New category?

[AugustWest]

How about a category for "Years after break-up and I was correct way back when I said that I am irrevocably damaged" or did I just witness myself self-fulfilling a self-fulfilling prophecy?  Here I am after courtship, marriage, divorce, getting back together, never seeing each other or talking ever again and nearly 23 years total have gone by and most days I feel like no one cares about me, never will, I could drive off of a bridge to my death and not only would no one care, they wouldn't notice anyway.  I think about her at some point(s) every day, I'm still scouring the internet for any answers to a billion questions, I'm here again over a year after my last visit, I can't get anyone interested in me, I pretty much hate myself, I feel so ugly and useless and undesirable and it seems that it must be true because here I am and absolutely nobody wants to be around me, I watch porn on the net that is "cheating wife" or "cuckold" or "humiliation" or pretty much a husband being mistreated and while I watch I think of her.  Help me, please.  I did write a new song for my new album and the song is "Borderline"  and here are the lyrics:

What does a life mean if it never existed?
Built up and burned down, so intricately twisted
There's no practice drill, no "stop, drop, and roll"
No doubt you'll find out if you've got soul
     No billboard, no sign, in front or behind the Borderline
     No warning, no rhyme, no reason behind the Borderline
     Slowly mending this mind of mine takes time
     What's yours was once mine, hope to find it left behind by the Borderline
Not reliable, just randomly consistent
Inconsistency, frequently persistent
Complex chemicals compound confusion
No innocents and no absolution
     No billboard, no sign, in front or behind the Borderline
     No warning, no rhyme, no reason behind the Borderline
     Slowly mending this mind of mine takes time
     What's yours was once mine, hope to find it left behind by the Borderline

[Tobiasfunke]

Sorry bud.
Those feelings suck. I’m fighting to stay out of that place. It’s a PLEASE READty place to be. I was there for too long and never want to go back. Just keep writing your music.

[Mutt]

Hi AugustWest,

I’m so sorry that you’re going through this. You mentioned that you were divorced for 10 years and that you felt like your situation post divorce was different than what members shared about their experiences. There’s a high chance that things were really not great before the divorce that led to the cause of the divorce.

You have some lows and highs - going from your last experience and I do t want to take away from what you’re feeling right now - do you feel like the pattern will repeat itself I’m using what you know about your past experience / pattern?

I can only imagine how difficult the last 18 months would be to find someone. You mentioned that you were getting help for PTSD.

Are you seeing a P or a T?

What are you doing for self care?

[EZEarache]

most days I feel like no one cares about me, never will, I could drive off of a bridge to my death and not only would no one care, they wouldn't notice anyway.  I think about her at some point(s) every day, I'm still scouring the internet for any answers to a billion questions, I'm here again over a year after my last visit, I can't get anyone interested in me, I pretty much hate myself, I feel so ugly and useless and undesirable and

Wow August West. I guess we're all wharf rats here. I'm sorry you are in such a low place. I have certainly had the same feelings. I was single for seven years between my first and second unhealthy relationships. The feelings of ugliness and undesirability are EXTREMELY painful. I am quite familiar with them. Sadly, these self-loathing feelings were largely what brought me into the second unhealthy relationship with a BPD. To prevent the cycle from continuing, I suggest focusing on making yourself happy right now.

Definitely continue to pour your heart and soul into your music. You say that no one would care, but if you're anything like me, your musician friends would definitely notice if you were gone. I'm sure lots of others would, too.

When I first joined this board I was in one of the lowest points of my life. Things are turning the corner for me. With selfcare, I guarantee they will for you, too. Once they do, you'll look back on your depressed mindset, and wonder how you could have ever believed that no would care.

Please, continue to reach out for help here. We are here for you.

[AugustWest]

Thank you Tobiasfunke, Mutt, & EZEarache.  To Mutt: My divorce was different, in that, it was peaceful and she didn't try to destroy me or take the kids or anything.  But my story is different also because I think the cheating seems to be way worse than most, if not all, the stories I've read from other survivors.  I can't get past it man.  I don't seem to be in any danger of repeating my past due to the fact that I haven't allowed anyone into my life in 13 years (and counting).  I won't be in any danger this way and it's horrible.  I'm so lonely and horny.  I really miss the smell of a woman, the softness of a woman in general, and I miss cuddling.  I was seeking help for CPTSD and I loved my therapist.  He is a trip!  However, I took him my albums to see if he would have any insight to share with me after listening.  He never listened.  I played and sang a couple of my newer songs for him and he cried.  When he offered me to buy some book so that I "could understand him better" is when I stopped showing up.  I'd never heard of BPD, but a couple years ago my daughter said, "Dad, I think Mom is BPD."  I asked what that was and she told me to look it up.  When I read about BPD that first time my tears were dripping from my face and hitting the pages of the book I was reading and they were soaking into the pages as I read a word-for-word account of my life with her. I had never heard of BPD or any of this stuff until 2019.  So, it boggles my mind a bit to think that on my first album (2006, I was still married) there's a song entitled, "Walking On Eggshells."  My second album has a song on it entitled "Torture" (divorced a few years) and my third album has a song entitled "Dis" which is short for "disillusionment," which may be the saddest result of this story. I thought I had never written any songs about her, us, or our time together.  Apparently, I buried it all and let the music take over.  In 2018 the Creature and I went and ruined a perfectly good...divorce.  We reunited on July 28 and sometime within the next couple months the flashbacks and the auditory hallucinations began, and later on the night terrors.  The flashbacks were sharp, pronounced, in full color, up in my face, and there were about a million of them and they never repeated.  I almost got fired from my job where I was in my 23rd year.  All is almost all-good now.  Somedays it isn't all good.  So, here I am, still trying to fill in blank spots and ways to deal with said "filler."  
To EZEarache: Wharf Rats, yeah bro, yeah, we are man.  You got no dime but thanks for your time and listening to my story.  I appreciate it and I have been focusing more on making myself happy.  I think some would care.  My middle school students, former and current, I think most would care, a few "friends," and some family perhaps.  It is the way of things, like when you said, "...you'll look back on your depressed mindset and wonder how you could have ever believed that no one would care."  I've been through this cycle before but this time I'm doing the heavy lifting which is "self-care."  You fellas that replied here sure help keep me on the lighted path.  May peace and good fortune be eternally our abundant reward.

[Ad Meliora]

I hear you August, a rough place to be for sure.  The self-destructive things you wrote down sound like the thoughts that were going through my BPDex's mind on a daily basis.  She did what she could to bring me down to her level of self-hatred and low self-worth, and she had some limited success in that, unfortunately.

Your story has value to me.  It tells a cautionary tale of trying to reconcile a relationship after 10 years with someone with BPD showing it doesn't get better with age.  In fact, it gets worse.

It also seems to me like you are a person of tremendous value.  You're a father of two grown girls, you're a teacher, and also a songwriter/musician.  There's plenty of value there in each of those categories individually and you have all three!

I hear you about not having a partner now.  Dude, cut yourself some slack, we're in a global pandemic--we're not supposed to be getting together!  I miss those things too of the opposite sex, this is the longest I've been girlfriend-free since '93 and it is rough...no doubt.  I was hoping I was going to get out with my bros this summer and then delta arrived, so takeoff has been delayed and my two wingmen remain grounded.  It's gonna be backyard beers for the foreseeable future.

I'm not going to get into the particulars, but instead of fantasizing about the past (which clearly didn't go well with the BPDex) how about picturing the future?  You know, finding a partner who loves you for you and actually respects you, and shows you love in return.  Someone who isn't the cheating type. None of my former ex's were, so they are out there.  In fact that's "normal" not to cheat when you're in a committed relationship.  Think about what you want to happen as you move forward, not the box your BPDex tried to keep you in.

May we all be beacons to each other on our road to recovery.  Good luck AugustWest.

[Cromwell]

We're in this together. Let's respond to think of the future. Its important to have goals and plans but id say it has to be also not too dreamy. The focus is on what actually exists, the present, the moment.

The past and the future do not exist except in reciting memories or dreamy predictions.

I could be dead by the tonight. There is one taboo cleared away. To be so arrogant to think i can devote the evening to comfortably ruminating on my troubled ex and how sour it all was? My last night of existence.

No thanks. But there is a place for some therapy ive had to go through it to the point of being finished with it.

There is no moving forward. There is being carried forward whether we like it or not. A lot of solace in my life was found by not just detaching from my ex but from fear. To get to a stage of admitting how incredibly fragile life is and ignore the illusions that i have any power to control outcomes.

We try to relate our relationships former exs and potential future. To do so involves filtering out and categorisation. You get it on this board all the time 'those lot with BPD, all the same, everything you went through I did'

Its not accurate, i leaned the same by reading horoscopes, cover the star signs and randomly pick any daily reading and they all seem to magically apply.

Thats not to say there is no value in grieving together, there is huge. But let's not enmesh and entrench ourselves into the 'them' and 'us' game. Its tempting and its powerful to be part of a group, but nah, keep some distance and rmemeber who you are as an individual.

Thats my allotted time over today, i now ration it. Thanks for listening.

[EZEarache]

You're sounding more positive. I wish we didn't have to be anonymous here and we could swap links to tunes. Be strong!