I Want To Pull The Plug Once And For All

[Family Court Strategies: When Your Partner Has BPD OR NPD Traits.]

I really have had enough of my ex's uncaring behaviour. I reinstated contact a couple of weeks ago after she cut me off FB. Yesterday she rang me accidentally and said she was trying to reach her son. Before she told me who she was trying to call I simply asked if she meant to call me or was it the wrong person. Her response was 'Don't start, I was trying to call my son on his birthday.' She has never called me accidentally before so I think it must have been a genuine accident.

Today would have been my brother's 51st birthday. He died when he was 17. I really don't feel like taking any of her nonsense of this day of all days and she has started ST again, though she hasn't cut me off FB.

I really feel like pulling the pull on this nonsense once and for all. We haven't seen each other for 18 months and she is now like a ghost in my life. Can anybody give me one good reason why I shouldn't go NC?

[RomanticFool]

I really have had enough of my ex's uncaring behaviour. I reinstated contact a couple of weeks ago after she cut me off FB. Yesterday she rang me accidentally and said she was trying to reach her son. Before she told me who she was trying to call I simply asked if she meant to call me or was it the wrong person. Her response was 'Don't start, I was trying to call my son on his birthday.' She has never called me accidentally before so I think it must have been a genuine accident.

Today would have been my brother's 51st birthday. He died when he was 17. I really don't feel like taking any of her nonsense of this day of all days and she has started ST again, though she hasn't cut me off FB.

I really feel like pulling the pull on this nonsense once and for all. We haven't seen each other for 18 months and she is now like a ghost in my life. Can anybody give me one good reason why I shouldn't go NC?

[Samson1234@]

Hey RF,

18 months is a long time and the way you talk you seem to be very clear that you do not want her in your life and it is totally witin your power to do exactly that if you wish. So why do you think you need our validation to go NC with her?

Is there something holding you back from doing that which you want to share?

[RomanticFool]

Hi Samson1234@

18 months is a long time and the way you talk you seem to be very clear that you do not want her in your life and it is totally witin your power to do exactly that if you wish. So why do you think you need our validation to go NC with her? Is there something holding you back from doing that which you want to share?

The thing stopping me from pulling the trigger is that I've done it many times before and it always ends up with me feeling pain and reconnecting with her. I've been spending the last 18 months detaching from her but she often re-establishes contact also. We have been engaged in a push/pull cycle for a long time now and I am trying very hard not to take action as a reflex to my own emotional dysregulation. In other words when I feel upset and angry with her I am apt to take knee-jerk action which I later regret.

RF

[Skip]

Reason: You are doing it to get back at her. It's just really silent treatment.

I think more importantly, you need to go to DNR (do not resuscitate). I think you need to let go of hope.  That is what is driving your anxiety.  You can lock here in a submarine and send her to sea... .it won't make you feel better... .you have to let go of hope.

Hope is what is torturing you. You still feel, deep down, that she will eventually see the light with respect to having relationship with you.

[RomanticFool]

Hope is what is torturing you. You still feel, deep down, that she will eventually see the light with respect to having relationship with you.

It is slowly dying on the vine. The question is, what is the best way to torpedo the hope? In the main retaining some kind of contact has made me feel better and it at least stops the push/pull - ST/reconnecting drama and keeps emotions on an even keel. I know I need to let this go and deep down I don't think torpedoing it is going to work, but letting it go gently is making me angry when she behaves like I am nothing to her.

[Skip]

I think what you are referring to as dying on the vine is, in all reality, growing resentment. So you have hope and resentment. Every day you hope she will decide she wants you. Every night you go to bed with increased resentment that she doesn't.  The hope is why you want to maintain contact. The resentment is why you block her on facebook 11 times in the last 18 months.

There is no outside force that can fix this - not time, not event.

This is in your head - its within your willpower.

For me, I sat in a quiet area, I got in a real clam place.  I confessed to myself that nobody has any hope for this relationship except me and the minute I give up hope, the pain will start to recede.

[Educated_Guess]

It is slowly dying on the vine. The question is, what is the best way to torpedo the hope? In the main retaining some kind of contact has made me feel better and it at least stops the push/pull - ST/reconnecting drama and keeps emotions on an even keel. I know I need to let this go and deep down I don't think torpedoing it is going to work, but letting it go gently is making me angry when she behaves like I am nothing to her.

Hi RomanticFool!  What is it that you are hoping for?  If you can find the need behind the hope, you can start finding ways to fulfill that need without her.

I'm going to go all armchair psychologist here and take a guess.  You get angry that she is behaving like you are nothing to her.  So you may be hoping that she behaves in a way that shows that you mean something to her. That's is a natural thing to want in a relationship and there is nothing wrong with that.

Remember that because of her disorder, she may not even be capable of seeing the worth in other people beyond what she can get out of them (love, support, attention, etc... .). Once she has gone through the devalue/discard stage, it is unlikely that she will see you as being useful for her again (and your worth in her eyes was determined by how useful you were to her).

Do you need to feel like you mean something to her to feel like your life has meaning?  This is a tough question.  Sometimes we look for fulfillment in others when we cannot meet those needs within ourselves. It was certainly true for me.   Once I started recognizing that I have worth and my life has meaning whether my ex realizes it or not, I took back the control she had over me.

Maybe it comes to accepting that you don't mean anything to her now.  But realize that this says something about her, not about you.  You matter whether she recognizes it or not.

[RomanticFool]

I think what you are referring to as dying on the vine is, in all reality, growing resentment. So you have hope and resentment. Every day you hope she will decide she wants you. Every night you go to bed with increased resentment that she doesn't.

I know too much about BPD and my own emotional life to be resentful anymore. More accurately what I feel now is overwhelming sadness. I get angry when she treats me with disrespect but that is because she has been so important to me in my life. I just feel sadness.

The hope is why you want to maintain contact.

Probably. Plus it is easier to function without the weight of daily grief hanging around my neck. But perhaps it is time to accept the pain of loss and let her go.

The resentment is why you block her on facebook 11 times in the last 18 months.

I have often done that after an argument as a knee-jerk reaction and regretted it. The last time she cut me off.

There is no outside force that can fix this - not time, not event.

This is in your head - its within your willpower.

It's not just in my head. It is also in hers and she will always try to reconnect even if she doesn't want me. That is what has made this so difficult. How do I let her go and stay in contact? Or do I have to go NC? I'm not sure what is the best thing to do.

For me, I sat in a quiet area, I got in a real clam place.  I confessed to myself that nobody has any hope for this relationship except me and the minute I give up hope, the pain will start to recede.

I don't really have any hope anymore. I just start to feel terrible after about a month when there is NC. I feel lonely and bleak. At least with some kind of contact, even though I know there is no r/s anymore, I still feel connected. Perhaps the time has come to break that connection.

[RomanticFool]

Hi Educated_Guess,

Thanks for your input.

Do you need to feel like you mean something to her to feel like your life has meaning?

Not so much my life but all those years I spent hankering after her. I don't want to feel they were all a total waste of time. However, it is clear that she has no interest in any kind of r/s with me and so I have to find a way to reconcile myself to the fact that what we had was in the past and let her go.

RF

[Cromwell]

Hi RF

I fully support you in your wish, I agree that this isnt going to make you a happy person its keeping you as a sort of reversed hanging man.

There is so much emotional input, yet nothing coming back your way that seems fulfilling at all.

I value others opinions, many declare and rue the time spent as "wasted", its just I dont share it, although I did at one point.

You know, it was hard to finally detach, hurtful for a long while, but I dont look at those years as wasted, I see them as necessary for progression.

I couldnt care less if I had a few weeks to left to live and had been together decades, id detach if only to be able to declare that I progressed, severed that toxic link, and hard as it was, progressed to being reconciled with some self esteem.

Also I got in the useful habit of never assuming anything - accidental call? On the one hand you say you inclined to believe it because she hasnt done so in the past - it makes me more suspicious that someone that appears so careful not to have made an accidental call in 8 years, just happens to make it as this juncture.

From my own experience, I never felt able to begin the path of truly expressing my emotions - wether negative or positive ones until I went NC. As long as there was contact, there was no mental free space, I was too distracted by the new barrage of stuff to do any kind of reflection.

[RomanticFool]

Thanks Cromwell,

I fully support you in your wish, I agree that this isnt going to make you a happy person its keeping you as a sort of reversed hanging man.

There is so much emotional input, yet nothing coming back your way that seems fulfilling at all.

This has been my concern with this situation. I reinstated contact with her because I didn't want to feel the loss and resentment that I was feeling as it was affecting my day to day life. Since I reinstated contact things have been cordial. I don't see any reason for her to 'accidentally' call me when we are on good terms. Normally if she wants a telephone call (very rarely these days) she will just ask if I can speak.

She did contact me today with the following message:

I have spent the last few days in a state of high anxiety as I have been unable to reach my son, however I have tried. The cat has also gone missing and I have had a virus which has given me a headache for 4 days. Otherwise I am fine but perhaps a little wired.

She often has headaches and is often worried about her kids and the cats. Knowing her as I do, I deduce from this that her mental state is not in a great place. These days I just make brief empathic statements as she is clearly preoccupied in her own world. I suppose keeping in contact with her and understanding that her disordered mind is obsessing over such things makes it somehow easier.

[Gemsforeyes]

Hi there RF-
I know this is a struggle for you, and I’m sorry.  I’ve been in a bad state myself and have finally found (I hope) a therapist, who I’ll see tomorrow.  There IS a point to what I’m telling you, I promise.

Too many years of pain can blend together sometimes and get confusing.  BPD, NPD... .  anyway, prior to my 4.5 year r/s with uBPDbf, I was married to a man who was a hardcore narc.  I didn’t know I was emotionally abused and controlled for most of those 19 years.  This was explained to me by a psychiatrist, when I fell apart after my separation- The marriage ended the night he threw me across the room and into a door.  The violence was in response to my suggestion that if we needed to separate, we should Part as friends... .

As a result of my husband’s actions (and cruel things he did afterward) and my emotional response, I fled my home, my entire life and support system and moved cross-country.  I did not know where to put those 19 years. 

19 years of my life, our lives... .all the things I did with him, for him, his kids, his extended family... .I’ve had to “box up” so to speak.  I was recently informed by a professional that he is a narcissist (“one of the worst” our marriage counselor had known).  I get that now.

The best I can tell you, RF, is that you HAVE to make a small space for it and put it away.  It will creep into your memory now and again, and when that happens, you can allow yourself a few moments with it, and then close the box back up.  That r/s doesn’t belong to you anymore.  Just like that marriage doesn’t belong to me.

And I do hope you will consider going “no contact”.  At some point it WILL be best for you to understand that you live in separate worlds.  The things she told you in her most recent contact are just things to re-engage you... .to pull you back in.  But it’s manipulative and meaningless for you.  She will NOT set you free.  You need to do that for yourself.

Don’t tell her.  Just give yourself permission to do it.  Allow yourself to grieve, feel the pain once and for all and release this thing.  You ARE allowed to simply turn your back and silently walk away.  She has become someone you used to know... .just like my husband and my exuBPDbf.  People I used to know.  Not everyone we lose is a loss.

Warmly,
Gemsforeyes

[Robbland]

You say you feel lonely and bleak.

I've been there when I last split up with my pwBPD although I think we are splitting up again.
But what helped me toward the end of the last split which is also what is helping me to believe I can do it is having something to replace her with or at least focus on.
For me I took up a new hobby. Not only did I find it very enjoyable and rewarding but I also met a load of really nice people and gained a whole new social network.
That's been probably the most positive helpful thing I managed to do and its what enables me to believe that if she does leave me again I'll be ok.  

[RomanticFool]

And I do hope you will consider going “no contact”.  At some point it WILL be best for you to understand that you live in separate worlds.  The things she told you in her most recent contact are just things to re-engage you... .to pull you back in.  But it’s manipulative and meaningless for you.  She will NOT set you free.  You need to do that for yourself.

Don’t tell her.  Just give yourself permission to do it.  Allow yourself to grieve, feel the pain once and for all and release this thing.  You ARE allowed to simply turn your back and silently walk away.  She has become someone you used to know... .just like my husband and my exuBPDbf.  People I used to know.  Not everyone we lose is a loss.

It's funny isn't it, even with everything I know about BPD, I still feel like I am abandoning her if I walk away. I have always had a hard time letting go of girlfriends but this one feels like I am losing a part of myself. I know for the sake of my marriage, my sanity and the obvious truth smacking me in the face: she doesn't want a r/s, I still can't let her go. Skip says I'm holding on to hope, but I think it is something more profound to me. I am holding onto a human who I care about, r/s or no r/s. That is the tough part.

[RomanticFool]

Thanks Robbland,  

But what helped me toward the end of the last split which is also what is helping me to believe I can do it is having something to replace her with or at least focus on.
For me I took up a new hobby. Not only did I find it very enjoyable and rewarding but I also met a load of really nice people and gained a whole new social network.
That's been probably the most positive helpful thing I managed to do and its what enables me to believe that if she does leave me again I'll be ok. Smiling (click to insert in post)

I have started to meet some female friends who I have known for a while. All of the friendships are platonic and my wife knows about them. Somehow having women as friends is really helping me. I have traditionally looked upon many women in the past as potential romantic partners. It is really quite therapeutic to spend some time with intelligent and funny people who I would have vetoed in the past on the grounds that they won't sleep with me. I am changing that narrative and feeling better for it.

I think I am growing up. All I've ever done in the past is try to protect my feelings ie if a woman won't share my bed then that precludes her from being my friend. I am beginning to realise the absurdity of that position. It is about maturity, respect and allowing myself to enjoy these platonic friendships. Something I never would have done in the past on the grounds that I can't have what I want. One of the things I miss about my ex is simply talking to another woman about her life. I have always enjoyed female company and once you take sex off the table I feel I can enjoy real friendships.

[Hadenoughtimes4]

RF I have seen some of your posts and you have a good head on your shoulders. Different when it's a snake in our own bed, harder to see the forest for the trees. Cromwell is, I think correct in his logic. What possible good can come of reconnecting with a toxic person, these relationships s/b fun and make us feel great, not these mind games and push/pull and pseudo lies about accidental calls. Why didn't she just hang up if it was, you are not with her for reasons and they certainly haven't changed. At least it wasn't a call starting out with "Baby, I miss you and need you, blah blah, blah" Much harder to resist in my mind. This is silly, she's puppeteer

[SerendipityChild]

You know, it was hard to finally detach, hurtful for a long while, but I dont look at those years as wasted, I see them as necessary for progression.
From my own experience, I never felt able to begin the path of truly expressing my emotions - wether negative or positive ones until I went NC. As long as there was contact, there was no mental free space, I was too distracted by the new barrage of stuff to do any kind of reflection.

I agree... .and see the experience as it takes its course. We all grieve in different ways and varying length of time before we start "feeling better". There are moments where I see a place we've been to and feel a little tug in my heart. Then try to shake it off and turn my music so loud if I am in my car or wearing my ear set. Sort of drowning the thought.