Print Page - I'm Back! 2.0

Hi everyone. Thank you for weighing in on my last post. https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=3061527.0

I'd like to ride out this snowstorm by getting some more thoughts down. I hope it brings some clarity to someone or, at least, encourages them to look at their situation a little differently. Maybe ask themselves questions they've never asked before.

I think there has to be some kind of through-line between us "BPD others", right? There must be some common thread, some reason why we tolerate what we do, why we continue to touch the stove.

I've spent the last few months--maybe years, even--asking myself: What is this story?

For me it's just as important to ask What isn't this story? and that means moving away from shame language and dispelling with some pop-psych myths:

Myth My truth
I'm addicted to chaos I believe true love appears on the other side of pain
Can't be alone I'm desperate for an accurate witness
Fear of rejection Fear of being rewritten without my consent
Control freak A need to have a shared truth
No self-respect I value commitment and covenant over self
I'm codependent I believe insight and devotion can fix instability
Savior complex True love means not abandoning people
Low self esteem Ability to make myself small in the name of connection
Can't let things go Afraid to let a counterfeit reality prevail
Fear of abandonment Fear of disappearing from my own life

And I can see how being in relationships with someone with BPD can play right into this story. Throughout each and every painful chapter I wasn't asking "Is this healthy?" I was instead asking:

"How does this fit what I already believe about love and truth?"

Idealization--->Finally, I'm being seen accurately. No one who sees me cleanly can hurt me
Threatening to leave--->She doesn't see me clearly. I must work harder
Suicide attempts--->I can weather this. She'll feel better if I'm a stable partner
Blame shifting--->If we can agree on the truth we can fix it
Gaslighting--->I need to respect her reality, even if it messes with mine
Lying--->The record must be corrected, otherwise everything that stems from the lie is fraudulent
Devaluation--->She's going to leave before I can correct my story

I've learned that these beliefs really stem from just a couple very unhealthy dynamics that I experienced early and often in life. I was a very, very intelligent kid. Very high IQ and all of that. But there was just something about school that didn't excite me. And multiple times a year I carried my report card home with the same message: "Matt is a very smart and kind young man. He is a pleasure to have as a student. But he doesn't do his homework and he is not living up to his potential"

I don't recall anyone helping me understand or reach that "potential". I was graded, evaluated and judged, and then passed along. I was never held back, never given extra tutoring, never offered any emotional or psychological support. It was like: I was important enough to critique, but not important enough to help. I was recognized as being nice and kind, but ultimately I was a failure because I didn't have good grades. What did I learn?

I can do things mostly right but still be negatively labeled. Other people are allowed to tell me who I am. The good parts of me were never good enough to buy me continuous care.

And this is a label that I've carried throughout my life. Good enough to be included, not good enough to be protected. That has kept me in this perpetual state of trying to prove myself, correcting unfair judgements, fighting revisions of who I am, and staying devoted to relationships that have been unbalanced, destabilizing, and unhealthy.

School taught me about my performance, and home taught me about love. A devoted father prone to rage and physical abuse and a mother who was all but totally absent and checked out. There was no peace, just moments where I wasn't being hit, ignored, or merely tolerated. Every day of my childhood was not hell, but I adopted another very unhealthy belief:

I learned that relief from abuse and neglect feels like love.

Aside from a lackluster academic career I was a pretty good baseball player and trumpeter. That was something I enjoyed and was proud of. I didn't realize it then, but even those pursuits carried a hidden danger:

My worth is determined by how well I support the group.

I look back now and I can see how those hobbies of mine were used to define me. I don't recall acquaintances, friends or even family asking me about me. It was often "How's baseball going? Are you still playing shortstop?", or "When are you going to play the trumpet in church again?" I had been reduced to a role, a caricature, and it was up to me to keep that going. To keep the illusion alive. I hated feeling like I was just a baseball-playing trumpeter but, then again, what if they asked about the real me? What was I going to say? "I never do homework, my dad beats me and my mother doesn't talk to me, and I don't know why?" It just felt easier to practice my scales or hit the batting cage.

I was learning how to survive by being small and convenient instead of being known.

High school was more of the same. Terrible grades, zero effort, an unrealized potential. That was also where I mastered being a fun-loving class clown who could hold the attention of thousands of kids, and even teachers, at once. I learned how to read the room--to sense people and attune to them and how to take risks. I pulled some epic pranks, some of which are still talked about today. My thesis was simple:

You do not get to forget me. You do not get to deny that I exist. You do not get to make me small.

Near the end of my senior year my guidance counselor approached me with an offer: do some projects or reports and they'll grant me the credits that I needed to graduate. This was despite a 0.0 GPA. I denied the phony diploma and said "I'll see you next year". I watched all my friends graduate without me. I returned in the fall to do an additional semester. And thus another belief was born:

I must deny care that I feel is unearned. And I will redeem myself via a grand, sometimes defiant gesture.

I graduated after an extra semester and immediately enrolled in college. I don't know, it just felt like the thing I was supposed to do. That did not go well either. Before too long I was skipping most of my classes and attending only the ones that I liked. One day I woke up late and thought "I have to get out of here."

That day I drove to the local recruiting office and enlisted in the Marines. I could have applied myself in school, or dropped out and gotten a job, or any number of things. Instead I chose to join the most grueling branch of the US military without any plan, understanding or frame of reference. Another grand, redemptive gesture of which my mother was not to happy. I shipped off to Parris Island (Marine boot camp) the day after Christmas as a kid with far more questions than he had answers.

Whether or not I realized what I was getting into is lost to memory. But instantly I found a psychological home at Parris Island:

Stripped of my identity--->no problem. I didn't like the one I had anyway
Viewed as a function and a role, not a person--->I'd been auditioning for this my whole life
Lost the right to express myself fully--->I'd spent years learning to take whatever shape would spare me punishment
Assigned value based solely on my contributions to the group--->Years of team sports prepared me for this
Received care only after suffering pain and demonstrating competence--->NOW WE'RE GETTING SOMEWHERE!

At Parris Island I found rules that made sense to me, even though I didn't like them. They were coherent. They didn't change. I wasn't at risk of being suddenly punished or discarded so long as I was willing to suffer and earn my place. I knew what to do and, if I didn't, someone told me what to do. There suffering had meaning. Endurance was akin to competence. Pain was indicative of growth. Effort equaled recognition and recognition meant belonging. I still remember my last day of boot camp, during our graduation ceremony. My drill instructor had to look down at my name before congratulating me. That was one of the things that stuck with me the most: I was strong enough to endure, big enough to matter, but small enough not to leave a lasting mark.

I learned to be big, but not too big. Endurance equals proof of value. And the group will protect people of value.

While I was in the Marines I met a woman and was immediately taken by her. Even today, 24 years later, I still remember that moment. It was like that scene in "The Godfather", where Michael meets Apollonia while hiding in Sicily. That look on his face, that speechless awe. That was me. I got hit by the thunderbolt. And there was no turning back.

For the first time in my life I felt the lure of romantic love. The feeling of being chosen, recognized and wanted. Being a military romance (she was also in the Marines) meant that we spent a lot of time apart. But that distance gave the romance a unique shape: that the love was timeless, born of a shared belief in duty and loyalty, and that it would be strengthened by enduring distance, longing, and even war. Its continuity made it feel fated, unbreakable.

I deployed to Iraq in 2003 and the lessons I had learned in my military career became solidified: endurance is competence, competence gets me accepted, and acceptance is safety. I still remember our first firefight, vividly of course. And I remember that feeling that I was going to die. Not someday. Soon. Now. Here it comes. And I pictured my own funeral. I envisioned my mom sitting there, next to my grave, dressed all in black. With my now-fiancée next to her. And I saw my mother getting handed a folded American flag, a star spangled triangle to commemorate her son who was dead because he was a terrible student. That moment burned something into me at a cellular level:

Death is real. It is coming. It may get me before I have a chance to be fully known. Love is the only thing that will make me immortal.

I returned home and my folks threw me a party. I hated it. I didn't understand it and I didn't want to be there. It was care that I had not earned. Love that I did not deserve nor want because I had not suffered for it. All I did was survive a war, a war I fought in because I was too lazy to do my homework. It made no sense to me.

My fiancée and I were married a few months later. But not some courthouse wedding. A real one. With a real ceremony, a real bridal party, real flowers, the whole thing. I felt legitimate. I was no longer a misguided kid. I was a combat veteran, a Marine and a husband with 150 witnesses to prove it. The vows were delivered by one of my high school teachers, in fact. I was undeniable. I had arrived.

A year later I was in bed with another woman. Drunk, lonely and afraid.

My then wife had deployed to Iraq herself a few months prior. I had no idea what I was doing. I didn't know how to handle this. Of course I knew that extramarital activity was wrong; I didn't know how to handle myself. I was alone in an environment fueled solely by alcohol, pressure, machismo, stress and sex. And I fell victim to it. It was a one-time thing and I regretted it immediately. I was ashamed, scared and unguided. I decided that I wouldn't say anything. I wouldn't tell anyone including her. I would bury this, punish myself mercilessly and press on.

Except she found out somehow. And she spent the next year punishing me. Pushing me away. Ignoring me. Confusing me. It was like I was married to a stranger. Because I didn't know that she knew. This continued for a year, exactly a year from the date of the affair. And then she told me: "I knew the whole time. You needed to suffer. I want a divorce." The lesson was clear:

Reality can exist without me knowing it. I can be punished without trial. My mistakes will ruin love. My failures no longer hurt just me. It's nobody's fault but mine.

As fate would have it, within days of her revelation I was fired from my job, broke (she emptied the bank account), soon to be divorced and on the brink of homelessness. I limped back home to my parents with nothing but a dog and a ton of shame.

I got back home and was confronted by something that would become just as formative to my story as the affair and divorce. I arrived and met...nothing. Silence. Not judgement. Not anger. Silence. It seemed that no one knew what to say or do, so they said and did nothing. There I was, steeped in shame and embarrassment, humiliation and confusion, and there was no one to guide me. No one helped. No one counseled. Just silence. I was suffering and all those witnesses from a year prior were gone. I was my only living witness. My belief that pain begets love had been broken.

I was welcomed back home with open arms and closed mouths. Good enough to be included, not good enough to be protected. If I am left to suffer alone then I will become damn good at it.

And I did. The shame and guilt that I felt, that I still feel today, took on a mythic quality. I actually became attached to it, like I replaced my wife with it. Internally I made the connection that if no one helped me through this then I didn't deserve help. Or maybe I didn't need it. So I figured this was exactly where I needed to be. Mid-20s, divorced, aimless and confused. I bound myself to the shame and refused to let it go. I could no longer be devoted to her, so I decided I would be devoted to myself. But not in a way that one would hope:

I will stand guard over this pain, as a testament to what she meant to me. The shame is what will keep me honest. The guilt will keep me from ever hurting anyone again. It is the last living memory of a love lost. It is what keeps her alive. I cannot forgive myself; forgiveness betrays the very magnitude of the pain I caused.

(I'll continue in another post within this thread)

BPDFamily.com

Relationship Partner with BPD (Straight and LGBT+) => Romantic Relationship | Detaching and Learning after a Failed Relationship => Topic started by: M604V on February 23, 2026, 11:11:36 PM