Hello robots. any of you in relationships with a bordelrine

>>35315180
I have Borderline and I'm married. My husband is really understanding and knows exactly how to help me when I'm having an episode. I've been on medication and going to therapy for a few years now and it's really reduced a lot of my symptoms.

Before I got help, I was extremely emotionally volatile, suicidal, self-destructive, suspicious, and sometimes even outright psychotic. It's a horrible thing to have to deal with, but it is so much easier with treatment.

I think a lot of people here are probably suffering from one mental illness or another, so I'll monitor this thread if anyone needs advice. Thanks for starting it, OP.

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>>35315180
The only thing awaiting you is heartbreak, physical assault, emotional abuse, false hope, and permanent mental damage.

There might be times when you think to yourself, "Hey! She's getting better." She very well may, for a time. Some of it might even be somewhat permanent. Then you'll hit a fucking plateau, where she never improves from. The smallest fucking thing will still set them off, and you'll be cursing your existence, simultaneously despising her and loving her, hating her guts while still being willing to do anything for her. You'll walk the line between being her caretaker and her lover, not sure the degree to which she merely is reliant on you versus how much she loves you. Your friends and family and her friends and family will have no extent the actual damage she does, maybe having an inkling that something is off, but never truly being able to consider the extent of it.

Then your relationship will end eventually, and you'll forever be a changed man, living the rest of your life in resentment of her and mourning for her having left, unable to truly ever love again the way that you loved her. Every girl you meet, you'll compare to her good points, and they'll never stack up. You'll think what could have been if only you did a few things different, or if she were born "normal." Some days, you'll only focus on the good, mourning the "best thing to ever happen to you," then other days, you'll only focus on the bad, grateful that she left.

Quit walking this path, it leads nowhere.

>>35315621
This.
Breaking up with her is probably the best you can do.

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>tfw borderline guy who managed to push the girl in pic related to the point where she wont speak to me or even read my messages

>>35315621
>The only thing awaiting you is heartbreak, physical assault, emotional abuse, false hope, and permanent mental damage.

I went through all of that already, I thought things would never improve and I experienced the worst of the worst. Break ups every day, extreme paranoa, accusations that came out of nowhere, extreme anxiety. All of it, so this isn't something new.


I know all of the other things, too.

The way I have dealt with it is being active. I said clearly: Here, here and here you were wrong. This is the proof that you were wrong. You said this and this that was wrong and you falsely accused me of that often. You are abusive.

I love you a lot, I wish to live with you, but I cannot live with an abusive person, so unless you change I am completely out of here. You get therapy, you listen to me when I feel threatened etc.

Does it work? Surprisingly yes, and the reason is that a borderline fears NOTHING more than abandonment. That is their core condition. When you threaten to leave and to break-up, no matter their pride, their narcissism and all of the other self-protection measurements she will panic and try to keep you. She will not initially feel bad for what she has done - due to her narcissism -, she will not know what she did was bad, because in her mind, it was out of self-defense against horribly intrusive thoughts. However, she needs to act, you said that you will leave if she doesn't change, so she needs to change or her greatest fear comes true

>>35315621
It's true that some symptoms will be here forever, and that sometimes I'll have breaks in my ability to cope, but Borderline is a disorder that becomes less severe as a person gets older. It also responds very well to CBT treatment and atypical anti-psychotics. I truly hope that OP's girlfriend is in recovery and I want you to know that it's not completely hopeless. Definitely leave any relationship that is abusive or that is one-sided, but it's not the only option a person dating someone with borderline has.

>>35315818
Keep up your delusions, anon. Keep convincing yourself of your (deep down disingenuous) insights, continuously telling yourself that there's a happy endgame for you. Bargaining every time something happens, excusing it, rationalizing everything.

You're constantly fighting an unwinnable war, and losing battles every single day. There's only one outcome for both parties, and that's abject misery and resentment.

Ask yourself, do you have the energy to put up with this for decades? To do your best every day, put on a fake smile, and keep reassuring her that everything is fine, putting up with her outbursts? Do you have what it takes to balance your home life with work? If she gets pregnant some day, are you willing to put up with the consequences of that? Would you want that child to be exposed to her volatility and unpredictability? Is this the life that you want to lead? Is it what's best for you, or her for that matter?

After you answer all of those after rationalizing and bargaining and making excuses, ask yourself, "Do I mean that answer?"

>>35315818
>so she needs to change or her greatest fear comes true
She also needs to realize that the things she does to "protect herself" are ironically the only things that are making those fears come true. She needs to realize that things she fears are not as bad as they seem (so what if you cheat? you weren't worth sticking around for and you weren't really ever there if you do, so it's nonsensical to worry about), and that it will be much more rewarding for her to protect YOU and establish real trust that she can depend on.
She's gotta chill out and not be afraid to take things at face value.

>>35315818
cont.

there will be relapses. In my case, there have been horrible relapses, but since about summer, she has completely stopped attacking me. During summer last year, she attacked, accused me non-stop. Called me a worthless asshole who nobody needs. All this stuff. It doesn't happen anymore. I made it clear it was abusive, I proved it to her without a doubt. I wasn't blinded by her being "okay" and hoped that "i didn't want to set her off" and stayed quiet by obviously narcissistic things. If she tried to avoid responsibility or pretend she didnt do anything, I insisted she was wrong at the risk of "angering" her. I basically stood firm.

However, I still gave her all the love I could outside of it or when she acted alright. It's tiring. You act like a parent. You scold her and you love her at other times, you have to treat her like a child. But improvements come.

In my gf's case, over time, she became more confident. She forced herself to question herself when she was abusive to not lose it and through this, indirectly, realized that she was actually loved by reminding herself that I didn't actually betray her. I worked with her through her issues, the things that most likely caused her BPD in the first place - she was abused and not believed by her parents, doctors etc and victim blamed. She felt worthless and disgusting (as many abuse victims do) for supposedly causing it, causing trouble to other people and so on. The more I worked with her through those issues, the more she improved. The first step was admitting that what happened to her was a bad thing, that it was terrible her parents didn't believe her (the first time she told me she acted like it wasn't a big deal) and so on. Once she started to know why she was feeling so terrible, what was doing it to her the less she thought it was me that caused it, the less she thought she had to take it out on me.

>>35316065
cont.

She is still BPD, she still has many symtpoms, she still has much less empathy (due to what happened to her, of course) but the improvement is truly massive.

The thing that makes me most confident is that, even with relapses, the improvements are obvious. They become less and less frequent. The outcries and paranoia becomes more quiet and less overbearing.

and it's easy, if she doesn't want to go through all that, the discipline, you telling her she is abusive, threatening break-up if she doesn't take you seriously - then just leave. It works no matter what happens.


>>35315996
>Keep up your delusions, anon. Keep convincing yourself of your (deep down disingenuous) insights, continuously telling yourself that there's a happy endgame for you. Bargaining every time something happens, excusing it, rationalizing everything.

I don't have delusions, there is no happy endgame. It just becomes liveable.

>You're constantly fighting an unwinnable war, and losing battles every single day. There's only one outcome for both parties, and that's abject misery and resentment.

I am literally fighting much less than I used to, it's clearly experienceable to both of us, why do you ignore that? You should take into account what I say. I considered all you have to say, I do know about this fucking condition perfectly. So don't tell me what I already know.

>
Ask yourself, do you have the energy to put up with this for decades? To do your best every day, put on a fake smile, and keep reassuring her that everything is fine, putting up with her outbursts?

A few months ago her outbursts were "you don#t even love me, my life is terrible and i want to kill myself, being with you was thebiggest mistake" now? "i hope i don't bore you", "i'm anxious i'm not enough for you", "i get jealous when i see X girl"

it literally gets better. it's BPD, but better BPD. And don't ignore what I say otherwise we have no conversation.

>>35316161
Keep telling yourself she's getting better, anon. How about you come back in five or ten years and talk to us again, tell us how things are going.

>>35316064
>She also needs to realize that the things she does to "protect herself" are ironically the only things that are making those fears come true.

She does and did and thus does it much less.

> She needs to realize that things she fears are not as bad as they seem (so what if you cheat? you weren't worth sticking around for and you weren't really ever there if you do, so it's nonsensical to worry about), and that it will be much more rewarding for her to protect YOU and establish real trust that she can depend on

The problem is that it's not as easy for a BPD to do that because they don't act the way they do for a reason they know. Most of them are abused, so they adopt behavior unconsciously from a young age on to deal with this behavior and it's basically a 3 year old child's fear that their mum might abandon them - they react with violence, with outbursts in order to stop that from happening.

I think there are multiple approaches that could work. First of all, conscious awareness (mindfulness) that these things are going on in her behavior and that it's nonsensical, harmful and doesn't help her (as you have said yourself); knowing where this fear and lack of empathy comes from and consciously working towards making her aware of other people's empathy for her and providing her with an environment of stability.

>>35316245
If she isn't I'm just leaving and breaking up, I'm not madly in love with her like I used to, if I feel abused I'm just leaving. It won't happen. I told her I'm not marrying her or having kids with her because of her illness and she knows and accepts it.

>>35315470
How does your boyfriend help you with it, how did the therapy help with it?

>>35316245
Plus, why are you so sure? Did you stand your ground in your relationship? did you tell her EVERY TIME she was abusive, selfish, self-centered? Did you threaten to leave if she doesn't accept your observations as true? Did you pull through even through the accusations that "it's you who's the real abusive one" etc etc ?

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>>35316433
Believe me anon, I've been exactly where you've been. I've told myself all of the same things about standing my ground and her getting better. I rationalized and read God knows how much about it from professionals and anecdotal stories from others in my position, sought out their stories, and devoted my life to getting her healthier and better. I put everything else in my life second to her. I got her into therapy and got her on various medications over time. I tried every last damn thing that you've written about, and told myself all the same things. The same conversation about not having children with her, the same things about her getting "better," the same hard conversations about her behavior and holding her accountable.

In the end, though, want to know something? It did me no good. All that it led to was her being massively depressed, constantly in her own head, hating herself for her past behavior, regardless of how many times I assured her that I didn't hold it against her. Maybe yours isn't as bad as mine was, maybe you'll have better luck, who knows?

All that I know is everything that exactly who you are, and exactly the things that you're thinking were me some time ago, before I realized. There have been many men just like you and me, men with good hearts and patience and all the love in the world, and in the end, it always ends up the same. Lots of times it will take years, perhaps decades, but in the end, it's all the same. We all tell ourselves "This time will be different! She can get better! She's improved so much! Studies show it improves with age! Medication and therapy are helping! She's my entire world, and I'm going to take care of her!" When somebody like you talks to somebody like me, you think that I'm cynical, or didn't try all of the things that you have in mind, but I promise that I did, and probably more than that.

Everything here is merely the ramblings of a doomed man who doesn't yet recognize he's doomed. I pity you.

>>35316324
>knowing where this fear and lack of empathy comes from and consciously working towards making her aware of other people's empathy for her and providing her with an environment of stability.
Spot on

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>>35317278
What failed then bro? She adopted her old before after months of getting better?


I know I am doomed. I'm still making the best of what I can. Sometimes I hope she doesn't get better so I can tell myself to leave. But I really do see improvements. I don't feel like I am in hell anymore. I sometimes feel like she is boring, too needy, that she gets sad too easily, triggered too easily. But I don't feel under stress every day or attacked every day and that makes it liveable. She makes a conscious effort to get into my interests, to listen to me, to engage with me. She isn't disinterested as she used to be. I don't shower her with affection anymore.

Did she relapse to the dark days or what happened in your case friend?

>>35317427
As I said previously, she hit a plateau. Her behavior wasn't nearly as volatile, she was more stable, her behavior was no longer as unreasonable, but there were unmistakable remnants of her past behavior present, constant reminders of some of the worst moments of my life for me, and an immense burden of guilt for her due to her behavior having caused those moments. I no longer feared being murdered in my sleep (quite nice when you haven't experienced it in a while, really), but the constant sword hanging over our heads was ever-present. Any time those little blowups happened, it brought back immense pain for her, and wore me down even more.

She, instead of having large scale blowups, became massively depressed, constantly inside her own head, becoming a ball of inner pain and indecision, constantly second-guessing herself, thinking that any mistake she made would lead to me leaving her. She no longer had any self-esteem, thinking that she was a bad person for the things she'd done, regardless of how many times I assured her it wasn't the case, it wasn't her fault, and I didn't hold it against her.

Occasionally she'd still have an issue. Nothing compared to what it was in the past, of course, but she was hardly even a person at that point. It was the most exhausting thing I've ever been through in my life, truly unable to put her mind at ease or make her happy, regardless of what I did. She got "better" in one regard, was more stable, but got much worse in other regards, becoming very depressed, and hating herself very deeply. She was beyond clearly in constant pain, and there was nothing I could do to better her situation. Even though I still did my best, it was nothing compared to the effort I was originally capable of putting up, having been worn down so much, bit by bit, over the years.

She ended up leaving me, of all things. I'd never have left her, no matter how miserable that I was, but she left me.

I dated a girl with bpd for about 8 months.

it was hard for me especially because I don't have perfect mental health either (GAD, depression). I had to basically constantly be acutely aware of her just to check up and make sure she was okay. it felt like babysitting or like looking after a poorly behaved animal.

the catch with my ex was that when we first met she managed to sell me on this idea of what she'd be like in the future when she "got better". she was always "making progress". but it was like walking on a treadmill, things never really improved, she just moved from some unhealthy coping mechanism to a different unhealthy coping mechanism that caused different problems.

I'm not going to tell anybody in this thread that they should break up with their loved one. but I think you should take a good and honest look at the relationship and decide whether you think it's worth it or not. I know it seems like it's the moral high ground to go through everything. but, in my relationship at least, in the end it just felt like hell, and I was basically killing myself and wasting so much time and effort trying to fix this girl who was unfixable.

I like to think of myself as a nice person, and I tried to be nice to her, even if it meant going through hell. but I realized I was also a person who also deserved to be treated well, and she was treating me awfully, and I was treating myself awfully by exposing myself to that. there was no way I could save her, but I could save myself.

are you happy with the way things are now? what do you think the future is going to be like? is that a realistic view of the future or is that just the optimistic view? are things as good now as you thought they were going to be in the past? what makes you think the future will be better?

>>35317776
>She ended up leaving me, of all things. I'd never have left her, no matter how miserable that I was, but she left me.

Were you relieved it happened? Why did she do it?

I know that phase you are in, it's basically my situation right now, but I actually think her confidence rose, rather than went lower. She sometimes feels guilty about what happened, but not THAT much. Maybe it helped the "hell phase" went on for only 3 months when I started waking up?

Long were you in this situation? I mean we did make progress, we went farther than other guys so maybe there is yet another way forward, like a "technique" one need to find to get to the next castle.

For example, lately, my gf is like "the horrible things, my feelings, my BPD were caused by being raped and the issues with my family, I am so angry it happened" rather than being depressed and self-hating. She still is those things, but she is LESS so than during "hell phase" (as i term it in my head). So even though the most horrible things are gone, the self-hating, "i hope i dont tick him off" neurosis shit isn't that prominent either.

> Even though I still did my best, it was nothing compared to the effort I was originally capable of putting up, having been worn down so much, bit by bit, over the years.

I know the feeling of being worn down very much friend.

>>35317952
It was by far the most confusing feeling I've ever had in my life.

I was extremely miserable, having lost somebody that I'd truly loved with all my heart, having made her the focal point of my life for so many years. Somebody who I truly thought I'd be with forever, and take care of, and who would always be with me.

At the same time, I felt an immense feeling of relief, as though I'd been released from a lifelong commitment and burden that had killed many parts of myself over the years. I put such a great level of importance on her that I lost sight of many other things in my life, and realized that I'd romanticized our relationship, and saw exactly what I wanted to see: somebody I placed all my hope on to get better, and only saw the things I wanted to see. It was only in hindsight that I could clearly see the issues present in front of me.

I thought the exact same things you wrote about in this very comment towards the end, and she truly did get better in some ways. The same realizations and epiphanies from her about her behavior due to a history of past abuse. I thought "Our situation is different!" In the end, it wasn't enough. You're quite literally on the same path I was once on.

I'm not going to presume to tell you what to do, maybe your situation really is different or her issues aren't as severe, who knows? All that I know is, the me of the past and the you of the present think and say and do the exact same things, and the person you're with sounds the exact same as the person that I was with. You're facing the exact same issues and are making the same rationalizations, and are giving yourself the exact same "hope" I sold myself. Additionally, as I pointed out earlier, you and I are far from the first to walk this identical path, either. It always eventually ends up the same.

>>35318270
Thanks for that anon. I now know that I still haven't achieved much in terms of reaching normalcy and I still cannot be sure if I will ever reach it. Everytime I want to break up I get closer to actually doing it, I think I'm going to give myself, after your post, the strength to actually do it next time I stop seeing hope or improvements.

However, the fatal flaw in your story is that in your case it got better as well. It was simply interrupted by her leaving you. So your story says too - you turned a psycho dangerous person without self-awareness into a depressive mess.

It's horribly cruel that, after all that effort and improvement, she left you leaving you with no vindication. It's like you throw the seeds for the crops you want to harvest but then someone else stole the harvest. However, I want to tell you, even if she wasn't cured and you are changed forever, you helped her and probably helped a horribly broken and destroyed person on the path to normalcy, even if it's a small step. You mattered and things got better, but as we both know, BPDs are children, 5-6 year olds emotional maturity-wise.

What I am going to learn from you: Expect the end of the relationship at any time, be ready to end it at any time and to not expect the glorious time to finally arrive. It never will and to know that nothing is achieved yet. I'm not even sure I love her that much, though we are reaching one year soon.

However, I am not lonely, I have someone to talk to, someone who cares about me and worries where I am, someone that takes time for me... so I get something out of it, it's a broken relationship, but liveable.

>>35317780
>are you happy with the way things are now?

it's not perfect but it's pretty good.

>what do you think the future is going to be like?

i expect mostly more of the same, with hopes that i can train her to become more independent.

>is that a realistic view of the future or is that just the optimistic view?

>are things as good now as you thought they were going to be in the past? what makes you think the future will be better?

certainly not as good as i thought they would be in the beginning but for a long time i thought i was in the worst relationship ever and wanted her to seriously just die, but idk i realized that things weren't as bad as i thought

>>35318489
>It was simply interrupted by her leaving you.
From my standpoint, that is an extremely optimistic interpretation of my story, anon. She wasn't getting any better beyond that point, she plateaued. There's a massive difference. She merely shifted her issues to other areas, internalizing and coping unhealthily. She was like that for years, and didn't "improve" beyond that point. No therapy or medication or adjusting my approach did any good beyond that point. I exaggerated her progress, and downplayed her still-present issues.

I know the desire to have somebody and not be lonely, all else be damned, but if I'm being entirely honest, I wish that I would have ended the fucking thing much sooner, or at least that she would have done me the courtesy of doing so herself. I never would have thought that at the time, but after it all happened, I wish I had that time and emotional capital back.

Deep down, that was always my biggest desire, to be free of her, but I always felt so responsible for her that I'd have never done so, though her issues weren't my fault. She was as much my patient as she was my lover, and I made her my entire world. If I could go back in time, I'd tell myself to never date her. If I couldn't go back far enough, I'd tell myself to break up with her then.

It's better to be alone than in a broken relationship, and that goes for both parties.

as a male with bpd this thread is describing me perfectly and it's killing me. i've wrecked so many relationships with people who genuinely cared about me, i've made people miserable. is it my fate to never love but to instead share my misery with the world?

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>>35318813
>If I could go back in time, I'd tell myself to never date her.

I would do that even now. I think that it'd be better I never had gotten with her but after I got with her but breaking up would break her and make me feel sad so yeah.

>If I couldn't go back far enough, I'd tell myself to break up with her then.

Are you basically me from the future then?

>She was like that for years, and didn't "improve" beyond that point.

Oh I didn't know that, i tried to cheer you up.

>I never would have thought that at the time

I do think of it all the time though, at least... I blocked her once already and ignored her completely, telling her she was too childish and that was it for real. I came back though... it was in a phase where she was worried about never being able to get better, which made her feel depressive in the first place. Of course I am grasping at straws here, but was your gf self-aware enough to a) realize her own unhealthy obsessions and b) not break down at the realization of it, but rather feel relieved to have figured it out?

I'm sorry for spamming you with text but I am simply happy to have someone to talk to. Another thing, honestly, the main reason I am so optimistic is because she is focusing her hatred and anger on what caused her BPD in the first place. I feel like she is developing a personality and sense of self finally, "They shouldn't have done this to me", "I wish I would have gotten justice"; before, she pretended everything was fine and that she didn't care and acted out her pain in other ways. Now she is focused on her real life issues that cause her pain and is motivated to get out of it, she isn't rationalizing, obsessing about crazy random things as much anymore, but about real things. This happened pretty much this month. So that's my optimism.

If, even after this, she relapses, I promise you this Anon whose posts I appreciated so much, I will end it and not have you time travelled to the past for nothing.

>>35318926
Don't have relationships until you stop having depersonalization issues, randomly fear death, abandonment or wonder if other people are laughing about you. Take therapy until those issues don't appear more than once a month. Then use the charm BPD people usually have to get a gf.

>>35319078
No worries about the walls of text, it's not as though I have much else going on in my life at this point to worry about. That's largely courtesy of her, in many ways, though ultimately the blame lays at my feet for making her the focal point of my life for so long and disregarding so many other areas.

>was your gf self-aware enough to a) realize her own unhealthy obsessions
Yes, very much so. She recognized the irrationality of it all, and fought very hard against it. I was very proud of her for that.
>and b) not break down at the realization of it, but rather feel relieved to have figured it out?
She had a sense of relief over it, yes. As I said, though, it eventually gave way to other issues, plateauing and shifting her problems around.

As far as the leaving her aspect goes, I actually did leave her at one point. It was a couple of weeks after one of her massive blowups, while I built up the courage. After I got her moved out, I missed her more than I've ever missed anything, and was sadder than I've ever been. I called her up not but an hour later and told her, and she missed me, as well. I wrote her a letter laying out my demands from her to make our relationship work and get back together, and we worked on them all over time. She did a great job on most of them, really. I was very proud of her. More than anything, I think actually leaving her showed her that I meant business through action, rather than words. Beyond that, I was too stubborn to ever leave her in our "okay, but not good" relationship that it became.

You know the rest of the story at this point and what it became, though. Best of luck to you, anon. I genuinely hope that it works out for you. Maybe some day you'll be able to help some poor guy in a relationship with a girl with a lot of issues looking for help, and have the right things to tell him, where so many of us have failed.

>>35319414
alright, thank you very much anon. You might have changed (saved?) my life by talking to me in such a detailed way. I will force myself to pull the plug remembering what you went through if this particular progress isn't maintained in order to avoid your fate. Seriously, I am very grateful.

>>35319521
On the other hand, there is this horrible feeling of failure if I break it off, I'm sure you know it too, but "if this works out, I'm a genius and a hero!" is a feeling I have. And it's something I need to get rid of

bumpity bump

this frog bumps this thread

>>35320584
Are we all frogs? Is that how it works? Or are just you a frog?

>>35321450
Not that anon but I'm a frog
A-Aren't you? I thought this was a frogforum. Isn't that why you guys post frogman all the time?