My long, confusing story of my uBPD bestie (NC since October)

[Thisisnotforyou]

Okay. Here goes.

I met bestie when we were both 15 and cast in a play together. We didn’t become friends until another year or two later but when we did it was fast, intense, and felt like a bond that would never break.

At the time she had been incorrectly diagnosed as bipolar, though we didn’t know it yet,and as a result was on mood stabilizers and anti depressants. This was the status work for the first 12 years of our relationship and while there was definitely verbal abuse disguised as jokes there was very few instances of splitting. I suspect this was due to the meds.

Then, 3 years ago bestie got into med school and through a series of egregious mistakes on the behalf of the school and numerous health care professionals her meds were messed with and she was doped with insane amounts of medication that led to a true manic phase in which her boyfriend and I were split black for about two months straight. She would explode over the smallest things and then deny/ignore that it happened. Everyone was the villain and she was the victim and that made it ok for her to be nasty to us. She started self-harming again at this point (had stopped for a few years) and when called on it substituted body modification for it (I’m talking two tattoos and three piercings in three months).

She eventually left med school and saw a new psych who said she didn’t have bipolar)which is true, she never followed the cycles, mania and hypomania were rare and if they appeared they didn’t last long enough to qualify). Instead she had ADHD. So he took her off mood stabilizers and anti depressants and the only thing she was on was Adderall.

This is when it got bad.

She was viscous, judgemental, and prone to hysterics. One time she asked her boyfriend to give her the phone charger and do he lightly tossed it onto the couch and it brushed her leg. Cue a thirty minute melt down and rant about how he’s abusive.

She was never a fan of any of my romantic partners (the very first thing she said upon meeting my Hispanic ex husband who owned a ford 4x4 was “there’s nothing worse than a Mexican in a truck) because I was the favorite person, but when I found my current partner she could not let that stand. She stalked him online and grilled him about the answers trying to prove he wasn’t who he said he was (we met on tinder). She consistently told me that I was obsessed and abandoning my friends for guy despite me talking to her on the phone every day and seeing her once a week. She said she was so afraid I would drop out of school because of my partner like I “did when I was 21” despite me telling her numerous times I dropped out because I wanted to work and party and wasn’t interested in school (I am now a year and a half away from graduating with two degrees and a minor sums cum laude and I’m still with my guy). She would tell me a mutual and very close friend of ours felt the same way (a friend who is a therapist and here after referred to as therapist friend) only for me to discover that was a complete manipulation and lie. She would consistently put down my degree fields and talk about how they weren’t hard because they weren’t science (I’m currently sitting on a 4.0). When I changed majors last year due to trauma I suffered at the hands of the subjects faculty and staff she dismissed my very real mental health issues as me being too middle school about the whole thing (I’m currently in therapy because that trauma messed me up so bad).

It all culminated one day when I decided I didn’t want to attend a town hall because political stuff was a huge trigger of my trauma. She proceeded to spend three hours on the phone with me telling me just how awful of a person I was. I was suddenly homophobic (I’m bi), racist, and thought all my friends were freaks and I just wanted to live a boring white suburban life.

All because I didn’t want to traumatize myself.

She thought this was my boyfriend’s fault.

When I tried to bring up my issues with her she wouldn’t let me finish and played the victim. Example: when I brought up that has been rude to my boyfriend she started screaming about how everyone thinks she’s a bitch and she can’t win and can’t be herself.

I eventually was so beaten down I just s.h.u.t. down (why does the board think that word is pornographic?) and agreed with everything she said. But that was the beginning of the end for me.

After talking with my therapist and therapist friend I began to grey rock and set boundaries. The first time I did (after yet another insinuation that I was abandoning my friends for my boyfriend as I’m literally hanging out with her and therapist friend) she shut down, she did not know how to handle me standing up for her much less having her audience (therapist friend) agree with me. It was scary to see hw quick she shifted from self righteous anger to her trying placate me and making sure I wasn’t mad at her.

When she continued to belittle me, insult my relationship, insult my decision making skills and make me the racist wealthy bad guy because my family helps me out (because I’m a single mom and a student in one of the highest cost of living states so apparently me living with them in the basement makes me rich) and hers doesn’t I was done.

I sent her a very cordial very emotionally detached I need space text to which she unleashed on me. She wrote a novel about how awful I am and in doing so laid out a version of history that was so at odds with reality I couldn’t even try to figure out her rationalization.

I didn’t reply and received an “apology” text two days later which was another novel and pretty much consisted of a whole bunch of justifications for her behavior.

I told her I appreciated it but wasn’t ready. She waited another month or two before asking me to meet in person because she needed answers. I said I wasn’t ready.

This entire time she’s talking smack to therapist friend who gently shuts that down. He’s been amazing, is on my side, and refuses to let her make him play messenger (although I did find out through him that her boyfriend is mostly on my side too and misses me but understands the situation we are in).

Since then it’s been nothing. Most days I’m ok and when I’m not I’m angry because I’ve staryed to remember 14 years worth of abuse I did and didn’t recognize. She shows up in my dreams a lot, and is pushy and mean so even y subconscious is mad at her.

As for how I came to the conclusion that she’s BPD? My therapist is the one who told me. She was very quick to say it’s an unofficial diagnosis because Bestie is not her patient but she handed me her DSM and I read the section on BPD and it made total sense.

She was/is a cutter
Has no stable identity (always intensely goes after identies for six months then changes from motorcycle girl to MMA fighter, to witch, to entomologist, to political activist to horror writer. These aren’t hobbies, no this is literally her life when she’s in these personas)
Completely unstable emotional responses
Was hospitalized for (I think) a suicide attempt in her teen years
Fears abandonment so much so that she constantly talks about how it’s not a big deal regardless of the actual topic of conversation
Thinks very black and white
Verbally abusive
Unhappy childhood (she was the scapegoat and lost child in a household with a NPD sister, an NPD mother, and a conflict avoidant/suicidal/untreated bipolar father).

So that’s where I am, and anytime I’m on support group sites when someone inevitably asks the “has your pwBPD done X?” The answer is almost always yes.

[spero]

Hey there Thisisnotforyou!   

First, I'd like to welcome to you this sub-board and community.

Thank you for taking time to share your experience, and your openness in giving so much details between you and your  bestie. The actions and behaviours that you've shared about your bestie are not uncommon. As you spend time interacting and reading post by other community members, you would find many similarities and behavioural patterns that you've personally encountered.

Behaviour patterns meaning, the splitting, gaslighting, self-harming ( my uBPDexGF would literally bang her head on the wall ), the devaluation, picking of fights, desire to control outcome of situations, portrayal of self as victim etc. These common patterns run throughout many postings on this website and sub-board. May i ask what led you to discover boards?

I'm so sorry that you're probably so worn out emotionally, mentally and perhaps even physically that you have little desire to engage further with your bestie. That is really understandable and many members have come here around those stages in their own relationships. It must have been very disappointing, discouraging and deeply hurtful to have experienced over and again, the "out of proportion" reactions of your bestie and that having taken heaps of what you have very much correctly identified as emotional abuse.

Are you still in actively seeing a therapist at this moment? Let us know are you feeling right now. Please continue to feel free to express how you feel and i hope that through the interactions and conversations in this community, you would find comfort and support in your present situation.

Take heart and take care,
Spero

[Mutt]

Hi Thisisnotforyou, 



Splitting is a defense mechanism that protects the ego - being heavily medicated would be really stressful were there other stressors.  I have tattoos I recall talking to a coworker once before I had them she had some and she said watch their addictive because once you get one you want more. I agree with her.

A pwBPD can’t self regulate their emotions and the frustrations about completely different things are directed at the people closest to them because they have a r/s with them and won’t run off at the first sight of their disproportionate anger - it soothes a pwBPD.

Id like to echo spero I can understand the constant chaos, drama and attention makes you feel emotionally and physically spent. I can see why you wanted you’re space has she respected your boundary? Have you two talked since? I look forward to reading your posts.