How do you feel about your ex-partner?

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

First off, anyone who got cheated on or abused, I completely understand if you hate your ex with the fire of a thousand suns. Those are two things that are completely unacceptable and any resentment would be more than understandable (and just).

I'm two-and-a-half months out of my relationship (no cheating AFAIK, no physical abuse, and the emotional abuse seemed to be more accidental/ignorant than intentional/malignant), and think I'm slowly reaching the point where I wouldn't take my ex back even if he came back pleading and apologising. It's almost as if all my suppressed anger and disappointment at his egomaniacal behaviour, the hurt he's caused, his countless broken promises, his lies, his lack of reciprocity etc. is slowly rising to the surface. Sometimes I look back on old text messages and think to myself, "This is atrocious, why did I put up with this at the time?"

So I'm wondering, how do you feel about your ex? Is it normal to suddenly begin to see someone in such a poor (though possibly more realistic) light? In retrospect, even our "happy" times now feel fraught with stress and anxiety, and I'm wondering whether I am pathologically splitting him, and why I can't just retain the memory of the good times as good memories.

[Sappho11]

First off, anyone who got cheated on or abused, I completely understand if you hate your ex with the fire of a thousand suns. Those are two things that are completely unacceptable and any resentment would be more than understandable (and just).

I'm two-and-a-half months out of my relationship (no cheating AFAIK, no physical abuse, and the emotional abuse seemed to be more accidental/ignorant than intentional/malignant), and think I'm slowly reaching the point where I wouldn't take my ex back even if he came back pleading and apologising. It's almost as if all my suppressed anger and disappointment at his egomaniacal behaviour, the hurt he's caused, his countless broken promises, his lies, his lack of reciprocity etc. is slowly rising to the surface. Sometimes I look back on old text messages and think to myself, "This is atrocious, why did I put up with this at the time?"

So I'm wondering, how do you feel about your ex? Is it normal to suddenly begin to see someone in such a poor (though possibly more realistic) light? In retrospect, even our "happy" times now feel fraught with stress and anxiety, and I'm wondering whether I am pathologically splitting him, and why I can't just retain the memory of the good times as good memories.

[tvda]

That's a really good question... I am slowly beginning to paint her in a new light - or better said, a new darkness.

I am evolving from seeing the final discard as a total 180 degrees switch from the ideal version of her before, to being much more critical of how she treated me beforehand as well. I put up with way too much, in hindsight. But as many of you probably know, it's a lot of small abusive moments that you let slide, but that add up in the end.

Most of all, I am left with a big feeling of "Who the hell was this person?" Looking back and integrating both sides of her, and seeing a lot of the small abuse more clearly, and all of the lies, broken promises and half-truths... I wonder if I ever really knew who I was dealing with.

I don't feel like I am splitting her. Quite the contrary. I feel like I am integrating two parts of her into one person, where before I would have the Jekyll and Hyde parts separately, and sort of ignore her hurtful side, and miss the purely good side. And now that I integrate her, and especially her actions and not her words, the total balance does not turn out positive for her.

And yeah, the love is being replaced by hate, I have to say. Strong words, and some people say you need to move from hate to indifference... I don't know if I agree with that - and there is a growing movement in therapy that says that "forgiving in order to move on" is actually quite harmful to your self.

I won't forgive her, I think. Forgiveness to me is something you need to earn, by (among other things) being accountable for what you've done, owning up to it, and being totally honest. She is doing nothing of the sort.

[BKDamon]

So I'm wondering, how do you feel about your ex? Is it normal to suddenly begin to see someone in such a poor (though possibly more realistic) light? In retrospect, even our "happy" times now feel fraught with stress and anxiety, and I'm wondering whether I am pathologically splitting him, and why I can't just retain the memory of the good times as good memories.

I completely get what you’re feeling, Sappho11. I too am seeing my ex in a completely different light, and I’m struggling to remember any really happy time with her, one that wouldn’t be tainted by some latent feeling of anxiety.

But I’m with tvda, I don’t think it is a BPD-style split. It’s here to stay, I just won’t paint her white at any point in the future (I don’t think I ever did). Now that all the lies and manipulation are gone, I can see things more clearly. PwBPDs are so good at convincing you that you are the problem, that they are victims etc., that even if you know deep down that it’s not true, there’s always some doubt. Until you’re out of their influence and you manage to get them out of your head.

And yeah, the love is being replaced by hate, I have to say. Strong words, and some people say you need to move from hate to indifference... I don't know if I agree with that - and there is a growing movement in therapy that says that "forgiving in order to move on" is actually quite harmful to your self.

I won't forgive her, I think. Forgiveness to me is something you need to earn, by (among other things) being accountable for what you've done, owning up to it, and being totally honest. She is doing nothing of the sort.

I understand that. Some things are just unforgivable. I was willing to forgive her after her first affair, but she never took the responsibility of what she did and never tried to earn back my trust. It was all about her again. She did that because she felt so sad, because I didn’t listen to her, because I was violent and so on. And even if I was even nicer and more caring with her after that, she tried to do it again. With even more lies and manipulation. How could I forgive?

But I don’t think that not forgiving means that I’ll hate her all my life or that it’ll hinder my chances of finding peace and happiness. I was really mad at her for several months, but I am now slowly becoming indifferent. Sure, I’d be sad and angry if I was to see her and the "friend" she cheated on me with together. But I am now 100% sure that I don’t want any of them back in my life.

According to my Ts and some people in this forum, I will eventually come to cherish certain moments of my life with her. I doubt it. But I do cherish the opportunity that is given to me to work on my assertiveness skills.

[Cromwell]

Why can't you just keep the good memories and split the others?

It could be because you know you are trying to deceive yourself, it can't work.

I think the only people who don't know they are splitting are allowed to do that.

Ive been feeling consistently dispassionate over past few weeks Sappho. Its taken awhile. With regards to happy times {i know you said good not happy} it's helped to find happiness in the daily life seek it and replace the dopamine memories from the past.

In short, my ex never had a monopoly on feeling good so in time the memories both positive and negative feelings they could produce just become, more irrelevant and unimportant

[Baglady]

Hi Sappho 

Officially in the "hate with the fire of a thousand suns" camp.  While I recognize that I wasn't in a good emotional place when I met him (age 21 - an absolute baby), he stole 27 years from my life, demolished my self-esteem, my simple dreams of a family, my child's right to normalcy and worst of all my trust in humanity.

Hell is too good for him...

I will never, ever forgive him and I'm at complete peace with this.

Warmly,
Baglady

[hammer]

All good replies and I am also in that camp. However, I am trying to move to indifference as all hate does, for me, is eat away at me. I am the only one suffering from that hate and anger, certainly not my ex.

She works for me and is in more contact with me than I would like. However, I will not react in any fashion toward anything she has to say. At this point, she is being super nice. She desperately wants to stay in my circle and have a friendship very much in tact. I am told she is upset and misses me terribly. However, she made decisions that came with the real possibility of losing all of me. I am honoring those decisions and have gone completely silent and only respond to very necessary work related questions and then short, polite and to the point and that is all. I allow no follow up even when she tries. Friendship is out of the question.

As for forgiveness... I have read an interesting take on that thought. Like the author, I cannot forgive in the traditional manner. That would be condoning what she did. The author of this thought says that her definition of forgiveness is to accept who the person has revealed themselves to be and accept them for who they are.

It seems like a good way to strive for indifference. I would much rather think nothing of my ex than to hold onto to anger and hate for them. In truth to do so is to keep holding on to them and the relationship. I want to be able to just let it go and relegate it to the past where it belongs. I look forward to the day when I don't feel anything for my ex, one way or the other. I will have lost nothing, but she will have. Her emotions are no longer my responsibility. She released me from that. Thank you very much.

[MeandThee29]

As for forgiveness... I have read an interesting take on that thought. Like the author, I cannot forgive in the traditional manner. That would be condoning what she did. The author of this thought says that her definition of forgiveness is to accept who the person has revealed themselves to be and accept them for who they are.

It seems like a good way to strive for indifference. I would much rather think nothing of my ex than to hold onto to anger and hate for them. In truth to do so is to keep holding on to them and the relationship. I want to be able to just let it go and relegate it to the past where it belongs. I look forward to the day when I don't feel anything for my ex, one way or the other. I will have lost nothing, but she will have. Her emotions are no longer my responsibility. She released me from that. Thank you very much.

Mine was a marriage of several decades, and indeed, I came to see him for what he was, a troubled, damaged person. He created chaos in our lives that I chose to no longer be a part of. The last years together were so difficult that one of our young adults once commented that it was hard to come up with good memories at times. Then the level of attempted manipulation and disordered behavior he displayed during the divorce shocked even the attorneys. Together they decided that I had to be a saint to have been married to him for so long. Thankfully it's over.

In my case, it's impossible to completely let go after so many years together. I am not at all in contact with him, but he remains in my thoughts and memories of course. So I accept that there were good and bad memories, but I'm a different chapter now. It had to be so.

[once removed]

she was my first real adult relationship.

it was three years, as opposed to say, my longest before that, at three months. a lot of history. a lot of firsts. even the boring, mundane stuff, like staying the night at each others place, or going to a new restaurant together, was new to me.

it was dysfunctional and unhappy, for far too much of the time. we fought a lot. we used to celebrate the amount of time wed gone without a fight. we said horrible things to each other when we did. it was a drain on us both. we loved each other. we had a hard time getting along. i cant forget that part of it. i never had the space that i felt i needed.

the good times were great. i never felt more understood or supported. all of the newness, the new experiences. she took me to vegas on her moms private plane. her mom took us, and my family, to paul mccartney. we had a healthy competition when it came to gift giving, and shes the most thoughtful gift giver i ever met, quite possibly ever will meet. shed find something you never thought of, never knew you wanted, that made you feel so gotten, so understood, so appreciated. we had a mutual friend that would attest to it. the comfort, and ability to confidently be myself, were unreal. the way id show up at her place with her so happy to see me (and me happy to see her, likewise), and the way wed kiss. theres too much that i loved about her, and loved about our relationship, to enclose in one paragraph.

we were not, ultimately, meant to be, and i suspect that deep down, part of both of us knew that for the entire time. there were a lot of things about each other that we couldnt accept, things we couldnt work out, conflict we just couldnt resolve. old conflicts one or both of us couldnt get over. the hardest lesson i might have learned is that neither of us were mature enough in love to make it work, and that maybe, it was never going to.

today, its been a very long time, over ten years. i dont think of her very often. i wish her the best, but not in a sort of conscious or active way, i just hope shes happy with whatever shes doing. its a bit like any other, long time ago, long forgotten relationship, except that it stands out as both the most significant, and also the most dysfunctional, and i still learn lessons from it to this day.

[Sappho11]

Today I spoke to my therapist about my inner conflict to reconcile the golden-hearted, tender, caring image of the man I'd fallen in love with, and the raging, controlling, unjust despot he turned out to be. That I couldn't understand how I could have been so blind.

The therapist said "You weren't blind. He was both. The caring side was real. But his darker side was also real."

I struggled to hold back tears as it reminded me how much I missed the caring side of him. And even the "darker side"... I remember looking at him and feeling love even during arguments. But this love somehow never got through to him.

I just wish I could have helped him better. I keep thinking "If only I had known then what I know now"... but from going on other members' experience, this likely is wishful thinking.

[pursuingJoy]

Such an interesting thread.

I really loved my ex-husband. He was the popular guy, the jock, the one that had all the answers and seemed like a good friend. The love was one-sided. He dated me only after the girl he really liked turned him down. I know, I know. one night, about 3 years after we got married, I asked what he loved about me and he couldn't give me an answer. He genuinely looked distressed and confused that he couldn't answer.

Sex was horrible. I hated it. He was very unstable and emotionally abusive. By the time I divorced him I was terrified of him. Once I stood up to him and his big balloon self deflated, I felt empathy - I could tell he really felt small, and that's where all the bluster was coming from. 

I'm parenting 3 kids with him and he hasn't changed. I have to see him and talk to him. Now I feel...distaste? Like a yuck feeling. I'm sad that he's the father I chose for my kids. I was in a meeting with him yesterday making school arrangements for one of our kids who was just diagnosed with auditory processing disorder. The way he rambled and schmoozed and the teacher ate it up...ewwwwww.

[MeandThee29]

Today I spoke to my therapist about my inner conflict to reconcile the golden-hearted, tender, caring image of the man I'd fallen in love with, and the raging, controlling, unjust despot he turned out to be. That I couldn't understand how I could have been so blind.

The therapist said "You weren't blind. He was both. The caring side was real. But his darker side was also real."

I struggled to hold back tears as it reminded me how much I missed the caring side of him. And even the "darker side"... I remember looking at him and feeling love even during arguments. But this love somehow never got through to him.

I just wish I could have helped him better. I keep thinking "If only I had known then what I know now"... but from going on other members' experience, this likely is wishful thinking.

Your therapist is right. We were attracted to them because there was indeed good. Dealing with that psychologically is really, really hard. It's hard to work through the mixed messages and see that the bad behavior can't be overcome.

Mine was a long-term marriage. I didn't find out about borderline/narcissism until I was separated. Our mutual therapist told me after he announced that he wasn't coming back. I still thought somehow I could do something to save the marriage. I totally got mired in the "if only" thoughts.

Looking back, I truly don't think anything I could have done would have saved it. I did all kinds of therapy/coaching/reading/groups, etc., and he ultimately changed very little. My ex dealt with surface issues and used blame instead of dealing with his core issues. He was convinced it was all me and that if we just started over in a new area of the country, all would be well. I was convinced that was magical thinking that would quickly blow up after so many discard cycles and chronic manipulation.

He promised a quick, merciful divorce, and I knew it wouldn't be but hoped for the best. It was awful, which was my proof that the pie-in-the-sky reconciliation would have gone really bad. His attorney was beside himself as my ex treated that poor man and his staff like he treated me. His attorney was constantly calling mine with wild stories after a while, asking for advice on how to handle my ex. My ex got more and more disordered as it went on as they usually do. Thankfully it's all over now.

IMHO it's not cruel to say that he chose his path, and I chose mine. He was a destroyer. I was not. The divorce was the end of a very sad chapter but had to be.