BPDFamily.com

Hi all, I haven't posted in a while and feel thje need to get responses on gaining closure regarding my BPDexgf who has been in jail since October 15. She went out in a blaze of glory, trying to blow her sisters house up and yelling it thru the neighborhood which in turn caused a complete evacuation of the street. She ran from police on her bicycle and when caught punched the cop and proceeded to light her hair on fire. I had never experienced this in the 5 years we were together, I am fortunate.

My question is getting closure in all of this, I feel I am moving forward, went on a date and keep busy. I seem to be having mood swings now and then which I have never had in my life. I see my therapist, but my biggest problem is putting all of this in perspective and move forward completely. I guess it will take time and patience.

Can anyone here give me some experienced insight?

I wish I could help you, I am also struggling with closure.  What I have been doing is trying to bring myself to a point where I accept my ex is just not who I thought she was and no matter how hard I try to convince myself she is still the woman I fell in love with.  She is not!  I am cycling through all kinds of emotions.  

Earlier today I was filled with anger, cursing her while I worked.  If someone had been watching me they would probably think I was crazy.  I get home and start wondering if there is a chance she might still want me, still love me.  Write a email telling her how much I want to make it work ... .never sent it. Then I was feeling like I was accepting that it is over, remembering some of the reasons why I had been in so much pain when I was with her.  Then I was remembering all the good things I love about her and how much I miss her.  Then I was thinking about my replacement and thinking about the things she was telling him.   Then I got angry again.  Now I'm just feeing numb.

This crazy yo-yo cycling of emotions is driving me insane.  

CStein thank you for your response, I feel time heals all wounds and that means we have to go thru our mood swings for as long as it takes. I am at a place of not recalling any good times, although my BPDex was well educated and cultured,  the emotional side was a rats nest. I think the person we fell in love with doesn't really exist on an emotional level. At this point I am not seeing any redeeming qualities in the emotional arena, I was the "caregiver" "life coach" 100% of the time. When I look back I could compare it to what Ann Sullivan was to Helen Keller but the outcome was completely different.

I think there is some PTSD for me in some respects, I am not conciously recalling the events, but physiologically I get severe anxiety attacks, not often but at least once a week. I had one on friday night after a full day of being with people I love, my heart palpatated for at least 30 minutes to a point of labored breathing, my blood pressure shot up, I know this because I took my blood pressure, everyting out of whack. That was frightening. A freind was here luckily and helped me to calm. I know its just the affects of living so dysfunctionally for 5 years and its ok. I know what I have to do to stay healthy and work thru all this emotional fallout, it will take a year, I am only 4 months out of the relationship. Closure will take time and only in stages.

You are correct in saying the person you fell in love with is definitely not who you thought she was, in fact just the complete opposite. We must go thru the stages of leaving like anything as in death which I equate it to, we cannot bring them back in our lives because the relationship is dead and didn't really exist in the first place, that person was not capable of having a meaningful relationship with anyone. No wonder we are a mess! I am set on moving forward cautiously, particularly bringing someone new into my life, I have become hyper sensitive.

I dont have anger, not to say I never will, I am just happy to be free of so much dysfunction as I start to relax in my body and mind.

I am sorry for your angst C.Stein, I know how gripping it is to get to the point of closure but realistically it will take time, I am running forward to get there but we know Rome wasn't built in a day. God bless us all

I agree with everything you said.  Acceptance is hard but we have no choice.  I struggle to find closure, to accept it is over.  I shared a dream with her that I had never shared with anyone.  I let her go and I question now if that was the right thing to do.  I feel like I failed her and perhaps I did. 

Then at times I realize it was the only thing I could do at the time for my own preservation, but I could have made more of an effort to communicate.  I think I am also experiencing some PTSD (according to online screening tests), having a hard time recalling feelings and emotions I was feeling and why I did (or didn't) do certain things.  I can see the emotions in my mind but I just can't seem to grasp them.

I did not like how I felt during the majority of our relationship.  I was almost constantly in a state of anxiety and fear ... .that is before I became completely numb and depressed.  But then there were times of extreme happiness and love.  The bad came so infrequently that it is hard to put aside all the good that was there.  The bad however did a lot of damage to me emotionally and that hurt the relationship. 

It is like a tree that was planted at the beginning of our relationship.  As our love grew and bond deepened the tree grows.  Each time something happens that emotionally hurt me or the relationship a branch was cut off the tree.  The problem we had is our tree was losing branches faster then it was growing them back.

C.Stein it is clear that your happiness relied on her mood as is with me, clearly we are codependent which has little to do with a real loving healthy relationship. If we could keep that in mind that we were not having a relationship at all, only in our mind was it a semblance of a relationship, the person we were with is not capable of having a real relationship and I guess we were not either. Since we know now what that felt like hopefully move forward and understand our own shortcomings and learn to love ourselves more.

Obviously for me my exBPD was severely mentally ill and it took me quite some time to see it, I was connecting more on an intellectual level than an emotional one and lived primarily in a world of hurt for a long time, my ex could not process her wrongs at all and of course I analyzed her as if I was a trained psychologist!. I realize I am not Jesus and clearly in my mind I thought I could save the world, that is fiction of course.

I look at it as a lesson and truly need to learn from it and that is the positive, working on me and knowing myself is the most important thing I can do. Just realizing we have so much more to offer ourselves in the forgiveness of where we landed and kept the dysfunction fire burning with heart and soul.

The closure will come when we can get to the perspective that the relationship was not healthy one and take responsibility for our own part.

Hi Eye438, sounds like you're very insightful about your past relationship and how you're feeling now. That is a good characteristic to have and will help you over time to heal.  |iiii

The saying that time heals all wounds is only partially true, we have to put in the work over time to heal the wounds, otherwise we fall prey to repeating the past. If you haven't yet followed the lessons, I would suggest checking out the side bar to the right of the webpage that says "Attachment leads to suffering, detachment leads to freedom". All the lessons links as well as the detachment links can help point you in the right direction of a healing path. Keeping these concepts in mind while continuing therapy will lead you to healing and self growth, not overnight yet you'll be surprised later on down the road how much you've healed and grown. Best wishes to you. 

Hi Learning curve74

Thank you for pointing out the sidebar, there is so much here to read that I didn't see that. I am reading When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron, this book is so enlightening!  Buddhism has been a part of my spiritual belief system for a long time, but as with many people the loss of keeping check on ones self can lead to derailment, we have all been there, some more  than others. The stress in the world today does not help, but reading these tools really help me. I hunger for being balanced and am working on me more than ever before. For the first time in my life I live alone, something I thought I could never do. One can be alone in a relationship and that to me is even worse as I have done it a couple of times. I am loving my alone time to let thoughts flow, its a wonderful feeling to take charge of one's own life and just be without the weight of feeling responsible for anyone but myself and its freeing! I am wide open to all things that bring a positive light on moving forward, its all very enlightening! Self help is the best thing we can do if we really want to make change possible. Thank you for your response!