Yes Virginia Borderlines are real

[How to communicate after a contentious divorce...]

Hello everyone

Just had to throw this out here, my foo issues were a big influence on me as I'm sure everyone's were.

The thing I find helpful is realizing that my parents did the best they could with what they had. Most parents do, my issue seems to be denial. Not sure why or when it started but the simple fact remains that my brain is capable of simply shutting down the part that knows the truth and I can operate under pure delusion.

I'm thinking it's my alcoholic brain? We in AA believe we are born with alcoholism and it just takes those few first drinks to set the ball rolling.

There's an analogy in the AA Big Book to explain the power of addiction and denial. Story goes something like this.

A man walks across a street without using the proper walk ways, and gets hit by a car. He brushes it off as bad luck and the next day walks across the same street again and fails to use the walk way. Gets hit again, breaks an arm. Fails to see what is wrong so the next day he crosses the same street again, this time gets hit, breaks a leg.

You know the rest of the story.

The man never connects his actions to the consiqenses of being hit by oncoming cars. He repeats the same behaviours over and over until crippled or dead.

Same with me drinking, I drank to get drunk and didn't care what happened until the next day.

I kept going back to my exgf in this same crazy way.

I could just "wake up" and realize I'm back with her experiencing the same abuse and disrespect and I was completely out of control.

Strange and powerful this thing called denial.

Addiction is my issue, I became addicted to my exgf.

I still think about her way to often, I'm fortunate to have friends and family who can see the truth and guide me into making better choices.

I believe the statistics for alcoholics is about 10% nationally, so 90% never recover and die to the disease. So treating my addiction to my BPDexgf I'm very grateful to recover and stay away from her.

Anyway I hope I don't sound like a mad man.

Just remembered something else, she hasn't changed and that's no surprise because pwBPD usually don't, can't or won't. So why am I so surprised that she don't change?

She pulled the same old tricks and nasty behaviours tonight and I ask people why she is doing this?

Why? Because she's sick, she's BPD, she may not even realize she's doing it.

So is denial still at work? Or am I just addicted to the new dynamics of our current circumstances?

This pattern needs to change, I'm wasting a great deal of energy behaving this way.

[JerryRG]

Hello everyone

Just had to throw this out here, my foo issues were a big influence on me as I'm sure everyone's were.

The thing I find helpful is realizing that my parents did the best they could with what they had. Most parents do, my issue seems to be denial. Not sure why or when it started but the simple fact remains that my brain is capable of simply shutting down the part that knows the truth and I can operate under pure delusion.

I'm thinking it's my alcoholic brain? We in AA believe we are born with alcoholism and it just takes those few first drinks to set the ball rolling.

There's an analogy in the AA Big Book to explain the power of addiction and denial. Story goes something like this.

A man walks across a street without using the proper walk ways, and gets hit by a car. He brushes it off as bad luck and the next day walks across the same street again and fails to use the walk way. Gets hit again, breaks an arm. Fails to see what is wrong so the next day he crosses the same street again, this time gets hit, breaks a leg.

You know the rest of the story.

The man never connects his actions to the consiqenses of being hit by oncoming cars. He repeats the same behaviours over and over until crippled or dead.

Same with me drinking, I drank to get drunk and didn't care what happened until the next day.

I kept going back to my exgf in this same crazy way.

I could just "wake up" and realize I'm back with her experiencing the same abuse and disrespect and I was completely out of control.

Strange and powerful this thing called denial.

Addiction is my issue, I became addicted to my exgf.

I still think about her way to often, I'm fortunate to have friends and family who can see the truth and guide me into making better choices.

I believe the statistics for alcoholics is about 10% nationally, so 90% never recover and die to the disease. So treating my addiction to my BPDexgf I'm very grateful to recover and stay away from her.

Anyway I hope I don't sound like a mad man.

Just remembered something else, she hasn't changed and that's no surprise because pwBPD usually don't, can't or won't. So why am I so surprised that she don't change?

She pulled the same old tricks and nasty behaviours tonight and I ask people why she is doing this?

Why? Because she's sick, she's BPD, she may not even realize she's doing it.

So is denial still at work? Or am I just addicted to the new dynamics of our current circumstances?

This pattern needs to change, I'm wasting a great deal of energy behaving this way.

[heartandwhole]

Hi JerryRG,

Is it denial, or resistance? It seems like you know what you are dealing with, even if you don't understand all the ramifications of BPD (who does?). And you know how difficult it is to break an addiction... .that doesn't sound like denial, the way I understand it.

Perhaps there is a part of you that doesn't know how to handle the freedom that comes with letting go and moving forward? It can be scary to be released from what has seemingly "held us together" for so long, because we have to learn new ways of living/coping—ways that may be initially very foreign to us.

But change can also be very exciting. It just takes time to adjust, and at first it can feel very disconcerting. That's how it was for me. I felt a bit lost, to be honest.

What are your thoughts?

heartandwhole

[Meili]

I can't speak for you JRG, but I do know that when I first found these boards I traded the chaos of my r/s with my x for the chaos that comes with the aftermath. I became as addicted to that chaos as I was to the r/s. Does that feel right to you?

What's funny is now that I believe that the addiction is broken, when my x and I talk, and there's any hint of reconciliation, I cringe at the idea of the chaos. Once I would have run as fast as I could to it when the opportunity to recycle appeared.

[Herodias]

 Everyone that sees me at work say I am so much better! What they don't know is that I am trying not to talk about it with them anymore. I seem to be crying more this last couple of weeks and I don't know why. I think I am just sad for myself. Life is pretty hard and seems to be getting harder at times lately. I am glad I don't have to deal with him because he wouldn't be mature enough to understand what I am dealing with. Besides that, I am reading a book about abusers. This woman told a story about a man that threw his wife over a balcony because he was tired of her. She somehow survived it, but it made me think... .they really do things like that and we need to take threats seriously. I can't believe I was married to someone that threatened me like that. It's kind of shocking. It's like I am coming to terms with who I was really with and I don't know why I didn't take things seriously. I always thought he was just saying it for a reaction, not that he would ever do it. I just don't know anymore. They do say that codependent people are the same as to repeating patterns until they break the cycle and learn who they are and love themselves. 10% is not a very encouraging percentage... .I hope you stay in that percentage. I am proud of you for keeping up the hard work at recovery and I am sure you are seeing the benefits. It is hard to change I gave up drinking a long time ago. I like to have a drink now and again, but I don't like it as much any more. I don't like not being in control and I don't like not feeling well. I am lucky to survived all of the ridiculous things I did while drinking in my past. I now know that the fun person I think I was while drunk was not really that funny and that I really can be a fun person without it! Glad you are doing better.