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These are a few of the things people have told me that have helped me. I go back to them when I feel weak or lost or alone.

I would love to hear some of the things that you say to yourselves when you need courage or peace.

- not my circus not my monkeys

- do not look to the past to find your future

- we lay in the bed we make even if it is a bed of lies

- why would I deny that person the privilege to learn that for themselves (said by my ex all the time)

- forgiveness is for my health not his

- self care is critical if you don't care for yourself why would anyone else

I love "Not my circus, not my monkeys."

That works for the way my ex and her new supply behave around me.   Its just such a perfect comment.

What helped me (I did not know about BPD until well after the breakup), was just recognizing that I was most likely suffering through someone else's mental illness.

It just help my mind to wrap itself around a thought that made sense when nothing did until I knew that she was emotionally damaged as a child and that was what was causing this adult (child-like), aberrant  behavior.  I was really stuck and unable to forgive until then... .and even at that I still struggle forgiving with all of the shenanigans they hae reigned on me since the betrayal.   

Great thread!

A few things that have helped me.

Realising that a pwBPD is stuck at the emotional age of a 5 year old. This really does help explain a lot of their behaviour.

Not taking it personaly: The way people treat you is a statement about who they are as a human being. It is not a statement about you

Reading and learning about codependency. The central message from a book on codependency is simply, stop concerning yourself with other people's lives and instead, concern yourself with your life. The recovery process is not about them, it's about YOU! They have their own path to follow, you have yours.

Unless they get help they will continue with their life of pain and turmoil, we get to have a good look at ourselves, dig deep and come out of this mess as much better, stronger people.

 Couldn't agree more drummer boy.

We will get better. They will not.

And we can never fix them, the disease is deeply imbedded in their minds and it is constant and so will always win. You may have been able to subdue it or restrain it for short periods, but it will always come back.

The hardest part for me right now is the smoke and mirrors they post on social media. (Don't want to block or delete as i think it is petty, any issues I have I will work on myself) We look at them like we would healthy people, but we cant, we have to train our brains to see the illness within. The deep seeded destroyer of worlds that lurks behind the sweet and innocent mask. I know that sounds intense but its the truth.   

+1000!

Hope,

He is not my ticket to happiness.

Live in the present, the here and now.

Look at this not as a mistake but a lesson.

The sun will come out tomorrow.

Love doesn't hurt.

It is what it is. And it really is. An utter nightmare for me but one that is going away. I just never realized how insensitive they are. The one I have to go with is your responsible for your own happiness, not anyone else.

How do you think you will feel an hour from now? A day? A year?

Things never stay the same, change is inevitable.

What you're feeling right now is temporary.

This r/s was a gift. Once you learn more about YOU you will be able to see the red flags in others.

Focus on you and why you stayed.

You are worth more than you led yourself to believe.

Shields up number 1.

"When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time" - Maya Angelou

"We tend to attract people who treat us the way we treat ourselves -- that's how to tell if you're ready to date. When you love who you are, it will attract the right person" - livednlearned, from another thread I read today here on bpdfamily

Love the quote... .and boy did I have that opportunity before I started dating her.

She showed me who she was with her actions and I ignored it... .then she "told" me who she was (a victim), and I believed her. That of course wasn't who she was at all.

I now know that if I had loved myself more, that I would have noticed that she showed me who she was and I would not have dated her.

Excellent statement BPD3103. I will have to remember these words whenever I find myself thinking of my relationship with my possible exBPD gf.

Some favorites:

• Let go or be dragged.



• Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose.



• We don't see things as they are, we see things as we are.



• Silence is a source of great strength.



• Never argue with a fool; onlookers may not be able to tell the difference.



• Be who you really are and go the whole way.



• If you kick a stone in anger, you'll hurt your own foot.



• Chase two rabbits catch none.



• Water is fluid, soft, and yielding. But water will wear away rock, which is rigid and cannot yield. As a rule, whatever is fluid, soft, and yielding will overcome whatever is rigid and hard. This is another paradox: what is soft is strong.



• When you look at the dark side, careful you must be... .for the dark side looks back.

   I've recently read numerous posts and I would like to thank all of you for your posts and comments on the part of healing and so on.  In all honesty, they were refreshing, inspiring, and made me feel better.

Thank you!   |iiii

If one must look outward to validate dignity, you'll most likely be disappointed. You best account for your own reflection.

Take care! Everyone

So true, because we see things with our own projections.  I now realise that when I saw my ex in those early days as being kind, considerate, loving, warm, giving, etc those were MY traits!  I see that I projected those things on him!  If I really look honestly at his 'actions' I see a selfish, inconsiderate and a not terribly kind man.  This ties in with the quote I posted of Maya Angelou's.  He was showing me who he was in his actions but I didn't believe him, wanting to believe in my fantasy of who he was.  I had invested too much already to be willing to see reality.

   Remember that in a way, they did us a favor.

  Mine knew she could trigger and spared bringing me down with her. I think she figured my maturity and strength as a person would get me through and it has. But it has truly been the hardest thing I have ever been through, she hasn't seen me sweat though, so I guess thats good for her and I.

 Anyways remember they did a favor by leaving. Particularly if your relationship wasn't that long (less that a year or two) you still have plenty of time. imagine those of us who have near decades plus with these people, what happens to their years? They are gone, forever. Gone to someone who never really cared about them on a deep and healthy level. That is the stuff that puts you in front of a shrink.

Another thing that always got me through... .You miss them for a reason. They must of had qualities that you liked, (Even if some of those were just masks for you) I know mine did, so take those qualities and put them in a healthy person. Now imagine your happiness. That person exists, don't sell yourself short.    

And another thing I just remembered that helps me. Think of it like this... .You can not only get better, but ESCAPE. if you're younger chances are that they have parents, who will never escape their illness until they meet their graves. If the parents don't have a disorder themselves (Which i'm learning is quite common). Point being you get to move on and start a new. Their parents, and I mean this in the best way possible, are STUCk with them. I feel sorry for mines mother everyday. 

Exactly. It took me a long time to realize I'm expecting rational adult behavior from a five-year-old; that every time I acquiesce to his requests for what activities we pursued, I was letting a mentally ill person run my life.

When I shared with my therapist the messages he sent, my therapist's response was astounding to me: "It's all about him." That's when I understood why I feel so lonely in the relationship--I'm not getting my needs met because it was all about how he was feeling at the time.

When I did try to get my needs met, I got hit with the usual attempts to make me feel anxiously guilty about not meeting his needs, to feel anxiously helpless about not being able to please or satisfy him, or to feel overtly hateful toward him because of his neediness.

There are no rewards or medals or good karma from uselessly sacrificing your life, especially if the BPD is not getting therapy.

I've got a quote from somewhere hanging on my wall: "Sometimes, you have to give up on people. Not because you don't care, but because they don't." I remind myself he's incapable of caring about me, no matter how much he wants to or professes to.

My next relationship will be with someone who loves me back.

'change nothing, and nothing changes'

^that quote works both ways: for the BPD and the non  |iiii

The most helpful thing i've been told came from my therapist and it was "You can't try to logic with a person that knows no logic".

I remind myself of this whenever i lose myself trying to pound something very obvious into her thick skull.

I forgot this one ... .

- you can't logic with a broken brain 

I say this one to myself a lot.

"She's crazy. And just when you think you've reached the bottom of her craziness, there's a crazy underground garage"

All of this stuff is great! Thanks everyone for sharing!

To add to the collection:

• It hurts because it's supposed to.



• There is a time to wallow. And then you stop.



• This too shall pass.



• Time heals all wounds.



• Somebody got tapped a little too hard with the crazy stick.



• Forgiveness is for you, not for them.



• You know you've forgiven them when there's nothing left to say.



• Love isn't supposed to hurt all the time.



• You'll live.



• Stop trying to make sense of the rantings of a disordered mind.



• "This is your chance to walk away. You should take it!" (her father said this to me)



• You can't tell a madman with a shotgun he can't shoot anyone.

Stay strong, kids.

Einstein:

• 
  
  Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
  
  

Had quite the emotional day because you find out you aren't alone in your pain and there are always people to love, help and support. Some of the things I've heard today:

• When are you going to stop dating our father?

From sister who has been down the same road herself, her belief is that in our lives, we have ended up in these relationships as a substitute to gain acceptance from a man who walked out on us who was most definitely NPD.

• You feel that hurt and pain right now and accept it as your pain and hurt. She can't ever do that and all replacement is for is to mask her feelings. They will resurface



• Our wounds will heal because we take care of them. Her's will never heal because she doesn't have the ability to accept she is wounded



• Real love is reciprocated, if it isn't then it's not real love



• How can someone love you if they don't even have the ability to love themselves?



• Do the things you love and love will find you



• Take the time to become the person you want to be and with that comes great rewards

I don't remember where or when I hear this but somebody told me that my crazy reactions to the stuff my husband has done is actually a normal reaction to an abnormal situation. When I was sitting back thinking his behavior was normal, my reaction was pretty abnormal. Any normal person would have lost it way before I did.

My sister in law tells me, "I will support you no matter what you do, but at the end of the day, your husband is a jerk."

"We all have our own demons, you just have to find somebody whose demons play well with yours." (That helps me not be so judgmental towards my husband or myself.)

Oh yes and this is one of my favourites.

- put your own oxygen mask on first ... .you can't be any help to anyone else is you are dead so talk care of yourself first

I'm devestated! I thought my mother was the source of that Maya Angelou quote! :)

It's a combination of influences that have lead me to understand I needed to stop obsessing about her and get myself well and strong. I needed a final blow from her it seems to jolt me i to understanding she doesn't have my best intentions at heart. I'm lucky in that at least a few people in my life do so I know how that feels, ive decided to be one of those people too.

- Come with your cup full

- Suffering is our greatest teacher

- 98% of your thoughts are unnecessary and repetitive

- they have to get well and come home not come home and get well

When I think of my beautiful, sexy ex girlfriend  with gorgeous eyes and beautiful smile I photo-shop that thought by imagining her bashing the window of my home wearing knickers on her head and knitting needles stuck up her note and remembering her brain is a circuit board made from twiglets and marsh mallows... .

It's not a motivational saying a such but its short cut to remembering how much of a nutter she is

I've seen this twice today, so I think it is trying to tell me something:

'The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new' ~ Socrates :)

Here's some more:

'Often the most powerful statement is your dignified silence' (one for supporting NC)

'You've never made a decision in your life with your heart. The heart is merely a muscle. Stop blaming the heart for your irrational decisions. Just consider the possibility that you might be stupid' (one for some light humor)

'Love is kind. Anything less isn't love at all'

'A break up is like a broken mirror. It is better to leave it broken than hurt yourself trying to fix it'

'Sometimes you just have to erase the messages, delete the numbers and move on. You don't have to forget who that person was to you, you just have to accept that they aren't that person anymore'

'Be patient and tough; someday this pain will be useful to you' ~ Ovid

'One day someone will walk into your life and make you see why it never worked out with anyone else'

'If God shuts a door, stop banging on it. Trust that whatever is behind it is not meant for you'

'Sometimes the hardest thing and the right thing are the same'

'When I look back on my life I see pain, mistakes and heartache. When I look in the mirror I see strength, learned lessons and pride in myself'

'If you have to question whether someone cares about you or not, they don't'

'There are no short cuts to any place worth going'

There's no more fight left in me anyway, so bring on the new. I can't wait  :)

When i said i'd die for you i didn't mean everyday... .

The sun is a beautiful thing but once you get too close it will burn you up like all the other stars... .

These are some quotes that I collected during the worst parts after my breakup... .that I kept coming back to for inspiration and encouragement.

Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.

-Rumi

The wound is the place where the light enters you.

-Rumi

Think of yourself as dead. You have lived your life. Now, take what's left, and live it properly.

-Marcus Aurelius

If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.

-Marcus Aurelius

Very little is needed to make a happy life. It is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.

-Marcus Aurelius

I laugh at those who think they can damage me. They do not know who I am, they do not know what I think, they cannot even touch the things which are really mine and with which I live.

-Epictetus

I walk slowly, but I never walk backward.

-Abraham Lincoln

Don't ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up.

-Robert Frost

Consider how hard it is to change yourself and you'll understand what little chance you have in trying to change others.

-Jacob M. Braune

The truth may be puzzling. It may take some work to grapple with. It may be counterintuitive. It may contradict deeply held prejudices. It may not be consonant with what we desperately want to be true. But our preferences do not determine what's true.

-Carl Sagan

The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.

-Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

When we make a change, it's so easy to interpret our unsettledness as unhappiness, and our unhappiness as the result of having made the wrong decision. Our mental and emotional states fluctuate madly when we make big changes in our lives, and some days we could tight-rope across Manhattan, and other days we are too weary to clean our teeth. This is normal. This is natural. This is change.

-Jeanette Winterson

Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.

-Louise Erdrich

You have a right to experiment with your life. You will make mistakes. And they are right too.

-Anais Nin

Drink from the well of your self and begin again.

-Charles Bukowski

Life is a shipwreck, but we must not forget to sing in the lifeboats.

-Voltaire

In the depths of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.

-Albert Camus

I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain! One always finds one's burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks. He too concludes that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night filled mountain, in itself forms a world. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.

-Albert Camus

Run my dear,

From anything

That may not strengthen

Your precious budding wings.

Run like hell my dear,

From anyone likely

To put a sharp knife

Into the sacred, tender vision

Of your beautiful heart.

-Rumi

Perfectly said

I have changed a Rumi quote that sums it up for me.

"Not until the heart is smashed to pieces can it open"

Here are some quotes that helped me:

• We must realize that everyone is ultimately responsible for their own happiness and simultaneously that everyone exerts a powerful influence on the happiness of those around them.



• I am in charge how I feel and today I choose happiness.



• Happiness, true happiness, is an inner quality. It is a state of mind. If your mind is at peace, you are happy. If your mind is at peace, but you have nothing else, you can be happy. If you have everything the world can give - pleasure, possessions, power - but lack peace of mind, you can never be happy.



• The fact is, we are no longer in a position to be the caretaker and support person for our “BPD” partner – no matter how well intentioned.



• Understand that we have become the trigger for our partner’s bad feelings and bad behavior. Sure, we do not deliberately cause these feelings, but your presence is now triggering them.

That one ^ helped me let go... .

Yes... .and it is an unwanted, twisted reality to own.  ... .but own it I do.     I cannot even have a conversation with her.   Not an option.    Others say... .why don't you talk to her.  They perceive the break up as something normal.  I do not bother to try to explain anymore... .some of my friends  think that "I" have it all wrong.  Frustrating to say the least.

Okay, my response is a little "outside the box," but another member recently mentioned a video called "How to deal with a breakup by Noah Elkrief (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vzk3EK6-690&feature=youtu.be (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vzk3EK6-690&feature=youtu.be)). Although I thought it was going to be cheesy, it's one of the most powerful things I've ever seen. After I watched it I started paying attention to my thoughts - and began realizing that my pain was coming from my thoughts, not from my breakup with my ex.  It has been very, very freeing, and has given me some topics of exploration with my T.

I'm not sure that I would have understood the message in the immediate aftermath of the b/u; but 8 months out it caused all kinds of light  bulbs to go off.  :light:

I watch Noah Elkrief's youtube videos all the time especially when I start recycling, ruminating and thinking about the exBPD. We just need to learn how to control our thoughts after BPD breakup or any breakup.

Maybe it's because I'm 8 months post b/u, but it's not so much about controlling my thoughts as it is identifying the thoughts that cause me pain. Those thoughts are my own and have nothing to do with my ex; the r/s and its aftermath simply brought them to the surface.  Thoughts about my own worthiness, for example - I think I've struggled for a long time with the fear that I'm not worthy of love. My ex didn't create that thought in me, but her exit from my life has brought it to the surface.  In a very real sense, that thought has nothing to do with her.