is atonement appropriate?

[Beware of Junk Psychology...]

Here is what I'm getting from you, P&C.

He pulls you into intimacy that you don't feel comfortable with outside of a committed monogamous relationship, and if (when) you ask for that, he gets triggered, runs away and shuts you out.

I would call this is a relationship-ending level of incompatibility--If you and he can't resolve it, one of you needs to end the relationship. There is an ultimatum buried in this, and I don't think it is avoidable.

I see four possible paths to resolution:

1. You accept this level of intimacy from him without the commitment. [You've been clear that this doesn't work]

2. You enforce a boundary of not being that emotionally intimate with him, even though he will try to pull you in, and he chooses to stay in this (more limited) relationship with you.

3. He changes and makes the kind of commitment you want. [You can't count on this one... .he has a bad track record here.]

4. End the relationship

And I don't see you liking any of the options... .and instead of picking one of them, you are stuck here... .

"If only I had made my ultimatum a little less ultimatummy, he would have picked door #3 and this relationship would be still alive."

"But if I back down now, he's going to keep on doing what he's always done and I won't be able to stop him."

[Grey Kitty]

Here is what I'm getting from you, P&C.

He pulls you into intimacy that you don't feel comfortable with outside of a committed monogamous relationship, and if (when) you ask for that, he gets triggered, runs away and shuts you out.

I would call this is a relationship-ending level of incompatibility--If you and he can't resolve it, one of you needs to end the relationship. There is an ultimatum buried in this, and I don't think it is avoidable.

I see four possible paths to resolution:

1. You accept this level of intimacy from him without the commitment. [You've been clear that this doesn't work]

2. You enforce a boundary of not being that emotionally intimate with him, even though he will try to pull you in, and he chooses to stay in this (more limited) relationship with you.

3. He changes and makes the kind of commitment you want. [You can't count on this one... .he has a bad track record here.]

4. End the relationship

And I don't see you liking any of the options... .and instead of picking one of them, you are stuck here... .

"If only I had made my ultimatum a little less ultimatummy, he would have picked door #3 and this relationship would be still alive."

"But if I back down now, he's going to keep on doing what he's always done and I won't be able to stop him."

[AndrewS]

Hi Patientandclear,

I am in a similar state. Hurting and confused 6 months out from breakup of a 5 year relationship. It's compounded by the fact that I also took on her daughter, and we became very close, and now I don't get to see her.

My uxpwBPD lives in the same apartment building but I rarely even glimpse her.

I too know now that I could have done a lot differently but I didn't even know what BPD was until after the breakup (the final one). I think the way we behaved in most cases is absolutely fine when dealing with pardon the term, more normal people. In which case what could you possibly need to forgive yourself for. It sounds like you tried as hard as you could. You can't be expected to know how to deal with BPD when most therapists out there don't know themselves. And the question that begs all of us is, why on earth do we want to try so hard to stay with someone who forces us to be doing this? Reading forums day and night just to work out how to even communicate with them? Is that a relationship? It's like pulling someone out of a burning house, you don't even try if you are going to get burnt as well. BPDs are the person in the burning house and they keep trying to get you in but they rarely try to get out. You are not to blame for this. I was raised to believe that if I try my best no one has the right to complain. I did. It sounds like you did.

Sorry to be blunt but it's like you are trying to resolve issues in one universe that has a different set of rules to the universe you are in yourself. You just have to accept and move on. Put all the effort into yourself and your child as it can be fruitful. The rest is a waste.

And I know this intellectually but still feel that I have not achieved it myself. I still hurt. It is changing gradually though.

Good luck and take care.

[HurtinNW]

Patientandclear, you've got me thinking a lot about regrets today. Thank you for that. (seriously!)

My regret wheel looks like this:

I focus on the trigger that set my ex off, leading to him raging and breaking up with me. By focusing on the trigger, I can easily see times where I, too, was less than perfect. In fact there were times when my issues came roaring to the surface and I was not able to handle things well. There were other times when I was reeling from his abuse, still hurting, and trying to get him to understand that. Other times it was hard to say who started it. We had certain issues that were huge flash points between us. There were times I behaved badly. I have to own that.

But by focusing on the trigger, I make my behavior the cause of his behavior, and it really isn't that simple. I end up regretting my actions because the outcome was hurtful. If the outcome had been different most of those actions I wouldn't have regretted. To me that's the real issue. The times I behaved badly? I regret those times because of myself, not his reactions. I've tried to go back and fix those things but it never works. The dude collects resentments the way other people collect joy.

The truth was, in a different relationship you could have said, "we need to talk about monogamy," and he might have said, "Heck yes! Let me get the whipped cream, depraved monogamy is my thing!" or "Sorry, I can't do monogamy, got to be honest with you, it's not your fault," or "you know, that scares me and I don't know why," or a million other replies. All relationships involve ultimatums at some point, life involves them. All relationships have times people flail, act clumsy, say the wrong thing, eat with their mouth open, put their wrong foot forward, and are just wonderful flawed complex beings. You can't own his actions. Only he can do that.

You don't have to be perfect to deserve respect. I worry that is the standard you are setting here.

[AndrewS]

Well said Hurting.  It's hard to not forget that we have had a lot of self confidence eroded by BPDS.  Otherwise they couldn't keep control. Because of this we question and second guess our own actions when under other conditions we probably would not.

My ex totally love bombed me and then pulled away. When I asked for any attention she called me controlling and pulled further away. When I gave her space she just took it. So no matter what she just distanced me. It seems obvious now but at the time I was in anguish about being too demanding. Even though I had outside sports and hobbies and friends so it's not like I wanted to be joined at the hip. I just wanted to spend some time together and she told me no one she knows in a relationship does that after the honeymoon is over. Back then I began to question my neediness but in reality that is BS, obviously. I can't find a description of a healthy relationship like that anywhere.

So my point is, judgement and decision making after being abused by BPD is always going to be bad. So let's not blame ourselves.

[patientandclear]

Here is what I'm getting from you, P&C.

He pulls you into intimacy that you don't feel comfortable with outside of a committed monogamous relationship, and if (when) you ask for that, he gets triggered, runs away and shuts you out.

I would call this is a relationship-ending level of incompatibility--If you and he can't resolve it, one of you needs to end the relationship. There is an ultimatum buried in this, and I don't think it is avoidable.

I see four possible paths to resolution:

1. You accept this level of intimacy from him without the commitment. [You've been clear that this doesn't work]

2. You enforce a boundary of not being that emotionally intimate with him, even though he will try to pull you in, and he chooses to stay in this (more limited) relationship with you.

3. He changes and makes the kind of commitment you want. [You can't count on this one... .he has a bad track record here.]

4. End the relationship

And I don't see you liking any of the options... .and instead of picking one of them, you are stuck here... .

"If only I had made my ultimatum a little less ultimatummy, he would have picked door #3 and this relationship would be still alive."

"But if I back down now, he's going to keep on doing what he's always done and I won't be able to stop him."

You're cracking me up, GK

I think this is accurate. But am I wrong about either of the final two points? Of course there is no certainty that if I had been less ultimatummy , he would have relaxed and we could have evolved something more mutually acceptable than we have had in the past. But there is also no certainty that that could not have been how it unfolded. We had both shifted quite a bit. And if I am right about those last two points, how NOT to be stuck?

[LingeringNoMore]

Forgiveness doesn't include any obligation to re-expose yourself to the same sort of harm you experienced from him in the past... .

What you needed to say to him was that your needs didn't match his behavior... .and that is inherently invalidating. That kind of invalidation cannot be completely avoided; all you can do is package it up pretty skillfully without extra.

I'm guessing that he would have responded almost as badly (disappeared for months) even if you had done this.

Does this fit with what you did and what you know of him?

I am pretty sure the BPD's do not have the capacity to respond in a good way - no matter how we say things.  That was the great awakening for me... .I could not speak my truth about anything that seemed "critical" to him.  That hurt started long before me and I am not able to fix it.  I am sad, I am grieving but I am so grateful that I am free from that very sick relationship.

You seem like a very thoughtful and kind person.  I am sure you did a great job and that his response is just evidence of his very broken self-hood.  You didn't cause it.  You can't fix it.  Be gentle with yourself.

[Grey Kitty]

And I don't see you liking any of the options... .and instead of picking one of them, you are stuck here... .

"If only I had made my ultimatum a little less ultimatummy, he would have picked door #3 and this relationship would be still alive."

"But if I back down now, he's going to keep on doing what he's always done and I won't be able to stop him."

You're cracking me up, GK

I think this is accurate. But am I wrong about either of the final two points? Of course there is no certainty that if I had been less ultimatummy , he would have relaxed and we could have evolved something more mutually acceptable than we have had in the past. But there is also no certainty that that could not have been how it unfolded. We had both shifted quite a bit. And if I am right about those last two points, how NOT to be stuck?

I'm glad you can laugh about this stuff. (I chortled when I wrote "ultimatummy" myself!) But on the serious side... .regarding those last two points:

I think he was going to react badly and run away however you raised the issue. Perhaps you could have done something different and actually talked about it before he ran away... .Still that is what he chose to do, and I don't think you could have brought it up in a way that he would have chosen differently.

What you seem to be trying to do here is blame your self (I said it wrong) for his action (ghosting you)

And the last one... .the idea that you are giving him a green light if you contact him. Well, I see two things that could happen if you reach out to him: Either a repeat of something very similar to the last round... .or you pick option #2, enforcing the boundary of not being emotionally intimate with him.

Actually if he "blinks" and contacts you next, you have those same two choices. [I'm assuming that he can't fit through door #3]

[patientandclear]

And I don't see you liking any of the options... .and instead of picking one of them, you are stuck here... .

"If only I had made my ultimatum a little less ultimatummy, he would have picked door #3 and this relationship would be still alive."

"But if I back down now, he's going to keep on doing what he's always done and I won't be able to stop him."

You're cracking me up, GK

I think this is accurate. But am I wrong about either of the final two points? Of course there is no certainty that if I had been less ultimatummy , he would have relaxed and we could have evolved something more mutually acceptable than we have had in the past. But there is also no certainty that that could not have been how it unfolded. We had both shifted quite a bit. And if I am right about those last two points, how NOT to be stuck?

I'm glad you can laugh about this stuff. (I chortled when I wrote "ultimatummy" myself!) But on the serious side... .regarding those last two points:

I think he was going to react badly and run away however you raised the issue. Perhaps you could have done something different and actually talked about it before he ran away... .Still that is what he chose to do, and I don't think you could have brought it up in a way that he would have chosen differently.

What you seem to be trying to do here is blame your self (I said it wrong) for his action (ghosting you)

And the last one... .the idea that you are giving him a green light if you contact him. Well, I see two things that could happen if you reach out to him: Either a repeat of something very similar to the last round... .or you pick option #2, enforcing the boundary of not being emotionally intimate with him.

Actually if he "blinks" and contacts you next, you have those same two choices. [I'm assuming that he can't fit through door #3]

Agree about the two possibilities you identify if I were to reach out. I could certainly choose to ensure it was the second possibility (I enforce boundaries, a low ceiling). However, what stops me regarding that is that (i) he has shown a high propensity for "confusion" about what I mean and what the implications are, no matter how clear I have been.  And he enjoys probing the boundaries.  So that would be an ongoing border skirmish with me keeping him out.  And to what end?  This r/ship has value to me because of the intimacy (just as to him).  So ... .reconnecting just to keep him trying to swim in a shallow pond of superficial communication seems somewhat pointless and confusing.

In the end, I really did want to talk (a third way).  Where I say "OK I don't really want to keep you out, but when we are doing this, what goes along with it for me is commitment and fidelity.  Wouldn't be able to keep it going on other conditions.  Just so you know." Without that talk, I think the two options you identify are the two available.

I wish he had had the discussion.

[Thread]

HurtingNW

Taking accountability is good, and that is atoning. But I would ask this:

Do you have to atone to him? What is the purpose of that, given how you know he will not hear it in the correct spirit?

My opinion is we atone to seek understanding. Some people atone in church. Others in prayer. Many atone in their future actions, but becoming better people and helping others. Sometimes we atone to the ones we hurt. But the point of atonement is not to seek his validation. It's about you making yourself right with the universe.

I've wrestled with the similar. In the past when I tried hard to take accountability for my side of the road my ex would use this as an excuse to exonerate himself. I have to learn to accept that. If I were to atone to him it would be for me, and I would have to radically accept it would be his chance to avoid accountability.

I'm not ready to do that, and further, I see no point. When I atone I plan to do it in meaningful ways, such as helping others, being good to the current people in my life.

My two cents.

Great thoughts! 

[Grey Kitty]

Agree about the two possibilities you identify if I were to reach out. I could certainly choose to ensure it was the second possibility (I enforce boundaries, a low ceiling). However, what stops me regarding that is that (i) he has shown a high propensity for "confusion" about what I mean and what the implications are, no matter how clear I have been.  And he enjoys probing the boundaries.  So that would be an ongoing border skirmish with me keeping him out.  And to what end?  This r/ship has value to me because of the intimacy (just as to him).  So ... .reconnecting just to keep him trying to swim in a shallow pond of superficial communication seems somewhat pointless and confusing.

Yeah, enforcing those boundaries requires effort on your part, not just telling him to stop trampling over it. He might figure it out if you were consistent and stop probing so much eventually... .but I cannot answer the question "why bother?" for you.

In the end, I really did want to talk (a third way).  Where I say "OK I don't really want to keep you out, but when we are doing this, what goes along with it for me is commitment and fidelity.  Wouldn't be able to keep it going on other conditions.  Just so you know." Without that talk, I think the two options you identify are the two available.

I wish he had had the discussion.

Uhm, excuse me, but this is exactly what you two have been fighting over for years, isn't it? Have you not said this to him already?

[patientandclear]

In the end, I really did want to talk (a third way).  Where I say "OK I don't really want to keep you out, but when we are doing this, what goes along with it for me is commitment and fidelity.  Wouldn't be able to keep it going on other conditions.  Just so you know." Without that talk, I think the two options you identify are the two available.

I wish he had had the discussion.

Uhm, excuse me, but this is exactly what you two have been fighting over for years, isn't it? Have you not said this to him already?

Actually, no. Our r/ship post-breakup was characterized by never talking about what we were doing. After reconnecting and having a really sweet reunion as friends, with daily emails and texts and a plunge back into quasi-partner territory except with no sex ... .He suddenly dropped "I don't ever want to be more than friends." It hurt but I accepted it because I was religiously committed to not pushing him (or anyone), and actually, at that time, I wasn't ready to go further than friends either--we had not addressed the sudden end the year before, what had caused it, why he had immediately taken up with one of my work colleagues. But I asked why, and he never answered and went silent, and we only resumed contact because I reached out and apologized for having asked. He claimed he had answered but his answer got stuck in his drafts folder ... .

We then spent a year in which we were as close as partners with intimacy issues , just with no sex and no acknowledgment. I wrote about it a lot on here. Never discussed our status with him. After he got disappointed after a particularly important/intimate talk he had requested about his favorite book, he moved from our city in just three weeks--sold his place and everything. Told me he was going to travel for a few months a and come back. But then wrote all excited that he had changed plans and was going to move to a city 1500 miles away. For no particular reason. I wrote asking why he was ditching his home and the people who loved him. He stopped communicating ... .Till I wrote sort of apologizing for having pushed on that point. (Pattern: he is silent till I take back any insinuation that there is anything problematic or hurtful in what he is doing.) We went on to have our best few months. Visited a few times, remarkable talks (again, not about our r/ship). Then I realized he was seeing someone or someones. Took a couple months to process what that meant to me. At Christmas, when he asked me to talk on Christmas Day, I said the thing I wanted to talk about this time: I love our thing but not if you are with someone else. First time I had ever discussed this with him. He basically said to have a nice life. Did not hear from him for four months. Then he sent a gift and offered to come visit and I said (nicely) no, not unless something had changed. (He had split with the other woman who was devastated per FB posts, but I meant: unless something had changed with us. As is my pattern, I enforced my boundaries so hard and remotely that we never even discussed this. I could have let him come and we could have discussed in person. But no.)

Again, 10 months of silence. Then a text asking why I won't talk to him, to which I replied explaining ("because this seems to mean more to me than to you; I give you my best and you keep leaving in various ways" but offered to talk. We had four conversations, in which he actually listened for the first time to me explain why I can't be emotionally intimate with him if he is seeing other people. I listened to him for the first time explain why he feels we should not try again as lovers (no one can handle his reactions including me and when things inevitably blow up it will be too painful). We had a little tension during these talks about him feeling pushed to go too fast and me feeling hurt when he put a hard limit on our phone call to go to a reception with some woman who resembled from his description the other woman he had dated. Mutual triggers. We settled it but suddenly he had shifted from talking about us having an intimate committed monogamous non-physical r/ship, to calling us "friends." I told him this did not work for me. He asked what were the consequences. I said we could not be in touch as it always becomes intimate with us and that is what I can't do if he is seeing others. Those talks ended with a lot of hurt on both sides. I was so raw and afraid of just falling back into our thing without enforcing boundaries that I was pretty inflexible and did not give us much time to sort it out without feeling that impending doom was around the corner.

And then I regretted THAT so wrote him a couple months later saying I thought I could try his terms--we could be in touch and explore our thing, so long as he would acknowledge what we are doing as a primary r/ship and if he was not exploring intimacy with other women. He wrote back that he would only engage in "a friendship without preconditions." I said OK, if you won't meet me on the terms that make me feel safe in intimate connection, I will have to set a low ceiling on how intimate our contact can be. He said he admired this, wondered why "other people" could not similarly use boundaries like I was so admirably doing (it seems he was having similar dialogues with at least one other person), then proceeded to push hard to get through every limit I set, then pretending he didn't remember that limit when I enforced it. He asked for all manner of intimate access. Rather than keep shutting it down as has been my habit throughout this r/ship, I decided maybe it would work better to let it be (it seemed very good), but make sure he understood MY terms for this. If he continued then it would be sort of a back door way of reaching a meeting of the minds. It is evident that he cannot walk through the front door and claim this in a direct way. I thought indirectly might work better for him.

So that's a long way around to say we have not been fighting about this for years--we have barely spoken of it. One or the other of us pulls the plug at the least transgression or hurt from the other, and we stay apart for many months until one of us makes a thawing gesture. What has rarely happened (only that Christmas) is for me to just articulate the terms on which I am willing to keep engaging. Then let him choose what to do. Affirming that I want to stay, that he matters to me, that I'm not on a hair trigger that might cause me to leave at any moment if he says the wrong word ("friends". Last year in our series of talks, he kept begging me for the "magic words" he needed to say so I would stay. I told him there were no magic words and that I needed to know what he wanted. To know if we want the same thing. I did not want him to just tell me what I wanted to hear. But I now feel like maybe it was less important that we feel the same way about it. Maybe over time with improved communication skills on my part, we could have found our way to a viable arrangement, in which he chose to be committed to me because that's what I needed and because the r/ship was lovely, even if he would never have chosen that himself. I never gave him a chance to figure that out over time and with ongoing reinforcement of how nice it could be.

I was too scared and scarred from his abandonments in the past to try this. I gave him a really high threshold for even continuing to engage with me, but that doesn't seem to work with him. Instead, engaging, with all the reward that entails for us both, but having clearly communicated my requirements for continuing that ... .Seems now like a way better plan. Whence my request to talk.

[Grey Kitty]

I didn't remember all the details, but the feel of that long story matches what I remembered.

So that's a long way around to say we have not been fighting about this for years--we have barely spoken of it.

I agree you have barely spoken of it.

It still sounds to me like you have fighting about it without actually discussing it for most of your time with him. You are clearly aware of it.

I'm not sure if he's self-aware or not. Either way, at some level, he still knows that it is the issue you and he are fighting over, and refusing to discuss or acknowledge it (and/or running away) is the way he does his side of the fight.

What do you think?

[eeks]

Hi P&C,

What I think I'm hearing in all of your accounts of your interactions with your ex is you telling yourself "If only I had walked on eggshells better, I could still have this relationship".  

This thread I started a while ago may have some relevant points for you:  https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=291810.0;all

But then wrote all excited that he had changed plans and was going to move to a city 1500 miles away. For no particular reason. I wrote asking why he was ditching his home and the people who loved him. He stopped communicating ... .Till I wrote sort of apologizing for having pushed on that point. (Pattern: he is silent till I take back any insinuation that there is anything problematic or hurtful in what he is doing.)

So you apologized to him for your inability to compensate for his inability to engage in normal communication?  (At least I think it is normal, to ask someone with whom you are emotionally intimate the reasons why they are making a big decision or life change.)  

Maybe over time with improved communication skills on my part, we could have found our way to a viable arrangement, in which he chose to be committed to me because that's what I needed and because the r/ship was lovely, even if he would never have chosen that himself. I never gave him a chance to figure that out over time and with ongoing reinforcement of how nice it could be.

A relationship has two people in it.  You say maybe you could have had a viable arrangement if you improved your communication skills.  What about him improving his communication skills?  

You said you needed monogamy, he was unwilling to give that to you, and wasn't exactly honest or up front about it.  When I read your account of his behaviours I think about the references on this site to the pwBPD attempting through their behaviour to manage the twin fears of abandonment and engulfment.  One of those has to do with being too far away from someone, the other too close to someone.  So it seems to me what that means is that the pwBPD has to work hard to keep the level of intimacy/closeness with others within the very narrow range with which they are comfortable.  Hence the push/pull behaviours, suddenly ending the relationship with no apparent reason, cheating, etc.

It seems to me that through his behaviour, your ex has made a choice.  And instead of accepting his choice (even if it is an ignorant choice where he could be missing out on a very good thing), you try to bargain, "maybe if I just softened this boundary of mine a little bit, he'd stay."  So, you know what you expect of yourself (ideal adaptation to him and his needs and quirks) but what do you expect of him?  To expand that further, what do you expect of someone you are in a relationship with?  

What I also think I'm reading in your narratives is a belief that "I can 'purchase' or 'earn' him meeting my needs, by meeting his needs first."

Something I talk about in the thread I linked to above, is when a person realizes that they accepted substandard behaviour, abuse, neglect, boundary violations or compromises etc. in one or more adult relationships because that is what they had to do as children to stay attached to their parents, in order to maintain the developmentally necessary fantasy that the parent is good, loving and capable of taking care of them.  I wonder if that is relevant for you?

eeks

[patientandclear]

But then wrote all excited that he had changed plans and was going to move to a city 1500 miles away. For no particular reason. I wrote asking why he was ditching his home and the people who loved him. He stopped communicating ... .Till I wrote sort of apologizing for having pushed on that point. (Pattern: he is silent till I take back any insinuation that there is anything problematic or hurtful in what he is doing.)

So you apologized to him for your inability to compensate for his inability to engage in normal communication?  (At least I think it is normal, to ask someone with whom you are emotionally intimate the reasons why they are making a big decision or life change.)

This made me laugh.  But ... .yes.  Because he is extremely sensitive to any implication that he should in any way consider the impact of what he wants to do on anyone other than himself.  It feels oppressive to him.  From all I've heard of his childhood, his independent self was under constant assault.  Preserving his ability to do what he wants is all-important, and questioning, or the implication that there will something important lost in the exchange (which is what I wrote him: "something important will be lost" feels very invasive and controlling to him.  

Maybe over time with improved communication skills on my part, we could have found our way to a viable arrangement, in which he chose to be committed to me because that's what I needed and because the r/ship was lovely, even if he would never have chosen that himself. I never gave him a chance to figure that out over time and with ongoing reinforcement of how nice it could be.

A relationship has two people in it.  You say maybe you could have had a viable arrangement if you improved your communication skills.  What about him improving his communication skills?

Well, sure, that would be great, but one of the lessons I've learned here is that we control us.  It isn't an issue of fairness.  He is actually showing some progress in communicating by telling me his feelings (e.g., I don't want to talk on the phone) rather than just doing what he thinks I want.  What has not improved is his ability to process my responses. That said, again, we control what we do, not what the other person does.  If I changed my part, our dynamic would also change.  That's an Improving Board truth that I've seen play out often enough to believe it is probably worth trying.

It seems to me that through his behaviour, your ex has made a choice.  And instead of accepting his choice (even if it is an ignorant choice where he could be missing out on a very good thing), you try to bargain, "maybe if I just softened this boundary of mine a little bit, he'd stay."  So, you know what you expect of yourself (ideal adaptation to him and his needs and quirks) but what do you expect of him?  To expand that further, what do you expect of someone you are in a relationship with?  

What I also think I'm reading in your narratives is a belief that "I can 'purchase' or 'earn' him meeting my needs, by meeting his needs first."

These are useful points to think about.  Re the one about purchasing or earning him meeting my needs ... .it's not that exactly.  I just wonder if there isn't some way we could find some viable middle ground that works for us both.  I am not interested in him changing to meet my needs.  I am confused by his pleasure in seemingly voluntarily doing things that very much meet my needs--things we both seem to enjoy very much; and his occasional behavior that violates my trust and seems counter to the implicit terms I thought we were both working with.  Because of the great mutual pleasure and near compatibility in many things (my need for intimacy and space matches his pretty well), it seems such a shame and a loss that we cannot figure this out.  We have both so often described it as a loss and a shame, and he calls it a "tragedy" ... .it seems like it should be avoidable.  It seems worth the effort to reexamine my own behavior to see if this is something that could be managed.

To your first point, what do I expect of someone I am in a r/ship with?  I don't have an answer in the abstract.  I don't find it works well for me to think of relationships as generic arrangements we assemble exactly to our specifications.  We meet actual people and try our best to find the optimal arrangement with them that maximizes both people's happiness.  People come with their peculiar histories and foibles that we might not order up.  That is OK with me.

That said, I do expect that someone I share myself with in the ways I did with this guy (i) make every effort to keep important promises made to secure my loyalty; (ii) be truthful, especially if I am brave enough to practically identify the truth for him and have already told him I have processed and accepted it; (iii) not deny the fundamental nature of our relationship' (iv) not shame my efforts to hold up and cherish and protect the relationship; (v) not pretend not to have heard important things I said that were at odds with what he wants; and (vi) not use our relationship as a side piece while he is really trying to find and develop a r/ship with "The One."

Something I talk about in the thread I linked to above, is when a person realizes that they accepted substandard behaviour, abuse, neglect, boundary violations or compromises etc. in one or more adult relationships because that is what they had to do as children to stay attached to their parents, in order to maintain the developmentally necessary fantasy that the parent is good, loving and capable of taking care of them.  I wonder if that is relevant for you?

Not so far as I can tell after a lot of therapy, except possibly some fairly common experiences in infancy.  My traumatic wounds have come in adult relationships.  This relationship came along on the heels of other hurt and betrayal, and somehow the loss of what briefly seemed like a redemptive connection and relationship has hit especially hard because it seemed to confirm a bunch of interior partially submerged ideas about myself and what happens in my relationships that had accumulated over time.  The core idea is that I will not ever really be safe with another person.  That when people get close and I show them myself in intimate detail, they will not step up.  That when I say what I need, people reject me rather than stepping up.  All of those conclusions have been massively reinforced by this and obviously, I don't want that, so getting this r/ship to turn out otherwise has been a very compelling hope/goal.

Thanks so much for your thoughts.

[patientandclear]

I didn't remember all the details, but the feel of that long story matches what I remembered.

So that's a long way around to say we have not been fighting about this for years--we have barely spoken of it.

I agree you have barely spoken of it.

It still sounds to me like you have fighting about it without actually discussing it for most of your time with him. You are clearly aware of it.

I'm not sure if he's self-aware or not. Either way, at some level, he still knows that it is the issue you and he are fighting over, and refusing to discuss or acknowledge it (and/or running away) is the way he does his side of the fight.

What do you think?

I think he might talk to me about it if he knew I wanted to -- but not if I make him.  I know this and yet because of past hurts btwn us I find it very difficult to completely let go of the expectation that I should be able to ask and he should respect that I need something and actually try, rather than per se rejecting it because it is a demand from another person.

His intense need not to be required to do things against his will reminds me very much of the warning Karen Blixen was given about Denys Finch-Hatton in Out of Africa: "he likes to give gifts -- but not at Christmas."  I can really identify -- I can.  Being forced is a sucky feeling.  At the same time, relationships involve not punishing the other person for telling you what they need/feel/want.  And the fact that I can so strongly identify with both sides of this is the source of my stuck-ness, I think.

[HurtinNW]

I can relate to the person with BPD/NPD hating to feel forced. My ex is very much that way. Any effort to get him to get to do something was met with great resistance, passive aggressive behavior, and silent treatments. It took me a long time to see that he really resented being told to do anything. He had an idea that a relationship was what each person wanted to give. A request from another person felt to him like a demand and an intrusion, as if was losing part of himself in the process. I can see now he was feeling engulfed. But he framed it to himself as he was being normal and I was being too needy.

Are you able to handle the idea of a relationship where you are not allowed to voice a want or need? This seems like difficult terrain to me.

I also really relate to your fear that if you expose yourself to a partner they will not step up. This has been perhaps the most damaging hurt of my relationship. I asked my ex to step up and he not only refused, he did so in hurtful ways. The message felt like "you are not worthy of someone stepping up for you." The same with my kids. The message we got from him in so many ways was we were not deserving or worth his commitment, his effort.

Digging deeper into this for me I am examining my own desire to have someone "show me" their love by stepping up. The idea is I want to be able to expose myself and have them embrace it, and be eager to meet my needs. It's a redemptive urge, a way for me to feel better about myself. It goes back to childhood for me, but I think any of can develop this fear of rejection. I am looking for them to validate me and my worth.

I am working now on feeling valid and worthy all by myself, and boy, is that a hard struggle.

[eeks]

Maybe over time with improved communication skills on my part, we could have found our way to a viable arrangement, in which he chose to be committed to me because that's what I needed and because the r/ship was lovely, even if he would never have chosen that himself. I never gave him a chance to figure that out over time and with ongoing reinforcement of how nice it could be.

A relationship has two people in it.  You say maybe you could have had a viable arrangement if you improved your communication skills.  What about him improving his communication skills?

Well, sure, that would be great, but one of the lessons I've learned here is that we control us.  It isn't an issue of fairness.  He is actually showing some progress in communicating by telling me his feelings (e.g., I don't want to talk on the phone) rather than just doing what he thinks I want.  What has not improved is his ability to process my responses. That said, again, we control what we do, not what the other person does.  If I changed my part, our dynamic would also change.  That's an Improving Board truth that I've seen play out often enough to believe it is probably worth trying.

Right, you do only control yourself.  And it's clear that you're taking responsibility for your own behaviour and communication in the relationship.  You are willing to change and grow in your relationships.  So am I.  However, I think it is reasonable for a person to say to themselves "I need a partner who is as committed to healing and growth as I am, in order for this to work". 

I still think I hear you trying to bargain for this relationship, and that decision, of course, is totally up to you (and him).  My comment on that would be, when you are in a relationship with someone, you get all of them, the good stuff and the bad stuff.  You had some beautiful experiences with him, and he also made it clear through his behaviour that he is not into monogamy and he is also not into honest communication about whether he is into monogamy.  Are the beautiful experiences you had with him worth accepting that about him?

Are you sure you're not hanging on to the regrets because of some buried belief "I can't have all the things I want in a relationship, there are always compromises to be made"?  I want to be clear that I am not suggesting you start strutting around acting entitled and demanding, or instantly ditch anyone who doesn't meet your exacting standards.  I am talking about values and boundaries.  You are very clear within yourself that you only want to be with him if it is committed and monogamous.  That's a boundary you have.  But unless I'm reading something wrong here, you'd have to persuade him (or communicate juuust right) in order to get him to give monogamy a try?

You realized in hindsight and due to discussions on this site, that there are ways you could have communicated some of your desires and concerns about the relationship with your ex that you think may have caused the communication to have a more positive impact (as opposed to what you refer to as "the ultimatum".  That's learning, and it's a positive thing!  Who among us doesn't look back on our past relationships, with pwBPD or not, and with regards to some situations think "wow, I really see now how I could have handled that better"?

I had a brief relationship with a uBPD man in 2014 and I absolutely look back now and see there are things I could have done differently/better/etc.!  But you see, the way I communicated/acted at the time was a reflection of where I was at personally at the time, with regards to emotions, self-esteem, relationships... .so how could it have been any different?

At first, I thought you were asking about atonement because the relationship was over, and you were trying to find something to help you grieve, to get emotionally unstuck.  It seems though that you are still very much emotionally attached to the idea of having a relationship with him... .it's so hard to let go of the good things about him, the parts of the relationship that were positive for both of you, and what you believe you could have with him if only he would realize it was a good thing. 

This relationship came along on the heels of other hurt and betrayal, and somehow the loss of what briefly seemed like a redemptive connection and relationship has hit especially hard because it seemed to confirm a bunch of interior partially submerged ideas about myself and what happens in my relationships that had accumulated over time.  The core idea is that I will not ever really be safe with another person.  That when people get close and I show them myself in intimate detail, they will not step up.  That when I say what I need, people reject me rather than stepping up.  All of those conclusions have been massively reinforced by this and obviously, I don't want that, so getting this r/ship to turn out otherwise has been a very compelling hope/goal.

This, especially the bolded part, could be a really potent area for self-inquiry for you.  And I completely understand and relate to the compelling feeling of wanting to "get the relationship to turn out" because you do not want that negative conclusion reinforced... .(for me, the negative conclusion is "I'm not worth it." 

I believe it is possible to have experiences in relationship that change those beliefs.  People do have some responsibility for themselves in relationships (e.g. making "I" statements about feelings and requests, rather than blaming and "always"/"never", but there is also the idea of each partner growing to become what the other needs.  That requires both an ability and a willingness on both partners' parts.  I would recommend Harville Hendrix' books on the subject (Keeping the Love You Find, Getting the Love You Want) and John Welwood's Perfect Love, Imperfect Relationships.  People can have transformative experiences in intimate relationships, but there are some conditions for that, and I think these books do a pretty good job of realistically laying it all out.

[gotbushels]

Hi patientandclear 

Let's go through this bit by bit, but narrow our focus:) Let's chat about what we were talking about. I'll admit the reconnecting part is out of my comfort area, and it's already being discussed right now. So I'd like to help on the bit that led to the atonement in the first place, your regrets.

I noticed you discussed a lot of regrets and a lot of pain. Do you have a personal list to keep track of how you dealt with each? I feel strongly that it would be highly beneficial to you.

For the questions, try and focus on what you are feeling specific to the question. Please don't feel you need to justify yourself or prove you were wrong or right, I'm not judging:)

I took him at his word because I was honoring and respecting what he said. I thought he knew his own mind. I had never heard of BPD.

I would assume now at this point that you know better and have educated yourself sufficiently on what to look out for about men with BPD traits. If you met another man like this today, what would you do?

I concluded I must have been wrong about the basis of our love because suddenly he was saying the opposite of things he had originally said to make me feel safe. At the outset he said he'd be infinitely patient while I figured out dynamics btwn him and my daughter. Then pretty much the first time things did not go well btwn them, he decided he needed to be done. Years later I can see his fear and jealousy and need for reassurance, some of which stemmed from his own dreadful childhood experiences. At the time though, I mainly saw that the assurances he'd made and portrait he'd portrayed had given way completely.

Okay. Are you discontent about being wrong on the basis of your love? Your writing looks like you aren't happy with being misled. For your next man, what are the signs you will be looking for that signal to you that you are heading for this sort of relationship?

I felt he was rejecting me because he rejected me. I offered to work it out. He said he'd think about it because the separation made him so sad--then came back the next day and reiterated it had to be done. While he said our love was amazing, that he still felt all he had told me he felt, that he would always miss me, he conveyed that he was "stuck" and had realized he would rather be alone. (Shortly, however, after we discussed trying again and he said he would work on his issues in therapy and developed those squirrelly feelings, and I told him we should take enough to space for him to decide what he really wanted, he started pursuing his ex-gf, a woman he had denied romantic feelings for, a young co-worker of mine. So the "I want to be alone" thing was another piece that I took at face value but was wrong about.)

If you place trust in him, and you have a tendency to be wrong about that, you can either continue doing it and getting hurt, or do something different. Are you still discontent about him rejecting you? What happens if you meet another man with this sort of shifting, too-malleable feelings? What are you going to do?

I concluded that we needed to be done because he said he "deeply disapproved of" my way of parenting my kid, and that ultimately (he said) I would be faced with the choice of changing my parenting or losing him, and that would be too awful. So better to end it then and there, he decided (unilaterally, without talking to me). He also said he had realized (after assuring me to the contrary and without discussing with me how we could arrange our lives so he didn't become an instant de facto step parent to my kid) that he had realized engaging with me given my kid was more than he could take on, given that he had become used to a solo life and his kids were grown and he found it difficult to parent them through what he described as a contentious divorce.

Okay. Are you content with the way you are handling your child? Does what he said still affect you emotionally?

Basically, I took him at his word about all these things because I thought he was saying them because he meant them. Could not imagine he would say them if he didn't--there was too much at stake. I told him I was open to other approaches that would accommodate his feelings; that he did not need to be a step dad; that I would be glad to listen to his opinions about my parenting and make changes when I agreed with him; and so on. But aside from telling him I was open, which he responded to by not changing his mind but apparently hoping I would ask to meet, beg, whatever, I let him decide what he wanted and I respected his choices. It hurt phenomenally. I walked around for two weeks looking at my kid feeling that she or my parenting had cost me my life partner.

Okay. I see the cause of this pain started from you trusting him in the first place. Are you still discontent that you trusted him? I hope you're already working on the pain caused regarding your wants for your child and your wants for a life partner. I think it's too wide to handle with regards to your regret regarding your ex, so we won't talk about it here. My good wishes regarding your endeavours on this part of your life:) , I feel that's probably a big issue.

About a month later I realized it was more complicated. He said he was puzzled I did not ask to meet; he said he did not know how to meet because we didn't even have things to exchange yet (I had left nothing at his place). That seemed to reflect a pattern of meeting up after breakups by giving things back, and restarting that way. When we did finally meet, he wanted to try again and with no really attention to what had gone wrong. It was as if he did not take his own feelings seriously (and how much damage his reaction to his feelings had caused). And had I not sent a NC message to which he replied about how devastated he was, he would seemingly have made no love to have that repair talk. None of this looked to me like the behavior of someone who wanted to be with me, and do what it took to make that work.

I like your conclusion best. May I ask, are you sharing, or do you still feel compelled to question his thoughts and reasoning / draw inferences from his behaviour?

I now think that, had I not pushed for definition of what was going on, not taken it all so literally, and waited, his feelings would have stabilized and we could have gone on. Till the next time, when I could have not taken it personally, waited till it stabilized, and gone on.

patientandclear I'm sorry if this sounds patronising, but please note that it's not my intention. If you did what you set out to do regarding the skills you equipped yourself with, it also comes with the responsibility of accepting that it's not going to work how you plan it to work out. In this case, from a neutral standpoint, it led to a breakup.

How I feel about this is consistent with eeks's summary statement (though not in the broad sense):

What I think I'm hearing in [gotbushels: this account] is you telling yourself "If only I had walked on eggshells better, I could still have this relationship". 

In a summary of your own feelings, accounting for all the things you've talked about, all the pain, all the things you don't like about your character, are you holding hope you two can still be together?

Which of these risks do you prefer?

1) Risk a chance at life with him (along with the reams of issues).

2) Risk a chance at being alone, but it also comes with being with someone else.