BPDFamily.com

Hi all,  Seeking your input

Its been a few years since I've posted.  Been together 9 years with my undiagnosed BPD partner.  We live 50 miles apart.
Its July, ugh, 5 of the 9 years, my partner breaks up with me in July.  Trigger month for reasons I do not know.  This had been a good year so I was lulled into thinking things were stable.
I mentioned excitement about starting to plan a romantic 10 year celebration trip with him for next year and he agreed.
The day before leaving on the family trip my partner received news that his department was downsizing. He was worried that his job would be impacted and won't know for a few weeks.

So on to the trip
We just returned from a family trip to Disney with my adult son and his gf, my teen children,  and his teen daughter.  My children and I are close, and they are close with my partner.
(My partners children are not very close to him but do speak kindly with me.)

Overall the trip went well. We ate all meals together and stayed in the same villa.  When at the Disney parks, his high school teen daughter often wanted to breakoff from the group with her dad in tow to see princesses/other attractions and to use her phone. I had no problem with this and wished them well , remaining with my kids & friend. (Apparently, that was the wrong answer... .I found out later that I was supposed to follow).  Each day, his daughter wanted her thing, left park early on 4th of July with a moments notice.  My partner, of course, left with her and then was angry at me later for staying out late for the park late hours saying "He didn't know the park was open so late".   During the trip, he said how well everyone was getting along and that he was enjoying it.

On the last day of the trip, my partner and I rose early,had coffee, breakfast, and a nice talk. 
A few hours later, I expressed to him that I could use help with the checkout/rallying everyone to get fed/packed/ready to go for the morning bus out.  (Big mistake!) Some of the group were still eating breakfast. He was upset and whining that the plans had changed as we had mentioned getting lunch before leaving the resort.  I err'd in telling him to stop acting like a Big Baby and that some help would be helpful.

He gritted his teeth and said that that was a deal breaker moment for him and that he has zero tolerance for my "outburst".  I apologized immediately. The silent treatment began for the rest of the trip,including lunch, the bus to the airport, airport loading, flight, and departure. He said nothing to me and physically removed himself from anywhere I stood.  We live in different cities so both drove home separately with no goodbye. 

Today, he would not take my calls.  He called late and said that he is ":)one" because our families were not "Blending" and that we purposely left his daughter out of group activities.  (Even though they were the ones breaking away each time). He complained about feeling forced to a schedule, about having to buy his own flight tickets, about having no choices, about me not having pictures of his kids hanging up at home (I do), about not buying his kids gifts, said I am controlling, and on&on about non trip related items.  He said "it is So Over".  I remained calm and matter of fact but I believe him.  He sounded Done and very cold.  He said anything I had to say would be irrelevant.  Then he said "good night" in a strangely kind sort of way and hung up.

So I'm a little in Shock after returning from a pretty nice vacation.  This breakup sounded more permanent in the way he expressed it.  I am sad. I want to chase.  Instead I am here seeking wisdom on next steps.

Good morning. Sorry that your vacation went so wrong. Sounds like a similar situation with my ex-husband. We went to Great Wolf Lodge and it was a disaster. He really didn't want to engage with us or the kids much at all kinda ruined our fun.
The unfortunate thing is that sometime we have to call it quits no matter how much it hurts because the hurt in the long run (in my case 17 years) is irreversible.
I would give him space and let him fix it if he wants this. I learned that with my current BF that stepping back and not talking to him is the best thing as he then wants to fix it.
good luck

Hi calmboom,

*welcome*

I'm sorry to hear that you had terrible experiences while you were on vacation. You probably already know this, BPD is an emotional dysregulation disorder, it takes a pwBPD a lot longer to return to baseline and they can't regulate their eemotions like you or I. I

I can understand how a vacation can be stressful, for everyone involved really. Also a BPD are often enmeshed with their kids, not knowing where they end and the other person begins, he could have clearly said that he wanted to things as a group and maybe have some one on one time too.

My son is autistic and he really needs routes ne and needs to know what's ahead of him or it throws him off and he gets emotionally dysregulated, I'm not perfect, nobody is, I try to tell him what we're going to do ahead of time, that way the experiences are smoother for everyone. I understand that your H us an adult, have you tried something similar in the past?

My guess is that this is his usual routine with breaking things off or feeling engulfed in the r/s and pushing you away, even though his tone has more seriousness to it, what does he plan to do if he broke up?