What do I do about still wanting to help her

[How to communicate after a contentious divorce...]

5 year relationship that had about 6 months year of partying, 2.5 years of solid stable normal times and then 2 years of hell. I took on her 3yo daughter who is now 9.

So finally she left me. Told me a million times she hated hurting me. Displayed nearly of all the BPD traits clearly but never diagnosed. In fact has been to numerous therapists who either tells her shes fine (because she lies to them) or she never goes back because they are "useless and don't know s%*t

She seems to be so aware and yet so blind. Asked me so many times what was wrong with her, why is she depressed, why doesn't she feel happy the way she sees me being happy etc. With a lot of patience on my part we reduced her impulsivity hugely, which she acknowledges. However, any mention of her needing to change some behaviours causes instant defence. Even if we argue and they are clearly bad behaviours she concocts the weirdest reasons and even says things like "I hate discussing this because I end up saying stupid things".

We are separated 5 months now and basically NC. I am really hurting because I love her and have very limited access to her daughter because she is not my child. I keep feeling like she is so close to seeing that she is unwell but so far from it at the same time and trying to work out how to alert her. She is very intelligent and my gut says that once she understood she would be able to change, albeit very gradually.

I know that for me it's best to move on and I am. I know it will be hard but that's OK, I can do it. Even if I move on and find total happiness, I still feel like it's unfair that she is left suffering, and possibly affecting her daughter. My upbringing was to stick by people and not let them down. It feels wrong to walk away and leave her. She had the most terrible childhood so this is not her fault and her daughter certainly does not deserve to be affected by it. How do I lose this loyalty?

[AndrewS]

5 year relationship that had about 6 months year of partying, 2.5 years of solid stable normal times and then 2 years of hell. I took on her 3yo daughter who is now 9.

So finally she left me. Told me a million times she hated hurting me. Displayed nearly of all the BPD traits clearly but never diagnosed. In fact has been to numerous therapists who either tells her shes fine (because she lies to them) or she never goes back because they are "useless and don't know s%*t

She seems to be so aware and yet so blind. Asked me so many times what was wrong with her, why is she depressed, why doesn't she feel happy the way she sees me being happy etc. With a lot of patience on my part we reduced her impulsivity hugely, which she acknowledges. However, any mention of her needing to change some behaviours causes instant defence. Even if we argue and they are clearly bad behaviours she concocts the weirdest reasons and even says things like "I hate discussing this because I end up saying stupid things".

We are separated 5 months now and basically NC. I am really hurting because I love her and have very limited access to her daughter because she is not my child. I keep feeling like she is so close to seeing that she is unwell but so far from it at the same time and trying to work out how to alert her. She is very intelligent and my gut says that once she understood she would be able to change, albeit very gradually.

I know that for me it's best to move on and I am. I know it will be hard but that's OK, I can do it. Even if I move on and find total happiness, I still feel like it's unfair that she is left suffering, and possibly affecting her daughter. My upbringing was to stick by people and not let them down. It feels wrong to walk away and leave her. She had the most terrible childhood so this is not her fault and her daughter certainly does not deserve to be affected by it. How do I lose this loyalty?

[hashtag_loyal]

She is very intelligent and my gut says that once she understood she would be able to change, albeit very gradually.

Are you so sure of this? Change is frightening, and if she had a terrible childhood do you really think she would be eager to relive it in therapy? I'm sure, deep down, she knows she has issues, but is too scared to do anything about it. It is much easier and feels much safer to just continue blaming everybody else for her problems.

How do I lose this loyalty?

You probably won't, but you'll just learn to eventually "radically accept" the fact that she is who she is and you do not have the power to change her. It will get better in time.

[Jonathan Ricciardi]

Change for the better is never frightening, facing the truth face on can be invigorating.  Of course all BPDs know they have issues, that is the key, they don't care about you.  They will move on with their lives as if nothing happened and stonewall you.  She has every right to dump you, there is nothing abnormal about breaking up.  People do it everyday, BPD or no BPD, but people who think BPD are victims are terribly wrong and need an education.

[kentavr3]

I understand that you are going through. I'm going through after 10 years of marriage. 4 months ago , in the morning , all our family was happy. I kissed her , kissed daughter left to job. She called me to the office and invited me to the restaurant. There she declared that she left me. She rented apartments and moved out. I was in shock, daughter was in shock. she blamed me for everything including that I said something wrong to her 10 years ago. she had already a lover and just kick me out. This was her second marriage. The first one ended up the same way, kid from the first marriage left to her father. I miss her a lot. This break up was the second cycle with her. First one with her  was when she filed a protection  order against me. Protection order was denied. During 4 moths I was begging her on my knees to go back to the relationship. I couldn’t understand what happened at all. This is the first time I heard about BPD. So we lived for a year and finally she left again. All this pre breaking cycle , I lived as in hell under her blames and love stage. I understood that I’m getting crazy too. I can give many samples how illogical BPD, but it is useless. BPDs are mentally ill. You’ll never understand them. But , try to find why you get involved with BPD? There are some problems in people who get involved with them.

She asked me several times if something wrong with her. We went to vacation in summer. Her nervous break ups started in the airport. I counted 3 in two days. Clinicians find pathological 5 per year.

[Daniell85]

You lose this loyalty by accepting her boundary. As difficult as it is.

Reframe yourself a bit. You are a man who was raised to act with responsibility and compassion. He takes care of those he loves. He is loyal and supportive. He does not abandon those he cares for.

The line is that she has made a choice. You don't have to stop caring about her or wishing you could be there for her. She won't let you.

So you step back. You accept. You allow yourself to get enough detachment that you stop trying to fix any of this for her. You accept HER choice and you cease to act on your feelings and impulses with her.

You feel how you feel and that is always ok. Under other conditions, your care and support would be welcomed by someone. With her, it becomes co-dependence to fix something, take responsibility for something that you can't fix.

[C.Stein]

I keep feeling like she is so close to seeing that she is unwell but so far from it at the same time and trying to work out how to alert her. She is very intelligent and my gut says that once she understood she would be able to change, albeit very gradually.

She quite likely understands already, what she doesn't have is acceptance of a possible PD.  She understands something is not right with her but she cannot accept it.  The catch22 life cycle will continue until she finds a way to accept her condition.

[Jonathan Ricciardi]

Daniell save a lot of typing, just tell the guy to give up.

[AndrewS]

Thanks for all of the advice folks. It certainly helps to see a few different views. I think I know it is futile and may even cause me more harm to not let go but I'm being honest with myself and finding it extremely hard. If everyone abandoned everyone who had a mental illness what would they all do? It can't always be good enough to just say it's too hard. Or maybe it can.

I find it very difficult to differentiate between wanting to care for someone I love who is unwell and trying to fix someone. I know I can't fix her, only she can. For her sake and her daughters sake, and possibly mine, finding a way to help her see what she has seems only fair.

I'm stuck aren't I?

[SadDaddy]

I know how you feel. RIght at the end, after years of going through therapists and struggling to deal with her BPD, she found a book that told her that it was my fault, that I had NPD and everything about how she was was because of me. So she just let her disorder have full blown control over her and less than a year after that first book, she accused me all kinds of off the wall s*** and left. Accused me of abusing our daughter, threw stuff from my past and our history in my face again, called me names.

I know that she's unwell. I've decided that it's over but in a last ditch effort to try and get a mediator to tell her that she is not well, I've gotten her to agree to couples therapy with me. I know I'm not well, and I'm dealing with it the best I can, but here's the rub: you can't help someone who doesn't want it. Mine has already found some deviants to fall in with online and I'm sure she will cycle through mountains of unhealthy relationships and maybe even die before she understands what is happening and what she does.

So at this point she believes that she is 100% healthy and that I am a sick narcissistic monster. Based on her mood, I'm all kinds of horrible things.

A guy on this board actually put it to me this way: wed been through so much pain together that I have actually become her biggest trigger. So any time I get remotely annoyed, irritated, or (god forbid) angry, she sees the guy I was five, eight, ten years ago, along with her abusive step dad, and her NPD mom, and she projects all of this onto me.

There's no fixing that. I'm going to find someone whole to care about, someone who cares about me too, not like my ex, where my trust was implicit and hers was not attainable, where I am expected to change but she is immune from even the very suggestion.

A couple other boards that helped me out here: one in which we reminisce about all the awful things our ex has said to us over the years. ANother one where we discuss their inconsistencies.

It's really helped me to focus on her calling me an abusive monster and a worthless drunk and a stubborn child and basically a dirty w****, to focus on how she thinks I can't love our daughter the way she does.

It helps.