Fighting back: the consequences

[Beware of Junk Psychology...]

I'm not sure what to think anymore. They create an environment in which you doubt yourself. More than that, I think I was becoming unhinged myself. I know I have issues. I'm not trying to dismiss that. But I know there was abuse involved on her part, even though she turned it around and made it seem like I was the abuser. I understand this is part of the disorder, the projection.  It worked on me like magic.  I doubted myself. Was I the crazy one? I still don't know.  I DO know I am self-aware, though.  Perhaps I contributed to the toxic environment. Yet, I doubt she could admit she played a role as well. She even said that the totality of the blame rested with me.  So how is one to proceed in a loving relationship when your partner refuses to admit some basic facts?  Nothing can be resolved.  That was the crux of the relationship dysfunction: we couldn't resolve a very minor argument that most healthy couples resolve with minimal effort.

So, it degenerated into a roller coaster of blame, and never stopped, with her distancing herself, and me getting angrier and angrier because she refused to resolve the issue. She claimed I f#$#ked up--that I sabotaged the relationship with my behavior.  The level of denial on her part was amazing. You can't have a relationship with someone like that--it's impossible!  

I don't blame her for the BPD, understand me.  I know her mother abused her in childhood with abject neglect and abandonment because her mother was a selfish a-hole.  The person I should be angry with is her mother, who destroyed a smart, beautiful woman, who I truly loved.  But it's hard for me to get past the abuse and see her as she is. I only feel hate now. I am sorry. I hope God will heal me. I truly do.

devalued,

Read what you wrote above and apply this thinking to it:

Your thoughts, expectations, emotional responses, knowledge, etc. are not applicable in her world. Likewise, the same can be said of her attempting to participate in your world. Y'all are foreigners from two different lands that met. The customs, language, metaphors, etc. are all different, and therefore, y'all were not compatible with one another.

The behavior(s) that she displayed, that you deemed as hurtful, are completely acceptable to her in her world; in her world they are actually normal. In your world, the "normal" world, they are abnormal, labeled as maladapted (rage, ST, black/white thinking, objectification of others, emotional deregulation, etc.). Professional therapies target these maladapted tools in order to allow the pwBPD to participate in our "normal" world.

What was said above is not to excuse her behavior, but rather to give you a different perspective on what occurred in the relationship. She is unhealthy, and therefore, not like you.

[apollotech]

I'm not sure what to think anymore. They create an environment in which you doubt yourself. More than that, I think I was becoming unhinged myself. I know I have issues. I'm not trying to dismiss that. But I know there was abuse involved on her part, even though she turned it around and made it seem like I was the abuser. I understand this is part of the disorder, the projection.  It worked on me like magic.  I doubted myself. Was I the crazy one? I still don't know.  I DO know I am self-aware, though.  Perhaps I contributed to the toxic environment. Yet, I doubt she could admit she played a role as well. She even said that the totality of the blame rested with me.  So how is one to proceed in a loving relationship when your partner refuses to admit some basic facts?  Nothing can be resolved.  That was the crux of the relationship dysfunction: we couldn't resolve a very minor argument that most healthy couples resolve with minimal effort.

So, it degenerated into a roller coaster of blame, and never stopped, with her distancing herself, and me getting angrier and angrier because she refused to resolve the issue. She claimed I f#$#ked up--that I sabotaged the relationship with my behavior.  The level of denial on her part was amazing. You can't have a relationship with someone like that--it's impossible!  

I don't blame her for the BPD, understand me.  I know her mother abused her in childhood with abject neglect and abandonment because her mother was a selfish a-hole.  The person I should be angry with is her mother, who destroyed a smart, beautiful woman, who I truly loved.  But it's hard for me to get past the abuse and see her as she is. I only feel hate now. I am sorry. I hope God will heal me. I truly do.

devalued,

Read what you wrote above and apply this thinking to it:

Your thoughts, expectations, emotional responses, knowledge, etc. are not applicable in her world. Likewise, the same can be said of her attempting to participate in your world. Y'all are foreigners from two different lands that met. The customs, language, metaphors, etc. are all different, and therefore, y'all were not compatible with one another.

The behavior(s) that she displayed, that you deemed as hurtful, are completely acceptable to her in her world; in her world they are actually normal. In your world, the "normal" world, they are abnormal, labeled as maladapted (rage, ST, black/white thinking, objectification of others, emotional deregulation, etc.). Professional therapies target these maladapted tools in order to allow the pwBPD to participate in our "normal" world.

What was said above is not to excuse her behavior, but rather to give you a different perspective on what occurred in the relationship. She is unhealthy, and therefore, not like you.

[cosmonaut]

Cosmo I'm saying Bundy was held responsible so was dhamer they were not judged insane yet we allow BPDs to get a pass because they are I'll ?

Let's not try and compare serial killers with pwBPD.  They are not equivalent and they are very different pathologies.  Let's keep the focus on BPD, and specifically on our relationships and our healing.  How can we utilize what we have learned about BPD to better understand our role in the relationship?  What might our partner have been providing for us that formed such a powerfully loaded bond?  What might we take from this for the future?

[Devaluedman]

Apollo,

That helps a lot. I wish I had found this site a lot sooner.

You folks are so rational about this stuff, and I really need to make sense of it from that perspective.  I realize now she was sick and nothing I could do would change what happened.  That is very liberating for me.

Thanks.

[volumetwo]

I wonder whether any of y'all were called verbally abusive and angry by a BPD.

Yes! I was told I have anger management issues and that I am controlling and emotionally abusive. I have also treated him horribly and made him miserable for our whole 20+ year marriage. He used "Stockholm Syndrome" to explain why he put up with so much abuse from me. He said he became used to my "abuse" and thought it was normal.

Now he's saying that he has been miserable our whole marriage and that there weren't any good times between us. 

It has been very helpful reading these boards and I remind myself that I did nothing to cause this and there's nothing I could have done to stop this.

Divorce is the best thing that could ever have happened to me and he is so anxious for me to leave that he's being agreeable. I'll be glad to have the papers signed and have him out of my life (or as much as I can when we have a child together).

[lm911]

She's not a freak, she's just a disordered person.  Let's remember that she never chose to have BPD and she's not distancing to make your life hell.  She doesn't take pleasure in tormenting you.  She's doing it because she is in tremendous pain - a type of pain that perhaps you and I will never be able to fully understand.  It's important not to give into demonizing.  It hurts tremendously to be shut out by the person we love - I've been through it too - but there are clear clinical reasons for it.  Try and have some sympathy for her.  As you said, she's a very broken person and that's not her fault in any way.

Anger is a normal and necessary part of healing, and I know that you are in tremendous pain right now.  I've been through it with my ex, and it was the worst, most miserable experience of my life.  So, I understand your anger.  I felt it too.  Our healing really does start, however, when we start to shift the focus to ourselves and what we need to heal.  Often there are deep issues inside of ourselves that need to be addressed.  Chances are very good that your ex was soothing something inside of you just as you were soothing her desperate need for attachment.  That was certainly true for me.  

Cosmo here I will slighty disagree with you. Sure she did not chose to have BPD, but we should not feel sorry for them  like we should not feel angry. We should be neutral. Yes they have BPD, but this does not mean that they can humilate us and we do nothing. I do not like such thinking - they are not guilty let them do whatever they want, I will only give them love and silence and validation. We are humans, too, sometimes we should protect ourselves too. Let me give you an example - you see your ex, she comes to you and spits on you. Then she says you are an ass. What you would you do? Would you walk away ( and saying to yourself that she is not guilty) or you will say something do defend your confidence and even your being?

[fromheeltoheal]

She's not a freak, she's just a disordered person.  Let's remember that she never chose to have BPD and she's not distancing to make your life hell.  She doesn't take pleasure in tormenting you.  She's doing it because she is in tremendous pain - a type of pain that perhaps you and I will never be able to fully understand.  It's important not to give into demonizing.  It hurts tremendously to be shut out by the person we love - I've been through it too - but there are clear clinical reasons for it.  Try and have some sympathy for her.  As you said, she's a very broken person and that's not her fault in any way.

Anger is a normal and necessary part of healing, and I know that you are in tremendous pain right now.  I've been through it with my ex, and it was the worst, most miserable experience of my life.  So, I understand your anger.  I felt it too.  Our healing really does start, however, when we start to shift the focus to ourselves and what we need to heal.  Often there are deep issues inside of ourselves that need to be addressed.  Chances are very good that your ex was soothing something inside of you just as you were soothing her desperate need for attachment.  That was certainly true for me.  

Cosmo here I will slighty disagree with you. Sure she did not chose to have BPD, but we should not feel sorry for them  like we should not feel angry. We should be neutral. Yes they have BPD, but this does not mean that they can humilate us and we do nothing. I do not like such thinking - they are not guilty let them do whatever they want, I will only give them love and silence and validation. We are humans, too, sometimes we should protect ourselves too. Let me give you an example - you see your ex, she comes to you and spits on you. Then she says you are an ass. What you would you do? Would you walk away ( and saying to yourself that she is not guilty) or you will say something do defend your confidence and even your being?

Yes, we should enforce boundaries and not put up with abusive behavior lm, you're right.  A borderline is not responsible for their disorder but they are responsible for their behavior, as we all are, and if that behavior is unacceptable to us we can express that to our partner, and if they can't or won't respect it, we can leave, we have those choices.  And it's also helpful to feel whatever we're feeling all the way; at the end of these relationships and after as the fog clears and we detach, we will probably feel anger, rage, denial, depression, disbelief, shock, confusion, disgust, whatever, and hopefully finally acceptance and freedom.  And one cool thing is, once we feel all those feelings all the way and process them, we may come to a place where the memories of the relationship are intact but the emotions tied to them are gone, so we can look more objectively at what it is to have this disorder and live with it, and maybe also develop compassion for our exes as we connect with how difficult and painful it is to live with, and that compassion can give us further peace.

[lm911]

I have never felt angry after the break up, I felt fear and guilt. That is why is strange to me that a lot of people are saying they are angry about their ex.

[FannyB]

Devaluedman:

Did the 2 week marriage include a honeymoon away? If so, how did she behave then?

[Devaluedman]

Fanny,

No honeymoon. And we never actually cohabitated. She decided after two weeks into the marriage that we had to re-do our relationship in order to live together.

Nice, huh?