EVERY relationship is exactly the same with them.

[Depression = 72% of members]

EVERY relationship is exactly the same with them. First, last, next, etc. All of them are just a mess. They're mentally disturbed and the thing that sets off their crazy is intimacy.

[santa]

EVERY relationship is exactly the same with them. First, last, next, etc. All of them are just a mess. They're mentally disturbed and the thing that sets off their crazy is intimacy.

[Skip]

Santa,

BPD is a spectrum disorder. By definition, everyone with the disorder is not the same.

And most of the SO this board and operating below the clinical definition of BPD (e.g., they are BPD lites, can be responsive to therapy, etc.).

So while pwBPD share core issues like reduced executive control and extreme fear of rejection - how that manifests can be very different.

The same is true for relationships - while there is generally instability over time - how that manifests can be very different.

If we want to grow from this experience, we have to see our own role in the relationship struggles.

Looking at Bowen "family systems" theory will help shed light on this.  The theory was developed by Murray Bowen, M.D. in the late 1940’s and early 1950’s, when he was a psychiatrist at the Menninger Clinic. After his time at Menninger’s, he moved to the National Institute of Mental Health, to Georgetown University Medical Center and finally established the Georgetown Family Center in Washington, D.C.  Many say his work is a significant as Freud's.

Bowen says that an individual’s overall life functioning is linked closely to his level of emotional maturity or differentiation. People select ... . partners who have the same level of emotional maturity. Emotional immaturity is defined as unrealistic needs and expectations. ~ Murray Bowen, M.D

We selected partners who have the same level of emotional maturity.

How that manifests in us is also different on an individual basis.

At the end of the day, we come here to grieve and to heal.  And a big part of that healing is to approach the "aftermath" of the relationship with a higher level of emotional maturity than the relationship.

We're here to "step up our game"  or joint the ranks of some past members that went on to live another disastrous relationship with someone else.

So when you say "they are all a mess" - maybe you should also think "we are all a mess" - or I, santa, am a mess.  But that doesn't sound like "stepping up our game"  

I don't know about you, but I don't want to live it again.

And yes, I know it hurts man.  Read my posts - I came to this place like a mama coyote that lost her pups and was howling late at night - I was profoundly sad too. And after a few hundred posts, a very caring moderator rocked my world with the "step up our game" talk.

Skip

[Perfidy]

That's exactly what occurred to me. It's the same relationship. Skip... . I don't want that. I won't have it. Tough, but that's exactly how it is.

[Skip]

Nothing changes unless we change.   

[Changingman]

Yes Skip and Perfidy,

This RS I've just been through, wow.

The talk here of how amazing the RS was then how wired, phony then hurt the betrayal then the zero feeling.

It's like a relationship slasher movie. All the elements of a relationship in the wrong order, upside down, meaning turning to meaningless, fantasy turned into reality, reality turned into fantasy, a spaghetti plate of connections.

What was my role, how did I end up here for 4 years.

This is one of the most important RSs I have had, simply because it was so bad it made me look at why! The past, my choices, mild depression, ADHD, chaos from my mother, mental illness running through my family, saviour complex, attracting BPD females, enjoying BPD females, drama loving, fascinated by puzzles and trying to solve them... .

This new awareness is like a superpower.

I'm gonna change and I don't mean please.

[ShadowDancer]

For me it has been like like a humiliating kick in the pants to realize that I, me, SD, am a victim and a causality of a war of the roses of and by my own design of choices. In the beginning there was much anger... . so much so that I was asked to take a break from posting here and actually prevented from doing so. I was deeply and judgmentally focused only on her and her "problems" and "reasons".

Eventually the misplaced anger and blame took on an out of control life of its own and turn inward until I began to feel as crazy and suspicious as any PD. When I finally in my own exhaustion came across the concept of radical acceptance/surrender some small movements of honesty began to reveal my own part into/about the reasons why I was in such a state of... . dis "ease". I was not happy in what I was becoming. What I saw in the mirror was not the me I could recognize. I had always been one to easily forgive/accept others for their mistakes. The question for me was... . am I willing to offer that same falling to grace to myself? Can I, even in the knowing what I now know, really and truly live and let live?

Santa, everything you say and feel is true. All of your anger is justified. You have GOOD reason to feel the way you do and say the things you must. My hope for all of us is to take this most horrible experience that we all willingly signed up for and learn something of value from its bitter after taste.

"That's what happens when you are angry at people. You make them part of your life". Garrision Keillor

Anger begets anger. Love begets love. It is a crossroads. Which way to go?

[growing_wings]

Nothing changes unless we change.   

amen to this... .

it requires so much effort to change... is painful! but i think is worth it. re-wire the brain, sort out FOO issues... . accept myself etc... .

[Turkish]

EVERY relationship is exactly the same with them. First, last, next, etc. All of them are just a mess. They're mentally disturbed and the thing that sets off their crazy is intimacy.

Mine cycled back to the pattern she had before me: younger narc boys. 6 years of trying to step up her game, she failed "wasn't ready for this r/s!" But we both wanted kids. Our mutual immaturity of doing that is shared.

My pattern was the same: rescuing waifs. Younger, older, didn't matter, though this was the first deep, LTR r/s. I've always been attracted to waifs. Partly due to my mom, and also, my T thinks, because my mom is a co-dependent rescuer and I learned a lot of it from her.

My mom told me a story the other night about when I was 5 years old, how helpful I was of the younger kids in our swim class, and it stood out in contrast to the other kids (my mom adopted me when I was 2.5 yrs). The other parents even commented on it. So I was co-dependent from the beginning, ! Maybe I'm just wired that way.