What would you choose?

[AwakenedOne]

Just wondering if anyone else on the leaving board feels like this about your exBPD?

Do you dread seeing or even hearing your ex's voice and going through any more BS with them so much that you'd go out of the way to the extreme to escape any chance of this happening ever again by doing any efforts like I have listed below?

Basically if you were promised by the Promise Fairy that it was guaranteed that you will not be bothered by your ex again if you do one of these things below on the list as a payment to the Promise Fairy.  So setting up this -> You would need to throw a pinch of salt over your shoulder and carefully measure out one teaspoon of pepper and throw it over your other shoulder and then say these words "Come to me my beautiful Promise Fairy", then you could choose to do one of the below choices and tell the fairy. If so, what would be your choice?



Promise Fairy

Choices:

You must walk 50 miles only stopping to rest and sleep beside the road in the woods and continue again the next morning when you wake up till you reach mile 50.

You must pay $10k now or take out a loan to pay off $50 a month for the next 20 years to the Promise Fairy.

You must never do your favorite hobby ever again.

You must become a vegetarian for life, only counts if you are non vegetarian now.

You must turn your favorite pet in to the animal shelter. Would you give up Fluffy the cat?

You must never again watch any sports on tv. Only counts if you like sports.

You must not wear deodorant for one year.

You must go on the jelly bean diet and just eat only jelly beans for 6 months and nothing else. Water and jelly beans.

You must go into a real haunted house and spend one night there alone. Boo!

You must spend one month in your back yard starring at the grass grow 24/7 rain or shine.

You must only speak Pig Latin to communicate to others for one month. Even at work.


I think I'd pick the jelly bean diet, it seems like a yummy choice.

Sincerely,

AO

[AwakenedOne]

*Notice

I just received a collect call from the Promise Fairy. He told me to add that a daily multivitamin is allowed while on the jelly bean diet.

[GreenMango]

It sounds like a no - win situation  , or you felt like you were in one.  I dont know about you but knowing I'm in one really doesn't leave much choice but take myself out of it.  It's frustrating and exhausting.

The choice between two bad options maybe shouldn't be an ooption if it doesn't have to be... . especially for a mate.

[AwakenedOne]

It sounds like a no - win situation  , or you felt like you were in one.  I dont know about you but knowing I'm in one really doesn't leave much choice but take myself out of it.  It's frustrating and exhausting.

The choice between two bad options maybe shouldn't be an ooption if it doesn't have to be... . especially for a mate.

Almost anything is better than being ever contacted by my uBPDstbxw again. I'd consider at least 1/3 of this list to do to not have her ever near again. But seriously, I feel she is one day going to try to recycle and I am not going to want to hear it from her after what she did to me. I think its going to come right after I file for divorce in a couple months.

[GreenMango]

What are you nervous about if she contacts you after the divorce?

[AwakenedOne]

What are you nervous about if she contacts you after the divorce?

I am somewhat nervous to see her any time ever. What I'm saying is when I file for divorce she is going to probably give me some lame sweet talk and try to recycle after she's lived it up for the last year. She puts things off, she wont file for divorce. It will sink in now in her mind of the bad thing about a divorce at that point. Who knows though, just an educated guess after 4 yrs of knowing her. This woman attacked me in my sleep and threw me out with nowhere to go. I lost job, car, all my money, no place to live, had to drop out of school etc... . Seeing this person who did this to me is hard to explain why it will bother me. She's like a cold horror movie figure basically now after all the cruelty and heartlessness. Its creepy as hell. No one with an ounce of empathy does that to a husband or even does that to a dog. I am doing the best I can to survive and rebuild and get life back to some stability. I consider her an abuser. She is an abuser. I stayed because of the wedding vows. I just seriously never want to utter one word to her ever or hear her voice. Lawyers can do the talking for us. Some cases deserve and need NC for life. I am not even sure that this jealous woman also might not one day try to kill me due to her deranged thought process. Unfortunately she knows where I currently living.

[Red Sky]

I would walk 50 miles. Easy. Can I run?  

My BPD ex? I'd mainly want to avoid her to avoid re-opening her wounds. I don't know how I can be anything other than outright horrible to her without going straight into the idealization thing again. My NPD ex? I fear seeing him. I don't fear wanting to return to him. I slightly fear being triggered. But I really fear that if he perceives me as happy, successful and moved-on, that he will try to sabotage me in some way. I don't trust that he won't talk to future partners behind my back, blackmail me or engage in minor acts of stalking.

Unfortunately I'm going to have to face up to my exes in a couple of months... BOTH of the exes that have caused me pain are returning to the same university that I am going to next year. All three of us did the same course as undergrads. They know each other - they've even fought over me. (Oh god. I forgot about this. After I broke up with BPD ex she contacted NPD ex to get the gossip on if I'm always so horrible. NPD dude told her a bunch of lies, stuff like that I am extremely promiscuous, sleep with someone then dump them... . She raged at me so much that I initially kept being friends with her so that my postgrad wouldn't be miserable. She chose to believe me raged at NPD dude for lying instead... . )

I've actually just accepted that I'll lose the friends I still have there and will have to find new ones. One ex NC'd is unfortunate. Two exes NC'd makes me look very, very bad. It actually made me spend some time examining myself to see if I was exceptionally callous. I don't think so but I'm certainly not ruling out that other people will see it that way... .

[AwakenedOne]

I would walk 50 miles. Easy. Can I run?  

You'll have to ask the -->   Promise Fairy  

[Red Sky]

You'll have to ask the -->   Promise Fairy  

INCANTATION TIME

[AwakenedOne]

You'll have to ask the -->   Promise Fairy  

INCANTATION TIME

Remember a pinch of salt and a teaspoon of pepper.

[Red Sky]

Dammit, I used a pinch of pepper and a teaspoon of salt and now my house is overrun by gremlins. Might need the promise fairy to get rid of those instead of my exes.

[notmeyou]

BPD Gizmo caca!

There's no way I'd become a vegetarian because I'm vegan now and that would be a step in a weird direction.  That also means I wouldn't give my pet to a shelter.  If I'm not mistaken, the promise fairy is a fairy.  HAVE IT PROMISE TO SCARE HER AWAY BY PROMISING HER LOVE.  I'M NOT A FAIRY BUT I PROMISE YOU LOVE WORKS.

[Trent]

Dammit, I used a pinch of pepper and a teaspoon of salt and now my house is overrun by gremlins. Might need the promise fairy to get rid of those instead of my exes.

No need to bother the promise fairy again, just drop the gremlins off at your ex's place.  Your ex will be so busy pushing, pulling, and Triangulation the gremlins he won't have time to stalk you.  Two birds, one stone!

[Mutt]

Do you dread seeing or even hearing your ex's voice and going through any more BS with them so much that you'd go out of the way to the extreme to escape any chance of this happening ever again by doing any efforts like I have listed below?

No I don't dread my ex because boundaries, radical acceptance, indifference, detachment are practical tools when I have to communicate and interact with my ex. How does a Promise Fairy help us in detaching, healing and self reflect?

[Red Sky]

Do you dread seeing or even hearing your ex's voice and going through any more BS with them so much that you'd go out of the way to the extreme to escape any chance of this happening ever again by doing any efforts like I have listed below?

No I don't dread my ex because boundaries, radical acceptance, indifference, detachment are practical tools when I have to communicate and interact with my ex. How does a Promise Fairy help us in detaching, healing and self reflect?

If you realise that you aren't desperate enough to try the jelly bean diet, then you know that you're moving on? :P in all seriousness this topic did actually give me a push to prepare myself for seeing my exes at some point in the future as well as a good laugh.

Dammit, I used a pinch of pepper and a teaspoon of salt and now my house is overrun by gremlins. Might need the promise fairy to get rid of those instead of my exes.

No need to bother the promise fairy again, just drop the gremlins off at your ex's place.  Your ex will be so busy pushing, pulling, and Triangulation the gremlins he won't have time to stalk you.  Two birds, one stone!

 When I inevitably see him again I might remember this and gigglesnort inappropriately.

[AwakenedOne]

I feel every case is not the same and different rules and solutions apply.

This woman (uBPDstbxw) has given me so much emotional trauma as well as inflicting physical injuries on me. For example when I slept at night I was attacked and hurt. I know what I lived though. It was fkn hell with some nice times mixed in. It was physical and mental abuse. I know maybe and probably she has BPD. It doesn't matter though it was abuse regardless. If she murdered me in my sleep, which thank God she didn't she'd be in prison as a murderer.  

Does an abuse victim detach to a point where they can say "Hi nice weather we been having" to their abuser one day? No, they recover and are happy the abuser is gone and they try to stay far away from them. If they are near the abuser, the abused becomes uneasy. That's me.

I had my part in the mistakes in this relationship and other mistakes. For starters, I married her too fast. I tried and tried though and forgave and forgave while honoring my marriage vows to God. Is that a mistake? At least at the time I didn't think it was. God mattered to me more than her as it should be. Coolio (a member), told me once God did me a favor by ending it all and getting me away from her. I believe this to be true.

This woman could actually kill me. I prefer not to share my very valid observations and concerns in detail about this though. Just trust me.  

I wish someone related to what I am saying but I accept that nobody is in my exact situation and I also recognize many others here have been through FAR greater hell than I have. I tip my hat in huge respect to those members.

May we all have peace,

AO

[coolioqq]

Hey AO,

You know, one (soon enough, no worries) day, you will look at all this as a lesson and a "coming to peace with yourself" journey. It sounds like the divorce is near and that you are keeping distance which is, as I have come to realize, the only way out. Both physical and emotional distance, that is.

Yes, I remember telling you about looking at the whole situation as if it was God pulling you out of it. And it's up to you as well, now that God pulled you out of it alive, safe and sound (you mentioned that you were worried for your life, so safety first!), just try to go on with your life. It sounds like you are rebuilding your life from the ground up which is a formative experience in itself. Something that is never too late to learn from.

I took a decently long break from the site, gathering up my thoughts, learning a TON of things I didn't even imagine were known about human psyche. It is transforming me. I learned all there is to about BPD. It is an extremely complex condition caused by partly genetics, but also a pathological state of the psyche. But, the lessons I learned did not end there. I learned TWO tons about myself in the process. How my (and everyone else's, for that matter) psyche works. What brought me to the relationship in the first place. I learned to distinguish what is innate in myself from what was acquired through upbringing and societal conditioning. I learned about my shortcomings and things that keep me stuck. Did I forget her? Oh no, not for a moment. Did I come to terms with the facts? Yes.

That is a personal journey for everyone here and everywhere else. It is part of the process of individuation. I can write a book about what I went through in just the time I haven't been here, and I will write up a longer personal post here when I feel ready. In short, I have come through so many realizations and learned a universe of things about myself that my dBPDexgf, as strong as my feelings for what I thought of her were, is merely a footnote in the process of establishing a relationship with myself and my inner world properly. BPD makes our partners good, if a little erratical, catalysts of either our demise or our individuation. The choice is ours.

Change of perspective starts with a change itself. I found it that a break from coming here and instead spending time researching human psyche itself has given me the much needed insider knowledge about not only the things that were going on in her head but mine as well.

So, try not to let yourself to get overwhelmed with all of this. It has never been a better time to catch yourself when you start thinking about her, remind yourself what God did for you (got you out of the thing before it was too late), appreciate it and focus on personal growth. She will then become a memory and a lesson you learned while you were finding yourself. All you can do is wish her a success in individuation. That will admittedly be much much harder for her than for you, but we are all responsible only for ourselves... .

Stay well, AO! Life is so much more than the confines we put on it ourselves.

[AwakenedOne]

Hey AO,

You know, one (soon enough, no worries) day, you will look at all this as a lesson and a "coming to peace with yourself" journey. It sounds like the divorce is near and that you are keeping distance which is, as I have come to realize, the only way out. Both physical and emotional distance, that is.

Yes, I remember telling you about looking at the whole situation as if it was God pulling you out of it. And it's up to you as well, now that God pulled you out of it alive, safe and sound (you mentioned that you were worried for your life, so safety first!), just try to go on with your life. It sounds like you are rebuilding your life from the ground up which is a formative experience in itself. Something that is never too late to learn from.

I took a decently long break from the site, gathering up my thoughts, learning a TON of things I didn't even imagine were known about human psyche. It is transforming me. I learned all there is to about BPD. It is an extremely complex condition caused by partly genetics, but also a pathological state of the psyche. But, the lessons I learned did not end there. I learned TWO tons about myself in the process. How my (and everyone else's, for that matter) psyche works. What brought me to the relationship in the first place. I learned to distinguish what is innate in myself from what was acquired through upbringing and societal conditioning. I learned about my shortcomings and things that keep me stuck. Did I forget her? Oh no, not for a moment. Did I come to terms with the facts? Yes.

That is a personal journey for everyone here and everywhere else. It is part of the process of individuation. I can write a book about what I went through in just the time I haven't been here, and I will write up a longer personal post here when I feel ready. In short, I have come through so many realizations and learned a universe of things about myself that my dBPDexgf, as strong as my feelings for what I thought of her were, is merely a footnote in the process of establishing a relationship with myself and my inner world properly. BPD makes our partners good, if a little erratical, catalysts of either our demise or our individuation. The choice is ours.

Change of perspective starts with a change itself. I found it that a break from coming here and instead spending time researching human psyche itself has given me the much needed insider knowledge about not only the things that were going on in her head but mine as well.

So, try not to let yourself to get overwhelmed with all of this. It has never been a better time to catch yourself when you start thinking about her, remind yourself what God did for you (got you out of the thing before it was too late), appreciate it and focus on personal growth. She will then become a memory and a lesson you learned while you were finding yourself. All you can do is wish her a success in individuation. That will admittedly be much much harder for her than for you, but we are all responsible only for ourselves... .

Stay well, AO! Life is so much more than the confines we put on it ourselves.

Coolio,

Perfect words as usual.

I think it will lessen my uneasiness about seeing her ever again if I just always remember what God did for me. Keep it on my mind constantly and everything will work out in life according to God's will. I am going to make a reminder card or note or something that I can see each day to help me to remember this.

Thanks,

AO

[BacknthSaddle]

There are many different people on these boards with many different experiences.  All of our relationships bore some similarity to each other, but all also had (often unpleasant, frightening) aspects that made them unique.  Similarly, we all have paths to healing and detachment that are similar in some ways, different in others, and we all have perspectives on offering support and insight that are similar in some ways, different in others. 

AwakenedOne, your experience has significant differences from my own, in specific that it is much, much more serious.  I can't imagine the mix of fear and anger, just to name two emotions, that you must experience, and I can't imagine you surviving if you weren't able to cope with those feelings in a humorous way, as you've done here.  The joke here is that virtually anything imaginable for you right now would be better than having contact with your ex.  The truth underneath the joke is that you have a desperate need to avoid her, which is completely natural.  You experienced genuine trauma here, and you still rightfully fear her, and so experiencing indifference when you see or think about her would seem to me to be a Herculean task.  I doubt the women who were held captive by Ariel Castro in Ohio, for example, feel like they can see pictures of him in the paper and just think "eh, whatever."

It did sound like in addition to this type of fear, though, you also were nervous about her attempts at a recycle.  Maybe I have that wrong; that's just how I read it.  So I think that's a set of emotions from which it's reasonable for you to detach from eventually. You may never feel completely safe from this woman, but it might be that the feeling of "dread" comes from fearing not only that she is dangerous, but also that she is manipulative enough to insinuate herself back into your life.  Once you feel confident that that's not possible, that the boundaries (even if those boundaries are formed by NC) are strong enough and you've detached, I'll bet that feeling of "dread" will be tempered, if not extinguished.

As for members her being perceived as condescending: we all have different approaches to lending support, as I said above.  Some are confrontational in their approach, because they believe that direct presentation of the truth as they see it is the most helpful approach.  This can come off as condescending to some, particularly to those who are more gentle or probing in their approach.  To others, this approach can seem extremely valuable.  I feel confident though, having been on this board for awhile now and received a lot of help from it, that no one here has anything but good intention with regard to the other members.  This site is called "BPD Family," and people in families say s*** that pisses each other off sometimes.  But ultimately, if the family is healthy, they are there for each other and want what's best for each other.  I feel confident that this is the case here, even if it's not always obvious. 

[Red Sky]

What does impress me on this site is that disagreements remain articulate and respectful. Makes it more possible to express your feelings than I've seen anywhere else. I know we are all aiming for the same thing and to support each other and everything is said with the best of intentions.

I think there are various reasons why one might not want to see their ex again. AO's situation sounds really scary, and so think there is a difference between being averse to a situation which might make you/your ex say something regrettable, or try to reunite, is a very different situation from one in which you have fear of a physical confrontation or something which will significantly impact your life. I know that unearthing some awkward feelings might make you feel you've taken a step backwards in recovery, and you will fear that. But that is a very different thing from feeling fear in the moment of the interaction. Whilst my fears are far, far more mild than AO's, and my exbf never hit me properly hard or such, no, I would do quite a lot never to be in the same room as him again. I will never be able to have the 'nice weather we've been having' conversation. (At least, not comfortably. We will probably have that conversation at some point.)

If I saw him, I would feel fear in that moment that he was going to sabotage my life somehow. Not fear I would want him back. Not fear that it would unleash a new crop of bad feelings. Fear that the meeting was going to do something which disrupts my life not through my own feelings or actions.

Further to that... . Isn't NC something which benefits us? It may be that it's the one thing which lets your SO know that it is O.V.E.R. It may be the thing which stops us feeding their drama. But is it also not about giving us the space to heal, to detach and become indifferent and accept the past? Is the enforcement of NC not exactly the same kind of emotional protection, a self-imposed Promise Fairy for those of us who are lucky not to have to see our exes regularly?

Finally - sorry for saying so much about myself... . I am not trying to bring everything back to me or my experiences because I want to talk about them specifically. It's just that my own experiences are my main frame of reference... .