Primary and replacement

[Family Court Strategies: When Your Partner Has BPD OR NPD Traits.]

Hi everyone,

I had a brief relationship with my partner, and I can see that in longer relationships people see themselves as the primary partner with others as replacements. In my relationship I cannot. With my ex, it seems like everyone thinks they are the primary partner and all others are replacements and this goes back almost to his first relationship? (The guy cannot let go, all his past relationships are in his life in some form) Is it because of the triangulations?

I sure was another "the one" but I don't think I was a primary, but I replaced someone from 2-3 years ago and she replaced someone else, they both think they are primaries and now I get treated like a primary because I left him. It's like he is the primary and everyone is basically a fallback depending on availability and they think they are the primary when this happens.

Have you ever seen anything like this? My ex seems more fuzzy than linear?

It's not very important that I have a clear answer, just curiosity. 

   

[thisworld]

Hi everyone,

I had a brief relationship with my partner, and I can see that in longer relationships people see themselves as the primary partner with others as replacements. In my relationship I cannot. With my ex, it seems like everyone thinks they are the primary partner and all others are replacements and this goes back almost to his first relationship? (The guy cannot let go, all his past relationships are in his life in some form) Is it because of the triangulations?

I sure was another "the one" but I don't think I was a primary, but I replaced someone from 2-3 years ago and she replaced someone else, they both think they are primaries and now I get treated like a primary because I left him. It's like he is the primary and everyone is basically a fallback depending on availability and they think they are the primary when this happens.

Have you ever seen anything like this? My ex seems more fuzzy than linear?

It's not very important that I have a clear answer, just curiosity. 

   

[Tommytwo]

I think most of us think we are the primary but I think we have that status just once during the initial feed, following the initial overvaluation and love bombing and subsequent devaluation   I've been recycled numerous times and I'm quite sure I was a replacement ,"holdover" until she either recycled from her stable of ex's or found a new host. My ex was a dedicated on line dater, constantly auditioning prospective victims. While saying these dates were innocent in her pusuit of the Right One, I now see it was more to do with her pathology to seek attention from literally hundreds of potential targets. I also believe she likely had sex with a large number of these men.

So, the fallacy of being the primary to me means that whoever is getting the most attention from the BPD's lighthouse at that moment.

[enlighten me]

I think it falls down to a ranking kind of thing which depending on mood depends where people sit.

During idolisation we are the primary. When it goes sour we get relegated and someone else becomes the primary. If they haven't replaced you then the primary could be one of their exs who they feel was the best fit at the time. This primary could change though as their mood and needs change. If they are broke financially then the ex with a good job, nice house and able to meet her needs could become the primary. If they are doing ok then the fun wild ex could be primary.

The primary could even be someone they haven't had a relationship with. A crush if you like.

[Confused?]

Everyone is a primary unless the pwBPD is living a double life. Example dating two people at once, not just hooking up but actually calling them their boyfriend or girlfriend. The term replacement is just that. It's a term. It's what us nons use to call the person that our exes left us for or lined up while still with us. The replacement becomes the primary. A pwBPD may feel a relationship is over months before finding anyone but they need to latch on to someone due to their low sense of worth and lack of identity.

Someone on here said the term replacement shouldn't be used because it is impossible to replace an individual since we are all different.

[thisworld]

Thank you Tommytwo and Enlighten me. Both of your comments clarify what I was trying to voice, and there is something validating in the way I perceive the existence of a hoard of exes. Part of my confusion is related with age I think. My ex is in his mid-thirties and I think, after enough repetitive relationship failures he has honed his skills of rationalization and also manipulation; so he introduces these exes right from the start with a very mature-sounding compassion discourse. This is something he now "comes with" but at first sounds innocent enough (I recognized this as a red flag but thought maybe this discourse, this way of looking at things was fine if people practiced appropriate boundaries - but of course, I didn't ask enough questions and discovered those boundaries!) I only later discovered that this discourse was just superficial and it's not just 5 exes, but also includes what Troisette calls cadets

And yes, the position of the "primary" seems to be exactly like what you are describing in my relationship.  

[thisworld]

Someone on here said the term replacement shouldn't be used because it is impossible to replace an individual since we are all different.

Yes, I remember that thread. I think, for myself, no, I cannot be replaced I'm unique. I also think this is the valid reality, individuals cannot be replaced. But I think the term is useful because it hints at how things work within the pwBPD framework and in my experience, no, I didn't feel like an individual there anyway. My ex couldn't grasp the implications of the fact that I was a "separate" being. So, the term still says something worthy to me - though of course, we shouldn't own it as a label defining who we really are. In reality, yes, we are unique individuals and what or who we are is not defined by the BPD.

[enlighten me]

People cant be replaced I agree but (for want of a better term) the service they provide can. This raises the question where we a partner or a service provider?

I fulfilled a need for my exs. That need to some extent has been filled by their new partners. How well we fulfilled their needs be it emotionally, financially etc depends on how we will rank later in their life.

[troisette]

Primary ranking; that's a difficult one for me. I'm not sure I ever felt like number one. Ex was like the lady in the circus, keeping all the plates spinning. Each plate had a different pattern: each of us probably felt that we were primaries in different areas of his life. Lots of "service providers", that sounds valid.

He talked of "cauterising" people from his life but, paradoxically, frequently spoke about his exs and others that he claimed to have cauterised. Triangulation was a feature - verbal and acting out, with exs, friends, ex lovers. Even, embarrassingly, my own friends who commented on his flirtiness. Unboundaried. So rankings difficult to ascertain.

At the end, I voiced my doubts to him that we'd ever been in a relationship (tacitly meaning a relationship as I understand it... .this involving loyalty, trust, communication... .). He assured me that we had been in a relationship: differing interpretations. I never felt the primary in his life but who's to say he didn't regard me as such in his convoluted BPD way?

A friend commented to me this morning that "he always had to be the centre of attention, I was so embarrassed when he was flirting with ... .in my kitchen". I've only just recently been reading about narcissism co-morbid with BPD but I am beginning to think he is. Narcissism and supply is somewhat different to BPD and replacement I think, although they can co-exist. Any comments on this would be appreciated.

[troisette]

Btw Thisworld: " after enough repetitive relationship failures he has honed his skills of rationalization and also manipulation; so he introduces these exes right from the start with a very mature-sounding compassion discourse."

Your ex, in his thirties, is practising the skills learnt by my ex who is in his sixties.

A psychiatrist told me that after repeated relationship patterns, they develop defence mechanisms. His friends of a few years think he is charmingly eccentric, nothing else. Whereas his ex wife, married for eighteen years, divorced for twenty five and never remarried, living in close proximity, will have nothing to do with him unless a family necessity. I guess she knew him him before the skills were honed... .

[thisworld]

Troisette,

Friends are always interesting. Some totally buy the façade, incredible. I think some are aware of what's going on - these are usually those who join later such as the wife of an old friend, etc. I believe they don't say anything for their own peace of mind. Then there are those who just continue their friendship despite all their proclaimed values, political values etc even when you expose an emotional abuser. Those are "friendships" based on interest I think. Sometimes the friend group or the society denies what's going on because, I think, they unconsciously don't want their schema to be shaken. Still, I don't think these people are liked as much as we think they are, or as much as it's shown to them when they are around. (There are loyal exceptions of course). His wife probably became "the mad woman in the attic" for this friend group, I wonder if anybody asked what made that woman mad. A couple of fair questions easily reveal the mentality of these exes actually.   

[troisette]

Interesting comment Thisworld.

We all live within a mile of each other, his friends, his ex, me and him. One of his friends commented that she never sees ex wife around town. My conversations with ex's son (before we ended) leads me to think that she deliberately socialises in next town, away from his group.

I've never met, or knowingly seen her so she may be deliberately avoiding him and his friends.

Interesting also that a newish member of his crowd commented to me on his immaturity. I think you are right, the schema must not be disturbed... .the illusion must be upheld. Frequently the way in groups, or communities, or societies... .

[didionit]

As hard as it is to process all of these things still, reading this series of posts is helpful as I'm faced with a still-ongoing cycle of attempts to get me to respond, via any form of communication left to him.  A friend took over monitoring his IG feed after he committed visual sexual assault (posting old intimate photos without my consent with long hate diatribes attached), and apparently, it's nothing but a cycle of posts about how much he misses me, followed by a hate post, followed by an over it post, followed by a post about his 'new true love' that's typically hypersexualized, in addition to being a clear repost of a photo that he did not take himself (whomever she is, she either doesn't know about his social media accounts, or, must really hate herself to be involved with someone who puts a post about her next to a post about his longing for his ex-lover's body), followed by a comment on a blog that I kept EIGHT YEARS AGO informing me that I'm the 'love of his life' but i 'killed him'.

You can't make sense out of the heaping pile of their discards and current supposed partners.  Because there's no sense there at all.

[thisworld]

I feel for you didionit,  these are very difficult things to go through.   Still, such volatility helps us see what we were dealing with clearly I think. I'm doing gray rock with him and if I have to choose, I'll try to pick my fights wisely. Apparently, I killed him too. I received an animation like that after our break-up, he started message bombing as soon as he reached his new house.

How do you feel about visual sexual assault? sometimes it helps to think that actually we have choices (like taking the websites and aggressors to the court) and not using those options right now is actually a choice of ours.

Stay strong

[didionit]

Thanks thisworld    I always appreciate reading your thoughtful posts.

As far as the assault--I'm investigating legal options.  I'm torn between wanting him to suffer any sort of real consequence for what he's done, and, the anger that arises knowing that it will only add fuel to his persecution complex, and further make me the villain here, even though, clearly, I'm not the one perpetrating the abuse.  It's so frustrating.  There's no way to ever make them 'get it'.  Not in any real way.

[thisworld]

As far as I know, you can collect legal evidence with the help of a lawyer, but may choose to start a case at a later date - in my country, there is a 1 year period. You don't have to decide anything now, you know. You can reassess the situation when you are emotionally stronger after some detachment. Maybe this would allow you to observe his behaviours (how malignant is he if there is a replacement for instance), how safe would you need to make yourself if you decided to get into a legal war with him? And then you an look at your feelings and decide, prioritizing your emotional and physical safety. I wouldn't torment myself with a decision if I'm unable to make one at the moment. We have the right to be indecisive. You will know when a decision starts to be shaped in you. Your well-being comes first.

Stay strong,