Please help

[Seriously?]

I had been doing really well. No contact since September. Feels like I have been healing. Lately, I read some of these stories on here and find myself almost longing for my ex to contact me. I can sit and read my lists of why it won't work and all the abuses he put me through, but sometimes the thought of never being with him again is overwhelming. I am trying to understand.  My chemical addiction should be way over by now. Maybe it is going through all I have emotionally and knowing there is nothing like that going on for him. I am just so sad and weepy about it lately. I have not had any real thoughts about reaching out to him, but I am kind of hoping he will reach out to me. Not so I can turn him down, but hoping to understand. Maybe even hoping I am wrong about him. Any encouragement? Any wisdom?

[jammo1989]

Hey seriously, before I can start with my advice, can you tell me a little bit of the background, like age, what traits does he show BPD/Narc?

[Seriously?]

It was always about his needs. Once he was "injured" by me suggesting he contribute more financially, it was downhill. Everything was over in the matter of a month after that point.  We were married on Valentine's Day this year. He moved out in June. He was on dating sites, etc. He tried to come home twice, but refused counseling so I could not allow that. He had physically shoved me into things twice on that last night giving me bruises. He had a horrible relationship with his mother.  Major attachment issues. Push pull through the whole relationship.  Our last conversation,  he told me he never loved me and was seriously projecting, accusing me of all kinds of things that are not me at all. HOWEVER, as we all have experienced, when he idealized me, it was wonderful and I thought he was the love of my life.  I miss how he was then. Almost perfect, although there were red flags.

[Seriously?]

He is 39 and I am 41.

[jammo1989]

It was always about his needs. Once he was "injured" by me suggesting he contribute more financially, it was downhill. Everything was over in the matter of a month after that point.  We were married on Valentine's Day this year. He moved out in June. He was on dating sites, etc. He tried to come home twice, but refused counseling so I could not allow that. He had physically shoved me into things twice on that last night giving me bruises. He had a horrible relationship with his mother.  Major attachment issues. Push pull through the whole relationship.  Our last conversation,  he told me he never loved me and was seriously projecting, accusing me of all kinds of things that are not me at all. HOWEVER, as we all have experienced, when he idealized me, it was wonderful and I thought he was the love of my life.  I miss how he was then. Almost perfect, although there were red flags.

Do you know a lot about BPD as a disorder? Because I'm guessing your new to the forum? If you don't I can certainly educate you and give you some excellent advice regarding this matter.

[LuckyEscapee]

It is still early days, and it takes time.

Often a lot of time and distance. Be kind to yourself Seriously?

[Seriously?]

It's not really about head knowledge right now. It is about how I am feeling.

[Chasing_Ghosts]

I had been doing really well. No contact since September. Feels like I have been healing. Lately, I read some of these stories on here and find myself almost longing for my ex to contact me. I can sit and read my lists of why it won't work and all the abuses he put me through, but sometimes the thought of never being with him again is overwhelming. I am trying to understand.  My chemical addiction should be way over by now. Maybe it is going through all I have emotionally and knowing there is nothing like that going on for him. I am just so sad and weepy about it lately. I have not had any real thoughts about reaching out to him, but I am kind of hoping he will reach out to me. Not so I can turn him down, but hoping to understand. Maybe even hoping I am wrong about him. Any encouragement? Any wisdom?

First off i highly encourage you to not break no contact if he comes back around. Made it 3 months nc was healing then we recycled. She dumped me and i was on the brink. So i then regressed reached out to her to soothe the pain she caused yet again to only be hurt more in the long run with this hopelessly one sided friendship.

I too wanted to "understand her". And the analogy i can only liken it to is like hitting my head against the wall. Ive literally been mentally picturing it throughout this whole point of contact and can almost in a psychosomatic way feel it.

Every time i would feel like i got close or that we were making progress... shed just throw in something that totally showed me the polar opposite. So even if she does a. i can still expect x. y. z. possibly to follow.

The point is until they are in therapy and utilizing dbt and cbt to change their thought patterns, therefore changing the reactions the disorder initiates... well we can expect another heaping serving of emotional chaos and heartache.

And the hardest part is getting back involved after detaching only for them to be extremely nice and fun. Yet once you truly understand their patterns its a constant fight between the emotional and logical mind. I know shes showing me this nice side as a manipulation... but i love her so i want to accept it as genuine.

This thinking has literally started to tear me apart and it was truly painful. Detaching and healing is nearly impossible when were still in contact due to the fact that no matter how nice they seem at some point they do something that triggers old feelings to come to the surface. Therefore the wound is ripped back open and were forced to restart. Yet due to her being nice and fun, whether it was genuine or not made it that much harder to detach again.

[jammo1989]

It's not really about head knowledge right now. It is about how I am feeling.

Yeah but with knowledge about the situation, it allows you to see through the FOG, if he is BPD, which by what I've red I'd presume so, the key point you made is that he has s terrible relationship with his mother.  His BPD is solely based on attachment not love, it is an attachment disorder.  He almost treats you like his own mother when hes been triggered, that's why he projects all his anger and agression onto you, because in his eyes, his mother wasn't there for him when he needed her most as a child, so in his eyes, it's your duty to look after and nurture him.  That's why he acted the at he did when finances came into play, in his eyes he's replaying his childhood traumas with his own mother, and sadly your the one he currently sees as her.  They are children trapped in an adults body, there's no logic or reasoning with them.  

The reason why you want to reach out is either because your co dependant, and feel you need to be there for him because others weren't, or your ego has been damaged, and you are expecting validation from him, and by accomplishing this would make you feel as if you really did mean something to him.  Sadly in the majority of not all cases you won't ever get that, because any sense of guilt further triggers their deep inner pain and anxiety issues, so the easiest thing for him to do is to go No Contact with you.  Not because he needs to heal and get over you, but because you are now the trigger that brings back his traumas.  You need to leave him and not contact him ever again, I know this isn't what you want to hear, but other users on this forum here will also advice you against doing so.  He's a survivor by nature, so everything is about him, not you, you were just his attachment, the person he expected to take care of him, so that he didn't have to feel alone.

[Seriously?]

Thanks for the replies. One of my self - defense mechanisms is intellectualization.  I have studied the disorder. I am seeing a therapist to understand my own role, etc. I have a hard time when I just feel lonely and sad even knowing the man I miss wasn't really who he was. He is emotionally immature, throwing tantrums and taking his stuff and going home. I KNOW all that. I have feelings sometimes triggered just because last year this time I was on cloud 9, sometimes triggered by a dream or a song. The feelings are just hard. I can know in my head he essentially lacks the ability to sincerely care, but it felt so real at the time. When my feelings rise up I am prone to believe all the projection, at least the things that were more general like I am a weak person. That is not overall true, but I can see how he may have perceived some things as weak. There were some projections he made about me cheating and lying that were just completely untrue. It hurts that I loved him and he didn't love me. Right now, knowing it is a disorder doesn't make it hurt less. I appreciate hearing what others here say because it validates the feelings. Even though we are intelligent,  caring people, we were deeply hurt.

[Seriously?]

Thanks jammo! It should have been obvious that he was seeing me as his mother. It explains the reason he was so jealous of my relationship with my teenage children. A good friend of mine told me if he and I ever got back together, my other relationships would suffer. She said what if you have grandchildren someday and he "punishes" you for wanting to see them. He never told me no in terms of what I did with family or friends, but there was always a punishment, either raging over something else or withdrawing affection. Again, thanks for that c9nnection. He probably did end up equating me to his mother when he saw me as not nurturing him.

[fromheeltoheal]

It's not really about head knowledge right now. It is about how I am feeling.

It's only been a couple of months, so you're in the thick of it.  I've been there.  What worked at the time were distractions: alcohol was a quick fix but it hurt more later, not recommended, but doing things, any things, with other people, any other people, helped quite a bit.  The goal is to slowly shift your focus from the past to the future and from him to you, but if it's just too much this early, distractions, try distractions, ones that won't necessarily move you forward in detaching, but won't set you back either.  In time it will get better, but you have to give it time; probably didn't want to hear that, but it's true.  Take care of you!

[jammo1989]

Thanks for the replies. One of my self - defense mechanisms is intellectualization.  I have studied the disorder. I am seeing a therapist to understand my own role, etc. I have a hard time when I just feel lonely and sad even knowing the man I miss wasn't really who he was. He is emotionally immature, throwing tantrums and taking his stuff and going home. I KNOW all that. I have feelings sometimes triggered just because last year this time I was on cloud 9, sometimes triggered by a dream or a song. The feelings are just hard. I can know in my head he essentially lacks the ability to sincerely care, but it felt so real at the time. When my feelings rise up I am prone to believe all the projection, at least the things that were more general like I am a weak person. That is not overall true, but I can see how he may have perceived some things as weak. There were some projections he made about me cheating and lying that were just completely untrue. It hurts that I loved him and he didn't love me. Right now, knowing it is a disorder doesn't make it hurt less. I appreciate hearing what others here say because it validates the feelings. Even though we are intelligent,  caring people, we were deeply hurt.

Ok so if you already know about the disorder and think about it like this... .As you already know he's spent his whole life being chased by his demons, and he will do everything possible to make sure they don't catch up to them.  Trust me, we think we are hurt now, they deal with this pain on a daily basis, my ex told me to never contact me again, after flirting with me, she smiled, and smirked while saying all this, later day I was blocked on FB and mobile and she was in a relationship the day after.  She took the punitive parent role at that point, and when you think about it, she was playing the role of her mother when she said that and banished me, just like her own mother did to her.

There's 2 ways of looking at this, feel anger, and resentment, or accept the fact that this is a mental disorder they have no control over ther lives, and karma will prove that with age.

Would you punch a Parkinson's patient because his constant twitching got on your nerves?

Would you physically attack a person with Tourette's because they said something about you?

My point here being, these people have no control over there actions or emotions, they were born with the short straw in life and that's more pain than us NONs would feel in a lifetime.

Just leave it be.

[Seriously?]

It's not anger I feel. I mean, sometimes, yes. Mostly, the overwhelming feelings are sadness and disbelief. I am leaving it alone. I will see what happens in January which is when our divorce hearing is. I so appreciate you all taking the time to give me your thoughts tonight. I have to say most people in my life think I should be over this by now. It's kind of refreshing when someone refers to this as the early days or stage. Take care everybody!