The things they bring out in us...

[Family Court Strategies: When Your Partner Has BPD OR NPD Traits.]

A letter I send my BPD ex a few weeks after our last split. It's long, but I wonder if anyone here can relate to it. The latest break up was so revelatory to me and finally forced me to look at my own behavior and actions over the years.


":)on't worry... .  I'm not deluding myself into thinking that you'll ever reply to me or that you're even reading any of this. Perhaps you've blocked me at this point. Whatever the truth is, I'm sure you feel incredibly wronged by me. I don't know... .  are people expected to blind and gag themselves in order to be loyal to you? Is that truly what you consider loyalty to be? Mindless devotion while you lie to everyone around you? Ah, well, I wasn't intending to write this in a negative mindset, but it can't help but come out, because - again, no matter what the truth - you have wronged me as well and deeply, deeply hurt me, in ways that I never wanted to acknowledge that you could. Whether you ever read this... whether you it ever reaches you... I think time has given me the right to send it instead of keeping it all to myself. You wouldn't leave me alone after I broke up with you... .  consider it your turn.

"You" said that the one thing you could never do was be deliberately cruel to me... .  presumably that was a lie as well. I have no idea what to believe. All the words you ever spoke to me are ashes now... .  I keep sifting through them, trying to divine the truth, but I come out more in the dark than when I began. Wondering if you've ever spoken the truth in your life. Wondering who you really are and why part of me still believes it really "knew" you on a primal level, better than I've ever known anyone but myself. I confuse myself in many ways - struggle endlessly for clarity - but in the deepest, most terrifying places... I know me. I thought I knew you, too, and I think it was always in that place. I believe that similarity is what made us resonate. (It was real for me, at least.) And our vastly different adaptations to surviving with that self-hatred and internal agony was what made us clash.

You've blamed me occasionally for making you this way, but you know better. I've read the things you wrote before you met me - your novels, your poetry, and your interactions with other people. You said being around me messed you up... .  well, being around you messed me up, too. But not in ways that didn't already exist in me. All you did was activate them, reaching through my barriers from the inside-out to find the cracks.

Epiphanies about "boundaries" are all well and good, but I've never heard of a  sudden epiphany that stuck. "So wrapped up in thinking about myself that I 'forgot' to communicate"? Really? That's simply not you, and I don't believe it for a minute.

There are some people in our lives that transcend any explanations written about human nature. I won't pretend that I believe I am that person to you anymore, but you never failed to be for me. You were never really my "light in the darkness". You were my companion there, however much we pretended otherwise, whatever masks you used and discarded as they cracked, whatever bridges the barriers above the chasm that I built. You were more than someone I loved... .  you were the only thing in the world that could make me question my adaptations and the self that grew and manifested in order to survive. You were the only thing in the world that ever made me feel the slightest desire to change inside. You were, and are, the only thing in the world that terrifies me as much as I do myself. I could spend my entire life content to continue rebuilding bridges over the darkness, being avoidant, and walling the pain up until I no longer feel it... .  but for you. If you're gone for good, I will probably go on. Not because I feel any desire to, not because the idea of a life without you is even remotely appealing, not because I don't spend nearly every second envisioning death, but because these mechanisms have existed for so long that they function independently of emotion, of loss, of life itself.

It is actually possible to show one's true and entire self to people, with all its ugliness, darkness, and secrets - and still have them love you, care for you, and find you beautiful. You mocked me once and said I was "in love with my brokenness"... .  no, but some part of me did learn over time to love myself. It doesn't counter the hatred, doesn't ameliorate it or cancel it out... .  but it means there's something else there to hold me, something to soothe me, when there's nobody external. What else could I do? In the end, I'm the only person who can perpetually withstand my rage against comfort and my refusal to accept it. I'm certainly not "in love" with myself. Far from it. But the only thing in the world that will always be with me, the only thing that will never leave me... .  is me.

A is the closest thing to an external source of acceptance and true love that I have - the person who knows more about me than anyone else in the world, who has been told nearly all of my secrets - but I don't let myself believe that he will be here forever. (You claimed to love and accept me as well, but you repudiated everything in a second and showed me that that was never true.)

But people CAN see everything about someone and still love them. I'm not going to kid myself after this that I saw anything that you didn't want me to see - my heart and instincts tell me differently, but god only knows how foolish it is to trust those, and I try not to be a fool - but I never found you anything but piercingly beautiful, even when I couldn't stand you, even when I criticized you, even when I was horrified to learn what you're capable of. Most often it turns into horror at myself that my truest feelings towards you would not, could not, change.

If what you said to B was true, you have abused my trust in the most terrible way possible for completely self-serving reasons; knowing full well that, above ANYTHING else, lying to me is the worst crime anyone can commit against me; knowing full well that similar things have been done to me before and have deeply damaged my psyche, my faith in people, and my ability to be "human"... .  and they were not done by people whom I had any reason to trust. Perhaps my entire life and defenses were building up until the moment when I would be utterly betrayed by someone I'd known for 12 years. If I believed in fate, I would wonder more about that.

But whatever the case, I still love you and fear that I always will. How interesting at last to learn the truth of it in the end."

I'm only eloquent when she leaves, and I still find that I delude myself into thinking that maybe things could have "worked" if I could be like this all the time, if I could somehow find the energy reserves to constantly give, give, give, to constantly write about my feelings and "pour them all over her", as she begged me to. Ugh... .  

[mosaicbird]

A letter I send my BPD ex a few weeks after our last split. It's long, but I wonder if anyone here can relate to it. The latest break up was so revelatory to me and finally forced me to look at my own behavior and actions over the years.


":)on't worry... .  I'm not deluding myself into thinking that you'll ever reply to me or that you're even reading any of this. Perhaps you've blocked me at this point. Whatever the truth is, I'm sure you feel incredibly wronged by me. I don't know... .  are people expected to blind and gag themselves in order to be loyal to you? Is that truly what you consider loyalty to be? Mindless devotion while you lie to everyone around you? Ah, well, I wasn't intending to write this in a negative mindset, but it can't help but come out, because - again, no matter what the truth - you have wronged me as well and deeply, deeply hurt me, in ways that I never wanted to acknowledge that you could. Whether you ever read this... whether you it ever reaches you... I think time has given me the right to send it instead of keeping it all to myself. You wouldn't leave me alone after I broke up with you... .  consider it your turn.

"You" said that the one thing you could never do was be deliberately cruel to me... .  presumably that was a lie as well. I have no idea what to believe. All the words you ever spoke to me are ashes now... .  I keep sifting through them, trying to divine the truth, but I come out more in the dark than when I began. Wondering if you've ever spoken the truth in your life. Wondering who you really are and why part of me still believes it really "knew" you on a primal level, better than I've ever known anyone but myself. I confuse myself in many ways - struggle endlessly for clarity - but in the deepest, most terrifying places... I know me. I thought I knew you, too, and I think it was always in that place. I believe that similarity is what made us resonate. (It was real for me, at least.) And our vastly different adaptations to surviving with that self-hatred and internal agony was what made us clash.

You've blamed me occasionally for making you this way, but you know better. I've read the things you wrote before you met me - your novels, your poetry, and your interactions with other people. You said being around me messed you up... .  well, being around you messed me up, too. But not in ways that didn't already exist in me. All you did was activate them, reaching through my barriers from the inside-out to find the cracks.

Epiphanies about "boundaries" are all well and good, but I've never heard of a  sudden epiphany that stuck. "So wrapped up in thinking about myself that I 'forgot' to communicate"? Really? That's simply not you, and I don't believe it for a minute.

There are some people in our lives that transcend any explanations written about human nature. I won't pretend that I believe I am that person to you anymore, but you never failed to be for me. You were never really my "light in the darkness". You were my companion there, however much we pretended otherwise, whatever masks you used and discarded as they cracked, whatever bridges the barriers above the chasm that I built. You were more than someone I loved... .  you were the only thing in the world that could make me question my adaptations and the self that grew and manifested in order to survive. You were the only thing in the world that ever made me feel the slightest desire to change inside. You were, and are, the only thing in the world that terrifies me as much as I do myself. I could spend my entire life content to continue rebuilding bridges over the darkness, being avoidant, and walling the pain up until I no longer feel it... .  but for you. If you're gone for good, I will probably go on. Not because I feel any desire to, not because the idea of a life without you is even remotely appealing, not because I don't spend nearly every second envisioning death, but because these mechanisms have existed for so long that they function independently of emotion, of loss, of life itself.

It is actually possible to show one's true and entire self to people, with all its ugliness, darkness, and secrets - and still have them love you, care for you, and find you beautiful. You mocked me once and said I was "in love with my brokenness"... .  no, but some part of me did learn over time to love myself. It doesn't counter the hatred, doesn't ameliorate it or cancel it out... .  but it means there's something else there to hold me, something to soothe me, when there's nobody external. What else could I do? In the end, I'm the only person who can perpetually withstand my rage against comfort and my refusal to accept it. I'm certainly not "in love" with myself. Far from it. But the only thing in the world that will always be with me, the only thing that will never leave me... .  is me.

A is the closest thing to an external source of acceptance and true love that I have - the person who knows more about me than anyone else in the world, who has been told nearly all of my secrets - but I don't let myself believe that he will be here forever. (You claimed to love and accept me as well, but you repudiated everything in a second and showed me that that was never true.)

But people CAN see everything about someone and still love them. I'm not going to kid myself after this that I saw anything that you didn't want me to see - my heart and instincts tell me differently, but god only knows how foolish it is to trust those, and I try not to be a fool - but I never found you anything but piercingly beautiful, even when I couldn't stand you, even when I criticized you, even when I was horrified to learn what you're capable of. Most often it turns into horror at myself that my truest feelings towards you would not, could not, change.

If what you said to B was true, you have abused my trust in the most terrible way possible for completely self-serving reasons; knowing full well that, above ANYTHING else, lying to me is the worst crime anyone can commit against me; knowing full well that similar things have been done to me before and have deeply damaged my psyche, my faith in people, and my ability to be "human"... .  and they were not done by people whom I had any reason to trust. Perhaps my entire life and defenses were building up until the moment when I would be utterly betrayed by someone I'd known for 12 years. If I believed in fate, I would wonder more about that.

But whatever the case, I still love you and fear that I always will. How interesting at last to learn the truth of it in the end."

I'm only eloquent when she leaves, and I still find that I delude myself into thinking that maybe things could have "worked" if I could be like this all the time, if I could somehow find the energy reserves to constantly give, give, give, to constantly write about my feelings and "pour them all over her", as she begged me to. Ugh... .  

[jaird]

It is quite eloquent. I feel your pain coming through.

Thank you for sharing, and best of luck!

[TheDude]

There's nothing like turmoil to bring out the muse in oneself. Epic.

Was there a response to this?

[mosaicbird]

Was there a response to this?

Nope.

In all fairness (why am I so fixated on always being "fair", sigh), I did completely lose my cool  during the worst of it and told her to "Feel free to forget I exist. I am done with you for good this time", as well as calling her a sick, disgusting, worthless, lying excuse for a human being. So that among other things probably contribute to the lack of response, I imagine... .  

[struggli]

Absolutely I can relate.  I have written her one of these type of eloquent letters at each breakup. 

I can relate to the content.  Some of the entire paragraphs are almost word for word things I have felt/thought.

But this time, although I was tempted to write another one of these, I found that I just didn't have the energy anymore. 

That is why I have cut and pasted your email and sent it to my ex. 

Just kiddin.

I think for my ex, it boosts her ego and lets her know she has power over me.  It doesn't melt her heart or make her realize she's made a mistake.  She just sees me as pathetic and in the palm of her hand.  Maybe I'm wrong but that's the impression I get from past experience.

[mosaicbird]

I think for my ex, it boosts her ego and lets her know she has power over me.  It doesn't melt her heart or make her realize she's made a mistake.  She just sees me as pathetic and in the palm of her hand.  Maybe I'm wrong but that's the impression I get from past experience.

My ex is the same way, and she has said as much to me - she likes it when I'm vulnerable and she feels that she has the upper hand, because she typically felt like she was the one doing the chasing/begging. Having the tables turned always made her happy. I don't think it makes her see me as pathetic, but who knows... .  it isn't really relevant anymore.

One of the things my relationship with her taught me, though, is that it is okay to be "pathetic" and vulnerable. There is a certain freedom in no longer letting your pride come before the expression of such feelings. It's a gift we give to the people we love, whether they treasure it or not.

[Mountaineagle]

I really like your letter and I can relate to your feelings in many ways!

That is why I have cut and pasted your email and sent it to my ex.  

Just kiddin.

Made me giggle   

[struggli]

I think for my ex, it boosts her ego and lets her know she has power over me.  It doesn't melt her heart or make her realize she's made a mistake.  She just sees me as pathetic and in the palm of her hand.  Maybe I'm wrong but that's the impression I get from past experience.

One of the things my relationship with her taught me, though, is that it is okay to be "pathetic" and vulnerable. There is a certain freedom in no longer letting your pride come before the expression of such feelings. It's a gift we give to the people we love, whether they treasure it or not.

Yeah, I felt the same way the first 2 or 3 times she left me.  I became pathetic and vulnerable to the point of giving up on many things I had come to expect in a relationship.

I eventually realized that expressing my emotions to her was futile, at least so far as hoping to have them reciprocated in a similar fashion.  It showed her that I cared, which made me "safe" I think, but not worthy of reciprocity.

I admit it does feel weird this time not doing the same thing I have done every other time to win her back. It feels weird not sending "that letter" again, it feels like I haven't tried enough.  However, I had to put my foot down, get my balls back, and tell myself over and over, "if she wanted you as bad as you wanted her, she would've sent one of those letters by now."

Lemme tell you, it's not easy resisting the temptation to reach out to her.  There are still days that go by that I feel like I should have expressed more, that I didn't tell her I loved her enough, that I didn't write that eloquent letter one more time.  But, selfishly (perhaps), I had to draw the line this time.  Because when we were together I did tell her I loved her, I did try to make this relationship work.  That must've been pretty entertaining for her.  Sometimes I feel like it was all a test to see what I'd put up with.  But to put up with more and more was to fail the test.

I will let her actions show me how SHE feels and, since applying that policy, I have not seen any effort significant enough to indicate she gives a rat's ass.  There are plenty of other guys who will write those letters to her.  They can sacrifice their dignity chasing her.