Painful to see my ex with her replacement

[swimjim]

So I went to the movie theatre with a new date and saw my ex at the show with the replacement. She seemed happy and content and has been with him for a year and a half. My heart was racing and I was concerned that my date would notice that something was bothering me. It is still painful after all this time. She seems to be happy and I am still stuck. I was relatively okay not ever seeing her since we broke up because I assumed that the replacement would have been devalued by now. What you don't know can't hurt you. This has been a setback for me. I lasted 3 years before I was split black. She grew to resent me because she wanted to marry me early on in our relationship. I know it should not bother me after all this time but it still does. Now I worry that she will prove me wrong and they will get married and live happily ever after. I wish I can get over this. Any help would be greatly appreciated. 

[Mutt]

Hi swimjim,

It's hard to run into your ex in public with the new guy and she looks happy. I can relate.

A pwBPD have an avoidant, uncertain, attachment style pre-occupied with fears.

What helps me is to recall that there are two people, one good and one bad when I'm stuck thinking about the good person. I hope that helps.

[swimjim]

Thanks Mutt. But who is the good person and the bad person in your example?

[Mutt]

Thanks Mutt. But who is the good person and the bad person in your example?

Sure.

I recall things in the r/s.

Keep in mind in the 8 years I was with my ex I didn't think that she may be mentally ill.

There was a week where I was split bad and she was baiting and belittling me. She was blaming me and accusing me on how I was not a good H. The marriage is bad and she's not happy because of me and "I don't get her."

It was a difficult and stressful week with awfully terrible rails. I was trying to keep the peace with doing nice things and she was saying very mean things. Whatever rapprochement I tried was met with anger and bitterness. Not a good person.

A morning at the end of the week I woke up and met her in the kitchen. Her personality was completely different and she was loving, affectionate and said "Mutt I love you so much" - a good person.  

I felt invalidated, resentful and hurt that she hadn't apologized or taken ownership for her bad behaviors. Not fun!

I think it's important to recall the bad experiences when we're focused on the happy times as well.

[swimjim]

Thanks again Mutt. Could it be that I am stuck romanticizing the relationship? There were many bad episodes but I tend to forget them in favor of the good times. My replacement also will see the bad as well right? I get stuck blaming myself for not marrying her when she wanted the ring just 5 months into our relationship. I need to feel that I dodged the bullet in not marrying her. Do you believe the odds are high that my replacement will be devalued in time? You lasted 8 years while I lasted 3 years. 

[cehlers55]

I think it's important to recall the bad experiences when we're focused on the happy times as well.

I couldn't agree more. I feel like crap today from what i saw on Facebook. So i re-read my 49 bullet points that i wrote about why our relationship was unsustainable. I have to re-read the bad times to help me overcome the feelings of want towards her. The bad times seem more tolerable and the good times are greatly missed. And the friendships of mutual friends of our i feel i have to let go of. I feel that I'm losing the "taking sides" game.

[Mutt]

So i re-read my 49 bullet points that i wrote about why our relationship was unsustainable.

I like that.

I think that's a good idea chelers55, having bullet points and checking them when you don't feel centered.

Thanks again Mutt. Could it be that I am stuck romanticizing the relationship? There were many bad episodes but I tend to forget them in favor of the good times. My replacement also will see the bad as well right? I get stuck blaming myself for not marrying her when she wanted the ring just 5 months into our relationship. I need to feel that I dodged the bullet in not marrying her. Do you believe the odds are high that my replacement will be devalued in time? You lasted 8 years while I lasted 3 years.

Things in my relationship and marriage were not fun around the year and a half mark. A lot of pain and suffering for years.

I married my ex for the wrong reasons. I married her thinking that maybe her immaturity and behaviors may stop once we are married - she'll grow up. It may fix the relationship. Boy was I wrong.

The r/s was in a slow and painful decline after the idealization phase.

I arranged many marriage counseling sessions and nothing felt at the time like it was working. I felt helpless and alone. My ex is not diagnosed and is untreated - she shows traits of the disorder.

BPD is ingrained in personality. Changing one's personality is hard.

Love is not going to cure the disorder, nor is love above the disorder. She has to want to get help to get better.

I found reading the 10 myths that keeps us stuck helped me with getting unstuck when I felt stuck.

Have you had a chance to take a look at these articles?

10 myths that keep us stuck

Surviving a Break-up with Someone Suffering with Borderline Personality Disorder

1) Belief that this person holds the key to your happiness

2) Belief that your BPD partner feels the same way that you feel

3) Belief that the relationship problems are caused by you or some circumstance

4) Belief that love can prevail

5) Belief that things will return to "the way they used to be"

6) Clinging to the words that were said

7) Belief that if you say it louder you will be heard

8) Belief that absence makes the heart grow fonder

9) Belief that you need to stay to help them.

10) Belief that they have seen the light

[raisins3142]

To the OP, did your ex usually act fake in public?  Mine did, and it was painful to have someone seem sullen and then switch on a dime once out and around others.  So, if yours is like my ex, maybe that is what you witnessed, her compartmentalizing and trying to act "awesome" in public.  Also, she might've saw you there and that would give her even more reason to put the act on turbo.  Or, because their moods fluctuate so much, you might've just saw her on an "uptick".

I do what another post mentioned, I have a list of dealbreakers in the relationship that I look over sometimes.  I think I  have 10 separate things that were all on their own enough to kill the relationship, if unchanged, and those dealbreakers interacted to create super- or meta-dealbreakers (for instance a few were related to the chances of her being faithful long term and 4 things like that are 4 times worse than 1 thing like that, if I'm being clear).

[OnceConfused]

I think

(1). you have not gone through the complete process of grieving. Grieving for all the hopes and the future you thought you would have with her. The way to counter these thoughts is like having a cup of stale water and the   re only are 2 ways for emptying that festering water:

1. Pour it out completely in one action. This sounds easier said than done, or

2. SLowly pouring fresh water so as to displace the old festering water. What is the fresh water in this case?. It could be new friendship in your life, or the thoughts of what would happen had you stayed with her. Every time when my mind wandered back to the good times with the old xBPDgf, I quickly interjected with the memory of the bad times we had and what would my life be had I stayed. That helped me a lot in closing out this chapter of my life

[swimjim]

Raisins3142, yes my ex did act on the uptick in public and that crossed my mind after I saw her. She may have seen me and when the show was over, I was really nervous that I would have to see her again. I made a point to focus straight ahead as I was leaving the theatre and try to be upbeat myself to cover my inner pain. I know that looks don't really matter but I was trying to figure out what my replacement was doing to keep her interest alive. I checked him out closely when she entered the movie theatre while he stayed around the concession area buttering his popcorn. He didn't look like anything special but he may have a great personality. She used to say that I was PERFECT and that she would marry me on the spot. And, yes Mutt, that is one of the myths that I fell for; her words. When we maintain no contact, we don't know what they are doing and we sometimes think that they are experiencing karma. When we see them accidentally and there is no karma, it feels like a letdown. I know it sounds selfish of me to want her to experience karma. Maybe my replacement is a doormat and has given her the ring.     

[Mutt]

When we maintain no contact, we don't know what they are doing and we sometimes think that they are experiencing karma. When we see them accidentally and there is no karma, it feels like a letdown. I know it sounds selfish of me to want her to experience karma. Maybe my replacement is a doormat and has given her the ring.    

I recall a thread about karma. I think it's important we focus on your own.

Karma - it's working

We're talking about your karma, correct? That's the only karma you can be certain is working. Your karma, (and your interpretation of it) is the only karma that you will ever be certain of. No one else's.

Most westerners have an incorrect notion of karma as punishment. Karma is really about consequences. It is a law of cause and effect. In suffering the consequences, human beings can rise to a higher level of consciousness.

When we accept what it means to suffer from a cause- we radically accept the suffering (the effect) as a consequence that teaches us to let go of the cause. Hopefully those teachings involve "evolving" change.

If we do not abide by the teachings from the effects of the "cause," we do not change and we stay in the suffering or repeat the cause and suffer from the effect in a completely new way. This is the notion of samsara; fixating on a mistaken concept of self and experiences that arise out of our wrong beliefs (about reality) which are characterized by dukkha (failure, suffering, anxiety, dissatisfaction.)

Many people who involve themselves in fantasy relationships, whether long distance or married, etc. suffer the effects of a cause. Many people with BPD suffer the effects of a cause. It's all about their beliefs.

Now, having said that. The idea of karmic retribution is really missing the point unless you agree that karma visits everyone. It is a law of the universe, and it teaches us, dispensing inner wisdom when we understand we've brought many things upon ourselves. So rather than focusing on someone else's experience of karma, it's necessary to focus on your own, because the path is fraught with causes, and the effects they create cause beliefs which cause suffering.

It is in the belief that you'll find the cause of the suffering. That's what needs to be addressed right now. The belief may go back to your childhood, rather than this most recent relationship. Test your belief and you may see that it consists of wrong knowledge, about yourself, about others, it's the result of actions and reactions, cause and effect.

Karma - it's working

[schwing]

Hi Swimjim,

Could it be that I am stuck romanticizing the relationship? There were many bad episodes but I tend to forget them in favor of the good times.

I think it is a normal human defense mechanism to retreat to the "good times" especially when the emotions associated with the "bad episodes" are strong and painful.  Carrying this cognitive dissonance, these two conflicting ideas in your head: that your BPD loved one was both the best and the worst, is difficult and takes time to work through.  When you "recover" from this, you'll be able to accept that she was both the best and the worst and also neither.

In one way, you need to grieve over the loss of who she was to you during the good times, because in many ways, that person died.  Or at least she is no longer available to you.  And I would argue that she was never here to stay, regardless of what you did or didn't do.

My replacement also will see the bad as well right?

Your replacement will also be dealing with a person with BPD and so his experiences will not be unlike the experiences of those in these forums.  It is an illusion to think that somehow she will be instantly cured from her disordered behaviors -- this fear comes from your conflicted belief that she can be the "good" BPD loved one you fell in love with.  However, because your history with your ex is different, I don't think he'll go through it quite the same as you.  I believe she'll be a different person for him than she was for you.  In any case, it won't be pretty.

I get stuck blaming myself for not marrying her when she wanted the ring just 5 months into our relationship. I need to feel that I dodged the bullet in not marrying her. Do you believe the odds are high that my replacement will be devalued in time? You lasted 8 years while I lasted 3 years. 

Marrying her would not have improved your relationship.  It would have deepened the wound which you are currently trying to heal.  I think that her insistence of demanding that you marry her is evidence of her disorder.  My understanding is that for people with BPD, the more feelings of "intimacy" they deal with, the more disordered fear of abandonment they experience.  So the closer she felt towards you, the more she started to believe that you would abandon her.

So as you two became more involved, that's when she started to demand you marry her.  Because in her line of thinking, if you are willing to marry her, then you would not be willing to abandon her.  But her problem is that her fear that you would leave/abandon her, does not originate with your behavior but rather with her disorder.  Even after you were to marry, she would still experience her disordered fear of abandonment and quite likely it would only get worse.  Who knows what she might have done in order to assuage that fear. 

Something else you should know.  The *devaluation* happens *throughout* your relationship with your BPD loved.  They can devalue you almost immediately after they idealize you.  Generally speaking when your relationship is "good", they are probably idealizing you.  And when they are "bad", they are probably devaluing you.  We might like to believe that our behaviors can affect whether or not they idealize or devalue us.  But I would argue that whether they idealize or devalue us has more to do with what is going on inside their head -- disorder and all.  But some people with BPD, instead of recognizing that their disordered feelings are in fact disordered, they choose to believe that other people are to blame for their tumultuous, capricious and disordered feelings.

Best wishes, Schwing

[ShadowIntheNight]

"Something else you should know.  The *devaluation* happens *throughout* your relationship with your BPD loved.  They can devalue you almost immediately after they idealize you.  Generally speaking when your relationship is "good", they are probably idealizing you.  And when they are "bad", they are probably devaluing you.  We might like to believe that our behaviors can affect whether or not they idealize or devalue us.  But I would argue that whether they idealize or devalue us has more to do with what is going on inside their head -- disorder and all.  But some people with BPD, instead of recognizing that their disordered feelings are in fact disordered, they choose to believe that other people are to blame for their tumultuous, capricious and disordered feelings."

Schwinn  thanks for these words. In the course of a long relationship, as in almost 10 years in my case, it's easy to forget the microscopic ups and downs and remember only the big things. There were plenty of times my ex was being mean or b___y, and I always put it off to stress from any number of things. It hadn't really crossed my mind that her behavior was possibly a result of internal struggles that were causing her to be unhappy in the face of everything being all right. She is a uBPD, but so many of her actions fit the pattern it's hard not to believe that she doesn't have some sort of illness. And I didn't even come across this illness until 3 months after she had gone.

And even though we had a come here/go away dynamic in the course of the relationship her actions didn't become pronounced until the last 4-5 yrs. Will these show up with the new person or will they just fade away and only be marginal til a later date like mine? Who knows, but I feel pretty sure she is doing the same things to whomever she is with now even if they are at a muted level. It couldn't be any other way since he is with HER.

[swimjim]

Thanks again Schwing. You have been very helpful. I have to admit, I have been through two failed marriages and have lost both my parents. Although those losses were painful, I have been able to go through the natural grieving process and have healed somewhat. On the contrary, I concern myself with my struggle in being able to heal from this broken relationship. I have been told that it has something to do with my childhood wounds. In individual therapy, I have tried to identify the childhood wounds that have risen to the surface but so far have been unsuccessful. Thanks again Schwing for taking the time to help me. Somehow and some day I will have the lightbulb moment I so crave right now to come out of this healed.

[schwing]

@ShadowIntheNight

And even though we had a come here/go away dynamic in the course of the relationship her actions didn't become pronounced until the last 4-5 yrs. Will these show up with the new person or will they just fade away and only be marginal til a later date like mine?

I would argue that if the next relationship burns fast and hot, it will crash and burn fast and spectacularly.  However, if the next relationship develops slowly and cooly, they might be able to persist for years (even decades).  It is all dependent on to what degree their next relationship triggers their disordered feelings.

And my understanding is that their feelings of intimacy is a primary trigger for them.  If the next person they are with is constantly pushing them away, or is otherwise emotionally unavailable to them.  Then they might be able to stay in that relationship for a long time.

This is why it's been observed that people with BPD seem to be stably matched with people with NPD.  If the relationship doesn't generate sufficient feelings of intimacy, then their fear of abandonment never becomes triggered to the point that they feel overwhelmed.  This is why I believe my disordered parents who are a BPD/NPD couple have been able to stay married for nearly five decades now.

Who knows, but I feel pretty sure she is doing the same things to whomever she is with now even if they are at a muted level. It couldn't be any other way since he is with HER.

She might be doing similar things -- she is still going through her psychological motions.  But *he* is a different partner.  And depending upon what he does and who he is, it can implode quickly or fester for a long time.  Either way, you will not be privy to what is actually going and it is better to focus on you and yours.  I would also argue, that the more you are inclined to speculate what is going on with her, that this would indicate it is more difficult for you to focus on yourself which can indicate more co-dependent type traits.  Our recovery isn't quite the same as theirs, but it is none-the-less a recovery.  We either get on the wagon, or else stay on the merry-go-round.

@swimjim

Thanks again Schwing. You have been very helpful. I have to admit, I have been through two failed marriages and have lost both my parents. Although those losses were painful, I have been able to go through the natural grieving process and have healed somewhat. On the contrary, I concern myself with my struggle in being able to heal from this broken relationship. I have been told that it has something to do with my childhood wounds. In individual therapy, I have tried to identify the childhood wounds that have risen to the surface but so far have been unsuccessful.

In my experience, I was far more accepting of the possibility that my exBPD loved one is personality disordered, than I was accepting of the possibility that my parents are; and it was not that easy to accept that my ex was disordered (look any my earliest posts... .I debated for a long time).  Also, it took be a long time to come to terms with the pain that that BPD-breakup stirred in me.  Eventually, I started to make connections with they dynamics I had with my exBPD and my FoO (family of origin).

You never want to take too large of a bite, because the pain can be overwhelming.  But just trust that so long as there remains something to chew, then there is still something to work through.  Some of what you work through will be unconscious.  Just go through the motions and take care of yourself.  Eventually the unconscious will be made conscious, but only in the right time and when you are ready.  You cannot rush a healing process.  You cannot rush recovery.  One day at a time.

Thanks again Schwing for taking the time to help me. Somehow and some day I will have the lightbulb moment I so crave right now to come out of this healed.

It might not be a lightbulb.  Or at least the light bulb has a very subtle dimmer switch.  By the time you start seeing things clearly, you won't realized exactly when you started.  Just be patient with yourself.

Best wishes,

Schwing

[swimjim]

Thanks again Schwing. One final question if I may. You mentioned in a response that you felt that she called the police on me because I did not give her the ring earlier in our relationship. Could it actually be that she thought of me as harassing her? She knew that I was a non threatening person. Also, when I finally offered her the ring at the end, I made it clear for her to take her time, no pressure, enjoy her thought process while deciding wit no deadline. There was no pressure. Thanks again Schwing.

[cloudten]

I don't know if anyone else has said this because I didn't read everyone else's responses... .

but... .

She can't offer him anything better than what she offered you.

Without major therapy and work on her part anyway.

This is something that has helped me tremendously. Not to diminish your feelings when you saw her. I am not looking forward to this myself. I know it will happen at some point... .and I will be right here in your shoes crying to my BPD family.  One foot in front of the other! You can do it! Keep focusing on yourself!

[swimjim]

Thanks Clounden. Yes, this forum seems to be the real family that gives true support. I doubt myself because of codependency issues. I feel so ashamed that someone would go so far as file a false restraining order on me let alone, have it be the one person who claims to once have loved me more than anyone else in the world. I self reflect on this so much. Guilt, shame, embarrassment. If anyone who knows me in my community would know that I  had to defend myself in court for having a restraining order on me, they would question my integrity whether or not I was guilty. I know it was thrown out but the mere fact of her trying to get me in trouble with the law is mindboggling.

[ShadowIntheNight]

Schwing,

I just wanted you to know I don't focus on what my uBPDxgf is doing with whomever she may or may not be with. Nor do I have ruminations on whether her relat is fast and furious or not. What I do know is that we were together until she jumped to someone else. In that context, it wasn't a slow getting to know you thing. I have neither seen nor spoken to her beyond a few emails in the last 6 months and have absolutely no idea if she is "with" someone specifically or just dating around as she said she was when she ended our relationship last August. I merely made a statement in the context of your comment about devaluation and ideation in a relationship. I was also pointing out that whomever she may be with, her BPD isn't going to be different just because she is not with me. I was more generalizing than saying specifically. Her BPD may look different, it may act different, but from what I understand it is not just going to go away. I know what codependency is. I know what healthy is, and I know what grief is. We are not all enablers just because we end up discovering our partner or spouse may ultimately have had some sort of illness in the course of our relationship. Sometimes bad things do just happen to good people.

[schwing]

Thanks again Schwing. One final question if I may. You mentioned in a response that you felt that she called the police on me because I did not give her the ring earlier in our relationship. Could it actually be that she thought of me as harassing her?

Whatever her specific reason, she probably felt inclined to call the police mainly because she had devalued you.  I think at this point in time, she blames you for all the occasions she *felt* you might abandon her.  In her mind, you really did try to abandon her and she only beat you to the punch.  She abandoned you before you could abandon her.  

But she can't get the police to arrest you for that, so she will only try to get you arrested for whatever reasons are believable to the police.  In any case, I wouldn't test this.  It is probably in your interest in have no contact.  Moreover, if she ever breaks her contact with you, it is best that you document that and gather this evidence because she can just as easily accuse you of breaking the restraint order (via projection).

She knew that I was a non threatening person.

It doesn't matter what you think she knows about you.  She always wanted to believe that you were incapable of abandoning her.  Right now I am pretty certain she believes that you abandoned her (even though it was she who abandoned you).  

And in her mind, someone who abandons is *worse* than someone who is physically threatening.

Also, when I finally offered her the ring at the end, I made it clear for her to take her time, no pressure, enjoy her thought process while deciding wit no deadline. There was no pressure. Thanks again Schwing.

It didn't matter at that point.  She decided to abandon you.  She attached herself to another person.  This is another idea that is difficult for non-disordered people to accept.  

For us, non disordered people, we can maintain multiple attachments with multiple people.  I can love my siblings, just as I love my close friends, and wife and kids.  Each attachment is a separate attachment from the other.  I *believe* for people with BPD, they really only ever have *one* attachment at a time.

When they are attached to you, you are the most important attachment they have or have ever had. Until they transfer that attachment to someone else.  Then for a while you don't exist to them.  Until they transfer it back to you. The more people they "bounce" between, the more obvious it might be to you that until you are the focus of their attention, you don't really exist for them except as an possibility of someone they might at another time be re-attached to.

So when she became attached to your ex-best friend, her attachment (her love towards you) ceased to be.  So even though you finally gave her what she had been asking for for however long, it no longer had any importance to her.  Her attachment to you had evaporated.

And this is the danger of being in a close relationship with someone with BPD.  Until/unless they begin to recover, you run the risk of their attachment to you suddenly disappear.  And this is a kind of abandonment.

[schwing]

I just wanted you to know I don't focus on what my uBPDxgf is doing with whomever she may or may not be with. Nor do I have ruminations on whether her relat is fast and furious or not. What I do know is that we were together until she jumped to someone else. In that context, it wasn't a slow getting to know you thing. I have neither seen nor spoken to her beyond a few emails in the last 6 months and have absolutely no idea if she is "with" someone specifically or just dating around as she said she was when she ended our relationship last August. I merely made a statement in the context of your comment about devaluation and ideation in a relationship. I was also pointing out that whomever she may be with, her BPD isn't going to be different just because she is not with me. I was more generalizing than saying specifically. Her BPD may look different, it may act different, but from what I understand it is not just going to go away. I know what codependency is. I know what healthy is, and I know what grief is. We are not all enablers just because we end up discovering our partner or spouse may ultimately have had some sort of illness in the course of our relationship. Sometimes bad things do just happen to good people.

That's well and good that this does not apply to you.  Because it certainly applied to me.

There was a time when my pain such that a typical way for me to retreat from that pain was to imagine what could possibility going on with her.  Even though I knew it was not a good thing to re-contact her, and for the most part I did not.  Even just the imagining and wondering was a form of displacing attention I should have been giving myself, towards someone/something else.  And I very much have co-dependent traits.

[willieb4]

I don't care for the term "replacement", I prefer "target" or "victim".