of self and limited boundaries, because they do not know where they end and you begin.  So if they need help, they are part of you, and you should then help.

Without leaving, nothing changes... . the Disorder just gets worse.

The best action we can take is to leave them.

A good rule of thumb.

My question to you: do you believe that self-soothing will genuinely work in the end, or that it is a less destructive course of action than having the people around the pwBPD try to help, achieve nothing, and end up with their own lives trashed in the process?

It is the only option.  Other people helping only causes a pwBPD more shame and more Disorder.   When did you rescue and it result in any real difference? 

All my efforts... . I believe made it worse for my ex.  It made her feel more childish and more shame. 

The intention might have been good on my part, but it was destructive in the end, both to me and to my ex.  And in reality, it was simply an excuse to feel value for myself and to not grow up and find real value in myself.

I hurt myself as much as I hurt her.  It was not my intention, but it was the result nonetheless.

If I were more mature when we met, I might have been able to respond to the  red-flag .  But I wanted a reason to be a superhero, live in fantasy, and not grow up.

The best thing I did was leave.

If, when we left them, they would "learn to self-soothe," that would be super.  But that isn't what happens, is it, generally?  They just find new people.

That's why I think it may be a fallacy that we are helping them by leaving.  It's a nice thought.  But I'm not sure it makes sense given what will almost inevitably happen next: they get a new external object/source of soothing.

I do want to modify what I was saying earlier though, about how I thought it was a good thing in my ex's life to have me around ... . I would not extend that to some of the dysfunctional dynamics that came into being between us.  Those needed to end for both of our sakes.  So I set boundaries and because he didn't want to accept those, we're done, at least for now.

Had he been willing to work with my boundaries though, I don't see how it would be per se better for him to have me leave him behind.

***

Tausk, just saw your post above this one.  I think it's important to distinguish between rescuing, which is unhelpful, and just keeping people company as they go through life with the attributes and liabilities that they have.

I am not contending that it is good for pwBPD for us to stick around and try to rescue them.  From what I know I completely agree with all you've written here about that.

I am saying that just staying with pwBPD while enforcing necessary boundaries, without rescuing or trying to change them, might be a gift, not damaging to them.

If we assume that our boundaries are just going to be ignored, then leaving them is the path of least overall destruction between you and the pwBPD. That I'll accept as a general rule of thumb.

As for whether you are better or worse for them than the attachments which they always appear to form soon after, I don't know. Presumably it does just depend on who you are. In my case I'm going to say I think it was good for both of us because she has plenty of people in her life who don't seem to trigger her.

I do think that my BPDexbf has a better chance of improving without me.  I have been an almost constant trigger and lightening rod for his behaviour, and this has only got worse.  I certainly hope he will improve without me, and I definitely made the decision to break up with the thought in mind that it was best for us both, not just me.

You can not enforce boundaries when the other party does not understand the whole concept. Becoming one of their soothing-object, used on needed bases is not something that could be considered gift, not for the BPD and certainly not for nons.

Something I learned from spending a lot of time at one point on the Staying board is that actually, boundaries do not require the cooperation of the pwBPD, if the partner adopting them takes them seriously and understands how they work.  Boundaries are our choices for ourselves.  If you X then I will Y.  Or, having seen that you Y, I will no longer Z because that isn't safe for me.

It is not an exercise in demanding that someone else do something different.  It is a choice to do something different ourselves.

Boundaries are our way to ensure that a relationship unfolds within bounds that we can tolerate without allowing ourselves to be harmed.  Usually to set boundaries with someone wBPD is to risk the end of the r/ship.  But to do so is respectful of both them and us.

Yes this was the case with me as well.  I tried to be friends with my ex.  My T said she needs to self soothe.  We tried no sex for a year.  She wanted to get back together and when I said that I wanted us to learn to be friends, she said in the most honest words that she has ever given me, "I don't know how to do that, all I can do is give you sex and cook for you."

However in the meantime, we triggered each other nonstop.   I get triggered with my FOO.  Being with them for any length of time, we regress into little kids, but I we can pull ourselves out of that mode.  I get triggered with old friends at time.

But with my ex, it was a destructive feedback loop. 

Whether my ex is better off with her new attachment or not is irrelevant.  We were pure toxic destruction.  The best thing I could do was leave.   

This was me as well. And it didn't help matters that in the end I was being triggered almost constantly too.

For me right now I try not to think about how she is handling the breakup. As far as I've been told she is not handling things too well but for me to think about it right now is not going to help me moving forward until I come to terms with the feelings of guilt over leaving.

Me too grover11. I am trying to think about what I am doing, not what he is doing. A lot of redirection going on in my mind.

I can relate to this. I started setting boundaries far into the r/s and it was the catalyst for the end of the r/s. Boundaries should be set at the beginning of the r/s, setting them late into a pwBPD r/s or healthy r/s is a very difficult thing to do. If I had boundaries from the very start would a r/s with a pwBPD unfold? I probably never would of had an r/s with my ex.

2010 had some good stuff over the years.

I think "letting go" is a topic that has many areas up for discussion - from boundaries to entitlement to self soothing - all of these topics have been thrown into this thread.

Control is what I think of when I thing of letting go - no longer controlling the outcome or the pain. 

"the best thing you can do for a person with BPD is to let them go"

It was hard, but it was the best thing for and probably her too. I truely believe if I stayed any longer she might be dead... . I just couldn't live that way anymore, and I feel so much better without all that drama and chaos in my life.  I think it is irrational for me to assume or think I know what she feel, thinks, or if it better for her to be without me? (for her standpoint) from mine, it is completely rational to not be with her or speak to her.

I was a trigger, and she became this person I did not know when she became trigger, she could became a scared kid, an angry teenager, or just a person who became and agry and felt entitled and would do or say anything to eleviate her pain or project onto someone else. I wish her well, I don't think there was anyway to predict that any of this would happen.

Can't change the past, or see in the future, just have to be here and live in terms of what I find to be valuable for me, and what I want in another person.  If someone can't provide me with the things I want and desire in life and vice versa, why stay? Ultimately, it came down to commucation, I was not able to communicate with this person, and the further removed she was from my life, the more I became reminded of what I want and don't want, you can get lost in these relationships, because I put someone beforee myself, and that was the case all the time, her before me, and that wasn't healthy.

This is pretty much what happened with me too.  Things were awful, then I tried to start setting and enforcing my boundaries and I think that contributed to things getting even worse.  (I also understand that things were made worse towards the end by me being away for a few weeks visiting family, as that triggered his abandonment fear in a BIG way). One huge extinction burst followed that I never got to see the end of, because things got so out of hand over a period of time, so I had to make the decision to end the relationship for my sanity and the safety of both of us.

My exH remarried about 8 months after our final break-up.  That was a year ago and he seems a lot more settled and happy.  I have as little contact with him as possible (because I am now triggered by him!) but hear about him from friends and our children.  I find it really hard that he seems to have gone from being so miserable and angry with me to a new, wonderful relationship weeks later that is, by all accounts, still going strong.  It's difficult not to take it personally at times.

I do, however, feel that he is better off being away from me because we were triggering each other so much latterly.  He came and went several times over years - things would be great and then flip. My theory is that the more he caused pain, the more shame he felt and the less he could handle it... . so he left again.  Or he would remember something I'd done that hurt him 15 years ago and he'd be off.  He did the same thing with another woman over a few years and she was utterly confused when, having finally divorced me he then married a third woman.  I found that painful but not confusing - there was no history with the new wife and so no triggers. 

So I agree with P&C - I can say that he's "better off without me" but, sadly, I wouldn't bet my mortgage on him being better off overall.  He's not been out of a relationship for more than 5 minutes and got married within six months of starting to date new wife.  Part of me hopes I'm wrong - I still care about him and she seems a decent woman (the other part of me isn't so generous  )

I want to say something like "the best thing... . would have been if I'd been more aware of my boundaries at an early stage in our relationship" or "the best thing... . would have been for him to have felt good enough as a child" or "the best thing... . would have been for me to have been the one to end things years ago" but as Tolou says, we can't change the past and so I will have to take what I've learned into my future.


When I think of letting go now (over 18 months out of relationship), I think about letting go of understanding our relationship and what happened.  I still seem to need to do this and it's futile!

take care,

Claire