Is this really the end? Does he mean it?

[Tan12]

Hi everyone
I really need some advice to get my head around things.

I’ve been with my boyfriend for just over 2 years and we were friends for a while before. When we got together he had come to stay with me as a friend. I was going through a family bereavement and he was spiralling and needed a place to stay. He says he felt safe with me and we connected on this very intense level that I’d not experienced before. What started as friends living together grew into attraction and it was him that initiated an intimate relationship. At the time and due to circumstances we ended up moving in together, we said as friends first and had a wobbly first month but then we made our relationship official.
My partner has been diagnosed with PTSD due to military combat and I had a hard time adjusting to his behaviour. I have some experience with PTSD due to working for a mental health charity for 10 years. However I have always suspected that there is another diagnosis relating to the severe childhood trauma he has suffered which includes losing his mother to suicide when he was 8.
He has a son who is 7 who I have always had a good relationship with.
A few months into our relationship he started abusing drugs and alcohol. Not all the time but he’d go on benders and not come home. I’d be out of my mind with worry and began to hate him drinking. He doesn’t habitually drink just when he goes on benders. Eventually I stopped drinking altogether and at the time he agreed he’d try to but he didn’t and the benders continued every few months. We have had good times and really bad times and I haven’t always reacted well, becoming angry, threatening to leave and we’ve both said some awful things to each other at times.
At Christmas things came to a head as he was spending time with a friend and had no self control around him and the benders got more regular causing him to miss work or let his son down. Each time he’d say he wouldn’t see this friend again but a few weeks later he’d start spending time with him.
We attended one counselling session together just before Christmas and it was a revelation but then he said he couldn’t afford to continue with the sessions.
When he did stop spending time with him about 6 months ago our relationship became so much stronger. He has an almost obsessive love towards his son and I feel almost jealous of this sometimes as he never seems willing to put even half of the effort into our relationship.
So we’ve been going through another up and down stage and a few months ago I said to him during a calm time that I felt he wasn’t in love with me and stayed because it was easy and Thai deserved better. I said he wasn’t a bad person if his feelings had changed. He cried and said he did love me but felt we’d lost our spark. We agreed to try and get things back on track. It was my birthday just after this and I felt he didn’t make any effort. I’m his defence he was ill with a stomach bug for that whole week but given the conversation we’d just had I expected him to make some effort afterwards.
We then started arguing often and I could tell he was heading for another bender. Every time we argued he’d end it. He said that he wanted someone who wants him and shows him affection and initiates sex but I feel like I have to pick my moments because I’ll get rejected which is pretty much what happens every time I I try.
We had started to go and do things together and then things came to a head one day. He came in from work and started ranting about quitting his job as his boss had pissed him off. I made some comment about charging more for his private work and then he said well I’m not coming to your competition. This is a fitness competition he has been training me for over the last 6 months. I lost it and said some awful things about him being manipulative and we weren’t talking  and slept in separate rooms. The next morning he came in and asked me to hug him and we both apologised. I was surprised it was resolved so easily but we just carried on as normal. Then that weekend he had his son and we spent the Friday evening together before doing our own thing over the weekend as I had an evening planned with friends and he had work and had arranged to meet a friend on the Sunday. I called him on the Sunday afternoon and suggested we meet up for some food before his son went home and he agreed so we went for dinner. He seemed a bit agitated during the meal but said he was rushing so they left and he said he’d see me later. He didn’t come home after dropping his son off and turned up later that evening saying he’d been to see his cousin and wanted to end our relationship explaining he felt we were on different paths and had nothing in common anymore.
We’ve argued about it since and he said he still loves me but isn’t in love with me because we argue so much and he feels I deserve better.
The thing is though that even though he’s found a flat to move into and told his family etc (with the exception of his son as we are going to do this together) I can’t believe him. I feel like since I’ve read more about BPD in the last couple of weeks it describes so many of his behaviours and I feel a bit like I’ve had this huge revelation in terms of how he’s feeling and how some of the situations we’ve been in could have been so different if I knew then what I know now. I want to give it another go and go back to therapy. I’m going to go anyway but I don’t know whether to bring it up or whether I’m just hurting myself or if it will push him further away and I’m so confused. Sorry for the long post but any advice/opinions?

[PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES]

PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members may appear frustrated but they are here for constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[Cat Familiar]

He’s stated that he wanted to end the relationship and he got his own place. Previously when you were together, he wasn’t willing to participate in therapy. What makes you think he’d go to counseling with you?

I think it would be a great idea for you to do individual counseling. People with BPD are often reluctant to look at their own issues and often attending counseling with them results in disappointment. That said, it can be exhausting and emotionally damaging to be in relationships with them, so learning strategies to strengthen yourself can be very helpful should the relationship continue.

[Tan12]

He did go to that session with me before and since then had talked about trying it again. The last time I didn’t bother booking it as he works most evenings and so I wasn’t sure when we’d actually get to go.

He hasn’t moved out yet. He has the keys to his new place as it’s through a friend.

It’s just confusing as he frequently changes his mind about relationships with his family members and friends. One minute they are great and the best friend ever and the next they’ve upset him and he doesn’t want to know them.

That is with the exception of his son and to a degree me as normally when we argue or he says he wants to break up he will then come in and say I don’t really understand what you’re upset about and sort things out.

That’s what is hard. This relationship has been hard work and I have suffered but understanding more about what might be going on with him and my reactions to it could have made a huge difference. I guess I just want to know if it’s too late.

I’m going to do the therapy whatever to help me establish healthy boundaries and heal but I guess I will just always wonder if we’d have stood a chance with some help and found our way back to each other

[Tan12]

I guess I want to know if it’s the BPD talking or him when he says he wants it to end

[Cat Familiar]

We sometimes say, people don’t *have* BPD; they are BPD.

It’s him, regardless of whether it’s being the calm rational side or the impulsive BPD side.

[LovelyRita50]

I have important questions for you that can reveal a lot about whether he is capable at this time of working on his issues and healing:

Did he receive any treatment for PTSD? It should be accessible to him through the VA.

Has he demonstrated any healthy coping mechanisms, such as having a healthy bedtime routine, deep breathing, meditation/mindfulness, ability to slow down and examine his feelings when angry?

If he has had any therapy for PTSD, they would teach him these skills. PTSD treatment focuses on learning to regulate one's emotional responses, then confronting traumatic triggers in a controlled, gradual way rather than avoiding them.

If he has BPD, he may not be capable of the emotional regulation required unless the BPD is also treated. As he seems to be self-medicating with drugs and alcohol, I would guess he either never learned the skills or has stopped practicing them.

Is he willing to seek individual treatment for his PTSD/BPD as well as couples' counseling with you?

You said:

"It’s just confusing as he frequently changes his mind about relationships with his family members and friends. One minute they are great and the best friend ever and the next they’ve upset him and he doesn’t want to know them."

I recognize this behavior from my ex w/BPD. It's maddening. It's called splitting people as "black" or "white." One minute, I would be the most fabulous partner ever, her soulmate and best friend, and the next I was a broken mess with severe mental-health issues who wasn't trying hard enough with her.

Ultimately, your partner's actions will tell you if he really plans to leave, or if he is simply splitting you black. In the meantime, try to focus on yourself, your own wellness, and your plans for therapy. Be honest with your therapist about your partner's behavior, and they should be able to help you with some new insights.

[Tan12]

Thank you. Yes he has had treatment for his PTSD and in a way that’s why we became friends because I worked for the place he received his residential treatment. I didn’t know him then. It was years later we met when he was an instructor at the fitness group I went to. We got chatting and he felt I had an understanding of his PTSD which is how we became friends. He has often brought up the fact that he expected me to understand him because of it and while I do have some knowledge I worked in the head office not as a therapist and to be honest when he has opened up to me about his feelings of abandonment, the fact he goes on benders because he thinks people don’t want him around, impulsive behaviour, mood swings, rages, the black and white thinking, completely different memories of conversations  etc I’ve always felt that it wasn’t always PTSD symptoms he was experiencing and my best friend used to be a psychologist and has always said she thought he was BPD.
In the early months of our relationship he returned to therapy to work on some intimacy issues after repeated self medicating. Unfortunately I think he knows the system and will only tell the therapist what he wants to deal with.
The real trauma is his childhood but as he’s a veteran with PTSD whenever he accessed help that’s all they see and that’s all he lets them see. He’s told me he’s scared to confront the trauma around his mother’s death and I think that’s part of why he wouldn’t continue with the couples therapy we went to. Before we went to the session he tried to get out of it saying it was a waste of time. When I insisted he went she was very good and I think he was scared that he couldn’t avoid it in that setting.

Another time recently he agreed to seek help but was met with barriers and gave up.

I feel like he could be splitting. He is very black and white. My view is that the spark can’t come back until we work on our relationship and that things like that can be regained but he has a difficult relationship history with them ending acrimoniously in the past.

At the moment I’m just trying to get through day by day and put my energy into healing myself.. He’s still living here so I’m trying to adopt some of the communication techniques and boundaries I’ve read about, give him space and not keep going over everything.

I just feel deep down that this isn’t what he really wants and it could be that I’m telling myself that because it’s not what I want so I think the therapy will help.

Ultimately I know from his family that he’s the best he’s ever been since being with me and in fact his son’s mum cried when he told her we had split up.

I guess I feel like there is a way forward where we could actually make it work without repeating old patterns but all I can do is work on myself and let him see that I’m here and I still love him without forcing that on him.

[Tan12]

Oh and yes he does employ healthy coping skills such as exercise, sleep, music and in the past we’ve practised yoga and meditation together but not for a long time.

[ChanelMadam]

this sonds so much like my story! we had the hots for each other for 6yrs, he was my tyre guy, the attraction was instant and lasted the whole time until i finally made a move! he always thought i was too good for him, and still does. just doesnt hear or feel my love for him. his mind wont allow it, so best he leaves, for my sake, then he splits when i agree he shld have a break from us (he moved out 6mnths ago) then the abuse starts coz he thinks i wanted a break so i could cheat. every day he asks me if ive ever cheated or do i plan to?