Confused, broken & lost

[How to communicate after a contentious divorce...]

I recently joined this group because I'm trying to make sense of a relationship that affected me very deeply. I'm also interested in hearing whether any of this sounds familiar to people who have been through something similar.

I was with my ex for about two and a half years. I loved her deeply. We lived together, planned a future together, and I was even planning to propose. There were periods when our relationship was genuinely wonderful, and I truly believed she was the person I would spend the rest of my life with.

But there was another side to the relationship that I still struggle to understand.

Over roughly a year and a half, she broke up with me around ten times. Things could be going extremely well, and then suddenly she would become cold and end the relationship. Usually, after 1–4 weeks, she would contact me again, we would reconnect, and the relationship would start again.

It became a cycle: love, closeness and plans for the future, followed by a sudden breakup, separation, and then reconciliation.

There was also extreme jealousy. I was repeatedly accused of cheating even though I never cheated on her.

Once, a picture of my ex happened to appear in my social media feed. She saw it, withdrew crying, and later accused me of secretly having a relationship with my ex. I was even willing to let her contact my ex and mutual friends to verify that nothing was happening, but it didn't seem to matter.

I want to be fair about my own history as well. I had a serious alcohol problem for many years. Alcohol certainly affected my behavior, especially during the earlier part of our relationship. I became sober while we were together and have remained sober ever since.

After getting sober, I spent some time in my home country while she remained in hers. One night she went to a party and became unreachable until the following evening. She also didn't call me back as she had promised. When I asked her the next day what had happened, her response was to want to break up. Eventually we talked through it and stayed together.

And then things became good again. We talked every day and planned our future.

During Christmas with her family, several strange conflicts happened within a short period. She became angry when I asked about money she had promised to repay me. The incident involving the picture of my ex also happened during this period.

On a family trip, her child became upset and cried because of the transportation arrangements. I gave her child my pre-booked seat in the taxi. That meant I had to make the return journey by bus instead, which took around 14 hours and was absolutely exhausting.

I didn't expect some huge reward for doing it, but I thought at least a "thank you" from my partner would have been reasonable.

Instead, when I finally got back after that horrible journey, she accused me of being selfish and of ruining everyone's mood.

Situations like this left me completely confused. My understanding of what had just happened and her interpretation of it sometimes seemed like two completely different realities.

One breakup in particular still stands out to me because of how absurd the trigger seemed.

We had been doing well. One night I couldn't sleep, so I got up and made myself some tea. She became furious because I was making tea in the middle of the night. The situation escalated, and she eventually told me she never wanted to see me again.

I spent about a month alone after that.

Then, shortly before I was due to travel to my home country, she contacted me again on her mother's advice. I needed to go back home temporarily because I had a work assignment there that had already been agreed upon.

We spent a very intimate night and the following day together. We talked about me returning to her almost immediately after finishing that work assignment, and we started planning a trip together. I was still completely in love with her and was seriously thinking about proposing.

Near the end of the relationship, we both tested positive for chlamydia. I had not cheated on her. Nevertheless, I was once again accused of infidelity, and this became one of the final major crises before our relationship ended.

What I'm struggling with now is reconciling two completely different versions of the same relationship.

I remember a woman who could be incredibly loving and affectionate. We shared a home, had genuinely happy times together, and planned our future. I loved her enough that I wanted to marry her.

But I also remember constantly losing that same person.

Sometimes everything seemed fine, and then suddenly she became cold, ended the relationship, or accused me of things I hadn't done. Then weeks later she could return full of love again.

Only after the relationship ended did I start discussing BPD with my therapist and reading about it myself. A lot of what I learned felt disturbingly familiar.

I want to be clear that I don't know whether my ex has actually been diagnosed with BPD, and I'm not trying to diagnose her myself. I'm here because I'm trying to understand what I experienced and because I'd like to hear from people who have lived through similar relationship dynamics.

I'm also not presenting myself as a perfect partner. I had a serious alcohol problem, particularly during the earlier part of our relationship, and I take responsibility for the ways alcohol affected my behavior. I eventually got sober while we were still together.

But I never cheated on her, and the repeated accusations that I did were simply not true.

I think the hardest part has been trying to understand how someone could seemingly love me so intensely, talk about our future together, and then sometimes within a very short period of time push me completely out of her life.

And maybe that's why letting go has been so difficult.

I didn't only lose someone I loved.

I lost the future I thought we were going to have together, over and over again.

[TheFox]

I recently joined this group because I'm trying to make sense of a relationship that affected me very deeply. I'm also interested in hearing whether any of this sounds familiar to people who have been through something similar.

I was with my ex for about two and a half years. I loved her deeply. We lived together, planned a future together, and I was even planning to propose. There were periods when our relationship was genuinely wonderful, and I truly believed she was the person I would spend the rest of my life with.

But there was another side to the relationship that I still struggle to understand.

Over roughly a year and a half, she broke up with me around ten times. Things could be going extremely well, and then suddenly she would become cold and end the relationship. Usually, after 1–4 weeks, she would contact me again, we would reconnect, and the relationship would start again.

It became a cycle: love, closeness and plans for the future, followed by a sudden breakup, separation, and then reconciliation.

There was also extreme jealousy. I was repeatedly accused of cheating even though I never cheated on her.

Once, a picture of my ex happened to appear in my social media feed. She saw it, withdrew crying, and later accused me of secretly having a relationship with my ex. I was even willing to let her contact my ex and mutual friends to verify that nothing was happening, but it didn't seem to matter.

I want to be fair about my own history as well. I had a serious alcohol problem for many years. Alcohol certainly affected my behavior, especially during the earlier part of our relationship. I became sober while we were together and have remained sober ever since.

After getting sober, I spent some time in my home country while she remained in hers. One night she went to a party and became unreachable until the following evening. She also didn't call me back as she had promised. When I asked her the next day what had happened, her response was to want to break up. Eventually we talked through it and stayed together.

And then things became good again. We talked every day and planned our future.

During Christmas with her family, several strange conflicts happened within a short period. She became angry when I asked about money she had promised to repay me. The incident involving the picture of my ex also happened during this period.

On a family trip, her child became upset and cried because of the transportation arrangements. I gave her child my pre-booked seat in the taxi. That meant I had to make the return journey by bus instead, which took around 14 hours and was absolutely exhausting.

I didn't expect some huge reward for doing it, but I thought at least a "thank you" from my partner would have been reasonable.

Instead, when I finally got back after that horrible journey, she accused me of being selfish and of ruining everyone's mood.

Situations like this left me completely confused. My understanding of what had just happened and her interpretation of it sometimes seemed like two completely different realities.

One breakup in particular still stands out to me because of how absurd the trigger seemed.

We had been doing well. One night I couldn't sleep, so I got up and made myself some tea. She became furious because I was making tea in the middle of the night. The situation escalated, and she eventually told me she never wanted to see me again.

I spent about a month alone after that.

Then, shortly before I was due to travel to my home country, she contacted me again on her mother's advice. I needed to go back home temporarily because I had a work assignment there that had already been agreed upon.

We spent a very intimate night and the following day together. We talked about me returning to her almost immediately after finishing that work assignment, and we started planning a trip together. I was still completely in love with her and was seriously thinking about proposing.

Near the end of the relationship, we both tested positive for chlamydia. I had not cheated on her. Nevertheless, I was once again accused of infidelity, and this became one of the final major crises before our relationship ended.

What I'm struggling with now is reconciling two completely different versions of the same relationship.

I remember a woman who could be incredibly loving and affectionate. We shared a home, had genuinely happy times together, and planned our future. I loved her enough that I wanted to marry her.

But I also remember constantly losing that same person.

Sometimes everything seemed fine, and then suddenly she became cold, ended the relationship, or accused me of things I hadn't done. Then weeks later she could return full of love again.

Only after the relationship ended did I start discussing BPD with my therapist and reading about it myself. A lot of what I learned felt disturbingly familiar.

I want to be clear that I don't know whether my ex has actually been diagnosed with BPD, and I'm not trying to diagnose her myself. I'm here because I'm trying to understand what I experienced and because I'd like to hear from people who have lived through similar relationship dynamics.

I'm also not presenting myself as a perfect partner. I had a serious alcohol problem, particularly during the earlier part of our relationship, and I take responsibility for the ways alcohol affected my behavior. I eventually got sober while we were still together.

But I never cheated on her, and the repeated accusations that I did were simply not true.

I think the hardest part has been trying to understand how someone could seemingly love me so intensely, talk about our future together, and then sometimes within a very short period of time push me completely out of her life.

And maybe that's why letting go has been so difficult.

I didn't only lose someone I loved.

I lost the future I thought we were going to have together, over and over again.

[TheFox]

Do you guys think this was bpd? I have never experienced anything like this before.