How to give support / space while protecting myself?

[flutterbyeblue4]

Hi! I am not sure where to begin, so I guess I'll jump right in. I am 36 F in a relationship with a 35 F. I met my SO with BPD almost 2 years ago. We met our first semester of school. At first, it was strictly a friendship with no romantic feelings. As we got to know each other we quickly became best friends. I loved spending time with her. We decided to take a trip together to a beach in another state. We had a blast. On our last night there we got really drunk and we started kissing. The kissing led to touching at so on. The next morning neither one of us knew how it all happened and we just passed it off as drunk college level stuff. Once we were home we tried to maintain a friendship but the intensity of everything freaked her out. She stopped talking to me for 6 months. It was miserable but I did my best to move on with my life. The hardest part was that I had to see her at school 3 times a week. Fast forward past the 6 months that we didn't talk and we ended up having a clinical together. We were both very nervous. The first week was kind of awkward, but we started talking again. Once we got more comfortable with each other I realized that I had more than friendship feelings for her. I was scared to bring this up to her. Somehow as we were talking we got on the subject of this and she admitted that she had feelings for me all along and that is the reason why she stopped talking to me. Neither one of us considered ourselves lesbians and had never had feelings for the same sex. In fact, I had just gotten out of a 15-year marriage with a man. Anyway, we decided to explore our feelings and things were going so well. We were kind of dating each other, we loved spending time with each other, and she made me feel things that I have never felt in my entire life. She told me that I made her feel the same. Then  stuff hit the fan. She got into a really horrific fight with her mom and asked me to come pick her up. She ended up staying with me for 10 days. Things moved so fast and were really intense but I loved having her next to me every night. Yesterday she decided to work things out with her mom and went back home. I immediately felt a shift in things. I could feel her pulling away and it scared me. She finally did tell me a little bit ago that she needs some space. I can respect that because things moved very fast, even for me. She said that she is a broken person and needs to heal. She told me that I am not the one who broke her and that she was mad that everyone else did this to her. She has always had very intense emotions in which I always try to remain calm through. She told me that I am the only person who has ever made her feel safe. The problem is, I have this knot in my stomach that she will leave me again. This would devastate me. So, how do I give her the space that she needs, let her know I still care about her deeply and am here to support her, while also protecting myself? I realize that this is a very condensed version of the story, but any insight would be helpful. Thank you so much.

[RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING]

RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members are welcomed to express frustration but must seek constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[RolandOfEld]

Hi flutterbyeblue4 and welcome! 

Varying back and forth between intense closeness sudden pulling away is certainly a BPD characteristic.

While I don't know if your friend has BPD, it would help to know more about your relationship and what brought you here.

~RolandOfEld

[pearlsw]

Hi flutterbyeblue4,

I can imagine that even if she was not BPD or had BPD traits this could be a confusing first experience. While she may have had certain desires, if this was the first time she acted on them she could still be questioning her sexuality and not sure how to proceed. Did she say what her sexual identity currently is?

Does she have other traits or issues you could tell us about?

warmly, pearl.