BPDFamily.com

Hi all, I'm new here.

I had a failed relationship in which I assume that my ex has BPD. However, she's not diagnosed, so I thought this would be the best place to tell my story and have some answers from the first hand. Thanks!

The Beginning

Ok, so, I met her during the summer two years ago. She is 9 years younger than me, and I knew about her for about a year before we met. She was very cute looking, very unconventional and different, shy and clumsy...
We used to get know each other for about a month before we started dating, but I was moving into a different city that autumn. She way VERY shy, whenever she was at my place she would usually sit in the corner and repeat "Talk.", "Talk something". I would tell stories and stories... And whenever I would ask her to speak anything she would go "No, I don't have interesting stuff to talk about, tell me more, you're stories are interesting and funny".

Early relationship / long distance part

After I moved into another city, we entered a long distance relationship. It was excellent, no worries, no nothing. I was with her every weekend. One of the first things she said to me was that she didn't enjoyed sex and that the previous partner didn't treat her well and was a really bad guy. So, for that reason, we still didn't make love (and that would last for about almost a year).

At one point (maybe 2 or 3 months into the relationship) she told me that I must be aware that she might fall into depressive moods here and then, and that she thinks she's maybe bipolar. I was laughing and sad that she reads too much internet. However, she did cry a lot for no reason, had a sad moment almost every time we met (later, every day). She started to complain that she had tough time at her home and that her father was drinking a lot. So, we always talked about it. That's when she started to say things like that I was her saviour and that I'm saving her from her past. And used to thank me a lot for the conversations. She used to wright me cute letters telling me that she found the perfect one and that she is in a recovery phase from her past.

What was her past? Well, by time, she told me first how her previous ex was very insensitive towards her, he broke up with her after two months because "she was to depressive for him", they got together again and six months later he cheated on her and they broke up. A week later she had a one night stand with a guy she already had a one night before. One or two weeks another one night with a Tunisian guy who wanted sex but she declined which resulted in him calling her a "crazy bipolar bitch" to other mutual friends. Two weeks after another one night stand. Another two weeks after, we met.
I should point put that she always talked about her ex and mentioned many private things that always felt bitter to me and my mood always went down.

She also told me that she smoked weed and cigarettes during this summer and hang with the "cool" people but she felt rejected and didn't like them either. But she smoked this stuff "to destroy herself" because she had problems accepting herself and had very low self-esteem. She stopped doing all that stuff (as far as I know) just a couple of months into the relationship with me. I should mention that I am a straight edge (no drugs, no booze, no cigarettes) so I was happy that she was on a good path by her own decision.
Than, another far dangerous story was told... .One of her first relationships was actually with a girl, who obviously had big problems with herself, and the relationship led to cutting, and self harming and she was threatened by suicide and so on... .But this she told me when I was already in love with her, it was weird, but I accepted it because she seemed like she was a calm person and that this was her past.

Golden times

She was also moving to the same city as me... This was the golden time. We were often talking how we are a perfect match and how we never fight apart from two or three arguments about some stupid things as usual.
By this time, she had only one friend and it was her decision. She often said that she only needed us two, apart from her family. By this time she deleted most of her friends on facebook, and later deleted the account and made an incognito account only for her friend, brother, and me. She deleted her instagram and claimed that she hated all this stuff and all those people from our hometown. 
Weird things from this period? She never played her songs and was always asking me to play my music. I was also asking her why she didn't play something but she always insisted that I should be the DJ. Also, any decision couldn't be made by her. She was always like "you decide". I didn't like that, she was giving far too much control to me. She would just never make any decision and let me to decide instead.

She started to study Swedish language after a doubt between architecture and psichology. Why Swedish then? Probably because I was learning that language by my own by that time and I always talked about that country and listen to bands from there.

She had two roommates and couldn't bare them anymore, she really had a hard time over there... She wanted to study, read books... .They would always party and swing with many guys day and night (it was horrible, I witnessed it). She complained about the constant cigarette smoke in the house.

However, I started to notice how she was very jealous towards of my colleges, she even got very upset one time she saw my crush from years and years before, but acted like it happened yesterday, or even like if it was happening now. I had even forgot about that person and was very puzzled. She even went and found their facebook accounts (I didn't have them in my friend list).

First signs of disaster

New years eve at my house in our hometown. 3am, I fell asleep, didn't noticed it either... She was with me in bed, and got very upset because she wanted to play. I apologized since I wanted to but was very tired. But the whole holiday went in some bitter mood for the first time. I wanted to go out and see my friends after a long time. Going with her to concerts and clubs wasn't an easy thing. I didn't like nightclubs either, but all my plans to go places were sabotaged by her because she was feeling very very anxious for the whole day.
One night we were supposed to go to the café where I would see my old friends after a while and she would… Well, ignore and be afraid of her former friends. She came an hour later, was very upset, got out and half an hour came back. She was panicking, afraid if her former friends will notice her and come to bother her. But her friends ignored her. She started to act very unpleasant for the first time. "You're watching those three blonde girls!" I was confused. She started tracking my gaze towards other people assuming that I was looking at other girls. She became very paranoid. Later she apologized for the whole bitter week she made me.
She than moved on into a new flat to live by her own, it was just 5 mins from my flat, how cool can it be? I helped her, I was actually the only one to negotiate with the owner because she was so frightened to do it. However, she always insisted to move in with me and to live together. Her parents also wanted that since she didn't know the city very well and they had huge trust in me. I was always telling her that it was to early and that I need time to adapt living with someone.
Few days before new year's eve, I got an offer for a job for a big company with a very good salary. She seemed happy. I started to work, had less time during the week, but she was living so close to me that we managed to see each other very often. Sleepovers on weekends always.

But, one night, she interrupted our sex all covered in tears saying "she can't do this." This was the moment when I realized that this was a sign that she will break up with me.

Disaster strikes

I went to my hometown for a week holiday, she stayed in the big city.
She used to talk about this girl she barely knows but wants to meet her. Day after I went, she contacted her and said they had a very nice time and that she also didn't have friends. She seemed overenthusiastic about her (almost like she was for me). She also contacted her sister in law after many many years, seems she lived just around the block. I was happy, "she finally started finding new friends, I always encouraged her to do that". But, her contact with me faded in the following days. I started to get anxious... The tension was rising a bit since she was clearly much colder (suddenly, she doesn't even bother ti miss me or to be happy seeing me in a few days).

I was returning for my birthday, looking forward to see her, but had a busy day at the office (how lucky, I know). Day before I came she had a weird request: "Hey, there's a poem night, I will go there... Maybe I can come the day after to give you the present etc." Hmm... .I was a bit annoyed to be honest. Still no usual "I miss you, can't wait" and now this? Hmm...
My birthday was a disaster, the night we had our first fight.
This was also the period she started saying some weird things, projecting them to me I guess... before she used to smile and said things like "you don't deserve me, leave me", "I'm not good for you"... but this time she went further with things like "I'm changing and you don't like my changes" - What changes? I didn't notice anything different, I love you and I feel the same. "You don't feel happy for my own happiness" - What? "You think that I'm perfect, but I'm not, you don't like the real me". Ok, this is weird now... I love you just the way you are.

The thing that was bothering me was this talk about some kind of "change". Because, she talked how she was "returning to herself more and more while she was with me, and in a New year letter wrote "this change is almost over, thanks to you, I'm finally close to my happiness." Yet, she now suddenly talks about some kind of a "new change I can't cope with". I didn't knew what she meant about that but I was assuming that she was projecting her own feelings towards me because she clearly wasn't happy about my new job and high salary. She even started judging me and accusing me because she shops her clothes in second hand shops. Well, I didn't shop anything more pricey than a pair of converse sneakers to be honest. So this accusitions were very weird.

For the next month she was very grumpy and mean towards me. She would get upset for some small and trivial things. She seemed annoyed by me, yet, she talked very happy about her new friend. I started to feel more and more confused, tried to get answers and so on...

Break up

In a café at a Friday night, she started talking things, I got to the conclusion "ok, I see, we are braking up?". She didn't mentioned any "the end" words but I got the point. We went out, she wanted sex and seemed happy... had two beers and bought two more (remember, she stopped drinking when she enter the relationship). But, I didn't like the plan of having sex, I didn't want to break up. But, I don't know how, we went to her place and I stayed there for the next two days. Contradict, I know.

Those two days were spent in crying, kissing, crying more, arguing, kissing more... .I didn't know what we were doing... .did we just broke up?
She started comparing me with that girl she used to slash her wrists with... .Then went to the bathroom, grabbed a razorblade and cut her hand in front of me. This was first time for me to see someone doing this… She started talking about very contradict stuff, she wished me well for future relationships and wanted me to wish her well also, and then she would say "well, we will be together in a week, don't worry". She clearly didn't want to leave me.

Day later I said that I didn't like how stuff was going and she was out of her mind because I was also dumping her. She deleted me on facebook (incognito profiles, she made us all made one)

I sent her a mail wishing her luck and telling her that she maybe isn't bipolar, yet had BPD, and that I'm here for help... .Well, she respond with 3 very rough mails that seem to end everything for good.

No contact period

I sent her a message, wishing to reunite, telling her I feel positive, let's be friends. She replied on all of them... sometimes happy, sometimes rough, but always reserved. It was like she hated me but beg me to stay. Whenever I was like “ok, I won’t bother you anymore she would say something just to live everything open. But, she was always sounding very depressive and angry. We even bumped into each other and she was smiling like in our golden period, it wasn’t sarcastic, very natural, she couldn’t let off her gaze on me. She initiated only once to tell me that she thinks she's pregnant with me (even she had her period). She ended up blocking me and insulting me. I cut every contact.

Aftermath

I try to recover and finally don't want to contact her ever again for my own sanity but I keep seeing her in the neighbourhood.

She now has her own face as her profile picture and started adding friends, even the ones she used to talk very bad about durig the whole relationship. She reunites with former friends on social media, instagram is up n running again... .She is literally coming back to who she was (is she just mirroring people she's with?)

I don't want to have anything with her, but I love her and I worry about her future... .I'm afraid she will easily get into drugs and alcohol again (I think she's already into alcohol). I feel like I was used for a year and a half when she didn't have anyone and that she just mirrored my attitude.

Hi gilac,

That's a lot of instability to deal with,  and she does sound BPD-ish. This might help shed more light:

I think it's Borderline Personality Disorder, but how can I know? (https://bpdfamily.com/content/what-borderline-personality-disorder)

Throughout your story,  I kept thinking "immaturity." We were all young once,  but a lot of those behaviors aren't typical for an adult.  At their core,  a pwBPD feels deep shame about who they are,  and unworthy of love.  It sounds like she was basically telling you this in some ways.  My ex projects a bit of a narcissistic streak, but I heard some of the same things. It's almost like a dare to love. 

She sounds very damaged as a person and that's sad.  Do you foresee any contact other than seeing her in passing? How can we help support you?

Turkish

Thanks for the reply!

Well, I actually saw her again from the public transport, and probably will because we live so close. At the time it was her idea to move as close to me as possible (because I didn't want to move in together yet). "The distance to you must be less than the distance to my college".

Talking about college, I forgot to mention that on the night she "broke up" she also mentioned that she wants to change her course in college, I saw that coming, she studied Swedish because of me after all... Last time we texted she mentioned it again and I'm sure she will drop out of her current course.

Thanks for offering me help. After the break up and first NC i did start to feel very very positive. That actually triggered me to send her a nice message of how we can still be friends and so on... .But she was splitting all the time, so from last week I've definetily decided to go on NC even if she turns up in sometime.

I have mixed feelings, I do want to go as far as I can from her, but I'm kinda afraid if the starts spiraling down again, I know she was devastated after our breakup (she mentioned that she missed all her classes that week, which was confirmed to me by another person). Sometimes I feel sick and I can't eat and then I feel worse then I did after the actual break up period. Even she did say awful things, I know it's some kind of demon that controls her when she feels unsecured and somehow I don't take her seriously. But it is.

I'm annoyed by the thought that she hangs out with the people she "hated", same people I was not allowed around for some reason. I know she will mirror their drinking and flirting behaviour and so on...

I forgot to mention this in my first post (well, there are million stories anyway)... Once she called me in the middle of the night sounding very terrified and asking me how I am, is everything alright and if I love her… We talked and she was thankful because I calmed her down and she wanted to hear me. Weeks later she admitted that she couldn’t sleep and started jumping around left and right in her bed and screaming, and that’s why she called me. She also said that this was common for her but that I didn’t know about it.

From DSM 5:

... .For example, the emotionally dysregulated child makes enormous demands on his or her family. The exasperated parents ignore or even punish the child’s outbursts, which leads the child to suppress his or her emotions. The suppressed emotions build up to an explosion, which then gets the attention of the parents. Thus, the parents end up reinforcing the very behaviors that they find aversive.

It was interesting (by interesting I really mean... .horrifying) to learn that in my best attempts to sooth my undiagnosed  BPD ex I was actually reinforcing her behavior.  One evening spending all night talking her down from a near catatonic dysphoria -in an attempt to help her, I may have been increasing the likelihood of its reoccurrence. 

I am not a health care professional, and thus cannot diagnosis my ex, but I believe in my heart she suffers from BPD.  I feel deep pity for her.


Wicker Man

it's funny how her new instagram account keeps growing minute by minute, adding all the people she ignored while we were together... she's probably blaming me when they ask where has she been for all this time

so much for her "new" change, she literally came back to what she was, poor girl...

During our relationship she went NC on two of her closest friends.  They were sending me messages begging me to have her contact them -both were in a time of crisis and need.  -Just to be clear I mean... divorce, ax, police, lawyers... .these friends really needed her.  She shunned them.  I was told to 'Never speak of these people again'.

After I left her she went back to these very friends.  In fact I believe she used the one friends these friend's phone to contact me.  (Her friend's English had suddenly gotten a lot better... .)  I received a few messages from this friend the last of which was 'What happened she needs you back'.  I replied 'It is her story to tell -we are done'. 

I answered in this manner for two reasons -if it was, indeed, her friend I did not want to betray my ex's confidence and share anything she may not have wanted her friend to know and if it was my ex I did not wish to give her any hope of my return.  I feel great pity for her and do not wish to do anything to interrupt her healing process.

I am afraid I agree with you.  There will be nothing 'new' for my ex.  Her life will continue to be as painful for her as it began in her childhood.

I am doing my best to no longer look at my ex's instagram -for over 100 days she posted daily veiled messages asking for my return.


Wicker Man

yeah, she is probably devastated because YOU left her, you didn't give her a chance to do it first... she probably want's contact just to turn the tables around so she could be the one who ends everything and feels better

this isolation part is obviously a big deal for them... I stopped telling her that I talked to some female colleges at the college because it was a nightmare everytime I would mention something like that. At one point I asked her "Ok, so I'm literally not allowed to talk to anyone while I'm there?" and she proudly responded with "Yes!"

the part you're talking about ditching her closer friends... same here... during the winter holidays she bumped into one of them and was invited to her place... .she never went, and was proud of that. now she likes her every photo on social media hahaha... .but I told that person that she talked awful things about her all the time, out of the blue

I'm wondering, did any of you had a problem that your ex BPD was talking about her exes (especially the last one) all the time? mine couldn't stop, every day... that they are the worse persons ever, that she doesn't even count them as her ex partners and that I'm the only one, she even talked about their private things which was very very humiliating for me but she used to talk about those things very subtle without any problem

Yes she was devastated when I left her.  She went non-responsive into the hospital, however I don't quite agree with the rest of your statement.  My ex never showed malicious intent.  She loved me in her way.  I do think she would have ultimately left me, and this was why I had to break our engagement -but we were in love.  We were still in the idealization phase -it is my belief she still had very strong and positive feelings for me.


Mine showed some jealousy, but it was in more of a joking tone.  She did rage with retroactive jealousy regarding my previous relationships -this was her major trigger until our final fight which was regarding the logistics of purchasing a home. 

This is precisely why I feel she had no intent and no control over her emotional state.  If there had been any intent she would have been supportive rather than raging at the end -she would have gotten a house out of the deal.  She was raging, I believe, because talking about the home purchase triggered deep fear within her --so much fear she broke up with me.  I ultimately agreed with her and this ended us.

In my case these were her friends, and it was best to end my contact with them too.  Further they live in the PRC, so it was a natural break when I left to return to the US.



Sure... .I was in her words a 'Knight in shining armor' (lovely to hear, but apparently common dialogue).  Everything was hyperbole -first, best, never, always. -It seems everything was exaggerated, both the love and the rage.

She spoke of several of her past relationships all but her first were very tumultuous.  Her first relationship was apparently a good one and ended because of school -I was happy for her, it sounded sweet.

The two relationships she had previous to ours were tough, however she kept both of these men in her orbit. 

I didn't find hearing about her past relationships uncomfortable, however I felt badly for her having had such a rough time. 


Wicker Man

I made a decision that I will not say hello the next time we bump into each other in the neighbourhood, I will ignore her and show her that I'm not falling for her gaslighting

I just remembered the last thing she wrote before blocking me was "I'm going to block you, there are other ways to communicate" where again she ended it with that "go away, but I'll leave a hook on you" attitude

because of that she probably expects to hear from me again, and I'll sure indicate that I'm not bothering to say hello like the last time when she responded and smiled

there's a possibility that she will contact me if she notices that I'm detaching, or totally be happy and keep ignoring me

ok, so I just found out the inevitable...

I was told that she is in contact with the person who stalked her during our relationship. yes, you can guess, she "hated" him and avoided whenever she saw him in a crowded place. once she even deliberately stood with me in front of him so "he can see that we're together"... I never liked that moment

to be honest, somehow I knew that he will be the next one even when we were together, in the end I even told her that she will probably end up with him now, of course, she denied everything and claimed "I don't want a relationship anymore", I laughed

he likes her every post on facebook now, for some reason they do not follow each other on instagram, but I wouldn't be surprised if they are already together. and I wouldn't be surprised if she already smokes and drinks again, since that is his lifestyle and she will mirror that 100%

it's interesting that his father is a psychiatrist, maybe he will be the one to handle her BPD, but I doubt hahah
as soon as he witness her self harming, cutting, scratching and hitting herself in the face, he will run away, poor guy, he still doesn't know what he's into

PS
I was also told that she confessed to her friend that she "felt love" when we bumped into each other... I wasn't relieved, I was scared... .I couldn't imagine how her brain was functioning, saying and feeling that and at the same time gaslighting and abusing, and insulting me just days after... .