BPD and Apologizing...

[bruceli]

Saw this on another post... .  It got me thinking... .  on the ULTRA rare occasion that BPDw has ever apologized... .  most when see blows and S14 is around... .  even when she does I don't feel that it is sincere... .  just a show for S14 to mimic what is right but she does'nt really seem to be sorry... .  Anyone else experience this?

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[wanttoknowmore]

pwBPD have great difficulty apologizing because if she/he apologize that means she is bad and if she is bad ... . she should not live. Apology causes further plunge in her/his little self esteem and that is intolerable to her/him.

They feel defective inside but they can not say it.

[ThisWayUp]

Yeah. Apologies don't come often, and when they do they're usually fairly back handed is "I'm sorry you were offended by me calling you every name under the sun" or "I'm sorry I reacted badly to your many flaws". 

Earlier this week, my BPDso prevented me from going to my weekly counselling appointment, by storming out of the house and leaving me with our D5. On her return she starts making comments to suggest I should have got more housework done while she was gone! I never did get an apology. Been feeling pretty hopeless since.

So yeah. BPDs don't seem to feel guilt, or remorse. Why would they? Everything bad that happens is your fault. Not theirs!

[VeryFree]

Mine almost never apologised.

After things calmed down she would always say: it's neithers fault. No apologies are needed. Nobody's guilty.

During rages and now the the r/s is over it would be otherwise: everything was my fault. Of course.

[Nearlybroken]

My BPD partner rarely apologises.And when he does it's always along the lines of "Well, I am sorry YOU feel that way but other people wouldn't react like you do " etc.He has no empathy for me and flatly refuses to see that his behaviour upsets me.We are meeting today to discuss our relationship and I am dreading it... .  mainly because I know all of my  (valid)concerns will be twisted into me being demanding and controlling.It sounds awful but even though I know he has BPD, I am tiring of using the BPD as an excuse for his behaviour.If he can be nice to other people surely he must know that he is doing wrong by me?I struggle so much with the concept of him being "a nice guy" in the eyes of everyone else but extending( at times) not even basic politeness to me.He has no qualms about telling me exactly what he thinks of me in hurtful terms.And no qualms about telling me that others bring more happiness to his life... .  though my close friends know about his behaviour towards me I know they must struggle to believe me as he is lovely to them.Totally different person.So I will wait to see if he will talk to me or stare into space,if he will apologise and,if so,in what twisted format his apology will be.Me mentioning his issues = me making his life difficult so I do not think today will be a success.Happy times!

[waverider]

It bothers me not whether a pwBPD apologizes or not, as it will not prevent a repeat occurrence of the event. Their feelings are real at the moment, if they do apologize they may mean it at the moment. But when the drama happens again, there is no consistency, there is no learned behavior as a result of regret.

So in real practical terms as far as going forward is concerned it has little benefit whether they do or not. It is important that you are grounded in what is right and wrong, not rely on a pwBPD for validation of your beliefs, use acceptance and move on.

[Rockylove]

It used to bother me tremendously that he wouldn't apologize and when I finally asked him why he didn't he told me that he didn't see a point since what was said, was said and couldn't be taken back.  It doesn't bother me nearly as much since learning more about BPD~~I thought he was just being a jerk.     I tried to explain to him that even if he meant every word he said while angry, it would be nice to apologize for hurting my feelings.  I don't think he understands that concept at all, but I did get an email with a sincere apology very recently.  I didn't ask for an apology nor did I say anything to steer him in the direction of saying what he said, but it was awesome and I'll save it forever~~it may never happen again! 

[dickL]

uBPDw very rarely has apologized over 35yrs . chronic unsucessful romantic relationships while married . her infidelity was blamed  on me for being an poor husband . never any dv , i was not a bad partner . her projecting her bad decisions on me . after running away to old boyfriend couple yrs ago , she returned brokenhearted it hadn't woked w /bf . She apologized for all the pain she's caused , tearful sincere , very emotional . by the next day she was back to blaming , criticising, angry , her friends betray her , her life sucks and has attempted suicide. refuses any further T, been yrs. she doesn't follow an apology with behavorial change . she doen't know how to do these things .

[allibaba]

It bothers me not whether a pwBPD apologizes or not, as it will not prevent a repeat occurrence of the event. Their feelings are real at the moment, if they do apologize they may mean it at the moment. But when the drama happens again, there is no consistency, there is no learned behavior as a result of regret.

I'm with you waverider.  It doesn't really matter whether there is an apology or not. 

So in real practical terms as far as going forward is concerned it has little benefit whether they do or not. It is important that you are grounded in what is right and wrong, not rely on a pwBPD for validation of your beliefs, use acceptance and move on.

I feel far more internal peace when I disconnect from needing apologies for bad behavior and focus on 'my side of the street.'  When I feel less like a victim of my circumstances... .  I notice that he treats me with less hostility and has far less likelihood of attacking... .  

[Cloudy Days]

I guess this isn't the norm, but my husband apologizes a lot. It can be instant, to where he has a blow up, he goes outside and calms down and comes in and apologises or it can also be a long drawn out fight where we both go to sleep mad and he will apologise in the morning. It should be mentioned though that my husband is owning his problems now and is about a year into therapy. He also does the "I'm sorry I did this but you... .  " Statements and that's usually him trying to restart the fight, or maybe to get me to Validate something. I can tell when he's genuine.

[waverider]

My partner is now owning and facing up to her disorder. To this end she has apologized for a lot of the high conflict abusive behavior of the past, which we seem to have moved on from. But apologies for current day to day issues are either absent or without real change as a consequence.

In other words the apologies themselves will not drive any change. Change has to be driven by a deeper shift. After that change has been made she feels 'safe' to apologize in earnest. Though the reasoning and excuses for the behavior are a little skewed

[KellyO]

It bothers me not whether a pwBPD apologizes or not, as it will not prevent a repeat occurrence of the event. Their feelings are real at the moment, if they do apologize they may mean it at the moment. But when the drama happens again, there is no consistency, there is no learned behavior as a result of regret.

So in real practical terms as far as going forward is concerned it has little benefit whether they do or not. It is important that you are grounded in what is right and wrong, not rely on a pwBPD for validation of your beliefs, use acceptance and move on.

My ex-bf is the King of Apologies. He did apologise, all the time... .  and did the same crap thing next day . I was expected to accept his apologies and have amnesia (he does , so it must be normal, right?). It was horrible. It was abuse. If I did not say he was forgiven, he simply lost it and we had a nuclear war, every nuke used and launched at me until I was a sobbing wreck. What use is there  for apologies if you know it does not MEAN anything? He hasn't forgiven me anything. I still don't understand what forgiving actually means for him.

Later I can see a "testing"-pattern here too. Because I forgave him when he made me (of course I now know I'm responsible for my own behaviour, but that time I was not that wise, and I was scared), he had to be worse next time when he did the same crap. So it just went worse and worse. This is the classic loose-loose situation. I forgave him: he got worse. I did not forgive him: all hell broke loose. What I believe now is that there can't be enough boundaries with this person. If you have, he is all the time testing and trying to find a hole in them. And if he finds one weakness, he will use it. He does not understand the word "equal", and he wants to make sure he is not the one who submits. And I say all this with compassion, it is a miserable way of living.

[waverider]

It is horrible when breaking and bypassing boundaries becomes the whole focus of their lives, which goes way past extinction bursts. Sticking to a particular boundary sends them off in search of another boundary to break. You end up with so many boundaries, that you feel like you have you own little Vietnam war going on. There seems no out for it, they are simply out for total control.

The only way out seems to pull back to a basic boundary of respect, whereby if you are being disrespected and abused like this you remove yourself from their presence for as long as it takes.

Until effective boundaries are in place and conflict is reduced, it is near impossible to achieve anything else

[Chosen]

He'd only apologise for the really trivial things.  Like if he was 5 minutes late, he would apologise profusely (and dramatically), saying "I'm so sorry, will you ever forgive me?"  And then of course I would say it's ok, and I suppose he wants to feel better about himself.

As for things that require real apologies, the only ones I have ever got was , "I'm sorry I did hit_ but you were hit (something even worse)."  Which bascially means he thinks I deserve the poor treatment, or he's trying to justify the behaviour. 

It doesn't seem like genuine sorriness to me.