Feel like it was all a dream

[mango_flower]

I woke up this morning and my first thought was her, as it has been every day for the last 4/5 months since she left.

And suddenly, I felt weird, not in a bad way, but like I was in a new reality.

Like our whole year together was just a dream, it was a different lifetime.  That it wasn't ME in that relationship but somebody else.  And that it was never ME who got engaged, never ME who moved in with that person, never ME who was happy in a relationship.

Maybe because I never wanted or expected those things, I never thought I'd get them?

I was hoping for some insight on this -

1. Is it a good or bad thing?

2. Is is detaching from reality? (quite worrying if so)

3. Why do I feel like this?

I've never felt like this about ANYTHING in my life before, e.g. my year backpacking abroad... . that was about the same amount of time as this relationship, but it very much happened to ME and I feel comfortable with it as part of my past, I enjoyed it, made new friends, and miss it some days.

I feel like right now, I'm in some weird hyper-reality, where nothing is real, the whole relationship was just one long dream... .

It scares me, even though it doesn't necessarily feel bad.  Just feeling kind of weirded out about reality. I woke up and it feels like none of the past year happened, that I've gone back a year in time to where I was... . the same life I used to live... . and I'm not saying it's bad but it's unsettling me to feel this way, like my thoughts are playing tricks on me.

Edited to add: It actually makes me feel so very very sad - that something that was so beautiful to me can now feel like it never actually happened to me. And I wonder if that's how she feels too.  Like we've both erased a beautiful part of history rather than accepting it and moving on.  And that IS just very sad.

[mango_flower]

Oh - and I'm totally confused about what I want anymore... .

She sold me the dream and I accepted it - I internalised it - wanted it as my own.  House, family, kids one day... .

Now I feel like I don't want ANY of that stuff and want to stay single forever and travel again at some point.

Now I KNOW there is nothing wrong with that, but it's my own quick changing of my mind that worries me - I don't know who I am anymore, or what I want... . it scares me so much and I don't know why!

I feel that I am now lacking the sense of self in the same way that she did... .

[Mightyhammers]

I wouldnt let it scare you, Id LOVE to feel like that right now! it looks to me that you are over a certain phase of grieving if that makes sense?

[mango_flower]

Trust me, it's taken me almost 5 months to get here!  And who knows how I'll feel tomorrow... . one step forward, two steps back and all that... .

I don't know why it scares me, maybe because as I added at the end, it feels like I don't know who I am anymore, all my dreams/hopes have twisted in some way and I don't know what I want or where I am going.  I feel very unsettled.

[Clearmind]

Mango, we bend our own values and sense of self to make the relationship work.

Its possible we also dissociate/check out to protect ourselves rather than stay present and use boundaries.

Processing grief takes time. All those 'if only's' - we begin to bargain.

I feel that I am now lacking the sense of self in the same way that she did... .

Its temporary - we base our worth on what they say about us. There is a reason why you believe her opinion of you - any ideas?

Where do you think you are in the Us: The Five Stages of Grieving a Relationship Loss?

The breakup of a marriage or long-term relationship can trigger similar grieving responses to the death of a spouse.

There are 5 common stages of grief that a person goes through.  These stages were first identified by the late Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, M.D. when she spoke at the The Ingersoll Lectures on Human Immortality at Harvard University in 1970.

Where are you in the process?  

What have you struggled with?  How might you have approached it differently?

How has your perspective changed as you have gone through the stages?

What have you struggled with?

Skippy



The five stages of grief are:

Denial

This is when we and our partner are on different page about our commitments to the relationship. This stage is filled with disbelief and denial.  

In the Kübler-Ross model, if your partner has died you still expect him to walk through the door.  The equivalent in a relationship breakup is that your partner is drifting away or has broken-up and you still think that he/she doesn't mean it - that it is a ploy or a reaction.  

Often in this stage we are engaged in relationship struggles and are expecting our partner to respond in the way that someone in a relationship would respond. However, they are in a very different, less caring place.  We are confused, hurt, put off by their behavior.

Anger/Resentment -

Anger often the reaction to being hurt and/or fearful, and helpless to do anything about it. The greater the loss, the greater the reaction.

In the Kübler-Ross model, you might feel anger at your deceased partner for dying (Kübler-Ross model).  In the relationship, you may feel anger at your partner for asking for a divorce and breaking up the family. You may feel anger at your friends or family for supporting her and not you. You may be angry for being betrayed.  You may be angery for not being idealized any longer (ego wound).  

Anger is a very complex pat of grieving - many of us stumble in this stage with either unhealthy anger (misdirected, trapping) or no anger (no release).

We need to determine why we're angry and focus our feeling on the true issues - if not, anger can imprison people.  

Bargaining

You try to negotiate to change the situation.

In the Kübler-Ross model, if you've lost a spouse to death you might bargain with God, "I'll be a better person if you'd just bring him back". In a relationship, you might approach your partner who is asking for the break-up and say "If you'll stay, I'll change".  

Bargaining is that stage of the break-up when you’re trying to make deals and compromises. It’s when you start talking about how an open relationship might be a possibility or a long-distance thing could work. It’s when you say to your partner, “if you just did this then I could do that and it would work”. It’s when you say to yourself that you’ll do x, y, z to be a better spouse so that the relationship doesn’t have to end.

Depression

The is the "it's really over" stage.

After all of the denial and the anger and the bargaining have been done and we realize that things really are starting to end and we become depressed. We fell helpless and powerless and overwhelmed with sadness about the loss that we are experiencing.  We realize the situation isn't going to change. The death or break-up happened and there is nothing to bring the other person back.  Acknowledgment of the situation often brings depression.

Acknowledgment often starts the serious process of us trying to understand what happened.

Acceptance – The "This is what happened" stage.

Acceptance is a final stage when we have finally sorting out what happened, accepted it and are more interested in moving forward than looking back.  

Acceptance can take a lot of time and a lot of processing. It involves understanding the situation, understand our role / understand their role, understanding what can be learned, and letting go / moving forward.  

Note: Each person mourns a loss differently.  You may not experience these stages in one fluid order. You may go through some of the stages more than once. Sometimes during the bargiaining stages we recycle the relationship. Or an event will trigger us to experience one of these stages again - like hearing your ex-partner is to remarry.

Any ideas how you can move through the grief?

[Mightyhammers]

I think unsettled is a better feeling than lost, which is how I kind of feel right now. This is yourself getting it in your head that it is now YOUR time, I wouldnt be scared Id embrace it personally

[mango_flower]

Thanks Mighthammers

Clearmind - I'm definitely not in the denial stage, have moved through the anger and from time to time I bargain, but more with my own mind about what could have been etc... . not in any way of "if I do this, maybe she'll come back".

I'm still going through the depression stage, some days worse than others.  Not sure I'm quite at acceptance yet!

What you said rings so true, that we bend and distort our own boundaries to make the relationship work. But now I don't know what I want - did I ever want those things?  What if I'd got them and they weren't what I really wanted?  What if I meet somebody else one day and they want those things, and I think I do (shifting boundaries again) and then don't REALLY want them and then have a child and don't want it... .

People say live in the present, don't think ahead, but I am a thinker and need to work through how I feel or I just act impulsively... .

Feel like burying my head in the sand today!  But must work through this!

[Clearmind]

I would have guessed the bargaining stage as well mango and its natural to oscillate into the depression stage - the five stages are not linear. I posted the five stages to illustrate that what you are going through is normal.

Our r/s break up's are symbolic. I chose my partners poorly however none where likely to be Borderline, until I met my ex. It was almost like I upped the ante with each partner choice rather than learn from them. I clearly had a lot of learn - hence the reason I chose a Borderline.

Folks need to hit their own form of rock bottom before we seek answers. It shows we are ready to seek answers - if we allow ourselves to feel vulnerable in the process. We can hide from vulnerability by continuing to not concentrate on ourselves - its safer to concentrate on our ex's.

What we needed from our ex's was to be needed - we felt validated like no other in that idealisation phase - what we didn't expect were all the conditions that came with it. It was conditional love - and for me - it was very reminiscent of my childhood.

So how do we find our true selves? We are adults with adult privileges however many of us are living by our childhood script. We model our relationships from our parents and its only now we begin to process what that actually means for us as adults. Its pretty clear how we have been doing things has not worked.

Who we are, are the values we live our lives by. Its the boundaries we set to protect those values that show others who we are. Its likely our own values as kids were bent, its likely we were not permitted needs or we were chastised or ignored when we set boundaries. For some of us, like me, my emotions as a child were not validated. I grew up in an invaliding environment and sought out validation in all the wrong places.

Its more than likely mango, your true self is alive and well - its your inner critic - that is bashing you over the head and telling you, you are not good enough.

I cannot recommend this free video series enough for those who have had a r/s with a Borderline - these video's begin to show us how we have neglected our needs for the sake of making someone else happy, how we show more kindness and compassion to others than we do to ourselves:

Great place to start: The Self-Acceptance Project - register with your email - listen to the live stream or download the mp3 to your smart phone.

[laelle]

What we needed from our ex's was to be needed - we felt validated like no other in that idealisation phase - what we didn't expect were all the conditions that came with it. It was conditional love - and for me - it was very reminiscent of my childhood.

This could not be more accurate of my relationship with my ex and my parents.