Regret, Lost Following Kicking Out Partner with BPD/ADHD

[ZZZDomino40]

Almost a month ago, the exact date I'm not sure as it's been such a blur since, I made the difficult decision to tell my girlfriend to leave our apartment. She had just gotten unbashfully drunk on a day we had reserved to do college studying, and I had reached my limit coexisting with her dysfunctionality. As I couldn't blame her for her condition and what had happened in her life to lead her to such actions, I needed to do something to show her the consequences of not caring about anything. She had been raised in a home riddled with drug use, and had to be given up to her godparents across the country around age 5 as her mother could not take care of her and went through rehabilitation. Her godparents are the wisest people in her life, yet she moved back to her home state and lived with her aunt, whom I could not say is a positive influence. She was later taken back up by her mother, whom had shifted from drugs to alcohol, coping with the loss of her mother, whom died just as I met her about three years ago. About 6 months ago, she too died from liver failure. So as I've known my exgirlfriend, she has lost two members of her family. I cannot imagine the psychological toll this has taken on her. I was the only person constantly there for her then, sleeping night after night in the emergency waiting room comforting her until her mother passed. In this vein of compassion, her exhibition of anger towards me led me to try and find a therapist for her since after her mother passed. This only angered her more, but I continued to call numbers and talk to psychologists to find the person right for her and find what was wrong. She'd tell me she'd find help when she was "good and ready", but I was afraid that day would never come. She's smoked pot since she was about 14 years old, and as much as I can detail the benefits of the drug for some people, she's self-medicated with it daily to the point shes created a dependence, which doesn't help as she suffers from ADHD as well. As she had appointments for therapists I found her prior to me telling her to leave the apartment I'd given her on my parents property, I still needed her to leave from her violent outbursts. I wanted to give her a positive and care-free space away from her troubling family, but the only place she had to stay other than our apartment was back at her aunt's house. Initially she felt remorse for her actions a few days after I kicked her out, telling me she called a crisis hotline that detailed the reasons for her actions, but I was still firm with my decision she couldn't live here. I never wanted to see her cry, but she did that night she came to pick up her stuff and announce that to me. Afterwards, we'd fight through texts as I told her what she needed to do to make this relationship work, and she'd continued to drink and detailed her plan to "just go crazy" and that she'd enjoy not having me to "be [her] dad" and get to be promiscuous during this break, sending me into a manic depression. She's since been to a therapist I found her, and has most likely been told she has BPD, but I fear for her every day that she'll still make a mistake she can't undo with no-one there to tell her otherwise. We're on off-again-on-again good terms as I try to accept that I can't worry about what I can't control and that I love her deeply, but every day I try to go on with life without her here in this apartment, I get texts from friends showing me her Tinder or I find something of hers she forgot to take with her back to her aunt's house, and I have nervous breakdowns and crying fits. She still tells me she loves me, but I'm not sure if she knows how to show it properly through her actions or if she actually does anymore. I continue to believe I'm the only one that understands her and loves her deeply, but she's puts me in a position of helplessness, loneliness and discomfort. I was and still is her only positive existing influence through life besides her therapist. I constantly remember the times she'd ask when we should be married, or how she asked permission to marry me on her mother's deathbed. I'm currently in the middle of waiting for calls back for my own therapist, as I feel so lost since I kicked her out. Should I try to bring her back to provide her with stability and care she needs so much? There's not a moment that goes by I don't think about her and what we could have had together. We both had solid dreams and aspirations, and I don't know what to do with myself, and I can't see how this situation could get any better. I'm constantly just told to "wait it out" and "if she comes back to you, you know it'll be right". The longer I wait the crazier and wound up I get sitting here alone. Anytime I use the phone, it's either to ask her how her therapy went and that I love her or to call a crisis hotline on myself till I get a therapist. I've done everything I can for her and I have so much more to provide. What do I do?
 
Thank you.

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[Ozzie101]

Hi ZZZDomino

It sounds like you've got a lot of emotions running through you at the moment. Understandable, under the circumstances. But they can also muddle the mind and make it hard to sort things out.

From what you say, you want to bring her back to your home so you can care for her and stabilize her. Correct? It sounds like that's what you did before, while also trying your best to fix her (calling therapists). Did it work?

The fact is (and it's something that can be hard to really accept and understand), you can't fix her. You can't manage her emotions for her. Only she can do that. So, if your goal is to make her better, you are not likely to succeed. That has to come from her. If your goal is just to love her, warts and all, while letting her handle her own emotions (her feelings and emotions are hers and hers alone -- just as yours are yours) and face the consequences of her own actions, there's more chance for success.

It can be so hard for us to see our loved ones suffer and not be able to really help. I, and many others here, are caretakers by nature. That's part of what makes us attracted (and attractive) to people with BPD. But one of the keys to a healthy relationship is being able to accept that there's a limit to what we can do. Building our own inner strength helps a lot with that.

What is your real goal? What do you really want?