Making everything about who's right and who's wrong

[HRb1tch]

Hi all, I hope you're all having a great start to the new year. I'm feeling pretty scattered--more lost than before, for sure. This post will be about my brother (M21), my ex-partner (now close friend; M24), and me (F24).

My brother was diagnosed with BPD at 19, and up until now, he hasn't received consistent counselling. He takes medication, but I'm not really sure how effective it's been for him, because he says that it helps, but also says that he doesn't want to take it anymore quite frequently. More recently, I've noticed that he's been referring to his past traumas a lot. I've tried to encourage him to attend individual counselling, or maybe go to family therapy with me. I thought we were getting close to seeing a family counsellor, but today, he started to question why he needs to go, and how it would even be effective, since, in essence, I am the one perpetuating the problem here.

Back in late 2019, I started dating my ex-partner, who I'll call S. We met and started dating rather quickly--I was very mentally ill, nowhere near stable and pretty actively suicidal. S was different from anyone I had ever met before or since then. He brought a pleasing calmness and comfort to me that nobody had really been able to before. He's never made me feel unsafe, misunderstood, or unloved--and I'm sad to say that that's rare for me. I felt that he was something special, and to me, he is. But more pressingly, around the time that I met him, I felt that I was a threat to myself while living at home. My family members are all very emotional people, and used to understand very little about mental illness (i.e. how to be supportive, how to not make things worse, etc.), and I ran away from home within a few months of dating S to save myself from all of that. Before leaving, my only means of escape was drinking, and I was only getting worse every day.

But in the process, I subjected my brother to pure hell by leaving him there. I tried to implore my other family members (who did not live in the same house) to take him in, but they refused to, and still, I did not return home for quite some time. I regret this action a lot, even though it saved my life. I stopped drinking, I attended therapy regularly, and I was finally connected to a psychiatrist that listened to me and didn't just put me on zombifying medicine. In short, I got my life back on track, though looking back, I honestly wish I'd just died back then (not only because of everything I'm talking about here).

Anyway, I came home months later, and from the beginning, I saw how much my brother resented me. The jokes that he would make about me to my face were incredibly cruel, and it took a long time to get him to stop doing that. Even now, he'll still say hurtful things, but he's a lot more direct, and just says that he's "being honest" or "not saying anything wrong." I used to be very defensive about criticisms or comments he'd make about S, and this is a huge source of trauma for my brother, because he says that I took his voice away from him. The emotions he felt from being subjected this behaviour seem to get worse the more that he thinks about in the present day.

S is socially anxious, and wasn't always aware of how his behaviours around other people made them feel uncomfortable or unwelcome. He's getting treatment now, but not before everything went to hell. The thing about my brother is that he is very serious about upholding his standards--not only with himself--but with the people he surrounds himself with. In his own words, he says he becomes "disgusted" when he sees things he doesn't like in other people, because he sees tolerating these traits or behaviours as a form of disrespect to himself. Personally, when I consider my brother's social life, it makes me sad. He has very little friends, doesn't go out at all unless it's with me, and is easily peeved by outsiders. He's not exactly leading by example, but still judges my friends and people I choose to get close to harshly.

S is also a different person around people that he's comfortable with (e.g. more talkative, expressive, personal), and knowing this fact really pissed my brother off, because it makes him feel totally rejected. Because they could barely connect on any level, my brother sees someone who forced their way into his life and made it nothing but abysmal when he thinks of S. In short, he hates S because he thinks that nothing about him is "normal," he hates the entire timeline and associated memories of us meeting and being together, and thinks that S is secretly a total piece of PLEASE READ that is only going to drag me down and bring me problems in the future. I can't say his name or mention him in any way without my brother completely shifting and experiencing intense anger and hatred. Suffice to say that S is totally painted black because of the surrounding trauma and lack of power/voice my brother felt all this time.

I could go on and on about all of this, but to save everyone time, my brother's resentment and anger towards S and me eventually led to us breaking up. And now that we're not even romantically involved, the fact that I'm still talking to him at all makes my brother's blood boil. He doesn't think that he needs therapy because he believes the solution to his problems is for me to stop associating with S, and until I do that, I am perpetuating his mental torture. While I think that giving S the time and space that he needs to address his social anxiety is a good thing, I think that the tremendous amount of stress that my brother put me under regarding S--which led to me suffocating S with my anxiety and frustration--ultimately led to this unnecessary outcome. Spending time with S, talking to him, and being connected to him is literally one of the only things that still makes me happy. I have to sneak all of this, or risk upset when I announce my plans--I have to keep all interactions with S on the down-low, or the day is practically ruined. These past years of my life have been PLEASE READing terrible--it's been a grind to get better, to catch up to my peers academically and career-wise, and all this ridiculousness at home that keeps getting worse is no help at all. My brother is not as kind as he thinks he is. He is not as charitable and understanding as he thinks he is. His pain often makes him selfish (or at the very least, self-centred) and he fails to see that. And he really dislikes when things aren't done his way, or as he'd call it, the "normal" or "right" way.

And the worst part is that this is my best friend. Someone who has saved my life many times over. The only person in my home who actually sat with me and my pain at my lowest points. I have always loved my brother and wanted him in my life. I find it completely sickening that he is essentially deleting himself from my life little by little, and will eventually come to see it as my abandonment of him. This whole situation has torn me apart--he wants me to choose between two people I value and love deeply. And I don't know what to do, because being forced to live two lives is PLEASE READing unbearable at this point.

[Notwendy]

Welcome to this board. I think it's commendable how far you have come and what you have overcome. It's a work in progress but you have shown a lot of stregnth and resilience. Thank goodness for supportive friends like your ex-partner. He has helped you to recognize your own self worth- but you have done the hard work of therapy and recovery from drinking.

Your brother's situation reminds me of this bridge story
https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=65164.msg623823#msg623823

Unfortunately, it's a common dilemma. The pwBPD looks outside themselves to meet their vast emotional needs, and to others to somehow rescue them from their own emotional discomfort. However, I know you learned in therapy that we can not "fix" another person's feelings for them. Still, due to his having BPD, your brother seems to be projecting his feelings onto others- and you are the closer one to him.

As important as our siblings are- we aren't obligated to live with them once we are all adults. Each sibling can move from home, establish their own lives and family. You did that and there is no reason for you to feel you did anything wrong by doing so. You have the right to choose who to be with as a friend or romantic partner.

Like the bridge story- it's a difficult situation- because we do care about our family member with BPD  but we also have the right to be individuals with our own friends and possibly partners one day. Considering that we can not "fix" another person, even if you only focused on your brother, you still could not fix him. At some point we need to have some boundaries the situation, for our own emotional well being. The bridge story is an emotional metaphor.

I hope you will make the choice of finishing school, having supportive friendships and your own well being. You can still care about your brother, but you do not need to sacrifice your own well being and future. It woudn't be helpful to him, even if he has an opinion about it.

[HRb1tch]

Thank you so much for taking the time to read my post, and for your encouraging and helpful comment, Notwendy. I feel like I read your reply at the perfect time too, and have a new perspective from which to consider future decisions thanks to the story that you linked.

Before I read your reply today, I had a long and difficult conversation with my brother about everything I mentioned above. It was one of the hundreds of talks we'd already had about this topic, but it was different today, because I didn't back down from my perspective, and didn't let his painful past eclipse my painful present in our conversation. At first, it was terrible--like taking pliers to my teeth. Everything that I said to him felt wrong, even though I knew it was how I truly felt. I had reservations about the compromise that we came to in the end--it was like an alternative ending where the person at the end of the rope actually decided that he will pull himself back up slowly. I won't get my hopes up about what comes next, but at the very least, I know what it is that I need to do for myself. And the story gave me the reassurance that I need to keep walking my own path.

"If I let go, all my life I will know that I let this other die. If I stay, I risk losing my momentum toward my own long-sought-after salvation. Either way this will haunt me forever." With ironic humour he thought to die himself, instantly, to jump off the bridge while still holding on. "That would teach this fool." But he wanted to live and to live life fully. "What a choice I have to make; how shall I ever decide?"

These lines in particular from the story struck hard. I find myself making decisions out of this mental framework pretty much all the time, always progressing into the latter "option" as shown above. I don't want to do that anymore. I love my brother so much, but I know that in order to make anything in my life work, I have to love myself more. I have to give myself the time and care that I've given everyone else in my life, all my life. It's just painful to feel like looking out for myself is selfish, and to not only see but be told that, in some ways, it is. But I see how my scattered attempts to care for myself when I'm at an absolute breaking point is primarily the problem, and not the part where I do what I need to do for myself. This is where I intend to place my focus moving forward. I need to be more deliberate about what I want, and when I want it.

Although the circumstances of my life currently do not allow for separation, I think this entire situation has forced me to confront a glaring issue within myself that I've faced for a long time. I may have chosen life when I realized that suicide was not the answer for me, but I never actually started *living.* I've been waiting all this time to feel alive, never realizing that the lack of love, care for and belief in myself is what keeps me feeling dead inside. It's what drove me to suicidal ideation in the first place. I have felt like a robot all my life. I want to be like Bridge-Man, with a desire made important solely because he loves himself enough to want it. He loves himself enough to walk away from a dilemma littered with willfulness and stubborn over-reliance that delays him and keeps him constrained, unwilling to settle for anything less than what he believes he needs. I've made it clear to my brother that the ultimatum he has given me is not acceptable, and from my point of view, that is what has been driving us apart. I see his intention to back off, but I won't get comfortable yet. I have a lot more internal work to do. I'm going to find love for myself from within, instead of giving it away at every turn.

Thank you again for taking the time to read and reply to my post. You're awesome

(P.S. Can you guess my major? When I learned that good writing = concise writing, I felt like I needed to switch fields ಥ﹏ಥ)

[Notwendy]

I think many of us can relate to that quote.

The emotional "rope" for me was attached to my father- who was attached to my BPD mother. 

Metaphorically, he followed her. At times, it seems I was pulling on one end, BPD mother on the other. I tried to help but I couldn't. She had the stronger pull on him.

I didn't understand BPD dynamics well at the time. Mostly what I felt was failure.

Now, after trying to assist my elderly BPD mother, also without success I realize- it's not possible to help someone who won't accept actual help, who self sabotages, who isn't willing or able to have the self insight to perceive the help.

You are quite alive inside. The "feeling numb" is a coping mechanism in these situations. While pwBPD dissociate and have rages, another form of dissociation is to disconnect from our own feelings- as a way of coping.

With counseling, we can reconnect with feelings and even if they are hurful ones- feelings come and go- and we can learn to sit with them, and then feel all of them- the happy ones too.