Need help recovering. Affecting my life negatively

[Fordthe54]

Hello there.

I'm 28 and back in the summer started seeing a 21 year old college girl.  Really sexy, had the slutty look to her. I hadn't been with any girl for about 8 months and this chic was immediately into me big time. We started hanging out, she was escalating things physically pretty quickly. She was telling me how much she liked me but how much that scared her too. She starts telling me that she's "___ed up" and that I shouldn't want her. I already know at this point that this girl smokes weed all day, drinks everyday and is depressed. Goes out 4 nights a week to the club and basically just constantly hangs out with her similar/slutty best friend. Anyway, I tell myself "alright I'll just have fun with this girl, she clearly isn't stable but she's hot so I'll keep ___ing her".

Well here's where the mistakes started happening.  This girl would text me all day and night. Good morning baby, good night baby, "I miss you 2-3 times a day". I'd text with her all day long too. Giving her the affection right back. I'd try to help her through her ___. She'd get sad all the time and tell me how she's struggling through life. I was there for her pretty much always. But getting her to hang out was really hard. She'd keep telling me she misses me and wants to see me but I'd always try to plan stuff with her and she'd say she's busy or just flake. She'd tell me she's just a flake and that she's sorry but that she wants to see me. Well eventually I'd start getting pissed that this girl kept saying she wanted me and only wanted me to be ___ing her but she wouldn't come around more than once every 2-3 weeks. We had a few fights over it and she'd just keep saying that she doesn't do relationships and this is why (but we totally acted like we were dating for about 4 months).

I got needier and needier trying to fuel my addiction to her. The sex was amazing. She wanted to blow me constantly. Pornstar blowjobs. She started getting colder, more distant and I got needier. Then she called it off and said i needed someone else and that it would only get worse if her and I kept going.

That was in December. Since then I went searching for answers. Learned about BPD (I never knew before) and realized she meets all the criteria (dad abused them when the were young, claims rape at 14, long history with drugs and alcohol, ___ed up relationships, depression, doesn't trust anyone, etc"

I've been battling hard with recovering from this. I know she's terrible for me and I just can't get her out of my head.  She's brought out all my insecurities and I'm left feeling embarrassed about how I got owned by her.  I was weak, inexperienced and she crushed me. After she ghosted o sent a few long emails claiming I had realized my mistakes and how I mishandled her. She wouldn't reply. I said merry Christmas and she replied. Then I sent one more long text on January 5th basically saying I've realized what's happened and that we're not right for each other but that I hope she's okay and good luck in the future. Since then I've been NC completely but I keep looking at her activity online compulsively. Today I got rid of Facebook cause she's starting to post a lot of pics of her at the club with other guys wit their arm around her, which she never used to do.

I know I gotta move past this little slut but it's been really tough. It's an addiction and whenever I'm at home alone and I get lonely, I go right back to analyzing all this ___ again. I'm a pretty smart dude and am honestly trying really hard to move on but this ___ is affecting my work and personal life greatly. I've been doing well, trying harder at work, trying to meet new people, been crushing the gym and eating well. But then I'll have days where I'm full on depressed about this. Today has been one of those days... .

Part of me wants to talk to this b___ and tell her if figured her out and that I hate what she's done to me but I know that's not realistic and wouldn't do anything. I know it's just up to me to move past this. Until today I've spoke to nobody about it and have been dealing with it completely alone. Thanks for reading

[bdyw8]

Hey Fordthe54, sounds like you're feeling a lot of the same things I've felt.  Sounds like you got lured in with a lot of good things and traits and then became "addicted" to them.  And then when she took them away, you become demanding and then get made out to be the bad guy.  If that sounds right, then we feel the same for sure!

I think you got it right when you realized she wasn't right for you.  I'm struggling too - I was with my exBPD for 4 years and have been taken to the cleaners emotionally as well.  Being alone is hard, but now, after a month and a half, I'm starting to get used to it and it's starting to feel not so painful.  When you become totally reliant on someone else to meet your needs and to make you feel like you're worth something, it's going to be hard to feel okay in your own skin, by yourself.

Going NC sounds like a good idea too, especially the facebook thing.  I deleted and blocked my ex as well as she would play little manipulative games to make me jealous and hurt me.  So I've insulated myself as much as I can from her reach to protect myself and help me move on.   I look at her like a drug.  If I was trying to get over my drug addiction, I wouldn't hang around my dealer or with using friends, having it in my face everyday.

Rather than focusing your energy on her, try starting to focus on yourself and healing yourself - maybe discovering why you fell for someone like this in the first place.  What I'm trying to realize and tell myself is that this was a sick person and she didn't intend to hurt me like she did.  She just did things acting on her own fears and insecurities and tried to protect her own emotions as much as possible.  Of course in doing so, I was devastated as she changed from a seemingly good-hearted person into someone very cold and callous.

I've learned a LOT about myself from this 4 year shxt show of a relationship and I learned that I need to work on a lot of things in me so that I can be in a healthy relationship in the future and not find someone else that will abuse me - more importantly, I won't stay in a situation where my needs aren't being met.  Would have saved me a lot of trouble if I had pulled the shoot at the first sign of serious red flags - in retrospect, I'm talking Date #2 and 3, that I blew right by because of my own co-dependency, low self-esteem, etc.

Good luck, and remember it will get easier with time!

[Fordthe54]

Hey Fordthe54, sounds like you're feeling a lot of the same things I've felt.  Sounds like you got lured in with a lot of good things and traits and then became "addicted" to them.  And then when she took them away, you become demanding and then get made out to be the bad guy.  If that sounds right, then we feel the same for sure!

I think you got it right when you realized she wasn't right for you.  I'm struggling too - I was with my exBPD for 4 years and have been taken to the cleaners emotionally as well.  Being alone is hard, but now, after a month and a half, I'm starting to get used to it and it's starting to feel not so painful.  When you become totally reliant on someone else to meet your needs and to make you feel like you're worth something, it's going to be hard to feel okay in your own skin, by yourself.

Going NC sounds like a good idea too, especially the facebook thing.  I deleted and blocked my ex as well as she would play little manipulative games to make me jealous and hurt me.  So I've insulated myself as much as I can from her reach to protect myself and help me move on.   I look at her like a drug.  If I was trying to get over my drug addiction, I wouldn't hang around my dealer or with using friends, having it in my face everyday.

Rather than focusing your energy on her, try starting to focus on yourself and healing yourself - maybe discovering why you fell for someone like this in the first place.  What I'm trying to realize and tell myself is that this was a sick person and she didn't intend to hurt me like she did.  She just did things acting on her own fears and insecurities and tried to protect her own emotions as much as possible.  Of course in doing so, I was devastated as she changed from a seemingly good-hearted person into someone very cold and callous.

I've learned a LOT about myself from this 4 year shxt show of a relationship and I learned that I need to work on a lot of things in me so that I can be in a healthy relationship in the future and not find someone else that will abuse me - more importantly, I won't stay in a situation where my needs aren't being met.  Would have saved me a lot of trouble if I had pulled the shoot at the first sign of serious red flags - in retrospect, I'm talking Date #2 and 3, that I blew right by because of my own co-dependency, low self-esteem, etc.

Good luck, and remember it will get easier with time!

Hey thanks for the reply. Yeah whats funny is everything you're saying, I know is right. It's more about fixing my own issues at this point. Issues I didn't realize I had before I met her. But still, I can't help but feel ___ty because my intentions with her were always good and they just end up leaving you in shambles, embarrassed, with all these questions. Then you realize there's nothing you can even do except try to move past it.  proving to be much more difficult than I imagined. She's a person and I cared about her cause I'm naturally a nice and caring guy. I feel like she's destroyed that part of me a little as I've never just been discarded like that before... .  Anyways. Time is helping but some days are tough. Thanks again

[bdyw8]

I hear you.  What I'm trying to take away from it is that I'm now more uniquely aware of some of the warning signs so hopefully on my next go around into dating/relationships, I will know to pull the pin sooner before I've leveraged my sanity, emotions, etc. on a woman.

As cliche as it is, time is the only thing that can heal.  And forgiveness for my exBPD.   I have lots of bad days still too and they suck for sure.  I sometimes wish there was a magic pill that would help me forget all of this. 

I talked with a counsellor over lunch today and she gave me renewed hope that there are healthy woman out there that can give me what I need without the constant struggle and fight.  Someone that I won't get to the point of being so eroded that I consider suicide.  Hard to believe I let myself compromise my sanity to that point!  The sooner you get out the more thankful you should be - this counsellor told me to not beat myself up but be thankful I got out at 4 years and not 14 years.  So be grateful you got out even sooner, even if it was on her terms, not yours... .

[Fordthe54]

I hear you.  What I'm trying to take away from it is that I'm now more uniquely aware of some of the warning signs so hopefully on my next go around into dating/relationships, I will know to pull the pin sooner before I've leveraged my sanity, emotions, etc. on a woman.

As cliche as it is, time is the only thing that can heal.  And forgiveness for my exBPD.   I have lots of bad days still too and they suck for sure.  I sometimes wish there was a magic pill that would help me forget all of this.  

I talked with a counsellor over lunch today and she gave me renewed hope that there are healthy woman out there that can give me what I need without the constant struggle and fight.  Someone that I won't get to the point of being so eroded that I consider suicide.  Hard to believe I let myself compromise my sanity to that point!  The sooner you get out the more thankful you should be - this counsellor told me to not beat myself up but be thankful I got out at 4 years and not 14 years.  So be grateful you got out even sooner, even if it was on her terms, not yours... .

That's a very good way of looking at it. I'm just thinking I would have actually sacrificed everything to try and be in a relationship with this girl. I was willing to do pretty much anything to make her happy instead of focusing on my own life, which is the healthy way to go about things. That's a sick thought. I would have ended up in a way worse spot if this went on for years instead of months. So i guess it's a good thing she ghosted me even though it hurts the ego. As you can tell I have the right mindset for recovery, I guess the hard part now is fully letting go. I can't stop checking in on her. I'm constantly wondering what she's thinking. So now it's that stupid attachment that's upsetting me and what I can't let go of. I can't bring myself to block her on social media because then it feels like she won. I don't want her to get the satisfaction of knowing I had to block her.  It shows that she's still affecting me. I'm gonna try and use will power and just not check her Twitter feed. I've been checking it like 10x daily for about a month since I went NC cause posts almost daily her thoughts and feelings and it was a way I still felt connected to her but it's just hurting me, I realize that. Still, really hard to not look

[bdyw8]

Maybe ask yourself why you want to look at her social media.  Is it because you hope that she'll be miserable without you and post that she misses you?   I know that is what I would want to see and seeing pics of her happy, losing weight, with someone else would crush me even more.   I know my exBPD well enough to know that she will take every opportunity to hurt me and make me jealous, even though she'll say to my face "I love you and always will and I don't want you to hurt".

So to protect myself, I block her from everything.  Ego blow or not, I want to protect myself from her manipulation and lies because if I expose myself to them, then she wins.  Like you, I always fancied myself a smart guy that wouldn't get duped, so I know what it feels like to feel absolutely lied to and deceived when you trust someone with all your heart.  So now I'm only worried about protecting myself for the sake of my own sanity.  I don't want to be at the jumping off point (literally) ever again in my life.  So I'll do anything to avoid that.   It's so hard to move on from these types of relationships when there is a connection remaining, however small.

That's my opinion at least, take it for a grain of salt