Is the good true and the bad BPD?

[How to communicate after a contentious divorce...]

I have enjoyed the more academic discussions about whether pwBPD have been unable to develop a "core self" or whether they have such a self that is inextricably hidden.

For me, it translates into whether the amazingly connected love we feel in the good times is just as much a part of BPD as the callus, awful devaluation and meanness we experience in the bad times, or that our connection reached those hidden places, but pwBPD cannot live on that deep level.

I am firmly hopeful in the latter camp.

However, something happened today. I don't think it is definitive, but certainly fodder for discussion.

I learned my uBODex has been looking for a special gift for my replacement for his birthday. What she is looking for will take and entire new thread.

I thought how cute. The replacement is away for the week and she is biding her time looking for a gift for his birthday that isn't for another two months. They've been back together for barely that. Oh how "mirroring," how "idolization," how "seductrous,"how BPD!

I know she will never have with him what she had with me! I can clearly name the attributes…

Like…oh sh!t,

Two months into my relationship my ex planned a birthday party that would mix our friends and cement that us publicly as a couple. I had never had someone throw me a birthday party. It was an amazing night!

She out did herself the next year by getting her brother-in-law's band to take over a local bar and create an evening of dancing and joy like never before!

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I loved how organized she was. By April, she would have the whole summer planned with romantic and family getaways. We spent so much time together. I knew that would never accomplish that on my own. How great to have a partner to compliment my weaknesses.

She has booked many of the same places again with my replacement. Except for his birthday get-away. They are going to a place that she frequented with the ex before me.

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About three weeks into our relationship was the big night. She had the house to herself for the night and invited me over to cook for me. Unfortunately, after an exhausting couple of days, I fell asleep earlier. I woke 10 mins after I was supposed to be there. I called her exactly 10 mins late. She painted me black and wouldn't talk to me for a week (should have seen a flag).

I learned after she recycled me with this replacement the first time…she created the exact same scenario.

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There are many more reasons I continue to hope that our connection was real. I still miss the depth of gazing into her eyes. But clearly, she has brought "mirroring," "idolization," and "seduction," down to a formula.

At some point, I have to acknowledge that.

[Pecator]

I have enjoyed the more academic discussions about whether pwBPD have been unable to develop a "core self" or whether they have such a self that is inextricably hidden.

For me, it translates into whether the amazingly connected love we feel in the good times is just as much a part of BPD as the callus, awful devaluation and meanness we experience in the bad times, or that our connection reached those hidden places, but pwBPD cannot live on that deep level.

I am firmly hopeful in the latter camp.

However, something happened today. I don't think it is definitive, but certainly fodder for discussion.

I learned my uBODex has been looking for a special gift for my replacement for his birthday. What she is looking for will take and entire new thread.

I thought how cute. The replacement is away for the week and she is biding her time looking for a gift for his birthday that isn't for another two months. They've been back together for barely that. Oh how "mirroring," how "idolization," how "seductrous,"how BPD!

I know she will never have with him what she had with me! I can clearly name the attributes…

Like…oh sh!t,

Two months into my relationship my ex planned a birthday party that would mix our friends and cement that us publicly as a couple. I had never had someone throw me a birthday party. It was an amazing night!

She out did herself the next year by getting her brother-in-law's band to take over a local bar and create an evening of dancing and joy like never before!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I loved how organized she was. By April, she would have the whole summer planned with romantic and family getaways. We spent so much time together. I knew that would never accomplish that on my own. How great to have a partner to compliment my weaknesses.

She has booked many of the same places again with my replacement. Except for his birthday get-away. They are going to a place that she frequented with the ex before me.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

About three weeks into our relationship was the big night. She had the house to herself for the night and invited me over to cook for me. Unfortunately, after an exhausting couple of days, I fell asleep earlier. I woke 10 mins after I was supposed to be there. I called her exactly 10 mins late. She painted me black and wouldn't talk to me for a week (should have seen a flag).

I learned after she recycled me with this replacement the first time…she created the exact same scenario.

------------------------------------------------------------------

There are many more reasons I continue to hope that our connection was real. I still miss the depth of gazing into her eyes. But clearly, she has brought "mirroring," "idolization," and "seduction," down to a formula.

At some point, I have to acknowledge that.

[woodsposse]

 

I wish I could comment directly on your question and excellet breakdown of your thoughts.  But I can't.

I've been here at this board for a little while, and had been in my own therapy for quite a while to deal with the break up of my r/s - and once I came here and really started digging in and learing about pwPD (borderline or other) I came to quickly realize... . for me... . I don't care what they do or what is running around in their head at this point.

I needed that information to help me on a journey which led me back to me... . why would I involve myself in such relationships... . period.

is the love real?  Is this their true self?  How can I be painted black?  can I go white again?  Why such a roller coaster... . all the same questions - keep me coming back to one question.

What does this have to do with me?

For me... . and this is just me... . I would rather spend my time now (after learning and sharing and reading and sharing) focusing on me and my needs.  Learn why I would allow anyone... . anyone... . to do to me what she did.  I mean, who in their right mind would just let that happen?

sure, there are a bajillion reaons why one may stay in such a relationship (married, kids, financial, etc) - but, sooner or later one either asks themselves why they are styaing... . or they ask themselves why am I not leaving because it is so bad.

Ultimately, for me, I needed to know what was it in me which allowed me to stay in such unhealthy rollercoasters.  Regardless of the symptoms of BPD.  I mean, if you gave me a resume for a girl I wanted to date and it bullet pointed all the bad traits (lying, cheating, manipulative, overly emotional, loves you one moment hate you the next, etc etc etc)... . and another resume of a girl I wanted to date which had none of these... . you mean I would pick the girl with all the problems?

Of course I wouldn't.  So what is it about me which made me turn a blind eye to all of it when I saw it happening?

I can't speak for you, or anyone else, but I found what I was looking for and it made perfect sense.  All the way back through basically every r/s I have ever had... . the same dynamics applied (regardless of the length of the relationship).  some r/s were just better because of things like we were separated because of duty stations (back when I was in service) - they were just one weekend deals... . those types of things

But had they been allowed to continue they would have followed the same pattern.  My second wife was always destined to be my second ex-wife wheter I knew it or not.  Not just because of what she brought to the table, but because of what I brought to the table (consciously and subconsciously).

So this is really more about me than her.

It's nice to understand the person I thought I was involved it - but since I'm no longer involved with her, what difference does it make for her?  I don't plan on being recycled into that mess.  So why should I be concerned about her true core self or what she is doing with whomever she is with.

And... . a quick side... .

I think I finally have come to dislike the term "replacement".  For me - my relationship is over.  For me to categorize the person she is seeing as "my replacement"... . I'm still putting myself in a role of a victim.  Yes, I may have been victimized, used, abused... . but it's over.  I'm out.

He's not my replacement.  He is her next victim. 

There is no connection any longer so saying "my replacement" somehow still puts me in her relationship and keeps a cloud of grey over my head.  I don't want that.

But I digress.

All I'm saying is - I got to a point where it is more beneficial use of my energy to focus on me... . instead of trying to figure her out.

[MissyM]

Well, the extreme fear of intimacy and the extreme fear of abandonment are both triggers for BPDS.  At least that is what partially lead to my dBPDh's diagnosis.  Whenever we have been really close and become intimate (not just sexually), he will panic and push me away.   This can be in short cycles or really long ones.  So I don't look at it as which part is real, they both are.  The crazy BPD behavior is driven by fear, well actually terror.  They have extreme fear.

[cosmonaut]

I don't know, Pecator.  It certainly *seemed* real at the time, didn't it?  I'm also trying to sort the truth from the fiction.  What was real and true?  What was just a fable?  There is no way to ever know for certain what was in her heart, but this is what I believe.

I do believe that my ex loved me.  I can't prove that, but I believe it completely.  I really don't think that someone could fake the emotion and care she clearly showed to me at times in our relationship.  I also know that she deeply wants to be loved.  I think everyone does.  Now that I know about BPD, I can see so many times when my ex must have felt very unloved and misunderstood.  I didn't intend that, of course.  We were just looking at the world through two very different sets of eyes.  I thought that I was helping when I would challenge her thinking - try to get her to rationally examine her thoughts an behaviors.  In actuality, I was only making things worse.  I had no idea that she really needed me to validate her emotions and engage with her on an emotional level.  Feel her feelings with her.  I kept trying to negate them instead.  I see now how that must have made her very confused and distant from me.  I think I can understand why she would shut down on me.

My gut feeling is that your ex loved you too - very truly.  She meant it when she would tell you that you were everything to her, that she wanted to be with you forever, that you were her soulmate.  I think degree by degree however that eroded away as more and more rejections, invalidations, and unseen slights chipped away at her feelings for you until her abandonment fears were triggered by the growing chasm of emotional distance - and she left.

Of course, you had no idea that you were causing this, and you really can't be blamed.  Non-BPDs (most of us on Earth), just do not see the world in the way our exes do.  We don't read hidden meanings into every word and action (or lack thereof).  I know that I keep beating myself up over my failure to realize this sooner.  For failing to discover the key (BPD) that would finally crack the code and allow everything to make sense.  I will be a hypocrite for saying this, but try not to beat yourself up for it.  You didn't know.  You did the best you could, and everything you did was out of love.  Even if she couldn't see that.

So, yes, I do think it was real at the time.  I do think that you are still a part of her - a part she has deeply repressed and hidden because the pain is too much.

[Aussie0zborn]

The "good" is designed to get you in to the bowed head position so that the BPD can strike you as hard as you "deserve" to be struck. That's my observation.