Does anyone else feel they are being talked at?

[pavilion]

I am just wondering if this is common to pwBPD but whenever I did and do spend time with my now ex BF (haven't gone NC yet) he tends to talk at me rather than converse with me. I feel as though I am being talked into a corner and then can't express myself. He says things like "I don't understand why we can't be together" and then goes off on a rant. I now tend to switch off to it. Whenever I do find a space to a)think and b)express myself clearly, he then manages to twist what I have said so that it sounds like what I've said isn't valid.

I remember this in the early days of the relationship but back then it was not aimed at me. He would talk for ages about how he'd been wronged by someone. I would try to persuade him to calm down and think about it from a different angle but I may as well have just remained silent.

Oh and I'm also getting the guilt trip because he is unhappy about our relationship ending and is "exhausted". I get the full works with the puppy-dog eyes when I see him. I expect he has been cutting himself too. Sigh.

[BuildingFromScratch]

Yeah, I spent 13 years being TALKED AT. Caused me to literally go brain dead. Then when I said, I didn't want to talk, she would play the victim and still shove herself down my ears. My father does the same thing, to a lesser degree, it's probably why I put up with it for so long.

[enlighten me]

yep still getting talked at by my ex.

It amazes me. I am a fairly articulate, intelligent guy yet as soon as she starts I find myself lost for words and unable to find a way to get my point across. I end up backed into a corner and even start believing her.

I have to constantly remind myself that even though her argument makes sense it is a selfish one sided argument that only ever takes her feelings and needs into consideration.

I think after years of brainwashing about how a man should be willing to do anything for the woman he loves I find it difficult not to be sucked in.

[pavilion]

That's exactly it. It's all the... "if you love someone you should be willing to put in the effort. Relationships are never easy. blah blah". Well if relationships are that difficult you can keep them. I'd rather be single! 

[camuse]

I was always talked at. I tried to make sense of what she was saying and explain how shed got.it wrong - the rages never made sense - but she simply didn't hear me. My voice was irrelevant to her. Very frustrating.

[Bak86]

Whenever we were discussing something she would always interrupt me and talk over me. Very annoying.

[Caramel]

Yes Pavilion. My partner did that to me too.

He cornered me. Argued with me over nothing. Accused me of things I had not done. And made me confess to those accusations. If I tried to explain or defend myself, he raised his voice, interrupted me and said I was justifying, manipulating and lying.

I learned that the point of the discussions was not to reach any solutions but to make him feel like the winner and to make me feel confused, small, stupid, insignificant and guilty. I eventually started doubting my own judgment and gave up trying and became voiceless.

Took me a long time to get my voice back. I'm so glad I'm out of the FOG now. It was devastating.

[Lolster]

I very much noticed the same with my ex.  He rattled off stories from the past (long, long ago) about people I didn't know and would never meet.  Last time I saw him I actually interrupted him more than once to tell him he was boring me about people I'd never meet and clearly not listening to any of my conversation.  His response was that I might, one day (in some mythical, far off land maybe). I walked away whilst he was still talking, after reiterating I was bored and found him rude.  

Other than that he only ever discussed what he'd bought, how much it cost, how it was better than anything comparable I owned.  The only interactions we had that were based in the present revolved around his physical ailments or my perceived bad behaviour towards him.  

This one never ever discussed my perceived bad behaviour face to face though, he would wait until he got home then rattle it off via email.  

[Tibbles]

I got talked at all the time. I used to sit there at times thinking I should just get a cardboard cut out of myself and put it in the chair as I was giving no input at all into the conversation that would at times go on for hours. He used to talk himself up into an emotional frenzy and then needed time to talk himself down from it. If I tried to interfere in that process or cut it short - it just made things so much worse. Used to imagine myself actually doing it and what his face would have been like if I'd done it. Before I went NC he did the same over the phone ( I moved out) and I'd sort laundry etc while he raved - a poor statement of my ability to draw boundaries but I'm getting better - it's amazing how much work you can get done with a phone on speaker and if you move quietly and are not needed to give any input into a monologue.

[pieceofme]

when my ex raged, i would be talked at. i remember the first time this happened, his eyes turned black and he looked distant. i didn't even recognize him, it was as if he turned into a stranger. i could hear the hatred drip off his voice, as he backed me in the corner with his rageful accusations. it was so traumatic that i couldn't respond; my voice only irritated him anyway. so i cried, which angered him even more. the harder i cried, the more he raged.

[hergestridge]

My wife used to go on one of her angry tirades when we were lying in bed, about to sleep. Often it was set up to convince of some horrible injustice she has been subjected to. Back in the day when I would believe her, this was horrible. After a while I was full of rage and wanted to talk about what to do about the supposed injustices, but then she would fall asleep when I was talking to her. In the middle of a sentence - when I was visibly upset.

She had got it off her chest. She had transferred all her anger and anxiety to me and then she found peace. I had my night's sleep ruined.

I started to notice that it was almost a conscious technique to get me upset to reduce her own frustration.

If I didn't get upset I didn't show "empathy" or she felt I wasn't listening.

[topknot]

Tibbles, I am hysterical about the cardboard cutout - I'm dying laughing!  That was me to a T.  Even his ex-wife wrote in her journal that I saw, "You never shut up for long periods of time, and no one can get a word in".  I was always being preached to - think he missed his calling.  I used to say, my cell phone is dying, and he would call me on my house phone.  When I would try to talk, he would say, "Topknot, TOPKNOT, TO-OP-KNOT! and scream on top of me.  Sometimes I just put the phone down, went to the bathroom, and he was still blabbing without missing a beat... .not sure if it was BPD or drunk, to be honest

[michel71]

I have been talked at and not listened to. The relationship would have been perfect ( for her) if only I was a mute. And if not a mute then a caveman who could barely grunt out syllables.

I had no voice after awhile; strange, in that my profession involves communication, trusted communication, and people tend to listen to my advice and counsel. My BPD wife still treats me as though my opinions don't matter even when I do get them out. Or my opinions insult her even if I am trying to help.

It is all about them. And their rages. Their opinions. Their feelings. Their needs. Their wants. Their desires.

Our words are twisted, our meanings subverted, our intentions vilified. They are on the defense. All the time.

[Pingo]

One time we were talking in bed and he was talking about some experience from his childhood (nothing traumatic, just a regular story) and I said "yeah, that happened to me too" and he got mad and told me that this was about him, not me!  Just shut me down!  I was in too much shock and disbelief that he had spoken to me like that to say anything more.  It was so childish.

I think the main times he was asking me questions (rather than monopolising the conversation) was regarding who called or texted me, what they had to say... .always fishing for info.  He would also interrupt me mid conversation and when I'd call him on it he would claim that if he didn't say what came to his mind right away he'd forget about it (because he has a brain injury).  So I had to excuse this behaviour supposedly.

My first husband who was a complete narcissist (but don't think a PD) also did all the talking (he never shut up) but not just to me, everyone.  Most people just found him too arrogant and annoying to be around.  So basically I've spent the better part of the last 15 years being talked at by two different men.  Thank God for my girlfriends!