You are not alone in being excluded from a family vacation spot, feeling both angry and hurt. It can be more helpful to focus on the hurt underlying the anger. My large extended family with many disordered family members including some with BPD have ostracized me from family gathering for several years now. When this happens, I often find myself thinking of the past when I was included. What does it say about us when we are no longer included? Oftentimes it means, our awareness and boundaries of the family dysfunction can not be hidden any longer and the disordered family members are extremely threatened by any challenges to their hurtful behaviors so  they prefer to not have us around.

 I need help repairing the harm I have caused in my chaotic relationship with my boyfriend. I’m trying to understand where I went wrong and if it’s possible to move forward.

Here’s the nitty -I’m pretty well versed on bpd (have read so much!) and still learning
-he’s not currently in treatment, and retreats in and out from self awareness
-4 years on again off again long distance relationship (I know, I know)
-usually very close, talking almost every day, multiple visits to see each other
-major bpd behaviours were meltdowns (splitting on me and getting into horrible circular arguments about how I’ve hurt him), shutdowns (going cold and dismissive, taking big chunks of space), and sensitivity to rejection (worst possible interpretations of my words, behaviours, possible thoughts).

I understand that I’m not perfect. And that my reactions and actions make sense because his behaviour can be confusion, hurtful, and frustrating. But I’m trying to figure out where I’ve gone wrong and to try to do better.

I’ve tried to “fix”  things instead of listening to his feelings Now I realize this made him feel invalidated and weak. I’ve tried to stay calm and ended up shut down and cold when he’s been overwhelmed. Now I realize this made him feel invalidated and ignored, and he read my calm as dismissal and threat.I’ve been needy and desperate for repair and reassurance when he’s needed space to calm down.Now I realize this made him feel pressured and smothered.

Worst of all, I had a meltdown. During a disaster of a holiday together, where he kept picking at me and making passive aggressive comments out of the blue, I lost my cool. I didn’t yell. And I wasn’t intentionally cruel. Just exhausted and desperate and not in control. I couldn’t stop crying. And I couldn’t stop talking. I did not filter or mince my words. I talked about my love for him.And I talked about my frustration and hurt too.

This scared him. After he told me he thought I was going to physically hurt him. Which horrifies me.

I apologized for scaring him, for losing control, for not taking space to calm myself down. But the damage is done.

The petulant child in me says “but he’s had some many meltdowns and acted terribly to you, and yet YOU try to understand where he was coming from and  forgive and move on! Why can’t HE give me that grace?!” But that doesn’t actually help anything. I can give myself grace and understanding here (I was overwhelmed, he was being _____ty) but that’s just not something he is capable of. Just have to accept that.

Which is kind of the aha moment. For so long I have wanted grace and understanding from him. Wanting him to understand why things hurt me, wanting him to understand why I react a certain way to his behaviours. But he’s not capable of that!

While the things I’ve done that hurt him are understandable, I still hurt him. So how do I move forward from that? How do I repair my relationship with him without throwing myself under the bus (“you’re right I’m a monster”) or slipping into trying to explain to someone who doesn’t hear/understand explanations?

How do I repair something so broken?

yes!  @Awiseone88, you need to record and track everything he says and does period, especially everything threatening or violent.  If you sit on things, it makes it harder to claim later that you were scared and felt threatened.  The obvious question would be "why didn't you call the police?"

So you need to make a report ASAP when this stuff happens.

If he doesn't put threats and violent statements in writing (texts, or emails), you should try to record interactions.  In most states, as long as one person in a recording consents to it, you can record it. 

If you have an extra phone, set it to record a voice memo, and put him on speaker phone to record the conversation.   There are also apps you can download to record conversations directly from your phone. 

Whatever method you decide to use, practice using it and get comfortable with it so in the heat of the moment you can take action and get a recording.

If he's threatening you in person, bring your phone and set it to record.  You can also use a voice recorder, or a hidden microphone.  I bought one of these: Philips DVT1600 VoiceTracer Audio Recorder Pen; you can find it on various sites for ($75-$100).  It's discreet and is an ordinary pen with a sensitive microphone in the tip.  It can record audio well. 

Hello,
My BPD sister sent me a text out of the blue with a picture of herself, my BPD mom, niece and grand- niece on a trip to our childhood vacation spot, which I was not invited to.
I am now left with feeling anger, hurt and being excluded.
I responded with kindness and took the high road, but I am now left with emotional flashbacks.
Anybody have any thoughts and support for me?

Thank you, Innerpeace2026

Thanks for understanding.  The thing about her current therapist saying I wasn't very mothering or empathetic really bothers me.  A friend said that that probably wasn't exactly what the therapist said; it was what my daughter heard.  Early on, she was in treatment and one of the therapists did say in front of her, that if we weren't more validating, she wouldn't get better and it was our fault.  She used that as a stick to beat us up for years. 

Why do these people never learn.
Last week she wrote our sons car off.

I had paid half of the cost of that car and hundreds, if not thousands, in maintenance costs all the time my son had it. She didn’t even tell him what she had done, I saw it parked up with half the front missing and the rest of it smashed in. He got hold of her and she said she hit a pothole and it bounced her off the road into a post. The following day he told me a car came round a bend and forced her off the road, so her story changed in 24hrs. She asked our other son for a lift to work the following morning, but didn’t tell him why she needed a lift either.
If it wasn’t her fault I don’t understand the secrecy, and not telling the person who actually owns the car she smashed up.

The day after we split up, her car wouldn’t start so she rang me ranting at me about it. Couple months later it failed it’s MOT on rot, and has sat at the garage for the last 2 and a half years waiting to be welded. It’s a high powered fast car and the garage owner knows she is a liability and is probably reluctant to put it back on the road for her.
So she borrowed our youngest sons car, smashed his wheels to bits and blew the tyres out so it was unusable.
Her bf then buys her a flash and expensive looking Range Rover. In reality, it was a cheap, high mileage piece of sh… that I told her would fail. A year later it failed, to the point of being written off.
She then gets a loan car through the insurance, and someone smashes the back window out of it within a week, carries on driving it about for another 3 weeks with the back window smashed out of it.
Then uses our eldest sons car and writes that off as explained above.

I’ve mentioned some of the reasons why she ran off with the guy she has run off with (drugs) but half, a lot, of the reason why was her massive debt and her thinking he had plenty of money. She even told our kids he can support her better than I can, he ‘sold’ his half of a small building company to his business partner and apparently had loads of money.

A friend of mine knows his business partner, so I know the reality of the situation. The building company was dissolved, and had a large sum of money, couple hundred k, in the account and the two of them were drawing a monthly wage until the money ran out. His business partner set up a new company and carried on while the ex’s bf sat on his arse doing nothing until very recently started going back out to do some work. His former employees were asked by his business partner to keep an eye on him while the business was still in operation, because he would turn up in the morning and then just disappear down the pub and taking cocaine.

All I can see is chaos, and someone trying to give the impression of wealth (the Range Rover) while in reality she has spent half the time running around in vehicles I’ve paid half for just to keep her on the road. She also appears to be ignoring her declining health, has skin cancer that according to our son is spreading all over her head neck and shoulders, probably due to the drug use and avoiding the situation.

This does indeed like a nasty, manipulative, deliberate ploy to hurt you. No one can say for sure why he wrote this 'journal' and left it there, but genuine journal entries are typically written over time, whether regularly or sporadically, and show some fluctuation in mood, approach and subject, since our state of mind fluctuates over time - doubly so for an emotionally unstable person. It might be that he uses this journal specifically as an outlet for negative feelings about the relationship, but if that is the case, it is certainly not a fair or true picture of the last 12 years.

If you have a peace bond in effect, then you ought to report this.  The terms of that bond are meant to ensure peace.  There's no way to interpret this but as a threat, intimidation or how imbalanced he is.  The reason to report such comments or actions is that: the sooner you report then the more likely it is to be considered legally actionable.

To illustrate:  If I called emergency services and said "my ex almost burned down my house last month" it's possible the person answering would respond, "call back promptly when it happens again since it's not an emergency now".  Timing is of the essence.  Report and provide what specific documentation you have... date, time, locations, witnesses, recordings, emails or texts,  etc.

I went through a separation, divorce and subsequent parenting orders a couple decades ago.  I learned a few things.  An important one was that adult relationships have little impact on parenting orders.  The courts generally don't involve themselves in infidelity claims and similar back and forth.

Just because he's been triggered by what others have said or insinuated is not basis to reject or rewrite a parenting agreement.  The problem becomes more complicated because the other is so vehement about the matter.

How ironclad is the separation agreement?  Has it been filed with the court?  Has the judge or magistrate approved it?  Those aspects are important.

Yes, your ex could bring it back to court but usually judges don't want to revisit a court-approved settlement until there has been enough time - a year or two - to determine whether the agreement can work, and if not then why not.  Even then your ex would need to provide documentation, generally that you're neglectful or an endangerment to your children.  Sorry, hearsay and unsubstantiated allegations aren't enough... not even an ex's mere upset.

So I swing back to the biggest matter - how far has that settlement gotten in court?  If it is approved by the court then he may have difficulty getting it modified anytime soon.  (Of course don't share that possibility with your ex.  One important lesson we all learn in these scenarios is that we only share necessary parenting details with the ex, nothing else unless approved by our lawyer.  With such high conflict separations we have to be very careful what we share since we don't want to enable the ex to sabotage us.)

That said... are you recording any of his rants, whether pressuring or threats?  Him threatening to burn down your house, if it was recorded or documented by witnesses, might be legally actionable.  (Your lawyer could provide legal advice for you.)  My ex posed as a victim and I knew she could initially play on the system's procedures.  So as I saw our marriage imploding, I chose to quietly record her rants and rages since I felt I needed to document that it wasn't me making threats or playing the aggressive victim.  If I happened to record what was said and shouted around me, well, not my fault.

I posted here awhile ago looking for advice and I took it. Things were so toxic. The problem now is he wants to find any reason other than him to be the reason we broke up. My new boyfriends ex girlfriend and my Ex hung out today ( weird ) and she shared with him a bunch of garbage about me cheating - no proof no nothing just a bunch of hearsay and honestly just gossip. He told me he didn’t want to drop our daughter off to me because he wants to burn my house down. He told me he wanted to amend the separation agreement and I’d sign it or he would take my child from me. ( he currently lives with his parents- and only gets her for 3 overnights in the span of two weeks - at his decision) he sees her every day because they pick her up and bring her to school as well. He assaulted me last July and blamed that on me and told me I was making things up and that he never choked me. He still is under a peace bond until next month and I’m so anxious to even call and report this because I’m scared of the retaliation that will come from it. He’s calmed down and dropped our daughter off tonight and said he just wanted one weekend every two weeks. I don’t know what to do. I’m trying to escape from this abuse I need help. I’m at a loss. Please help

Sounds less like he left out a journal than that he wrote a mean note to hurt you.  That's really all it was.