My Letter to my exBPDgf

[WhatJustHappened?]

It won't be sent so perhaps therapeutic for me.  


Dear exBPDgf:

By now you have figured out that I have extricated myself from this relationship permanently.

Since some time has passed, I wanted you to know the reason why. Mainly for my benefit.

You are a fraud and a liar. You haven't been straight with me in regards to your health and/or where-abouts. I am also betting you have not been truthful about your so-to-be-ex husband or pretty much anything. "Where there is smoke, there's fire" as they say.

I believe that you are either a very cruel or a very sick person or both. Regardless, there is nothing I can or want to do to help you.

When I finally figured everything out, it all made sense. It really started back to 1988 with your lying and cheating (she was one of my first loves). I should have not denied it then. You also had a friend back then who pleaded with me not to trust you (I can't remember her name - she lived near you in XXX). You were such a good liar back then that I was not willing to see the light and of course was already hooked. That's on me. Apparently you have only gotten better at lying and deception.

Now that I understand your game, I know that most, if not all of our recent experience was not a real possibility for you. Worst case scenario for me is that I wasted about 90 days of my time on a 'never-going-to-happen' fantasy. There were so many clues and inconsistencies with your excuses, rationale and stories.

Thankfully I found out before too much time passed. I am also thankful for not catching any STDs as I just had a full work-up with negative results. Good for me. I'm sure there have been many other victims as your fixation with all things sex was a big, giant clue.

You are a disgrace to the health professional industry (she is in that industry). You are even more of a disgrace to all the people who are really sick and are suffering from cancer, brain tumors, MS, etc. That's just pathetic. If I believed in karma, I would say yours will be coming but karma is just a human idea that makes people feel good.

Well, I can't really think of anything else to say. I could go on about being hurt and how I knew blah, blah, blah but who cares. For me, in the end, it was just 7 days of fun so I can't complain too much. My only other regret was sharing my weaknesses with you as an emotional vampire (thanks to one of this board's members for this expression) like yourself will only try to use that kind of information against their victims. BTW, I really enjoyed the message you left saying an attorney was going to call me to play on my anxiety. People who love each other don't try to exploit their "soulmate's" weaknesses. I guess that's some real love huh? (sarcasm - she left me a message stating that this is 'some love' as I didn't call her back)

Lastly, I don't feel sorry for you because demons like yourself always manage to get by. Luckily, your bright and attractive so that helps. But my suspicion is that you will never admit to any of your behavior and will continue to blame others' for your actions and never find any real happiness. Or maybe not. Who knows/don't care.

Good luck on your next shiny toy/victim.  

All the worst... .

WJH

[PlanetsBendBetweenUs]

Well put my friend. They do make you feel like crap about yourself. I have been going over parting last words that I would like say to her  all day and I thank you for writing this so I don't have to. Don't get me wrong I have much that i would like to say to her but I have to do strict NC. I do not trust her nor do I trust myself around her. She is evil. An evil feeling surrounds her like a dense fog. It is insane and I ignored it and it HURTS! I want to scream out LOUD! You ___ you cannot treat me like this anymore it is OVER DO YOU READ ME OVER! I hate you you castrating ball busting little ___ You are the SCARIEST MONSTER THAT I CAN THINK OF they should make a movie about YOU and put ___ vomit bags on every seat because you are sickening and MAKE MY SKIN CRAWL. Sorry a little angr there oh well I am over that so again Well put Bro.

[WhatJustHappened?]

Thanks TPBBU... .

BPDs should come with a warning label. Perhaps BPD Offender List? Think of how many people we could spare from needless suffering?

[Mutt]

Hi WhatJustHappened?,

It really started back to 1988 with your lying and cheating (she was one of my first loves).

'88 is a long time ago. Did you lose touch or were you friends?

[WhatJustHappened?]

Yep, we lost touch and went out own separate ways. There were some of the same issues (lying) then as there are now. I chalked it up to youth and other party-related matters which tend to cloud one's judgment if you know what I mean. After all, it was the 80s

[Mutt]

I understand what your saying about being young and partying   She was special because she was your first love.

Where you thinking about her over the years? Maybe re-capture lightning in a bottle?

How did that feel like that you were able to re-connect with her 27 years later? Were you hoping for a more mature person?

[WhatJustHappened?]

I understand what your saying about being young and partying   She was special because she was your first love.

Where you thinking about her over the years? Maybe re-capture lightning in a bottle?

How did that feel like that you were able to re-connect with her 27 years later? Were you hoping for a more mature person?

Second love... .a lot of passion and intensity. Yes, I did think of her frequently. I'm not sure if I was thinking about the person or the intensity if that makes sense. There's just something about young, raw love. We met back up a few times about 14 years ago and then lost track.

It felt like a blessing when we reconnected. We hit it off like wildfire. She was separated from her long-time husband (I think... .who knows) and told me all the bad things about him while telling me that it was fate to met again at this time. I had been single for over a year after my own long term relationship and was lonely. It seemed perfect. Yes, I was hoping for a more mature person. Those are some good questions Mutt. I got a little choked up reading them.

[Mutt]

Sure there's something you don't forget about intense passionate love. Her marriage was failing and you were available. I can understand feeling lonely and the timing was right? It's a second life with your romance and she treated you the same way. This has to be a lot of pain

[WhatJustHappened?]

The only good part is that I understand it now. That's the only good part of this f'ed up situation. I now see other relationships that had the same characteristics. That tells me something.

Frankly, when we were young, I just lost interest in the drama and moved on. It hurt but there were other ladies to see. I regretted it later because I missed that intensity.

[Mutt]

Did you find that she gave off a certain electricity?

Is that how she was different? What did you find out? What were you able to piece together with her characteristics and other relationships?

[WhatJustHappened?]

Did you find that she gave off a certain electricity?

I felt that I was always attracted to her. I can't say if it was electricity... .maybe... .but definitely an undeniable connection.

Is that how she was different? What did you find out? What were you able to piece together with her characteristics and other relationships?

There was just something about her, her looks, mannerisms, magnetism and connection. It was just very alluring. I can't really explain it any better. She is like a drug as many have said. I found her to be my greatness weakness and I can't even explain why. The sex was amazing and our intimacy was incredible.



Yes, I was able to piece things together I am very thankful for that. For whatever reason, my "fixer" personality and compassionate side is easily exploited. I look back at the three turmoil-based relationships and see the same patterns. Push/pull, drama, manipulation. And the worst part, I seemed to enjoy some of the turmoil myself! That's the scariest part. Not so much now but definitely when I was younger. Could the women who shared these same characteristic have PD of some sort? I'm thinking yes.

Mutt, you're asking some great questions. Is there a reason or rationale behind what you're asking? Just curious.

[Mutt]

I notice that your letter is angry and rightfully so. Your anger may be because things didn't turn out the way you expected. Do you feel betrayal? The rationale is that this is your personal experience with someone that has mental illness. I find that it helps me to talk and have someone listen that's nonjudgmental. I'm trying to do that for you  

I had a girlfriend that had certain pathologies, she was emotionally immature, manipulative, little empathy, although I can't say she was borderline.

my "fixer" personality and compassionate side is easily exploited.

I am the caretaker type and I do think that I lacked personal boundaries, unfortunately I met a woman that I had no clue about. I think it's important understanding the behaviors and less so diagnosing ex partners.

I now know certain behaviors that raises alarm bells and I have a protective outward layer that defends my core values by boundaries. You're a compassionate person and find that you are easily exploited. Can you identify with lack of personal boundaries?

[WhatJustHappened?]

I notice that your letter is angry and rightfully so. Your anger may be because things didn't turn out the way you expected. Do you feel betrayal? The rationale is that this is your personal experience with someone that has mental illness. I find that it helps me to talk and have someone listen that's nonjudgmental. I'm trying to do that for you  

I had a girlfriend that had certain pathologies, she was emotionally immature, manipulative, little empathy, although I can't say she was borderline.

my "fixer" personality and compassionate side is easily exploited.

I am the caretaker type and I do think that I lacked personal boundaries, unfortunately I met a woman that I had no clue about. I think it's important understanding the behaviors and less so diagnosing ex partners.

I now know certain behaviors that raises alarm bells and I have a protective outward layer that defends my core values by boundaries. You're a compassionate person and find that you are easily exploited. Can you identify with lack of personal boundaries?

Yes, I do feel like I was betrayed. I feel that there was never any honest intentions behind the words. It's hard for me to understand how much of this was due to a mental illness or just plain deception. Either way, it doesn't feel good. It's interesting, once you begin to unravel one lie, you begin to question everything else. And then when you begin to question everything else, you start having those "oh, that's why that didn't make any sense" moments.

Yes, I can identify with lack of personal boundaries in the instance. Usually I am much better at cutting the ties when things seem fishy. But this one was different. I still knew something wasn't right but continued anyway because I was lonely. Hopefully this will be the last time that I don't listen to my gut.

[Mutt]

I notice that your letter is angry and rightfully so. Your anger may be because things didn't turn out the way you expected. Do you feel betrayal? The rationale is that this is your personal experience with someone that has mental illness. I find that it helps me to talk and have someone listen that's nonjudgmental. I'm trying to do that for you  

I had a girlfriend that had certain pathologies, she was emotionally immature, manipulative, little empathy, although I can't say she was borderline.

my "fixer" personality and compassionate side is easily exploited.

I am the caretaker type and I do think that I lacked personal boundaries, unfortunately I met a woman that I had no clue about. I think it's important understanding the behaviors and less so diagnosing ex partners.

I now know certain behaviors that raises alarm bells and I have a protective outward layer that defends my core values by boundaries. You're a compassionate person and find that you are easily exploited. Can you identify with lack of personal boundaries?

Yes, I do feel like I was betrayed. I feel that there was never any honest intentions behind the words. It's hard for me to understand how much of this was due to a mental illness or just plain deception. Either way, it doesn't feel good. It's interesting, once you begin to unravel one lie, you begin to question everything else. And then when you begin to question everything else, you start having those "oh, that's why that didn't make any sense" moments.

Yes, I can identify with lack of personal boundaries in the instance. Usually I am much better at cutting the ties when things seem fishy. But this one was different. I still knew something wasn't right but continued anyway because I was lonely. Hopefully this will be the last time that I don't listen to my gut.

I can understand how your feelings are hurt. I think that lying ( dissociation ) is often driven by the disorder. If her feelings are out of place she will alter reality to match her feelings. My ex partner was so convinced that she was telling the truth that it had me guess my own judgment. It wasn't a good feeling.

I get it. I felt lonely, depressed and anxious to settle down with a woman. When I met my ex partner and I recall a few things that set alarm bells off, she was clingy and she had a display of disproportionate anger within the first few weeks.

I think that we do the best that we can with what we know and I don't think we should be hard on ourselves. I can't say that I'll always make the right calls. I'll simply do the best that I can. I can say that the experience has brought wisdom.

I got intimate with her very quickly and as I said before that I didn't understand what I got involved in. I can say now that I would choose to know a person better and have things move slowly and the push / pull behavior with personal boundaries would set alarm bells.

What I appreciate from my relationship is that I learned a lot of life lessons from the mentally ill and I think that the mentally ill teach us.

[WhatJustHappened?]

Mutt-

I was going to ask you about your story. Can you go into more detail? I am curious. What type of work do you do?

Maybe it's the anger but I am still not 100% convinced that my ex was BPD or just board and evil. A hard thing to say I know.

[Mutt]

I do non specific work in the tech field.

I had a young family of 6. My ex left in 2013 and the kids were S1, S5, D9, SD12. I knew very little about abnormal psychology and zero knowledge on personality disorders.

Over the course of my common-law relationship and marriage I found myself seperated for a couple of weeks and sometimes for a month and a half or so because of the conflict and my wife's engulfment. This pattern went on for a few years. My sister was sympathetic and would let me stay with her family. I saw it as a mental break and I would recharge my batteries.

My marriage was bad and I had become frustrated with my ex partner's behaviors and in late 2011 when she had a particular bad borderline rage I had told her enough, I want a divorce. I was frustrated because the tools that I had learned in counselling and couples counselling were not working. I wasn't a perfect husband by any means and I invalidated her often. I didn't really want a divorce and it was a bluff that triggered her fear of abandonment. Looking back on it now, her abandonment fears could of been triggered at any time.

Things got really bad and then ugly after she left. I felt defeated and she wanted to separate and divorce and move out. At the time I couldn't understand the logic because she didn't have the financial means and employment. How is she going to rent a place and support herself with 4 kids?

She had emotionally checked out and I could tell that anything that I would say to try to convince her otherwise doesn't work. I had seen her act this way in my marriage where there were periods of what I thought was extreme stubbornness and I couldn't get through to her. I understand these periods now as splitting and that I was split black. I thought let her leave and go through whatever it is that she's going through and she'll come back and reconcile. I thought maximum she would be able to support herself is two months or maybe three. I was wrong, she's been gone for close to two and a half years now.

She moved into her new place in early 2013 and the anger hadn't hit me. I stayed in the family home for a few weeks before moving out. I was shell shocked and realized that I am going through a traumatic event.

I get the anger, it is a part of grieving the loss of a relationship. I went through the anger stage around three weeks after she moved into her new place. I had hopes that we would reconcile and at the time I has access and visitation every second weekend with the kids. The second visitation that I had with the kids she sent an email and I read it at work.

I don't want you to hear this from the kids Mutt, but I have a boyfriend

I felt anger and resentment because I was lied to. Things were getting real and what I had worked hard to keep together ( family ) I felt I loss control of. I understand feeling betrayed. I was angry for a few months about her affair and that she was sleeping with another man. I didn't have emotional support from my family and I did have support from my biological mom. I had begun searching for my mom just before I met my ex wife through post adoption agencies. I met my mother 10 years ago and had begun to know her and I had made her a part of my life and family.

My biological mother picked up on my wife's acting out and what I was sharing with her with our conversations. She let me vent the anger for about three months after the split and I had told her I thought my wife was a sociopath because of the lack of empathy.

My mom said No Mutt, your wife is borderline personality disorder

I then started searching online and the top results were sites that validated the anger and I found bpdfamily.com and lurked for about a week or so. I was reading the threads on Leaving and saw many posts of similar stories with members and joined. What I wanted was the truth about what I had experienced for 7 and a half years because nothing made sense.

[WhatJustHappened?]

Wow Mutt, that's rough all the way around with a lot of moving parts. How are you and your children doing now? Is there some sort of balance between you and your ex-wife now or is it NC? I'm really sorry to hear about your situation.

[Mutt]

The kids and I are doing well. It's very difficult to get full custody in Canada and the family justice system does like to give shared custody. I went to court and got a court order and for shared custody. I think the kids need an emotionally stable parent to help them cope with a parent that is mentally ill and they are thriving   I removed the system I had in place to stop the bleeding for both sides with no contact and I have full contact with my ex partner.

The balance is that I learned about BPD to depersonalize the behaviors. That said, she can be difficult when she's emotionally dysregulated. I understand it's not about me and I learned the tools to defuse these types of situations like validation and SET.

For example last week she was emotionally dysregulated and likely because she's pregnant and being invalidated with her boyfriend. I took what I could validate and it stopped her from escalating. The tools work and I'm gentle and I don't retaliate with anger. Her anger is from whatever trauma she experienced and not about me. It's not something I thought possible a year or two ago and certainly not in my marriage. It helps me because I understand.

[Hawk Ridge]

Mutt, you have been so helpful in your posts, a solid rock to me, over the last year so thanks for sharing your story.  You make a difference. Thank you

[Mutt]

Thank you HawkRidge.

I'll leave you a bit of advice WhatJustHappened and I can understand the anger.

Pain is inevitable; Suffering is optional.

Work the lessons to the right side of the board and there's tons of stuff at the top of this board in LESSONS.

Hang in there.


----Mutt