I'm not sure what I'll write here will help, but here goes. And it's going to be a l long post.
I went through what you describe in a 5 year relationship. Too long to write about the details because I'm not sure the details matter, it's the behavioral patterns that are the same and I recognize them here. I was ghosted often, sometimes for a week at a time, I was kicked out of her place multiple times, and so on.
Her behavior made no sense to me, I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. I knew she had serious mental problems, but didn't identify it as BPD until about 6-8 months before we split (I'm not a doc, she hasn't been formally diagnosed, but I'm certain she would meet the full DSM-V criteria for BPD, and the source of it environmentally was an abusive, emotionless childhood at home and more).
When she behaved the way you described I tried to 'help', I validated her as best I could, I did the things you describe. I sent her an email once, saying I was confused, that I loved her, that I don't understand why she was treating me this way -- her response was a text tirade of how I wouldn't change my behaviors and worse. Then a couple of hours later, a good night, I love you text from her.
She had moments she recognized she had these issues, that something was wrong -- she would sometimes apologize the day after an incident, but it wouldn't 'stick'. Alcohol abuse clouded the behaviors further.
She projected onto me often, meaning she would ask me why I was acting like a dick, out of the blue, and I'd sit there stunned, my mind racing through what I'd said or did the past hour or day trying to find out what *I* did to 'fail' her, or make her angry. The truth is, I was a foil for her BPD. I'm certain that she had emotions she couldn't manage, and, in that example, had the emotions related to how badly she was treating me, she couldn't accept that about herself, so split it off and projected it on to me.
The turning point for me came after one particular incident: I had stayed the evening, ordered the 'right' food for delivery, we had a wonderfully intimate night, it was heaven. Next morning things seemed fine; I got up, got ready for work, said I'd come over around 1pm to drive her to the airport for a work trip and pick up her pup to watch. Before I left I asked her if I should take the leftovers or leave them for her. She said take them. I returned at 1pm to find her sitting at her kitchen counter with her work laptop, and it's clear she is fuming and angry. "Why didn't you leave anything for me to eat?" My adrenaline began pumping immediately, and I responded, "You said to take the leftovers." I struggled to remain calm, and sat out back in the sun for a bit while she fumed inside. I went in for water. "You didn't even leave some of it for me -- you should have known to do that." I asked her if she remembered me asking her if I should take them or leave them, and that she said to take them -- she responded yes, she remembered. That's when the light bulb went off in my head: none of this was about me. I'm certain it was her emotional dis-regulation kicking in -- she was feeling intense emotions she had never learned or been taught how to manage, she needed something to 'pin' those emotions on because to her it was obvious that her emotions were always caused by someone externally, so she pinned it on the only thing that presented itself - me taking the leftovers. Had I not taken them, she would have still been fuming when I came over to drive her to the airport, and would have picked something else to pin her emotions on, possibly why I didn't take the leftovers with me.
Why would she still have been fuming? Because I'm certain the real cause of her anger when I arrived to pick her up was due to how close and intimate we were the night before. It was too close, and now the feelings of being intimate were overwhelming her, threatening to her, generating feelings of fear of being controlled, smothered -- she was afraid of her love feelings towards me (she'd said this many times in our relationship). She had switched to 'push away' behaviors to distance me so her emotions would settle.
Sure, this is speculation on my part -- who am I to say what was really going on in her mind? Experience, four and a half years of experiencing incidents like this, being exposed to the pull and then the push. She would say 'part time is working well for me, I can't see myself being full time with anyone' -- I sat there and somehow responded in my most uncharacteristic way -- "that works for me -- we don't have to be together full time, or even live together or get married" -- and that caused a sudden shift in her to where she was silent, then asking questions - "really?" and "how would that work?" and others. It was clear that she was trying to push me away, but instead of trying to get pulled back in I indicated that me 'going away' was fine, and then she started 'pulling' me back immediately.
She ghosted me for a week many times, but during one, I went shopping, new clothing, sports jacket, things that I felt good about. I went out to a meetup and met someone who is now a good friend. When she texted me a week later, asking me to come over, I was in one of my new sport jackets, slacks, nice shoes. The change affected her, she was silent, would ask a question about the clothing. Asked what I'd been doing the past week, said I went out to a meetup, and that got her attention -- she was saying things like it's dangerous to be out around that location; why would I go? Why would I meet people? And so on. I attribute that to her fear of abandonment, here I was doing independent things, taking care of myself, MEETING other people, and I'm certain she took it as a threat that I was potentially going off on my own without needing her.
If you've slogged through all of that, here is the reality that I refused to see in our relationship, and I think it's the reality you need to face, accept and work with, followed by my advice:
- It's not your fault. Her behaviors truly have little to do with you directly or personally, most of the time. Yes, you may do something that should legitimately piss her or someone else off, but most of her behaviors are generated from within, and it's not about you. They're almost certainly emotions that are overwhelming her, and that likely come from extremely damaging childhood development environment. It's not your fault she is generating emotions within her and then blaming you for them, or behaving the way she is behaving. Her behavior isn't about you at all.
- You do not have control w/r to her, and you have to accept that. You want contact, communication, I completely understand. You want to help, you want to validate her (I have advice about that later). I get that, and I was at that same place. But if she does not respond, does not reply, does not want to communicate with you, that's her right not to do those things. (Again, advice later on how to handle that).
- You are not going to resolve this with logic or reason, so set those aside. The fact is this is how her mind works, and you are not going to change that from the outside. Only she can do that. You can certainly help in specific ways, but *she* must be open to that, and accept that, and if she doesn't, you not only won't convince her to, it's not your place to. It's not her fault she is the way she is now, but it is her responsibility as an adult to 'sort herself out', to do something about this.
My advice is as follows:
- If you want to keep the opportunity open for communication with her, that's fine -- nothing wrong with that. Text her every once in a while, for example, and just say something like, "Hey, checking in -- hope all is well with you. Would love to grab lunch some time, but completely understand if you don't want to. Take care!
" She may not reply, or she may reply with something you don't want to hear. Or she may want to have lunch. No matter WHAT the response is, or if there isn't one, PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT IS GOING ON IN YOU as a result. Because ...
- You have work to do on yourself. Ask yourself: Why would you be hurt if she doesn't respond, or she responds negatively? Or she won't communicate? Why are you so intent on pushing her to communicate -- that's what you want, but it doesn't seem to be what she wants, and regardless of why, you seem to refuse to accept that and YOU feel hurt as a result. What is it you want from her? Why? Is it possible you're getting exactly what you want from her right now? The 'struggle' may be recreating your own childhood or emotional traumas that you're comfortable with and familiar with.
She certainly sounds like she is mal-adaptive, has behaviors that seem to fit with BPD behaviors, and needs help. But guess what? What you are doing and how you are feeling are indications that you have your own mal-adaptive behaviors and emotions that are being generated that you want generated. NO ONE can make you have an emotion, whether it's anger, sadness, happiness, joy and so on. Some incident or event happens and YOU react and respond with an automatic emotion or feeling that you almost certainly developed as a defense mechanism between infancy and 4-5 years old. YOU are generating those, in response to what's going on outside of you with her. She is *your* foil in that you are choosing, albeit subconsciously, to pursue someone who has seemed to indicate that she does not want to communicate. How you respond indicates that you have your own attachment issue or issues that you need to delve into and sort out.
It is irrelevant that she texts you things that don't make sense, or ghosts you right after texts that seem to indicate she wants to communicate; or invites you on the To: line to a baby shower at work, right after cutting you off. These are behaviors that seem to make no sense but that's only because you're putting them in the context of a relationship with you, and not accepting that these are the behaviors she has due to emotional dis-regulation and that *is* the explanation. There is nothing you can discuss that will penetrate to help or 'fix' her fragmented, damaged personality and behaviors.
I say all of this with compassion. Work on yourself. You have attachment or other issues that are keeping you locked into this, and you're justifying it (I think) by being the knight in shining armor who will save her. You won't. The best you can do is resolve your emotional and developmental attachment stuff.
I thought I was the knight in shining armor. I thought I could save her. I thought I could help. Why? Because I had / still have attachment issues from my childhood that I've been delving into for over a year now. I chose to go into therapy because it became clear after the 'leftovers' incident that, yes, she had significant issues, but no matter how I wanted to help or be with her, there was nothing I could do but be her foil, and because of my attachment issues, I did not have a strong self that could withstand the projections and criticisms and attacks that to me made no sense, and that would trigger my defensiveness and protest behaviors. I thank her in my head regularly for being the one who made me realize I needed to sort myself out, that I was not going to fix her.
We haven't communicated in almost a year. I still miss her; we've crossed paths a few times -- she works a block away, we use the same coffee shop, etc. so it happens. The last time, I was exited right as she was entering. I said good morning in a nice way, she retorted with a curt, "Hey" and bolted into the coffee shop.
I've since heard from a friend who knows us both that she's had two boyfriends since, both crashed and burned quickly, and that she is now realizing that she is the 'problem' in her relationships. How far that will go is up to her.
My therapist has said, several times, she needs to hit bottom. That the best thing I can do is stay away and let her be. I'm certain that's the best advice, though it was incredibly hard to accept at first.
My goal with therapy is to sort myself out. Go do the same for yourself. It's not your fault she's the way she is, it's not your fault she won't communicate with you. You are enough, you always have been. You need to developing a strong self before you can be involved with someone else in a deep romantic relationship. I stopped dating completely. I need to fully resolve my own mal-adaptive issues before getting involved with someone again, because if I don't I WILL REPEAT THIS PATTERN AND CHOOSE WOMEN who subconsciously I know will trigger my attachment issues and we'll be in the same situation again.
Take responsibility for you, at least for now. Be open to communicating if that's what you want, text once in a while, but observe your own feelings and emotions of hurt or frustration or anger that YOU are generating as a result of her behavior. Don't blame her for those feelings in you. Those emotions and feelings are created by you, and they are your responsibility, but they are gifts, because they point to where you need to work, they are signals -- you can trace them back to where they came from and resolve them in the past.
I can post one or two examples of my emotions flaring up, how I traced them back, and what they were originally created from if you like, just reply here -- this post is long enough I think it's time to close it!
All the best, and I hope you begin turning the spotlight towards your self and work there -- it's something you have a measure of influence and control of, something you can do.
