Surrounded by BPD

[Living w BPD]

Hi all,

Not sure if I have already posted an intro... . If I have I apologize for a repeat. Being overwhelmed with stress effects memory as you all know. So a bit about me;

I grew up with a recovering alcoholic father and a borderline/bipolar mother. So a bit chaotic to say the least. My sister also has developed a major mental illness.

I married a man who has NPD and had two kids with him before he left. Then I remarried a man who had BPD... . Had one child with him before escaping his abusive tendencies.

Now I am currently with a man that seems to have it all. I entered into therapy and a 12 step group for relationship addiction/ codependency/ childhood abuse 4 years ago and have finally understood the why's, how's of how I got to my current situation. Understanding though brings little comfort.the codependency I exhibit is extreme. The men I have allowed in my life are sick... . But so am I. I stayed for too long. I had no boundaries to begin with and so excepted, tolerated abuse. So today I am at a standstill. I know I must leave. I know I can not do this to myself or my poor children again. I know I have a broken picker... .so entering into another relationship is out of the question. Here is my dilemma, the man I am with today I have known for the past 25 years. I however had no idea of the abuse he endured as a kid... . He kept all of that hidden from me. He was an awkward kid... . That Haifa crush on me. Well at the age of 21 he asked me to marry him... .we had never even went on a date... . Of course I had said no. He left without incident. He continued to try for many years... . Always showing up with flowers and asking me to call him if u ever needed anything. He knew way ore about me than I ever knew about him... . So when my second marriage ended I ran to my friend for safety. He had always been there. I felt like I could trust him. The red flags that had been there all along I ignored out of my pain. I trusted him... . He had never hurt me.

Well soon after he moved in (he had also gone through a divorce, he moved a state away from his kids and left his job to be with me) he fell apart. It was severe... . He started harming himself, drug use, alcohol abuse and severe depression. I had no idea what I was in store for... . I knew he had PTSD from being in the military and so I did everything I could think of to get him help. His well being became my full time job. He had no family... . Like I said I really didn't know too much about his past but what I found out was that there was severe anise, neglect, and abandonment... . Honestly his story makes the book "a boy named it" look like child's play. So here I have this man who is telling me I am the closest person to him. His psych dr is telling me he has severe BPD, severe PTSD, panic disorder and well a whole list of physical ailments! Do this is when I seek therapy... . See at this point I think what have u gotten myself into? It was at this point that I also remembered that my ex had also been diagnosed with BPD. So I start connecting the dots and again see the why's and how I keep finding myself in these relationships. I start making a plan to how I get this guy out of my life... . A lot harder than I anticipated. Shortly after he moved up my life fell apart... .

I had a near death experience (Bled internally due to something going wrong in my body), 2 weeks later I lost my grandfather, 2 weeks after that I lost my dad, 3 weeks after that I was in an accident, my mom lost it (went psychotic,) the guy I am in the relationship with lost it, my kids all started to develop symptoms of extreme stress/depression... . It was a mess. Really after things started to calm down I look back and can see that I even had a bit of psychosis... . My therapist says severe depression can bring that on? Anyways we made it through. But he is still here. For the last year I started to pull back from him. Started to detach which has made had triggered all of his abandonment issues making really things worse again. This last fall it got really hectic... . He started to stalk. I was able to get him to move out in Jan... . But this isn't enough space between us... . He won't let go. I know I participate in this dance... . Trying not too.

Monday night however it hit a new extreme (well let's say a year ago he raped me so that I guess would also be extreme... . Oh who am I kidding it's all been extreme!) anyways he started to really talk suicide... . He has done this before and I know it's part of his control measures... . But this time it felt real. This time I believed he had done something... .  He hadn't. This was pure torment. I am angry. I am exhausted. I feel hopeless. I need this to stop.

He is going to a funeral out of state in June... . I am considering serving him restraining order papers then. Is this cruel? This is his grandfathers funeral. He will have his sister there with him... . He is expecting me to go... . But he is going there before I am supposed to go. It's the only time he has been able to be away from me... . Most of the time he doesn't want to leave my side. The stress of it all has taken its toll and I feel weak. Any guidance or advice is welcomed.

[PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES]

PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members may appear frustrated but they are here for constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[living in the past]

 hi and welcome here,i can"t offer much guidence,it sounds like you need some time alone,i would do what ever i had to do to get out of the fog,he is not going to do it for you unless you get lucky and he leaves,good luck to you... .

[an0ught]

Hello Living w BPD and ,

and yes you did post before

Ok so here is my story. My mother has BPD, my ex husbands (2) have BPD and I am now engaged to someone with this. For the longest time I did not understand that this was what I was facing. But over the last 3 years it has all been diagnosed. Meaning my mom was given the diagnosis last year. The year before my ex and my fiancé were both diagnosed. I have lots of therapy under my belt so I understand why I kept ending up in abusive crazy making relationships. I would run from one to another. This one by far is very overwhelming. He is low functioning. I am exhausted from the emotional roller coaster, hypersensitivity, paranoia, extreme clingy behavior. With being surrounded with BPD my whole life I am now recognizing I have some traits... . Not enough for that diagnosis but I do have some of them. I wanted to find out if anyone on here has had good success with DBT? I told my fiancé that things need to change and that both he and I need to go through this along with therapy for me to consider staying. I also told him he needed to move out while we were doing this. He is flipping out. Scared, almost a full on breakdown. Will this even work? Am I fooling myself? How do I let him go? I am starting to truly understand that I can not fix him. But he tells me he is full on committed to do whatever to keep the relationship... . I am skeptical that he can even do it. Insight would be helpful.

Thank you

T

and sadly nobody responded at that time. This should not have happened, may have contributed to forgetting and it is really the other way around you are owed apologies  .

Now I am currently with a man that seems to have it all. I entered into therapy and a 12 step group for relationship addiction/ codependency/ childhood abuse 4 years ago and have finally understood the why's, how's of how I got to my current situation. Understanding though brings little comfort.the codependency I exhibit is extreme. The men I have allowed in my life are sick... . But so am I. I stayed for too long. I had no boundaries to begin with and so excepted, tolerated abuse.

kudos for reaching out and learning so many hard truths about yourself. Now if you just could take back a tiny step when judging yourself. You simply don't know how much you are off what is "normal" if there is such a thing. The symptoms we see in the relationship are cumulative over time and depend on the BPD partner and on many, also environmental factors. The severity of symptoms is not a good measure of the severity of the actual underlying problems. Cut yourself some slack you are braver and more active than many here . Keep in mind that you are exhausted, possibly a bit depressed (many members are at the beginning) and so may not be an objective judge of yourself.

I had a near death experience (Bled internally due to something going wrong in my body), 2 weeks later I lost my grandfather, 2 weeks after that I lost my dad, 3 weeks after that I was in an accident, my mom lost it (went psychotic,) the guy I am in the relationship with lost it, my kids all started to develop symptoms of extreme stress/depression... . It was a mess. Really after things started to calm down I look back and can see that I even had a bit of psychosis... . My therapist says severe depression can bring that on? Anyways we made it through.

Wow, dealing with that must have been overwhelming. Recovering from such a series can take a long time and may well change the way you see and experience life

He is going to a funeral out of state in June... . I am considering serving him restraining order papers then. Is this cruel? This is his grandfathers funeral. He will have his sister there with him... . He is expecting me to go... . But he is going there before I am supposed to go. It's the only time he has been able to be away from me... . Most of the time he doesn't want to leave my side. The stress of it all has taken its toll and I feel weak. Any guidance or advice is welcomed.

A lot depends on where you want to go.

If you want to continue the relationship - in that case you need to learn to set boundaries as you have clearly noticed you got a number of boundary problems. Some learning on how to communicate with him could complement that.

If you consider leaving - then planning for leaving would be a first step. As he seems to be really very tightly attached to you this should not be done without thinking it all precautionary measures through.

Again a warm welcome,

a0