How Is It Better To Get Back And Solve Problems?

[Maverick74321]

Hello everyone, this is my first post in here. I've read a lot about BPD to educate myself, to understand better my SO and this is the first my r/s with woman that has BPD problems. She is not diagnosed and currently not in T. She is a high functioning BPD. While what I will write in here may sound like everything was bad and the only way is to leave but there were plenty of moments were we were having a good time together even in a such unusual ways while not in idealization but I focus on the r/s problems in here to find ways how to resolve them and so I may omit most of such happy moments.

The way I found about BPD and what it is started after she was doing to me a silent treatment. I also wasn't aware of such thing because I've never experienced anything like that before.

I'm in the early 30s and she is in the late 30s. This is a LDR.
We've been in a relationship for almost 10 months. Around 1,5 months ago I've went no contact with her after she refused to remove very hurtful photos addressed to me and instead of trying to resolve that she cheated on me and right now is seeing with a new man with low self-esteem whom she found exactly the time I stopped talking to her and started seeing him recently and currently she is in idealization phase. I found about that after she posted a temporal black and white photo where he is kissing her and she was looking with a grim smile. I was very shocked by that because she is kind of woman that never do such thing and love only one person for life and because she told me that I'm the one for her and we agreed to marry. Sometimes I just start crying much because of that and it's very difficult to feel such betrayal. But I can stand for myself and now feeling better but still it is a very heartbreaking event.

I really care about her and don't want her to spend her life miserable and alone because of knowledge how such replacement relationships will end and more importantly that she will hurt herself much. While I was no contact with her I needed to take some time for myself to learn to not take her insults personally, to better understand my reactions even though I've been analyzing mine and her behaviors from the very beginning and because I was for months very focused on herself instead of myself and my own health. The last time I've contacted her I tried softly to set some boundaries and told her that such behavior will not be tolerated but also reminded her that I love her and will not leave her. Instead of trying to resolve the problems she continued to posting temporal photos and videos for month. But about what was the problem I will write in more details as people are different and so you will better understand the situation.

I will write how it started, it's not a usual story how relationship with BPD person started so maybe someone who is in a similar situations will learn something from reading this and I want to ask some questions, that I think are hard for me and her,  from people who are currently in such r/s and facing similar problems and who resolved them, people who successfully were able to make such r/s work, people who currently have BPD and what were the actions of your SO that you started to act on your actions in more proper ways, people are different and I want to understand my SO better and to make this r/s work so I'm looking for and ready to implement constructive ways how to do that even if they will be counter-intuitive, illogical and/or against majority of people opinion who may think that leaving and moving on from her to somebody else are ways to do in such r/s. I've tried to find answers to those questions but on some of them I haven't found them. While I understand why all of the problems are happening I don't know how to resolve them.

Before me she was in a relationship for 5 years with a man who has NPD. They had a lot of arguments, he was loving only himself. They never married and in the end of their relationship she lost her newborn child from him while he cheated on her with other women. She was highly depressed, afraid of security and hypersensitive. We've started our r/s right after that while she was still in the hospital. At first she had moments of rage towards me. But I managed to eliminate them back then. We liked each other very deeply. Unlike in usual BPD relationship ours didn't started from idealization and mirroring. It was more like a usual relationship but she had a very broken heart. We got to know each other and have many interests and views on life in common. I know this not only from her own words but also from her history. So I know for sure that deeply inside she is a very great woman and I don't want to give up on us. I've got her out of the state when she wanted to commit a suicide while all her friends didn't care that much and haven't realized what was going on inside herself.

Her mother has unrecoverable illness and her father I believe lives separately as she avoided talking about him. She have tendency to talk more about women than men. I think this is due to inability to trust openly. She has fear of intimacy. 

Unlike what I've read about BPD she understand her actions, feels guilt but can't express it properly, can't say sorry while in the beginning she said sorry. I know about this because she constantly was giving me hints about how she feels inside and that she also wants this r/s to work but as long as high level of emotions is present due to some events her logical reasoning is suppressed by emotional reasoning and she may do something that she really don't want to do but she can't stop herself from doing it the proper word for this will be self-sabotaging. I've read that  people with BPD have problems with recognizing emotional states of other people and at the same time can't properly express their emotions as this two are linked together. I believe that despite T. opinions that this is a very difficult mental condition if to somehow to make emotional regulation inside the brain of the person with BPD work all the problems will be resolved. Have you tried clinical hypnosis? If yes were there improvements in behavior if not can you try it and tell what were the results?

We live in different countries and still haven't met in person. There are some legal issues in my country to travel to her. But she can easily travel to me. And only after marriage I can travel easily to her. This is the one of the hardest problems. Because she can't take action to do that and not only this. She has problem with procrastination. What were ways that your SO started to take actions?  Another way is to tell her mother to put her on a plane but she may not believe me about anything right now because I'm currently painted black by SO and perceived as not a man even though I've proposed to learn not to start arguments, to resolve conflicts and live a happy life.

At first we communicated on facebook without any problem. It took some time I even was told by one of her relatives not directly that I'm being slow with her but again nobody thought how difficult it was, they saw only that she became very happy with me. We used to talk every day, we wrote poems to each other, she showed deep interest in me and there were clear signs that she fall in love but at first there was some resistance before we got to know each other and she became more comfortable with me. Later when the problems started I was the first to propose to start doing video calls but she haven't picked up the phone. I always told her that communication is important in r/s. So instead of idealization it started from soft devaluation and then idealization+devaluation. She began having problem that I was commenting on her posts and telling like one comment is ok but not more. At the same time she commented on my profile just once. She started to hide our r/s. She started to talk to me less directly. At the same time after I've gave her a choice to be with me or not she posted publicly that I'm the one for her but without my name in there. Even though we were very happy about that. This problem that she doesn't use my name when she post something publicly to me and about me is still present. There is such thing on facebook called My Day. Those are videos or photos you can show in a message but they will disappear after 24 hours. Instead of writing to me directly she started to use this Days. When someone tells you that you are the one for them you clearly understand that they love you so I started to talk to her more intimately. But right there began her moments of rage. She told me in very rude language how bad I was that she don't know me at all while that was already 4 months. I was very confused and after I told several times that I don't understand why she behave towards me in such a way her rage shifted to more normal state. Later she also started saying that she has a bf and to leave her alone but I knew that it wasn't true. Once she said that she was pregnant. I clearly saw that it was her recalling her past. I learned such thing as trauma reenactment when you specifically remind about past traumatic events so it will be properly processed and understood every detail of it because she was keeping that inside herself and didn't talked about that with anybody not to say that nobody from her friends even asked her. I told her what, how and why I did this reenactment so she was aware that I'm doing that not to hurt her in any way but to break a cycle of her inner fears. It worked to certain point. Her rage and anxiety was less and less present in her behavior. She started to improve but at the same time she was justifying her bad actions as if that's ok and should be so ignoring some but not all of my suggestions how to make it better and she was finding reasons for such her actions while she understands her actions and that those reasons are far from reality but she can't stop doing it herself.
She tried to make an impression to me as one of her male friends was her boyfriend but I knew that he was just her old friend. I told her about that and after some time she stopped doing that. But haven't removed any of such things.
She kept a photo of her ex were they were standing together and removed it only after I posted it myself publicly and asked who is really important for her. Right after that she posted photos where she is very happy it was like if somebody (means me) have done something she wasn't able to do herself due to conscious blocks and finally she got out of her trouble.
She had plenty of photos of her ex and what I found to do was to completely remove reminders of her past. After I told her about that at first she was refusing doing that but after I persisted that in r/s people tell each other words like I love you while in the state of rage she told me to give her some time and space. At first I refused to do that but I thought maybe it will work and haven't contacted her for 2 weeks while she went to visit her friend to another country. At the same time I felt like I'm not important to her. I was surprised when she got back she posted for the first time but publicly I love you and it wasn't like "I love your attention" or "I need your attention". At the same time she removed  photos of her past where there was her ex herself in just one day but still she has video where she writes a love letter to him.

In the beginning she was talking to me directly and by my name. When she felt anxious she wrote my name in small letters. I told her about that and she didn't told my name in small letters after that. But the problem is she doesn't mention my name at all like I'm not existent, like she is available single woman and is not in any kind of r/s even though she posted after she blocked me everything publicly and anyone who can think properly will see that there is someone significant in her life. When I asked her if she will marry me she clearly agreed but not telling me this directly. Before she once used triangulation with her friend. But I told her about that her friend contacted me and that I'm honest with her. The same day that friend blocked me. The same day I've told her about that but she acted like she has nothing to do with that. While I clearly understood that she told her to block me because her friend was very friendly to me and I haven't said anything bad.

After one argument that started from such insignificant thing as to write two comments on her profile instead of one she went into rage  and told that I wasn't her boyfriend, that she don't know me, that  I'm ill and need to go to the doctor and to leave her alone this time I used her own words and told that she wasn't my girlfriend, never was and that I will write to her e-mail if she will tell otherwise and the next thing that happened was she blocked me. She never told me her e-mail and I found it myself, so it was a surprise for her that I mentioned it. She used silent treatment on me. I didn't know what to do so I asked her friend to tell her that I want everything great to her and told her that we will marry and that she agreed to do so. The reply from her friend was Who are you like if she don't know me while she clearly now who I am, I'm not hiding from anyone and she blocked me. The same day I received a series of threatening e-mails from SO to which I replied calmly as I didn't believed anything of that but still I was shocked. In the e-mails she told me that I'm a liar that I told to her friend about that she agreed to marry me so she denied her own words, she told that I'm reported to police, that I'm ill and need to see a doctor, that she has a boyfriend and happy with him and I'm a stalker, that she hope that I will die and I'm piece of you know what and that was where she also told that she is pregnant. This was a clear recalling of her past. So despite of opinion that people with BPD act illogically you can clearly see that there is logic behind their actions and I was able to realize that only because I knew her history and what have happened to her before. So if You will get into relationship with BPD person and will not know such things You will perceive their actions as illogical. While they are not. And every action has it's reason linked to some traumatic event from the past.

After blocking me and after this rage and silent treatment she shifted communication to instagram. That was the moment I started fully to figure out what was happening inside her. It happened after I thought to read what is the behavior of narcissists and I found about silent treatment.

First I thought it was PTSD and even posted back than on one forum related to that but I was called a stalker because you may see there are no clear evidence of me because she never use my name as if we are not in r/s and I was blocked, that was from people who supposed to help, I was very depressed, I wasn't able to talk to any of her friends or family because no one will believe me, I was saying to myself that it is insanity. I know for example that if a person says that she/he wants to commit a suicide you should be very serious and concerned about that not like she/he is just imagining things.

[PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES]

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[Maverick74321]

So that is how our communication continued after she blocked me. I wrote her e-mails and before that and after that I wrote many stories about myself while and this is also a problem she haven't told me any story about herself. So I write her private e-mails and she replies on them publicly by posting photos/videos on instagram and describe her emotions and answers to me in the description of those photos/videos. She doesn't reply to me directly. I tried to write to her on instagram but she also blocked me because everyone will see that we have r/s. After 2 weeks she told to take her back. I was thinking how she even can say that because it was clearly her fault but at the same time that is the moment that I was co-dependent with her and I thought that I was too focused on the problems and need like they say to reignite the fire between us. As I also was learning how to do things better in usual relationship not only in such with the person with BPD. So I started doing things that I used to do so she will like fall in love again. I thought it was that but it was that she wasn't fully trusted me and had fear of intimacy. As the times went on she had a birthday and while I was blocked I congratulated her through e-mail and made her a video present. She posted publicly how happy she is of everything she has, that she thanks for the time invested in her, and ready for everything that will happen after that. At the same time she used one word about my present that insulted me and I've asked her to remove that word but she never did so. Imagine how it was to me, everybody was able to congratulate her with her birthday in normal way without her blocking them without her raging on them without her threatening them but I was like not existent for her.
Till today she haven't unblocked me even though I've asked her and told why she did that because of her fear of abandonment and that I just repeated her own words so she will feel how it feels to me when she does that. In such a tricky way we continued our communication. While you may clearly see that it's not a normal way in r/s to talk because r/s is something intimate when you have private conversations, when you share things about yourself with each other. After blocking on instagram while she was replying to me by posting there she at first only was talking about herself but later she improved and after I was telling her how it should be in relationship she started using words like "you" means me and "us". Another problem is she used to also reply to other men as a way to hurt me and at the same time as to find some kind of safety that if I will leave her she will deny everything because there is no direct evidence of me and she can easily say that there is nothing between us. She never blocked any of those men and never removed their comments. After I've raised concern about that she stopped doing that. But as I learned about BPD it may be that even that she stopped she was able to start that anytime. So far she haven't done that after that but it is like to divide everything in two parts: 1) something that she knows I will see and 2) something that she thinks that I don't see but still I see that, not everything because I've made other accounts just to see the overall picture of her behavior. She started to post temporal photos/videos on instagram that also disappear after 24 hours. In those photos/videos she was replying to me, even telling me how and why she loves me but she haven't posted the same things permanently only in such temporal way. She used black & white photos that I understood representing her black & white thinking and mood swings, she posted not temporal photos of herself with her face fully shown, partly covered, or she is standing opposite to the camera so her face is not visible -> this represent her current openness and trust, she used quotes and mentioning other people like posting temporarily one woman's quote with saying to her "thanks for reminding me" so she doesn't tell it in her own words, after I told her about that she started to speak only in her own words.

My family member had a birthday and I've asked her to congratulate her. It seemed like she was excited that I trusted her for introduction but instead she haven't done so and posted a temporal video where there was a shadow of her on the ground with her friend dancing in the evening and they were having fun. She completely ignored the birthday and was having fun about that. I was really hurt by that.

The whole thing is she is high functioning, she has a job, she meet with her friends, talk with them, share stories with them, like when she went to another country to visit her friend and one of her friends asked her about the trip and she was keen to tell her, when I asked her how was it and what was she doing there - she said nothing directly to me, while later she posted photos and videos about what she was doing there so I will know.

So now she posted on instagram a temporal, that already disappeared, black & white photo of new man kissing her so I will see that and it's a way to hurt me and express her anxiety towards me (even though in the last e-mail I told her that I will not be looking on what she will post and that I hope that she will write to me and unblock me so we will start talking about legal things of the wedding but she haven't done so instead she was posting temporal photos and videos on instagram for month even posted that "anybody that knows me I reply in few seconds" but I haven't written anything on that because I've tried to implement some boundaries and that wasn't respecting me as a person that I felt like I'm no one for her). This cheating is also a recalling of her past when her ex cheated on her behind her back. She is in idealization phase right now. This man has a very low self-esteem. I can stand for myself but he is clearly can't. I found who he is. He has a photo with his mother. Every time he is asking everybodies opinion about their actions like he is unsure for himself and don't have his own point of view. This is the way I find what is going on there. He has a job that reminds her of what great things I was doing for her. She posted once a comment to him that adrenaline is pumping when they planed a trip, and that was clearly her idea, in exotic country but they haven't gone in there. He went to another country himself for his job but she stayed at home. I think this is the time that her perception of him as flawless will begin to fall and the devaluation will start. In one comment she wrote "love this picture" not "I love this picture" not even "I love you" so she use such a way of wording that she has nothing to do with him personally. While he may comment like she is his girlfriend she never does so, she doesn't post anything permanently about him, she doesn't post anything about him at all, she doesn't go with him anywhere with her friends, she doesn't show him to them or any kind of direct connection. She keeps the photos while we were together, the last photo she posted was month ago that is not showing her face, she keeps the profile picture where she smiles and that was me who made her smile and she knows that. This is a not normal way of silent anxiety. If I write her e-mail she may say now that she has a boyfriend and to leave her alone and while before it was not true, now it is partly true, and partly because he is not her boyfriend and she will not admit it. While I understand that it's me who should make such decisions but what is better to do? To wait or rather to risk waiting, because who knows what will happen, until the devaluation will went to such point that she will leave him herself and based on what I've read will contact me and so I will continue no contact with her? And based of what you've read most likely she may not contact me directly but through some friend. Or, while I'm not expecting that, it will be some kind of a miracle that suddenly she will contact me herself and even say and unknowledge everything what she have done to me including this cheating due to a harder fear because it will be the second time of
her leaving r/s. While I can't call that a r/s. Because we were reading books together on the relationship and family, about wedding and life as a whole, she was also reading self-help books but I think self-help books will not help in the case of BPD because they doesn't address specific issues of BPD, she even went on one workshop for me and that was her own idea to better understand my psychology.

While I've read in here such example that BPD is like a person who is constantly jumping in the ocean to be drawn and to be saved I recalled some moments from the movie that I think better show it because I haven't saw such people who will jump in the ocean on their own to be saved it is more abstract and less realistic. The BPD can be divided in 2 parts: 1) how it is seen from another person point of view and 2) how it is perceived inside the person with BPD. For the first I'm talking about the movie "Of Mice and Men" 1992 with John Malkovich:

Lennie accidently kills his puppy by being too rough with it. When Lennie is holding the dead puppy, he looks at it and says, "You ain't so little as mice. I didn't bounce you hard".
Interestingly, Lennie is not upset at himself. He is upset at the puppy for dying. He does not take responsibility for being too rough with the puppy and begins to worry about George's reaction.
He fears that George will not allow him to tend rabbits and contemplates hiding the dead puppy.
Lennie then erupts and begins yelling at the dead puppy and throws it across the room. Lennie's reaction demonstrates his lack of perspective and understanding. Instead of realizing that he was at fault, Lennie blames the puppy. The only consequence that Lennie fears is George's reaction to finding out he killed the puppy. Lennie is obsessed with his dream of tending rabbits and is worried that he will never have the opportunity to take care of them.

For the second I'm talking about Vincent van Gogh "The Scream" painting. Were you experience all the bad things inside but can't express it outside. You can't tell anyone. Even though you are surrounded by people it is just you alone with your inner self.

It will be interesting to hear how accurate this examples will be for the people with BPD and their SO?

While on the bpdfamily website there are a lot of materials that explain BPD and relationship with people who has it, it is only useful after you know what it is either because you've experienced it before or you've found out it yourself or through some public awareness, even if people will start to talk about things like that in schools. And I think it clearly shows how much you care about person that despite all the bad things you find about this yourself and not afraid to continue. Not like people who say about r/s with BPD person that after 3 months or whatever time they left them, feel good about doing so, found normal person who can love them not unconditionally, that it was wasted time or it was just time that they say thanks that they learned more about r/s in general and will behave better in new r/s and that people with BPD are abusers. It just shows that such people choose easy ways and the first thing in their mind when they have any kind of problem not just a r/s problem is to escape the situation and not to change themselves and not to resolve such problems. To people who say about going to T. as the only way I will remind them that doctors are also people who may be ignorant, who may have some sort of disorder, who may not care much and see their patients as just way to make money, as a flow of people who just pass along, they are not unique in any sort, what they know you can learn too, and it may be also some kind of co-dependence and shifting responsibility of actions that you should do on somebody else. Besides you are the person who spends most of the time with your SO not the doctor. There are good doctors and people. Just don't expect solely that they will be good as if they will not be so you will be very disappointed. How the saying goes expect for the better but also prepare for the worse. I will say from experience I saw people who are mentally ill but I rather will call them people with disbalance than illness because I feel it's really hurts when someone point at you and say that you are disabled and it's cruelty against them. So among those people (while I'm not talking about people who have such disorder that may be unsafe to human life) there are people who are unable to understand their actions (and their actions are very out of normal) and no medication, no therapy currently can help them and don't forget that pills that they are prescribed have many side effects and those people when they start using them are simply done to use them for the rest of their lives and more importantly nothing of that really helps them, they get back to where they were. They do not resolve the problem, they simply hide the problem. BPD people understand their actions, they can love and care just not on their own, at least not in the beginning. So don't give up on them.

This is my first such relationship where I've gone that far. I thought that all of that is normal. I know that r/s is about both people and I'm aware about my own actions and learn to become better and to understand myself.
Previously I had much trouble in r/s. Once I didn't persisted when it was needed but mostly the women were either irresponsible or to certain point incompatible. Nobody ever told me I love you. The Valentines day was the worst day when you see couples around but you are alone and feel bad. There was a period when I lost a friend and it was very hard to me. After that I grew up more quickly than other people of my age. I was shy and had trouble to meet new people. But now by my own effort, will and years of self determination I learned to manage them even though I understand that they will never go away.

Ironically speaking I even suggested to my SO radical acceptance but I did so after I read how to more easily take actions. But I haven't sometimes applied it to myself. And that was my mistake.

Writing all of this even helped me to take a broader view of everything.

Thank you in advance for your help!

[once removed]

hi Maverick74321 and

it feels good to get your story out, eh?

do i have it right that the two of you have had no contact in a little over a month, and that shes currently in a relationship?

[Maverick74321]

hi Maverick74321 and

it feels good to get your story out, eh?

do i have it right that the two of you have had no contact in a little over a month, and that shes currently in a relationship?

Hi @once removed, thank you for reply. I've written longer first because it's do feel better to tell somebody what is inside yourself, second because I've read other people stories before but people are different and to better understand motives for their actions it's better to tell what happen after what otherwise it may be inconsistent and third even though I've read a lot about BPD I haven't read about specific problems and their solutions I wrote about. Besides most things I found about BPD were somehow biased in a way to leave the relationship and calling people with BPD some bad things.

Yes you understood right, I've made no contact for around 1,5 months while she was posting to me but not in a way that will progress the relationship, she haven't unblocked me, haven't even asked how I was feeling and if everything was ok with me. Yes she is currently in relationship if to call that a relationship.

[once removed]

and you want her back, right?

is she posting vindictive/mean stuff?

[Maverick74321]

and you want her back, right?

is she posting vindictive/mean stuff?

Yes I want to make this work but in a way that she will not be cheating again and that there will be progress rather than regress, while I understand that sometimes progress is inevitable without regress. She went into this cheating to express her anxiety towards me.

Right now she is not posting anything bad, she doesn't post anything on instagram at all because she knows that we were communicating there last time and I may see that. Just to add that she was also choosing to make temporal posts because she can see who view those temporal posts but there is no way to know who viewed something posted permanently. But there is a way to see those temporal posts without her knowing that.

I have one idea how to resolve this but I want to ask if I can tell that to you in a private message?

[once removed]

I have one idea how to resolve this but I want to ask if I can tell that to you in a private message?

in order to fully utilize the "support" aspect of a support group, and so that members can keep up with our stories and weigh in its really best to keep things on the boards. youre anonymous and safe here.

have the two of you met in person yet?

[Maverick74321]

in order to fully utilize the "support" aspect of a support group, and so that members can keep up with our stories and weigh in its really best to keep things on the boards. youre anonymous and safe here.

have the two of you met in person yet?

No we haven't

[once removed]

No we haven't

okay. i think this is important to keep in perspective here.

your relationship took off fast and heavy in a short time. it sounds like there has been a fair amount of chaos in that time, and that the two of you werent always on the same page in terms of where your relationship stood. this can happen often in long distance or online relationships. its not easy to navigate.

how long has she been seeing someone else?

[Maverick74321]

okay. i think this is important to keep in perspective here.

your relationship took off fast and heavy in a short time. it sounds like there has been a fair amount of chaos in that time, and that the two of you werent always on the same page in terms of where your relationship stood. this can happen often in long distance or online relationships. its not easy to navigate.

how long has she been seeing someone else?

It wasn't fast, it took a month or so, but I didn't know she already started to search for replacement back then while at the same time she was posting to me.

She has been seeing him not frequently from time to time not everyday for 2-3 weeks.

[once removed]

Maverick, i think the only card you can play here is to let things go (for now) and let her relationship play out.

meanwhile, learn the tools and the lessons here (they are to the right of the board ----->, and prepare yourself in the event that she reaches out. if she does, youll need a very different game plan to give this a shot.