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I have recently gotten out of a one year relationship with my pwbpd. I am feeling rattled, crazy, so lost. I feel like none of it made sense and like I need clarity and that I want to apologize for my part in it. Have any of you ever written a letter to your expwbpd and if so, how did it go?

Hello and welcome to the site, we can all relate to what you've gone through.

If it's some sort of closure and explanation you're seeking, it's unlikely you'll get it. In the mind of the BPD, they were always the victim and tend not to justify anything they did.

It would indeed be nice if our exBPD's did take responsibility and acknowledge - even if in a small way - that they caused problems, instead of leaving us in a shattered wreck both mentally and physically wondering what the hell just happened.

If you're happy the relationship is truly over for good then I wouldn't be inclined to initiate any contact as they would see this as you still being interested and a candidate 'if all else fails' and they have nobody else in the picture at the moment.

If you want to re-engage with the hope of trying again then remember that they were unable to accept sense, reason and logic when you actually spoke to them so are likely to treat a written letter the same way.

I wrote to my exBPD a couple of times during her many meltdowns but I don't think it ever served any real purpose. She went out with me because I was her best option at that time. Took me  a long time to realise that.

Best wishes whatever you decide to do, keep us informed we've all got your back.

When it comes to seeking closure from a person with BPD traits (pwBPD), our experience is that it's generally counterproductive.  It's better to Gift yourself whatever Closure you feel you need.  Remember that explaining yourself just exposes yourself to needless discord.  We have to remember that using JADE (Justify, Argue, Defend, Explain) (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=139972) is a communication approach that works well with us reasonably normal people, typically fails with pwBPD.  In other words... if it's over, then just accept it's over.  Let the sleeping dogs lie undisturbed.

Some here have really felt a need to DO something.  How about writing your letter and then, with or without friends or ceremony, let it burn.  (No forest fires, please!)

Hello and welcome to the family!

I wrote a few letters post breakup at different stages and I don't think any of them did any good.  However, the process of writing and getting my feelings out on paper helped me quite a bit.

A few of the letters I sent.  The other letters I threw away.  None of them were directly discussed or replied to though and I was okay with that.

So if you want to write a letter, write a letter.  Or write 20 of them.  It feels good to get all that out.  Just know that it's beneficial for you and probably counter-productive for your partner/ex since they'll view it through a jaded lens.  So actually sending the letter is optional and most here would tell you to save the price of the stamp...it's not worth sending.

 I would not write any letter. Anything you write in there, short of you taking blame is going to come off as you being a horrible person with no accountability. Go no contact and block them everywhere if that is a possibility. Keeping any door open will only keep you trapped. We all know how addictive these relationships are and it truly is like a drug.

Thank you for the welcome.  I do understand that it may be counterproductive.  I have written many letters at this point.  I myself suffer from C-PTSD which i had before I met my pwbpd. I have never before come into contact with anyone with bpd as far as I know. This was a whole new experience for me.  Incredibly wonderful to start, quickly got tumultuous. Felt like I wanted to try to help him but things just kept getting more chaotic. My own trauma responses made gray rocking almost impossible. I would need to talk about it after and it almost never worked even though he said he would be able to. I made mistakes and I lied once to try to avoid a fight. That was stupid of me but is hard to believe the outcome would have been much different if I had been honest. I later found out that he had been talking to other women. Women he said he broke up with because he never really felt much for them.  I also found out that he told our coworkers that I had assaulted him. Which is horrible for many reasons and also untrue. I myself had been assaulted about a year prior to meeting him and had been vulnerable with him about this. So it blows my mind that he would say something like that about me. I feel the need to call him out but to also apologize for being so reactive when we would fight. A mutual friends called the cops on him and they took him to a hospital for holding. While he was in there, i took care of his dog. When he got out,  i didn't get a thank you. He refused to be at his apt when i dropped her off and made me kick in the door and break the frame since it was still messed up from the cops. He has another ex who started out being kind to me and quickly switched to saying i was the crazy one amd blocking me. To be fair, I did lash out at her because she also lied about her intentions and had been trying to get back with him the whole time we were together.  To be honest,  I DO feel crazy. It's all so complicate and messy. I oscilate between hating him and wishing we had never met and wanting to make things right for my part in it.

I think at this point,  I just feel so confused. I have no idea who or what to trust. I do believe he loved me. I know i loved him. I think I want to believe that he would be receptive because he seemed to have serious moments of clarity in the past. It just feels like everything got so insane for a minute there. I am in therapy and have been going to support groups. Just,  at the end of the day, he is still the one I want to talk to about all of it. And due to the relationship, I have cut many people out of my life in order to help cut down his triggers. So I'm feeling especially isolated. Many of the friends I do still have don't really seem to understand it. They tend to make me feel worse. Reading posts on this site have helped me a lot so that is why I am here now.

So in a one-year relationship, he:

- Lied to you many times
- Lied about you to others
- Cheated on you (many times)
- Was hospitalized for mental issues
- Found a new love (in an old flame)
- Lied to her about you
- Lied to you about her
- Showed no remorse or appreciation
- Avoided you after helping him

That list is just from two of your posts, so I'm guessing it's only a small snapshot of the full picture.

Going back to your first post- what part of that list makes sense to anyone?  It just doesn't.  And it will never make any sense until you add the one thing that all of this revolves around.  He's sick.  He's mentally ill.  He means well but self-sabotages every relationship in his life.  Then he runs before he can get hurt.  But it still hurts, so he jumps head-first into another relationship right away.

This is the story of a BPDs life.  It's the same toxic, abusive cycle.  And its heartbreaking because I'm sure underneath the mental illness, he's a pretty good guy.  But you can't look at one thing without the other- they're a group package that comes together.  That's why his past relationships have failed.  That's why his future relationships will fail.  It's sad but unfortunately, it's the honest truth.  He's sick and he's the only one that can help himself.

You are not crazy and this is not your fault.  There's nothing you can do right now to "fix this."  

I will give a piece of advice though; his current relationship will also fail and he'll be looking for someone to quickly replace her with.  He might come back and say all the right things, do all the right stuff, and you'll think that it's true love destiny that you're together forever.  But the same cycle will repeat once again, just like it always has in his life.  You'll have a whole new list like the one above.

Right now, your focus should be on healing from this relationship and finding your way forward.  It doesn't make sense right now because this comes in stages, but I'm telling you now where you'll eventually end up- he's mentally ill and none of this was personal.  He does the best he can while fighting mental illness and it causes chaos in all his close relationships.  That's not your fault and in some ways, it's not his either.  Again, he's sick.

I hope that helps!

Yes, that does help. It's so frustrating because I know logically that this is a person who did all.of those things and pretty severely abused me yet I feel at fault. I know that is by design. And i know crazy makes crazy. It is very hard to keep your cool in those situations. The fights would get so bad. It would be 4 am and we both had work the next day and he would have the lights on, tv blaring, piling up everything I ever gave him on the floor, screaming at me to get the f*** out of his home and his life. And i would just be crying, hiding under the covers. He would try to push me out of the bed and eventually just go sleep on the couch but leave the tv blaring. This would happen often and I wouldn't always be able to just lay there. Sometimes I would throw a fit back. Sometimes I would drive away into the night.  There was no winning and he blames me for always pushing him to that point. And so does his ex that I told him he would unblock so that he would have more support in his life. Something he would not have done for me. I only had him block her in the first place because she was sending him love songs and asking him out to the bar after midnight.  Plus he had me block pretty much every man in my life whether I had history with them or not.

Advice I received was to write a letter, and then hold off on sending it for a decent amount of time, and then come back to it and see if you still want to send it.

The issue is, you're seeking closure for how the relationship went, and want to rectify the mistreatment you likely received, but a pwBPD is not going to see it that way, and is not interested in setting anything straight; sending a letter to them is not going to start a productive dialog, it's just an invitation to continue the same deceptive and disingenuous communication patterns you had during your relationship.  Does that make sense? 

It's like getting back in a hamster wheel and thinking this time running in it might take you somewhere.  It hasn't changed though, you'll still just go around in circles.

That is an excellent caution.  Do not write anything that could imply that you did something legally objectionable.  There are laws (at least in the USA) that you do not have to incriminate yourself.

Here's a thought... It's probably okay to apologize for hurting the other's feelings.  Last I heard, you can't be found guilty or jailed for hurting someone's feelings, though some countries in Europe seem to be leaning in that direction.

Did you ever decide to send ot after all?

Could I post the letter here and hear your thoughts?
Or is that too personal? I feel as i am lost at sea most days and using this type of message board is new to me as well.

I never wrote a letter; I considered it after my divorce, and then read some of the accounts here, and recognized that it would just re-open the door to more pointless conflict. The fact that we had nearly divorced a year prior to that, but she begged me to reconsider and I caved, only to have her immediately revert to established behavior patterns once she felt like the threat of divorce had passed, made me see any attempts at having a genuine conversation with her as an exercise in futility.  I knew it was all a game to her... I don't even know if she is capable of having feelings like a normal human would.  For her the truth is whatever she can convince people of, and if you're not trying to manipulate others to do what you want, you're just a sucker and a fool.  

So I concurred with what I read from others here, that any attempt at opening a dialog would just result in the same finger pointing and blame shifting she always engaged in.  So I never wrote a letter, let alone sent one.  

Instead I write here, and hopefully can provide some guidance to other people going through high-conflict, miserable relationships like I did.  I view this as a lot more productive, and a net good for humanity, rather than going in circles with my ex about why everything was my fault actually, and she only yelled and screamed and picked fights with my mom, my aunt, my brother, etc. because of reasons, I never loved her enough, put her first, or [insert baseless, impossible to achieve standard here].  No thanks!

You can absolutely share it here as long as you leave out any identifying information (his name, the new girl's name, etc) or ultra-specific stuff (like locations you went on certain dates, etc).

Absolutely, it is maddening and it's so hard to know which way is up when your partner is disordered and just wanting to fight about something.  I lived that as well.

Just know that how I felt a few weeks after breaking up was very different than how I felt a few months later, or even a few years later.  You're so close to this right now that it feels like it's worth fighting for...which is normal.  If you love someone, you fight for them and forgive them.  But that brings us back to mental illness; he's not fighting for you because in many ways, he was incapable.

Quick glimpse into his thinking.  He's having a terrible day but trying to hide it.  His thoughts are everywhere.  He comes home, starts ranting, and you try to silently back away.  You don't want to do that, not again!  And he senses that.  But instead of thinking what a normal person would think- maybe I'm being overly drammatic, his mind goes the opposite direction and blames you.  How could she not understand how much pain I'm in?  How could she reject me when I'm feeling like this?  What sort of person would look at me that way when I ask them an important question?

Again, mental illness is leading this parade.  His thoughts are jumbled and before long, he's convincing himself that you're going to leave him, that you never cared to begin with.  He can't face rejection, he can't handle it at all, so he sabotages the relationship and either leaves, or forces you to leave.  Why?  Because you can't abandon him if he kicks you out.

This disordered way of thinking drives his every action, defines his entire life.  He's always looking for the slightest hint of a problem and when he sees it (regardless if it's real or not), he fixates on it until he's built a completely different narrative in his head.  One random thought leads to another and before long, what he thinks about the relationship is nothing like the reality before him.  He must fight or flee.

The cheating, the abuse, all the other stuff comes from this cycle.  In his mind, you were the mean one and he did what he had to do in order to survive.  In reality, his own brain was working against him and he was simply running from all the pain.  The problem wasn't you though, it was always within him and that's the scariest thing in the world for him to even consider.

This is the version that I have landed on now. I decided to leave it most of the happy lovey stuff because let's be real, I don't think reliving that is helping me and it would only make him mad because he might stew on what he can't have anymore.
It is a bit of a read but I do feel that I am taking responsibility more than I am placing blame. Maybe a little too kind for everything he put me through but who knows.

Dear exbf

I write to you now from my truest heart. The heart of a person you said you love more than anything and that loves you still. I realize that it is possible that you have split me black and villainized me in order to make things easier for you.  But now, I ask that you please read this with an open and compassionate mind. It is not an attack, it is insight. You are a person that I love and care deeply about. The time we had together means so much to me. I want to apologize for how I communicated with you at times. My own life trauma has changed my brain and the way my nervous system responds to things the same way yours has. Yes, it is different. No i don't have bpd. I do however have C-PTSD. Along with some usual suspects, depression, anxiety, panic disorder. For me, high-anger conflict, accusations, hurtful words, feelings of being abandoned or pushed away so hard etc, trigger a fight or flight reaction as well. I get emotionally overloaded, defensive, scared, reactive. That kind of conflict proves to me that I am in fact worthless and it drives my ever present need to try to make everything ok. I feel constant guilt of everything being my fault even when I logically know that is not the case. So when you would say everything was my fault, it would confirm my fears. I over explain due to the fear of not being understood. Especially by the person I love. When you would leave after or in the middle of a big fight, with no thought as to when you'd be back, I would feel severe abandonment. That is why I always asked for a timeline because I would worry that you wouldn't come back at all. Like you had threatened. Even though I logically knew that you needed space and wanted to give that to you. When you did come back, I would try to talk about it because I wanted everything to be ok. Not to be pushy but to have a conversation and make it right. To avoid spiraling on my end and making it worse. To try to connect with you and build a stronger bond by being able to talk through things together. Like you, I can get stuck on things and it is hard to get out. Like you, i sometimes need a delicate touch and reassurance.

I am a caretaker and a people pleaser. That came from my need to have peace, stability and safety in my home life growing up when there was none. I have a very hard time feeling safe around other people. It takes me a long time to feel like I can trust them or like I can fully relax and be myself. While our shared trauma brought us together and forged an incredibly deep and passionate bond, it also made it so that when both of our nervous systems were dysregulated, it would create an intense trigger-response cycle. A lot of the time, my response to your cycle was to either shut down or defend myself. Usually, before I even knew what was happening. I know you are unwell but that does not excuse abusive behavior, harsh double standards or hurtful lies. When I would try to take a time out, it was not usually successful. I know I was sometimes not good at giving you space either. I tried my best to do what I could. When you would split on me, it felt like my world was ending. I thought I was losing you every time. I would get so scared especially when you started threatening or hitting yourself. I vividly remember you holding a knife to your throat and laughing. It tore me apart watching you hurt yourself. I would blame myself and feel the need to make it right for you no matter what. Even though I know it was not my fault and that there was not much I could do. When I felt that I couldn't do anything right, I would withdraw and beat myself up. I know you do this too so you understand the importance of reassurance around those feelings. This is why I needed you to read about my trauma triggers and responses as well so that you could understand the ways in which I am similar and we could both do the work to better our communication and our reactions.

I never wanted to block you in the first place, It felt so wrong. I kept unblocking you because I was worried about you. Not because i wanted to torture you. You were my best friend. 90 missed calls in a row made me feel like you were screaming that you needed me. So I would unblock you to make sure you were ok. And then it would devolve because we were both emotional and reactive. So many times, you would say one thing but mean another. There were no rules. You yourself said that you have never pushed or tested another partner so hard and I felt that. You say I badger you but sometimes when people get pushed to an extreme, they push back. That is not an excuse. Just something that can happen. You instilled in me that you wanted me to do everything I could to push through your walls. To stay even when you were screaming at me not to. To find every way to contact you even when I was blocked. You said those exact words to me. That is a hard habit to build and an even harder one to break. I was trying to do what you had asked for so many times.To always keep trying, to not give up, no matter what you said or did. I loved you more than anyone I've ever known. I fought harder for our relationship than I have for anything. I showed you countless times that I was not going anywhere. Proved my loyalty and my worth over and over. Feeling like there was never enough I could do to convince you takes a toll.

I am ashamed of lashing out at you at the end. I know that you being in the hospital was scary and horrible for you. I regret not being more present and sensitive to that. And for not being able to better control my emotions. Between everything that had happened between us and losing the baby, I was already in such a dark place. Then I found out many things that really hurt me. I felt like everything was a lie. I know that if you had heard those things about me, I would do everything I could to show you it wasn't the truth. You didn't do that for me and it made it feel even more that it was in fact the truth. I still don't know who or what to trust or believe. All I truly know is how I felt in that moment and how I feel now. The only thing I can do is take responsibility for my own actions.

I keep replaying dropping dog off in my head. I feel so awful that that's the way it all went down. I know you told me to break the door frame but it all felt so extreme. I love her more than anything too. You two were my family. I just wanted so badly to help you both. Even after everything. I wanted to leave with more grace but I just couldn't. I was and still am in so much pain.

I didn't end things because I don't love you. I love you so very much. The constant fighting was doing heavy irreversible damage to us both. From everything I have read, it is almost impossible for someone with bpd to seek treatment while they are in the depths of a romantic relationship. The highs and lows are too drastic to be able to focus on anything outside of it. You told me yourself how all you did was rot and obsess when I wasn't right in front of you. I never want that for you. I ended things for both our sake. I know that I've had a difficult time detaching. I never wanted to be without you. It's all so complicated. I understand that we both have very different ways of processing heartbreak. I also think that it is incredibly hard to detach in general after bonding the way that we did. I understand that you now feel a need to fill that void with something or someone else. I hope, though, that you can find a way to focus on yourself and find the motivation to work towards healing in a way that brings you peace. You are so incredibly special. Not just to me. But to so many people. Seeing you in pain breaks my heart. Many unforgivable things happened to you as a child and that was not your fault. Neither of us deserved the horrible things that happened to us. You deserve so much love and happiness. I also understand that part of why things got so intense is because of how strongly you feel about me. I know you said you have never felt the way you do about me about anyone else. I get that the more intense the feelings are, the more the symptoms present themselves and the fear of losing that increases the need to self sabotage and push me away even harder. I can't imagine how difficult it is to try to navigate that with so many conflicting things going on in your mind. But you are not unworthy of love and good things. There were times that I was successful in helping you but I know that there were many times I was not and I will forever wish I could have been stronger in those moments. I have been working on myself too. Therapy and support groups have been very helpful to me. I have a whole lot to heal as well. I wish that we both could have found better ways to communicate with each other and feel like the other understood. You do not need to respond if you do not want to. I just wanted to share this with you, someone who is very important and dear to me. If you truly feel like hating me is the only way that you'll make it through this, then I understand. But just know, I could never hate you. I am hurt and feel betrayed but when I think of you and of us, I choose to remember all of the good, the love and the adventure. I will love you and miss you for the rest of my life.

We dated for a year. Things got progressively worse. I definitely held on longer than I should have. I told him from the beginning that mental health was very important to me. After he told me about his bpd, about 3 months in, I told him I needed him to seek treatment if he wanted to pursue a future with me. He promised he would. Every now and then he would take a small step towards that but then would blame me for any set backs. He said thay the only way he would get better is if I lived with him.  I told him I was not ready for that and needed to ensure that my home could be more stable then how it had been woth us lately. I tried breaking up with him in April but he charmed me back in. Things kept getting worse. The stress of it all caused me to have a miscarriage. He was not there for me through that. He could not get off the living together thing.  I even tried to compromise by moving into the same apt complex just in my own unit but it wasnt good enough. The fighting kept getting worse so I ended things again at the end of June. Had him blocked off and on but then when he went to the hospital,  I wound up taking the dog so I couldn't have him blocked during that time. Every interaction just kept getting worse. It sucked.

And maybe I'm delusional to care so much at all. Yes the emotional and verbal abuse was horrible. And maybe I already have a high threshold for that so I didn't see it for as bad as it was at the time. And maybe the trauma bond made me feel a crazy desperate love that wasn't real love. I am a sensitive and traumatized person. That being said, I do clearly value myself enough to get out. I just feel so insane at this point. Sorry to vent so much.  I clearly needed to get some stuff out.

No, you can't fix someone with BPD by being in a close relationship.  It's more the opposite... the close relationship usually deteriorates because of the close relationship since the person with BPD traits (pwBPD) can't get past the huge emotional baggage of the close relationship.  (I hope that makes sense... It is why therapists don't make friends with their patients, they do seek to build Trust but certainly not an emotional connection which would be triggering at times.)

Another reality is that a pwBPD will typically describe their prior ended relationships as horrible or even abusive ones.  It's the common Blaming, Blame Shifting and posturing as the victim (see |---> Karpman Triangle (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=108440)).  And yes, that is how he will likely describe you to his future relationships.

That is so infuriating and horribly tragic at the same time. I put so much effort into this relationship. I read everything I could about his illness. Tried my best to do all the things they say to do. Lost so much of myself. Got so many new gray hairs. Body shutting down. And he couldn't even come support me on the rate occasion I needed him or do one thing I asked.  I told him I needed him to write me a love letter so that when he was splitting, I would have something positive to look at. I asked him for that for a year and he wouldn't even do that.

It's not a bad letter, but there are a few things to consider cleaning up.  For instance, the 2nd and 3rd sentence will be taken far out of context and cast everything else into a shadow.  He will read it as something like, "You're the villian, so you're painting me as the villian to live with yourself".

I'm finishing up at work and don't have time to comment further today, but I'll try to give you more insight in the morning.

Yes, I did decide to take that part out. Thank you so much for your time and help. I really don't know if I will send it or not but I would like to perfect it all the same.

Okay, let's start with the good stuff:

- The letter mostly focuses on you and your feelings.  A BPD can relate to feelings.

- You offer apologies in multiple areas, in different ways.  The, "I'm sorry this happened" type of apology is good, while the "I'm sorry I didn't/couldn't handle things well" is great.  The second version is a little better because of the first point, it ties back to your personal feelings and your vulnerabilities.

- You end talking about how much he means to you.  I would scatter that in througout, but leave it strong at the end.

Some not so good stuff:

- The blaming portions will miss the mark and here's why.  If you're blaming over something, he's going to defend and it pushes you further apart as the conflict grows.  Keep these to a minimum or remove them completely.

- The lines "ex best friend" comes off wrong as well.  Rephrase that stuff to something like, "I miss my best friend who I could share everything with."  It means the same thing essentially, but one is a negative (which brings shame, comflict) while the other focuses on the positive aspect.

- While you've apologized, it would be even more powerful if you tell him that you forgive him as well.  That's where so much of his shame and abandonment come in at.  Let him know that you're not holding it against him anymore and you genuinely hope he heals and grows.

Overall, you wrote this from the heart and that's a great thing.  BPD and C-PTSD have many similar traits, which means you can connect with him on that level where he struggles so much.  So I'd leave much of the letter the same when it's focused on what you feel.  But for the other parts, for the judgement, you really have to think about what you'd want from this letter. 

If it's a "goodbye" then you don't have to change much.  If it's a "let's talk" then you still have a lot of editing.  And if you're unsure if you'll ever send it, then you can decide the balance since you're really speaking to yourself more than anything.

I hope that helps!

Reading your letter, I think it's better if you didn't send this to him (or anyone who is BPD).  There are a lot of heartfelt, deep feelings you're struggling with, and you should tell this to someone who you trust, and who is a good listener (or possibly a therapist) to get it off your chest, and get some perspective on how and why you feel this way. 

You're seeking closure on this episode of your life, and the last thing a pwBPD can provide is closure.  By the very nature of their disorder, they're incapable of taking responsibility for their actions and making amends, or even simply just apologizing.  They're always going to take the position that they were the victim, and when they mistreat their own partners, will always find an excuse for their bad behavior in something their partner did or said, or didn't do. 

It's frustrating, but that's just how it is.

Hi Ashes,

I see you've been through so much, and you're deeply hurt.  I'm sorry the relationship feels so tragic.

Look, I've had disordered people in my life:  a dBPD, an uNPD, and also people with BPD traits.  My advice to you would be not to send the letter.  While writing it might help you process your feelings and do a post-mortem of the relationship, I think that sending it to a pwBPD would probably backfire, by riling him up.  This is probably the opposite of what you'd hope, correct?  There's a reason you're not communicating well with him right now, and that's because he's not ready.  I think if you reach out, you're breaking a self-imposed cooling off period. 

Moreover, I think a pwBPD would recoil from an emotionally-charged letter like this one.  Here's what the pwBPD traits in my life might think or say:

You expect me to read this?  It's too long.  You go on and on and on about your feelings, when you know full well the issue is that YOU abused ME!  I'm not reading this ****ing email.

I told you not to contact me!  You're such an idiot, you can't even follow my simple orders!  You disrespected me, you ****.

Why are you sending me this, in the middle of the day / late at night?  How dare you!?!:!  You know I'm too busy for this sort of crap.  You're trying to sabotage my workday / sleep.

Oh, so NOW you're apologetic.  Well, it's too late.  You're a psycho.

You think a couple of sentiments will make up for the horrible things you did?  You are SO WRONG, and I'm furious.  This just proves to me that you won't ever take responsibility for what you did.

You're just covering up for cheating on me.  Clearly you're wracked with guilt. You're such a liar, this proves it.

Etc.

You see, it's not so much about the content, but the context.  You'd be placing more importance on your emotions over his, but in pwBPD-world, the emotions that matter are always the pwBPD's.  He'd take everything the wrong way--that you're attacking him, blaming him, better than he is, more important than he is.  He'd twist a tiny aspect of your letter, sometimes the technicalities of the letter itself (how long it is, the time of day you sent it, which account you used to send it, how long you waited before sending it, your pretentious vocabulary, etc.), and he'd take it as insulting in some way.  Why?  Because he's hurting, and anything and everything you do will be seen in a negative light.  So if you don't want to "poke the bear" so to speak, I'd say, keep the letter to yourself.  But it is valuable, because it helps YOU.  I'd only consider sending it if he made some sort of conciliatory move first, to show that he's "ready."

I can't help but think of an episode of Friends, where the central couple had a tumultuous breakup, and the leading lady (Rachel) wrote a heartfelt letter to her ex (Ross) to express her feelings and try to patch things up.  Since the letter was "too long," Ross didn't finish reading it.  But when Rachel asked Ross what he thought about the letter, he was too embarrassed to admit he hadn't finished it, and he decided just to go along with her and agree with her, leading them to reconcile.  But then Ross read the letter in its entirety, and he was infuriated, because he felt that SHE blamed HIM for the breakup.  Not only that, but he started to pick apart the technicalities of the letter--length, grammar, timelines, etc.--further riling Rachel.  I think the message was that they could get back together if they had let the past be the past, and forgive each other, rather than dissecting the breakup and assigning blame/responsibilities.  I guess I'm saying that this sort of thing happens even with non-BPD folks (on TV at least).

Just my two cents.

Yes, all of that makes sense. I think I am just so confused and lost. I am having a hard time figuring out if my ex truly did have BPD or if it was more than that. To the people that I am describing this to, they either say that he could possibly have the worst case of BPD they've heard of or that maybe he also has NPD or ASPD.

I feel so responsible. I truly believe that I made it worse. But at this point, I also cannot tell if that was all by design and he convinced me of that. There were absolutely times that I kept my cool and I let him go through my whole phone and accuse me of texting other men or of deleting texts and I let him rage and yell and throw stuff and I just stayed calm and quiet. But there were times when I couldn't control myself and after days of being stonewalled or accused or after hours of petty jabs, I would snap and I would say things back that I regretted. He made me feel like I was untrustworthy and disloyal. That I had made him so jealous because of my behavior. I would spend weeks, months trying to convince him that I was worthy of his love and of being trusted. I AM crazy for trying so hard. For blaming myself. For holding myself to these impossible standards but not holding him to the same ones. For telling myself well he's unwell so I have to let it slide. Or he's unwell so I can't expect him to understand. Or his exes cheated on him, of course he fears that I will do the same. Yes, I know they can lie about these things but I did confirm that it for sure happened with at least 2 of them.

He would have me send him videos of all of my notifications throughout the day because he thought I was texting other men at work. I had my location on for him nonstop. I would rush to answer my phone quickly so that he didn't get suspicious if it took longer to text back. I would tell him when I was getting in the shower in case it took a little too long to respond. Had to text when I was leaving, when I got home. If god forbid, someone from my past did reach out, I had to tell him/show him immediately or he would think that we had this whole conversation and I deleted it or deleted some of it to make it more palatable. There was once when he spent hours begging for me to come over while also saying to stay away (the whole testing you to see if you will still come no matter what they're saying thing) and I finally fold at like 1am. So I go over there and he won't let me in. For almost 2 hours, I sit in the 40-50 degree cold on the cement outside his door. Begging to be let in. FINALLY he does and he tells me, "don't touch me, don't touch my dog, don't turn off the tv(it's blaring), just shut up and go to sleep" and I do. I just lay there in the dark, horribly uncomfortable because I couldn't get under the covers and I'm too scared to complain or move. And I'm too scared to leave him. Why didn't I leave? Because I was set on proving to him that I wasn't going to abandon him. That he wasn't unlovable like he so feared. Stuck in a whirlwind. Thinking that if I just stick it out, eventually he will see that I mean it when I say I love him. That I mean it when I say I'm not going anywhere.

It's also so confusing because the good times were so magical. And at the beginning, there was a whole lot more good than bad. He once drove me home from work because I was sick. He bundled me up on the couch, kissed my head and made me homemade soup. Put on disney movies for me while he rubbed my feet. Or for dates sometimes we would take these wonderful romantic night time bike rides through the city. Stop at parks to explore or have a picnic. The way we would explore together made me feel like I was a teenager again. In love and free. He helped me make dietary changes that truly made me feel healthier. We went to shows together and the drive in. Went on incredibly fun road trips. Cooked together. We would go swimming and he would just hold me and stare into my eyes while telling me how beautiful I was. All kinds of wonderful romantic movie type memories.

I am just a complete mess ya'll.

I spent a lot of time feeling the way you do. Your care for him is obviously genuine and you want to help, and you want to make amends for any hurt you caused. This is genuinely kind.

The challenge is, he cannot receive this kindness due to his illness. He cannot handle the intensity of the feelings or balancing his feelings and yours.

I agree with others it’s better not to send the letter.

You are a caring person and also deserve healing. He is an adult, albeit an ill one. You didn’t cause it, you can’t cure it and you can’t control it.

I think the challenge now is to turn your compassion to yourself. Appreciate the love and care you offered him. Appreciate that he hurt and abused you. Understand you’re not perfect and it was a tough situation.

For those of us with CPTSD these relationships unfortunately tend to mirror our childhoods and bring up those wounds. That’s torture but at best it’s an opportunity to look with adult eyes at what we suffered as kids that caused our challenges.

In short - you can’t heal him, sadly. But you can help heal yourself.

The patterns you're describing fit BPD perfectly.  However, each person is an individual with unique thoughts and upbringing.  Some also have more traits than others and some of those traits are way more dominant.

My BPD daughter is a lot like your ex.  My BPD ex-wife is nothing like your ex.  Yet all three have BPD.

One more thing; BPD/NPD are like close cousins, so some of the traits overlap.  Some have one or the other with additional traits from the second category, some show dominant traits of both and could be diagnosed with both.

In any case, you did not cause this and you've been through absolute hell.  This is the time to focus on your own needs and mental health.  It's a time to heal and find yourself once again outside of the relationship.  I know it's impossibly hard because I've been there- my ex left me for another man after 23 years of marriage.  I felt all the same things and I fought for my marriage so hard at first.  Yet in time, I realized that it was a toxic situation and I had to move on for my own wellbeing.

Right now, this must be about you and you alone.  That's the path towards healing and it's what you desperately need.

I'll share a quote from someone from a different site, that said this to me many years ago when I was first trying to make sense of why my then-wife acted like she did:


So, can you see the futility of reaching out to the person who made you feel this way, in order to resolve your feelings?

If drinking water from a well made you sick, you should not drink more from it. 

I know that i have a particularly high threshold when it comes to being abused which is not a good thing at all. But it does tend to skew my view and downplay how bad things can get at times. He definitely does have bpd, no question. I am trying to figure out  just how bad his is. What kind of abuse did ya'll put up with?
He was still calling and texting at first and then just fully disappeared which is also probably for the best but I can't help but feel angry that he could just cut me out of his life like that. That he could delete every single thing we shared together. Is it all just because it hurts him too much? Or is it because he has decided that if am a monster?

If you want raw honesty, it's a little of both.  BPDs run from the pain and often lash out while doing so.  They can't stand to admit fault, even though they know that they played a part, because it eats them up inside and makes them wonder what the heck is wrong with them.  So if he has to choose between focusing on you (which hurts), himself (which hurts more), or some new girl that is giving him positive attention (which feels great), it's a pretty easy choice to make.  Run from your problems, blame others, and live a happy new life (until that falls apart and you're doing it all over again).

Did you do things wrong?  Yes, you're human and we all make mistakes.  But you shouldn't focus on that because you didn't make the kind of mistakes that makes it okay to cheat on someone, spy on them, give them no privacy, be verbually abusive, etc.  You must see that and accept it for what it really is. 

You were dating someone unstable and they treated you badly.  I fully understand how much it hurts for the relationship to fall apart, but you did your best and you will learn from this experience. 

I think you're onto something here.  He tries to erase you from his life because it hurts him too much to think about it.  He can't stand to admit that he played a huge role in creating chaos, because the shame eats away at him.  It's easier to tell himself that you're a monster--to blame you, instead of take responsibility.

While it's typical for pwBPD to cut you out and enter a period of estrangement, it's also typical for them to re-engage.  Usually when they re-engage, (i) they pretend like nothing happened, and (ii) it's usually because they need something.  The needs might vary from person to person, but if you read these boards, typically they need emotional support and/or money/housing/logistical help.

Just my two cents.

Yeah that is all very true. I am notoriously excellent at being super hard on myself.  At first he was calling and texting/ emailing nonstop and now he's just gone. I feel crazy for feeling blindsided. Like, of course this is how this was all going to play out. I just had so much hope and faith. Heard it gets better with age.  That it is curable or at least can become much more manageable. Wanted so badly to help him get there. I just was being treated as if I didn't matter at all and I was asking for the bare minimum. I know there is no logic. I know crazy makes crazy. I am having a hard time wrapping my head around it all. I regret trusting certain people. Yes I am a human who was pushed to extremes but I still beat myself up for failing so epically. And i miss the good times and I miss his dog. It's all so sad.

It varies since people with BPD traits (pwBPD) are just like us, no two are exactly alike.  Also, the scenarios are different from person to person, some are BF/GF, others are engaged, others are married, others have children together, etc.

But one common thread is that it generally worsens over time.  It's been compared to the boiling frog analogy.  Drop a frog into a pot of really hot water and it will hop out.  Drop a frog into water and gradually warm it, you'll soon have a boiled frog.

It's almost as though the other, once the initial adoration or infatuation is past, "lets down their hair" so to speak and you see what's underneath.  Then once you seem to have reached your limit, then it lessens for a while and then it resurges again, to a new level, the push-pull repeating.

Then, too, it is more likely for there to be ultimatums and demands, shouting matches, ragefests, unreasonable guilting, disrespect and so much more.  It may not be abusive at first, but with some people verbal and physical abuse are real risks.

In my case, I believe it was my spouse's childhood FOO, especially the abusive stepfather but also the complicit mother too.  I didn't realize it at first, though just before the wedding I formed an impression I was saving her.  In the first decade I thought her episodes were the result of child abuse, but the pattern, looking back, was that her behavior and ragefests gradually worsened.

About that time I got that idea that if we had a child then she'd be happier watching our child discover the joys of life.  I was so clueless!  It made everything worse because when we divorced, we didn't just have to end the marriage, we also had to deal with the added complication of custody and parenting issues.  Our child was 3 when we separated, it took several years in and out of family court before we had a court order that worked.  Some 15 years later our child aged out of the system and the parenting issues lessened, but conflict is still there lurking in the background since my ex is prone to being easily triggered.

If you decide your relationship would be unworkable, even damaging, in a future together, better to cut your losses sooner than later.  That's not what any of us want, we want all roses and popsicles, but it's the reality when BPD is in the mix.

I just feel so hopeless. Like I lost the love of my life. Which I know it's insane because it was so chaotic and unhealthy. I am having such a hard time counting all the bad against him when I know how much bad there was. And how intensely bad it was.  But all i can think about is the good and how much i miss that version of him.  I must be sick too.

In a way, we all arrived here sick because we were depressed, stressed out, and looking for answers.  Relationships are comfortable and it's tough to break that bond at first because it feels natural...even when it's actually harmful to you.  So you're not feeling anything that the rest of us felt when our relationship with a BPD ex or relative seemed to fall apart.

For instance, I went on sleep meds for a good 3 or 4 weeks after the breakup.  I was a complete mess and would have done anything to save the relationship.  Yet a few years later, I see how incredibly toxic it was and how much of my life I sacrificed to placate to my ex 24/7.  Everything was about her, everything was always chaos.  But it felt normal because I did it for so long.

It takes time to get over these relationships.  The good times were great, but that was part of the mental illness as well.  He mirrored everything you liked to be the perfect person for you...which sounds wonderful.  But none of us would have entered those relationships if we knew what was coming, if we truly understood BPD.

Recovery is a process, not an event.  Counseling is so very helpful.  Of course, peer support such as the support found here is also so very helpful!

Be cautious about starting another relationship too quickly.  Rebound relationships often fail because we haven't yet regained our equilibrium.  How do we determine what might be a rebound relationship?  One indication is if we are unsettled and focus too much discussing the recent disaster.

Was any of it even real? Was his love real at all?

It was real for sure, and he probably did the best he could.  His best in not what you deserve though.

Update: he is now telling all of our friends thay i am a rapist. So, that's great.

That is so ludicrous.  He's supposedly the man and you're the woman.  Did you kidnap him? :( But of course, he felt he had to make the worst insinuation possible.

It is often noted here that pwBPD are known to cast ALL their failed relationships as horrible people.  It's that Blaming and Blame Shifting urge they have.

Probably now you accept he's not worth even a letter.

I hope this sort of thing helps you see who you were dealing with, and stop internalizing the pain and self doubt.  You just dodged a bullet.  Had you married this guy, or worse, had kids with him, you'd be in for years of this sort of thing.

You asked earlier what sort of abuse we dealt with.  Like @ForeverDad said, it varies per person. 

I never dealt with physical abuse, but a lot of mental and emotional abuse; a lot of fights, screaming matches, and then hysterical sobbing.  My ex also loved to pick fights with my family members, really nasty fights, and then corner me, like "who's side are you on?" 

She did once admit that her goal was to isolate me from friends and family, so I would be too alone to leave her.  She really underestimated me, because I saw through it.  It was still not easy to deal with, but if her goal was to preserve her marriage, she was too clever by a half, because her actions made me lose any sort of respect or affection for her whatsoever, and indeed, went ahead and divorced her

Yes, it's insane.  And the text that accompanied the accusation is even more so. Anyone would read it and say he is completely unhinged but it still hurts. Especially given both of our pasts with sexual abuse and assault.

I was definitely on the verge of sending him a simplified version of my letter last night and decided against it. Literally pulled up to my therapy appt this morning and got the screenshots from my friend. While it makes it easier to kill the love, it also makes me feel even worse for him.  I hate that I still feel so responsible for him.

Yeah, I always felt like this was the case and the couple times I hinted at it, I got shut down very quickly.
I am sorry that you had to go through so much hardship. It is horrible feeling like the one person in the world that is supposed to make you feel safe actually makes you feel the least safe you have ever felt. But i suppose that is how they feel about every partner they have. Very tragic. Hard to not feel compassion for them even though you want to shake them.

Not for me!  I feel no compassion for them.  *)

They're adults, and if we're going to have any sort of functional society at all, there has to be some personal accountability.  We can't allow otherwise healthy adults to go through life creating nothing but chaos for themselves and everyone unfortunate enough to get involved with them.

Welp. I was writing and rewriting the letter to try to process the new information and I fell asleep with it open and I guess my hand hit it or something cuz it sent. Soooo.. that's not great. But i guess there is not much I can do about it now.

If it's sent, then it's sent.  That's okay.  You said what you wanted to say and this is ultimately about you.

The odds are that he won't respond.  That's okay too.  This is about closure for you and getting it off your chest.