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Author Topic: Deleted All Evidence of Me  (Read 1103 times)
JJacks0
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« on: August 07, 2016, 12:57:24 PM »

I woke up last night to a Facebook notification that my ex had tagged me in some photos. I clicked on the link but there was nothing there. After investigating a little it turns out she was deleting all pictures that I was in, cropping me out of those she could, and reuploading them without me in them.

She left one up that I was in because her mom is also in it (who passed away last year) & Facebook must have automatically tagged me in it before she could stop it (hence the notification). She quickly untagged it and that's why I saw nothing when I clicked on the link.

I'm sure this shouldn't bother me as much as it does. But I had dreams about her last night and woke up this morning feeling like it was the end of the world. I looked through her profile pictures, tagged photos, etc. and she has deleted absolutely every trace of me. 7 years worth of photos & memories. Maybe this is what people need to do to move on, but it just feels terrible. I can understand not wanting to see reminders when you're trying to move on, but to take the time to crop me out of each photo and reupload them seems like quite the daunting task, and it looks like that's how she chose to spend her entire night. I guess I know personally that I just couldn't do that - I'm not ready to completely delete her and that's probably what makes this hurt. It's been 8 days since we spoke last and in the back of my mind I wondered how long it would be before I heard from her again. This makes it seem like she's really moving on this time, trying to pretend I never existed. Maybe this is really it.
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rfriesen
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« Reply #1 on: August 07, 2016, 08:45:06 PM »

Hi JJacks,

I can understand how it would be incredibly painful to see yourself being cut out of 7 years worth of photos and memories. This is a common theme among us posting here -- the hurt caused by seeing exes not just avoiding reminders of us, but seeming to so quickly go out of their way to cut us out as though they hope to completely delete us and years of intense feelings from their lives.

I'm sure this shouldn't bother me as much as it does.

You are only a week or so out from a 7-year relationship. It's perfectly normal to feel powerful painful emotions. More important, what good will judging your emotions do? You have no direct control over your emotions and there is nothing to be gained by judging yourself for what you feel. It took me a very long time to wrap my mind around that. It's a process. But try to let yourself feel whatever emotions come, without judging or dismissing them. That can be a challenge -- one thing you can try, if you feel your mind constantly judging or dismissing your emotions, is simply to focus on what you're feeling at a very simple level. Do your feelings have a location, a size, a shape, a colour, a smell? I felt silly when I first tried that, but it really turned out to be a helpful step in learning to feel some distance from my racing mind and to begin finding at least some sense of calm in the emotional storm.

And those moments when you feel some relief from the pain and ruminations, try bringing some of your focus back to yourself and what you need to get through these first days that can be so painful. It's not easy to turn away from the social media and wanting to know what our exes are doing, but try to observe your thoughts and feelings as you do it, and whether you would be better off stepping away and spend some of that time on activities that you care about.
 
Excerpt
But I had dreams about her last night and woke up this morning feeling like it was the end of the world. I looked through her profile pictures, tagged photos, etc. and she has deleted absolutely every trace of me. 7 years worth of photos & memories. Maybe this is what people need to do to move on, but it just feels terrible. 

It may be what your ex needs. But as you point out, it doesn't seem like a healthy way to move on from someone you shared many years and a deep emotional connection with. And, more to the point, it doesn't sound like it's what you need. I know I have never wanted to exit deep and meaningful relationships with a sense of hostility and wanting to delete the past. I want to grieve for what's lost and to remember the good times, and learn from both. That takes time and it can be a painful process. So give yourself the time you need and don't judge yourself for it, or measure yourself by the ways your ex is moving on.

I know it can be very very painful, believe me. My heart really goes out to you right now, JJacks. Hang in there 
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michel71
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« Reply #2 on: August 07, 2016, 09:02:47 PM »

Mine deleted all evidence of me from her Facebook page save a non-descript picture of me in a non-descript place. She hid her relationship status ( who knows, maybe from just me). No pictures of us together. No wedding pictures. She even changed her last name back to her former married name!
AND THIS WAS ALL DURING THE RELATIONSHIP! During better times she did not change her Facebook page.
Effectively I have been personal non grata for quite some time but didn't want to see the reality of the situation. And yet I stayed longer.
I feel your pain. It is horrible.

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fromheeltoheal
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« Reply #3 on: August 07, 2016, 09:23:43 PM »

I can understand not wanting to see reminders when you're trying to move on, but to take the time to crop me out of each photo and reupload them seems like quite the daunting task, and it looks like that's how she chose to spend her entire night.

This makes it seem like she's really moving on this time, trying to pretend I never existed. 

For a borderline it's not pretending, it's real; my ex did the same thing with each ex, the bedsheets were first, into the dumpster they went.  With someone with a personality disorder that causes extreme emotions that can't be soothed, that picture cropping was more than a photoshop exercise, she was literally cropping you out of her life, a psychological tool developed to deal with intense emotions she can't soothe otherwise.

Standard borderline there, apply as applicable, and I'm sorry JJacks, it's brand new and raw, and the best thing you can do is take very good care of yourself, eating, sleeping, hydrating, no booze, watch the caffeine, surround yourself with supportive people, talk to us and a professional if you need it.  Detachment is a project, one that's the most difficult at the beginning but it gets easier, one day at a time, and there are benefits too, something to look forward to.  Take care of you!
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Splitblack4good
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« Reply #4 on: August 10, 2016, 01:09:45 AM »

It must be hard after 7 years together.
this thread i find interesting to me for the opposite of what you have experienced.

I've been on and off with my ex Bpdgf for 7 years aswell so same time scale . The more push/pull and recycles we had in that time the worse it got like most on here it always goes the same way and similar dynamic of a relationship with someone with BPD however my ex has always deleted her exes out of her life in the same ways as you described. With me though she never has . Every time we split up and the last two times especially they have been major she doesn't delete photos of me on her FB page or previous posts of us even though she's in a new relationship with someone else. She even asked me if it was ok to keep my old dressing gown when I was removing all my belongings from her house recently. We have a 5 month year old son together so we are tied in that respect .
Even when she has told me that she really does hate me and been the most angry and nasty person towards me after we split . She's even blocked me everywere in in past break ups and gone NC for 3-4 months before we had our son every time she will not delete me from her past in that way she's always said she tries so hard to hate me but can't and I'm the only person she's ever truly loved and has told me on several occasions that she didn't love any of her exes not even the father of her first 3 children and that's why she could so easily delete them out of her life like they didn't excist.

So leads to this quistion maybe someone with BPD is capable of falling in love even though the disorder has proven highly time and time again that they are incapable of such a feeling ?
Just a thought !
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JJacks0
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« Reply #5 on: August 10, 2016, 09:28:23 AM »

I don't really have any frame of reference for that, I was my ex's first relationship. She said all the same things to me and I have no doubt that she did genuinely love me. I believe she still does, and taking down pictures makes it easier to move on. But who knows.
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Icanteven
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« Reply #6 on: August 10, 2016, 10:13:01 AM »

My wife has done the same thing to me and our kids.  I mean we're talking about wiping Facebook out so far back that I think Mark was still at Harvard (ok, that's hyperbole, but I'm impressed by her resolve to wipe out that much of her timeline; it wasn't a quick project).

My T and P are almost dismissive as to her reasons: has nothing to do with me and everything to do with triggering her; it's not that she doesn't love you all it's that she loves you so much that seeing those pics triggers shame and guilt which she's desperately trying to avoid since, ya know, that's EXACTLY what she should feel for being despicable.

So, a little gallows humor: we have pics of the kids all over the house, but a lot never made it off the Internet and into frames.  And, because a lot of the pics of the kids weren't tagged, by deleting them she deleted the only copies of those photos IN EXISTENCE.  Anyway,  her mother calls me to ask if I have a few photos she wants to frame of the children, and I inform her, no, I don't have them because your daughter deleted them all and those were the only copies which promptly sends my MiL into a full-blown rage such that my phone rings fifteen minutes later and it's my wife reading me the riot act for telling her mom that she deleted the only version of certain photos of her grandchildren.  MiL calls in the middle of this undressing and I conference her in (because f*ck it, right?) and I get to listen to approximately 20 minutes of the two of them going after each other.  I know it was passive aggressive and I know I shouldn't have done it but I was gonna get an earful from grandma as well unless I cut out the middle man.

You'll read all over the website about how pwBPD act impulsively and don't think things through.  That applies to pictures of their own kids.  Remember that. 

Also, seeing you on some of the other threads, you will wake up on a bad day in a few months and it will be better than a good day now.  And a good day some day will be a good day with no qualifiers and a bad day won't have anything to do with her.  I wanted to die.  My kids were pretty much the only thing that kept me going.  But I kept going and I'm firmly on the path to recovery when I wondered if I was permanently damaged by all of this.  You will recover too if you give yourself a chance.
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JJacks0
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« Reply #7 on: August 10, 2016, 02:04:06 PM »

Thank you for that perspective, Icanteven. Makes me feel slightly better I guess, knowing that it's not actually a reflection of the way she feels about me.  I do find it strange that she remains friends with me on FB though, considering.

And I suppose there's really no way I could convince her to not feel so much shame, is there...
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Icanteven
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« Reply #8 on: August 10, 2016, 02:22:16 PM »

I do find it strange that she remains friends with me on FB though, considering.

She's remained friends with you because she's comfortable with that level of control.  It gives her a window into your life and let's you gawk at her's in the ways she sees fit.  My wife changed her status and unfriended me the same week she left. Not sure which is worse.

And I suppose there's really no way I could convince her to not feel so much shame, is there.

You can't "convince" her to do anything, especially not to feel shame.  You can, however, avoid doing things that trigger her feelings of shame.  It's a good news bad news thing though, as simply existing may cause her to feel shame, the thing she desperately cannot allow herself to feel.  And she should feel ashamed of the way she's acted, only shame represents ego death represents annihilation, so that's not going to happen, at least without years of therapy.  Mine's been at it a almost a year and I'm just seeing results, and even then, I have no idea what would happen were she unleashed into the real world.  Granted, mine has a lot of comorbid conditions, so YMMV, but it would be comical what creates emotional dysregulation if it weren't so sad and life destroying.
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JJacks0
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« Reply #9 on: August 31, 2016, 02:07:58 AM »

Not sure if this is in any way true or not, but I had a different perspective about this today.

I was looking through my own Facebook photos and had to skim past anything with her or traces of our life together in it, as quickly as possible. If I settled in or focused on anything for too long it was incredibly painful - emotions came flooding back that I have been trying to repress for the past month.

I'm sure this seems like a pretty typical reaction after a significant break up, but it wasn't quite so hard for me to look at these images mere weeks ago. Probably because I hadn't fully accepted the finality of the break up yet (in truth I'm sure I still haven't, but a month of NC has made it pretty clear that she's okay without me). I wonder if in some way her deleting the photos... .the cropping out, etc. was just a sign that she had reached that stage before me. Maybe looking at them was too painful for her as well.

Albeit, I still have no intentions of doing anything that drastic... .at this point I'll just avoid looking at them. And it was her decision to cut off ties and end it this time, so it does still strike me a bit strange that if she was in so much pain she would stick to her guns as she has. Unless of course it has to do with shame, as some have mentioned.

I guess there's really no way of knowing... .just something I thought of and felt like getting out.
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LilMe
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« Reply #10 on: August 31, 2016, 09:31:18 AM »

Sorry you are hurt JJacks0    I came here today also feeling the pain of being cut off and totally discarded; like our 10 years together never happened and didn't matter to him.  My uBPD is blind so doesn't do Facebook, but when I see him for a few minutes at drop off and pick up for his supervised visitation once a week, he is cold and awful to me; won't even talk to me, but says rude things about me to the children.  Then I hate myself for still feeling sadness and love for him.

Yesterday he told the children he had to give their dog away because he is blind and can't take care of it.  Uh, no, it is because he was abusive to us and won't/cannot admit doing anything wrong and we were forced to leave with only the clothes we were wearing!  We couldn't take the dog when we left as we had no where to go and he is a big dog.  He would not let us take the dog once we got into a house.  My dog ran away to the neighbors and we now have her back.  He didn't tell us she ran away until a month after she left!

I am 4 months out and doing much better due to almost NC, but it is still hard and very painful to see him.  Especially when he bad mouths me for the entire 5 minutes I am there picking up the children.  I wish I had an easy solution to all this pain!  But time does seem to heal some.  I only break down several times a week now when it was several times a day, so there is progress.  I even find myself feeling happy and hopeful often, which I hadn't felt for many years!

Hang in there, it will get better.
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