Reminders

[OutOfEgypt]

Last night I got a text from my uBPD ex wife.  She wanted me to know how grateful she is that our children have me as a father and what a great dad I am.  I thanked her, wondering if somehow it was her fishing for some kind of redemption about her mothering, so that I would say "You're a great mom, too."  But I didn't.  We did a few small-talk texts about her dog swimming.  Kept it light and short.

This morning, she texted me a handful of texts about her dad.  She never knew him because he died before she was born.  I commented that she must have been thinking about him a lot, lately.  She replied, talking about crying about it but saying that is good.  I replied, "Yes", but then changed the subject.

You know, there is a big buy-in to have things seem "normal", to be able to look at your ex wife as an "old friend", albeit one I would never get back together with.  But I'm reminded of a few things.

1. Not that I am scared of a recycle, because I absolutely will not at this stage in my life, but my willingness to offer compassion is how she hooks me.  "Come close, so I can hurt you."  Has happened too many times.

2. I am not the only one who can offer her compassion.  It is easy to think that since we were so close for so long that I have cornered the market on knowing her and offering her compassion.  And that may be true, but that it not my fault, and we are not married any longer for VERY good and real reasons.

3. I do firmly believe that her wanting to be "friends" with me is an attempt to avoid her own shame for the awful things she did to me.  If I let her close and give her my compassion, she gets to absolve herself.  On one hand, who cares.  Whether she holds herself hostage or absolved herself is her problem.  But on the other hand, it is wrong.

4. Memory fades quickly.  Here I am finding myself thinking, "Sure, she's BPD.  But maybe she's not THAT bad.  Maybe she is capable of SOME degree of friendship."  Wow.  That blew me away to hear myself think that.

The difficulty is that I do have to relate to her because we share children, so it is certainly preferable that it is friendly than drama-laden and exhausting.  That said, I do feel like I need to keep a firm line.  And I do.  And then I feel it soften as things die down, and then she is extra nice and confiding in me, and bam.  I realize I relaxed my line.  Ugh.

And right now, I am both sad and angry.  Sad that I have to close her out again, and angry at her for even trying to get in.

[heartandwhole]

And right now, I am both sad and angry.  Sad that I have to close her out again, and angry at her for even trying to get in.

This makes so much sense, OutOfEgypt, and is so natural and understandable, although I know it's not easy to balance the energies pulling from different directions.  I think writing them down helps a lot, and you seem to have a really good handle on what's coming up for you. That kind of growth and wisdom is inspiring.

One thing that has been helpful for me is to understand that feeling love and compassion, even friendship, for someone, but not engaging in a close relationship with the person, are not mutually exclusive concepts. These feelings and thoughts that you are experiencing are OK.  For me, letting them have their space and time inside of me, without making them some kind of "truth" that needs acting upon, allows me to honor what I know is best for me now (and if I'm not sure, what I think is best for me now).  Learning to trust ourselves again.

I certainly can relate to that "relaxing" idea, and in fact, I fell into some hurt because of it with pwBPD during our relationship.  Allowing hope to dissolve, relinquishing the role of the "believer," was another big leap forward for me.  I don't know if any of that resonates with you, but at any rate, you are definitely not alone in your reflections. Stay true to your values and to yourself – that just might help her, too, in a very different way than either of you expected. 

heartandwhole

[OutOfEgypt]

"Relinquishing the role of the 'believer'" = letting go of the idea that I can ever have a functional emotional relationship with her in any capacity?

[heartandwhole]

"Relinquishing the role of the 'believer'" = letting go of the idea that I can ever have a functional emotional relationship with her in any capacity?

I wouldn't say that... .I mean, one never knows, right?  But that's a story about the future, and we've only got now for the moment. 

What I meant is that for me, when I stopped believing in the fantasy (my relationship had a large dose of that), the words that were being said, the dreams and hopes (that were actually a desperate move on my part to avoid facing my wounds and patterns) – when that went, I was able to see what was happening, to get honest with myself and start looking more deeply at why I was searching for salvation in a relationship that was far from healthy or emotionally fulfilling. It was hard and I felt very sad, but that was okay, too.  Feelings pass; everything does. That said, I didn't have to continue contact with my pwBPD.  You do, and that makes things quite a bit more challenging. 

OOE, do you think the sadness about "closing her out," could be more about you putting up a wall of protection (thus closing your heart to yourself) than a comfortable boundary? Are you more concerned with her needs for comfort and compassion than your own?  I ask because of course these are my tendencies.  When my boundaries are protections, they tend to be rigid and feel uncomfortable, anxiety-producing.  When they are expressions of how I value myself, they feel more flexible, and I feel relaxed and actually safer, if that makes sense.  My boundary with pwBPD had to be fairly rigid in the beginning because I was afraid. That's very different from a limit that communicates my values and self-respect – and it feels so much better when I'm coming from that place.

heart

[OutOfEgypt]

OOE, do you think the sadness about "closing her out," could be more about you putting up a wall of protection (thus closing your heart to yourself) than a comfortable boundary?

Well I am definitely putting up a wall of protection or whatever you want to call it.  But it is not a closed-off-ness from my own feelings.  What I feel is grief because I'm quite in touch with them and worked very hard to get there over the past four years.  My grief arises from the fact that I do care and would love to be there for her but do not want her emotionally close because it is not good for me (or her, really).  So, there's the unmet longing being touched on again.  The anger is in concert with the pain... .like I'm saying to her, "Why the #$ do you have to be like this?   Get away!"

[talithacumi]

OOE (still love typing that, btw!),

Your post really resonates with me today. I've been away from the boards for a couple of months - got myself a little trailer up in the desert that needed power, water, the whole nine yards - a lot of work - very hot - but my own place (at last!) and I'm happier/more content than I've been in a long time.

My decision to take advantage of this particular opportunity came at a point in my therapy/recovery where I felt I had enough personal boundaries, and self-trust in place to make staying NC unnecessary - at least as far as my own emotional protection was concerned.

I, perhaps like you, have felt from the beginning that shutting my ex out - given the history/children we share, and the feelings I had/have for him - was - not wrong (I definitely needed to do something to stop the bleeding/allow myself to start healing) - but misleading/dishonest.

I care a lot about my ex. The years I spent with him, the relationship/life we shared, are really important and have a lot of personal value to me. I know I experienced a lot of things that have come to mean a great deal to me that I very probably otherwise wouldn't have even considered trying or doing. I know I learned a lot from him, and that my time with him at least contributed to making the person I am today - both good and bad ( ).

Going NC and shutting him out of my life altogether felt, to me, like I was saying he and none of those things mattered enough to me anymore to make it worth my time/energy/effort to simply stay in touch with him - which wasn't true - and never sat very well with me at all. It created a major moral dilemma for me, and one I repeatedly shared with my therapist/tried to find some other way to reconcile for myself, but never did.

In the end, we agreed that it probably wasn't necessary anymore - that I'd developed a strong enough sense of self-worth, had a firm enough grip on the facts, and was fundamentally no longer in need of, or susceptible to the kind of mirroring/validation that made him with his disorder so attractive to me in the first place.

So I held my breath, hoped we were right, and broke NC with a short text in the middle of June.

Our interactions since then have been very sporadic, very short, and very superficial. I text/write only when I want (which isn't often). I don't expect any kind of acknowledgment or reply (usually don't get either). When I do get one, I interpret what he writes as a reflection of how he's feeling in the moment, full of his usual mirroring, as well as his usual disordered distortion of what's going in his life. He does victimize himself. He does look for validation/approval/sympathy/compassion/support/etc. I don't feel obligated or under any pressure to reply/respond/give him whatever he wants. When I find myself feeling like I really need/want to do that for some reason, I recognize it as a red flag telling me to slow down, take a deep breath, recenter/regroup, and really think about why I'm feeling that way instead of simply acting on it.

So far, I'm okay with it. Feel better about myself doing it than I did not having any contact with him at all. But, you're right, it can be really hard at times. I do find myself wanting to relax some of my boundaries, and especially wanting to ignore that big red flag of wanting to fix/rescue/care take him. And I also find myself feeling really sad sometimes that I actually have to protect myself in this way from someone who means so much to me/I care so much about. But I do. Because he's disordered. And nothing's going to change that.

I guess what I'm saying is that I'm finding it really hard to operate/interact with someone I met, fell in love with, gave my heart/soul to, built and shared an entire life with, and then had it all very suddenly taken away because he was suffering from a mental illness I never knew/didn't even suspect he had until long after he was actually gone.

There's a lot of sadness in that. A lot of loss/grief there. And a lot of unmet longing to both comfort your ex for the pain/suffering you know they're experiencing, as well as to find comfort for all the many very sad things you're feeling, too.

Maintaining those boundaries - keeping that distance - is really hard under the circumstances. Harder for you than me, I think, because you still have young children to raise with her.

Go gentle on yourself, OOE. You've come a long way from where you were when you first got this board. And know you're not alone in the questions you have, and problems you face.

Big hug,

TC

[enlighten me]

Im also in the position where my ex wife and I have contact because of our sons. I recently spent two days over summer with her and my boys. It was very light conversation and she confided in me about her new husband.

I found I had to constantly remind myself of what she did and all the lies she told. I didn't pander to her in any way and sometimes put her in her place but never had any dramas.

After she had gone I went over everything she had done while we where together just to cement it in my mind that the person that had been there that day wasn't who I truly knew she was.