7 months NC

[hopealways]

It has been 7 months of NC.

I do think of her less often, but I still think of her every day, all the time.

I do see a light in the horizon, but it is so far away. My T says I need to be more patient with myself.

BPD tragedy hits all demographics.  I'm highly educated, very well off, handsome, and live in a large city.  I know my friends wonder why I can't seem to just move on since I seemingly have everything going for me.  And I do. And I will.  I just need more time.

For anyone doubting NC, don't. Yes it is painful, but that is why we chose our BPDx, to get to today, to get to this pain, finally, to let all our struggles out so we can finally live.  I am certain of this.

And that is why I persevere. I refuse to look at her social media, or to ask friends what she's up to.  

One reason for my impatience is that I feel I am in a race to get better because I feel if she does contact me before then, I will go back.  I want to be able to say no.  My T says she wouldn't be surprised if my BPDx contacts me again, any day, explaining that there is no rhyme or reason when she will reach out, that it is completely dependent on her own neediness.  Very well said.

Hang in there.

[gah]

Awww deep hugs! I feel your pain.  It was a year ago the man I loved turned into someone I didn't know.  We bought a house this time last year.  He was amazing till Jekyl showed up. I left a couple months later after he tried to run me over with a car. 

I've dated a few people since then.  It's hard because we do not have the same connection - that I know wasn't real/the man I loved didn't really exist. I want Hyde back and feel ridiculous.  My friends would disown me.  I know they come as a pair  BPD is so incredibly sad.   

[hopealways]

Thanks gah. Yes it is truly sad. Sometimes I wonder if any of this even happened.  My friends post photos of awful roses (I mean wilted, short stemmed, and 10 pieces not even a dozen) from loser boyfriends with the caption "I'm a lucky girl" and I did SO MUCH for my ex emotionally, financially, spiritually, you name it, to be discarded via text.  It's like the more you do for them the worse they become. There is no winning. Unfortunately I ruminate on all the happy memories instead of remembering the awful ones.

[Jazzy]

Hopealways,

Good to hear you are doing better.

I am 4 months NC now . There are days when I feel better , yet again there are days when I get totally  overwhelmed with the pain . It is one step forward two steps back.

Reading your mail gives me hope that I will reach a stage when I am indifferent to  my bf  and stop questioning why he betrayed  me and  replaced and discarded me for no fault of mine. My life revolved around him and his needs for 6 years , but now I must invest in ME.

I wish you all the best .

[heartandwhole]

Hi hopealways,

I can really empathize with your feelings. I remember at 7 months out how I felt about my pwBPD, and I was still quite anxious and thinking about him a lot. I remember saying to my T when I started to feel better that maybe after I understood everything about BPD and my own FOO stuff that we could somehow have a relationship again. My T was not enthusiastic about that idea, to say the least, and I remember feeling a bit dejected about her reaction.

Today, I understand exactly why she reacted that way and I am SO grateful.

I remember about a year or so after our breakup, being on a train and hearing a male voice that resembled pwBPD's... .it wasn't him, but my body reacted with anxiety and stress, I'm talking a fright/flight/freeze- like response. I used to get the same reactions near the end of our relationship when emails came in from him, because so many had been shocking, out-of-the-blue retractions of what I thought were his feelings/plans/intentions.

I, too, decided that NC was the way for me to go. I know it's not for everyone, but I needed uninterrupted time to grieve, recognize my unskillful patterns of relating, and recover. I told pwBPD that I needed NC to help me heal and he respected that (for the most part; there was some indirect communication from him that I didn't respond to).

The reason I'm telling you all this is because of your comment about wanting to get stronger before your ex possibly contacts you. I really understand what you mean. There was a break in my relationship for 3 months (initiated by me) and when I contacted him after that brief time of NC, with the intention of just letting the "wall of silence down," (not wanting a romantic relationship) I was sucked back into the dance. I hadn't taken enough time or done the work of looking at myself and my patterns.

A couple of weeks ago, after nearly 4 years of NC, pwBPD (newly married!) contacted me directly. When I saw his name on the email, I felt surprise... .and that's it. No twinges or heart racing or anything like I had felt before. It seems I just don't believe the words anymore. I've learned that I can't count on them meaning what I think/want them to mean, if that makes sense. I was able to answer with love in my heart and tell him (kindly) that I didn't feel the same bur wished him much happiness.

Things get better, hopealways. It takes time, though. I think your T is wise to say be patient with yourself. For a while in the beginning, I felt like I'd never feel joy or well-being again (and I didn't care), but I did and I do. Healing comes in increments and is different for everyone. For me, at about 9 months something started to shift. Then, every few months it seemed that I felt better, but it was subtler and subtler until one day I realized that I felt good. Really good.

I think it's great that you are seeing a T and taking time to sit in your garden ('ve read some of your previous posts). I find connecting with nature to be very healing. I'm also into yoga/meditation and writing.

What other things do you do for yourself hopealways?

I'm grateful for your sharing. Keep on keepin' on. I know it's hard but it's so worth it. 

heartandwhole 

[C.Stein]

One reason for my impatience is that I feel I am in a race to get better because I feel if she does contact me before then, I will go back.  I want to be able to say no.  My T says she wouldn't be surprised if my BPDx contacts me again, any day, explaining that there is no rhyme or reason when she will reach out, that it is completely dependent on her own neediness.  Very well said.

It's been about 6.5 months since I was discarded via text, 4 months since her last contact confirming my suspicions from last April that I had been replaced (final text discard beginning of August).

I also think of her nearly every minute of every day.  She even follows me into my dreams almost daily as well.   It is very frustrating and it continues to confound me why I still feel so attached.  Never before have I been so profoundly hurt and impacted/damaged by another person, at least in memory.  I still find myself with tears in my eyes at least once or twice daily (sometimes more).

There are moments where I feel like it was yesterday when we were together and other times when she seems like a complete and total stranger.   Just about everything I do in my life I am reminded of her.  Her "ghost" follows me everywhere.  I have felt a lot of anger towards her over the past month or so, but I wonder if it is her I am angry with or myself?

Three weeks ago I had a small reason to think my ex might be trying to "accidentally" run into me.  Turns out I was wrong but the feelings the idea evoked were powerful, conflicted and confusing.  Numerous scenarios ran through my head of how I might respond.  These ranged from wanting to hold her accountable for what she did to telling her to stay away from me (in a not so nice way) to wondering if and how I might be able to get past what she did to give it another shot.  I was right back into feeling anxious again and I still do from time to time.  

Then I was reminded of how she has given herself and her love to my replacement and I feel somewhat disgusted and repulsed ... .yet at the same time I still feel love for her somewhere inside of me.   Regardless, I am still dead to her apparently.  A deleted waste of time.  I suppose I should be grateful?

[Jazzy]

C. Stein,

I  feel your pain as I am at the same stage as you are... .nearly 7 months since I was replaced and discarded  and and 4 months since I went NC.

My ex is on my mind every waking moment.  The only time I do not think of him is when I manage to get some sleep. Like your ex, mine has not bothered to ever get in touch with me. One part of me hates him for the way he has destroyed me, yet another part of me misses him like crazy .  There are times when   I want to text him or call him, but when I remember that my place has been taken by another person I hold myself back. I am constantly see sawing between wanting him back and knowing that staying away is the best for me. I don't know whether life will ever be normal again.  Every little thing I do  or see or hear reminds me of him. I feel he will haunt me all my life.

Our only hope is that with time we are able to cope better.

Hugs.

[C.Stein]

Our only hope is that with time we are able to cope better.

I have no doubt I will never completely get over this but I will eventually come to a place of indifference.  Why it is taking so long to come to that place however is really confusing me.

Sucks to be us   

[bdyw8]

Hopealways, thanks for this post... .

I SO relate to everything you said.  I went 3 months NC with my exBPDgf in the fall and then she came to my place just before xmas and I was in a dark place and I opened the door and I let her charm work on me again.   After about 4 days of idealization, I committed all-in again to her and 4 days after that, she dumped me again, leaving me a puddle on the floor questioning my reasons for being alive and coping with the pain of being duped AGAIN.

So now it's been about 45 days NC and I'm still struggling terribly, especially after this past V-day weekend.  I almost broke down yesterday.  I miss her so much, even with all the emotional and psychological abuse, my mind chooses to stay attached to the brief and fleeting good moments and how high she could make me feel at those times.

My exBPD lives two blocks away from me and I am, like you, DESPERATE to get better.  I'm afraid to see her car on the road, afraid to see her out walking in the neighbourhood with her kids (whom my kids miss terribly as well).  I'm afraid she will start stalking me again like she did in the fall when I first did the NC with her.  I'm afraid to see her with someone else and for the betrayal to be complete.

I want to get better too as fast as possible.  I have lost friends and even a sponsor in AA over this relationship and am getting to a place where I feel really alone and hopeless.  It's good to know that other people are struggling too - tell me it gets easier with time?  

I'm praying that she does not purposely register her kids in an activity she knows I do with mine.  She mentioned something like that in our 2 week shxtshow over the christmas break.  I don't know what I would do if she did.  

I'm at a pretty low point that I haven't been at since the first couple of weeks... .  :'( :'(

[Itstopsnow]

It is the hardest thing I've gone through in a long time. And me too I think about my time with him like it was yesterday. I'm lonely and alone a lot. But I'm not ready to date. Life seems to be very dark or heavy at times. But I have to realize that it's been 100 days of nc and it will only get longer as each day passes. I have to let my heart catch up to logic. I am saving money, piece of my mind and I'm not as stressed out as I was with him. And now knowing the whole relationship was a fraud. And who even knows how many girls or maybe even guys he cheated on me with. It's just so disappointing knowing this person wasn't at all who I thought he was. Left with broken memories sucks. Especially when so many of those memories were at one time wonderful to me. He even said to me before every came out that in 30 years when he looks back at his life and that our relationship will be his favorite. I know our connection was real. He even told my replacement that I was beautiful and he didn't know how he got me and I was funny. But it didn't stop him from raging at me and cheating on me. I don't think he will find someone to go on all the vacations I went with him. He likely won't have money to do that anymore anyway. Because he's in deep credit card debt now that he doesn't have me paying for 80% of this life anymore. I was such a fool

[balletomane]

I am just over eight months NC.

Like Jazzy, there are days when I feel better, and days when I feel debilitated by pain. Lately things have been hard, because it's almost a year since I was cheated on/'replaced' and I had hoped to be further on by this time. I'm frustrated by how I feel. It's still very hard for me to trust people and I feel isolated from all my friends, as though there is a sheet of glass in the way that no one perceives except me. I don't like being this person, but I've almost forgotten what it was like not to feel this way. I know I was different once. Sometimes it overwhelms me. Other times I remind myself of how far I've come and that I need to be more patient with myself. My ex was rarely if ever patient with me. I never felt good enough for him, no matter how I tried. I've got away from his accusations and criticism, I don't want to start replicating them.

It hurts me that he is still with the woman he cheated on me with, his longest relationship yet. I know that there are various factors keeping them together (he only gets really paranoid and accusatory when you're out of his sight, and as she is his flatmate there hasn't been opportunity for this side of him to come out) but sometimes it makes me worry that the fault was mine, that our relationship failed because I lack something she has. Lately I have been encouraging myself to remember that it is irrelevant what she's like or if, why, and how they're still together - my priority now is me and the kind of life I want to lead. The mess I got into with him has no part in that life.

[Pretty Woman]

Hopealways,

   I am the female equivalent of you.

I completely understand what you are feeling. It is amazing to me. Here I am this educated, successful woman, with good friends and everything I could really ask for and I still ruminate. It's been 8mo NC for me.

I fully believe a lot of my reactions are based on how I grew up. My mother is a very cold person and can go months not speaking to me. I have learned to accept it as is and love her as I am capable of... .knowing I will not receive the love from her I deserve.

Not everyone can do this. I would almost thank having this horrible relationship with my ex in helping me be able to accept my own mother. I am so much better with boundaries, even in dating. I no longer settle.

I am high value and I deserve to be treated as such.

This is such a growing experience. Rejection sucks... .but when you really think about what is rejecting you... .

it gives you a new perspective!

PW

[circularref]

Great post! I am almost 4 months NC and like the others, think almost all the time about my exBPD. I am making a very slow recovery, but definitely way slower than I expected. I was talking a lot to this friend after the breakup, but he didn't seem to fully understand what I was going through. He was telling me to get over it and move on. However, he just recently broke up with his gf after a 14 year r/s and he realised (now that he can compare his experience with mine) that what I'm going through is not a regular breakup grieving.

I have lost several friends, and it seems I have lost one more. Presumably my exBPD manipulated him into thinking I'm a horrible person, but who knows? I have to focus on friends that actually support me. I can see that my exBPD is dragging everyone down around her, putting everyone against each other and I'm glad I'm not in this drama mess that constantly surrounds her.