the new and "improved" xmas story...

[raindancer]

Three triggers/One day

I know what my triggers are - his baggage, his splitting and his addiction.

I got to face all three in the last 24 hours. Right now I feel like Scrooge except instead of wanting to celebrate with the prize turkey, I feel like I'm the turkey (and not the prize one).

His baggage is the exGF. She's the ghost of the past that periodically rears her head to reak havoc on every good thing that he's working on in a positive way at the time. They had a very destructive r/s for 7 years that included major drug addiction, self-harming, suicide attempts, infidelity and abuse of every kind. In the last 3 years, since we've been together, she shows up every once in a while to remind him of all the wonderful years of disfunction they shared and leaves with the message that she'd gladly go back to that with him. Every time she re-appears, I get to deal with the aftermath for months. She re-appeared yesterday.

Trigger number one.

His splitting is all the negative hit he's said about me over the last 3 years - mostly to his family that enable him to be hited up. They are the ghost of the never-ending present that never go away. Last night he gets messages out of the blue asking him questions about the state of our r/s from a family member who's never met me but has heard all the evils I've supposedly committed from his mother. She asks him why he's staying with me and reminds him of the one time I spoke out to them (months ago) in a very negative way about what was going on with us at that time. They forget all the good things and hold onto that one bad thing like it's the definition of my existance. I deal with these people on a regular basis and am always waiting for the axe to fall... .

Trigger number two.

His addictions are many but the worst one (the one that bothers me the most) is porn. This ghost of the future, the wishful thinking he clings to of finding the ideal partner, the "other woman" he expects me to live up to without realising that I can't. This morning in the aftermath of dealing with ghosts one and two, I walk into the bedroom to him watching porn.

Trigger number three.

For weeks we've been working on validating, communicating and various other positive things. Today, however, it all crumbles to nothing. He morphed, and I get to guess what comes next.

Right now, I'm working really hard on not loosing my hit on him. Hard to do when I'm holding a loaded mental/emotional gun.

I'm staying away from him - reminding myself that this is all BPD, trying make sense of all of this... . and figure out what comes next. 

[raindancer]

My day in a nutshell... .

No major conflict - just a whole lot of think, think, thinking and talking.

I'm not really practiced at SET or DEARMAN yet. I can, however, set boundaries, which I did.

These three things keep coming up. They are always going to continue to be a recurring theme no matter how long we work on everything else or how much progress we make in other areas of our r/s. I've come to the decision that I can allow them to keep plunging me back into my own issues (I've been PTSD, depressed since my sister was killed in a car accident) or I have to make a move to take care of myself rather than devote all of myself to helping him.

I just finished reading in the lessons about how nons can end up in a r/s w/BPDs while they are in a bad place. That is where I was when we started. I was in a bad place, a pretty vulnerable place when we got together - my sister died, I left a very abusive husband of 16 years who may or may not be BPD, I was almost killed in a crime that I really didn't see coming (home-invasion by a very drunk/stoned stranger), and then a very hostile high-conflict divorce that had me basically living on the streets in a strange place with no support system, what was left of my family went AWOL to my exH when I left him. All within a few years - I don't think of myself as a victim, I survived all of it just parts of me got left behind while I did. Then my pwBPD came along... . with a whole lot of his own baggage that got thrown on top of mine with the expectation that I'd be able to carry both loads.

I've never dealt with my own issues, they keep getting suppressed every time I have to deal with dramas.

I'm still undecided about our future - but today I know more than ever that I'm drowning so I need to see a therapist of my own. I'm no good to anyone, least of all myself, if I don't walk my own talk and help myself first... .