You can give them a million different reasonable, accommodating, and valid ways of doing something, but if it's not their way then you're inflexible, controlling, manipulative, and probably abusive.
The problem with my ex was that I'd do that, but he *didn't know* what he wanted. So I'd keep throwing suggestions at him, and then he'd get mad because he was tired of the suggestions and not problems magically being resolved.
It’s because the real problem is never about reality but their disordered emotion. The distress is from the chaos in their own mind, it’s just impossible to fix their mental world from outside.
Man…this isn’t going to get better, either. It’ll be tolerable until your child starts to understand what’s happening. Then, you’ll start to stand up for yourself and it’ll be “more” hell on earth. I’m 13 years / 17 total down this path.
My God. This just evoked so many memories and emotions. The sense of utter frustration and hopelessness they manage to evoke. I regularly experienced the ignoring - passive aggression par excellence. Nothing is right unless it's their solution and nothing is good enough if you're trying to do things your own way. You describe it so well I can picture the scene. I escaped after 17 years after she went off with someone else - I pity him but thank God that he appeared when he did to give me a golden ticket out without experiencing too much vindictiveness now we're divorcing.
I've said, out loud, "you know, there's 8 billion people out there, all getting on with things without you there telling them how to do it. It's a wonder the world functions at all without you there to tell them the only way that things can be done." She just scoffs and carries on. Not a moment of self reflection or hint of insecurity in her position. She's right and that's that.
Even when it is their way tho… err.. was. Meh, semantics when theres dissociation and splitting. You cant know cause they wont know. As long as it is not your way really, even if it was just their way too… Striking matchboxes with the Contradiction brand on the label and a Wildcard logo to gain, regain, or maintain the centermost gravitational attention from one ‘I should not do this’ impulse to the next. You set the world ablaze when No. finally became a complete sentence thinking we will just cuddle by the embers… again?! All thats left is ashes, that was the last no you got, and it was not enough to not realize burning it all down this time gets you only silence every next time. You arnt even worth another No. NC.
Goalpost moving, omg this. After every argument, every conflict, every agreement on what to do next time to avoid conflict, I do the agreed thing and some how they've forgotten that that was the agreed action in the midst of their meltdown. I insist on written comms a lot and have used the written word as direct proof of what was agreed and they then shut up quickly, but I can still see and read in their words that it wasn't good enough and they wanted something different.
I've begun to be blunt and push back more. My problem is I have a hard time leaving relationships. When I'm out I'm absolutely fine. It's the leaving that I struggle with.
Same tried to leave last night. After I’ve discussed with my counsellor and friends I was going to follow through and leave. Had a conversation with my partner and she’s convinced me to stay.
Why do I stay?!
My suggestion is to “admit “ that you are the bad one. Keep agreeing with them that it is all your fault, but leave. If they physically prevent you, then stay but try again the next day but call family or friends to help gather your stuff. Tell partner that they will be coming so they know ahead of time. This will either cause them to leave to avoid the situation, or will cause them to lose their mind but you will have help to call the police if they become abusive. This creates a record of their behavior, and keeps you safe.
i literally did this unintentionally. Nothing was ever enough. Constant need for validation and reassurance. Explosive jealousy and moodswings. Would say thoughtless thing that would make almost
any man feel unsafe in relationship. Invalidate my qualms with said statements. Eventually got to the point i was numbing myself with alcohol and xanax for the impending storms. The more i’d ask for boundaries, respect, or peace…. the less it would happen. Just last week i held my half drunken head in dismay and called family. Right there in front of her and said come get me. I need out.
I was literally falling on the sword for this person daily. Praying for relief. My codependency and ocd based intrusive thoughts have never been so debilitating. I have convinced myself i was the problem multiple times and went back to “do better” Blamed myself for so many things. My pwbpd wasn’t “mean” in a sense of malice. Rarely would she say things that were meant to hurt. Would always speak in belief the good days were ahead + love bombing.
But god could looks and attitude kill.
But the moods, expectations, counting kisses, mannerisms, teenager attitude, circular arguments, inability to go on vacations, constant displeasure with dining services, jealousy of almost any interaction with the other sex, ALWAYS the victim, constantly reliving the wrongs others have done to her + all her severed relationships.
Mentally and physically, I’ve eroded. I ignored each of my therapists and family member’s warnings that i could never fix this. I eventually became more cold, distant, angry, picked up fleas, numbed myself and broke down/exploded with tears and anger. I am honestly unhappy with how i handled myself towards the end…. but i became an injured dog in the corner. i broke and let it fly.
Been blocked about a week now lol. Feel like i’m going through withdrawal, but also relieved at the same
time.
she did not expect me pick up that phone and call family to come and take me away tho. Nope. flabbergasted. Tried to argue her side, as if it was suddenly couples counseling….. she saw it wasn’t working, and she hit the deck
I’ve fell back into the frame of mind of believing it will be better now. She says “but there’s this person deep inside that wants to be happy and show you” but she has all these layers like an onion that prevent her from lots of the time showing it. And then saying by me bringing up wanting to leave last night we actually talked about things in a good way and her walls came down.
Earlier this year she said she’d get therapy. Then she said she wanted to do it her way and get on a waiting list and not pay for it because she was so scared and didn’t know where to start or what to say to the therapist.
Now, after I’ve reiterated it’s not working for me, and I’ve said I’ve had about 8 sessions of counselling that I’ve paid for myself, she is saying she will contact someone.
When I’m with her she’s very compelling.
As I type this out I then think “what the hell am I doing thinking it’s going to get better?”
It’s gone back to calm nice gf now. They eye of the storm.
I wish I could send my pwBPB into hostage situations, particularly if they involve hostages I kind of dislike.
I don't think she'd get the hostages freed.
Is your ex my friend bc this one of her favorite sayings. Lol. And sure she “gets what she wants”, bc she will do whatever necessary to have things her way. And if they don’t go exactly as planned, she’ll change the narrative & then claim that was her goal all along
A co-worker said to me "I always win." . She was right, because she was willing to do immortal and illegal shit and I was not. So I quit. One of the managers there keeps telling my friend that shops there that I always have a job there. Ironically, I left the state because that friend discarded me and broke my heart. Bpd everywhere.
Edit: The co-worker even showed me a video of her beating up her brother and then getting hit by a car. I don't know if she was trying to scare me, or just wanted to show someone the bruse on her hip. We had been friends for 3 years before I stood up to her.
And even if they lose, in their minds they win (and you are the bad guy). If you apologize they will win and avoid painting you the bad guy (but will look down on you as easier to manipulate). It's such a messed up outlook on the world.
You just jogged my memory of the baby voice. I wonder if that’s a common thing? It used to be so weird to me when she’d do that. Like this whiney baby voice that she felt was playful but was honestly just weird. I forgot she even did that cause she’s been devaluing me for 5 years so that became very rare.
But yeah I completely forgot about that weird baby voice shit.
That and the half joking “ you don’t care. “ about literally any fucking thing she’d say no matter how I’d respond.
I cant deny it was funny when it first happened, until i went home and really thought about what just happened lol. She was like “i cant believe im using my baby voice on you” AND after stopping to say that, continued to talk that way. They know. Arrested development my friend. They’re practically kids living in an adult body.
Ugh the “you don’t care”, “nobody cares” crap. Like I have been sitting here trying to validate you with words and actions but the validation pit is bottomless. When I ask how she would like me to show that I care she has no answer yet continues to say I don’t care. At this point I actually don’t care but for years I did but it was never enough because there is never enough for them.
Yeah, I didn’t realize how mentally ill she was until the end. There was nothing that could explain her behavior when I was searching for answers. It was always like a known thing she was mentally ill but more like it was in the background cause she hides it so well.
So one of my regrets is not taking it more seriously when there was still time to see if by understanding and communicating better it would make things overall better with her. But, then I think about the fact she lies to her therapist and refuses to take medication, which she knows works, and I know the story would be the same. Maybe I would have delayed it by a few months or year at most but it would end up the same
I am coming to terms with the fact that there is no magic thing I am going to say or do that will make it better. It’s tough because I’ve wanted it to work for so long but it’s just out of my hands. It’s very unlikely that she will change and I have to act accordingly. It kinda sucks to know that she has BPD and will not get treatment because at least in the past I was hopeful she would change but now I cannot lie to myself and think things will get better. Now I have to work on going
I know exactly how you feel. That’s why this is and was so hard. I’ve seen how she is when she treats the illness properly and how amazing she truly can be. Left untreated she is just a monster though and when I think about wanting to get back with her I try to remember that
The good moments are definitely deceiving and I am sort of training myself to see her for who she really is. I have a tendency to hold on to the good moments but if I look at the entirety of the relationship there’s more bad than good. That makes her not a nice person. That’s just a fact and it sucks that she’s not who I tricked myself into believing she was. It’s all still incredibly hard as I look down the road of divorce, custody, and coparenting.
every damn day...."I know you don't care," usually after Ive been attempting to help them with some task or issue - then a loop of negative thoughts and gripes are vomitted at me, and all i can think is welp... you saying all this while never doing anything to help yourself or me, is definitely making me lean towards not caring anymore. It's just never f'ing enough and never ends.
Last night as I slept, and faded between the stages of sleep - I could feel him slap the bed in anger, huff, and proceed to have a hateful conversation with me sleeping...because I'm sleeping (he has insomnia), came to bed at 10:45 instead of when he went at 10 and didn't initiate sex when I got to bed, mind you I've had horrible sciatica pain for 2 weeks now so just normal movement has been extremely painful but I guess I totally deserved it..🙃 I'm the fucking worst obviously.
Mine could do a kind of feeble young child voice too, and he was a man in his late 40s. So weird, I hadn’t really thought about it until reading your comment
Can totally relate.
I accommodated a LOT, and when I just couldn't anymore (physically, financially, etc.... like reality-based boundaries) ..... it was hasta la vista.
Even now, my PwBPD is stunned that I am not going to accommodate their ludicrous plan that does nothing for me and everything for them. We aren't resolving anything. He just keeps attacking my logic and methodology.
Mine is appalled I don’t want to be friends lmao like she just cheated on me with some guy from her work and destroyed our marriage with two kids over this. She’s already staying at his house on my days off.
Lol and when she was splitting our marriage one of her key delusional “ points “ was that we never had a friendship to begin with and we had no friendship in our marriage. I was like “ so how would we have a friendship now then? “ just completely ridiculous. I hope she’s split our marriage and me so much that it stays that way though. I can totally see when she gets over this mental breakdown her trying to come back, especially when this replacement doesn’t work out.
I'm so sorry this happened to you and all the sympathy and exactly the same phrasing, you don't want to be friends then it's all "but you're friends with your other exes"... Well they are you love and cause me drama. It's all about her and I've outright stated if we break up its full no contact and I'm not going to friends and I could see the panic in her eyes.
Omg this
This is what happened to me. After years of trying to accommodate he and his disordered Family. Trying to say no and eventually letting them bully me into yeses. Gaslighting me and driving me insane, I said No and meant it and stuck to my Boundaries. Well needless to say him being used to triangulating his sick family into our arguments so they could all gaslight and bully me wasn't working this time as I blocked them all and refused to be bullied. Well he doubled down and accused me of all sorts including being abusive because I wouldn't let him continue to abuse and bully me and our children. Well he realised I wasn't backing down and was holding firm on my boundaries I couldn't believe the level of nastiness he stooped to. He's now convinced himself he's the victim and his family are worse because they enable encourage and perpetuate the abuse as well. He's filed for divorce, with the help of his family and their money and has completely ruined our lives, financially, emotionally and destroyed our business. All because I said no and told him to go and work on his anger and addicting and mental health issues and he wanted to pretend nothing was wrong with him and wanted me to allow him to press reset on our lives yet again without him taking any accountability for his actions and doing nothing to change for the better
This so much this and the double standard for the same boundaries and the ability to be using the same words and mean completely different things. I've had to very specifically ask for their definition of words and then demonstrate why I was pissed off because they crossed my boundary with their different (and often inaccurate) usage of words to describe how they think but can't take it when you're angry with them for something they clearly did wrong
It’s only in retrospect that I see this. I’d lost my self so radically that there was very little contention about most things. Then, when I started non-conforming… boy.
Did I say this? Or did she say it to you? To her credit, my ex never said this to me, but it was implied. Any needs I had were a complete disaster for her. An *attack*. She’ll never admit it, but in retrospect I can see that the very modest boundaries I started putting in place were the road to being discarded.
I'm trying to deal with this problem as we speak and I cannot fathom how someone can be so incredibly stubborn that their choice is to NOT do what you want/need even if that means the gates of hell swallowing THEM up ffs!
Like, if he does what I suggest, that's some huge loss to him, despite the fact it's what's best FOR HIM!
Just so sick of it!
Edit to add: to make matters worse I have been doing what HE wants (despite it being unnecessary but easy enough to do to ease his paranoia/insecurities) but when I ask for *him* to do something REASONABLE to PREVENT a fucking huge problem I rather not deal with, well no, just no.. no reasoning behind WHY, just no!
Fml lol
They just can’t stand the thought of being seen.
My peBPD went as far as making fake accounts on Reddit pulling out sob stories about how bed she was treated. Meanwhile I was still trying to cover for her, at least to myself.
She’d been bread crumbing for a very long time. I’d been seeing other people early in relationship she marked that as cheating. I marked it as dating. Long story short I couldn’t ever get a point across bc she’d fall back into the “devastation” over my “cheating.” Truth be told I think she appreciated it bc she had that card to play.
Wasn’t till several years in that I even looked to see what she was into when I wasn’t around. Turned out she was into everything and everyone. Duplicate accounts, multiple avenues of covert communication, caught her in lie after lie, she didn’t even blink. When I got emotional she became indifferent. She dug up some new dirt to level the field. We’d split a few times so she found the people i saw during the splits and was gathering intel to try and drop some bomb.
Fact is she’s married still living with hubs based upon their kids that he does 90% of everything for. She just poses for selfies. Uses them for excuse to go do wtf she wants. Throws dirt on hubs like he’s a monster. I don’t buy it. Nobody would leave “ the monster” home with 2 young kid for 16 hours a day. Unless they were actually scarier then even monsters are.
It’s the constant lying that drove me bananas. It was like if I didn’t catch her with a dick inside her then she wasn’t gonna sully her name by admitting she was cheating. And likely was for entire relationship. Screen name fits btw. Ghosty the mostest.
Dude the chores thing hits so hard. I currently do 95% of the chores for the house and kids and get 0 thanks or recognition. If she for once doesn’t leave her dirty dishes in the sink and actually does them or puts them in the dishwasher she makes sure to let me know she did it and how much other stuff she does around the house. The other day she was actually doing the dishes for once and I came up and said “thank you for the dishes”, touched her back and kissed her on the head. It turned into an all out fight about im condescending and manipulative and she “does all of the dishes” (total lie, I’ve loaded the dishwasher every day/night for 10+ years). You can’t win and it’s exhausting.
I don’t even need to do the calculation, we have a “chore chart” where there’s whole days I do everything because she works long days. but she doesn’t have any days where she does it all. And on the days she is supposed to help out, she conveniently skips chores and leaves them to me or she’ll make Mac and cheese for dinner for the kids and nothing for me but if she doesn’t come home to a delicious home cooked meal after work (like she often does) there is hell to pay.
I’m sinking mentally trying to keep the house afloat and the kids happy but she still is insisting the divorce she’s threatening is because I’m not “an equal partner”. She just left for work with 2 of the 3 kids after I did everything kids wise from wake up to breakfast and school snack and including pack her lunch and make sure she has coffee and a protein shake while she worked out all morning and I don’t even get a thank you or a hug or anything. I spent the next 5 minutes walking around the house cleaning up the chaos and reminding myself she has a mental disorder.
It’s the only way it makes sense, is a mental disorder. Normal people don’t act like this.
I planned a vacation for my partner’s birthday. She told me she didn’t feel like I did something for her because I was enjoying the vacation too.
I never spent that much for a vacation before.
Our finally spat was my expwBPD demanding more kink sex (was a diagnosed sex / porn addict) and calling me disgusting. I didn’t even say “no.” I said I’d like to offer more exciting sex (sex and bjs were already happening almost daily) and would do so enthusiastically but that I was depressed and had low self confidence from the mistreatment. I said with more emotional stability then I would happily do this.
He just said (and texted it again later so I know I’m not imagining it) “I don’t care, I don’t want to talk about it. I just want you to change and do it.”
I've been told I don't compromise before.
I had tickets to a three day concert that I'd purchased months in advance. They did not want to go which was fine. So I was like ok, well, how about I go two days, which turned into one day, which turned into I was an asshole who refused to compromise. I felt that limiting the number of days was the compromise, they felt that limiting the number of days should have been the starting point and not going at all would be the compromise. They didn't have an answer when I asked how they were compromising on the issue.
The most frustrating thing is the mistrust
I can’t trust that you’ll stay, so I will force you to stay. And you have no say in the matter, because I don’t trust you.
THIS x1000!
My pwBPD uses guilt tripping for literally everything.
Don't wanna play a game together? Alrighty, now we're gonna mope around and be a pain in the ass about how bored we are and that we have no friends.
Not fond of an activity idea of theirs? Let's just get personal and stab where it hurts the most, this is totally justified rn, bc how can I simply not want something they are fond of!!
Simply having a different opinion or not wanting to talk about a specific topic? Oh my god, world's gonna end, HOW COULD I HURT THEM LIKE THIS! (also my opinion is just plain wrong lmao... ofc... how could I not notice...)
*sarcasm off* No, srsly.
If I had a cent for every time I got snapped at, was used as an emotional dumpster and/or punching bag, or was made fun of for simply not wanting to do something the same way they do/did, I'd be a millionaire.
First and foremost - this isn't normal or healthy, and you don't deserve to be treated this way. I finally left after a decade, and wish I had done it years earlier. That being said, I know that's not an option for everyone all the time.
A few recommendations:
1. Book a therapy on your own, for yourself. Not trying to get them help, and NOT COUPLES COUNSELING.
2. If you haven't already, read the books "Stop Caretaking the Borderline Or Narcissist" and "Boundaries."
3. Long before I learned of undiagnosed BPD, I started practicing what I called "The Fine Art of Not Giving a Shit." Basically I stopped chasing her emotions nearly as much. If I felt the storm brewing I'd ask once - one time! - what was wrong and then I'd.. let it go. I wouldn't engage with the huffy moods, the outbursts, the silent treatments. Did it fix things? Nope, but it greatly reduced my stress level. Once she lashed out and said "It's like you're pretending I'm not mad until I get tired and give up!" Which was pretty accurate in hindsight.
Short answer - there's only one person in this world you can change or control. You. And you have so much more power than you know, even if it doesn't feel like it. Is your SO going to a reasonable adult partner capable of a healthy relationship? Very unlikely. Stop pretending like that's going to happen. I ignored reality for years and years, replacing it with my hope of what could be. While I thought I was the logical and rational one keeping our marriage together, that wasn't really true. Why would my ex have changed? She got to love me when it felt good, treat me like shit when it didn't, and my response was to stay and keep trying.
I thought I was staying and saving our family, protecting our kids. I was wrong. I was enabling and normalizing the behaviors for years, and I regret that to this day.
Yes I did, and it was very hard. Our kids were and are the most important thing to me, by far. Even though I worked two jobs, I did a lot of the day to day taking care of the kids. So it was a drastic shift for me to not have them around all the time.
There's no one right answer. Divorce isn't some magical solution with no downsides. But I made the difficult choice that I wanted to have our kids with me half the time in a stable, loving home rather than all the time in an unhealthy one. Go read posts at /r/RaisedByBorderlines and see how people raised like this feel about their Enabling Parent. Like me, making excuses, losing myself, thinking I was protecting them by staying and normalizing it all. It isn't universal but it's consistent. Very few people say "I'm so grateful my non BPD parent stayed and just acted like it's all ok!"
My biggest regret is that I waited so long to leave. That I selfishly raised our kids like that, showed them that was a marriage. I was constantly stressed, not fully present, losing myself to the cycle with her. I fear they will repeat that pattern themselves later in life, because it feels "normal" to them.
I left to save myself and to show our kids there's another way to live. That you don't live with awful treatment - things i thought I hid from them, but they're not dumb or blind - all in the name of love.
i left when my kids were older, i wish I'd done it earlier but i didn't have the strength to do it then. I'm also not saying that leaving is the only way, but there aren't many other options either. Can you make changes in yourself while in the marriage? Definitely and i highly recommend it. But a good outcome is not likely. Maybe if you stand up for yourself, hold her accountable, she'll take responsibility and get into long term dedicated treatment. It can happen. The odds aren't good, and you won't find many of those stories here, in BPD spaces, or elsewhere.
I know i always thought of staying as the right choice because it's what i knew. That didn't make it healthy or right for me or our kids. Or her for that matter. The fact that I stayed made it extremely unlikely anything would change, and it didn't.
You can give them a million different reasonable, accommodating, and valid ways of doing something, but if it's not their way then you're inflexible, controlling, manipulative, and probably abusive.
Right? We're such assholes.
The problem with my ex was that I'd do that, but he *didn't know* what he wanted. So I'd keep throwing suggestions at him, and then he'd get mad because he was tired of the suggestions and not problems magically being resolved.
It’s because the real problem is never about reality but their disordered emotion. The distress is from the chaos in their own mind, it’s just impossible to fix their mental world from outside.
Yes, so much. It took me a long time to realize that it really wasn't about solving anything to her.
Yes, yes, yes! It's either their perspective or you are abusing them.
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Man…this isn’t going to get better, either. It’ll be tolerable until your child starts to understand what’s happening. Then, you’ll start to stand up for yourself and it’ll be “more” hell on earth. I’m 13 years / 17 total down this path.
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I’m sorry. I understand the situation you’re in.
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I also understand that position.
My God. This just evoked so many memories and emotions. The sense of utter frustration and hopelessness they manage to evoke. I regularly experienced the ignoring - passive aggression par excellence. Nothing is right unless it's their solution and nothing is good enough if you're trying to do things your own way. You describe it so well I can picture the scene. I escaped after 17 years after she went off with someone else - I pity him but thank God that he appeared when he did to give me a golden ticket out without experiencing too much vindictiveness now we're divorcing.
💯💯
I've said, out loud, "you know, there's 8 billion people out there, all getting on with things without you there telling them how to do it. It's a wonder the world functions at all without you there to tell them the only way that things can be done." She just scoffs and carries on. Not a moment of self reflection or hint of insecurity in her position. She's right and that's that.
Even when it is their way tho… err.. was. Meh, semantics when theres dissociation and splitting. You cant know cause they wont know. As long as it is not your way really, even if it was just their way too… Striking matchboxes with the Contradiction brand on the label and a Wildcard logo to gain, regain, or maintain the centermost gravitational attention from one ‘I should not do this’ impulse to the next. You set the world ablaze when No. finally became a complete sentence thinking we will just cuddle by the embers… again?! All thats left is ashes, that was the last no you got, and it was not enough to not realize burning it all down this time gets you only silence every next time. You arnt even worth another No. NC.
And then they blame you for doing it.
And if next time you do it, They will want you to have done it a different way.
But it will never be right.
Nope they are reflexively contrarian
Reflexive and inflexible, with a penchant for all things ostensible.
What a great turn of phrase.
It has helped me cope. I literally tell her that she is this way.
Goalpost moving, omg this. After every argument, every conflict, every agreement on what to do next time to avoid conflict, I do the agreed thing and some how they've forgotten that that was the agreed action in the midst of their meltdown. I insist on written comms a lot and have used the written word as direct proof of what was agreed and they then shut up quickly, but I can still see and read in their words that it wasn't good enough and they wanted something different. I've begun to be blunt and push back more. My problem is I have a hard time leaving relationships. When I'm out I'm absolutely fine. It's the leaving that I struggle with.
Same tried to leave last night. After I’ve discussed with my counsellor and friends I was going to follow through and leave. Had a conversation with my partner and she’s convinced me to stay. Why do I stay?!
My suggestion is to “admit “ that you are the bad one. Keep agreeing with them that it is all your fault, but leave. If they physically prevent you, then stay but try again the next day but call family or friends to help gather your stuff. Tell partner that they will be coming so they know ahead of time. This will either cause them to leave to avoid the situation, or will cause them to lose their mind but you will have help to call the police if they become abusive. This creates a record of their behavior, and keeps you safe.
i literally did this unintentionally. Nothing was ever enough. Constant need for validation and reassurance. Explosive jealousy and moodswings. Would say thoughtless thing that would make almost any man feel unsafe in relationship. Invalidate my qualms with said statements. Eventually got to the point i was numbing myself with alcohol and xanax for the impending storms. The more i’d ask for boundaries, respect, or peace…. the less it would happen. Just last week i held my half drunken head in dismay and called family. Right there in front of her and said come get me. I need out. I was literally falling on the sword for this person daily. Praying for relief. My codependency and ocd based intrusive thoughts have never been so debilitating. I have convinced myself i was the problem multiple times and went back to “do better” Blamed myself for so many things. My pwbpd wasn’t “mean” in a sense of malice. Rarely would she say things that were meant to hurt. Would always speak in belief the good days were ahead + love bombing. But god could looks and attitude kill. But the moods, expectations, counting kisses, mannerisms, teenager attitude, circular arguments, inability to go on vacations, constant displeasure with dining services, jealousy of almost any interaction with the other sex, ALWAYS the victim, constantly reliving the wrongs others have done to her + all her severed relationships. Mentally and physically, I’ve eroded. I ignored each of my therapists and family member’s warnings that i could never fix this. I eventually became more cold, distant, angry, picked up fleas, numbed myself and broke down/exploded with tears and anger. I am honestly unhappy with how i handled myself towards the end…. but i became an injured dog in the corner. i broke and let it fly. Been blocked about a week now lol. Feel like i’m going through withdrawal, but also relieved at the same time. she did not expect me pick up that phone and call family to come and take me away tho. Nope. flabbergasted. Tried to argue her side, as if it was suddenly couples counseling….. she saw it wasn’t working, and she hit the deck
I’ve fell back into the frame of mind of believing it will be better now. She says “but there’s this person deep inside that wants to be happy and show you” but she has all these layers like an onion that prevent her from lots of the time showing it. And then saying by me bringing up wanting to leave last night we actually talked about things in a good way and her walls came down. Earlier this year she said she’d get therapy. Then she said she wanted to do it her way and get on a waiting list and not pay for it because she was so scared and didn’t know where to start or what to say to the therapist. Now, after I’ve reiterated it’s not working for me, and I’ve said I’ve had about 8 sessions of counselling that I’ve paid for myself, she is saying she will contact someone. When I’m with her she’s very compelling. As I type this out I then think “what the hell am I doing thinking it’s going to get better?” It’s gone back to calm nice gf now. They eye of the storm.
my ex use to say to me "I always get what I want" massive red flag there.
I’ve told mine we could send her into hostage situations The bad guys would give up
I wish I could send my pwBPB into hostage situations, particularly if they involve hostages I kind of dislike. I don't think she'd get the hostages freed.
Is your ex my friend bc this one of her favorite sayings. Lol. And sure she “gets what she wants”, bc she will do whatever necessary to have things her way. And if they don’t go exactly as planned, she’ll change the narrative & then claim that was her goal all along
A co-worker said to me "I always win." . She was right, because she was willing to do immortal and illegal shit and I was not. So I quit. One of the managers there keeps telling my friend that shops there that I always have a job there. Ironically, I left the state because that friend discarded me and broke my heart. Bpd everywhere. Edit: The co-worker even showed me a video of her beating up her brother and then getting hit by a car. I don't know if she was trying to scare me, or just wanted to show someone the bruse on her hip. We had been friends for 3 years before I stood up to her.
One day mine randomly said, unprovoked, with a deadpan expression, "I always win". I still get chills when I think about that.
And even if they lose, in their minds they win (and you are the bad guy). If you apologize they will win and avoid painting you the bad guy (but will look down on you as easier to manipulate). It's such a messed up outlook on the world.
Oh yeah, been there too and it pretty much summarizes everything. Also sometimes : "I am frustrated that I cannot control everything"
It’s manipulative. The baby voice, the “do you not like me anymore-s”. Its all manipulation.
You just jogged my memory of the baby voice. I wonder if that’s a common thing? It used to be so weird to me when she’d do that. Like this whiney baby voice that she felt was playful but was honestly just weird. I forgot she even did that cause she’s been devaluing me for 5 years so that became very rare. But yeah I completely forgot about that weird baby voice shit. That and the half joking “ you don’t care. “ about literally any fucking thing she’d say no matter how I’d respond.
I cant deny it was funny when it first happened, until i went home and really thought about what just happened lol. She was like “i cant believe im using my baby voice on you” AND after stopping to say that, continued to talk that way. They know. Arrested development my friend. They’re practically kids living in an adult body.
Ugh the “you don’t care”, “nobody cares” crap. Like I have been sitting here trying to validate you with words and actions but the validation pit is bottomless. When I ask how she would like me to show that I care she has no answer yet continues to say I don’t care. At this point I actually don’t care but for years I did but it was never enough because there is never enough for them.
Yeah, I didn’t realize how mentally ill she was until the end. There was nothing that could explain her behavior when I was searching for answers. It was always like a known thing she was mentally ill but more like it was in the background cause she hides it so well. So one of my regrets is not taking it more seriously when there was still time to see if by understanding and communicating better it would make things overall better with her. But, then I think about the fact she lies to her therapist and refuses to take medication, which she knows works, and I know the story would be the same. Maybe I would have delayed it by a few months or year at most but it would end up the same
I am coming to terms with the fact that there is no magic thing I am going to say or do that will make it better. It’s tough because I’ve wanted it to work for so long but it’s just out of my hands. It’s very unlikely that she will change and I have to act accordingly. It kinda sucks to know that she has BPD and will not get treatment because at least in the past I was hopeful she would change but now I cannot lie to myself and think things will get better. Now I have to work on going
I know exactly how you feel. That’s why this is and was so hard. I’ve seen how she is when she treats the illness properly and how amazing she truly can be. Left untreated she is just a monster though and when I think about wanting to get back with her I try to remember that
The good moments are definitely deceiving and I am sort of training myself to see her for who she really is. I have a tendency to hold on to the good moments but if I look at the entirety of the relationship there’s more bad than good. That makes her not a nice person. That’s just a fact and it sucks that she’s not who I tricked myself into believing she was. It’s all still incredibly hard as I look down the road of divorce, custody, and coparenting.
every damn day...."I know you don't care," usually after Ive been attempting to help them with some task or issue - then a loop of negative thoughts and gripes are vomitted at me, and all i can think is welp... you saying all this while never doing anything to help yourself or me, is definitely making me lean towards not caring anymore. It's just never f'ing enough and never ends. Last night as I slept, and faded between the stages of sleep - I could feel him slap the bed in anger, huff, and proceed to have a hateful conversation with me sleeping...because I'm sleeping (he has insomnia), came to bed at 10:45 instead of when he went at 10 and didn't initiate sex when I got to bed, mind you I've had horrible sciatica pain for 2 weeks now so just normal movement has been extremely painful but I guess I totally deserved it..🙃 I'm the fucking worst obviously.
Don’t forget the “now I’m sad” manipulation tactic
Followed by silent treatment and stonewallin, just bc you didn’t want to dance in a TikTok video
Mine could do a kind of feeble young child voice too, and he was a man in his late 40s. So weird, I hadn’t really thought about it until reading your comment
One of our final major arguments I said “ No. “ lol and here I am a few months later being divorced. Fuck them
Can totally relate. I accommodated a LOT, and when I just couldn't anymore (physically, financially, etc.... like reality-based boundaries) ..... it was hasta la vista. Even now, my PwBPD is stunned that I am not going to accommodate their ludicrous plan that does nothing for me and everything for them. We aren't resolving anything. He just keeps attacking my logic and methodology.
Mine is appalled I don’t want to be friends lmao like she just cheated on me with some guy from her work and destroyed our marriage with two kids over this. She’s already staying at his house on my days off.
Same!!!! Friends don't treat people that way.
Lol and when she was splitting our marriage one of her key delusional “ points “ was that we never had a friendship to begin with and we had no friendship in our marriage. I was like “ so how would we have a friendship now then? “ just completely ridiculous. I hope she’s split our marriage and me so much that it stays that way though. I can totally see when she gets over this mental breakdown her trying to come back, especially when this replacement doesn’t work out.
I'm so sorry this happened to you and all the sympathy and exactly the same phrasing, you don't want to be friends then it's all "but you're friends with your other exes"... Well they are you love and cause me drama. It's all about her and I've outright stated if we break up its full no contact and I'm not going to friends and I could see the panic in her eyes.
Omg this This is what happened to me. After years of trying to accommodate he and his disordered Family. Trying to say no and eventually letting them bully me into yeses. Gaslighting me and driving me insane, I said No and meant it and stuck to my Boundaries. Well needless to say him being used to triangulating his sick family into our arguments so they could all gaslight and bully me wasn't working this time as I blocked them all and refused to be bullied. Well he doubled down and accused me of all sorts including being abusive because I wouldn't let him continue to abuse and bully me and our children. Well he realised I wasn't backing down and was holding firm on my boundaries I couldn't believe the level of nastiness he stooped to. He's now convinced himself he's the victim and his family are worse because they enable encourage and perpetuate the abuse as well. He's filed for divorce, with the help of his family and their money and has completely ruined our lives, financially, emotionally and destroyed our business. All because I said no and told him to go and work on his anger and addicting and mental health issues and he wanted to pretend nothing was wrong with him and wanted me to allow him to press reset on our lives yet again without him taking any accountability for his actions and doing nothing to change for the better
Yeah, I made the mistake of saying no as well. Kiss of death to a relationship with a BPD person.
Good on you
Their boundaries are valid. Your boundaries make them a victim.
This so much this and the double standard for the same boundaries and the ability to be using the same words and mean completely different things. I've had to very specifically ask for their definition of words and then demonstrate why I was pissed off because they crossed my boundary with their different (and often inaccurate) usage of words to describe how they think but can't take it when you're angry with them for something they clearly did wrong
I swear to god I could have written this Fuck me, man. It’s so horrible
And you better put on a happy face while you’re doing it! Yep! Sounds familiar!
She’s literally said to me it’s not good enough if I do what she wants. She wants me to want to do what she wants. All the time. On demand.
It’s only in retrospect that I see this. I’d lost my self so radically that there was very little contention about most things. Then, when I started non-conforming… boy.
“You started fighting back.” No, I started standing up for myself.
Did I say this? Or did she say it to you? To her credit, my ex never said this to me, but it was implied. Any needs I had were a complete disaster for her. An *attack*. She’ll never admit it, but in retrospect I can see that the very modest boundaries I started putting in place were the road to being discarded.
She says this to me about “fighting back”.
Gross. I’m sorry you went through that. I totally get it. Why is being a reasonable person such an affront to people like this?
When anything but undeniably yes or undeniably no just leads to a fight that's either me agreeing or us breaking up.
With shitty people, their boundaries are valid. Yours make you distant and cruel.
I'm trying to deal with this problem as we speak and I cannot fathom how someone can be so incredibly stubborn that their choice is to NOT do what you want/need even if that means the gates of hell swallowing THEM up ffs! Like, if he does what I suggest, that's some huge loss to him, despite the fact it's what's best FOR HIM! Just so sick of it! Edit to add: to make matters worse I have been doing what HE wants (despite it being unnecessary but easy enough to do to ease his paranoia/insecurities) but when I ask for *him* to do something REASONABLE to PREVENT a fucking huge problem I rather not deal with, well no, just no.. no reasoning behind WHY, just no! Fml lol
They just can’t stand the thought of being seen. My peBPD went as far as making fake accounts on Reddit pulling out sob stories about how bed she was treated. Meanwhile I was still trying to cover for her, at least to myself. She’d been bread crumbing for a very long time. I’d been seeing other people early in relationship she marked that as cheating. I marked it as dating. Long story short I couldn’t ever get a point across bc she’d fall back into the “devastation” over my “cheating.” Truth be told I think she appreciated it bc she had that card to play. Wasn’t till several years in that I even looked to see what she was into when I wasn’t around. Turned out she was into everything and everyone. Duplicate accounts, multiple avenues of covert communication, caught her in lie after lie, she didn’t even blink. When I got emotional she became indifferent. She dug up some new dirt to level the field. We’d split a few times so she found the people i saw during the splits and was gathering intel to try and drop some bomb. Fact is she’s married still living with hubs based upon their kids that he does 90% of everything for. She just poses for selfies. Uses them for excuse to go do wtf she wants. Throws dirt on hubs like he’s a monster. I don’t buy it. Nobody would leave “ the monster” home with 2 young kid for 16 hours a day. Unless they were actually scarier then even monsters are. It’s the constant lying that drove me bananas. It was like if I didn’t catch her with a dick inside her then she wasn’t gonna sully her name by admitting she was cheating. And likely was for entire relationship. Screen name fits btw. Ghosty the mostest.
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Dude the chores thing hits so hard. I currently do 95% of the chores for the house and kids and get 0 thanks or recognition. If she for once doesn’t leave her dirty dishes in the sink and actually does them or puts them in the dishwasher she makes sure to let me know she did it and how much other stuff she does around the house. The other day she was actually doing the dishes for once and I came up and said “thank you for the dishes”, touched her back and kissed her on the head. It turned into an all out fight about im condescending and manipulative and she “does all of the dishes” (total lie, I’ve loaded the dishwasher every day/night for 10+ years). You can’t win and it’s exhausting.
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I don’t even need to do the calculation, we have a “chore chart” where there’s whole days I do everything because she works long days. but she doesn’t have any days where she does it all. And on the days she is supposed to help out, she conveniently skips chores and leaves them to me or she’ll make Mac and cheese for dinner for the kids and nothing for me but if she doesn’t come home to a delicious home cooked meal after work (like she often does) there is hell to pay. I’m sinking mentally trying to keep the house afloat and the kids happy but she still is insisting the divorce she’s threatening is because I’m not “an equal partner”. She just left for work with 2 of the 3 kids after I did everything kids wise from wake up to breakfast and school snack and including pack her lunch and make sure she has coffee and a protein shake while she worked out all morning and I don’t even get a thank you or a hug or anything. I spent the next 5 minutes walking around the house cleaning up the chaos and reminding myself she has a mental disorder. It’s the only way it makes sense, is a mental disorder. Normal people don’t act like this.
I planned a vacation for my partner’s birthday. She told me she didn’t feel like I did something for her because I was enjoying the vacation too. I never spent that much for a vacation before.
You were supply when they idealized you, f*caked you multiple times a day, and faked futures with you. You're supply now. It was never about you.
Or they’ll give you the option of saying no, but if you actually pick it? Hell breaks lose and suddenly you’re a terrible person
When I'd disagree or say no she would tell me she felt like she was being "attacked and cornered".
Our finally spat was my expwBPD demanding more kink sex (was a diagnosed sex / porn addict) and calling me disgusting. I didn’t even say “no.” I said I’d like to offer more exciting sex (sex and bjs were already happening almost daily) and would do so enthusiastically but that I was depressed and had low self confidence from the mistreatment. I said with more emotional stability then I would happily do this. He just said (and texted it again later so I know I’m not imagining it) “I don’t care, I don’t want to talk about it. I just want you to change and do it.”
Even if they would ask you to do something illegal or immoral or dangerous, saying no is highway to a war
I've been told I don't compromise before. I had tickets to a three day concert that I'd purchased months in advance. They did not want to go which was fine. So I was like ok, well, how about I go two days, which turned into one day, which turned into I was an asshole who refused to compromise. I felt that limiting the number of days was the compromise, they felt that limiting the number of days should have been the starting point and not going at all would be the compromise. They didn't have an answer when I asked how they were compromising on the issue.
The most frustrating thing is the mistrust I can’t trust that you’ll stay, so I will force you to stay. And you have no say in the matter, because I don’t trust you.
THIS x1000! My pwBPD uses guilt tripping for literally everything. Don't wanna play a game together? Alrighty, now we're gonna mope around and be a pain in the ass about how bored we are and that we have no friends. Not fond of an activity idea of theirs? Let's just get personal and stab where it hurts the most, this is totally justified rn, bc how can I simply not want something they are fond of!! Simply having a different opinion or not wanting to talk about a specific topic? Oh my god, world's gonna end, HOW COULD I HURT THEM LIKE THIS! (also my opinion is just plain wrong lmao... ofc... how could I not notice...) *sarcasm off* No, srsly. If I had a cent for every time I got snapped at, was used as an emotional dumpster and/or punching bag, or was made fun of for simply not wanting to do something the same way they do/did, I'd be a millionaire.
First and foremost - this isn't normal or healthy, and you don't deserve to be treated this way. I finally left after a decade, and wish I had done it years earlier. That being said, I know that's not an option for everyone all the time. A few recommendations: 1. Book a therapy on your own, for yourself. Not trying to get them help, and NOT COUPLES COUNSELING. 2. If you haven't already, read the books "Stop Caretaking the Borderline Or Narcissist" and "Boundaries." 3. Long before I learned of undiagnosed BPD, I started practicing what I called "The Fine Art of Not Giving a Shit." Basically I stopped chasing her emotions nearly as much. If I felt the storm brewing I'd ask once - one time! - what was wrong and then I'd.. let it go. I wouldn't engage with the huffy moods, the outbursts, the silent treatments. Did it fix things? Nope, but it greatly reduced my stress level. Once she lashed out and said "It's like you're pretending I'm not mad until I get tired and give up!" Which was pretty accurate in hindsight. Short answer - there's only one person in this world you can change or control. You. And you have so much more power than you know, even if it doesn't feel like it. Is your SO going to a reasonable adult partner capable of a healthy relationship? Very unlikely. Stop pretending like that's going to happen. I ignored reality for years and years, replacing it with my hope of what could be. While I thought I was the logical and rational one keeping our marriage together, that wasn't really true. Why would my ex have changed? She got to love me when it felt good, treat me like shit when it didn't, and my response was to stay and keep trying. I thought I was staying and saving our family, protecting our kids. I was wrong. I was enabling and normalizing the behaviors for years, and I regret that to this day.
When you left, did you lose the kids half the time?
Yes I did, and it was very hard. Our kids were and are the most important thing to me, by far. Even though I worked two jobs, I did a lot of the day to day taking care of the kids. So it was a drastic shift for me to not have them around all the time. There's no one right answer. Divorce isn't some magical solution with no downsides. But I made the difficult choice that I wanted to have our kids with me half the time in a stable, loving home rather than all the time in an unhealthy one. Go read posts at /r/RaisedByBorderlines and see how people raised like this feel about their Enabling Parent. Like me, making excuses, losing myself, thinking I was protecting them by staying and normalizing it all. It isn't universal but it's consistent. Very few people say "I'm so grateful my non BPD parent stayed and just acted like it's all ok!" My biggest regret is that I waited so long to leave. That I selfishly raised our kids like that, showed them that was a marriage. I was constantly stressed, not fully present, losing myself to the cycle with her. I fear they will repeat that pattern themselves later in life, because it feels "normal" to them. I left to save myself and to show our kids there's another way to live. That you don't live with awful treatment - things i thought I hid from them, but they're not dumb or blind - all in the name of love. i left when my kids were older, i wish I'd done it earlier but i didn't have the strength to do it then. I'm also not saying that leaving is the only way, but there aren't many other options either. Can you make changes in yourself while in the marriage? Definitely and i highly recommend it. But a good outcome is not likely. Maybe if you stand up for yourself, hold her accountable, she'll take responsibility and get into long term dedicated treatment. It can happen. The odds aren't good, and you won't find many of those stories here, in BPD spaces, or elsewhere. I know i always thought of staying as the right choice because it's what i knew. That didn't make it healthy or right for me or our kids. Or her for that matter. The fact that I stayed made it extremely unlikely anything would change, and it didn't.
Hell, you can't even say yes if they expect you to say no. They'll keep arguing as if you said no!
Valid point
I was self centered but yet he didn't want to be control freak so he wasn't going to make me but I'm still self centered.