Has anyone written a letter to their expwbpd? If so, how did it go?

[Ashesanddust]

I have recently gotten out of a one year relationship with my pwbpd. I am feeling rattled, crazy, so lost. I feel like none of it made sense and like I need clarity and that I want to apologize for my part in it. Have any of you ever written a letter to your expwbpd and if so, how did it go?

[Under The Bridge]

Hello and welcome to the site, we can all relate to what you've gone through.

If it's some sort of closure and explanation you're seeking, it's unlikely you'll get it. In the mind of the BPD, they were always the victim and tend not to justify anything they did.

It would indeed be nice if our exBPD's did take responsibility and acknowledge - even if in a small way - that they caused problems, instead of leaving us in a shattered wreck both mentally and physically wondering what the hell just happened.

If you're happy the relationship is truly over for good then I wouldn't be inclined to initiate any contact as they would see this as you still being interested and a candidate 'if all else fails' and they have nobody else in the picture at the moment.

If you want to re-engage with the hope of trying again then remember that they were unable to accept sense, reason and logic when you actually spoke to them so are likely to treat a written letter the same way.

I wrote to my exBPD a couple of times during her many meltdowns but I don't think it ever served any real purpose. She went out with me because I was her best option at that time. Took me  a long time to realise that.

Best wishes whatever you decide to do, keep us informed we've all got your back.

[ForeverDad]

When it comes to seeking closure from a person with BPD traits (pwBPD), our experience is that it's generally counterproductive.  It's better to Gift yourself whatever Closure you feel you need.  Remember that explaining yourself just exposes yourself to needless discord.  We have to remember that using JADE (Justify, Argue, Defend, Explain) is a communication approach that works well with us reasonably normal people, typically fails with pwBPD.  In other words... if it's over, then just accept it's over.  Let the sleeping dogs lie undisturbed.

Some here have really felt a need to DO something.  How about writing your letter and then, with or without friends or ceremony, let it burn.  (No forest fires, please!)

[Pook075]

Hello and welcome to the family!

I wrote a few letters post breakup at different stages and I don't think any of them did any good.  However, the process of writing and getting my feelings out on paper helped me quite a bit.

A few of the letters I sent.  The other letters I threw away.  None of them were directly discussed or replied to though and I was okay with that.

So if you want to write a letter, write a letter.  Or write 20 of them.  It feels good to get all that out.  Just know that it's beneficial for you and probably counter-productive for your partner/ex since they'll view it through a jaded lens.  So actually sending the letter is optional and most here would tell you to save the price of the stamp...it's not worth sending.

[Me88]

 I would not write any letter. Anything you write in there, short of you taking blame is going to come off as you being a horrible person with no accountability. Go no contact and block them everywhere if that is a possibility. Keeping any door open will only keep you trapped. We all know how addictive these relationships are and it truly is like a drug.

[Ashesanddust]

Thank you for the welcome.  I do understand that it may be counterproductive.  I have written many letters at this point.  I myself suffer from C-PTSD which i had before I met my pwbpd. I have never before come into contact with anyone with bpd as far as I know. This was a whole new experience for me.  Incredibly wonderful to start, quickly got tumultuous. Felt like I wanted to try to help him but things just kept getting more chaotic. My own trauma responses made gray rocking almost impossible. I would need to talk about it after and it almost never worked even though he said he would be able to. I made mistakes and I lied once to try to avoid a fight. That was stupid of me but is hard to believe the outcome would have been much different if I had been honest. I later found out that he had been talking to other women. Women he said he broke up with because he never really felt much for them.  I also found out that he told our coworkers that I had assaulted him. Which is horrible for many reasons and also untrue. I myself had been assaulted about a year prior to meeting him and had been vulnerable with him about this. So it blows my mind that he would say something like that about me. I feel the need to call him out but to also apologize for being so reactive when we would fight. A mutual friends called the cops on him and they took him to a hospital for holding. While he was in there, i took care of his dog. When he got out,  i didn't get a thank you. He refused to be at his apt when i dropped her off and made me kick in the door and break the frame since it was still messed up from the cops. He has another ex who started out being kind to me and quickly switched to saying i was the crazy one amd blocking me. To be fair, I did lash out at her because she also lied about her intentions and had been trying to get back with him the whole time we were together.  To be honest,  I DO feel crazy. It's all so complicate and messy. I oscilate between hating him and wishing we had never met and wanting to make things right for my part in it.

[Ashesanddust]

I think at this point,  I just feel so confused. I have no idea who or what to trust. I do believe he loved me. I know i loved him. I think I want to believe that he would be receptive because he seemed to have serious moments of clarity in the past. It just feels like everything got so insane for a minute there. I am in therapy and have been going to support groups. Just,  at the end of the day, he is still the one I want to talk to about all of it. And due to the relationship, I have cut many people out of my life in order to help cut down his triggers. So I'm feeling especially isolated. Many of the friends I do still have don't really seem to understand it. They tend to make me feel worse. Reading posts on this site have helped me a lot so that is why I am here now.

[Pook075]

To be honest,  I DO feel crazy. It's all so complicate and messy. I oscilate between hating him and wishing we had never met and wanting to make things right for my part in it.

So in a one-year relationship, he:

- Lied to you many times
- Lied about you to others
- Cheated on you (many times)
- Was hospitalized for mental issues
- Found a new love (in an old flame)
- Lied to her about you
- Lied to you about her
- Showed no remorse or appreciation
- Avoided you after helping him

That list is just from two of your posts, so I'm guessing it's only a small snapshot of the full picture.

Going back to your first post- what part of that list makes sense to anyone?  It just doesn't.  And it will never make any sense until you add the one thing that all of this revolves around.  He's sick.  He's mentally ill.  He means well but self-sabotages every relationship in his life.  Then he runs before he can get hurt.  But it still hurts, so he jumps head-first into another relationship right away.

This is the story of a BPDs life.  It's the same toxic, abusive cycle.  And its heartbreaking because I'm sure underneath the mental illness, he's a pretty good guy.  But you can't look at one thing without the other- they're a group package that comes together.  That's why his past relationships have failed.  That's why his future relationships will fail.  It's sad but unfortunately, it's the honest truth.  He's sick and he's the only one that can help himself.

You are not crazy and this is not your fault.  There's nothing you can do right now to "fix this."  

I will give a piece of advice though; his current relationship will also fail and he'll be looking for someone to quickly replace her with.  He might come back and say all the right things, do all the right stuff, and you'll think that it's true love destiny that you're together forever.  But the same cycle will repeat once again, just like it always has in his life.  You'll have a whole new list like the one above.

Right now, your focus should be on healing from this relationship and finding your way forward.  It doesn't make sense right now because this comes in stages, but I'm telling you now where you'll eventually end up- he's mentally ill and none of this was personal.  He does the best he can while fighting mental illness and it causes chaos in all his close relationships.  That's not your fault and in some ways, it's not his either.  Again, he's sick.

I hope that helps!

[Ashesanddust]

Yes, that does help. It's so frustrating because I know logically that this is a person who did all.of those things and pretty severely abused me yet I feel at fault. I know that is by design. And i know crazy makes crazy. It is very hard to keep your cool in those situations. The fights would get so bad. It would be 4 am and we both had work the next day and he would have the lights on, tv blaring, piling up everything I ever gave him on the floor, screaming at me to get the f*** out of his home and his life. And i would just be crying, hiding under the covers. He would try to push me out of the bed and eventually just go sleep on the couch but leave the tv blaring. This would happen often and I wouldn't always be able to just lay there. Sometimes I would throw a fit back. Sometimes I would drive away into the night.  There was no winning and he blames me for always pushing him to that point. And so does his ex that I told him he would unblock so that he would have more support in his life. Something he would not have done for me. I only had him block her in the first place because she was sending him love songs and asking him out to the bar after midnight.  Plus he had me block pretty much every man in my life whether I had history with them or not.

[PeteWitsend]

Advice I received was to write a letter, and then hold off on sending it for a decent amount of time, and then come back to it and see if you still want to send it.

The issue is, you're seeking closure for how the relationship went, and want to rectify the mistreatment you likely received, but a pwBPD is not going to see it that way, and is not interested in setting anything straight; sending a letter to them is not going to start a productive dialog, it's just an invitation to continue the same deceptive and disingenuous communication patterns you had during your relationship.  Does that make sense? 

It's like getting back in a hamster wheel and thinking this time running in it might take you somewhere.  It hasn't changed though, you'll still just go around in circles.

[ForeverDad]

I would not write any letter. Anything you write in there, short of you taking blame is going to come off as you being a horrible person with no accountability.

That is an excellent caution.  Do not write anything that could imply that you did something legally objectionable.  There are laws (at least in the USA) that you do not have to incriminate yourself.

Here's a thought... It's probably okay to apologize for hurting the other's feelings.  Last I heard, you can't be found guilty or jailed for hurting someone's feelings, though some countries in Europe seem to be leaning in that direction.

[Ashesanddust]

Advice I received was to write a letter, and then hold off on sending it for a decent amount of time, and then come back to it and see if you still want to send it.

Did you ever decide to send ot after all?

[Ashesanddust]

Could I post the letter here and hear your thoughts?
Or is that too personal? I feel as i am lost at sea most days and using this type of message board is new to me as well.

[PeteWitsend]

Did you ever decide to send ot after all?

I never wrote a letter; I considered it after my divorce, and then read some of the accounts here, and recognized that it would just re-open the door to more pointless conflict. The fact that we had nearly divorced a year prior to that, but she begged me to reconsider and I caved, only to have her immediately revert to established behavior patterns once she felt like the threat of divorce had passed, made me see any attempts at having a genuine conversation with her as an exercise in futility.  I knew it was all a game to her... I don't even know if she is capable of having feelings like a normal human would.  For her the truth is whatever she can convince people of, and if you're not trying to manipulate others to do what you want, you're just a sucker and a fool.  

So I concurred with what I read from others here, that any attempt at opening a dialog would just result in the same finger pointing and blame shifting she always engaged in.  So I never wrote a letter, let alone sent one.  

Instead I write here, and hopefully can provide some guidance to other people going through high-conflict, miserable relationships like I did.  I view this as a lot more productive, and a net good for humanity, rather than going in circles with my ex about why everything was my fault actually, and she only yelled and screamed and picked fights with my mom, my aunt, my brother, etc. because of reasons, I never loved her enough, put her first, or [insert baseless, impossible to achieve standard here].  No thanks!

[Pook075]

Could I post the letter here and hear your thoughts?
Or is that too personal? I feel as i am lost at sea most days and using this type of message board is new to me as well.

You can absolutely share it here as long as you leave out any identifying information (his name, the new girl's name, etc) or ultra-specific stuff (like locations you went on certain dates, etc).

[Pook075]

Yes, that does help. It's so frustrating because I know logically that this is a person who did all.of those things and pretty severely abused me yet I feel at fault. I know that is by design. And i know crazy makes crazy. It is very hard to keep your cool in those situations.

Absolutely, it is maddening and it's so hard to know which way is up when your partner is disordered and just wanting to fight about something.  I lived that as well.

Just know that how I felt a few weeks after breaking up was very different than how I felt a few months later, or even a few years later.  You're so close to this right now that it feels like it's worth fighting for...which is normal.  If you love someone, you fight for them and forgive them.  But that brings us back to mental illness; he's not fighting for you because in many ways, he was incapable.

Quick glimpse into his thinking.  He's having a terrible day but trying to hide it.  His thoughts are everywhere.  He comes home, starts ranting, and you try to silently back away.  You don't want to do that, not again!  And he senses that.  But instead of thinking what a normal person would think- maybe I'm being overly drammatic, his mind goes the opposite direction and blames you.  How could she not understand how much pain I'm in?  How could she reject me when I'm feeling like this?  What sort of person would look at me that way when I ask them an important question?

Again, mental illness is leading this parade.  His thoughts are jumbled and before long, he's convincing himself that you're going to leave him, that you never cared to begin with.  He can't face rejection, he can't handle it at all, so he sabotages the relationship and either leaves, or forces you to leave.  Why?  Because you can't abandon him if he kicks you out.

This disordered way of thinking drives his every action, defines his entire life.  He's always looking for the slightest hint of a problem and when he sees it (regardless if it's real or not), he fixates on it until he's built a completely different narrative in his head.  One random thought leads to another and before long, what he thinks about the relationship is nothing like the reality before him.  He must fight or flee.

The cheating, the abuse, all the other stuff comes from this cycle.  In his mind, you were the mean one and he did what he had to do in order to survive.  In reality, his own brain was working against him and he was simply running from all the pain.  The problem wasn't you though, it was always within him and that's the scariest thing in the world for him to even consider.

[Ashesanddust]

This is the version that I have landed on now. I decided to leave it most of the happy lovey stuff because let's be real, I don't think reliving that is helping me and it would only make him mad because he might stew on what he can't have anymore.
It is a bit of a read but I do feel that I am taking responsibility more than I am placing blame. Maybe a little too kind for everything he put me through but who knows.

Dear exbf

I write to you now from my truest heart. The heart of a person you said you love more than anything and that loves you still. I realize that it is possible that you have split me black and villainized me in order to make things easier for you.  But now, I ask that you please read this with an open and compassionate mind. It is not an attack, it is insight. You are a person that I love and care deeply about. The time we had together means so much to me. I want to apologize for how I communicated with you at times. My own life trauma has changed my brain and the way my nervous system responds to things the same way yours has. Yes, it is different. No i don't have bpd. I do however have C-PTSD. Along with some usual suspects, depression, anxiety, panic disorder. For me, high-anger conflict, accusations, hurtful words, feelings of being abandoned or pushed away so hard etc, trigger a fight or flight reaction as well. I get emotionally overloaded, defensive, scared, reactive. That kind of conflict proves to me that I am in fact worthless and it drives my ever present need to try to make everything ok. I feel constant guilt of everything being my fault even when I logically know that is not the case. So when you would say everything was my fault, it would confirm my fears. I over explain due to the fear of not being understood. Especially by the person I love. When you would leave after or in the middle of a big fight, with no thought as to when you'd be back, I would feel severe abandonment. That is why I always asked for a timeline because I would worry that you wouldn't come back at all. Like you had threatened. Even though I logically knew that you needed space and wanted to give that to you. When you did come back, I would try to talk about it because I wanted everything to be ok. Not to be pushy but to have a conversation and make it right. To avoid spiraling on my end and making it worse. To try to connect with you and build a stronger bond by being able to talk through things together. Like you, I can get stuck on things and it is hard to get out. Like you, i sometimes need a delicate touch and reassurance.

I am a caretaker and a people pleaser. That came from my need to have peace, stability and safety in my home life growing up when there was none. I have a very hard time feeling safe around other people. It takes me a long time to feel like I can trust them or like I can fully relax and be myself. While our shared trauma brought us together and forged an incredibly deep and passionate bond, it also made it so that when both of our nervous systems were dysregulated, it would create an intense trigger-response cycle. A lot of the time, my response to your cycle was to either shut down or defend myself. Usually, before I even knew what was happening. I know you are unwell but that does not excuse abusive behavior, harsh double standards or hurtful lies. When I would try to take a time out, it was not usually successful. I know I was sometimes not good at giving you space either. I tried my best to do what I could. When you would split on me, it felt like my world was ending. I thought I was losing you every time. I would get so scared especially when you started threatening or hitting yourself. I vividly remember you holding a knife to your throat and laughing. It tore me apart watching you hurt yourself. I would blame myself and feel the need to make it right for you no matter what. Even though I know it was not my fault and that there was not much I could do. When I felt that I couldn't do anything right, I would withdraw and beat myself up. I know you do this too so you understand the importance of reassurance around those feelings. This is why I needed you to read about my trauma triggers and responses as well so that you could understand the ways in which I am similar and we could both do the work to better our communication and our reactions.

I never wanted to block you in the first place, It felt so wrong. I kept unblocking you because I was worried about you. Not because i wanted to torture you. You were my best friend. 90 missed calls in a row made me feel like you were screaming that you needed me. So I would unblock you to make sure you were ok. And then it would devolve because we were both emotional and reactive. So many times, you would say one thing but mean another. There were no rules. You yourself said that you have never pushed or tested another partner so hard and I felt that. You say I badger you but sometimes when people get pushed to an extreme, they push back. That is not an excuse. Just something that can happen. You instilled in me that you wanted me to do everything I could to push through your walls. To stay even when you were screaming at me not to. To find every way to contact you even when I was blocked. You said those exact words to me. That is a hard habit to build and an even harder one to break. I was trying to do what you had asked for so many times.To always keep trying, to not give up, no matter what you said or did. I loved you more than anyone I've ever known. I fought harder for our relationship than I have for anything. I showed you countless times that I was not going anywhere. Proved my loyalty and my worth over and over. Feeling like there was never enough I could do to convince you takes a toll.

I am ashamed of lashing out at you at the end. I know that you being in the hospital was scary and horrible for you. I regret not being more present and sensitive to that. And for not being able to better control my emotions. Between everything that had happened between us and losing the baby, I was already in such a dark place. Then I found out many things that really hurt me. I felt like everything was a lie. I know that if you had heard those things about me, I would do everything I could to show you it wasn't the truth. You didn't do that for me and it made it feel even more that it was in fact the truth. I still don't know who or what to trust or believe. All I truly know is how I felt in that moment and how I feel now. The only thing I can do is take responsibility for my own actions.

I keep replaying dropping dog off in my head. I feel so awful that that's the way it all went down. I know you told me to break the door frame but it all felt so extreme. I love her more than anything too. You two were my family. I just wanted so badly to help you both. Even after everything. I wanted to leave with more grace but I just couldn't. I was and still am in so much pain.

I didn't end things because I don't love you. I love you so very much. The constant fighting was doing heavy irreversible damage to us both. From everything I have read, it is almost impossible for someone with bpd to seek treatment while they are in the depths of a romantic relationship. The highs and lows are too drastic to be able to focus on anything outside of it. You told me yourself how all you did was rot and obsess when I wasn't right in front of you. I never want that for you. I ended things for both our sake. I know that I've had a difficult time detaching. I never wanted to be without you. It's all so complicated. I understand that we both have very different ways of processing heartbreak. I also think that it is incredibly hard to detach in general after bonding the way that we did. I understand that you now feel a need to fill that void with something or someone else. I hope, though, that you can find a way to focus on yourself and find the motivation to work towards healing in a way that brings you peace. You are so incredibly special. Not just to me. But to so many people. Seeing you in pain breaks my heart. Many unforgivable things happened to you as a child and that was not your fault. Neither of us deserved the horrible things that happened to us. You deserve so much love and happiness. I also understand that part of why things got so intense is because of how strongly you feel about me. I know you said you have never felt the way you do about me about anyone else. I get that the more intense the feelings are, the more the symptoms present themselves and the fear of losing that increases the need to self sabotage and push me away even harder. I can't imagine how difficult it is to try to navigate that with so many conflicting things going on in your mind. But you are not unworthy of love and good things. There were times that I was successful in helping you but I know that there were many times I was not and I will forever wish I could have been stronger in those moments. I have been working on myself too. Therapy and support groups have been very helpful to me. I have a whole lot to heal as well. I wish that we both could have found better ways to communicate with each other and feel like the other understood. You do not need to respond if you do not want to. I just wanted to share this with you, someone who is very important and dear to me. If you truly feel like hating me is the only way that you'll make it through this, then I understand. But just know, I could never hate you. I am hurt and feel betrayed but when I think of you and of us, I choose to remember all of the good, the love and the adventure. I will love you and miss you for the rest of my life.

[Ashesanddust]

We dated for a year. Things got progressively worse. I definitely held on longer than I should have. I told him from the beginning that mental health was very important to me. After he told me about his bpd, about 3 months in, I told him I needed him to seek treatment if he wanted to pursue a future with me. He promised he would. Every now and then he would take a small step towards that but then would blame me for any set backs. He said thay the only way he would get better is if I lived with him.  I told him I was not ready for that and needed to ensure that my home could be more stable then how it had been woth us lately. I tried breaking up with him in April but he charmed me back in. Things kept getting worse. The stress of it all caused me to have a miscarriage. He was not there for me through that. He could not get off the living together thing.  I even tried to compromise by moving into the same apt complex just in my own unit but it wasnt good enough. The fighting kept getting worse so I ended things again at the end of June. Had him blocked off and on but then when he went to the hospital,  I wound up taking the dog so I couldn't have him blocked during that time. Every interaction just kept getting worse. It sucked.

[Ashesanddust]

And maybe I'm delusional to care so much at all. Yes the emotional and verbal abuse was horrible. And maybe I already have a high threshold for that so I didn't see it for as bad as it was at the time. And maybe the trauma bond made me feel a crazy desperate love that wasn't real love. I am a sensitive and traumatized person. That being said, I do clearly value myself enough to get out. I just feel so insane at this point. Sorry to vent so much.  I clearly needed to get some stuff out.