I stood by his side through tragedy, now I'm being labeled as "toxic"

[nervousgumball]

Hi there! I'm losing my dang mind and in need of advice.

About 8 months ago, me and my ex with BPD started dating. It was wonderful. We fell in love. Everything seemed great until his mom passed away unexpectedly. It was particularly devastating to my ex as it was his last remaining family member and they were very close. During the next couple months that followed, he relied on me for everything. I helped him plan most of the funeral, moved his mom out of her apartment, bought him groceries, drove him everywhere, stayed at his apartment almost every night while he cried. As the loss set in after a couple of months, he began to pull away. He became more and more distant until one day he broke up with me. While I was heartbroken, I was understanding as he had been going through so much and needed space.


After about a month of being broken up, he began reaching out to me. Of course I went running back to him and we ended up in a relationship again. It was fine at first even though he was still distant. I understood why though and remained patient. For the next few months, we continued to date and I tried to remain as understanding as I could as to why he canceled plans, never wanted to see my friends or family, I was just happy to have him back.

Fast forward to October where everything came to a screeching halt. He became incredibly withdrawn out of the blue. He said his grief was getting worse due to the holidays. He stopped wanting to have sex and would sometimes stop responding to me for days. The worst part was when he did want to talk to me, it was usually to ask me for favors, which I did for him because I was so afraid to lose him and wanted him to keep me in his life. This lead to me becoming resentful and insecure. We began arguing. After, I would ask if he wanted a breakup and he would tell me no and that he loved me very much. Then, we had a huge blowup that turned into him demonizing me, calling me a toxic person and throwing me out of his house at 5 am at his birthday party I threw for him over a small disagreement we had that escalated on both of our behalves. While he was demonizing me, I said mean things I shouldn't have but I was so hurt it was hard to keep my emotions in line.

Ever since then (about two weeks ago), he iced me out, has come back, expressed wanting to get back together, then changed his mind last minute over the phone and said he didn't want a relationship. Again I broke down. I was angry and said mean childish things that I deeply regret due to the pain I felt. He now is convinced I am a toxic person and claims I am an unhealthy person to be around and says he wants to commit to moving on with his life without me.

Looking back, I know the relationship was deteriorating and was becoming a bad time for both of us so I am not sure if I even want to try saving it. What I want and need help with is reversing the narrative of this breakup. I do not want to be known as a "toxic and unhealthy person" at the end of all of this, it's an awful weight to carry. I have tried my best to be supportive and loving during his darkest time. I know I handled the breakup poorly but is there any advice that could be given as to get him to stop demonizing me? I've tried apologizing, I've tried begging him to not be mad at me, everything I do just turns into him having the upper hand, he's even now flirting with my friends on social media where I can see it even though we just broke up a week ago. I'm devastated and just want peace.  Do I just stop contacting him?  Can anyone help me?

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[alittleawkward]

Hi Gumball, welcome to bpdfamily. I'm sorry to hear about your break up.

The best thing you can do for someone who is clearly on an emotional ride is give them space and batten down your hatches. It's important to remember that BPD is essentially a form of emotional immaturity, so his actions that follow after the trauma of losing a close family member and a relationship may be wildly sporadic and irrational.

I would first of all ask what kind of friends you have, if they are openly flirting with your ex so soon after a break up. Be wary not to read into things too much - emotions will be high everywhere and it may even be an idea to remove yourself from social media to give yourself head space.

It's definitely also worth reading some of the advice pages you can find on this website, there are some incredibly insightful and reassuring paragraphs of info about BPD in regards to relationship issues and break ups.

Reaching out or replying to him is giving him what he wants - bowing to his messages allows him to be authoritative and powerful over your dynamic. If you wish to send him a message then so be it, but just remember at this point you need to do what will be best for you in the now, and going forward. Not what's best for him.


My ex has demonised me for 6 months on social media, however in person we get along ok. I have come to accept its almost like her dark-side-splitting finding a voice. People are bored of her comments now, thus anyone with opinions worth caring about knows that I have done far less wrong than what may be made out. When we ended it I met up with my ex a week after our final split and had a chat with her, but the following weeks and months I had a flurry of aggressive paragraphs from her and abuse online.

Like anything, it will fade with time (and I know how incredibly hard that is to read, but it is honestly so so true), but it will be difficult, like any break up, just with even more complexities involved. Right now you need to work out what would be best for you - whether thats closure in person, or starting no contact, or having a social media detox, or finding counselling. Those are just a few ideas people tend to find. I found that reading as much as I could about break ups and BPD and removing my social medias every time I felt overwhelmed or tempted to check in helped a lot. There is also a lot of power to be had in the silence of no response. Then you can dictate when a conversation will be had, IF you want it.

Be selfish! It'll be good for you!

[nervousgumball]

Thank you so much, alittleawkward! It is a situation where I feel like no matter what I do, he will be angry with me so I am afraid to initiate a no contact period and delete my social media. It is very tempting to try and reason with him through initiating contact, but you are right in saying it just feeds into what he wants. I just hope he is able to eventually come to the realization I was not a bad person.

Unfortunately my ex is a public figure, and it does not take a lot for him to be able to win over my social circle who are also friends with him. None of them are super close friends, it's just hard to watch and the immediate need to date and flirt where I can see it feels like a direct result of wanting to hurt me.

Can I ask if your ex ever stopped demonizing you?

[alittleawkward]

To this day my ex still tweets garbage about me. Very little of it is entertained by anyone though, and anyone who is worth worrying about being hooked in by her stories worked out what was going on within a month or so. I have never risen to it or bought it up, just kinda left her to it. Her personal messages went from weekly, to fortnightly, to monthly, until I asked her to call me and we were finally able to talk properly. They have since stopped (this was around about a month ago) and we now communicate between each other civilly, however she keeps up the victim story online. I just know that I am damn well better than ever concerning myself or acknowledging such pettiness on public domain.
Her previous ex before me would often call her tweets out and reply with similar venom to that which she tweets, which would ultimately end up in a great big s*** slinging fight between friendship groups online. They're back together now anyway. Seems like they can't live without the toxicity of each other!


No matter what you do at this point, your ex will find reason, if they want, to be frustrated with you. Accepting that you will never be in the right with them until they see fit is fundamental to moving on. They will not forgive you, so forgive yourself. You're human, no one is perfect, and it is particularly tricky to keep the foundations of any kind of relationship strong with someone with a mental health disorder. This was another thing I experienced myself... Block them; get hassle. Still follow them..; get hassle. Ignore their messages..; get hassle. reply to their messages..; get hassle. This is an unfortunate result of a break up and it is particularly intense with someone with BPD. This is why it is absolutely fundamental to do what is best for you, so to minimise the heartache and guilt.

Personally I would start NC and de-activate my socials for a period so that it doesn't matter whether or not they would be angry with me - I wouldn't know nor care. I would just stay in my own bubble with my own problems and my own things. Of course, everyone deals with stuff like this differently. Maybe seeing what they were up to would give you peace of mind and help you move on, or maybe having counselling or researching BPD etc will help. Again, everyone is different.

If you need to reply then by all means reply, just remember when you put your hand in the snakes mouth it will find it much easier to bite. It's much easier to remove yourself from the venomous area all together, and try and immerse yourself in things you enjoy. Reach out to friends who truly have time to listen to you and will give you sound advice, and family members too. Maybe try some of the things in my above reply. Through grievance you will find who your good friends truly are, and may even revive some lost friendships too. I am truly sorry to hear what you're going through, but I hope you can find some reassurance and support.

[Stillhopeful4]

Ever since then (about two weeks ago), he iced me out, has come back, expressed wanting to get back together, then changed his mind last minute over the phone and said he didn't want a relationship. Again I broke down. I was angry and said mean childish things that I deeply regret due to the pain I felt. He now is convinced I am a toxic person and claims I am an unhealthy person to be around and says he wants to commit to moving on with his life without me.

Hi Nervousgumball,

Welcome to our group.  I can relate to this.  This is the exact same thing my W of 10 years has done to me.  I've been working on it in therapy.  You can look up reactive abuse.  I have now been labeled toxic as well.  She even went as far as telling my D23, just yesterday, that our breakup is all my fault because I have treated her like poop for 10 years.  My daughter is WELL aware it was not I that treated her like poop, but it was the other way around.  Projection.  She has also launched a smear campaign against me online and with our friends.  My T says not to react to it or try and defend it and that eventually her lies will catch up with her.  Let me say NOT DEFENDING MYSELF against this and being labeled as toxic is EXTREMELY hard for me.  I have a few slips (which have made things much worse for me), but in general I've done better over the past month.

Anyway, I wanted to welcome you and let you know you are not alone.

((HUGS)
SH4