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thisworld
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« Reply #1 on: February 27, 2016, 11:41:43 PM » |
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Dear Sadly,
I'm so sorry for what you are going through but am happy that you are sharing them with courage and candor. Please know that there are many, really many people here who are and have been through these difficult and mixed emotions, people who have felt bad, weak, pathetic (as you say in your other posts) for so many reasons and then, somewhere in their healing discovered that hey, maybe they are not that weak, bad or pathetic after all. You are not alone.
I have read your story and feel for you. You are a survivor and that on its own shows the tremendous power in you even though you may not always feel that way. Those of us with difficult childhoods try to mend what was wrong by putting ourselves in similar situations expecting different outcomes, perhaps to be able to repair our own wound. And maybe, these are ultimately a call to us to start learning to thrive than just to survive. Never beat yourself up for that call. Relationships with pwBPD are known for the repetitive pattern that we call "recycling" anyway. But when we are ready to thrive, it becomes all about US.
I see that you have gone through that with him and it hasn't worked. And now you are friends with him. That's understandable, too. But only if this friendship brings comfort to you. What are your expectations from this friendship? Given your experience with him, do you find all realistic? What would make you feel emotionally safe and comfortable? Basically, what are you ready to tolerate and what are you not ready to tolerate? What are you ready to do when he violates your boundaries?
Your answers, together with a realistic understanding of BPD can guide you in your path toward something more comfortable. Do you feel informed enough on BPD to have realistic expectations from him, would you like us to provide some reading materials for you so that you can put his reactions in a framework? And sometimes, we are simply undecided. One minute we want to detach, one minute we want to stay. That's so understandable as well. Can you tell us how you feel in general so that we can look at the dilemma and support you better?
Below are my personal comments to your situation:
What do you do when you are constantly accused of lying.
I ask myself why I'm in a relationship with someone who is constantly accusing me of lying. I ask myself what I'm getting from that relationship. I have different answers for different people in my life. For instance, I have an old friend who first became schizo-affective and then his diagnosis moved toward schizophrenia. He doesn't take his medication properly and is in and out of psychosis through the day. He is a very important for me and I decided to keep our friendship even though it is something similar to being an emotional caretaker when I'm with him. He blames me of lying, of putting microchips in his spine, of many things. I let go. With my BPD ex though, because there was an emotional intimacy on a different nature, I couldn't let go and stay. I don't want a friendship like that either as we don't have a long enough history to feel motivated for anything like this.
So, what we do depends on what we want and whether that is realistic as we are talking about a Cluster B disorder here.
Why can I not convince him I am not a liar?
Because he has a mental disorder with cognitive distortions and many other things that prevent him from evaluating facts the way we generally do this. Feelings equal facts for pwBPD. And when a negative feeling is triggered for whatever reason - these are not always under your control either, it can just happen due to many factors and are not always related to your actions - it becomes reality. This isn't about you or your actions. And in his world, it is reality. Can I convince you that the sun is green or blue? No. You have access to reality. Same for him. At that point, he thinks that's reality. You didn't cause it, you cannot control it, you cannot cure it. We need to radically accept this fact.
How can I remain NC .
This is a question that gets asked a lot and if you post it separately, you will get encouraging suggestions. There are a lot of members going through this at the moment. However, if I understand correctly, you seem to both want a friendship with him and also go NC. (This is very normal, many of us start there, completely understandable.) It seems that you want to offer him support but also do not like the way he treats you. But you also want him to understand you correctly. NC will mean letting go of many of these. Which things would you like to start working on?
Why do I keep giving in.
Oh, for a variety of reasons really. Because of our own family of origin issues (FOO), boundaries, habits, because of the pwBPD's charm during initial stages of attraction and recycling, because we fear that we may not find someone better, because we feel particularly strong on a good day and want to practice new support skills:)) Working on these here and on the self-awareness forum help us discover our unique reasons and things start getting better for us.
And hey, you are not a failure. I understand the feeling, when I disappoint myself the critical voice starts speaking in my head sometimes (hello mother:)) And I feel frustrated too. Why am I doing all good things and not getting good results in return? Simply because I'm good to others but not always as good as compassionate to myself. I bet, if I wrote your story, you wouldn't say "you are a bloody failure" to me. You would show me understanding and you would genuinely feel for me as well. Why don't you start doing that to yourself right now? Like, starting to treat yourself as compassionately as you would treat me or someone else?
We are here for you as others have been for us
Looking forward to your replies,
TW
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