Dumped/abandoned by the love of my life [Part 4]

[pjstock42]

Oh no, I definitely wasn't questioning the validity of NC at all but I can see how it would come off that way. I suppose that maybe I don't fully understand how 100% NC will eventually be even a piece of making me feel better from this but that's more just me feeling hurt in general and the concept of healing from this seeming like such a pipe-dream in itself if that makes sense.

I know with absolute certainty that there is no benefit to be had from me breaking NC and I've never once come close to doing it thankfully. Definitely didn't mean to to insinuate that I saw some positive to breaking NC but again, it just comes down to my general pain/confusion about this whole process and most times just having to trust the advice of others in terms of doing the right things that will eventually pay off without fully realizing the benefits myself as of yet.

[drained1996]

Good, happy to hear my radar was off  !

[Fogclearing]

I only read the thread start.

Looking back at my relationship with a BPD woman who left from one day to another leaving me and the children in a very difficult financial situation I have come to this conclusion (not only based on her very sudden departure, but also on little details from every day life that I now see a pattern in):

BPD never thought of these relationships in the terms of WE. Nons normally do that. We think of it as WE going through life and obstacles in life together. As a WE. As a UNIT. A unit based on MUTUAL trust and solidarity. And we think that out partner sees it the same way. BPDs (and other personality disordered partners like for example narcissists) DON'T. They don't see the WE. They see the ME. They don't have the solidarity of the WE. They don't feel obligation, responsibility and solidarity. It is as simple as that. They want instant gratification and satisfaction for themselves only.

Harsh but true. I've learned my lesson.

[pjstock42]

Fogclearing,

You are totally right and that was one of the first things that I realized yet still one of the hardest things to accept. She did such an incredible acting job in deceiving me to believe that the "we" feeling that I had was mutual and gave me almost 0 reasons to think otherwise (until near the end, of course).

This experience made me think a lot about my prior gf before her who was a non. Things didn't work out, it was long distance for a while and I just couldn't see myself with her for the long haul. It was difficult but that was the way that a normal relationship ends, even though one person ultimately has to pull the trigger. With my non-BPD ex, I know for a fact that she would have never done or said anything even close to what my BPD ex did/said to me and that was because that girl believed in the "we" too, which obviously is pretty crucial to a healthy relationship.

For whatever reason, my belief in the mutual "we" mindset with my BPD ex was so much stronger than it ever has been in any relationship that I've had which of course has made this discard/detachment period that much more difficult. Finding out that you could be so wrong about something is a big blow to the ego and that confusion/pain just compounds that emotional turmoil already presented by a shock breakup in the first place. All I can really hope for now is that I never again get into a situation where I believe in something that was never real.

[SoMadSoSad]

In my case I believe she believed in "WE" until her fear of abandonment kicked in and she felt she had to fend for herself probably because she thought I would leave her. I see her going through the "WE" stage with the replacement also. So I don't think that this "WE" "Me" thing is exclusive to  BPDs.

[Fogclearing]

Mine made me believe that she really had this WE-feeling too. But looking back I should have payed more attention to the little every day details. Like how she could never settle for less than an expensive iMac for HERSELF or the latest, biggest, most expensive smart phone (toddler tantrums until she got them refusing to consider ANY cheaper but very well functioning other options) during a period when the family struggled financially because of me losing business opportunities (she didn't work but had a small disability retirement).

Like you do, pjstock42, I hope I'll never ever end up in a situation again where I believe in things that aren't real.

I so much distrust my judgement after this experience that I don't even LOOK at women anymore. I can't see myself together with a partner ever again. Which is sad at the age of 44 still with things to give to a person that could see the WE.

[pjstock42]

I so much distrust my judgement after this experience that I don't even LOOK at women anymore. I can't see myself together with a partner ever again.

I'm with you on that one but anyone I've told about this mindset says that it's temporary. At the very least, I've given up on seeking any kind of long-term relationships with women, that isn't to say that it will never happen again but for the foreseeable future, I won't be actively looking for it at all. I'm sure this is a somewhat common feeling during/after going through this so don't be too hard on yourself about having those thoughts.

[pjstock42]

Something else that I've learned about through this, not really having to do with my ex at all but just about human nature is how rigid and unsympathetic people can be to you when you're dealing with personal issues.

My boss at work has been pretty accommodating about all of this. I don't like to discuss personal things at work but I was incredibly messed up right after this happened and focusing on work was nearly impossible. A few days after the discard, I decided to tell him 1 on 1 what had happened to me and he said something like he was surprised that I was even at the office when that had just happened. He told me to do whatever I needed to get better from this including days off / working from home more etc. and I really appreciated that. He was also very flexible in terms of me having to be at the whim of the current tenants of my new place in terms of when I could move in and understood that it may be a bit of a last minute decision in regards to which day I would be able to move on.

On the other hand, the lead of another team that I work with has been pretty much the opposite of how my boss has treated me through this. He's been getting on me about the slightest of things, calling me out in meetings for insignificant things that could be handled directly etc. Now that I finally found out on Monday that I could move next week, he's giving me a really hard time about the day I took of to move because he is on vacation that day as well. I told him straight up that this wasn't something that I was planning for and that I need to have somewhere to live which I thought would be pretty understandable but he is being very difficult with me about this and making things harder than they need to be. Perhaps my boss has dealt with something like this and therefore understands how hard it is vs. this guy who maybe has never faced something similar? I don't know, it just really goes to show you who you can trust in times like this. If I knew this had happened to someone at work and that they needed a bit of time to take care of things / get their life back on track, the last thing I would want to do is treat them poorly and make them feel bad or as if they're intentionally screwing things up for me.

[rfriesen]

On the other hand, the lead of another team that I work with has been pretty much the opposite of how my boss has treated me through this.
... .
Perhaps my boss has dealt with something like this and therefore understands how hard it is vs. this guy who maybe has never faced something similar?
... .
If I knew this had happened to someone at work and that they needed a bit of time to take care of things / get their life back on track, the last thing I would want to do is treat them poorly and make them feel bad or as if they're intentionally screwing things up for me.

These are some of the insights you can gain from being in an emotional place that's unfamiliar. You see the world from a new perspective. I know that's cold comfort while you're still in the phase of hurting so much. But the insights are worth holding onto nonetheless.

I found that I became much more aware of these little tensions and irritabilities that people carry around with them. The team lead who's unsympathetic to you and a bit of a pain ... .whatever the exact reason, that kind of person who unnecessarily and counter-productively (in the context of a working environment) is unpleasant with people who are going through a hard time (or with people in general) - well, that kind of person is carrying some kind of emotional discomfort that they don't want to deal with.

Actually, I went through a phase after the end of my relationship when I found it really depressing to look around and see so many people who seemed unhappy about something and so ready to take it out on others. Why take it out on others? Why not - as you say, PJ - have some sympathy and be considerate?

I think many people are in some degree of emotional pain, but for whatever reason don't want to admit that even to themselves, and project it all outward in the form of a general irritability (especially with those who seem to be trying to deal with a difficult emotional situation). As I finally started feeling happier and more stable myself, and to feel confident that I was recovering from the break-up, I found myself more sympathetic to people who act irritably. That doesn't mean I excuse them or don't stand my ground -- in fact, I find it much easier to draw my boundaries, to defuse situations with humour or by addressing any source of conflict directly, because I see that an irritable person is suffering from their own issues and it really has nothing to do with me. It's a question of degree, of course -- if someone is irritating or offensive enough, obviously it gets to me. But it's the kind of insight we can take with us from the unpleasantness we're going through.

And on a more positive note - as you say, we can really come to appreciate people like your boss who are open, understanding, and sympathetic. When we're in a tough place, one nice thing is how much we can value and appreciate simple acts of understanding.

[pjstock42]

rfriesen,

I agree about embracing the opportunity that I have to see the world in a new light. I've always been a very empathetic person and I don't feel much different in that sense but this is definitely the first time where I've been the one dealing with some kind of intense emotional pain and it is interesting to see how different people react to this.

It's a bit odd because this guy actually reminds me a lot of my dad, or at least how my dad used to be when I was growing up and living at home. I'm not saying this in a negative way, just more pointing out the similarities in how unemotional and down to business they are. My dad has softened up quite a bit as he ages but when I was younger he was very much the kind of dad to say "man up" and "get over it" etc. if there was any kind of emotional thing going on with me. I don't think he ever meant this to be cruel or uncaring, it's just the way that he was brought up through having a very militant and emotionally unavailable father himself. It must have been my mom that balanced this out in me during my upbringing because for whatever reason, I'm someone who is always hyper-sensitive to the emotions of others and I always want to help people and fix their problems if I can. Of course, applying this logic to a gf with BPD seemed great for a while because there was a lot to fix but it was unsustainable in the end.

On another topic, today has been a bit difficult due to the dream I had last night involving my ex. I have had dreams about her before this but this was the one that I was really hoping wouldn't happen, that being the dream of getting back together with her. It seemed so real, I was talking to the same person who I loved but with all of the knowledge I had now. She was sympathetic, apologetic and so intent on making things work again. Obviously, this means that those thoughts are still up there in my head somewhere but safe to say, starting my morning by waking up after that dream was not a great start to the day.

One thing I've started to track is patterns of how I'm feeling on a day to day basis. Early on, it was just continual bad days over and over with maybe an hour or so of peace thrown into the mix. Lately, it's been bad days spaced out by 1 good day and before today, I had 3 days where I never had any breakdowns and didn't have any of those overwhelming feelings of hopelessness/loss etc. So as pathetic as it sounds, 3 days was a big step for me and I will continue to track this and hope that the gaps of good days between the bad ones continues to grow wider.

With days like today, I feel like a prisoner in my own brain. I'm constantly being reminded of her by the smallest things and because I'm cognizant that this is happening, I quickly get sick of myself and wish I could just be someone else to escape this self-imposed mental torture that I'm putting myself through.

One week from today I will be moving out of the apartment that she left me at and I know that will be a big step symbolically in my healing. I am a bit scared that the moving itself will overwhelm me with emotions due to the finality that it represents but I know that I have to get it over with. I'll never forget standing at our front door and kissing her goodbye as she left for work, the last time I ever saw her. There's still this part of me that feels like a little kid whose parent went off to work and never came back, yet they continue to stare at the door waiting for them to return even though they know that it won't happen. I'm hoping that getting out of this place where all of my memories are tied to her will help me to break out of that mindset but only time will tell.

[chillamom]

Hey, pjstock42, I think 3 days without a breakdown is GREAT and means REAL PROGRESS.  Of course there will be many setbacks, and a dream like yours certainly indicates that your unconscious is busy dealing with wish fulfillment, but I do think that the change of residence that's coming soon will ultimately be tremendously healing.  That's something to look forward to.  We talk a lot about "state dependent" learning and emotions in my field (psych) and often leaving a place does indeed loosen the grip of the things that have taken place there, good and bad.  I hope that's the case with you!

[rfriesen]

One thing I've started to track is patterns of how I'm feeling on a day to day basis. Early on, it was just continual bad days over and over with maybe an hour or so of peace thrown into the mix. Lately, it's been bad days spaced out by 1 good day and before today, I had 3 days where I never had any breakdowns and didn't have any of those overwhelming feelings of hopelessness/loss etc.

That's really great progress. It's important to remember what our baseline is. I'm more than five months out from our final break-up and I still have days where I just don't feel like myself, unable to focus, and kind of down. Last night, for instance. Was just feeling anxious and kind of empty. But when I compare where I'm at now to five months ago, it's basically night and day. Just like you, in the first weeks I was desperate for even an hour's worth of relief from the constant painful ruminations and sadness/anxiety. Now I have some great days, some bad days, and some mixed days. But it's progress, and stringing the good days together is a great sign. Notice the progress and let it give you confidence, and then do your best to accept the bad days when they come.

So as pathetic as it sounds, 3 days was a big step for me and I will continue to track this and hope that the gaps of good days between the bad ones continues to grow wider.

Doesn't sound pathetic at all. We're often taught to feel that being in emotional pain is pathetic. This process helps us let go of that view. It's great when we can adopt habits that give us emotional stability and happiness over the long run. But when life hits us hard, it takes courage to acknowledge that we're in pain and deal with it. There's nothing especially brave about pretending not to be in pain. I mean, we do our best to get on with life - we go to work, keep up with exercise, see our family and friends and socialise, etc etc. I try not to focus on still feeling hurt. But if someone asks and wants an honest answer, then yes, even after five months I still hurt quite a bit from the whole relationship breakdown.

With days like today, I feel like a prisoner in my own brain. I'm constantly being reminded of her by the smallest things and because I'm cognizant that this is happening, I quickly get sick of myself and wish I could just be someone else to escape this self-imposed mental torture that I'm putting myself through.

I hear you. But is it really self-imposed? You didn't choose to be going through all of this. But it's where you are now, so no need to add any pressure or anxiety by telling yourself you've imposed it on yourself.

One week from today I will be moving out of the apartment that she left me at and I know that will be a big step symbolically in my healing. I am a bit scared that the moving itself will overwhelm me with emotions due to the finality that it represents but I know that I have to get it over with. 

Congrats! I understand the anxiety. It's another step in moving on. I also struggle a lot with letting go and closing the door for good. Every step we take makes the next one a bit easier. That's part of what causes the anxiety, of course - the feeling that it's more and more final, irreversible. At least you can see some of the progress you've already made, and that it's slowly getting better. Good luck with the move!

[pjstock42]

Hey, pjstock42, I think 3 days without a breakdown is GREAT and means REAL PROGRESS.  Of course there will be many setbacks, and a dream like yours certainly indicates that your unconscious is busy dealing with wish fulfillment, but I do think that the change of residence that's coming soon will ultimately be tremendously healing.  That's something to look forward to.  We talk a lot about "state dependent" learning and emotions in my field (psych) and often leaving a place does indeed loosen the grip of the things that have taken place there, good and bad.  I hope that's the case with you!

Thank you for enlightening me on the topic of state dependent emotions. It has been really difficult having to continue living in the same place where I only moved to because of her and it goes beyond just the apartment itself to the stores/restaurants etc. nearby because we used to go to those places together so everything is just a constant reminder of her. Before she did this & had threatened to move out that first time, I had told her that her leaving me behind in this place would be the "saddest thing that I could imagine experiencing" and well, it pretty much has been. I wish I had the luxury that she had of just fleeing the scene instantly and not having to face any accountability for her actions, I'm willing to bet that she has been able to get over this much more quickly than I have because of that, along with the fact that she didn't really care about me very much in the first place.

rfriesen,

I'm glad that your "bad days" seem to be more just "bad moments" at this point, that is really good to hear. Even though I'm only ~2 months into this, I can look back through the weeks and certainly notice a big change in how I've progressed. I wouldn't say that I'm anywhere near "happy" at this point but I think my growth has been more focused on just being able to live my life without having this ruin every day for me. I thought that yesterday was going to be a bad day but it really ended up just being a bad morning and by the time the afternoon/evening rolled around, I had snapped out of it to an extent and was able to just do my thing.

Back when this first happened, I already had a trip planned a few hours away to see my parents and best friend and only being a few days out from the discard, I obviously wasn't in a very good place. My mom told me recently that I was shaking while eating dinner and my best friend said that he barely even recognized who I was, and I've known this guy for 15 years. I went back again to see the same people 2 weeks ago and they all said that I seemed like a different person altogether so I'm glad that I've been able to normalize to the extent that I'm not interfering with my friend/family relationships. I agree with what you said about not focusing on being hurt yet if someone really wants to know, I would tell them. I'm still a bit mad at myself for getting into online dating so shortly after this because now there are people who are constantly wanting to hang out and I want nothing to do with it & would rather just be on my own for ~6 months at the very least. I've already deleted all of my profiles but it was a really stupid idea of mine to attempt to fill the gap left by my ex so shortly after everything happened.

I can't explain how excited I am to move, it's come to be something that dominates my thinking almost as much as thoughts of her does which I think is a good thing. This morning, all I could tell myself was how this was the last Friday morning I will ever be waking up in the place. Tomorrow is the last lonely Saturday I will ever have in this place where everywhere I turn, I am reminded of her. I've only lived in this city since March of last year and this will be my 4th time moving so I am getting a bit sick of it but this move has much more symbolic importance behind it than those in the past due to the circumstances of how I ended up here in the first place.

While I mentioned above that I'm sure being able to leave this place behind in an instant would have sped up the healing process, I'm also trying to think of the positives in this situation that I was forced into. I'm wondering if having to face these constant reminders of her being shoved in my face relentlessly every day has maybe, in it's own way, accelerated the detachment process even a little bit. I basically had to face what I knew in my mind to be my worst fear so maybe having done that made me stronger / more numb to this than just fleeing the scene and never looking back would have? I guess I will never know but either way, only ~136 hours left of me living in this place, not that I'm counting or anything  .

[pjstock42]

Some random venting here. Sunday nights seem to be my most difficult times for some reason and I just wanted to spew this stuff out.

I'm moving on Thursday and as excited as I am to get this over with, there have been some strange feelings coming to the surface in the last few days and I'm just wondering what other people may have to say about them from knowledge of this process / past experience. Chillamom mentioned the concept of "state dependency" and that's something that I'm trying to wrap my head around as of late since it may be playing in to how I've been feeling for a few days here. Basically, I think that in some incredibly odd way, I've developed an odd attachment to this apartment. Despite this place being somewhere that I don't want to live, somewhere that is literally saturated with memories of my ex that are inescapable, I've somehow found some strange sort of comfort in being here. This really presented itself on Friday night and I couldn't understand what my mind was doing. I had gone out to my new neighborhood to arrange purchasing a couch and I had planned to then go out to a few of the local restaurants/bars that are about a 5 minute walk from where I was. As I went to go do this, I was suddenly overwhelmed with this suffocating, almost anti-social feeling and all I wanted to do was go back home and be by myself in my room. I had no idea why I wanted to seclude myself and not take this opportunity to explore my new neighborhood but it was such a strong feeling and I had to follow it, so I came home just to be alone in this space.

Having had some time to think about this, I'm wondering if the finality of this move and how symbolic it will be is something that I'm maybe not fully ready to face yet. Even though I know that she is gone and never coming back, even though I haven't seen her in over 2 months and haven't communicated with her in any way in almost as long, I think there's still some small part of me that is convinced that if I stay here, that leave the door open for her to come back and make everything ok. This sounds so stupid as I write it out but that's the only thing that I can think of as to why I would be having these feelings. I mentioned in an earlier post how I felt like the little kid who said goodbye to his mom/dad in the morning, expecting them to come home after work and then they never did yet he continues to sit and stare at the door waiting for them to come back. This is more of that mental reconciliation process where the logical side of my brain is still trying to convince my emotional side that this really happened and that things will never be the same. I think being in my new neighborhood, working on real & concrete plans about moving there and starting fresh, all of that represents the true reality of this situation. The actual life changes that I'm going through as a result of this situation are finally catching up to the work I've been doing in getting through this mentally and it is not an easy pill to swallow. Part of me wishes that I could just wake up tomorrow and be in my new place with everything all set up because I still worry that performing the actual process of moving on Thursday is going to be very emotionally challenging for me. Even though I know that nothing will change for however long I stay at this current place and wallow in my misery, the act of moving to a new place truly represents the end of this chapter of my life and removes any possibility of her coming back.

I don't know if any of this makes sense. Hopefully, I am just getting myself worked up over nothing. I know I am moving, all of the plans are in place for it and on Friday, I really will be waking up in a new place that represents no connection/attachment to my ex in any way. On the surface, all of this sounds great and I know that it is a very important step for me in this process yet my mind is only focused on the negatives of this, it's definitely getting old to never be able to see the positives in things and continually be relating whatever I'm doing/thinking to this one person. I knew that this process wouldn't be easy but time is definitely helping. I think that my mind has well and truly exhausted itself with the constant ruminations and thoughts of missing her so perhaps now, in it's depressed and negative state, it is simply looking for something else to focus on and highlight the "negatives" of. I know for a fact that I'm in a better place than I was 2 months ago, 1 month ago and even a week ago so I need to be cognizant of this growth and not always be focusing my energy on the things that worry me / stress me out. Thank you again to everyone who has kept up with me through this, I really don't know how I would be doing if I never found this community.

[FallBack!Monster]

I've seen this post and thought keep reading the reply but afraid to truly and honestly participate in this discussion.

pj, I concur! totally understandable. I feel the same way. Earlier today I found out my ex moved away. I felt a fearful feeling in my stomach. But I was around my friends so I acted like I didn't care. But indeed reality hit me like a ton of bricks. She's really gone, not coming back, doesn't want my acquaintance, nothing?

The title of this post makes my heart skip a beat each and every time I read it. I know I can go on w/o her just fine but I guess my heart wasn't ready. Talk about pwBPD not caring about anyone enough to give them closure. It hurts like hell.
It's not easy. Sharing so many intimate moments then she leaves and never talks to me again. Now she's moving away. I feel out of control but tomorrow is work so I just gotta smile anyway... .As if nothing happened. Pretend I'm okay.