Vicious cycle

[Crynangeleyez]

  I could use some guidance and how to end this cycle between us. Here are some key points. We were engaged but are now broken up, he is in prison, I broke his trust,  he immediately replaced me and became engaged to another woman. He still loves me, I still love him.
Now that all that is our little way, I'm hoping to find some guidance on how to break the cycle of every conversation is a repeat of the previous one. I have noticed what he accuses me of doing is just a projection of himself. He insists that I was the one to detach and move on first, He accuses me of speaking with multiple men inside the prison. Those are his two main focuses and of course as time goes on, he continues to compound more on top of those. My question is he always asks me who I am talking to, who I am with and why did I break his heart. My answers have never wavered, there has never been another man and I have never spoken to anybody else in prison. How do we get out of this cycle when his beliefs are completely different than my truth.
I have honestly thought about making up a story just to appease him, so he feels validated and vindicated. Hoping that we can move past it after that. However I struggle with lying (I have autism) and just a thought of lying to him about that makes me cringe. So I am open to any suggestions on how to break this cycle.

[RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING]

RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members are welcomed to express frustration but must seek constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[Pook075]

Hello and welcome.  I'm sorry you're going through this and the difficult circumstances.

The way to break this cycle is to just stop doing it over and over again.  Let's roleplay a little bit here.

Me: What guys are you talking to?

You: Nobody.

Me: Stop lying, I know you're cheating on me.

You: <here's where we change> What make you think I'm cheating on you?

Me: Because you cheated on me before and broke my heart.  It's what you do to me...

You: I'm really sorry you feel that way, but I can't keep talking about the past since it doesn't get us anywhere.

Me: You're a lying bleepity bleep.  Just tell the truth.

You: Again, I'm really sorry for what happened in the past, but you can't talk to me that way.  It's not okay.

Me: I'll talk to you however....<click...this is where you hang up>

Then the next time you talk, reinforce that boundary.  You care about him but that doesn't give him a free pass to be abusive.  If he brings up the past, you're hanging up.  If he continues calling, you'll contact the prison and have his privileges revoked.  Make it crystal clear that the accusations are not okay.

One of two things will happen from there.  He will either escalate...in which you'll tell the prison you're being harassed...or he will back off.

You're in the ideal situation currently because he has zero power from inside the jail and you are safe from him.  So set those boundaries now, make them crystal clear, and then stick to them.  He will either adjust appropriately and treat you better, or he won't and he'll be blocked from contacting you.  Either way, the cycle stops.

[seekingtheway]

Hi there,

Thank you for sharing some of your story with us - I went and read your previous post just to get an idea of what's been happening, and it sounds like it's been a difficult time.

So am I right in understanding you recently broke up, and he's since become engaged to another woman, but you are still in pretty regular if not daily contact at this point in time, but those interactions were stuck in this same pattern before you broke up, as well as now?

It does sound like a pretty established pattern of communication that is just repeating, and as Pook pointed out, the only way to change the course of that is for one of you to do something different. And many times, that falls to the person who is most distressed by that pattern...

What stood out in your post was the focus you currently have on your ex - you are putting a lot of focus on trying to understand his logic and his needs, you are trying to soothe him, but underneath that there is a strong part of you that is trying to assert your own truth. It's really good that you're in touch with your own reality because it can get confusing when someone else's perception is so far away from what yours is. Doing what you can to stay firmly in touch with how you feel, what you need, and what is true for you sounds important here.

Having some internal rules/boundaries of what kind of conversation you will and will not engage with might help you. You mentioned in your last past that it does spiral into namecalling, so that's an example of something you could set a firm boundary around and state that you are unable to stay in a conversation where you're being called names or spoken to aggressively, and then follow through with that by saying you'll speak to him another time once he's in a better head space. That might not be enough to stop the circular conversation altogether, but it might be a start in terms of creating some emotional safety for now?