the silence IS deafening

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

I’ve just endured a 4 month break-up. Apart from a few days here and there my ex was in constant, persistent contact. It imploded a week or so ago and I haven’t heard from him since. Ahoy wrote something yesterday that resonated with me ‘the silence is deafening’ and it is.

I’m in a lot of emotional pain. I ask myself questions such as, Is this it? Will he come back? Would you want him back? Yes, I want him back. No, I can’t go back to that! My emotions are all over the place and it hurts. 

I can't seem to help it. I won't contact him, no chance at all, but the yearning for him to is terrible. What can I do? Anyone been here?

[Larmoyant]

I’ve just endured a 4 month break-up. Apart from a few days here and there my ex was in constant, persistent contact. It imploded a week or so ago and I haven’t heard from him since. Ahoy wrote something yesterday that resonated with me ‘the silence is deafening’ and it is.

I’m in a lot of emotional pain. I ask myself questions such as, Is this it? Will he come back? Would you want him back? Yes, I want him back. No, I can’t go back to that! My emotions are all over the place and it hurts. 

I can't seem to help it. I won't contact him, no chance at all, but the yearning for him to is terrible. What can I do? Anyone been here?

[Hadlee]

Ugh that stage is truly awful.  I really feel for you.  It's such a painful place to be in.

I honestly did not think I would get through it, but I did.  I did reach out a number of times to the pwBPD, which I realize was just to soothe my own pain, and to essentially have a mentally ill person validate my existence.  Crazy, but true.

In hindsight, I believe one of the biggest mistakes I was making was not FEELING the pain I was in.  The moment I said to myself, "ok what are you really feeling here?" things started to change.  I acknowledged the pain, would sit with it for a time, accepted it, then gradually started to let it go.

Then came taking back my life, and my power.  Getting out there and exploring the world once again.  I'm living my life again and it feels great.

I was LC up until the last couple of months.  I've changed to NC now, which is helping even more.

Hugs and all the best.  You WILL get through this

[Ahoy]

Anyone been here?

If that was a family feud question, and the 100 members of the audience were all partners of BPD's their would be 1 reply for the whole 100 points... .YES!

A few things

1. Yes the silence is truly deafening. But it also serves to remind us how one sided these relationships ended up being. Were you like me, checking your phone every 15 mins for a long awaited reply.

2. When people talk on here about a fresh breakup, it is usually referred to going through an addiction withdrawal. Your body is literally craving the contact of your partner (even negative contact!) and it's not going to give in without making you feel terrible in the process. I would say after 7 weeks I still have little urges or 'tingles' to contact my Ex (even though that would be the worst idea ever)

3. Your questions, all 100% natural. Believe me, if your partner is BPD, you will NOT get answers from them (if you do, you are the 1%). Your best ally in this is knowledge. Reading back into the forums help me piece the jigsaw puzzle of my relationship (and separation) together. Sadly, through case examples, I had about 50 "Aha!" moments when I realised that my partners lying stretched far, far back to the very start of my relationship with her.

Don't get me wrong, I still have LOTS of questions but I have learned enough to allow me to start to shift the focus ever so slowly onto me.

4. Practice mindfulness. Mindfulness is about living in the moment. It's freaking hard to do. I'm trying (and failing) every day. It can be meditation, going for a long walk, anything that keeps you in the present.

My trick is to go for a walk at sunset every day I can  facing the sun, watching all the colours of the twilight. It makes me appreciate life and I try and keep my thoughts on the future. Another thing I do is jigsaw puzzles (I party hard) but that is therapeutic to me... .whatever floats your boat!

5. Have a strong support network (here/family) just SOMEONE you can talk to when you feel weak.

6. Accept this is just going to take time and you will have good/bad days. My last 4 days? very, very average. Today? Not too bad! you can't predict how you will go.

Hope this helps a bit =)

[Larmoyant]

busygall & Ahoy, thank you so much. I think it’s finally sinking in that what I started 4 months ago is now finished. He tried recycling twice, you know trying to pick up where we left off with no issues resolved, then threatened that he’d be forced to find a new girlfriend, which he subsequently did though refused to give me a straight answer, but it didn’t stop him from pursuing me. I’m convinced after reading here that he perhaps hadn’t fully secured her yet or wanted me as some sort of back-up.

I almost gave in at one point, but I don’t trust him so managed to save myself. He then tried friendship and wanted a shoulder to lean on while getting over me and no doubt would have paraded the new woman in front of me. Absolutely no chance of that happening. I’m hurt enough.

It was a painful and long break-up because he was still there. He was persistent which was fueling my hope. Hope has been my downfall. I kept thinking he’d step up and we could resolve our issues, but he kept doing the opposite, sabotaging us, e.g. finding a new girlfriend (s).

Thank you both for the feedback. It really does empower me to try to get passed all this hurt. Hugs and best wishes to you both. This won't hurt us forever.

[Hadlee]

Thank you both for the feedback. It really does empower me to try to get passed all this hurt. Hugs and best wishes to you both. This won't hurt us forever.

Good on you Larmoyant.  That's the spirit.  Take back that power

Be kind to yourself.  In time you will see a beautiful world filled with wonderful opportunities.  You deserve to be happy

This isn't the usual genre of music I'm into, but I listened to this track a lot when I was getting in touch with my emotions, releasing them, and refocusing on me.  It gave me goosebumps, and also hope for the future.  And it's true... .there is a garden

Have a listen.  Hope it helps x

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMgvlAjJi5Y

[Suspicious1]

I’m in a lot of emotional pain. I ask myself questions such as, Is this it? Will he come back? Would you want him back? Yes, I want him back. No, I can’t go back to that! My emotions are all over the place and it hurts.  

I can't seem to help it. I won't contact him, no chance at all, but the yearning for him to is terrible. What can I do? Anyone been here?

Oh my, totally relate to this. I still go through phases of this two years down the line (that sounds hopelessly negative, but it's not like it was. Those feelings come up every so often, it's not like they are that intense all the time).

I too walked away from the relationship, and there was no way on this sweet earth I was going to contact him. My counsellor suggested that, if I wanted to so badly, why didn't I do it? I was appalled at the very idea. There was no good that could come of any outcome: either he'd ignore me (which would hurt), or he'd give me a mouthful (which would hurt), or he'd try to recycle me (at which point I'd be suckered back in which would be no good for me at all). Reminding myself of those things kept things straight for me.

One of the things I did that really helped me, was to give myself a deadline at which point I could contact him if I still wanted to. I chose a date four months down the line. That really helped me to stay away - I wasn't thinking "I'll never speak to that person ever again", which felt too heartbreaking, but "it's ok, I can speak to him on this day". Of course when the day came I didn't want to do it. Or the next day, or the next. Because the same rules still applied - no good of it was going to come.

I now accept that one day I *will* speak to him again. It's fairly inevitable, given that we live about 10 miles from each other and our social groups cross over a bit. Unless he moves to the other side of the country, it's likely we'll bump into each other. That again keeps me feeling calm about things - I panic less, for some reason, and can focus more on my life.

Part of my inability to move on is the constant waiting for him to resurface though. That's because of all the splitting in the past - I've been conditioned to think he'll pop up again at some point, so it keeps me alert. This in itself isn't a bad thing as it helps me structure my life in a way that I can avoid him, which I still need to do.

The yearning *is* terrible. It's frustrating to love someone you have no contact with, and there are days I can think of nothing else, where it hurts and hurts, and I fantasise about how wonderful it would be if he was back. That fades though; I also have days where I focus on what it might be like if he were still here. By now the excitement and joy would have faded and we'd be into the mundane. And with him, the mundane would have been hell. He split me black every three months, and each time was gut-wrenchingly awful - if that patter had continued, I'd have been split black another EIGHT times by now. That's eight incidences of emotional trauma I've saved myself from. I focus on the reasons I dragged myself away from him, how I was being the kindest to myself that I knew how to be. I do mindfulness and yoga. I re-read the old emails he sent me when he was unforgivably awful. It makes me angry, it makes me want to contact him just to tell him what I think of him, but anger is better than yearning.

One of the most useful things was keeping a list of the reasons I left, the things I didn't like about him, and the things I wouldn't have to put up with anymore. Still works like magic to dampen the yearning.

[Larmoyant]

Well, he’s broken his silence, but appears to have gone silent again. He texted me late last night, and included a link to one of ‘our’ songs, probably drunk:

“This just came on the radio. Remember then? I’m not trying to contact. How?”

It’s all just more nonsense. More push/pull. Pulls me in with the romantic song and pushes me away with the “I’m not trying to contact”.  It’s torturous really.

I responded with “How?” but didn’t elaborate. I wanted him to think about how it ended, but he’ll make of it what he will.

He hasn’t got back to me so here I am back in the misery waiting for him. I don’t know how to break the hold he has over me.

Suspicious1, I was going to send him a list of ‘how’ it didn’t work, but decided not to. I applied your reasoning. What would be the point? No good would come out of any outcome.

It’s all so painful and exhausting. I would have been better off if he’d stayed silent. Now I’ve got to start all over again.

Busygall, thank you for the link. That song is beautiful.