Saving or Moving On

[MarkDavid]

Hello: I'm a Newbie.  I posted on the "Relationship Ended" board, but was gently suggested to move here to this board.  So here I am.

This is primarily copies and pasted from the other board, but here it is:

As mentioned, I gave it the ole proverbial one last try with my BPD over the course of the last several weeks.

So the New Major its forever over event happened, basically commencing last Sunday.  Things actually are different and worse this time, so I do actually think this is finally "it".  We had been talking about her moving in with me and my 16 year old daughter, but she was froggin' around with that decision and cold feet and everything else; that at least was the back drop for when on the cusp of that supposedly happening, she screwed with me and was being rebellious toward me after I had totally included her in family events with my adult family - siblings and 88 year old mother birthday party; another attempt to show her/prove to her it was real.  We had a fight in the aftermath of that about the imbalance in the relationship (I spoke up), she got upset by that (me speaking up), it morphed into a week long fight culminating in a break up, with her saying she can't deal with me, basically I would say around Wednesday or so.  I called her a liar, a sneak, ungrateful, selfish (all of which I am sorry to say is absolutely true), and tiptoed right up to but stopped at saying she has BPD and other disorders, out of kindness, which I told her I was holding back on that (because she was really pushing at me, trying to say things were MY fault and not hers).  SO, we broke up mid part of last week.  She then did her usual of texting me each day in the aftermath and over the weekend (which was always the pattern).  I finally last night informed her that I was blocking her from texting me, which I did actually do, because she is a texting junkie.  For the moment, that has seemed to do the trick.

My story will be right up there with the craziness I'm sure a lot of others posted.  To cut right to the chase, the main events are:

1999 - 2001 affair with her, 2 years

2001 I cut her off over some crap she pulled at our workplace getting me somewhat in trouble; I went "no contact"; for 10 years.  Seriously.

We were both married.

2011 My father died

2011 right before he died, I apologized to her for my mistakes in 1999-2001

3 weeks after that apology, we were making out.  What a shock: from there things escalated and as shown below things became more intense than ever.

I divorced in October 2014
She divorced in January 2015

Plan was for us to be together

She screwed around on countless things as part of "the plan" for us to be fully together, always foot dragging seemingly.  Excuses, drama, chaos.  Things advanced to the point where she was going to move in this October (at some unspecified date; she was controlling the details as to that, and being very vague, plus with cold feet, and needing serious re-assurance.  And then it all blew up when I just said I had enough of the imbalance and said how no matter WHAT we do, things are just never going to change and will always be one-sided.

2 people on this planet who never should have gotten together, but did.

What a shock: it didn't work out.  I get it.  Just like always, really, but it all truly happened.  Tried to give it a go.  Never realized the BPD part of her until after the divorce; to me, I just missed the red flags on that aspect of it, but since 2014 it all started to then jump off the page, when she blatantly was foot dragging and making my life miserable.

[RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING]

RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members are welcomed to express frustration but must seek constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[once removed]

youve got quite a history here. should you break up for good, im not sure this (the big fight) is the note you want to go out on.

can you be more specific about her getting cold feet and moving in, as well as the primary/long standing conflicts in your relationship? that will help give us a better picture.

[MarkDavid]

youve got quite a history here. should you break up for good, im not sure this (the big fight) is the note you want to go out on.

can you be more specific about her getting cold feet and moving in, as well as the primary/long standing conflicts in your relationship? that will help give us a better picture.

I'm not sure what you mean about that being the note I want to go out on; out of the 1,000 other fights, and this was a huge one, I don't know how this huge one vs. something else makes a difference - it had been building to this.

I was the greatest thing since sliced bread to her at the beginning; she was the one would pretty much threw herself back at me in 2011 and it re-started.  We had a very specific plan in place as far as how we would be together; I kept to it; I adhered; she breached and breached and breached.  I think in the end she would have a moral dilema about what she had really done with me (the affairS) and her youngest daughter; she claimed that the roadblock was her youngest daughter's (age 14, a FRESHMAN!) had concerns about me "abandoning" "them", so that was the primary excuse that would get thrown in my face; and the burden was then on me day after day to be be the one to "prove" to her I was going to be there and "re-assure her" so that she could "fully trust me"; which became so frustrating as I was chasing my tail and would definitely get very frustrated at times and express my displeasure.  Also, even though I pushed my ex away completely, she managed and manages to still have that father of her 14 year old (and 23 year old) a lot too cozy, and definitely in a manner that NO WAY would she allow me to be that "cozy" with my ex.

Those were the primary factors and items of near constant stress and turmoil.  And I just reached the point where it became clear that nothing I do EVER will really be enough for her.  And which begged the question all the time:  why didn't she just leave long ago?  My answer has at this point evolved to the fact that she has a NEED to feel what I gave to her, in order to positively feel ok about herself - it's not me, it's the feeling I gave to her, which made her feel better about her own troubled self.

I should add:  she is a domestic abuse survivor from some sort of relationship in her early 20's and NOT with her ex-husband; her ex-husband is "softer" than I am and a walk-over (sorry to say, but he is); I'm the "bad boy" compared to him.  But whenever anything would not be to her liking, I would hear the domestic abuse lingo:  I am "hurting" her; this is the worse pain EVER; nobody has ever done THIS to her (she would be comparing me to the guy who apparently beat the hell out of her 25+ years ago (we are both 49).

[once removed]

what i mean is, while youre angry now, do you want to look back in say, five years, knowing this is how it ended? ive been out of my relationship for some years, and the two of us hurt each other a lot, but im still proud today that i kept my cool in the end, can look back fondly now, and be pretty confident she can too.

We had a very specific plan in place as far as how we would be together; I kept to it; I adhered; she breached and breached and breached.  I think in the end she would have a moral dilema about what she had really done with me (the affairS) and her youngest daughter; she claimed that the roadblock was her youngest daughter's (age 14, a FRESHMAN!)

mark, these, especially the latter, are pretty valid concerns. moving a fourteen year old into a new home with a new man (affair partner) would be a significant adjustment for her, and thats putting it mildly.

she managed and manages to still have that father of her 14 year old (and 23 year old) a lot too cozy, and definitely in a manner that NO WAY would she allow me to be that "cozy" with my ex.

this too, is a valid concern.

heres the thing: affairs are fantasies/escapes. they work only in a certain dysfunctional sort of harmony that takes a balance, and when one partner pushes, the other tends to pull, they may switch roles, but rarely do both parties get on the same page, fully commit, live happily ever after. not without a lot of work and trust building. its a difficult foundation on which to build trust.

so i understand that today you want things to be over. maybe you will feel that way tomorrow, and maybe you wont. if you change your mind tomorrow (or the next day), we can talk more about applying the tools, working to change the dynamics in the relationship.

you work with her, yes? is there any forced communication at work, or are the two of you in each others proximity?

[MarkDavid]

what i mean is, while youre angry now, do you want to look back in say, five years, knowing this is how it ended? ive been out of my relationship for some years, and the two of us hurt each other a lot, but im still proud today that i kept my cool in the end, can look back fondly now, and be pretty confident she can too.

mark, these, especially the latter, are pretty valid concerns. moving a fourteen year old into a new home with a new man (affair partner) would be a significant adjustment for her, and thats putting it mildly.

this too, is a valid concern.

heres the thing: affairs are fantasies/escapes. they work only in a certain dysfunctional sort of harmony that takes a balance, and when one partner pushes, the other tends to pull, they may switch roles, but rarely do both parties get on the same page, fully commit, live happily ever after. not without a lot of work and trust building. its a difficult foundation on which to build trust.

so i understand that today you want things to be over. maybe you will feel that way tomorrow, and maybe you wont. if you change your mind tomorrow (or the next day), we can talk more about applying the tools, working to change the dynamics in the relationship.

you work with her, yes? is there any forced communication at work, or are the two of you in each others proximity?

We can largely avoid each other, but some sort of interactions are inevitable. It is a day by day thing, which random interactions, perhaps as little as just seeing each other.  We hear each other from our office areas always.  Today, as an example, we are both avoiding each other; to avoid a conflict/blow up.  In addition to asking her not to text me, I asked her not to email me, which she is actually surprisingly following through on at the moment.

[once removed]

okay. it sounds like things at work are relatively stable, and youre both cooling off. i would recommend, in a couple of weeks, after some more thawing of emotions, and if the breakup holds, reaching out on a graceful "wish each other well"/closure note.

in the meantime, if things devolve at work or elsewhere (or if you want to consider another go around) check in with us, we can help you navigate.

[MarkDavid]

We can largely avoid each other, but some sort of interactions are inevitable. It is a day by day thing, which random interactions, perhaps as little as just seeing each other.  We hear each other from our office areas always.  Today, as an example, we are both avoiding each other; to avoid a conflict/blow up.  In addition to asking her not to text me, I asked her not to email me, which she is actually surprisingly following through on at the moment.

There are a couple of facts that i want to share that I actually typed earlier but got deleted; particularly as you all may sense a lot of anger from me; it needs to be explained.  There are 2 primary things that have always been "askew", wherein it has been a question of is she playing it both ways/am I being played:

1. the residential situation. My ex-wife and I did the traditional post divorce deal with the living situation, wherein I bought my new place, and my ex bought her new place.  We have subtantially equal placement of our 16 year old daughter; we also have a 20 year old away at college.

1. My now ex-GF had a different "arrangement": she has a 23 year old daughter and a 14 year old daughter; for supposed "financial reasons", title to her marital house has remained in her name and her ex spouse's name.  he moved to an apartment; she kept living in the house; she primarily has the 14 year old, though he certainly does interact with the 14 year old.  Neither one of them ever bought each other out of that house.  That situation has been an issue between us for 3 years now, and has angered me; so now the deal was going to be that HE would move back in that house, primarily be with the 14 year old, and she was leaving to live with me; the 14 year old is not ready to come with her to live with me, as I will explain below.  so, it would either be my GF would move in with me OR finally get her own apartment, which she "never wanted to do to the 14 year old" (get an apartment).

So now with this going down, either ex-GF will actually get her own apartment OR it is possible that should get just shack up with her ex-H in light of our break up (to save more money) - NICE, HUH?  Since we are not talking, who knows what she is up to.

2. I have included having the ex-GF around my 16 year old; at my house with the 16 year old present probably 10 different times; last year went to 2 basketball games with me of hers that the 16 year old played in for her school.  

Ex GF did not have me around the 14 year AT ALL, and I know her 14 year old from youth sports things from prior to us "coming out"; I don't go to her sporting events and I'm not around her AT ALL.

So the "imbalance" that I talked about: here are the main things.  And they have p*ssed me off for multiple years.

I always had to "prove my trustworthiness" and this and that in order to "earn" these things; all while was doing various things to re-assure ex-GF by having her at various public events to show "proof" that i was for real.  My 88 year old mother's birthday events were 10-6-17 and 10-7-17 and ex-GF was there.  Fight starts on 10-8-17 and here I am.  The fight had to do with ex-GF being disrespectful to me and breaking relationship rules when she was on the cusp of moving in with me and my daughter, which was unacceptable to me and I spoke up about it.  MOVING IN!  IMBALANCE!

I just never could do enough to ever prove myself to this woman, no matter what I did.  It was just never enough, even when she would not reciprocate to me.  And she was the one who pushed originally for all of this and certainly easily jumped into bed with me a 1,000 times AND said her divorce and all the details would be "no problem"; well everything was and still is a problem and I'm 3 years out from my finalization of my divorce in October 2014.  i feel like I have wasted my life on all of this.

So, yes, I have anger.

And I know I have to work through that; so at least that is something.

So I guess I just would like to know from all of you would have basically seen this before:  what is going to happen next?  All objective observers know what is going to happen, but I don't at this moment.  Was this really the end?  It is kind of feeling that way.

[once removed]

we all understand the anger md. its a given that our partners are difficult, and its important to acknowledge.

you do provide a good picture of the primary conflict in the relationship. from 30000 feet out, it sounds like, in summary, that the two of you are on different pages, and want different things. would you disagree?

what happens next really depends on you. if you want to rekindle the relationship, there are steps that can be taken, and in a nutshell they will take a fair amount of processing things like the anger, essentially treating the old relationship and their dynamics as dead, and a new one as a new iteration, with a different game plan, new tools, new approach, a lot of Radical Acceptance, among other things.

you dont have to make that decision today, though i would start leaning in one direction or the other. reading through the lessons and tools here really cant hurt either way, and will definitely inform your decision.

as to what happens next, youre a big part of that equation, and at a minimum, it would be best that the situation doesnt deteriorate.

its been two days. any update?