Hello everyone,
I created a couple posts in the past at the beginning of my relationship with the person in question as I was totally lost. Since then I seeked therapy and researched a whole lot on BPD, Narcissi and Trauma Bonding.
I am asking for general advice, or perhaps external validation of sorts, to know I am not alone can help sometimes.
TLDR; I feel lost and don't know how to support her anymore
For context, It is a friend of 10+ years that 6 years ago we started spending more time together and started a casual situationship. I knew she was "intense" from before and I helped her realize she might have BPD as everything checks out. She comes from a very dysfunctional family and a line of narcissistic exes. I thought I could help her and that I was strong enough, boy was I wrong.
She made it very clear she does not want a relationship, and I agreed. She needs time to heal and get the help she needs. It was perfectly fine at first but the cracks started to show soon after. I went through idolization phases and belittling phases, splitting, the whole shebang. I got the help I needed and decided to continue.
Around that time, the stress started piling up and it affected my libido / erections. This affected her greatly (body image issues) and that's when the self loathing began for me. I learned I was a people pleaser through therapy (still ongoing), but instead of being relieved it was not because I did not want her anymore, it got twisted into "Now I can't trust anything you said before because you were just agreeable to avoid conflicts". Which fair, could happen at times, but I will never do something I don't want to do.
Since then things have gotten better sexually, but still not as it used to be.
I get attached easily, but I can control my feelings easily. She sometimes acts as if she was in a relationship, the jealousy (will never admit this), how often we see each other, etc. This led me to start acting like it too and basically assuming this was a relationship. That was wrong of me, despite the mixed signals. We had a discussion about how she felt pressured to reciprocate, and i felt like
PLEASE READ. I am okay with being just casual, but that got twisted into me apparently being manipulative only to get in her pants. When I try to pullback, she sees it as confirmation, or that i'm quitting because things got hard and i'm a coward. Extremely confusing.
I am tired of walking on eggshells, I can't express myself for fear of being taken the wrong way. I can't say things like "I believe in you" because it's being taken as "me saying she does not do enough". It's draining. I don't know how to set healthy boundaries because of my people pleasing tendencies and fear of conflicts. I don't know how to support her because I don't know what to do or say anymore. I can't just walk away because of the suicidal ideation and well, I truly care about her. I am tired of being second guessed, scrutinized and not being trusted, despite being told i'm the most trustworthy person in her life.
I'm lost and want to know how to best support her, while finding myself again.
Thank you all for listening, and any advice, small or big, is greatly appreciated.
