Menopause and Other Factors

[Augustine]

So, in my instance there was a clear latency period of relative stability that occurred before the worst BPD symptoms appeared.

The first 3-4 years were relatively benign. Afterwards, her symptoms were proportional to the degree of stress she was experiencing, and disappeared with the stress.

In the last two years, we had moved across the country, and bought a home that we knew beforehand needed some considerable updating.

This is when the symptoms went completely off the charts, and she wasn’t even recognizable anymore in the last year.

She had received a promotion at work two years ago, and it quickly emerged that she wasn’t equal to the new responsibilities and workload that came with the promotion.

She wasn’t equipped to deal with the responsibilities that accompanies a house renovation.

Her beloved pet of 12 years became very ill and died seven months ago, and they had been inseparable.

Lastly, she was clearly exhibiting menopausal symptoms in the final year we were together.

The last year together was excruciating, and I looked forward to going to bed, as sleep was the only opportunity of getting a break from the horror each day.

Anyway, I was curious if anyone else noted a huge uptick in the symptoms during menopause, or when the stress became too much for them bear? I noted that it didn’t take much before she reached her stress limit.

As well, did your partner have a pet?  I have never encountered someone as attached to their pet as she was with hers.  However, she’d still rage at the dog from time to time, and that was always distressing to witness.

[StartingHealing]

Hi Augustine,

 The exwBPD, she thrived on stress, drama, emotional roller coaster, she would start showing signs of depression if there wasn't enough "drama" going on. 

Being deep into the areas that I was engaged in, (f/t work, f/t university, house redo,) I was busy and actually didn't have time to interact with her as much as she felt she needed.  As such she would create a situation of negative attention which she didn't care because it was attention.

Her mother had some sort of something, and she had a aunt that was diagnosed with schizophrenia.

She did have pets but after this last go she don't care. 

Yes, it appeared that there was a correlation between her menopause and the increase in negative behaviors. 

[Augustine]

Hi Augustine,

 The exwBPD, she thrived on stress, drama, emotional roller coaster, she would start showing signs of depression if there wasn't enough "drama" going on. 

Being deep into the areas that I was engaged in, (f/t work, f/t university, house redo,) I was busy and actually didn't have time to interact with her as much as she felt she needed.  As such she would create a situation of negative attention which she didn't care because it was attention.

Her mother had some sort of something, and she had a aunt that was diagnosed with schizophrenia.

She did have pets but after this last go she don't care. 

Yes, it appeared that there was a correlation between her menopause and the increase in negative behaviors. 

Fascinating, quite fascinating.

Your experiences mirror my own in almost every instance.

One element in particular stands out, because on reflection, I was experiencing an identical outcome when I was thoroughly preoccupied with our house renovation, and my full-time job: she made more of an effort to stir up arguments. At the end of my day I’d feel so drained that I scarcely had the energy to attend to myself, let alone have any surplus to lavish her with attention. It’s little wonder that arguments would then ensue.

I suppose that it stands to reason that they’ll be hamstrung by anything out of the ordinary, and non BPD women are truly challenged by menopause, so for a BPD, the menopausal symptoms must truly aggravate their condition. 

No wonder she was such a handful.

[Biggus]

As well, did your partner have a pet?  I have never encountered someone as attached to their pet as she was with hers.  However, she’d still rage at the dog from time to time, and that was always distressing to witness.

Hi Augustine,

I knew my ex before and after her menopausal years but not during them, so, I didn't witness her behaviour at the time.

Your question about pets caught my attention.  I tend to think "Like owner like dog". Dogs learn from not just what their owner teaches them, but also from what their owners are, they can also learn all the insecurities their owner has. Her dog was very friendly and nice, but felt like very insecure and super emotional, barking at everything all the time, though without aggression, possibly the continuous barking was just commentary about everything the dog witnessed and felt. Ex was a bit of a loner type, so I don't think the dog was well socialized. She was very attached to it, didn't rage at it, as she mostly was respectful to others, more like nagged at it, which I tend to think just added to the problem. The dog liked me very much and was somewhat more relaxed when it was alone with me.

Did you notice similar "like owner like dog" things with your ex and her dog?

[TheRedLion]

Hi Augustine,

My exdBPD had a pet that she loves and cherishes like no one else on the planet. During our relationship, her pet became ill and my ex went off the rails. That stressor was unlike any other stressor I've seen (maybe even more than her parents getting sick). She later gave me some insight that I think was particularly helpful.

She told me, while crying when I was angry at her, that her pet was the only one in the world who would "love [her] unconditionally", no matter what she did in her personal life. As long as she continued to feed the pet and give the pet attention, the pet would always be by her side. She didn't have to test the pet for their love, because the pet is never, ever leaving. Many of us have heard our pwBPD say that what they were searching for was "unconditional love". Well, pets are the only ones that can really offer that in a way that someone with BPD can accept the boundaries of. That's why the promise of death felt particularly difficult and stressful.

As I'm writing this, I'm starting to think about how she acted in our relationship. She acted out and broke quite a few of my boundaries, but she also cooked me dinner consistently and spent an absurd amount of quality time with me. It's possible that she had been trained to show love that way by taking care of her pet so much. In some ways, looking back, I may have been treated like a pet too. I was fed, I was talked at (and when I contributed, my words went into one ear and out the other), I enjoyed her physical touch, and I was controlled in ways an owner controls their pet. Which is why when I expressed hurt about my boundaries being broken, how my love wasn't unconditional, she seemed so flabbergasted and surprised/hurt.

This might be too much of a stretch. But I do think there are some similarities and it is a worthwhile comparison. I have less to say about menopause as she didn't go through that during our relationship.

[kells76]

Interesting discussion of how some pwBPD interact with others (whether pets or people), and what needs those interactions are serving:

She told me, while crying when I was angry at her, that her pet was the only one in the world who would "love [her] unconditionally", no matter what she did in her personal life. As long as she continued to feed the pet and give the pet attention, the pet would always be by her side. She didn't have to test the pet for their love, because the pet is never, ever leaving. Many of us have heard our pwBPD say that what they were searching for was "unconditional love". Well, pets are the only ones that can really offer that in a way that someone with BPD can accept the boundaries of. That's why the promise of death felt particularly difficult and stressful.

As I'm writing this, I'm starting to think about how she acted in our relationship. She acted out and broke quite a few of my boundaries, but she also cooked me dinner consistently and spent an absurd amount of quality time with me. It's possible that she had been trained to show love that way by taking care of her pet so much. In some ways, looking back, I may have been treated like a pet too. I was fed, I was talked at (and when I contributed, my words went into one ear and out the other), I enjoyed her physical touch, and I was controlled in ways an owner controls their pet. Which is why when I expressed hurt about my boundaries being broken, how my love wasn't unconditional, she seemed so flabbergasted and surprised/hurt.

Have you had a chance to check out our Q&A thread on BEHAVIORS: Objectifying the romantic partner? Lots of info tying in to this topic. The first post there especially reminded me of your thoughts:

...We all know neediness is at the core of BPD and I think it has much to do with how people with BPD look at the world and at people. Distrust of others' motives (especially if the person with BPD was sexually abused) lends a coloring to all personal interactions: fear is a self-centered emotion, a defense mechanism. So if someone with BPD is driven by a deep and intense need to be loved while at the same time fearing the object of that love will go away or will hurt him/her, then it's easy to see that s/he will tend to view another AS an object, if that makes any sense.

Neediness and fear are all about what is happening to the person, and they leave little room for empathy or even awareness of anyone else's needs. In the same way as a person with NPD uses others as ego-gratifying objects that feed their "narcissistic supply", a person with BPD uses others as an outside means to comfort themselves and to perhaps even give themselves worth, which they believe they lack. ...

It makes sense that she'd be astonished at you expressing needs -- to her, you "weren't a person" in those moments, you "were an object" filling a role in her life, and who expects "an object" to be an individual?

And it also makes sense that she'd treat the dog and you so similarly in certain ways -- again, both of you were filling roles in her life vs being individuals, so the difference between a pet and a person wasn't the important thing going on for her.

Would be interested to hear your thoughts on the thread--

kells76

[TheRedLion]

Hi kells76,

That thread was quite a read. You make a great point about how this may play into what we have discussed on this thread: treating nonBPD partners as almost pets, in many ways objectifying them and finding the fact that they have needs incomprehensible.

For me, this line stood out:

They (we) forget ourselves in our fear of rejection/abandonment and can emotionally regress to a very child-like approach to others, which is fundamentally self-absorbed in its own wants. Unfortunately this state can be pervasive, due to things like well-entrenched defenses and habit. Personality disorders are often so much a part of the person that they aren't even aware of them.

I certainly noticed that at times of dysregulation, my exdBPD would have trouble understanding that I had needs, that I was a human. When I expressed my needs to her, that ended up feeling to her (at least I'm guessing) like a personal attack on herself, as I failed to fulfill the role of satisfying her wants. We all read about the role of caretakers in BPD, and as her FP, when I expressed my own needs during a period of her dysregulation, I was failing in my role as a caretaker.

Thus, especially in times of dysregulation, I became an object, meant to satisfy and pacify her rather than a complex human being in a complex world where we all have desires/wants/needs. Just like her pet satisfies and pacifies her in times of stress and dysregulation, I was supposed to too.

Another thing that I'd like to note is that, interestingly, one thing my ex complained about is that in previous relationships she felt like others were "using [her] as an object". We've all read on this forum about blame shifting and projecting. Oftentimes, when my ex complained about her former partners, usually she either did the same thing she was complaining about to me, or she'd somehow have reversed the roles in her head (meaning she did it to them). My guess is she has a habit of objectifying partners, realizes it, but can't admit fault for it, so she projects the blame onto her past partners.

Pets do seem to hold a special role for someone with BPD as someone offering unconditional support and love. Partners, on the other hand, have limits and can't love unconditionally. I don't know if I'm allowed to cite other forums so I won't right now, but I found a thread about how dBPD feel about their pets that was insightful and seems to be consistent with this.

[Augustine]

Hi Augustine,

I knew my ex before and after her menopausal years but not during them, so, I didn't witness her behaviour at the time.

Your question about pets caught my attention.  I tend to think "Like owner like dog". Dogs learn from not just what their owner teaches them, but also from what their owners are, they can also learn all the insecurities their owner has. Her dog was very friendly and nice, but felt like very insecure and super emotional, barking at everything all the time, though without aggression, possibly the continuous barking was just commentary about everything the dog witnessed and felt. Ex was a bit of a loner type, so I don't think the dog was well socialized. She was very attached to it, didn't rage at it, as she mostly was respectful to others, more like nagged at it, which I tend to think just added to the problem. The dog liked me very much and was somewhat more relaxed when it was alone with me.

Did you notice similar "like owner like dog" things with your ex and her dog?

Very insightful thread.

Everyone commented on the fact that her bond with her dog was like nothing they had ever witnessed before.  At the start of our relationship, it did take me some time to mentally accommodate the fact that she’d carry her dog with her everywhere like an infant. They were quite inseparable.

However, there was also a dark side, as I noted that the dog would bear the brunt of her anger if she had an issue with me.

When the dog passed away, she became very detached-practically from everything-and I was alarmed by her blunted affect.  However, she never lacked the resources to rage…over anything.

A month after the dog died, she formed a friendship with a woman who had followed a path identical to ours, having recently moved across the country from the same province. 

The woman was completely around the bend, but I encouraged the friendship anyway as it seemed to be doing my partner a great deal of good.

In no time at all, the level of enmeshment between the two was mesmerizing to witness, and to such a degree that it wasn’t long before the interests of the new friend supplanted my own.  She’d found herself a new dog/attachment figure that could provide her with unconditional attention/affection/etc.

The new friend was convinced that she was Guinevere in a past life-even going so far as writing a book on the subject, and purchasing a long sword-so I was becoming worried about the course this friendship was now taking, as the new friend was less than discrete about disclosing details about her life, and her life was clearly punctuated by mental illness. 

It wasn’t very long before my relationship ended, thank God.

[kells76]

Reflecting on the tangible manifestations of the disorder (delusionally enmeshed friendships, no boundaries between how pets and people are treated... the list goes on), for me, helps me to remember that the pwBPD in my life is coping with a mental illness, not just "some quirks". Reminding myself that BPD is a mental illness puts me in a place of radical acceptance. I no longer have beliefs that if I could just explain things well enough, maybe she'd have an "aha" moment and turn a corner. She is who she is, and that's reality, and I can accept that.

For you, in what stage of your process would you place what we're doing here (reflecting on manifestations of the disorder)?

[Augustine]

Reflecting on the tangible manifestations of the disorder (delusionally enmeshed friendships, no boundaries between how pets and people are treated... the list goes on), for me, helps me to remember that the pwBPD in my life is coping with a mental illness, not just "some quirks". Reminding myself that BPD is a mental illness puts me in a place of radical acceptance. I no longer have beliefs that if I could just explain things well enough, maybe she'd have an "aha" moment and turn a corner. She is who she is, and that's reality, and I can accept that.

For you, in what stage of your process would you place what we're doing here (reflecting on manifestations of the disorder)?

Despite being familiar with the diagnostic criteria, I didn’t (or sub consciously wouldn’t) make the attribution between my partner’s behaviour, and a chronic mental illness while I was in the relationship.

A month after parting company with her, the facts slowly entered my consciousness like the denouement in a detective story.

What emerged was the vast gulf between what one normally experiences in a breakup, and the scorched earth liquid fire napalm strike in this recent breakup.

Then the question appeared: Why did I ignore the symptoms that were as subtle as a chorus line of music hall Can-can dancers?

I’m here looking for an answer to this question, principally, as I was already beginning to emotionally detach from her towards the end.
  
Ending a relationship is never easy-even the sh!tty ones-but ending one with a pwBPD is especially challenging due to all the questions that remain unanswered afterwards.  

Comparing BPD behavioural notes, and how we collectively responded to them, typically in unison, goes a long way towards reducing the disagreeable aftertaste when the relationship ends.

Fortunately-or not-I’ve been down this road before with another partner, albeit not to this degree of commitment, or length of time invested, so I don’t feel as flensed by the experIence as I did after the last one.

However, communicating with everyone here has really accelerated the radical acceptance process so significantly that I can joke:

“What’s the difference between the Titanic and my relationship?”
“The Titanic had a band.”

[capecodling]

Reflecting on the tangible manifestations of the disorder (delusionally enmeshed friendships, no boundaries between how pets and people are treated... the list goes on), for me, helps me to remember that the pwBPD in my life is coping with a mental illness, not just "some quirks". Reminding myself that BPD is a mental illness puts me in a place of radical acceptance. I no longer have beliefs that if I could just explain things well enough, maybe she'd have an "aha" moment and turn a corner. She is who she is, and that's reality, and I can accept that.

For you, in what stage of your process would you place what we're doing here (reflecting on manifestations of the disorder)?

Do you have more information on radical acceptance as it relates to dealing with a BPD breakup?  I still have moments of anger and betrayal and pain, even knowing she couldn’t control her behavior — or at least for the most part she couldn’t.  Radical acceptance, I believe, is one of the keys to accessing the final stages of the grieving process and ultimately dissolving the trauma bond.

[Collaguazo]

My ex also had a strong bond with her dog, but I never saw she mistreated him or anything like that. The dog was also well behaved and calm.

What was interesting was that my family dog didn’t like her. I remember the first time I took her to meet my parents, she was raging the whole trip. When we arrived, the dog looked at her and growled. First time I saw him do that to anyone.

Also, when I am at my parents house the dog follows me everywhere. When my ex called me on the phone, I always went to somewhere quiet to speak in case she got abusive (I always take the calls on speaker) so my dog was next to me hearing everything. Eventually, the moment he heard her voice, looked at me, stood up and left the room.

Then when I was about to leave, the dog was crying almost begging me not to go. With time he got resentful.

Now that it’s 1 month since the break up, my dog is once again happy to be around with me and got very affectionate when I told him she is gone. Poor thing, probably was also scared of her and felt my suffering.

[kells76]

Great question, capecodling; thanks for the prompt. I think you'll have started a good discussion.

Do you have more information on radical acceptance as it relates to dealing with a BPD breakup?  I still have moments of anger and betrayal and pain, even knowing she couldn’t control her behavior — or at least for the most part she couldn’t.  Radical acceptance, I believe, is one of the keys to accessing the final stages of the grieving process and ultimately dissolving the trauma bond.

I spun off a new post titled Radical acceptance and dealing with a BPD breakup to keep the OP's thread on topic.