Cheating, right from wrong

[Darkblaez]

My ex has cheated a lot, starting online mixing it up with guys by taking sexy, nude, erotic pics of herself to send to them, sexting, using messaging apps, etc. Then it moved to dating apps and multiple affairs over the course of almost 8 years.

The question is, do they not know right from wrong? I assume that my BPD ex-wife did. During what I thought was a reconciliation phase I asked her if she thinks I should have a free pass to cheat. She said absolutely not. I asked her why and she told me because it would hurt her feelings. I then asked he did she not think her cheating not only hurt my feelings but devastated me, she said yes but somehow it was my fault so she never apologized or showed remorse.

I also pointed out that her overt flirting with guys is also disrespectful to me and to our marriage. If she thought my eyes even glanced at another woman anywhere we went she would get very upset and goad me in to a reaction. I told her I do not look at other women out of respect for her and our commitment to one another and that would be disrespectful. I told we are all subconsciously at things around us but that it’s not with intent. It could be a dude with a mohawk or anything that catches are attention randomly in passing.

If BPD individuals like my ex understand that they do not want these things done to them, then are they unable to understand that doing these things are hurtful? I think I get that perhaps they cannot help themselves or just do not care. Guess I am trying to rationalize discrete moments where this really is no rationale to it.

-Darkblaez

[Cromwell]

thanks for posting this.

i had to physically escort my ex out of a supermarket because she started a loud, dysregulated, face flushed freshly with blood onslaught at someone for apparently "looking" at me twice.

even from the car park she wouldnt stop. as far as i noticed it was the normal sort of glance that someone does as they walk into an aisle and notice the presence of another human being so as to walk around them, then she came back into our aisle to look for an item she must have passed by but saw us there again. this possible logic escaped my ex, and of course i was being somehow either stalked or eyed up by someone just grabbing a few groceries.

yet when it suited her, she was a "free bird" allowed to flirt online, add anyone to her fb she just happened to interact with from store clerk serving her in a shop onwards.

cheated on me in the most hurtful way i could have never expected, made it obvious as day and night, but never admitted to it.

pressurised me into entertaining the idea of threesomes, i wasnt against the idea until I saw the person she lined up and without any acting skills just completely natural reaction said "are you trying to make me vomit"? to a sort of confused look but then quickly agreeably laughing the suggestion away.

i still cant decide if maybe in 2018 im just old fashioned and this isnt a symptom of BPD but just a very free-spirited, hedonistic, fun loving person. but someone said on here "they regard cheating as no different than grabbing a cup of coffee". id like to support your view in that yes, they dont regard it unless it happens against them.

when i asked her why her ex broke up with her she said its because he caught her cheating, but she then said its because she heard rumours that he had done it first. then the story developed more that she already cheated on him before the rumours.

she then concluded to say "and theres one thing that no one will ever do - and that is cheat on me first" in a sort of tone that assumes everyone else does that as a matter of course.

I think its just part of their distorted world view and general persecution complex. but then again, she admitted she knew I wasnt the type who would cheat, so I think it is also impulse driven, they cant help themselves if the opportunity presents it self. especially if they can justify it to themselves that you have "wronged" them in whatever trivial way they can invent to themselves.

[Foursome]

Ever take a young child to the toy store.  Everything they see they want to look at it.  When they are bored they toss it and pick up the next one.

I know its more too it but I dont think im on the wrong track here.

[Moselle]

I think its just part of their distorted world view and general persecution complex. but then again, she admitted she knew I wasnt the type who would cheat, so I think it is also impulse driven, they cant help themselves if the opportunity presents it self. especially if they can justify it to themselves that you have "wronged" them in whatever trivial way they can invent to themselves.

BPD is a serious mental illness. Almost all the cases I've seen feel the  need to hurt someone who is close  to them.  They know they do it. But rather than face the deep pain of admitting and face the consequences, a defense mechanism kicks in, and they use denial scapegoating etc of a target to justify their behaviour in their minds.

As I said. It's a serious mental illness.

[Shawnlam]

They do what they want like a child that’s their maturity level.They are in an adults  body so instead of candy they do the next best things (drugs booze sex) and in their eyes how dare you question it! Sick people should be put down at the first sign of symptoms

[Cromwell]

BPD is a serious mental illness. Almost all the cases I've seen feel the  need to hurt someone who is close  to them.  They know they do it. But rather than face the deep pain of admitting and face the consequences, a defense mechanism kicks in, and they use denial scapegoating etc of a target to justify their behaviour in their minds.

As I said. It's a serious mental illness.

The question from the OP is whether they cheat and i believe the nub of what he wants to know is

do they know whether it is right or wrong.

if they didnt think it was wrong they wouldnt care if it happened to them.

there is a great source of grudge holding in my ex, I believe that despite at the time she did it I was incredibly kind and loving towards her, that she did it to triangulate and couldnt handle how strong I felt for her, at the same time I believe she held grudges against me for something that had happened between us before we even got committed to each other. even know she said herself, it upset her but she knew I was on drugs at the time, I think this grudge stuck with her.

once that cheating episode was over, and she felt I was going to detach, which I myself hadnt figured out what to do about it. it was never proven but it was a blatant open-secret the way she portrayed it to me to maximise the shock factor. (chaos generation theme).

what I just couldnt get my head around, throughout this relationship is her lack of saying "you did x,y,z to me, I dont want to be with you anymore".

my only real understanding gained towards this is that rather than provoke an abandonment she preferred to just go through these endless devaluation/idolisation cycles instead.

this (curable with therapy) illness does not cause an inability to not be able to differentiate between right or wrong.

[Cromwell]

They do what they want like a child that’s their maturity level.They are in an adults  body so instead of candy they do the next best things (drugs booze sex) and in their eyes how dare you question it! Sick people should be put down at the first sign of symptoms

I think what the hardest part to accept is that it is possible for a person to cycle from such extremes to another. its excruciating to love someone who can shape-shift that way. I didnt want to give up because despite what she did in the devaluation destructive moments, I put down to her illness and waited for the "good" person to resurface.

I dont think I will ever get the truth im looking for, whether there ever was a person at all (she said she had no soul)

Identity, or in these cases lack of, is the most mind-bending part of the getting to grips that i was in the relationship with someone that i cant even describe properly as she didnt know from one minute to herself who she was.

maybe she didnt cheat on me but her alter-ego or something did.

my head hurts 

[Shawnlam]

I understand much more about BPD including why they are the way they are.However I do find myself not caring in a sense on their blanket of symptoms and impulses more and more .Yes they are sick and yes they are broken but the sheer damage they do to people is outside of tolerable levels as far as I’m concerned.If a puppy gets bite by a bat who has rabies ,knowing the damage that dog can do before it dies ,because it wasn’t it’s fault so we let it go uncontrollably... .No we put it down to prevent further damage.Now obviously I’m not sick enough to want to kill people with BPD that’s  just my anger talking.Oddly I still love my BPD exGF and I know she cheated ,lied and hurt me .I hope to somsee extent modern science will bring to the table a solution to help these soulless creatures ,they wreak hovac like a locust storm in their lives.

[Cromwell]

I know these anger feelings your having shawnlam, or at least, ive been through them. its good you are experiencing them your on your way to getting over this.

you can probably see the pattern of people who are confused the most, it is the ones (and im still guilty of it) who are still trying to "crack" the BPD code and understand the behaviour of a person who is psychotic and doesnt grasp reality.

trying to find rational explanation from irrational behaviour. this is where the circle of confusion keeps going round and is so torturous.

im more concerned now to find out why I put up with this when I could have had an equally attractive to me looking partner with no personality disorder, and between the two, I chose the BPD.

shift the focus away from her, and I only managed to do this once i wriggled completely off her hook she kept me on. i recommend you do the same and look at your feelings right now as to how this person has made you feel and will you give her the opportunity do so again in the future.

[once removed]

keep in mind the impulsive nature of someone with BPD traits.

impulsivity doesnt see long term connotations, its about immediate gratification. in that process, theres little time or thought with regard to right or wrong.

that doesnt mean there is no regard for it after the fact. often times, there is a great deal of shame. i saw it many times.

people with BPD traits struggle intensely with shame, and there are a variety of coping/defense mechanisms in order to avoid it, some of which have been mentioned.

from 30000 feet up though, it sounds like the two of you were not aligned in your values, and/or she had a great degree of difficulty living what she professed were her values. this is important to see going forward.

[Moselle]

I think its just part of their distorted world view and general persecution complex. but then again, she admitted she knew I wasnt the type who would cheat, so I think it is also impulse driven, they cant help themselves if the opportunity presents it self. especially if they can justify it to themselves that you have "wronged" them in whatever trivial way they can invent to themselves.

Yes. They know right from wrong.

Your sense of equality 'what's good for one is good for the other' is NOT shared.

Right and wrong only applies to you, in their eyes.

Best response to this - "You are welcome to.your view" . Best not to JADE.  Justify, Argue, Defend or Explain it.

[Kaboodle]

what I just couldnt get my head around, throughout this relationship is her lack of saying "you did x,y,z to me, I dont want to be with you anymore".

my only real understanding gained towards this is that rather than provoke an abandonment she preferred to just go through these endless devaluation/idolisation cycles instead.

Normal people with integrity end relationships respectfully, and then take time to grieve before embarking on a new relationship.

My uBPDxbf considered himself a "moral person". So he would manufacture arguments and breakups, in order to cheat without troubling his conscience. "We weren't together at the time" was his justification for screwing his ex-wife's best friend, a friend from high school, a married woman separated from her husband, a woman with seven children, etc. (After each one-night stand / fling / short-term relationship, I would get the breadcrumbs-idealize treatment.)

Make no mistake: chronic infidelity is emotional abuse, and wrong.

[Cromwell]

Normal people with integrity end relationships respectfully, and then take time to grieve before embarking on a new relationship.

My uBPDxbf considered himself a "moral person". So he would manufacture arguments and breakups, in order to cheat without troubling his conscience. "We weren't together at the time" was his justification for screwing his ex-wife's best friend, a friend from high school, a married woman separated from her husband, a woman with seven children, etc. (After each one-night stand / fling / short-term relationship, I would get the breadcrumbs-idealize treatment.)

Make no mistake: chronic infidelity is emotional abuse, and wrong.

exactly the same. mines was very often quite haughty in the way she would lecture on what good morals are and how everyone had failed. but I had to bite my tongue as she commented and so accurately described everyone elses faults - with such a tone of distaste, and impression she was way above all that; I wanted so hard to say -

"but all these things are what you are, or how you have behaved to others" (in short, you are a hypocrite)

part of me wishes so much that I had, but then maybe I was right about my intuition as far as ive learned here. it wouldnt have worked but have made her worse. I was a natural non-JADEr.

A few times I did give her a piece of my mind, when I had been stressed out to the max, of what i thought of her. I then apologised because I felt in the situation it was undeserved, to which I got

"why are you saying sorry, you have nothing to be sorry for".

In other words, she knew I was right but still pushed my boundaries whenever she wanted, she had this view that if you were stupid enough to allow it you deserved it. she respected me more when Id confront her. ( child playing games with the parent and wishing to be punished as proof that they actually care enough to do so - but not to go so far as to abandon them because of it).

i really feel mines was constantly replaying issues from childhood into adult life with me as a way to find some sort of justice. this could also turn itself to being abusive to me when the association between me and the father she had been forced to paint black in her mind would become too strong.

it has taken me a long time to get to a place where I feel ive came close as possibly can for an explanation. well, not so much to understand her but to try and heal from the onslaught of it all. As time goes on I feel more at peace and dont take what happened to me personally. I was just a supporting actor in her mind for some daddy-roleplay of issues that originated way before id ever met her.

[Shawnlam]

Put it this way everytime after or before she didn’t something bad to me I would get one of these texts:  baby you know I’d never hurt ,betray or disappoint you on purpose right? I’m sincere when I say that.   Then literally anywhere from the next day or a week later I’d find out she cancelled a trip or scheduled a vacation out with her gf to cheat on me with an ex boyfriend or go down south to have fun (I’m sure you all figured out what I meant by that). So yeah they know but don’t care.I equate to a child saying I love you mommy right after they ate all the cookies or smashed moms prize vase.

Sometimes they do it just to get a reaction out of you.My ex asked me why I never got mad at her and what would it take for me to be angry (I usually tried to resolve issues with adult conversations,never worked out).

[Kaboodle]

Put it this way everytime after or before she didn’t something bad to me I would get one of these texts:  baby you know I’d never hurt ,betray or disappoint you on purpose right? I’m sincere when I say that.   

After his first infidelity, my uBPDxbf said, "I will never do this to you again. I never want to see this look on your face ever again." Same words after the first time he screamed at me to "shut the f*** up" and the first time he called me a "c***".

Words are meaningless with a BPD. Ethics are situational with a BPD.