Sometimes when someone is facing addiction, jail is the absolute best place for them to sober up and find a new path in life.  My BPD kid learned that the hard way and even though she never actually did any time, being arrested and charged was enough for her to start prioritizing better living.

Just remember that it's okay to love her and to show up for her, but the drugs are a hard and fast boundary that you won't cross.  With my BPD daughter, she knows I'll do anything for her...but if she's high on marijuana (the only thing she still does) then I'm not going to talk to her or help.  Call back when you're sober and I'll be on my way.

Hi everyone!  Thanks so much for the replies and sharing your stories as well.  It's crazy so many of us have experienced something similar.  I do think maybe the mind maps around those memories to prevent it from harming us.  It's pretty amazing if you think about it.  But I have no idea why they'd come back years or decades later.

As Wendy said, I've decided that those memories don't define me and I'm going to give them as little thought as possible.  What happened was terrible, but that's not where I'm at in life anymore and I don't want to feel like a victim.  Bad stuff happened, and I've lived and learned from it.  I refuse to let it define me though.

With that said, I did lose sleep the first night I remembered what happened- I couldn't believe that I forgot about such a major moment of my life.  I held off posting for a day or two though because I wanted to process it and share without all the emotion in case it could help someone else down the line.  We talk about BPD all the time but rarely our own mental health problems, and we certainly do have them from the trauma and all the disordered thinking we were exposed to.

Anyway, thanks again for replying and for being a part of this community.  It's been invaluable for me the past few years and I'm so thankful I've met all of you!

My 18 yr old SD has BPD. She leans into her anger heavily.
I was wondering if anyone else here becomes afraid of approaching/engaging w them during the bad moments.

I grew up w a histrionic narcissistic mother who often raged. So for me, it’s quite triggering and I feel small and scared.. but I digress. A 50yr old mouse. 

Someone mentioned grey rocking and envisioning Sancho ducking the whizzing hurtful words of blame. I will give that a go! My husband has always told me not to take her words personally.

I think a form of dissociating from trauma is known in childhood. To not remember is a coping mechanism.

What I have read is that 7 years of abusive relationship as an adult would cause similar effects as childhood abuse. Can't recall the source.

Why this happened in shorter relationships, I don't know for sure but one idea is that these episodes are so different from the social persona that it's confusing. It's the social person one gets to know first. Also since the pwBPD blames you, and she's so different at other times, it's believable.

With my BPD mother, the good times seemed to have a "spell like" affect- so much that we questioned our own perception- did this really happen? I think we forget because, we want to forget because we have seen the "good" side. BPD affects the most intimate relationships the most and so, it may only be with you, and that makes you wonder if it is you and if perhaps you are crazy. You're not.

So what to do about the memories coming back? I think everyone who has been or is in a disordered relationship would benefit from therapy to help with emotional recovery. If one has moved on and feels recovered but has the occasional memory, that might be a lesser issue.

I'll try to be brief.  Daughter has over 8 characteristics of BPD.  The current situation is this:  I keep very rigid boundaries.  All of a sudden with a new "fiancé" my daughter wants me to participate.  Next week is invitation 4.  She wants me to go with her and granddaughter dress shopping.  Her tone is getting short in text messages because Thanksgiving I went elsewhere, I was invited to her dress fitting(I had a doctor's appointment ), and she says a lunch or coffee invitation was also done since this engagement. First marriage done at courthouse on my birthday and divorce was barely two or three months before the move in and engagement.  Now next week I just can't sit in her vehicle for an hour to David's and I'm unsure if I can drive.  Worse yet she has reserved a wedding date at my church my husband and I chose for our vows. I'm overwhelmed and her controlling nature is ready to explode with me as I remain no contact this Christmas. Questions?  Advice?

Thanks for sharing your story and one way or another she is gonna have to give it up cause she has indictments coming so it’s either gonna be probation of jail either one of them she ain’t gonna be able to just do what she want as far as me I guess idk it’s so hard to just give up and I won’t but I am establishing boundaries that I won’t allow to be crossed thank you again I’m sure I’ll have more issues down as I could myself.up learning to manage how to deal with my issues an situations

Agreed. Share more if you're comfortable. I'm sure you'll be surprised to see that we've all experienced it. It's very surprising and validating to see you're not alone. Like The Bridge said, we're with you. This is a seemingly impossible journey. Vent.

I think we all do. I'm unsure I'm qualified to speak on this since mine is relatively fresh, but I often get triggered by things I see online or on TV. I get reminded of lots of things. And yes they constantly bring up things you did to hurt them somehow.

Even your throwing her out story, triggered something in me. 7 months into dating she came over with an overnight bag, started going off on me, finger in my face, her super close to me yelling that I'm an aszhole, her being aggressive because I was annoyed and I'm controlling and insecure because she was over an hour late when I made us dinner, and she didn't let me know. And "everyone knows I'm always late". She kept on for an hour or so about how I don't listen, "I didn't think you were stupid", etc. I told her no one talks to me like that in my home and she should leave until she calms down, she claims I shoved her out of my house....the doorbell camera footage said otherwise...then it became about me deflecting and denying her reality   and I have no  accountability.

The more you all post the less crazy I feel.

Hi. I’ve written my story on here and have explained my situation involving drugs and my wife. We were both using cocaine for approximately the last 5 years of our 27 year relationship.
It started because my wife’s business partner was having an affair with someone that dealt drugs, so my wife asked him for some and it snowballed.

For the last 3 of those 5 years I kept telling my wife to stop picking it up. She wouldn't listen, and carried on, and would shove it in my face. It came to a head when I said the words “stop getting coke you are killing me” and her whole behaviour towards me changed, culminating in her running off with her friends husband who by this point was the one supplying her the drugs. She had apparently told him we no longer wanted it but he would message her every Friday when she was at work to go and collect it even after being told we didn’t want any but you know what addiction is like!

I have not touched it since we split up, over 2 years ago. She would tell me she quit too, but then admitted to doing it once with her drug dealer boyfriend (that has been a coke addict for over 30 years) and I also caught her coming out of another drug dealers house a little while after that as well. I’m pretty sure they are still on it.

Since splitting up with her she has ended up in hospital on three occasions likely linked to her drink and drug abuse, and at the age of 46 has suddenly developed asthma too, which I also believe is down to the drugs.

It is painful, as you know how it is wrecking her life, how it has wrecked your relationship, yet they carry on oblivious to the damage it causes. I would google the affects the drug has on you for reasons to quit, she would google the affects it has on you for reasons to carry on doing it.

No matter how much you want them to quit, how you would do absolutely anything in your power you possibly could to make them see, make them realise, it is absolutely impossible to do so unless they want to give it up themselves.

I am 51 and she is going to be 40 and no we’ve always been and they using relationship which I know is not good but and I know that I need to PLEASE READing I can’t make her do anything else and I need to worry about myself get that it’s just hard because I don’t know how to stop loving her and I don’t know how to let her go and I don’t know if I really want to. I really don’t everybody else in her life is just giving up on her and and pushed her away when she does this PLEASE READ and I’m not gonna be that person with her. I’m not gonna give up on her. I’m not gonna freaking. We have an amazing love. It’s just yeah that push pool thing and I will always choose her. Maybe not over my sobriety per se anymore, but I will always choose her over everything else in my life and I guess if I got a lover from afar, I have to love her from afar for a while until she freaking becomes ready because there’s no ins and outs about it. She’s gonna have to freaking get off the drugs because she has indictments coming and she’s going to be put on probation or put in jail or whatever which honestly part of me kind of would like to see her go to jail. I hate saying that, but that’s gonna be the only part a problem. I think that it’s gonna be able to get her to freaking realize what she needs to do, but yeah, that helps me a little bit. I mean, I don’t like a lot of the things that you said that I should do that. I know that I need to do, but I mean, I just need to start learning to not play into the bullPLEASE READ and just let it go and you know let her do her thing and then you know it’ll make it less of a PLEASE READing issue and less time behind it and just I don’t know it’s just it’s so PLEASE READing hard to love somebody with BPD but thank you I appreciate any help in the matter cause it’s just I need to learn how to manage it