BPDFamily.com

Foreword: I have just learnt that this forum frowns upon the use of the H word to describe the actions of exes, since it apparently always implies a malicious intent, or it absolves the person using the term from any responsibility in reengaging with their ex.  In my experience this is not always how the term is used, and as I've made it clear in my post I'm not sure what the intentions of my ex are. I don't think "charming" is an adequate replacement of what it's taking place, so I've resorted to using vacuuming as an alternative, but I do want to make it clear that I'm not implying the actions of my BPD ex are necessarily malicious. I also think the post clearly shows that I'm being very thoughtful about how to react to my ex, and in fact I haven't event talked to her yet since she reappeared roughly 3 months ago, so I'm not using the term either to absolve myself from the consequences of any future possible recycling.


Hello everyone! Reading the articles of this website and some of the experiences of you guys has been really helpful and comforting, and yet I'm still confused about how to deal with the reappearance of my BPD ex in my life. There is so much I could say about her and our brief and intense relationship,  I hope this topic will not end up being overly long!

She is vacuuming by showing up in my favourite hangouts, places where dancing events take place and that I mentioned to her while we dated. She showed a slight interest in the dance style I regularly do( Swing/Lindy Hop)  and we did attend an event together on our second date. We were actually going to attend another one but we broke up before that,  our relationship lasted less than a month. That being said, this wasn't a style she danced regularly and she didn't attend these events before our relationship, she had a bigger background in other dance styles. So, given how she had maligned me during and after the breakup, I was extremely shocked when I saw her in one of these events about 6 months later, and during the last three months she has shown up every few weeks. It is worth mentioning that Swing events take place in relatively small venues, and the number of people attending tends to be between 40-70, so it's almost impossible not to notice who is there. It turns out she actually started taking Lindy Hop dance classes during this year, and the people she shows up with are her classmates.

So she has gone out of her way to actually learn Lindy Hop at an academy, something she didn't do before,  and meet new people there in order to be able to attend events accompanied by others, events she knew I go to regularly. For me it's clear that she has done it in part to have a good cover up that will allow her to coincide with me whilst having plausible deniability about her intentions. In fact she still has me blocked on messaging apps, hasn't approached me nor talked to me, and tries to play it cool, as if her showing up is entirely unrelated to me.  At the same time I've noticed her staring at me from time to time, and one time our gazes came across by chance I detected a flicker of shame.

I had read that vacuuming was so common in people w/BPD that the fact that no such thing had happened in my case during those 6 months was one of the few things that made me question if I was right about her having the disorder, so one of the upsides of this situation is that it confirms my suspicions,  it's another thing that fits. Another upside is that I now feel that I am significant to her, and that she's probably not over me, in fact she doesn't seem to be with any of the guys of the group she hangs out with; one of the most soul-crushing things about the months beforehand was feeling that after the discard I was nothing to her. On the other hand her presence irks me for plenty of reasons:

- I feel more observed and on edge whenever she is there.

- I still find her really attractive and I do get jealous when she gets male attention. I would really hate it if she ends up dating someone from the scene, specially someone I would have to see regularly.

- I obviously dislike that she hasn't made any direct attempts to approach me and say hi. Once I explain more details it should be clear why I believe that it should be her that makes such a move, and that anything else would be enabling , although my resolve when it comes to this is starting to falter. While we are in the same event I feel obliged to act as if her presence is indifferent to me and to show her through my actions that her behavior in the past towards me was unnaceptable and that she won't get anything out of me by her mere presence, but once I'm by myself I start to second-guess myself. Maybe what I'm expecting, that she would eventually show some level of contrition and awareness of her poor behavior, is too much from someone like her? Even now she is showing one of the trademarks of BPD, not realizing how her behavior affects others. Maybe I should be the more level-headed and mature out of the two?

- It makes me wonder constantly about her intentions. I do think it's pretty clear she wants to affect me, see if she still has power over me, and that she also wants to find out what's going on in my life,  but beyond that I'm not sure. I'm not implying she is necessarily trying to get back with me, but I do think it's an option she hasn't discounted yet, although she doesn't want to be the one making the first move. I think that's the most likely reason why she hasn't unblocked me either, it would make it obvious that her reappearance has something to do with me. As I would detail below she already engineered scenarios during our relationship so that she would have the upper hand. As we all know feeling in control is key for people w/BPD, specially for the petulant variant, which I think is the one that fits the most for her. So I think the perfect scenario she might have had in her mind is that I would eat up her pretence that these coincidences have nothing to do with me, that I would start being adequate supply without even mentioning the past and that, if she ended up wanting to patch things up after all, she would be the one giving me another chance, holding all the cards. For me any reconciliation under those terms is a non-starter. I think I've noticed attempts on her part to make me jealous and make me compete for her. As I've described before it does bother me, but I think I've made a great job at hiding it, and make it seem like I couldn't care less what she does with other guys.

It is also possible that her intentions are more vindictive, or can become more so now that she's seen she's not getting anything out of me for the time being. I do fear she might end up hooking up with someone from the scene out of spite and to get fresh supply, and it would bother me quite a bit.

I think the most likely possibility is that she fluctuates, and that she isn't entirely sure about what she wants to get out of all of this.  

- During all of this time I haven't stayed still when it comes to girls, but sadly nothing has worked out.  So a part of me is starting to wonder if all of this means that we are meant for each other after all, or that there is at least unfinished business between us, and that under all the cover ups of her false self she might deep down feel something similar. Due to everything that happened during and soon after the relationship I had already reached a resolution that rekindling anything with her was out of the question, but all of this is making me waver. I know this is probably what she is after, that I would end up in a more weakened position by returning to the fantasies of the idealization/ love-bombing stage. The issue is that she does have some very good qualities( intelligent, good conversationalist, funny, pretty, sexy, stylish), and her presence is making me wonder again if I could be the one that would somehow fix her and get to have something with someone with all of those positives whilst curtailing her disfunctional BPD traits. I worked a lot during the previous months in getting rid of the idea that I could be the one that would save her, or inspire her to change, and if she had decided to do things in such a way that we would not have come across each other( we both live in a very big city) I think that idea would mostly not have popped up again in my head, but now that she is coming to these events I can't help it, sometimes it does resurface.

The thing is, due to certain actions I did during and after the relationship broke up, sometimes I think I really got into her head. How so? As someone who couln't be controlled, who wouldn't be enticed by her manipulations, and as someone who was forthright with her( hence my name!) as perhaps no one before ever was. I have no way of knowing for sure, but at least from what I can gather she hasn't gone the route of getting with someone new, and believe me she easily could. One of the times we were both at the same place she had shown up with a guy who was clearly an orbiter of hers, and yet I saw that for a brief moment she started smiling and looking at me like she used to when she saw me dancing.  So it seems to me that the attraction towards me is still really strong, and that none of her other pretenders have satisfied her. When we dated she talked about her past in a way that showed that she was extremely picky, another telltale sign that she is a petulant BPD. So perhaps I am the last guy she's been with( I know, I know, BPDs triangulate ...but she wasn´t promiscuous and was extremely demanding, so much so it was one of the reasons why the relationship failed, so I don't think it's that improbable) and all of these efforts to coincide with me show she's still not over me, as I'm not over her. If I remain steadfast and consistent in showing her that she won't get anything out of me with cluster B mindtricks( I do think she does have some narcissistic tendencies too ), might that inspire her to at least reconsider her behaviour? Should I hold some hope that something like that could eventually occur?

I was actually going to describe the relationship and the aftermath in this first post, but this is already too long and I've managed to explain my doubts without it. I will probably write a follow up soon enough with that description, although perhaps it's best if I just give more details in response to the comments of other members. In any case thanks for reading!

 

It is understandable that having someone appear in your world like this is confusing. As to her motives- that would be mind reading- so there is no way to know. What is common with BPD is a push-pull pattern and attempts to recycle- but taking a step back- if it's a pattern, the push and pull can both happen.

How to deal with it? Since you can't know for sure what she wants, how to deal depends on what you want. If you don't want a romantic relationship with her, then don't get into one.

Every relationship has pros and cons, so the fact that she's attractive and has positive aspects doesn't make the whole of the relationship. We don't get just one part- base your decision on the whole of it. Understandably, you might feel jealous if she's with someone else- thinking some other guy gets the best of her-  but he's going to experience the dynamics too because these are a part of her relationship dynamics. You said you didn't see this for 6 months but that is a short time in general and BPD behaviors can vary on a spectrum.

Will she feel any contrition? I don't know. BPD is on a spectrum and self awareness can vary. It would be guessing to try to know what she feels. More importantly- it's what you feel. It is possible that she's available for you to try to rekindle the relationship- but whether to do that or not is your decision.

You introduced her to a swing dance and now she enjoys it.  She made no attempt to approach you during the dance event.  She is not trying to be back with you. 

Stay clear of her and value your self respect above all.  There is a consequence of taking her swing dancing and now she enjoys it.  Next time, don't take a girl to a swing dance event?

Thanks for your reply Notwendy.

You're right that I should focus more on what are my wants and neeeds.  What do I want? I thought I was dead set on NOT considering getting back together as an option, but now that she's showing up I can't help having second thoughts.

What I DO know is that I don't want to get back together with the same exact dynamic that made us break up. I would like her to understand that if she wants something out of me she has to be willing to change. There doesn't appear to be any strong evidence that she's on that path, if she was I think she would have at least approached me and say hi, instead of seemingly engaging in mindgames.   Maybe this is a desperate attempt on my part to find something positive in her behavior, but after carrying out a smear campaign against me with her family and probably her friends she's now okay with us being in the same hangout, so I sometimes wonder if this is her indirect way of communicating that she knows she went overboard.

In any case her particular circumstances  make it particularly difficult for her to make any significant change. I think I have correctly surmised that she corresponds to the relatively frequent pattern of a daughter having BPD due to her mother also having it. Her mother is a BPD Witch/Queen, controlling and invasive, and she is very much involved in her life. On our first date she told me that her mother was harsh and abrasive towards her father, and that made me think that she sided with him and didn't want to emulate her mother's behavior, but soon enough I found out that she was just like her. She might reject some of her behavior at a concious level, but she grew up with that model and can't help repeating it. At some moments she seemed to be scared of her own mother,  but at the same time she was her main confidant when it came to romantic relationships. She lived real close to her parents and would spend some time with them almost every weekend.

I think trauma with respect to her mother is what mainly caused her BPD, and that today she isn't motivated to change because her mother is also her biggest enabler, validating her worst behaviors. I will describe more of the mother-daughter dynamic in a future post.

Hi ForthrightZ, I want to join in welcoming you to the group. Taking those first steps to understand how BPD impacts relationships is so important.

Notwendy has thoughtful feedback about how, no matter what your ex is or isn't doing, or is or isn't thinking, you have 100% control over discovering what you want and feel, and using those discoveries to make choices about what you do.


The part in bold is a good realization to have. Whatever else you're working out, you know that you wouldn't want to rekindle the same relationship.

The challenge with being in a relationship with a pwBPD is we have no control over "getting them to realize" things or "making them see" their part or "hoping they'll be willing to change" their actions.

Your relationship dynamic with her had contributions from her and contributions from you. If we want these relationships to work, we have to work on the parts we can control -- our own contributions and approaches. Some members have noticed that when they "take the lead" emotionally, that opens a door for the pwBPD to follow that healthier path. Not many members have success with hoping that the pwBPD has healthier realizations.

It takes work and might not feel fair to choose to be the emotional leader. However, as you think through what you want, know that you will likely need to be the one to set the tone about making those changes yourself, instead of waiting for her to take the lead with realizations/changes/etc.

So, no matter what happens, it will likely be a positive use for your time to examine what you contributed to the dynamic that you (rightly) recognize you don't want to return to. It's not about blaming or shaming, more about -- okay, what was it I was doing that wasn't working? And how can I do the hard work to change myself?

While the pwBPD in my life isn't a SO (it's my H's kids' mom), I can share that early on, I interacted with her in ways that didn't help solve problems. I just didn't know -- I didn't have these tools and skills. So it isn't about me blaming myself, and it isn't about me pointing the finger at her, like "if she would've just realized how dysfunctional she is, things would've been better". It's about me learning and making changes in how I communicate in order to have the "best possible" relationship with her. It's not a great relationship -- the best it can be is her not sending nasty emails, and me not asking her to realize how her behavior impacts the kids. The best it can be is that we don't talk to each other for more than ten minutes and about anything besides the weather and kid logistics.

All that to say --

There are many reasons why your ex behaved the way she did -- trauma is potentially one, getting needs met, etc. Like Notwendy mentioned, at the end of the day, it might be speculation.

What isn't speculation -- what you can know -- is what you discover inside of yourself, about what attracts you to her and what is giving rise to those second thoughts. You're in the driver's seat in terms of whether you pursue this relationship again, or close the door on it. Many members here do try to rekindle a relationship, and those with better chances of success are those that work on themselves.

It's a weird yet sometimes relieving paradox -- we have 100% control over our contribution to the relational dynamic, so we can make impactful changes on our own, without needing the agreement, participation, cooperation, or awareness/insight from the pwBPD.

Food for thought --

kells76

A brief P.S.:

It's really normal here to think you want to end the relationship, and then to have second thoughts. That's fine; it's part of the process. There's no requirement to instantly "know for sure" what you want -- we work through that over time.

One thing to know is that we have different boards with different focuses (foci?) that can offer better targeted feedback for your situation. For example, you are welcome to check out and post on the "Conflicted about continuing" (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?board=10.0) board, where members have experience with working through "well these are the positives, and these are the negatives, and I'm trying to figure out if I want to be together or not".

Many members on this current board (Detaching) have typically chosen to end the relationship and are working through their own feelings and grief process.

And, our "Bettering a relationship" board focuses on practical, positive problem-solving for those choosing to be in/stay in a relationship with a pwBPD. There's lots of discussion of learning and using the tools and skills to help make things better.

Hope that distinction helps you find good support;

kells76

It's interesting how kids respond to a mother with BPD. I have a mother with BPD but none of her children have BPD. There is some genetic pattern but it isn't 100%. I will admit to some learned behaviors- parents are strong role models but also I learned what behaviors not to do- from observing them too. Through counseling, we can examine our learned behaviors but that requires being willing to do that.

I think one possible difference is the enabling. We could be the favorite child or the scapegoat child. I was not the favorite child and was not enabled. My sibling who I refer to as the Golden Child was enabled and was more enmeshed with my BPD mother. So siblings can have the same BPD mother but have different relationships with her. In general when someone's behaviors are enabled, it lessens an incentive to change.

I think you mentioned something important- being willing to change. With BPD, denial and projection are strong. They may see their issues as being external to them and themselves as the victim of other people's behavior when it's their own issues. "Getting them to see" is the problem- we can't change how someone else thinks. If they can't see it, we can't "get them" to see it.

BPD dynamics are a result of their perspective. So when you say you'd consider going back but not with the same dynamics, you are saying you'd consider being with this person without this part of them. Yes, there are positive aspects to most people but we can't just pick these aspects of a person.

Thanks kells76 and Notwendy for your insightful replies. I have a very busy week, I won't be able to give a thorough reply till next one.

Hi everyone,

I'm sorry that I sort of abandoned the thread. During the summer I had a relationship with another woman, one I actually met in the same dance scene which my ex started to frequent this year, and although that didn't make me stop wondering about my ex's behaviour it no longer was that big of a priority for me, that's why I stopped posting. Reading the forum has still been really helpful. Right now I'm single again.

 During quite a long period my ex w/BPD didn't show up in the dance event where we tend to coincide, throughout all of July and August. Her classmates mostly didn't appear either, it's not that rare in the summer, and she always comes accompanied by them, so perhaps she would have liked to show up more but couldn't due to her classmates not being available. Nevertheless it was a rather long absence, so I started to wonder if perhaps she had quitted being interested in the dance scene. Some of the questions that would pop up in my head were: "Has she met someone else and she now wants to pursue one of the hobbies of the new guy?" ; "Have I acted in such a way( mostly grey rocking ) that she no longer finds it interesting to coincide, since she hasn't been able to provoke any drama?". The possibility of not ever running into her caused in me relief but also,I must confess, a bit of uneasiness. In any case once September arrived the coincidences started to occur once more, two for the time being, and we continue to have no interaction. On both ocassions she wasn't being flirty with anyone, so thankfully nothing suggests that she started dating someone from the dance scene; that possibility was one of my big concerns when she started showing up in March. I've been able to see that multiple guys have shown interest in her, and I sometimes wonder if she hasn't been receptive to any of them because she doesn't want anyone else from the dance scene to find out how she behaves inside an intimate relationship, specially if she maligned me to them. She might not want to lose any allies in her distortion campaign. Another possibility is that for whatever reason she hasn't found anyone that she considers suitable, she's extremely picky and demanding.

In any case there is something that I've been wondering about and that I would love to get help from you guys: If the BPD person showed signs of extreme jealousy- and almost all do- while you were involved with them, are they bound to feel jealous even when you're an ex, or is it different once they no longer consider you a suitable "prey"?

In the few weeks that we were together there were many indications that she was a very jealous person. Not just with other girls, even saying that I thought highly of her brother would make her slightly morose, as if it diminished my feelings towards her. I actually met her on the summer of 2022 whilst she was on a trip with her brother and his gf, and she later on got her brother involved in the breakup, directly or indirectly( I actually think  the most likely possibility is that my ex told her mother, who I think is a BPD Queen, and that the mother pressured the brother to get involved, since the siblings actually didn't get along that much, in fact I do know for a fact they went together on the trip due to the mother's pressure).

In any case my ex w/BPD has seen me in the dance scene sorrounded by other girls, flirting with them etc.  It wasn't enough for her to be sure that I was with them, since she didn't see me kissing them for instance, but wouldn't that be enough for her to feel jealousy, perhaps become competitive with them or do something more that what she's doing? She acts like she mostly doesn't care, but I've also done the same when I've seen guys flirting with her, so maybe it's all make believe on her part.

In relation to what I wrote on June I decided that the only step I was going to do was to unblock her on Whatsapp. I wanted to indirectly communicate through that gesture that I wasn't closed to her approaching me to talk or write to me, but that I wasn't going to be the one initiating it( I continue to think that me initiating anything would be enabling).  She hasn't availed herself of that opportunity yet. I sometimes think that her whole purpose while showing up has been to present a façade that she's never been happier ( which some people suggest is another form of vacuuming, designed to make you think it was only you who brought out the worst in her),  and that acting in any other way would make her lose face with her family, friends and anyone else who she has included in her distortion campaign( avoiding shame is the whole point of the false self). So perhaps she does feel jealous but she cannot express it outwardly, for fear of exposing herself to her own social circle.

Anyways, looking forward to hearing the feedback of BPD veterans!


 

This week is the 1 year anniversary of our breakup, so I can't help thinking about our relationship more.

Especially because yesterday there was a dance event which has particular significance in our breakup. It's an event they do yearly in a town close to the city in which we both live, and last year we had already talked about going, but we ended up not doing so due to the break up. In fact we fought due to that, she blocked me and gave me the silent treatment during the previous week, then she called me and I forgave her and told her that I was still okay with doing the dance plan, but instead of appreciating all of that she started to present all kind of problems to do it, which irritated me to no end.

I think it's almost impossible that the repetition of that particular dance event hasn't brought her memories of our breakup. I keep awaiting that she has some sort of epiphany about the whole situation, perhaps now she can't avoid acknowledging to herself that the way she handled things one year prior was unnecessary and counterproductive? And yet there are no exterior signs of that. It would be nice to at least get some sort of vindication if she reached out.

In any case, due to the even'ts significance, I expected her to show up this time, but she didn't. When I didn't see her my first thought was that maybe she just doesn't care, but her classmates didn't come either, and she never comes without them. Perhaps she would have liked to come but she didn't have anyone with whom to do so. She definitely musn't have a new relationship with a dance guy, if that were so she wouldn't have missed the oppportunity to rub it in my face. But of course she could be seeing someone else, someone not in the dance scene.

I feel like I'm getting kind of tired of all this guesswork. Maybe I should do something? The more I think about it the more I feel like just coinciding in dance events isn't going to provoke any sort of reapproachment, we're stuck in an impasse. Whenever she's in a dance event she's always with her classmates, and I've sensed that she's told them something about me, so she's not going to do any positive gesture in front of them. I kept thinking that me doing anything would be enabling, but maybe that's a position that has run its course and that I should reconsider.


                                                                                        

A few more details worth mentioning:

- There are a ton of Whatsapp groups pertaining to Swing/Lindy Hop in our city and country, and I belong to a bunch.  Since she started showing up in dance events she hadn't joined any of them, when we were dating she said she didn't really like Whatsapp, along with many other things she found fault with( I sometimes thought that it would have been shorter if she just stated the things which she fully approved of haha). But early in September I saw she joined one of them, and I've noticed that whenever I post something( info about events, replies to other user's questions etc.) she sees it almost immediately, sometimes in the same exact minute in which she has received it. So she seems to be keeping track of what I'm posting.

Neither of us has Instagram, so Whatsapp is one of the few avenues through which either of us can find out something about the other. After seeing what she is doing in the group I think I can safely conclude she's also been looking at my profile pictures and when I've blocked and unblocked her. If she's done so she's probably been able to figure out I was with someone else during the summer. And once more I'm wondering if that can lead to her doing something triggered by jealousy and competition,  or it would rather  produce new splitting episodes in which she paints me black(i.e. because I have abandoned her for another woman instead of fighting for her).

She keeps doing things which show she wants to find out what is going on in my life, but stops short of doing anything else. It seems she's convinced that she is doing the greatest acting job of her life, perfectly dissembling her intentions. It's true that everything she's doing has an air of plausible deniability, but nevertheless there's always something that reveals them.

- I would like to clarify that when I'm talking about there being some sort reapproachment I'm not saying I want to get back with her. Having said that,  I do think it would be a shame if we never speak again when everything suggests we're going to be sharing the same hobby for years, perhaps the rest of our lives(  I would like to stress once more that it was my hobby to begin with). I've read tons of stories here with even more contentious and acrimonious splits than in the case of me and my ex w/BPD, but at least there was a point when the BPD ex was completely out of the member's life. My ex decided that wasn't going to be the case for me  when she joined the dance scene I was part of. "Out of sight, out of mind" is not an option for me, that's why sometimes I think we're stuck in an absurd impasse and that eventually a more constructive situation should arise, despite the fact that there's no moral obligation for me to bring it forward, as my family and friends keep pointing out.

it seems like there was something about the hurt from this breakup that really stuck.

what happened? we are joining the story somewhere a ways down the road after the breakup.

who broke up with whom? why?

You haven't given us the background story yet so I am not convinced she has BPD. You are obviously reading her actions through your perspective, which includes your history, so you may well be correct. But my perspective is only informed by what you have shared and so it is different. Therefore, I will present a different point of view.

Nothing you describe is in any way out of the ordinary. I have had two BPD relationships and I have taken habits or hobbies from each -- although I certainly rejected plenty as well. She may have simply found your dance hobby intriguing and was in the need of social interaction and so decided to give it a shot. You emphasize that she only shows up with her group, which can be read as evidence she is not primarily trying to intervene in your life. She may indeed by curious as anyone would be about an ex. Given the social safety net her group provides, she is able to see you from a distance and yet not be too vulnerable.

The part I found surprising is that she is not hooking up (apparently) with other dudes. Many BPD's will jump right into a new relationship after the discard. What you describe so far seems like an emotionally healthy response to the breakup on her part.

Now she may be playing a more devious long game? I promise that when she does hook up with someone new, and you find out, it will deeply hurt you. Far more than you realize today. Her presence is creating tension about when she will finally get together with someone new. If she does hook up, you will beat yourself up over this question of whether you should have approached her or not.

Personally my red line was cheating or even triangulating with another dude. It doesn't seem as if this occurred with you. Perhaps you can explain about why you think approaching her would be enabling her? Because from the outside, from what you have already shared, she doesn't seem that dysfunctional. And yet you wouldn't be here if she wasn't.

Thanks once removed and ClusterBeeline, your posts make me realize I should give more details about what happened.  But first I would like to do a post to clarify a few things with regards to the dancing hobby which I hope will finally make it clear why I think the way I do:

- We only dated a few weeks( less than a month) and went to a dance event once, in which I had to teach her the very basic things of Lindy Hop. Of course if we had dated longer and gone frequently to Lindy Hop events it would not be that strange for her to show up, but again we only went once, there wasn't time for it to become a shared hobby or a habit. There was an aspiration that if we became a long-term couple it would be one of the things we shared, but it didn't happen.
- She did have a background dancing Salsa&Bachata, a dance scene of which I'm not a part of,  so if she wanted to dance post-breakup to fulfill her needs for social interaction she already had a scene available, one with far more events than the one of Lindy Hop, and also with bigger crowds and younger people( she's 30, I'm in my late thirties).
- She didn't have any friends who were part of the Lindy Hop scene, all the people she's showing up with are people she has met recently.
- She had never taken Lindy Hop classes. She had tried it once or twice in the past, but had almost forgotten everything, to the point I had to teach her the basics the one time we went to an event.
-  Lindy Hop just wasn't an important thing in her life.  

I think most people would tend to avoid a hobby which they basically did once with an ex, in which they didn't have any friends, and in which they were bound to come across that same ex they vilified, especially if they had alternative for doing the same activity ( dancing).  Unless they actually wanted to coincide with that person, that is.  I think this clearly counts as a case of H**vering, as it's understood in other sources dealing with cluster B disorders. Thank goodness it's not an extreme, Fatal Attraction kind,  but that doesn't mean it's not an example.

During the breakup I remember I told her if she was really ready to forego all the things we had said we were going to do together, one of them being dancing. I think that might actually have been what triggered her to start taking dance classes and join the dance scene, so as to indirectly communicate to me: "See, I'm here in the dance events without you and I'm having tons of fun, I didn't need you to do Lindy Hop". I never said she needed me to do it, and in any case she IS STILL missing out plenty of perks of the dance scene by not being with me. I know almost everyone and get invited to most plans, I'm involved in special events like doing flash mobs in our city, whereas whenever she shows up she only ever dances with the same two dudes from his class,  her plan seems pretty lame and boring to be honest, that's why she's probably not showing up that frequently. All in all it's a radder shoddy attempt to show me that she doesn't need me and that she's having the time of her life.

I'll reply with more details about the breakup, BPD and possible hookups in the next post(s).

My mind is not bringing me back to her and our relationship that much anymore, even though she showed up once more in a dance event last Friday( 29th). By now our relationship had ended last year. Once the anniversaries of key moments in our relationship and breakup, specially the dance event of the 23rd, were over I'm back to a more healthy place.

I'm not sure if I want to continue this thread, maybe it will not serve me moving forward. Maybe this is fleeting sensation, but this week I no longer feel that we have unfinished business of any kind, or that we are meant to be. Picturing a future life in which she plays absolutely no part is no longer something that makes me melancholic.

I don't really know if I want to describe the breakup in detail, why go over something that painful? Maybe I'll end up doing so down the road, but I can't promise anything. I will reveal this: On the first half of 2022 I had already experienced a hard heartbreak, and during the summer I went on a trip to get over it,  which is where I met my BPD ex. I now know that a lot of people get involved with BPDs during a difficult time in their life, but she initially acted in such a way that I felt all my previous pain was now redeemed, since that had lead me to do the trip and through that I had met a solid, loyal woman which will keep her word, the sort of person I had always been looking for and with whom I could envision a future.  A few weeks later I found out none of the adjectives really applied to her, and my heart was broken once more. So in 2022 I had two piercing heartbreaks, and I don't use that word lightly. Sometimes I call it "The Year of the Sirens".

In regards to her having BPD, I'm absolutely certain she has it, and I think the Petulant subtype is the one that fits her the most. Again I don’t necessarily want to revisit some of the darker memories that show that’s the case right now, but I've already mentioned a few things that are quite revealing. For instance, who gets annoyed and jealous when someone tells them they have a good opinion of their brother? Most people would be glad or neutral to hear that.

Her being a Petulant BPD is important when it comes to possible hookups. I noticed she tended to feel better about herself by devaluing others, she did it with all sorts of reknowned people in different fields( at the beginning I thought that showed she was someone who knew what she liked and with her own standards, but eventually it happened so much I started to suspect it was more of a coping mechanism). She also told me she had been on dating apps but was never able to find anyone suitable to simply go on a date with, and other stories of guys who had tried something with her but there was always something about them that was disqualifying. She said I had been the first guy with whom she had been after breaking up with her boyfriend more than a year before; perhaps she wasn't being completely honest, but she did say plenty of things that weren't convenient for her to reveal, so I'm inclined to think that was true.  So I feel that, just as any other BPD, she might invite the advances of guys to get validation, but ultimately feels better devaluing and rejecting them, instead of accepting them. Some people think all BPDs are promiscuous, but in fact the DSM says it is a possible but not necessary feature of the disorder. There are two other girls in the dance scene who I think have BPD or BPD traits and both are promiscuous, but I wouldn't say they correspond to the Petulant subtype.

So I think it is within the realm of possibility that she hasn't been with someone else. That being said, there was a 5 month period between our breakup and when she started showing up in dance events of which I know absolutely nothing, she very well could have rebounded with someone else, and maybe later it fizzled out.In any case she still hasn't acted in the most healthy way when it comes to other guys within the dance scene. In the first months in which she started to show up there were 3 people( the 2 classmates+ another guy) that showed obvious interest in her and I think there were signs that she tried to make me jealous through them, to the point I really got worried she was eventually going to end up with one of them, or at least hook up. There was a particular ocassion in early April which was egregious in this regard, I might describe it in a later post. Everything suggests that nothing ended up happening with any of those guys, which makes me glad, but I do think she deliberately made me anxious about that possibility in the initial period in which she entered the dance scene.




 

because taking part in a support group and receiving support requires sharing and opening ourselves up.

because healing requires looking back at a trauma or wound with new, (ideally) detached perspective each time.

and because just logistically, it is hard to support you if we know very little about what have you been going through.


i get the sense that this greatly impacted you, as it did for all of us. it sounds like you went through a lot, and in a relatively short time.

in her book, the journey from healing to abandonment, susan anderson talks about five stages of abandonment (that are likened to the stages of grieving). she describes stage three as "internalizing".

sometimes a wound, whether its rejection, embarrassment, heartbreak, or abandonment, can fester, becoming semi permanent, or even permanent.

i think that it would help to unpack what happened then, in order for everyone, yourself included, to better understand what is happening now.