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I honestly don't know where all this talk has come in about pwBPD loving you so much that they leave you before you leave them. I know that deep down they have a fear of abandonment, but seriously... .Mine was always chasing someone else thinking I would stay! Then when he found someone he was interested in to possibly have a r/s he told me he wanted a divorce! He told me hated me and couldn't wait to get rid of me and our house! (it was for sale) It took idiot me to find him in our bed last Xmas with someone else to finally walk away! I think that maybe they are so mixed up in the head that they don't know what they want... .he is now with another person than that xmas woman and told me that maybe at the end of the separation we could get back together, but too much had happened and we needed time apart! None of this makes sense... .but, I DO NOT feel like he just went off and found someone because he feared I would leave him. I feel like he did what he damn well pleased... .I doesn't feel like love to me! This new person is just a pacifier anyway, because she is not at all they type of person he would ultimately want to be with... .Maybe that's the key work here... .since they are all toddlers at heart. We are pacifiers! When I would confront him on his bad behavior, he didn't like being told he was doing wrong... .so he went off thinking he would find someone who will put up with his crap. He treated me like his Mother really... .sad.

I know where you are coming from Herodias. You have every right to feel angry and upset by your fella's behaviour.

In my opinion, there are pwBPD who are using their partners/gfs/bfs as soothers and there are pwBPD who genuinely love their partners/gfs/bfs (just as there are nons who use and nons who are genuine in their love and affection) and also need help with self-soothing. The difficulty is how to distinguish between them. You know your chap. If what you read on these boards doesn't ring true for you, discard it. It may not apply in your circumstances.

Love Lifewriter

Yes! They perpetually feel an emptiness inside but have no idea how to fill it. They never will get what they want, because what they truly want is not something they can get from another human being. That doesn't stop them from trying, though.

Not loving you in the sense you mean, being attached to you, you are an attachment, someone to 'complete' him, along with the fear of losing that attachment, abandonment.  So the answer is to create another attachment, or several, so that losing one doesn't leave him totally alone, where a borderline can feel like they literally don't exist without an attachment.  That's all probably subconscious for him though, and shows up as emotions; I feel bad with who I'm with, I feel bad about myself, I want to feel better, this person over here makes me feel better.  And sitting down and having a heart-to-heart with you isn't an option, because then you will see the worthlessness and shame he sees in himself and you will leave, abandonment.


One possibility: he takes all his shame and self-hatred, projects it on you, hates you instead of himself, leaves you, which conveniently makes the parts of himself he hates go away, and then establishes a new attachment with a corresponding fantasy that THIS one will make all his pain go away.  It doesn't, but it was a plan, one that leaves pain in his wake, so in that sense he's 'sharing'.


It does make sense if you look at it through the lens of borderline personality disorder.  Not fair and painful, but possible to understand, and most of us here have not been exposed, not only exposed but emotionally connected to, someone with a mental illness before, especially one that causes the sufferer to get very good at attaching emotionally to people, because it's literally a matter of life or death for the borderline, but they don't come with a rulebook or a manual, so we get to find out the hard way how they're wired.  Sorry you're going through that Blue, learning about the disorder and how it applies to him might help.  Take care of you!

Hi Herodias,

Do you feel regret that you didn't listen to your gut when he was chasing other women?

Was your gut telling you to leave him?

I agree with Sunfl0wer that it's Ok to feel angry. Is the anger directed at him or are you angry with yourself?

Well yes and no, Blue. Ours do not, likely because they were NPD.

Mutt, I am angry with him and myself... .I am mad at myself for getting into this situation in the first place, angry that I did soo much to try and help him and learn all I could. All for him to leave.  Angry at him for never even trying and using me the way he did. Very angry at him for discarding me in the way that he did as well... I hate that he did this on Xmas! I am having allot of trouble with that fact. Trying to deal with the PTSD that he put onto me with this holiday coming up. All I can think of is what happened last year with that woman in my bed on Xmas day! Every time I go into a store and see decorations... .I think about it!   I don't even want to put up a tree this year and I used to love the holiday! I am furious about that! I was getting better until all the decorations came out this year and it brought it all back to my mind!