Manipulation Tactic: Out of Context

[freemanstrut]

Has anyone else experienced their ex using the tactic of taking your words out of context as a way of goading you to break NC?  Mine did during a previous breakup, and just did.

I introduced her to a forum for those with BPD.  She has only ever used that forum for the purpose of attempting to elicit a response from me.  Today, this jewel:

"He wouldn't even feel sad if I died. He said that."

What I actually said:

"If you don't confront this problem head on, it _will_ kill you.  It will sadden me to hear if it does, but I've done all I can to help you, and I would not blame myself for your death for an instant."

This worked on me before, last summer.  It was passed to me through a game of telephone that someone had told her the opposite of what I'd told them, that there was still hope we'd get back together, and the urge to "set the record straight" brought me back into contact and sucked me back into the maelstrom.

I'm not falling for this again.

I'd told her I'd speak to her a week after we broke up to check in.  The love-bombing and engulfing began again immediately - as did the lying.  This was part of a longer letter I wrote to her, holding her accountable for her actions and indicating my hope that she gets help.  I'll post it below.  It is not gentle, but I did not write it out of spite.

[freemanstrut]

BPDex:

As you read this, please remember that I care about you, and that I know you're not a villain.  But you need some tough love, and I love you enough still to give it to you.

What I hope to evoke in you is not shame, but a perspective and a renewed commitment to get help and stick with it.

There are times when you make me feel like hope is blossoming, both within me and for the rest of the world.  You made me feel that love was real, very real, painfully, achingly real, and you made me believe in that love.

You've also lied to me constantly.  At every phase of our relationship.  After every reconciliation, after every time we blow up, after every time you flee to shelter with someone who has ___ed you or who has taken advantage of you.

When we reconnected this weekend you told your first lie within 5 minutes.  You lied about keeping the agreements you yourself insisted we make on breaking up within the first 15 minutes.

I would have been kind had you lapsed and told me, but you didn't.  The picture you painted made me very, very proud of you, and I was, until that pride turned to ash.

You were drunk, you were lying to me about drinking, and what's worse - you kept right on drinking.  All that night and the next day, a day full of time we spent bonding and communicating and of hope for us, you kept right on drinking and kept right on lying to me about it.  You even tried to rationalize going to a gay bar when you ran out, pitching it as a "safe place" for you.  An alcoholic.

I don't give a ___ that you ___ed [name].  I told you I wouldn't hold it against you, and I don't.  We weren't together.  I give a ___ that after making me agree to be celibate with you after the breakup for a time, that you lied to me about it over and over and over again before finally owning up to it.  You acted like I was being unreasonable for probing you about it but your every action telegraphed that you weren't being honest.

[Agreement was, we stay celibate after breaking up for a while, and she stays sober.  She kept up neither part of the agreement she twisted my arm into making.]

Part of me feels sorry for you.  That maybe in your childish desire to feel appreciated and like the center of attention, you let another selfish prick inside you, let another man use you as a notch in your belt before discarding you.  That you can't even remember if he wore a condom.

But I know that there's a part of you that loves it.  That loves being slutty and ___ed up and dangerous.  That loves being unredeemable and shameless.  And I get that.  I've skirted the edges of society and delighted in twisted thoughts, but I leave them in the realm of fantasy where they belong.

I lied about ___ing [name].  I'm sorry.  I wanted to see if volunteering a ___-up on my part would encourage you to open up to me.  It doesn't feel like it did.

You have given me cause to doubt everything about myself and others.  You have made every word of love you speak a knife in my heart for the sea of lies you have told me.  You have made me rue every time I have trusted and believed in you and you have crushed every last scrap of faith I have in you.

I feel so foolish for caring about you.  I feel so foolish for opening up to you, opening my heart to you, opening my home to you after you lied to me time and time again in [state] and promised up and down that you wanted to change - that you were ready - that it was time.

I have sacrificed a year of my life bleeding for you.  It was a year full of love and wonder and deep intimacy - and also a year of never knowing what you weren't telling me.  Never knowing what omissions or lies hid behind your smile.  Never knowing what you were hiding, or sneaking in behind my back.

I tried trusting in you.  It was disasterous.  I tried to supervise you when it became apparent that you would self-sabotage even in the best of times for little to no reason.  When that wasn't enough, I tried to micromanage you, and only drove us both crazy, though it was the only time you seemed to stick to treatment.

Despite all of my efforts to help you have made next to no progress in the last year.

You are 2% at best through your journey to wellness.  You have barely even identified your problem, you are still incapable of stopping yourself to ask why you feel the way you do or how you should react to a situation.  You have engaged in only the most rudimentary research into your problem and the myriad solutions to it.

I did research, summarized it for you, provided you with references, workbooks, and all the tools you would need to improve your life without help from others.  And those tools did nothing but gather dust.  I encouraged and volunteered to read with and to you and to help you.  I had hoped it would get you started, that you would pick up the ball and run with it, but you never touched it without my prodding and eventually began to even resent it.

You get a month or two of sobriety at best before convincing yourself that it's okay to have a taste.  That you can get away with it.  ___ it, it doesn't matter.  I need this right now.

You aren't an alcoholic, BPDex.  You are an addict.  There is no drug or pleasurable experience you can have without binging on it.  Nicotine, food, pot, booze, meth, opiates, benzos, sex, video games - you have developed literally every addiction on the planet running from your problems.  You rummage through strangers' medicine cabinets for drugs to steal.  You convince yourself that your journey has been so hard, so very hard, that you deserve a break from your struggle to be free.  That you deserve to have it be easier on you.

You don't.

You want to be a good person but you're not.  You are one of the most selfish people I have ever met in my life.  You are capable of rationalizing any behavior that makes you feel whole or better for even a moment, and then dismiss your guilt for the ostensible purpose of your mental health when you've done the unforgivable.

You want to change.  You want to be free of the shackles that bind you, but you are unwilling to do any of the hard work.  You love the attention that going to your first few AA or group therapy meetings gets you.  You love the outpouring of support and hope and well-wishes from those who haven't yet learned that you have no desire to change your ways.  You drink it up like fine cognac, and then when the buzz about your bold effort at sobriety fades, you wash it down with whatever cheap swill you can find.

Is this the person you wanted to be when you grew up?  When you were a young girl, full of hope and despair and conflict, even when your soul ached so, was this the relief you envisioned?  :)id little BPDex envision herself bouncing from bed to bed, couch to couch, incapable of supporting or protecting herself, incapable of leading a normal life?  Trading your body for a roof over your head or a buzz?  :)id little BPDex ever think that she would be so scared and so miserable, so anxious about her total lack of control over her life that she would try everything - sex with strangers, meth, heroin, _anything_ to escape that terror?

Is this the life you want to lead?

You alternate between thinking that you're not worth it and that an addict is what you were meant to be.  Between thinking "___ everything.  I need this to escape" and "I'm a gypsy princess and it's better to burn out than fade away."  You keep thinking, well, I'll hit rock bottom eventually.

But almost every part of your last decade sounds like a horrifying blend of using others, being used - being forced into the beds of near strangers, abusers, and enablers alike for shelter and food.  You have become a vagrant who has little to offer the world but lies and a pretty smile in hopes of a warm meal and a dry bed.

BPDex, I don't know what you think rock bottom is, but I am not waiting around to see what _you_ think rock bottom is like.

You are in free fall and you need help.

I don't know how much of your problem stems from damage to your brain from totally reckless drug use.  I don't know how much comes from your admittedly ferocious personality disorder.  But any time you run into an obstacle you either whine for help to get over it, or simply slink off to get ___ed up and think about how great you would be at getting over that obstacle if only you cared enough to.

A tidal wave comes upon you, and you tread water and splash about like it's any other day at the beach, or worse - you swim right into it for a better view of the rocks.

You are a captivating young lady drowning in a turbulent sea, one who knows how to swim but refuses to take off the chains that bind her, because she has romanticized what the chains mean and the slow death they bring.  Every man who jumps in and tries to save you will drown with you until you take responsibility and get help.

You, my scorpion, will forever sting and drown until you get the help you need.  You don't seem to have the slightest notion of how much professional help you really need.  You don't seem to have the slighted notion of how much effort and stubbornness it will take to see you through this storm that has enveloped you for nearly twenty years, and that every lapse only makes the climb steeper and harder.

You have inspired so much mistrust and pain in all those who love you and who desperately wish to help you.  You manipulate your lovers, your family, your therapists, your friends, you manipulate all of them to get what you want.  But it only takes you further away from you what you need most.

You need to be loved.  To be understood.  To be accepted.  But all those who know you can only protect themselves from you.  Those who understand you, fear you - your actions make little to no sense to others.  They watch you try, and try, and smile, and take pride in your accomplishments... .and then, seemingly out of nowhere, you throw away everything and vanish in a cloud of smoke, booze and sweat.

[1/2]

[freemanstrut]

I don't know what you're still hiding from me but it's near mathematically impossible that you're not.  You lied to me in [state], in [city], in [state], in [state] - from my own ___ing home to both edges of the continent, the only constant has been your dishonesty.

Maybe that involved cheating on me, maybe it didn't.  It at least involved you rationalizing whatever you wanted to do as "hey, it's not cheating!" and doing as you pleased.  :)rugs, alcohol, lying, talking dirty with your ex... . Every confession I have had to drag out of you over a trail of false indignance, lies, and accusations that _I_ am the one with the problem for not trusting you.  Every time I have felt compelled to dig you have painted _me_ as the problem, and yet each time I have dug I have found some sordid lump of coal you buried away deep in your heart. And every time I have found one you have revealed only and exactly would it would take to get me off your back.

You, BPDex, are a scorpion.  You are the sorrowful poison in the vial at Romeo's feet.  You are the siren that lures men at sea to their watery death.  You are the millstone that grinds good men to dust.  

One way or another, if I stay with you, I will become one of those men.  Either broken by your selfishness and my idealized love for the version of BPDex I wish you to be, or turned into a monster that uses and abuses you for his own pleasure while caring nothing for you.

I will not be broken.  Nor will I become a ___ty person to survive being with you.

Part of me feels that save for informing you about local mental health resources, allowing you to contact me was a mistake.  But another part of me is glad that I did and that you were this transparently manipulative.  The pain of your absence evaporated quite neatly, and for that I am grateful.

There was a BPDex that I had hoped to find, that I hoped that you could find in yourself.  I did not find her, and neither did you.

I love the person that I thought you were.  I love the part of you that is kind, and sweet, and caring, and I know deep inside me that that part of you is not a lie.  I loved watching those pretty blue eyes brighten with joy, and even when they brimmed with tears it made me happy to be there for you.

I know that you're not a villain.  I know you're not evil.  I know that BPD is the worst kind of ordeal and that it seems unceasing and permanent.  It's not - if you deal with it head on.  It's not if you give it your all.  You _can_ lead a normal life and not end up a statistic.

Please seek inpatient care.  Put up your list of coping mechanisms again.  :)on't be ashamed of it - they are all that stands between you and being swept away.  Read BPD for Dummies cover to cover.  Finish your workbook.  Go to DBT and therapy, keep it up for years, and you can live a normal life.  You might stumble, but if you don't convince yourself that you've ___ed up and that it excuses ___ing up again, because you ___ed up and who cares anymore, you'll get up and get back at it.

You are going to be alone, or used, or fill good men with sorrow or hatred until you get and see yourself through the help you need.  You will not find a man worthy of the woman you can be until you become the woman you can be.  You spoke of [BPDex-ex] and [BPDex-ex] as projects you should not have adopted - men you wished to fix.  You told me you had learned that you shouldn't try to fix men, that you shouldn't date men who are "projects."  It is time to turn that mirror on yourself.

If you don't confront this problem head on, it _will_ kill you.  It will sadden me to hear if it does, but I've done all I can to help you, and I would not blame myself for your death for an instant.

It's not fair to blame me for not completing your treatment in [city].  It was a struggle every step of the way to get you to go to both AA meetings and therapy.  You found it satisfying when you finally got there and stuck with it, but the damage from months of lies and sneaking drugs and booze during your time here was done, and it took me reaching the frayed ends of sanity for you to stick with it.

I'm sorry for responding when you contacted me.  I care about you.  I wanted you to know that I cared and that I belived in you.  I wanted to know you were sober and safe, and that if you weren't, to help.

I hope whatever advice and hope I gave you for yourself sticks with you.  I hope that you will let weed be enough for you when you heal from what has been a rough time for both of us.

I know it hurts reading this.  Writing it has torn at me.  I don't like the thought of you sitting there with eyes full of tears because of me.  I didn't send you away because I hated you, or because I didn't love you.  I sent you away because you were hurting me and I deserved to heal.

But it's not fair to tell me you love me.  It's not fair to ask me to tell you that I do.  It's not fair to ask me to take you back, or to even talk to you after what you have put me through.

Every time I give you a chance to hurt me, you do.

Please let me go, and please leave me be.

Non

[2/2]

[balletomane]

It hurts to be misrepresented, even if people aren't deliberately lying - I suspect that my ex interpreted things in such a distorted way that most of the time the misrepresentations were unintentional. Whether she's doing it purposely or not, you are not going to be able to change the way your ex receives your words. I spent ages agonising over the right way to reach my ex, convinced that if only I found exactly the right way to say things, he'd understand what I meant and everything would be fine. There is no special formula and there are no magic words. Rather than concentrating on your ex's misrepresentation of you and what it might mean (she may not be doing it to get a reaction - this could be honestly how she sees things), I think it's better to focus on how to stop the misrepresentation from having so much power over you.

You mentioned she wrote this on a BPD forum that you introduced her to, and that she very rarely uses. How do you know that she rarely uses it unless you go there and read it and look for her posts? Assuming she is using it just to get a reaction from you, she's only able to do this because you are there, reading.

The thing that struck me about the excerpts from your letter to her is how long the letter is. You have poured a lot of time and effort into trying to get her to shift her perspective and to understand just how much she's hurt you, and you end with a request for her to let you go, and leave you be. But if you are prepared to spend so much time writing lengthy letters to her, and you are even now checking a BPD forum to see what she might have written, this suggests that you are not letting go either. Letting go means no longer checking up on what she's saying about you, and working towards a point where it no longer matters.

I can relate to the pain in what you wrote, and I understand how it feels to want some acknowledgment and respect from a person who has hurt you so badly. Even if my ex never apologises, it would mean something to me to find that he knows what he's done. But that is unlikely to happen. No matter how painful, we have to get past this. We can't hang our recovery on the hope that the misrepresentations will stop and that our exes will finally understand.

[Hadlee]

"He wouldn't even feel sad if I died. He said that."

What I actually said:

"If you don't confront this problem head on, it _will_ kill you.  It will sadden me to hear if it does, but I've done all I can to help you, and I would not blame myself for your death for an instant."

I wouldn't automatically assume she said that for your benefit.  She could very well have posted it to get support and understanding from fellow BPD sufferers.  Whilst I know it's not what you said, I can definitely see how a pwBPD would interpret it the way she did.  And remember... .feelings = facts for a pwBPD.

I didn't read your other posts, sorry, they were just too long.

[freemanstrut]

Yeah, I'm not perfect.  I read the BPD forums in part to gain insight into their reasoning processes - and yes, in part because some part of me still wants to see what she has to say.  It's kind of my split white/split black indicator.

You're totally right to call me on it.

It's probably not healthy, but I'm still NC, and seeing her post there doesn't tempt me to break that.

It's a different kind of not letting go now.  It's not about not letting go of her.  It's about not letting go of why I felt the way I did with her.  Why I tried so hard to help her, why she hurt me so badly, and why I didn't put my foot down sooner.  It's not about hearing from her.  It's about holding on with white knuckles to why our relationship was toxic and cannot be.

You're right about the whole "the right way to reach them" thing.  I was stuck on that for ages.  Pages and pages of attempts to reason with someone who can't be reasoned with.  I have no illusions of her ever truly understanding my perspective.  She can't understand her own.

But it felt cathartic to write and to assert myself and my feelings.

I should probably block that forum through my router so I'm not tempted.  I'm a professional typist and a fraction of a second is all it takes for me to indulge that curious itch.

And I understand about the posts being too long.  Forum made me split the damn thing.

[Hadlee]

It's probably not healthy, but I'm still NC, and seeing her post there doesn't tempt me to break that.

Complete NC would mean not visiting the forum.  However, I do understand looking at it to get insight into their thoughts and behaviour... .I also visited those forums at one point.

Good on your for not reaching out and for working on yourself

[WoundedBibi]

I did read all of your posts. I agree with everything balletomane said.

As balletomane and you I spent a lot of time trying to find a way to get through to my ex, to stop him misinterpreting everything I said or did. And I can't. From some medical research things I've read I now know that pwBPD have a different brain structure and hear and interpret words in a different way than others might. There simply is no way for me to find the right wavelength to get through to him. And the same goes for you.

All the pwBPD will read in my emails or yours is criticism. And for a pwBPD there are no bad deeds, just bad people. So for your ex (or mine) getting an email or text pointing out things that they could do differently in order to feel better or things they have done that have hurt us, sends them straight to a place of core shame. The idea they are a bad person. And not the way you or I would think it when we do but an overwhelming feeling they are bad to the core and do not deserve to live. The pain of feeling that is too big. They cannot deal with it and certainly will not self reflect and change their ways because the message has reached them.

Let go of trying to fix her or save her.

You did not cause her BPD, you cannot control it, you cannot fix it.

And by the by, NC is more than just no contact in the sense of not talking, texting, emailing and so on. NC also means no checking up on social media, forums, asking friends about what they are up to, or any of that. There is a lesson somewhere on the site (don't have the link) on NC. I think it is called 'NC the wrong way and the right way'. Or 'NC the right way and the wrong way'.

[once removed]

 

"No Contact" the Right Way and the Wrong Way

i do question the suggestion that "no contact" means not peeking at social media or the like. not because i advocate doing so, but because i believe "no contact" is one tool for detachment, as opposed to a lifestyle, and these rules, which seem to vary from person to person, can dilute the purpose of that tool.

Which best describes your approach to detachment?

[freemanstrut]

You guys are right.  If she's using the forum as a means of reaching out to me, I need to stop reading it.

[WoundedBibi]

You guys are right.  If she's using the forum as a means of reaching out to me, I need to stop reading it.

Even if she isn't you should stop reading it IMO; reading it will keep you engaged. Still focusing on what she is saying, writing, thinking instead of focusing on you.