Wouldn't be great (or not great) if they had an AI chat bot that you could talk to about issues like this?
How come you don't have anyone you can talk to?
Usagi, indeed, I enjoyed a series called Humans on Netflix where the AI Bots could be programmed to be whatever you wanted them to be, then were incredibly lifelike if a little creepy at times. (It was like the movie AI). Many of the human characters had married a bot and I can so understand why hahaha.
Your second question is much harder to answer. Who do I have to talk to?
- dbpdw - you can imagine I have been very careful with what I say about everything.
- my kids - too small to help, they are wonderful but I don’t burden them with my misery
- my mother - mostly talk during our online piano lessons but she mostly wants to talk about piano. I have never been close to Mum, and my wife dislikes her because she is not an emotional person like us. Mum knows my wife is very unstable but we don’t often discuss it.
- my Dad has advanced Parkinson’s and he cannot really talk anymore and he certainly doesn’t need to know about my unhappy marriage.
- my brother talks to me about 2-3 times a year, only if I reach out. He is very busy and serious, has always been an optimist and has never been able to connect with me and the darkness I’ve always inhabited.
- I have students, colleagues, students’ parents. I love the social aspect of my work. But I am not close to anyone.
- I do not have friends. I discovered early on when I was with my wife, that our relationship was incompatible with me so much as messaging friends let alone seeing them. Tbh I was fed up with everyone letting me down by then. I had a vast collection of friends from different eras of my life, all of whom I adored but they never made any effort with me. So I basically dumped them all by deleting them off Facebook and most of them didn’t even notice. I’d always feared this would be the case if I stopped contact, but being with my wife I finally felt strong enough to do it and I have no regrets. As I said to my Mum, if I wanted they could be my friends again, and if not I can easily replace them.
- I have been explicitly forbidden by my wife from seeking therapy for myself because my wife doesn’t wish to be talked about. I know that it is my choice to comply with this order. I just can’t be bothered to deal with the fallout, our relationship is going through an ok phase so it’s never a good time.
So yes, folk in bpd family are the only people I really talk to. And I’m so happy to have found such an amazing community.