BPD Birthdays always a trigger?

[Depression = 72% of members]

I was wondering if anyone else had had any issues with their Borderline partners, or ex partners when celebrating their Borderlines Birthdays? I understand a lot of people with borderline had bad childhoods, which my ex also experienced so that might be part of the reason they are so withdrawn etc on that day. However, I wondered if they could be even more to it that this disorder is the cause of.


Thanks.

[Findingmysong723]

I was wondering if anyone else had had any issues with their Borderline partners, or ex partners when celebrating their Borderlines Birthdays? I understand a lot of people with borderline had bad childhoods, which my ex also experienced so that might be part of the reason they are so withdrawn etc on that day. However, I wondered if they could be even more to it that this disorder is the cause of.


Thanks.

[mango_flower]

My ex always hated her birthdays and freaked out when I arranged for some mutual friends to come to the pub to celebrate, complete with cake... .  mind you, I hate birthdays too, just don't like the attention all on me, so I didn't find it weird... .  !

[LuckyEscapee]

For me this had been true. Birthdays and other significant events.

He uses anything around these times as an excuse to contact me.

Then he tries to be friends again, and self-excuses his past behavior towards me.

What the fruitloop? He has an alternate version of reality that he is sticking to.

I am getting used to it and am forearmed, and i dont freak out the same but it's SO annoying!

[mssngpeces]

It's so amazing to see how many Nons have had the same experiences. Birthdays were ALWAYS a huge issue for me and my exBPD. Mine was also NP I believe so it was always her birthday that was the focus. So much so that once near my birthday she started to talk about hers upcoming months away. She also did the absolute minimum to acknowledge my birthday (e-card and phone call) while I took her on trips and sent her hand made cards etc. A couple times the alternate life she would lead by cheating on me and painting me black would also surface around my birthday which in fact just happened again over a month ago. These people are self consumed. I would not doubt that she expects me to take her to France in July to celebrate her birthday while she is now with another guy she thinks she is in love with but is clearly another cycle of user and person who allows themselves to be used. We deserve better! Especially for our birthdays.

[Findingmysong723]

Thanks for the comments.

Yea, for me my EX Boyfriend (undiagnosed Borderline) never seemed that happy on his birthday, or around that time of year after the Holidays, a very stressful time. Stressful also because of money and he is in recovery from alcohol and it was close to his anniversary date... .  so yes Birthday and Sobriety... not the best combination.

We broke up twice, the first time was in early February (2012) and 2nd time was in January (2013)which is the month of his birthday. My better memories of him seemed to be in the spring and summer, when he was able to get outside more and enjoy the fresh air the sun and not be depressed so much. However, still have a memory of him raging in the summer because he felt I wasn't living up to what I needed to do to keep our relationship progressing. Made it seem he was ready for moving in and kids in the future... yeah right he had no patience for me... .  I'm sure a screaming baby would of been right up his alley!

I remember him telling me that I enjoyed his birthday more than he did. I made him a cake this year and he did seem to appreciate it. I know that as a kid he had to share his birthday with his brother and it wasn't all about him. I never made his birthday into a big event, it was always just him, me, some cake, some gifts and a card that expressed why I cared about him so much. Ironically, we were never together when my Birthday passed, however during our "breakup" he did take me out on a day trip to a place I wanted to go and to lunch, so that was nice.

Well, looking forward to celebrating my birthday with someone who knows how to love me and someone who allows me to really love them! We'll see what the future holds!

[LetItBe]

Yes, mine broke up with me just a few days before we were to celebrate his birthday.

[No Black Tie Man]

My wifes birthday was this past Sunday. Saturday night I was asked to leave the house. I have been out of the house since.

So yes. Pretty much every year it is an issue. So are most other holidays vs well.

[Leaf]

My exBF is BPD (w/NPD traits) and I've just read "Narcissistic lovers – how to cope, recover and move on". I'd recommend this book to anyone whose ex has NPD-traits, high maintenance women etc. It really completes the BPD (w/NPD traits) picture with its NPD perspective.

Anyway, this book shed some light on his behaviour on holidays and birthdays. He preferred being out of town on holidays, mainly to avoid family gatherings with my family. As a true narcissist he couldn't bear it when the attention wasn't focussed on him. He used to say my family "weren't interested in other people".

If a gathering with some of my relatives was unavoidable, he'd rehearse some story in avance. He'd introduce it in such a way that everybody had to listen, so all the attention was on him at least part of the time. We all found that very weird, we were having a good time and he interrupted it.

The book also explained that narcissists (especially the ones that rely on their looks) have an extra big problem with ageing, because they fear that with age it will become more difficult for them to attract 'fresh supply'. Also they pride themselves on looking younger than their age. Maybe they want to hide their true age from some people and you can't do that at your birthday party. All this applied to my ex.

About gifts the book says something I don't recognize but others might: "The N expects to receive gifts that express how others feel about him. The N takes inexpensive or unplanned gifts as an insult."

[Clearmind]

Birthdays for some are a milestone - a benchmark that a year has past and we can reflect on our achievements.

Birthday's for my ex were full of heartache - it was a reminder that he still feels the way he did last birthday, how alone he still feels, no further along in deciding a direction in life, how he has wasted his time. Its also usually a family event and his Queen BPD Mother would make it all about her.

Birthdays lead to emotional turmoil.

[Mike_confused]

Oh my God!  Birthdays of my soon to be ex uBPD wife were hell on earth for me.  She had her 40th birthday this past November - the mother of all birthdays.  I tried to plan a surprise dinner out, had her bet friend flown in, bought an expensive gift that I thought was perfect.   At every turn she was trying to interfere with the planning by inciting her friend to meddle in the planning, thereby confusing everything.

She wanted me to fail at planning the party to somehow justify her painting me black.  Kudos to her - she succeeded. 

I haven't seen her in two months, and I won't reconcile with her.  I hope she enjoys the next party without me.

[Findingmysong723]

Also, I remember my Ex getting all impatient and basically telling me to get the gifts already... I mean really the suspense was too much for him!

[daze]

More of the same --- my uBPDh has a tendency to damage birthdays, holidays, anniversaries, vacations - not always but more often than not.

[daze]

My mom has NPD traits and she sometimes ruins holidays.  Unfortunately, we share a birthday and probably 75% of the time she will try to cause drama.  We are on LC and I plan to continue that for perhaps the rest of my life.

One year, can't remember which one, she told me she wished I hadn't been born on her bday and that she would celebrate her birth on a different day.  She used to decide what she wants ahead of time and then send a blanket email to let everyone know and coordinate.  Actually, that probably made shopping for her easier. 

This year she announced to me - via email that we don't need to exchange gifts from now on.  She also sent me an email saying among other things, "Clearly if no one had sex, none of us would be here.  Doesn't make life any easier but I feel maybe more compassion for us all.  Love (whatever that is). One thing for sure, I'm done with pretense. Mom."

To which I responded, "Happy bday, Mom.  Hope you had a great day."

I wish I hadn't waited so long to address my mommy issues.  Guess it took r/s with pwBPD to bring it to a head.

[Newkate]

Same with my BPDbf... . Every year right around his birthday is when he starts having episodes of dysregulation. Last year his best friend and I had planned a huge surprise party. About a week before that party I had to tell everyone I did not know if it was still on... .

This year he broke up with me right before his bday. He did not answer any call or text about it, either.

[causticdork]

Yep... . My birthday, her birthday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and her niece and nephew's birthdays were all punctuated by huge fights from completely out of nowhere that left me confused and shaken.  I'm not sure what the deal is with celebrations being triggers, but my ex's birthday was a week ago and it's the day that, after a solid month and a half of being friends and being totally decent to each other, she decided to spend all day blaming me for her misery, despite it being completely illogical to be angry at me for anything at all.  Her birthday is the reason I finally went NC after trying to make a friendship work for the past four months.

When I asked her initially why she was so sad about her birthday she started moping about how she was broke and jobless and not any better off than she was on her last birthday, and how depressing that was because she should be in a much better place by now.  It was really hard for me to comfort her because all I could think was, "Yeah, you really should be. You should have found a job and taken some responsibility and gotten clean and bloody well learned something by now!"  Instead I just listened, and then the next morning I was painted black.