Self fulfilling prophecy?

[Before you can make things better, you have to stop making them worse...]

She worries constantly that her depression and constant bad mood will drive me away.   Yet she can't stop her worry, which causes her bad mood. 

She's convinced her bad mood and negative attitudes are making me less attracted to her (true), and I will leave (that may happen if things don't change).  Yet, that's not enough for her to curb her negative language.

It just makes no sense!

It's almost like on some subconscious level, she wants the relationship to fail, either to prove in her mind that I was the ass all along (and it wasn't her), or because that is what always happens for her.

And boy - pwBPD are unusually perceptive.  One sour facial expression and they are guessing what is going on in your brain, and often they are right. 

[maxsterling]

She worries constantly that her depression and constant bad mood will drive me away.   Yet she can't stop her worry, which causes her bad mood. 

She's convinced her bad mood and negative attitudes are making me less attracted to her (true), and I will leave (that may happen if things don't change).  Yet, that's not enough for her to curb her negative language.

It just makes no sense!

It's almost like on some subconscious level, she wants the relationship to fail, either to prove in her mind that I was the ass all along (and it wasn't her), or because that is what always happens for her.

And boy - pwBPD are unusually perceptive.  One sour facial expression and they are guessing what is going on in your brain, and often they are right. 

[Red17]

"Self-fulfilling prophecy"... . if I had a nickel for every time I've said that phrase to my BPDbf (maybe I should be saying xBPDbf at this point).  He does that with just about everything.  I've talked till I'm blue in the face trying to get him to see that you get what you expect.  If you're constantly sure something's going to go bad you'll look & look & look for a reason to declare it bad.  He says he understands, but he doesn't stop.  I honestly think he can't help himself.  He self-sabotages every aspect of his life.  He's in the endstage of doing it to our relationship.

[maxsterling]

Because my GF seems to articulate this cycle, I think she understands this.    She knows what kind of effect her negative talk has on others.  She knows she screws up relationship.  She basically tells me so, although there is still that angle that everyone else is an a-hole and gave up on her.

And many times I think it is happening here.  Sometimes I feel she wants me to leave, even though she says she would die if I left.  If I stay, I am a fool for sticking around her and she can't understand why, and then she doesn't trust me because who in their right mind would stick around someone as miserable as her.  If I leave, the universe behaves as she expects and how it always has behaved.  I sometimes think it causes her agony that I havent bailed on her like everyone else.

[Red17]

Wow, does that sound familiar.  He claims to understand it, too, but it doesn't stop him.  I hung in there as long as I could, but his refusal to get any professional help is pushing me over the edge.  He walked out last Wednesday & I just let him go.  I know he expected me to try to get him to come back, but I didn't.  He's often made threats of suicide that if we don't work out.  That & wanting to help him/not abandon him have kept with in the r/s far too long.  He's finally getting what he expected all along, but it is a direct result of his leaving--not me.  Whether he'll ever see that or not is another question.

[Murbay]

Max, I feel your frustrations and sorry you are going through it right now. Unfortunately it is a cycle that is very hard to navigate.

I think you hit the nail on the head about wanting the relationship to fail, because doubts start to creep in your own head about it and the more that goes on, the more distance comes between you.

I've been accused of so much that I have not done and then she has ended the relationship. I've been compared to exes in the sense that ALL men are the same, even when I have done nothing wrong. I was accused of wanting my exgf back, even though we have been separated for 12 years now, she is in a stable relationship for the past 7 years and we have a daughter between us, simply because we communicate about our daughter. This came about because my ex called me to say our daughter is having issues at school but won't talk to her about it, knows how close I am to her and wondered if there is anything I could do to help. That makes me a cheat and a liar according to my BPDgf, the same as her ex and ALL men.

Like yours, she knows her thoughts are irrational and has explained how they eat away at her. She quite her job, has taken to sleeping most of the time as she says when she sleeps she isn't thinking. I've listened to her tell me that she bets I wish I had never met her, that she is nothing but trouble to me, that she can't do anything right, that everybody would be better off if she wasn't around.

It soon puts you between a rock and a hard place. Right now, I have stepped back because that's what she asked for. Not seen her for 3 weeks now but I send her a text every few days to ask how she is feeling and let her know I still care. If she doesn't respond, I don't go chasing and just get on with what I need to do. Just keeping things consistent right now.