Were You Ever The One To Push/Pull?

[JJacks0]

I got to thinking last night and today about the last few months of contact my ex and I had. Ultimately she pulled me in and pushed me away last. However, (to a much lesser degree) I acted similarly in the months prior. I'm wondering if anyone else can relate.

Every time she told me that she needed to go no contact with me I felt so desperate to have her back - I tried so hard to pull her back in and give her what she wanted. I would go to great lengths to achieve this and prove myself to her. But once I had her it was not what I had wanted it to be, I didn't feel content. And I'm sure it did show on occasion - I'm sure she did notice that my efforts were not always consistent. I think that maybe a part of me was just reluctant to trust her with my emotions after being told on more than one occasion that she didn't think we should talk. I wouldn't go so far as to say that I "pushed" her away at these times, but I have been guilty of holding back and acting more reserved. I know that I genuinely did want her back when she was gone... I still do. So it isn't a control issue, and it isn't just comfort or familiarity.

It's just confusing because I wanted her back so badly, but then when I had her my enthusiasm sometimes dwindled. My only guess is as I said... .that because of the way she'd reacted to me previously I can't get past that feeling of impending doom or let my wall down entirely. It's a frustrating and conflicting space to be in mentally. Even now, my heart wishes for nothing more than to speak to her and see her, but my head knows that it's too soon and she probably won't be the person I want her to be.

I guess I just thought it kind of ironic that I'm guilty of doing the same push/pull behavior to an extent. It almost helps me to understand why she does it. It's just so sad. I wish there were a way to fix it.

[satahal]

Every time she told me that she needed to go no contact with me I felt so desperate to have her back - I tried so hard to pull her back in and give her what she wanted. I would go to great lengths to achieve this and prove myself to her. But once I had her it was not what I had wanted it to be, I didn't feel content. And I'm sure it did show on occasion - I'm sure she did notice that my efforts were not always consistent. I think that maybe a part of me was just reluctant to trust her with my emotions after being told on more than one occasion that she didn't think we should talk. I wouldn't go so far as to say that I "pushed" her away at these times, but I have been guilty of holding back and acting more reserved. I know that I genuinely did want her back when she was gone... I still do. So it isn't a control issue, and it isn't just comfort or familiarity.

It's just confusing because I wanted her back so badly, but then when I had her my enthusiasm sometimes dwindled. My only guess is as I said... .that because of the way she'd reacted to me previously I can't get past that feeling of impending doom or let my wall down entirely. It's a frustrating and conflicting space to be in mentally. Even now, my heart wishes for nothing more than to speak to her and see her, but my head knows that it's too soon and she probably won't be the person I want her to be.

I think you hit the nail on the head when you describe feeling like you couldn't entirely trust her when you got her back. When we've been blindsided we tend to be skittish.

The other thing is BPD behaviors are probably extremes of behaviors we have all engaged in at one time or another. The difference is probably motive and degree.

It's probably impossible to be an impeccable partner to a disordered person - their erratic behavior and mercurial emotions put us in a very crazy head space too.

She hurt you and even though you loved and wanted her, when you had her back you likely saw the writing on the wall, hence your ambivalence.

[bunny4523]

Hi Jack,

I think what you are describing is on a different scale.  You may see you don't want this person around because they are causing you grief and you step back a little. (push) then once you have some distance, you reflect on the good and you want to be closer. (pull)

but with BPD - they want to be close so they push us away in a fear that if they don't do it first, we will.  Then when they start seeing us moving on, they get scared we will really go away so they pull us back in.  :)oes that make any sense? There's seems to be in attempt to escape an irrational fear of abandonment.  

Bunny  



 

[JJacks0]

Thank you both for your replies.

I haven't talked to her in over a month and while I have been trying to use this time to improve myself, I also find myself going over the past quite a bit. There are times when I see BPD traits in myself and have to remind myself that it was her with the PD, not me. Like you said... .

The other thing is BPD behaviors are probably extremes of behaviors we have all engaged in at one time or another. The difference is probably motive and degree.

My ex had a lot of wonderful qualities and I am literally struggling to remember some of the outrageous things she did. I guess the most telling factors were her self-harm, suicide threats, rages, eating disorders, and impulsivity. She had a period in which she lied a lot as well. When I remind myself of that it is clearer that she was the one with the disorder. Eventually I developed significant anger, moodiness, irritability, and probably an abandonment issue as well. When I think about it I could even convince myself that I'm idealizing her now, whereas I devalued her before. So sometimes the lines get blurry for me and I question myself. I guess I do have several BPD traits myself now, but I didn't always.

[JJacks0]

but with BPD - they want to be close so they push us away in a fear that if they don't do it first, we will.  Then when they start seeing us moving on, they get scared we will really go away so they pull us back in.  :)oes that make any sense? There's seems to be in attempt to escape an irrational fear of abandonment.  

Yes, that does make sense. Although, my ex has not tried to pull me back in at all after pushing me away a month and a half ago.

[satahal]

Thank you both for your replies.

I haven't talked to her in over a month and while I have been trying to use this time to improve myself, I also find myself going over the past quite a bit. There are times when I see BPD traits in myself and have to remind myself that it was her with the PD, not me. Like you said... .

The other thing is BPD behaviors are probably extremes of behaviors we have all engaged in at one time or another. The difference is probably motive and degree.

My ex had a lot of wonderful qualities and I am literally struggling to remember some of the outrageous things she did. I guess the most telling factors were her self-harm, suicide threats, rages, eating disorders, and impulsivity. She had a period in which she lied a lot as well. When I remind myself of that it is clearer that she was the one with the disorder. Eventually I developed significant anger, moodiness, irritability, and probably an abandonment issue as well. When I think about it I could even convince myself that I'm idealizing her now, whereas I devalued her before. So sometimes the lines get blurry for me and I question myself. I guess I do have several BPD traits myself now, but I didn't always.

I can completely relate to your confusion. I've often thought, "maybe I have BPD too." But, time brings clarity.

It's great that you are reminding yourself - one friend came up with the idea of making an actual written list of some of the things that the ex did. We all get into this place of only remembering the good or distorting how good the good was and how the bad wasn't all that terrible - it's part of the incredibly confusing toxic experience.

It's not devaluing someone to see that they are disordered. You had no way of knowing that early on because, I'm guessing, you're not a mental health professional and you probably never dated a pwBPD. We go in thinking the best, believing what seems to be true and it takes some amount of time to have that undone or complicated. That isn't devaluing; it's the veil falling from your eyes.

You developed your symptoms likely because you were living in a war zone of a r/s and had no tools to stop the bleeding - we break down in these relationships - that's what makes them toxic. We become angry, confused, fearful, insecure, depressed and anxious.

You do not need to be without your own psychological ticks to justify her disorder. You are a human with flaws like the rest of us and unfortunately you (and I and a bunch of other folks) picked someone who was profoundly damaged.

My ex had so many wonderful qualities - truly. I tried for 9 long years to figure out ways to sidestep his flaws: insane fear of abandonment, cheating, rages, etc, so that I could enjoy the lovely parts of him. I was determined that I could keep him content enough for a reasonable life but I couldn't.

It's blurry because there's good in her and things that you'd like to change in you or that you regret doing or saying but neither changes the bottom line. We have to let go of the good to get rid of the bad and we couldn't have done anything to take away their demons.

[eprogeny]

Yes, I did the push/pull, too.  Around the time I first wanted out, I pushed away and then would feel guilty and think I was being too hard on her - and because I did love her, I would reach out and we would rekindle... .so, yeah, I had my share of the push/pull blame.  Even in the end, I wanted and didn't want to walk away.

Love is a drug, and we've been addicts.  We need our recovery too.

[Infern0]

Kind of.

At the beginning of what would have been our last recycle I was blindsided with info she'd done quite a sordid sex act while we were broken up which a lot of people knew about and it was worse than anything shed done up to that point and i didnt think sged sink that low.

Anyway this obviously upset me and put me in a position where I had to choose between my pride and my love for her.

I was very indecisive for a while, what I really wanted was a true apology and some ownership from her and recognition that she was doing bad stuff. And her to show a real effort to change.

But of course I got half asked apologies and her being annoyed that I was having expectations.

I "push pulled" at this time because my mind was telling me this has gone too far but my heart Still wanted her and I couldn't decide

In the end she cut me off

[rfriesen]

Yes, I did quite a bit of push/pull unfortunately. Very similar to what eprogeny says. About eight months into the relationship, I was feeling unhappy and like I couldn't get through to her, in spite of the intense emotional and physical connection. So I tried explaining to her that I needed some time on my own. I was already moving away for work and she had been putting a lot of pressure on me to let her move with me and have a place together and by then she had started raging at me occasionally, which I had never experienced in a relationship before.

So, for all those reasons, I tried breaking up with her as gently as I knew how. The reaction was like nothing I had ever experienced --- such intense rage and hatred and yelling, followed by hysterical tears and her telling me how much she loved me and begging me not to do this to her. I folded. I felt I just couldn't do that to her when I saw what I felt at the time was the incredible depth of her love and need for me. (I've since learned the hard way that intensity of emotion does not equal depth or durability.)

And thus we were launched into eight months of brutal push/pull. My ex felt increasingly insecure and would test me in various ways and quiz me on my thoughts and feelings constantly. I was feeling increasingly guilty and torn between those intoxicating feelings of being needed and loved, on the one hand, and the fact that the relationship was running me ragged, on the other. And all of this seemed to incessantly up the emotional intensity of the relationship -- I guess we were both constantly wondering whether we were in the midst of our final days together, and it added a bittersweet quality to all our professions of love, to our sexual connection that was doing more and more of the work of holding us together, to every email and phone call ... .all of it just seemed to get more and more intense as we felt it slipping away.

When it comes to push/pull, I take on fully as much responsibility as my ex. I pushed and pulled quite a bit, trying to escape the madness but hold onto the sweetness at the same time. What still hurts and upsets me now when I think about my ex's behaviour is not the push/pull so much as the rage and the ways she lashed out at me. That was a line I never crossed. I never insulted her or tried to put her down or ran to another woman while we were on a break. I fought really hard to control my conflicting emotions and to act on the love I felt for her, never the anger and hurt she could also bring up in me. Whereas she would give full vent to her most negative feelings instead of working to deal with her inner conflict. What I would like for her to understand is that other people have to deal with that inner conflict too. She sometimes seems to think she's the only one with conflicting emotions and so she should have a licence to go nuts unleashing them on those close to her, while everyone else has to manage their inner turmoil.

But who knows? Maybe her inner conflict really is that much worse and more difficult to control. It just hurts when you feel you've worked really hard to show the love you feel and to control your own hurt and anger, only to see the person you love seemingly not trying at all. That's what finally made me walk away and decide I could never accept my ex's behaviour if she weren't willing to make a genuine effort.

But push/pull? yes, I was definitely guilty of that.

[VitaminC]

Hi JJacks,

There are some really good responses here, honest and self-aware and kind. I'm noticing the kindness to the self, really, which is a good thing to aim for. We as the nons in the relationship are non-BPD, which does not mean we are non-everything. We all have our mechanisms and patterns, as it helps me to think of them, rather than labeling them as disorders.

(It's a spectrum, a fine line sometimes, and I personally prefer to stay away from diagnosing myself, or even another, and find it more useful to just look at the patters before I try to dig a bit deeper)

In particular Bunny's response resonated for me - probably because I've been thinking along the same lines myself recently - our outward actions (push/pull) might appear similar and have similar effects on another, but the key is to look for the motivations that underlie them.

Typically for a pwBPD it would be a fear of abandonment, and for a "non" - well, it could be that too, to an extent, or any number of other things - as people here have already pointed out. That push/pull that we practise is part of our own fears and insecurities that initially led us into the relationship, the subsequent disregard of red-flags, any unhealthy co- dependency and dynamics that developed, all of it.  It's also a reaction to the confusing signals we were getting and sometimes the very strong conflicting desire to both stay in and get away.   At least that's how it was for me and how I read many of the member stories here. 

I put up my hand and say, yes, I too did some push/pull. Definitely. It's what remains as guilt for me about how I treated another human being. That guilt comes from my compassion for another, and also, importantly, it is my opportunity to see in myself both the good qualities (compassion, kindness, love) and the areas I really need and want to work on.

So rather than berating myself for the push/pull I indulged in (I am given to self-criticism), I am trying to understand why I did it, what fears there were in me, and note how they are old fears and have been present in every relationship. This one brought them out most strongly (and helpfully, if I look at it as a learning opportunity).

Important to that process is remembering and unravelling who did what and when things happened. That's the other part of your original post that stood out for me - our difficulties in remembering the bad things. It's the second or third thread I've read in the last couple of days, where members are talking about what methods they came up with to help them get some facts clear in their heads - whether they were still in the relationship or after it has ended.

Our memories are so selective and imperfect, so filtered through our emotions. It's important to have methods that allow us to step out of the emotions enough to see some facts.

Weaving the facts back in to our emotional awareness then gives us a slightly different pattern or texture. I think that's "understanding".

How are you doing now?

[toomanyeggshells]

Until I saw your post, I never realized that I've been doing this, but I have.  Every time he would rage, I would tell him how much I wanted to move out and I absolutely meant it.  Then a few days would pass and things would be okay and we'd go back to "normal".  We did that dance probably hundreds of times in the 7 years we lived together until I did finally move out two weeks ago.  I'm finding it hard to completely walk away.  We're still talking and seeing each other but I don't think its going to work as bf/gf living separately after we've lived together.

When I moved out, I told him I wanted to stay together as bf/gf because its definitely hard for me to completely cut off contact, regardless of his past behavior towards me.  Every time the subject of staying in the r/s been brought up since I moved out, I tell him I want us together but apart.  I think I'm doing the push/pull thing with him because I feel bad leaving him and I still have some sort of feelings for him. 

[JJacks0]

toomanyeggshells - it sounds like our stories are similar. I was with my ex for about 7 years and we lived together for most of it. 

Due to raging and uncontrollable behavior, I moved into a place by myself about 4 years in, and she moved back in with her parents. We did not break up - the plan was that she would do DBT and could focus on herself more if we weren't constantly under the same roof. Well that lasted all of a few weeks. Then she moved herself right back in with me. And I wanted her to.

When our lease was up we struggled to decide if we should move together again or get separate places. Things hadn't really improved - she dropped out of DBT and we had some pretty bad fights/chaos in that year. Well, we ended up getting another place together. We decided this would be the last attempt, it had to get better here. And if it didn't, separate places. It got better for a while, but this was largely due to the fact that we fell into a friendship-type relationship. I pulled back tremendously because of trust issues, and with that dynamic she had lower expectations and the highs and lows were at a minimum. We reached a place of contentment, but things were very platonic and not how she wanted them to be. Long story short, her mother ended up passing away that year, and it caused all of the highs and lows to come surging back - understandably she had a very difficult time managing her emotions. But as a result, her anger turned to me again. It was my fault I could not make her feel better, I was "selfish" and didn't care about her whenever I did anything for myself in the months after her mother's passing. She ended up giving me an ultimatum - either we dive headfirst into a serious r/s again or we move out. At the time I felt I had no choice. I had to be honest and tell her that I didn't feel like I could meet her expectations at that moment. I felt like she was never happy with me and simply putting more pressure on the r/s wouldn't miraculously make things better. I didn't want to break up, however... .I just wanted to continue at the pace we were at. I thought that if we enjoyed each other on a friendship level that would set the course for an improved romantic r/s. But you can't just skip ahead when trust has been lost.

We ended up moving out and got separate places this past April. But I don't think either one of us were ready to be done with eachother. We engaged in a push/pull dynamic for nearly 3 months until she finally cut me off in late July. That was the last time I saw her and the last time I really spoke with her.

[hergestridge]

I guess I started to engage in the push/pull eventually. For the last two years of our relationship I didn't like her very much. I stayed because I didn't want to hand over our daughter to her, not even part time.
We spent a lot of time together and for the most part I just tolerated her and didn't show affection at all, because I didn't feel any and in my world she had betrayed me and destroyed my life. But from time to time I got tired of being cold and then we could have a laugh and feel good for a little while. Then the resentment returned and I became cold. I Always felt very guilty about that.