Are they really doing well after they discarded us?

[Depression = 72% of members]

Hello, sorry for posting again but yeah this recovery thing comes in waves. Had a good couple months but accidentally stumbled onto my ex's social media (I blocked her now). It's all rosy apparently. She got a job around 9 months ago and it was a huge trigger. She could barely go a day without having a mental breakdown, even cried in front of her boss because we had an argument She lied to me about meeting up with her ex and when confronted started crying. Now I am fairly sure she's in a new relationship because she just can't be alone. Frantic efforts to hook up with someone on Tinder as soon as possible was the norm. She has a history of unstable relationships. Went through like 5 "serious" relationships in less than 4 years. All of them are abusive and toxic btw (including me ).

The thing with breakup was there was never any closure. She raged at me and blocked me everywhere and denied any kind of communication after that. Felt like just my existence triggers her now and it was all over a misunderstanding. Now she's posting pictures such as "Glamourize having healthy and happy relationships and healthy work environment. I just wanted to ask this to people here, are they as happy as they claim on social media after dropping a serious relationship? Seems like she's managed to keep the job for around 9 months now but the first 3 months at the job was a nightmare. Even the smallest thing like her boss looking at her the wrong way triggered her and I would end up taking care of a 23 yo woman like a 4 year old.Don't know how she's doing after the discard. Are relationships a trigger for pwBPD? I can't help but think her life is so perfect now and I am still recovering from all the lies, manipulation, rage and blackmail. I can't even think about entering into a new relationship while she effortlessly starts projecting the same feelings she once had for me on someone else? Thoughts? Advice? Experiences?

[redhaired1818]

Hello, sorry for posting again but yeah this recovery thing comes in waves. Had a good couple months but accidentally stumbled onto my ex's social media (I blocked her now). It's all rosy apparently. She got a job around 9 months ago and it was a huge trigger. She could barely go a day without having a mental breakdown, even cried in front of her boss because we had an argument She lied to me about meeting up with her ex and when confronted started crying. Now I am fairly sure she's in a new relationship because she just can't be alone. Frantic efforts to hook up with someone on Tinder as soon as possible was the norm. She has a history of unstable relationships. Went through like 5 "serious" relationships in less than 4 years. All of them are abusive and toxic btw (including me ).

The thing with breakup was there was never any closure. She raged at me and blocked me everywhere and denied any kind of communication after that. Felt like just my existence triggers her now and it was all over a misunderstanding. Now she's posting pictures such as "Glamourize having healthy and happy relationships and healthy work environment. I just wanted to ask this to people here, are they as happy as they claim on social media after dropping a serious relationship? Seems like she's managed to keep the job for around 9 months now but the first 3 months at the job was a nightmare. Even the smallest thing like her boss looking at her the wrong way triggered her and I would end up taking care of a 23 yo woman like a 4 year old.Don't know how she's doing after the discard. Are relationships a trigger for pwBPD? I can't help but think her life is so perfect now and I am still recovering from all the lies, manipulation, rage and blackmail. I can't even think about entering into a new relationship while she effortlessly starts projecting the same feelings she once had for me on someone else? Thoughts? Advice? Experiences?

[Laylabelle1]

Hi Red,
No closure is very hard. I think a lot of us have had it at some point and can relate. Its even harder if you can see social media and best if it's blocked, but for that I think you need to find your own closure otherwise you carry on hurting yourself and it adds to the torture, though i know it will take time.

Whether they are really happy or not makes little difference, they will probably be happy (or feel they are if it's not too taxing) in anything new, whether it be a relationship, a new car , or new red shiny shoes with glittery buckles. The glitter comes off and the colour fades eventually, and the next  relationship  will likely have all the same dynamics as yours did.

You are missing someone badly whom you considered a real love. Only someone who has no empathy can swan from one person to the next without any feelings at all. Normal people try to solve misunderstandings.
Yours wasn't the only misunderstanding she will face and if that's how she reacts then it is probably how she will always behave.
Leaving someone without closure is cruel and cowardly unless its for personal safety reasons. Try to remember that if she was still with you she would stomp off without affording you closure again and again everytime SHE misunderstood something.  That is not a healthy way to carry on a good two sided relationship.

Try to tell yourself that YOUR happiness and sanity are more important.  It doesn't feel good right now but it will lessen with time.
Being lifted takes us up high,  but being dropped  or put down heavily is painful, which would you prefer to have in your daily life?

[crushedagain]

In my case, I look no further than the beginning of my relationship with my BPDexgf. I am somebody who likes to take things slow, yet she was moving everything along at a breakneck pace. She invited herself to move in with me within 2 months. She was as smitten with me as a woman could be. I relaxed my boundary and allowed her to move in.

When I think back on it, I think she was still talking to her ex at that time, I just didn't know it. She literally jumps from one relationship to the next. And she was as happy as a clam early on. She was idolizing me, putting me on a pedestal. So I'm sure that's the course she took with the previous guy until the devaluation came, and I'm sure when I was heartbroken and bedridden over her devaluation of me, she was in some new guy's bed, filled with the joy of the new relationship as she had been with me. I shudder to think of how many men she's burned through in the past 3 years.

[Rev]

I can't help but think her life is so perfect now and I am still recovering from all the lies, manipulation, rage and blackmail. I can't even think about entering into a new relationship while she effortlessly starts projecting the same feelings she once had for me on someone else? Thoughts? Advice? Experiences?

Hey Red...

Yes, I do.  I have highlighted the piece that is most pertinent, at least to my mind. (I like to say that my opinion plus a 1.50$ buys you a bad cup of coffee.)

But seriously, I went through the same kind of cycles that I am sensing here until something really kicked in for me.

I finally got my head around the fact that I was part of a pattern. Same pattern,  whether it was her friendships, intimate relationships, jobs, hobbies, what have you. The only thing that changed was the length of the cycle. Some were shorter, some were longer, depending on the situation. The key was to understand that they all started and finished the same way. When I got my head around that, I had the closure that I needed. I had to imagine it (the closure that is) but at least I had something to go on. From there, I could let go of the future, and true to form, the pattern is continuing. Same start, same finish , just with another guy and another job.

So the part I highlighted - go look at it again. And ask yourself - "Do I care now?" 

For sure this hurts, but know this, it happened just as if you got into a car accident and the other person was under the influence. For sure you are going to need to heal from something like that. But there is precious little healing to be found in continuing to wonder why the other person was drunk. I know that the analogy breaks down here, because the next step is the rage one might feel if the drunk driver got off scot-free. Trust me, if your ex suffers from a BPD condition, she continues to suffer. She is not getting of scot-free.

Which leads me to another re-frame.

If she does suffer from BPD, the feelings she had, they weren't for you so much as they were about her excitement at being able to reboot her pattern. It was never about you. It was never about me either. It's not about my ex's new guy either. It's not about you any more than a drunk driver intentionally has a car accident. It's just that drunk drivers get into a lot of accidents. But they don't always drive drunk and sometimes they're good drivers. Likely they like to think about those times to convince themselves they don't have a problem.

Hope this helps your mindset. You have the closure. She's not any happier. Do what you need to do heal. Next time, watch your blind spots a little closer. Once you've been dinged like this, you'll never forget.

Hang in there.

Rev

[Rex31807]

Well said Rev. We cant dwell on what they may or may not feel because in the end it doesnt matter. I dont think they study how we feel at all.  Its a sad cycle and you have to.separate yojrself from them. Worrying about how they feel is a form of codependency at this point.

[Laylabelle1]

Exactly Rev!
Its that beautiful/awful love bombing which secures the hook of addiction and puts us in a false sense of a perfect magical place. Once we stand back and actually look,(for me it was the patterns too), it really does become clear that its just a recycle flipping from one to another.
I had PTSD from my relationship and just like Red, I clung and clung to those high moments wondering how someone could just vanish when he 'loved me so much'
Red,
You may not realise it now but all those bad parts, the being bedridden, the obsessing over how she is, they have been instilled into you through a toxic dangerous liaison. Every day that you get through it is a day closer to getting yourself back.
If you can stay blocked please try to keep it up.
I let mine back in thinking I could handle it. The patterns were exactly the same, the silent parts were longer.
Take a day at a time you will get there.,

[redhaired1818]

Thank you guys so much for responding. Some really good advice here so once again thanks a ton! Rev, that is exactly what made me feel better. Research about the disorder combined with the fact that now I could see that recurring pattern in her relationships atleast. She didn't have any close friends and most people tried to distance themselves. It's a shame how she uses pity to lure in her victims instead of changing her behaviour to finally have a healthy relationship. Reading all the charming stories doesn't make me wanna go back to say the least. I am still studying so there's so many beautiful healthy girls out there who would be more compatible. Now I think about it, she completely forgot about her ex when she was with me just a couple months out of a LTR. It was a huge red flag but I thought she genuinely liked me (yeah, I was stupid ).

The only thing that really messed up mind was just 24 hours before she exploded we were talking about a perfect future together  . It just messed up mind for the next few months. Also, she never looked back. Once she blocked me she decided she wanted nothing to do with me (a mutual friend told me). But the biggest mistake I made was assuming she would act like "us" and not let emotions take over. She was hypersensitive and I didn't know about BPD so I just thought she was maybe just slightly immature but that would change but looking back, I did ignore so many red flags.

[Cromwell]

Red-haired sorry im on my phone can't type as well.

The social media is where like a dating profile or a job application is a platform to cultivate and present the persona or I Image. We all might do this.

My exs page is more locked up than when i was with her. It shows a snapshot or snippet and leaves the viewer to figure out the rest. Exactly what has happened in your situation. You wonder if she is consistently living this really good life.

Eventually the interest will wane. Don't be suckered into the one sided illusion. My experience is this is familiar to meeting her in the first place.

It's the tentacles to get suckered in its also why she didn't like to lose anyone from the 'network' it helps to making new victims by showing others as distractions {like a handbag accessory. Object with purpose but thats all they think of us}

[once removed]

ill bite.

this was one of the hardest aspects of my breakup in the early days. while i would later realize that the writing was on the wall for us for about a year, the breakup felt very sudden and out of nowhere at the time. i wasnt even 100% certain we had broken up. i had no idea what was going on with her. things ended amicably, until she kinda freaked out on me, and shortly after that, she was suddenly in a new relationship. it was a huge shock to my system.

the thing that i had a hard time comprehending is that she was always so needy and dependent on me for the three years that we were together. i couldnt understand why i was having a nervous breakdown, and she appeared to be doing fine.

i think one important thing to understand is that the person doing the breaking up has generally, to some extent, grieved the relationship, and both parties tend to be on a very different page by the time it ends.

like you, OP, the last time i saw my ex, she told me she was "falling in love with me all over again". i couldnt understand what happened to that. the thing is, when a relationship is ending, its really not that uncommon for one to have second thoughts or doubts about breaking up. with bpd, you just tend to get wilder swings back and forth.

and the other, in a similar vein, is that you just cant really know what another person is going through. a couple of months out, i discovered that my ex had been getting into the email that was attached to my facebook, reading all of the messages sent to me, every night, all that time. i never expected that.

i cant tell you whether your ex is doing better or how her life is going. i think for most people, we are all a work in progress, trying to do a little better each time. people with bpd are no exception. i peek at my exes social media sometimes, and she is doing pretty well. while im sure she still struggles in interpersonal relationships, and emotionally, she has her dream job, shes kept it for several years, she loves it, and im sure its very rewarding. to the extent i care, im glad for her.

i can tell you that your breakup dealt a wound that has festered; understandably so, it was a traumatic breakup. the more that you detach from that wound, the less your recovery will feel tied to her success or failure.

I thought she genuinely liked me (yeah, I was stupid

what makes you think she didnt?

[redhaired1818]

To the poster above, thank you so much. I understand that the person breaking up usually has some sort of a head start and they have obviously slowly detached. I think that's understandable but my ex cried just a day before that she never wanted to lose me and was so in love with me yada yada. Also the "I hate you, don't leave me" during the discard was absolutely mind boggling. Emotions were running high on both sides so I thought maybe we could discuss everything in the next few days and figure it out like rational human beings, obviously after the emotions have subsided and you see the full picture. She asked me not to text her for the next few weeks and I obviously didn't want that. My instincts were telling me that she was forming an emotional bond with someone else on the side because I put some heavy boundaries about how she treated me.

The reason I say that she never liked me was you don't treat the person you claim to "love" this way. I just became an emotional punching bag. Stressed at work? Her dad said something mean? Her "friend" ignoring her texts? Yeah sure take it out on me. All the negative emotions after a day's work were just offloaded on me. I tried to offer solutions because that is the kind of person I am. If I am bothered by something I don't let emotions run amok, I try to find what's the reaason behind it and solve the issue. I tried to solve her so called issues but nothing stopped her wild emotions. No amount of words, comfort or reassurance worked. After a while, I was tired because I have my own studies to deal with and had to tell her to please stop and get her emotions in control. That's when the heavy devaluation started and her fear of abandonment really kicked in. I had to listen to her problems for hours and just that. She was never interested in my life. She was interested in my career and studies but I have huge plans for my future and I am working towards those plans. I also got the feeling that she kind of didn't want me to get too involved with money and a high end job because she thought I would leave her after I finish my degree. After the discard, she made me out to be some kind of a crazy, obsessive, abusive, stalker psycho. No responsibility for her actions or emotions and I am responsible for everything wrong in her life. I dont think she would have treated me this way if she actually loved me.

[OutOfEgypt]

I can't help but think her life is so perfect now and I am still recovering from all the lies, manipulation, rage and blackmail.

Can a leopard change its spots?  I assure you, she isn't going to just jump and skip her way into another relationship and have the fantasy she pretends she can get.  I've been remarried for 6 years and divorced from my BPD ex for almost 9 years.  She is in the same place she was in back then... going from one dysfunctional relationship to another, always convinced the new guy is the one for her... until he isn't.  Then it's all his fault.  She was going to go back to school.  She had plans to do this and that.  None of that happened.  I paid her a sinful amount of spousal support over a number of years, and she blew every dime of it.  She's not any different, and most of her children don't even have a relationship with her.  She's lost many friends, and the ones that she's kept long-term... she's told us how stupid she thinks they are.  They are literally only around to support her ego.  Sad.

Just remember, like a vampire, she survives upon you being the failure, the rejected one while she is on to bigger and better.
 Have you researched the Karpman drama triangle?  Right now, you're in the role of the persecutor/rejected one.  Any new guy is going to be put into the role of the rescuer.  Meanwhile, she is the misunderstood victim who can't seem to find the "right guy" and is doing her best to better her life in healthy ways.  It's theater.  It's fake.  She's playing a role in a story that she needs to believe in order to protect her fragile ego.  She's hoping you continue to play your role, too, and yes, she will find men to the play the role she once had you in.  But in time, as you heal, you will leave that role behind and come to pity those men.  I do with my ex wife.  I actually think the guy she is with now is a really nice guy, and I would love to take him out for a beer and warn him, but he wouldn't get it.

As you heal (which you will), as you start to leave that role behind, she'll probably try to pull you back in, either as the persecutor again or as the rescuer.  My ex would do that.  She would call me and my wife when her latest boyfriend was being abusive -looking for me (and by proxy my new wife) to be there for her.  I knew things had changed for the good when I no longer had a desire to be in that drama.  

My advice is to continue to build your own life to where whatever role she assigns for you in her made up narrative is no longer something that concerns you.  It doesn't matter.  It's a fantasy, it's fake.  With time, counseling, and just building more relationships with others and pouring yourself into serving others, you'll gain more clarity on what the relationship was and come to your own resolution and closure about it all.  She'll try to pull you back in here and there, and you'll have to keep good boundaries in place to avoid being sucked back in.  You have a lot of grieving to do.  I kept a journal and wrote things down... how I felt, things that I remember that she did to me, etc.  It was helpful for a time to be able to really put out there what happened to me so that I could properly see it.  I took a lot of walks, I visited family.  I went on trips.  I did things so that I could experience that I am capable of standing on my own two feet and enjoying the short life I've been given.  Godspeed!

[once removed]

I think that's understandable but my ex cried just a day before that she never wanted to lose me and was so in love with me yada yada. Also the "I hate you, don't leave me" during the discard was absolutely mind boggling.

with bpd, the swings are so much wilder, and everything is more extreme. its really disorienting to be on the receiving end because the love and hate are just so extreme, and at times, like near a breakup, they can be even more so.

this is really over simplifying as well as generalizing, but its also that someone with bpd traits might feel, in two weeks, like you might after many months. that can owe to any number of coping mechanisms, compartmentalization among them.

The reason I say that she never liked me was you don't treat the person you claim to "love" this way.

i claimed to love my ex and i treated her in ways im ashamed of when i think about it.

it might be easier, rather than believing she didnt like or love you, to think of it in two ways:

1. thats her limitation. we all hurt people we love. people with bpd traits really struggle with not taking...anything that upsets them, out on those closest to them. they can be very difficult people to love. im not a morning person and i dont want to talk to you until ive had my coffee, and in a far more extreme way, people with bpd traits cope by, well, lashing out at their loved ones.

2. maybe she has/had a shallow idea of love, and, importantly, one that doesnt match yours. when i think about it, that much was true for me too. in my case, my relationship ended over 10 years ago, and it was my first real adult relationship. im a different guy today. my ideas about love, and my capacity for it, have grown and changed. i wouldnt say i didnt love her, but my love for her was, in a lot of ways, shallow, immature, naive. i think thats true for all of us, but its generally part of someone with bpds personality that they are fickle, they are dreamers that invest a great deal in fantasy, they are impulsive, and they over emote.

After a while, I was tired because I have my own studies to deal with and had to tell her to please stop and get her emotions in control. That's when the heavy devaluation started and her fear of abandonment really kicked in. I had to listen to her problems for hours and just that. She was never interested in my life.

to what extent did she devalue you vs to what extent did the relationship depreciate in value for both of you?

i imagine that helping her with her problems made you feel good, in the same way helping others here makes me feel good. but at some point, when you dont feel like youre helping, whats in it for you other than bad feelings? so on one hand, you get tired of her problems and helping, and she becomes less appreciative. something that may have in part brought you together, over time, may have driven you apart.

what do you think?

[redhaired1818]

Yes I agree, I have made mistakes during the relationships but I never raged at her. I was a bit upset when she lied about meeting up with one of her exes and told me it was just someone else. I did feel betrayed so I followed up with questions but even they she would start crying and manipulating. How could I trust someone who's lied to me about something so significant, for months. I would obviously need more information and facts on the table before I invest my time and energy. Also, after this incident it was impossible for me to trust her fully. Also, I may have said something about her "friend" she talks to like once every few months. That's not a friend honestly, atleast not in my book. She would also use emotional baiting, say something to make me jealous to get a reaction out of me so she could justify the discard. Looking back, I can't believe this was going on. Sure, a relationship takes effort and there is a strong possibility that we would make mistakes sometimes. I don't understand what prevents them from taking any sort of responsibility for their behaviours. I apologized for everything I did or said wrong even though it was mostly a reaction to something she did or said.

I didn't really mind helping her through some of the issues she was having, but I started to feel unappreciated after a while. In a way, I was just numb because I knew it would be her taking up my entire evening with stuff like "I think everyone at the job hates me *sobs*" or " Why did my client not wish me good morning? *sobs*" I did ask her to grow up and stop acting like a child (a huge mistake  ). But at some point, you have to tell yourself that this is not acceptable behaviour.

I believe even though I am hurting, this was a good learning experience. Luckily, I did not marry her or have kids with her because that brings a whole new set of troubles which I don't think I could handle. Is it okay to say I don't ever want a romantic relationship or even friendship with someone who has uBPD? It sounds selfish but why would I ever want to be in a relationship with someone who suffers a serious mental disorder with "unstable interpersonal relationships" as one of the main diagnostic criteria? I can't speak for everyone but my ex was (probably still is) highly unstable emotionally, a master manipulator and as one of our mutual friends told me, "would shed crocodile tears". During the discard, she brought up stuff from 5 months ago  like it didn't bother her the day before or a month before but suddenly now she was raging at me for something that happened 5 months before the discard  , like that's why it's so hard to understand because we're used to thinking like neurotypicals

[butterflylover33]

Hey red! I just broke up with by BPD ex, and I can tell you that even though I ended things, it hasn't made it any easier. I know that is an easy thing to say though. Honestly, it's been really tough moving on without the closure that comes with a normal break-up. I don't think its selfish to say that you do not want to be a relationship with someone who has a "pattern of unstable relationships." Sometimes, it helps me to cope with the pain by looking at the other forums and seeing what a longer-term relationship with someone like this can look like- it is definitely a very difficult thing.

[Cromwell]

Is it okay to say I don't ever want a romantic relationship or even friendship with someone who has uBPD? It sounds selfish but why would I ever want to be in a relationship with someone who suffers a serious mental disorder with "unstable interpersonal relationships" as one of the main diagnostic criteria?

Some folk have less choice, it is family members or married, kids involved so forth.

If none of this applies, thank yourself as very fortunate that you can walk off and close the door on them.

Also if this is first sort of experience into BPD, I know there is some "stings" to recover from and you will, but its very encouraging to see that in the midst of it you already learning what you know is not for you and not to go down that similar road again.

To answer the question, I think anyone should forgive themselves for not knowing any better. but in my situation now to go and date someone with BPD would be an act of idiocy.

[redhaired1818]

Thank you to the posters above. It was truly scary to read some of the horror stories when you are tied like marriage or have kids with them. The suffering it would bring would be unimaginable. As for my ex, I think the damage done between us is not repairable anymore, even though it was over a misunderstanding and I highly doubt she would ever contact me again especially when she has a new Favourite Person. I was her FP once and I know how she behaved. No one else existed. I believe it's the same when she's with someone else. I don't exist. I would obviously love some kind of an acknowledgement that I did mean something but I think I understand that in the grand scheme, I am replaceable. I am also aware that it's their never-ending patterns and it's in no way a reflection on me (or everyone present in this forum for that matter). We had plans to get married in the next few years. Kind of fast since we're both in our early 20s but honestly it would have ruined my life. The only way I would ever take her back is if she visits a psychiatrist, gets a proper diagnosis, works on it with all her strength and keeps her emotions under control. But that sounds like way too much effort (not to mention time-consuming) for, lets be honest a very little payoff. Especially not for someone who admitted that they treated me like PLEASE READ. She was crying this one time and told me, " I know I treat you like PLEASE READ" but she was not capable of any kind of change. No apologies though, it was mainly her perceived fear of abandonment.

[Cromwell]

For some people, even a very little payoff can be worth it though ( intermittent reinforcement)

It sounds like you are weighing things up, evaluating. Thats a very good sign. Self-reflecting also.

Yea, it might take some time to go with her to the psychiatrist. Have you any idea realistically how long?

what would be acceptable to you, she would be better in your mid 20s, late 20s, early 30s? 

[redhaired1818]

I honestly don't think I can be a part of this cycle anymore. The few months after the discard: I cried everyday, had one meal a day, couldn't focus on my studies and had nightmares pretty much every night. I'd spent countless nights just crying and ruminating while she went to a party just the night after, denied any sort of communication while I begged for just 5 minutes of her time. This is someone who wanted to get married to me a day before.I got nothing. She blocked me everywhere and I basically just stopped existing in her world.

I think I still have bad days and some thoughts here and there (that's why I am here), but I am fairly okay. Reading on this forum helps me find some sort of an explanation and makes me feel validated that I am not alone. I still have love and compassion for my ex as a person but not for her destructive behaviours: lying, splitting etc. She could get better in her own time, although I highly doubt she would go and get a diagnosis. She even admitted that she thought there was something wrong with her but I don't think there would be any efforts on her part. I would rather just move on with my life. I have my own weaknesses, traumas, insecurities and limitations just like everyone else. Sacrificing my life for someone who sees me as an object to fill her void is not a very good idea. I'd rather just wish her well on her journey and find myself someone else who doesn't have a serious mental condition. I don't wanna date right now because I am still processing everything and it wouldn't be fair to my next partner if I still have unresolved issues. Slowly but surely, I'll reach there someday.

[Rex31807]

Just move on. Thats the only advice I can give. Every day that you spend hurting and she doesnt care is one more day she takes from you. It could be a day spent fishing, golfing, painting, building, learning who you are. You matter as well.

You matter. Your life has purpose and meaning. Find it and build it. After a few months your perspective will change. The next step is most important. Find out why you allowed it to happen to begin with. Why did you stay in it.after the red flags? For me it was religious beliefs and i felt like i was not living up to what God commanded. Dont judge me because i have deep faith.  I extend Gods grace and love to everyone and that is what kept me in it and my struggle.

Each day the sun will rise and you will heal just a bit more.

[Cromwell]

members have brought this up often in the time ive been here, it is this pain via being the one feeling being rejected, and discarded is the term used interchangeably.

I just ghosted my BPDex after 3 years together. It is the equivalent of discarding rubbish into waste bin, with the intention that it wont come back from the dumpyard. Some members on hearing this have had impression that id done "better" by being the discarder rather than the discarded.

What i say in reply, if this is a source of agony. You can become the discarder at any point you wish. The issue is more complex than having been 'discarded' in the first place (you only think you have been by them - you are wrong)

she can reach out to you at any time. It is not guaranteed (nothing in life is) but id say its highly likely. it just requires situational factors to come together.

she has not discarded you, she just does not need you and has other ones to "work".

there is not enough validation or security to have one source. when they try that, the relationship gets ruined even faster.

you still are in a trance to fix her and turn this into fairytale ending - its not over you are just the waiting-wounded.

this is an opportunity in your early 20s to make a shift from a place of temporary disempowerment to finding it and turn this situation to your long term advantage and betterment.

Dont waste your 20s on silliness like this. She will go from disaster to disaster and these "doing really well" depends on definition. It does not take any genius to do what my ex did with her parties and substance abuse.  There is difference between doing well and "feeling good" and posting it on facebook to make others envy or get that impression.

they are failed narcissists, put them on a desert island with no-one else and thats what she would become.

thats all you are missing out on and grieving over.