Are you still obsessing about a crazy, abusive ex-girlfriend or ex-wife? Do you still compare the “chemistry” you had with her to every subsequent woman you’ve encountered and find them lacking? Especially women who appear to be kind, loving and stable?
Do you torture yourself with “what if'” and “if only” thinking? Do you hold on to the few good times and minimize the abusive behaviors to which you were subjected? Are you still making excuses for her? Do you still believe she is the “love of your life?” Are your friends and family tired of listening to you talk about her or him?
If so, you are stuck and you don’t need me to tell you it’s an awful place to be. You’re stuck, but odds are, you’re not stuck on her. I frequently work with men and women who are painfully stuck. They grind through the same ruminations over and over and over again and just can’t seem to let go of Crazy.
The discomfort and pain they exhibit while enumerating their obsessions, wishful thinking, longing, shock and awe is palpable. Oftentimes, men and women who have a history of being attracted to abusive partners come from families in which one or both parents were similarly abusive.
This is not always the case. Nice boys and girls from nice families are also targets for abusive, personality disordered partners. This article is primarily for men and women who were groomed during childhood to accept abuse from the people who “love” them, but can also be applied to nice girls and boys who were raised to always turn the other cheek, to always keep the peace and to only see the good in people.
If you’re stuck on an abusive ex or still in a relationship with an abusive partner, but can’t break free because you “love” her, you need to wake up. The abusive ex or partner is not some irreplaceable, special snowflake. She or he is not the end all be all — I don’t care how good the sex is or how good the sex was. She is not your soul mate. She is not the one. She is not your destiny, unless you believe that you’re fated to spend your life in misery. In reality, you’re probably not hung up on her, but on old childhood wounds and the fantasies you have built around her that have nothing to do with who she is in reality. Most likely, she represents a chance at a new outcome to an old hurt.
Crazy is probably nothing more than the embodiment of your unresolved childhood issues and your blind, childish insistence that things work out differently this time. If the descriptions of high-conflict, Borderline, Narcissistic, Histrionic and Sociopathic women on Shrink4Men resonate with you, your “love” is more than likely nothing more than an incredibly damaged, self-obsessed, emotionally stunted, psychologically immature, entitled, manipulative, selfish, empathy challenged, blame shifting, unaccountable, abusive child or teen in an adult body who is incapable of love.
You have likely constructed a fantasy around this woman or man. It is time to stop the “what if’s” and “if only’s” deconstruct the fantasy. You need to distinguish what is an act from what is fact (thank you, Mell) when it comes to your Crazy ex or partner. Ignore her or his words and emotional performances and really look at her or his behaviors. That is usually where the truth of this person lies — as opposed to their words.
But what if I just try harder to reason with her? No. Logic, facts and reason only anger a woman like this.
But what if I just try to be more patient and understanding? No. Being more patient and understanding only makes you an easier and more submissive victim.
I’m not perfect. There are things I could have done differently. No one’s perfect and becoming angry and hurt in response to being abused is a natural and healthy response. Smiling through the abuse and pretending like everything is okay is not okay. Staying, tolerating more abuse and calling it “love” is supremely unhealthy and only leads to more abuse.
I did everything she wanted. How could she just throw everything away and treat me like she did? Please reread the paragraphs above, take a breath, get off the hamster wheel and stop spinning.
In some ways, the folks who get stuck on Crazy remind me of little kids who want to make house pets out of wild and dangerous animals. But what if I’m really, really, super special sweet to Rhonda Rattlesnake and extra, extra patient and loving? Surely she’ll see what a good boy I am and love me back. If I feed her mice whole, take her out for a slither 3x a day, play with her and let her sleep in my bed, she’ll love me, too, and won’t ever sink her fangs in my jugular and pump venom into my carotid artery!
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This is not how it works. Predators prey. Emotional terrorists terrorize.
If you enforce boundaries, hold them accountable and deliver effective natural consequences for their predations, they will move on to find a new unsuspecting target to feed upon. That’s how it works, no matter how patient, loving and kind you are. It’s the law of the jungle.
Grieving Crazy or grieving your past?
If there are similarities between your abusive partner or ex and one or both of your parents, please understand that you are no more likely to get the love, acceptance and approval you desperately want from this woman or man than you were from your mom or dad. You are trying to obtain an emotionally corrective experience from someone who is no more capable of loving you than your parent(s) who did the original damage.
If you’re torturing yourself with questions like, “What if I try explaining things differently?” or “What if I try harder?” or any other “What-if’s,” please stop and ask yourself if you had similar feelings and thoughts when you were a child? Did you have your parents’ love and approval or were you consistently told “not good enough?” Did you feel you had to work hard to earn your parents’ love while they continually moved the goal post? Did your parent(s) put you in no-win situations? Did your parent(s) parentify you (i.e., make you, the child, responsible for taking care of them emotionally and/or physically?) Did your parents’ blame you for their bad and abusive behavior?
Abusive and/or personality disordered parents make their children feel responsible for their rages, cruelty, and withholding of affection and approval. Abusive, personality disordered women and men do the same thing to their partners, exes and children.
In reality, it is the parent who is damaged, but causes the child to believe he or she is flawed or bad and that if only he or she was smarter, faster, more attractive, more quiet, more responsible, more something, then mom or dad would love them and be nicer to him or her. It’s a real mindf—-.
Many of the men and women I work with have similar beliefs and feelings about their abusive partners and exes. They’ve got it backwards. Even if they intellectually understand they’ve got it backwards, the old beliefs, feelings and fears from childhood persist. They also make similar excuses for the abusive partner or ex that they did for their parents. “She had a rough childhood. She was abused. Her father was an alcoholic. She’s really emotional. It’s my fault for doing . . .”
Again, these types of abusive personalities are nothing special. They are uncannily similar right down to their speech and tone of voice. You have probably constructed a fantasy around this woman that has nothing to do with who she is in reality. The fantasy is just that — a fantasy — and it is part of what is keeping you stuck.
There are bad people in the world. Bad things can happen to good people no matter how nice they are. Smart good people understand this and distance themselves from bad people who will do bad things to them if given the opportunity.
If you had shitty parents, it was not your fault. You were not responsible for the way they treated you. They were the adults and their behavior is on them and only them. The same goes for your abusive partner or ex. The difference is that you now have agency and resources that you didn’t have as a child. You can walk. Yes, even if you share children, you can walk.
Typically, the biggest glitches seem to be fear and confusing giving up on and letting go of the abusive partner/ex with giving up on receiving the love and approval you always wanted from the abusive parent. Giving up and letting go of being able to win over your abusive parent/partner/ex then becomes confused with personal failure and blaming yourself for being “unlovable.”
REALITY CHECK: You can’t get someone to love you who is incapable of love and you can’t “fail” at something that’s impossible to “win” — like turning Rhonda/Ricky Rattlesnake into Betty/Bobby Beagle. Not going to happen no matter how wonderful you are.
You can’t love an abusive personality into treating you well because you are not the reason they abuse others and anyone else who gets close enough to them. Just like Crazy isn’t special, you’re not special either. Crazy does the same dance over and over and over again. The only thing that changes is Crazy’s target du jour. Your love is not going to “save” or “fix” Crazy. And again, is this really about “the love of your life” or not being loved the way you needed to be loved by an equally effed up parent?
Mourning and letting go of the Crazy ex will take discipline and effort. It may seem callous, but you basically need to snap out of it, redirect your thoughts when you start ruminating and reliving your relationship with Crazy, get the hell on with it and start sifting through and grieving the original damage from childhood. In many cases, I believe that those who get stuck on Crazy as an adult, are suffering the effects of reopening narcissistic injuries suffered in childhood.
In a nutshell (pun intended), Crazy rips off the old scabs and grinds salt in your wounds. In this respect, your Crazy ex or partner does serve a useful purpose. If you can connect the dots back to the original damage, stare it down, feel the feelings that arise, and release yourself from the fear of looking at and feeling these things, you (hopefully) won’t have to do this phantom dance with Crazy anymore.
First things first, the next time you catch yourself missing Crazy and wistfully ruminating, “but I love her/him,” I want you to stop, give yourself a mental shake and say, “I don’t love her. I am missing the love I never received as a child” and take it from there . . .
Counseling with Dr. Tara J. Palmatier, PsyD
Dr. Tara J. Palmatier, PsyD helps individuals work through their relationship and codependency issues via telephone or Skype. She specializes in helping men and women trying to break free of an abusive relationship, cope with the stress of an abusive relationship or heal from an abusive relationship. Coaching individuals through high-conflict divorce and custody cases is also an area of expertise. She combines practical advice, emotional support and goal-oriented outcomes. Please visit the Schedule a Session page for more information.
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Awesome article, Dr. T!
Thanks, MB!
Amen, amen, AMEN! Thank you for writing this Dr. Tara! I finally became free nearly a year ago and the yearning has been heavy lately. Must be the spring weather. Great timing for me personally and hopefully many others as well!
Sounds like it’s time for some spring cleaning of the emotional kind, NPD/BPD Free. Rip out the stink weed and make room for healthy people and pursuits.
Dr. Tara!
Wonderfully written article and impeccable timing…For I am currently getting out of a relationship with a woman who has all of these characteristics and has put me through hell and back, currently has broken up with me…
Im a 27 year old man who about a year ago got into a relationship with, in what I believe now, is a narcissist/BPD emotional vampire. All the stages of the cycle were accuratley described to the Tee. The idealization, the devalueing, and resentment. I am younger than her, and she begun to take control over every aspect of my life. At first I took it as simple input and saw her interest in my personal life, job, family, as a sign of endearment, then it became something much much worse, she began to control. It came of out nowhere follwoing suit were a number of wtf moments that would take too long to list.
Fast forward 4 months, she met my family, I met hers, we were in love and in talks of marriage, and in one snap of the finger- I’m now walking on land mines. The once happy go lucky, and oh so funny and charming man I was, became a silent, tense, and miserable person. She treated me like I was her enemy. I was confused because I was consciencly trying to be a a great man, a loving boyfriend, by being patient, supportive, giving, understading, and attractive (She came after my weight after I got busy with a new job and no longer had a 6pack!) We had it all, yet it still was never enough. There was always something wrong, always a new agenda.
She had already broken up with me a couple times, and lured me back in. I felt hearbreak, sadness, betrayal by her vicious words, and anger all within this period, and in order to not feel pain, I became disconnected emotionally, and my mind closed down to not allow any thoughts to be let out in danger of fear of attack. Afraid to be left, I became blank.
The fear started when she came after my self esteem. She claimed she needed a man, (I was 5 years younger) Yet would then exclaim how Im the greatest man in her life. She would always have a reason to compare me to her(In which I choose to not point out all of her issues) I never did. She always created problems,and would sabatoge us, yet still I would be patient, and understading, but in the end I would end up feeling used and betrayed, and it was my fault, and I still loved her.
I come from a very healthy and happy family, and amongst my friends and coworkers I’m a leader and someone people go to for advice. Yet with her I became weak, she constantly would insult me, break me down, I was always on the ropes, and after a while I started to beleive that I was indeed a loser she would try to make me feel like I was. I always chose to go the higher road, to always turn the other cheek, yet I would continously get lured back and hurt and the cycle continued until I found my first gray, that I’ve comically named after her.
This last time she broke up with me, it hurt, bad. After readin almost every article and comment on this site, I have used the knowledge to help me gain strentgh in trying to not contact her, and cut her out of my life for good. I realized my fear, not being able to have another drop dead woman love me like she used to, to be alone, and somehow its becuase I wasnt enough of a man on why she broke up with me, which I know is bull. My friends and family have been a great part in keeping me busy, and reminding me how though she was attractive, I was selling my self short with her. I believe them, and I know they are right, even times like now while Im writing this Im counting my blessings and seeing how fortunate I am to not have a child or marriage with her. Yet at times I miss who she once was, I want to call her, and tell her I love her and to come home. Why AM I SO WEAK!?
Anyway, I’ve been in no contact for about a week now, and so far its been hard, but I got to keep it going. Thank you for this website, these articles, and thank you fellow users for all the comments out there, everything has been so supportive in helping me realize how toxic this relationship was and theres nothing I did, or could do. Though at times, I ask my self, was it me? Am I just calling her this in order to protect my ego and pain? Then I come to this site and realize, that indeed, It wasnt me, it was never about me, and its just that reason why these people will never be happy.
I am a stud, I have so much to offer.I deserve love, kindness, respect and happiness. Life is too short, and I want to LIVE!
AceOne.
Hello AceOne,
I am sorry to read you were treated so cruelly by your ex. Sounds like she dismantled you, but unlike Humpty Dumpty, you can put yourself back together again. Keep maintaining No Contact. Taking a hit off the FOGger 3000 will only put you back to square one.
Thank you for your response Doctor.
I will be taking your advise and keeping of the fog, this is truly a drug.
I also decided to keep my one shining gray hair which stands center middle like a unicorn horn, to remind me of the stress she brought to my life.
On the side note, have you seen that NBC show parks and recreation?
A character named Ron Swanson has two ex wives named Tammy, they resembles my crazy ex’s personality, scary and hilarious!
Thank you again.
AceOne.
I just read this post by “Aceone”….Im a 30 year old man.
I read this post of yours and couldn’t help but COMPLETELY relate to the “relationship” I had for the last six months. I met a girl here, five years older than me as well, extremely attractive and gave me endless attention, before long we were talking / texting each other every day and started sleeping with each other as well. She completely rocked my world. But the control came in where I couldn’t do anything without her knowing about it and she utterly refused to ever call me her boyfriend – which caused plenty of arguments as she was dating other ppl. The vicious cycle of abuse of pulling and pushing continued and got more and more intense, so intense I can’t even write some of the stuff down but she did get physical at one point. I ended up changing my number, blocking FB – she still contacted me through other means – I admired her relentlessness, maybe she really did love me, we slept with eachother again then the rest of the weekend was brutal verbal abuse. I blocked these other communication channels too. Its been two weeks for me now, yes I have written messages to her and deleted them before sending, I know if I go back more of the hurt from the six months will come back and I can’t do it anymore. My friends and family cant hear my broken record and confiding stories anymore, its hurts them to hear it and the only person who can change it is ME!! I was weak before, was it the physical attraction, the loss of the relentless attention, the good times were so good so can I turn the other cheek to the bad – well in the short term yes but long term…its damaging, very damaging. I don’t know why I feel the urge to go back, but I am trying to stay strong – you should too.
Dear Dr T,
I found this article quite helpful given my situation of divorce, emotional abuse, parental alienation, gaslighting, lack of accountability, projection (I call it the mirror trick) etc.
I have read some of the comments below but they seem to be focussed on either fixing CB, analysing CB or walking away from CB. In your article you suggest the fix needs to occur internally. My father walked out when I was a few years old and mother was too busy trying to keep the home together plus used aggression rather than love in parenting so there are some issues at childhood. CB knows I crave to be a good dad but limits my contact time to a bare minimum imposing her silly terms on what I can or cant do. I’m fighting this in the courts but lets go back to the internal fix. You state the following:-
“Crazy rips off the old scabs and grinds salt in your wounds. In this respect, your Crazy ex or partner does serve a useful purpose. If you can connect the dots back to the original damage, stare it down, feel the feelings that arise, and release yourself from the fear of looking at and feeling these things, you (hopefully) won’t have to do this phantom dance with Crazy anymore.
First things first, the next time you catch yourself missing Crazy and wistfully ruminating, “but I love her/him,” I want you to stop, give yourself a mental shake and say, “I don’t love her. I am missing the love I never received as a child” and take it from there . . .”
What I am struggling with is how one actually does this and where do you go from there? How do you release yourself from the childhood trauma so that you can finally wake up and walk away from the phantom dance. Is it just a release from the fear? I dont feel fear, just sadness.
I am part there in that my intellect registers and says why would I want to take this crap from CB anymore, however I do not want to be reeled back in when CB’s nice mask goes back on nor do I want to fall into the same trap with anyone else.
Thanks,
Harald.
From the article: “This article is primarily for men and women who were groomed during childhood to accept abuse from the people who “love” them, but can also be applied to nice girls and boys who were raised to always turn the other cheek, to always keep the peace and to only see the good in people.”
And from AceOne: “I come from a very healthy and happy family,…”
And then from the article again: “First things first, the next time you catch yourself missing Crazy and wistfully ruminating, “but I love her/him,” I want you to stop, give yourself a mental shake and say, “I don’t love her. I am missing the love I never received as a child” and take it from there . . .”
Now here’s the confusing thing. I come from a relatively happy and healthy family too but have been in and find myself currently in these type of relationships. My current wife makes my previous wife seem like child’s play. How do those of us who had “normal” childhoods address the issues that are causing us to get into these relationships when we don’t know what those issues are to begin with?
Rhonda Rattlesnake. Nailed it. CB’s first name was Rhonda, and she was from the West.
I honestly had no idea, never again. Rhonda Rattlesnake has more of a ring to it than Rhiana Rattlesanake or Rosemary Rattlesnake or Rachel Rattlesnake, so I went with it 😉
Rachel would have worked, too. That was her NPD sister’s name.
While we’re at it, how about ‘Ana Anaconda’? A star is born!
😀 actually, they usually have ‘cute’ names, as shary schreiber noticed:
“It’s amazing how many female Borderlines have names like Candy, Amber, Bambi, Misty, Kristie, etc. Kinda makes ya wonder if they might have had a shot at growing up and becoming adults, if they’d been given different monikers. (Well of course not–but it’s an intriguing theory.)”
That is an interesting theory. However, my BPD X had a very traditional name.
Ana Anaconda sounds good for her reptilian charachter…but I’ve also used Ana Banana b/c she was fruity as a loop and even had hallucinations.
Anaerobic? Anarexic? Anachrist? No…OMG: Anasauras Rex
Rosemary Rattlesnake was my mother in law…
Thanks for the fresh article Dr.T! It’s been 2 years since I got away from my crazy ex but, recently I saw a picture of her on my friend’s blog and I got really shaken(my chest got tight and a great dread came over me). I do not miss her by any means but, I’m frustrated by the fear I still have towards her. What’s a good thing to do to get completely free from this?
Hi Martin,
Sounds like a trauma response. Trying doing a mental exercise in which you shrink her down to size. For example, instead of seing her as her adult self, imagine her as her true self – a bratty teenager or petulant 4-year old. Unless she has your kids, aside from spreading malicious lies about you, what power does she really have over you?
Martin – I get the same dread/tight chest feelings also when thiking of or see photos of the ex’s (plural – I’m a magnet for Borderlines/Narcissists).
I have had to figure a lot of this out by myself. This article puts the last few pieces in the puzzle. Its too bad that the damage has already been done. I hope I can do better next time !
Another good article. Deep down inside I’m finally, slowly, beginning to feel (realize) it wasn’t my fault. I surely could have done a few things better, but especially w/ the ex-wife I was a saint to that woman. Good grief. What craziness.
I think part of my problem for going to crazy women was a combination of difficult childhood, bad decisions as a teenager that caused quite a few problems for me including low self-esteem, and, the culture. Our culture is incredibly judgemental and harsh on people, especially men.
On a separate note – did anyone see online the story of pro-basketball player Steve Nash and fighting child support? He currently pays $30,000/month in child support, plus all medical, school, etc. and 90% of nanny’s salary…yet his ex-wife wants more child support b/c he makes more money than her. Sounds…crazy!
Great article Dr. T! 🙂
And great timing because I have been a little bit STUCK lately with maintaining no contact with my emotionally abusive XCB for 2 weeks. I was NC for a couple of months but she showed up on my doorstep and we had an altercation. She stepped into my house and it got physical because I told her to leave and she started grabbing some of my things she thought she was entitled to. She even ran off with my cell phone, locked herself in her car and texted my family and friends untrue problems she thinks I have (i.e. commitment issues, emotional and physical abuser, etc.) It was so embarrassing but my friends and family know me and checked up on me.
It’s amazing how she can still find avenues of getting to my head via cell phone and email. I get texts from unknown numbers that are mind altering bs. In her words/mind I wasn’t a real man, selfish, controlling, abusive. I’ve read every single article and every single comment on your site. Amazing. I have been able to get 99% out of the FOG by reading, reading, reading. And adjusting my boundaries, realizing she is not the end all be all and I am a good, loving, caring person after all of the emotional blackmail I got from her. She didn’t have the right to use fear of breaking up with me every week, obligation to get married for her agenda, and guilt constantly to make me feel bad about myself and lowering my self esteem. The people I have talked to about this, a couple of them have told me they are shocked I stuck around. It’s hard to explain because I thought it was about love. I think it was more about her getting control of what I can do for her always, giving up my friends and family, and what my bank account number is!
I also like this part of your article:
“Crazy is probably nothing more than the embodiment of your unresolved childhood issues and your blind, childish insistence that things work out differently this time. If the descriptions of high-conflict, Borderline, Narcissistic, Histrionic and Sociopathic women on Shrink4Men resonate with you, your “love” is more than likely nothing more than an incredibly damaged, self-obsessed, emotionally stunted, psychologically immature, entitled, manipulative, selfish, empathy challenged, blame shifting, unaccountable, abusive child or teen in an adult body who is incapable of love.”
This was serendipty that you posted this article. I have been reeling the last few days under a heap of confusion, false guilt, emotional manipulation, fabricated stories and bullish*t. I feel a weight lifted off my shoulders after reading this and feel a peace coming over me. I have a new found confidence that I can let the emotional connection to a very damaged person go.
I would point out that sometimes a man remains obsessed with a crazy or a crazy -ex is because he has not dealt with infatuation/rejection experiences from early dating experiences from high school or college. This is what is happening with me.
Thank you Doctor.
Mel, you hit on a great point. In a lot of our cases, I think our previous experiences with women (starting wiith our mothers) led us to believe that Crazy is how it is, and that we have to tolerate it because we cannot do any better. I grew up believing that I had to accept any woman who would have me, because I would only get one chance.
Cousin Dave – YES!
You have summed up why I got married in a single paragraph. I’m still coming to grips with how my mother treated me. My ex started better, but became worse. It’s been two years since my divorce and a dozen since my ex cut me off emotionally. I both greatly enjoy living my own life, but am also miss companionship. I’ve tentatively tried online dating and have been rejected multiple times and have found myself relieved; I’m scared shitless of getting into another bad relationship. (All amplified by the fact that all my divorced colleagues have crazy ex-wives.)
Thanks Dr. Tara
Isn’t it strange that these crazy manipulative creatures have this hold over us!! I had told a couple of female friends of some of the crap that i had tolerated and they said it was emotional abuse yet i couldn’t at the time. There were some warning signs from the start though (which i ignored) – a previous boyfriend had committed suicide after their volatile relationship ended and she started a relationship with a much younger guy (22) who was the son of her friends, she was 39 at the time. One of her daughters had left home at 17 and moved 1000km away within weeks of completing her final year of school. The other daughter had cuts all up inside her arms from self harming. She had a story for all of it!
She also had quite an arsenal of weapons … she is a psychotherapist and used a variety of tactics when i protested. Our communication wasn’t working for her and i had invalidated her. Just because i had a different opinion was all it took. She wanted me not to reply until there was a sufficient enough pause after she spoke and then i was only allowed to acknowledge what she had said but i was not allowed to protest or criticize, whilst she was hyper-critical and at the same time hyper-sensitive.
She was also a “spiritual” zealot so her tools of trade there were “what you dislike in others is only because you dislike it in you” and the coup de grass “thats only your perception and it doesn’t really exist, just in your reality!!”
She spoke to some of her work colleagues because she was the victim in an abusive relationship … because i got angry and told her to fuck off!! Pity she didn’t!! Every time we split when i got sick of her shit within a few days or weeks later she would want to get back together. Wanted us to go to couples counselling. When i told her i was seeing a psychologist myself she asked for her name then googled her and rang her!!
Self esteem, self respect and happiness within myself was what i had to loose to find how to get it back. I still have resentment and anger but i believe i have forgiven myself for my part in all this. My psychologist told me, “you seem to have good intelligence and intuition and you did correctly identify the warning signs, so the only question you have to answer is – why don’t you trust yourself?”
Thanks again Dr. Tara, you have been part of my awareness and road to recovery!
Cheers
Martin
Martin – I feel your pain. I dated a neuropsychiatrist/neurologist for a year. She knew all the little tricks of the psychology trade and played sooo many head games with me…but I actually was onto some of her games, like always trying to make me jealous, and I wouldn’t get jealous and she’d get mad. She’d also try to stamp out any opposing opinion I had, and tried to silence me with her emotional rationalizing and poo-pooing me, among other tactics. Dating a Cluster B/Narcissist with training in psychiatry/psychology is a double dose of insanity.
Doctor, is your point of view strictly behaviourist or determinist, or is there room in it for some form of free will?
Hello Rommial,
Everyone makes choices. With a few exceptions, I don’t buy into the claims of “I can’t control it” or “I can’t help it.” Sociopaths, bullies and most PDs are perfectly capable of controlling their behavior. For example, the high-functioning ones behave when in public and abuse others behind closed doors or where there are no witnesses. They can be charming and kind when it serves their agenda.
Folks who are attracted to these types also make choices and they can make new and healthier choices. If I didn’t believe that, I wouldn’t be here.
The part I’m having trouble accepting is the idea that people are necessarily attracted to this type. Especially when you bring up the concept that such people can decieve so readily. It seems to me that the choice of a mate is just as much a gamble as any other, and you can’t necessarily know with certainty what hides in their heart (or that they lack any such thing) until all the commitments are made, and it’s too late. One may genuinely have been looking for what was presented and been blindsided by what lies beneath.
Likewise, there’s the question of the dissociative mind, and the degree to which it lies to itself, and how effective this makes the deceptions they carry out with their spouses and in social life generally, and more pointedly, in court. Isn’t it possible that this act of dissociation, if elaborate enough, may engender them to the point of actually believing their own lies? Even up to the point of fabricating false memories?
And is it also possible that such a dissociative mind may actually be attempting to become that person which it compulsively presents itself to be? And that being in a relationship puts a strain on them, between the compulsion presented by their self-image and the compulsion of (maybe I’m not saying this right) their neurological imbalance?
In other words, could it be that all abuse is compulsive?
Mind you, I would not say such a thing, were it true, excuses abuse. I’m just trying to grasp the nature of the beast, if you will; to know my enemy. Perhaps the difference between an abusive and non-abusive person is the difference between compulsion and intention?
IMO – I don`t believe that people are consciously attracted to these people, I believe that their childhood plays a big role in who they choose as their partners later on in life: for example, some people, as stated in the article, may be taught to “turn the other cheek”, “always keep the peace”, and “always take the high road”, so in a healthy relationship, both partners would do this, equally, but in an abusive relationship – the abuser would use this thinking and these beliefs coming from the healthy partner, against them in order to control and abuse them.
I believe that there are warning signs coming from these people – but so far, we have not been educated enough, as a society/humanity about what is abusive behavior (especially covert abuse), and about what is – really – healthy thinking. So we may choose to ignore the warning signs, and categorize them as “honest mistakes”, because we know so well *we wouldn`t hurt another on purpose, so it is relatively difficult for us to always take into consideration “oh wait, maybe this person is trying to abuse me, let me reality check”. At least for now, that is – but I can see more and more of us getting educated about the specifics of these people, and being more conscious and deliberate about the *facts, when in a relationship.
IMO – these people see the world very differently than we do: they see everyone else as objects that are there to serve them, in any way they see fit. They do not see us as equals, but as their “slaves” if you will, slaves that should always be grateful for the opportunity to be abused by these people. I believe that even if they talk about the facts – if we pay close attention, we can see that they see everything from a completely different, abusive in nature, perspective. It`s the way they relate to the reality that is distorted in the first place, so there will always be inconsistencies between the way they see the reality – between their words, and their actions.
I am not sure if they are “wired” in a different way, but so far, from my interactions with these people I have concluded that they have no idea that there might be something wrong with their views on life and people, or their thinking, their words, their behavior – so I think until they understand the difference between how they see life and people, and what life and people really are like, they can not get better.
I am not sure about the compulsive – because compulsive means “Resulting from or relating to an irresistible urge, esp. one that is against one’s conscious wishes: “compulsive eating”. “; “(of a person) Acting as a result of such an urge. “ so if their abuse were compulsive, I guess they would not be able to control themselves as they do. Yes, they can behave in public, and abuse in private only – so I would assign this to self control, but also they are very insightful regarding which behavior (yelling, pretending to be nice, manipulating, and so on…) would get them the best results in inflicting their abuse, so again – I would assign this to self control.
I think that we should pay more attention to the things that seem off about the other person in the relationship, and then insist on talking about this with *them – if they are willing to understand, and assume responsibility for their own behavior, and if we see the signs of them being willing to get better, and doing their work, then we are clearly dealing with a healthy, normal person who simply has picked up on some “fleas” from interacting with others. However – if we are dealing with an abusive, disordered person, they will start blaming, projecting, making excuses, and for sure, never, ever, ever, ever take responsibility for their part, their own words or behavior, but instead, blame and project onto us, whatever the problem is: we experienced the reality wrong, we misunderstood, we thought the “worst”, we…, we…, we… .
Of course, even for a normal, healthy person it takes a while to correct the unhealthy “fleas”, but that`s the time for us to reality check who we are dealing with: do their words match their behavior? Are they really trying to make a change? Do they really see there is something they can benefit from, by improving themselves? In either case, it takes a while to get to know someone – so IMO, we might as well pay attention, and reality check the facts in the meantime.
However, if we are even thinking about the possibility of getting into an abusive relationship, because we are not sure which is the healthy, normal way to think, speak, behave – I believe that we should first work on ourselves (which is exactly what we are doing right now).
First – find out what are the healthy, appropriate behaviors in a relationship, and focus on that for a while, practice thinking about this information, and practice expecting it from ourselves – and from the other person. And then it will simply be easier to understand and identify what really is off and has no chance to get better, and what really is off but has the chance to improve – because then we *know, and we don`t doubt, we don`t “what if”, we don`t “if only”, we don`t “maybe if”.
I think we should first take some time to learn to respect ourselves, to learn to asses the new relationship correctly, to learn to reality check and to *not emotionally reason the facts, and, most importantly, to define what it is that we want from a new relationship. If we do this first, it will be more clear to us what we want, and easier to understand and know whether the reality of the new relationship checks out, or not.
I do agree with the difference between them and us being intention. Their intention is to use and abuse everything and everyone at all costs in order to “satisfy” their internal needs and fears, while our intention is to have a wonderful time in our relationship with the other person, and for both parties to benefit from the relationship.
Regarding your last comment about intention: I’m not so sure they intend to use and abuse so much as they create a dissociative fantasy about what a mutually beneficial relationship is, and then react abusively when they are inevitably disillusioned.
In practice, of course, the results would be the same as if they were malicious; but if that dissociation is the cause, as opposed to an intention to harm the other party, that would mean that the intention to have a mutually beneficial relationship is sincere, but that the inability to comprehend the proper actions which need to be taken to make that happen would ensure that it would not.
An analogy: when I was a child I had a TV that sometimes fritzed out. For the longest time I could smack the side of it and get it to come back into focus. Of course, in hindsight I know that what this means is that there was a short somewhere in the TV, and my smacking it caused a frayed wire to touch together. Inevitably it would slide back apart. Inevitably, of course, it disconnected completely and the TV or the wire had to be replaced; but as a child my ignorance of the inner workings of a television lead me to believe that it was the smacking of the TV that fixed it, a sort of autonomic magical thinking, and I didn’t realize I was just smacking the TV until I finally broke it for good.
That’s what it seems to me that Crazy does. Bewildered by the relationship’s continual inability to live up to their fantasy of how it should work, they smack it until it breaks completely.
Like I said, in practice it doesn’t matter. One should still avoid such people. I know all too well.
I think CBs feel much better when they abuse others but I don’t think it’s a compulsion, even though they may seem like they’re out of control. I agree with dr T, they are pefectly aware of what they’re doing and they can control themselves. When my ex bpd roommate said she can’t remember abusive rage episode she had the day earlier I told her that maybe I should call her mother so she could help her recall events (btw her mother is a narcissist and a professor of psychology and my roommate was very afraid of her). She screamed – YOU’RE NOT GONNA CALL MY MOTHER!!! – and so on… After that she calmed down and till the day I moved out she behaved normaly, like she never was borderline…
I think it probably depends on the particular individual. I’ve lived around my share, both intimately and as an observer. There is not this sharp contrast. There are degrees. I’ve seen some– especially the narcissist– who are absolutely incapable of seeing anything at all wrong with their behavior. I’ve seen others genuinely upset at their lapse of control, as if they were really trying to be a different person, and had some conscience of the fact of what they were. I suspect, or at least wonder, if that attempt to overcome the compulsion only makes them more dangerous, or worse off. I do believe there is a compulsion at work, primarily. To follow through with intention takes a great deal of deliberation, but deliberation is not enough. It also involves a level of calculation of which someone with wild mood swings would seem to me incapable.
Everything CBs do seem genuine, they are great actors and manipulators.
They are aware that such behavior is wrong but they would never admit it and never take responsibility for it. They would use logical fallacies, verbal force or blantly “I can’t remember” just to get away. And they would never tolerate it from others.
When it comes to working, I think that high-functioning CBs are able to sustain a job when there is noone to support them. It may be difficult for them to control their mood but they won’t abuse others if they are not allowed to. With proper medications there’s no need to tolerate borderline that “can’t” work.
Mostly, I think you’re right, but I suspect I have experienced a severe case that is the exception to your general rule. Also, a wealth (or should I call it a debt?) of experience has made me seriously dubious about the efficaciousness of medication.
What have you experienced? Was she bpd or npd?
Two psychiatrists and three counselors and a group of doctors at a mental hospital came up with various diagnoses, but could commit to none. Bi-polar. Post-traumatic stress (from childhood). Obsessive-compulsive. General anxiety disorder, whatever that means. Psychosis was very real. Inability to remember things that did happen. Fabrication of memories that did not, some even from works of fiction she didn’t remember reading.
I also once lived with a textbook narcissist, who fits perfectly into the things you describe, and the experience was much different. There I could see deliberation and calculation; but there were still signs of dissociation apart from that which make me think that she genuinely believed she was the victim and in the right, all the while she was attempting to manipulate my life vicariously through our child, among other things.
I can trace to some extent the factors that made me attracted to them, but there is also the simple fact that I genuinely believed, at the beginning of those relationships, the front they put up; and maybe the reason it was so convincing is because they themselves believed it.
The most convincing liar is, as any good actor or writer of fiction might tell you, the one who can convince themselves.
I suspect, however, that these people have moments of clarity, when in solitude, that greatly upset them. However, I think in most cases it must cause them to reinforce the dissociation in order to relieve their cognitive dissonance. The more they do this, the more they become the monster. If this weren’t the case, I imagine they might actually change for the better.
And if someone was once such an individual, and they did have that moment of clarity, and they resolved the dissonance by accepting disillusionment about themselves and bettering themselves, who would ever know?
As with drug abuse, we tend to harp on the worst case scenario as if it were the norm, when we can’t really have an accurate knowledge of the ratio of abuse to use, as the mere users would learn their lesson and move on to more mature and better things. It’s no wonder, then, that we think the worst case scenario is the norm; and, it probably doesn’t help that whole industries build up around treating that extreme and advertise about it and thereby reinforce the misconception.
So I contend again that life is a gamble, and you take your chances, and you lose, and you try to learn what lessons you can. You can try to count the cards or load the dice, but it doesn’t always work, and, in any case, you then have to wonder if that doesn’t make you the manipulative one… by defintion. 🙂
When I met my [BPD] ex, she had instinctively put on her good face and gave me what I thought was the emotional intimacy that I so strongly desired and didn’t get from my own mother. Relatively speaking it was. And, to the extent that I was her Prince Charming, her behavior was genuine.
By comparison, about two years previous, a sister of a friend had thrown herself at me. She also satisfied that emotional craving, but I wasn’t physically attracted to her. I’ve since realized that while she had her own problems–we all do–she isn’t batshit crazy. Had she been more attractive, we would probably have gotten married, had a much better marriage and would still be married. About that, I have no doubt.
“Isn’t it possible that this act of dissociation, if elaborate enough, may engender them to the point of actually believing their own lies? Even up to the point of fabricating false memories?”
Absolutely, though my ex disassociates herself from memories that contradict whatever new reality she has invented for herself. I used to think my ex was just lying about not remembering the hurtful things she’d done, but our marriage counselor assured me that it was disassociation (it helped that my ex actually did this once in front of the counselor.)
“In other words, could it be that all abuse is compulsive?”
No, especially not when dealing with Cluster B’s. My hypothesis is that ALL Cluster B personalities lack empathy. They live outside the normal human experience and have learned to survive by pretending they don’t. They learn to put on masks relative to the situation. Few can sustain this in intimate relationships, especially since, as I said, they don’t really understand how real people operate, they can only observe and mimic.
As I said, I was my ex’s Prince Charming. For the first fifteen years of our marriage, she was able to somewhat sustain a mask. Our religion and my naivete and easy going personality helped her. However, once the ideal was shattered (I was laid off, she had to work) the mask dropped, I became the person who was preventing her happiness and, I now realize, she cut me out of her life (well, except for money and using me as the very occasional dildo.)
There was no intention, no rationale, behind my ex’s abuse and that’s what made it so insolvable and so cruel. I was trying to use reason where none applied. My ex lacks empathy so I couldn’t even appeal to that. To put it another way, if you peel back the persona my ex projects, there’s nothing underneath. Nothing. It’s a void, a black hole. Had my ex been the very angry sort and had, say, murdered me, she would have felt nothing. No guilt, no joy. Nothing. That’s what makes her so fucking scary.
In other words, if you can genuinely reason with someone, they aren’t a true Cluster B personality. They aren’t a sociopath/psychopath (I prefer sociopath since it’s a more accurate term.) Attributing intent is attempting to lay a foundation for reason. if there is intent, it’s that of a cornered animal; self-preservation instinct and nothing more.
(Hence the disassociation–I’ll absolutely guarantee that if you talk to my ex, she’ll genuinely deny doing the horrible things she did the last 18 months of our marriage. She’ll deny saying must of what she said in counseling. To her, these events literally no longer exist. This is hard to fathom, but that’s because most of us lie within the bell curve of normal human behavior, no matter how screwed up we otherwise are.)
Jason, you are hitting the nail on the head. Our experiences, I’m sorry to say, are very similar. The black hole, nothing inside. Prince Charming is gone, gorgon appears. Thank you. It helps to know that this happened to someone else, even though I greatly lament the fact that it happens to anyone.
Jason: I will tell you that not only do I agree with what you wrote here, I shiver a bit because realizing how detached my XCB was from reality in what she recalled and how she recalled it was one of the final breaking points and finally scared me enough about her to bite the bullet and GTFO for good.
It started in our arguments where she’d recall things completely different from how they’d actually happened and then I began reading her journal entries and became terrified. You could see the day-to-day splitting “He’s perfect, I love him, great dad and husband, I’m so grateful” to “I hate him and will do whatever I have to to protect our child…” after recounting events that never happened and circumstances and behavior that I hadn’t done such as drinking entire half-gallons of vodka (I haven’t drank vodka in 15 yrs and cannot even stand the smell of it AND would need to go to the ER after drinking half that) to abuse and humiliation of our son – I’ve NEVER spanked him or yelled at him, I’ve never called him a bad name, etc.
It was f-ing terrifying.
And finally that, coupled with a 2-day fight about how much of an ahole I was because I refused to allow her to quit working the job she hated where nobody appreciated her genius and clearly superior knowledge about everything nudged me out the door. And then she made up even more disgusting claims I’ve documented elsewhere here to try to use the only thing I actually cared about – my relationship and parenting time with my son – to punish and destroy me for committing the cardinal sin of daring to leave her.
Mr. Itis, your experience too rings eerily true with my own. Thank you.
Here’s an experience I had once with a senior-level manager, whom I now realize was a Cluster B. In a large meeting, she made a very controversial statement and issued orders to various people to act on that statement. This was a reoccurring weekly meeting, so the next week, one of the people whom she had given orders to started to present what he had done based on her orders. When he started to get into it, she stopped him and said, “Who authorized you to do this”? The guy answered, “You did, Jill [not her real name]. Last week you said X and told us to move out on it.” Jill responded indignantly, “I never said X and I never told anyone to do that!” There were 50+ people in the room when she said X, and many including me had made notes of it, so lots of people started to pipe up. She shushhed everyone and said, “I never said X, and anyone who says I did is in a lot of trouble. And that’s final.”
At that point I realized that, career-wise, she was very dangerous. I minimized my interactions with her after that, and when I did have to interact with her, I treated it with kid gloves. Fortunately, I’m well away from that organization now.
That’s what makes it so hard when you’re dealing with their psychiatrists and/or the court system. You may know this person intimately and frequently enough to have seen these things, whereas the judge or the doctor sees them for a couple of hours every so often… but guess whose judgments carry more weight? It’s bitter. I once described it as feeling like Tom from Tom and Jerry. In some of those old cartoons, the lady of the house would clean up and tell Tom there better not be a hair out of place when she gets back. Of course, Jerry overhears, and tortures Tom all the while she’s gone, throwing dishes and stealing food. By the time she gets back, the house is a mess; and who do you think gets beat out the door with the broom? Poor Thomas. While Jerry snickers behind his hands in his mousehole. It’s a good analogy, because people in general would still view Thomas as the big mean thug and Jerry as the innocent little mouse, and cheer for him; but if you take each episode of Tom and Jerry as its own little microcosm, you can see that the creators of the show were constantly reversing those roles. Silly, I guess, but that’s how I always felt.
Rommial,
The infrequency of being around other people came up during one of the many pre-break-up arguments. She was anxious about a recent medical diagnosis, and claimed that I had no compassion. This, following my listening, consoling and affection. The key here was not that I did care, but I wasn’t doing it correctly. I assume that triggered abandonment fears. Found out later that after giving her all my attention that day, she went for a walk, cried and got empathy from a complete stranger. All I could think of was they really do not know you. These people seem to seek attention from any source available.
amazing! this is helping me a year or so later! WOW!
Great question
Great article, Doc!
I don’t think you can overemphasize the importance of separating fact from speculation when trying to get past these people.
What they say and what they do are facts. Their words and actions may or may not be consistent. In my experience, they were, which makes things easier. No amount of wishful thinking will change facts. To suppress facts, you have to suppress or deny them.
Why they say or do something is speculation. It’s not the facts that keep you stuck, it’s the speculation. I got an “A” in Rationalization but I had finite capacity for denial.
If played correctly, I think the “what if” game can be useful. “What if” I could craft a fairy tale ending to all this? What would it be? When I played the game this way, in light of the facts, I couldn’t come up with one. It’s a guess but if you ask people those questions, many of them would be hard pressed to give a precise answer.
Thanks for yet another eerily insightful article, Dr. Tara. I’m not sure if you realize just how valuable your work is to those of us who have recovered from these relationships. It is probably no surprise to you that I, like so many others, went through the idealization process of my hoovering ex, only to be reminded that now that the financial gravy train has left the station, I’m told that I’m just as much of an a$$hole as I was before. The second-best benefit (after not feeling a hint of regret or missing her any longer) is that I can see Crazy in the first conversation with a woman and remain happily alone, valuing that over any potential reliving of the nightmare. My only question is this: Do you need an intern? because my 13 year-old points out to me that “Mom hates you, but is mad that you divorced her. I think she just wants to have you around to torture.” I’m kidding, of course, but how thankful I am that such a young child has such wisdom. Hopefully, he doesn’t end up in this type of relationship when he is older. Thanks, again, you rule!
Yes, you aren’t truly free until the day that you wake up and say to yourself, “Being alone is better than being with her”. And yes, it takes a while to get there. Most (all?) of us got into this situation because of beliefs that we had established within ourselves before the relationship. In my case, the “Being along is better than being with her” day was the day that one of my long-established views got torn down. And it was incredibly liberating. I realized that day that I was in a prison of my own construction. I finally found the exit door.
And yes, I really wish something like Shrink4Men had existed 25 years ago. My CBX is over two decades in the past now, but until I starting reading Shrink4Men a few years ago, I still had lingering questions about what had happened and why. It’s odd; I’ve been to several therapists in my time, and not one of them ever mentioned the Cluster B personality disorders to me. It wasn’t until I started reading here, and at Narcissists Suck, that I ever heard of them and started doing some reading up on the subject.
Touche!
I haven’t seen my exgf in 25 years but she did send me a FB friend request in February. It took the Israelites 40 years to make it out of the wilderness so I’m 15 years ahead on that score.
I think there’s an easy explanation as to why therapists may have missed it. Look at the history of DSM. Toss in that Cluster Bs are not likely to seek treatment on their and can arguably function in society and it’s no surprise it wasn’t understood then. Theodore Millon’s “Personality Disorders in Modern Life” wasn’t published until 2000.
After 29 years of marriage, 4 years divorced,and 1 more year of child support, I am better off alone. The crazy thing is she thought she had so much control, she insisted I leave. after 6 months in therapy. I knew I couldn’t go back. Now I have nearly zero contact, but our adult children are starting to stir the pot.
[…]your “love” is more than likely nothing more than an incredibly damaged, self-obsessed, emotionally stunted, psychologically immature, entitled, manipulative, selfish, empathy challenged, blame shifting, unaccountable, abusive child or teen in an adult body who is incapable of love.
Wow, impressive. The above reference nicely encapsulates exactly what an ex is without me having to put any further concerted effort or thought into it. But I just abbreviate that particular personality now as D.D.O.C. which stands for in my shorthand, deeply dysfunctional obstinant cunt.
“In a nutshell (pun intended), Crazy rips off the old scabs and grinds salt in your wounds. In this respect, your Crazy ex or partner does serve a useful purpose. If you can connect the dots back to the original damage, stare it down, feel the feelings that arise, and release yourself from the fear of looking at and feeling these things, you (hopefully) won’t have to do this phantom dance with Crazy anymore.”
For me, this was the most difficult part to accept because it wasn’t the message that was primarily wrong (a thin thread of truth existed), but it was the delivery mechanism for that message that caused the most distress. Treating me like a broken object instead of human being caused me to be stuck for years; whist attempting to fathom out the message from the twisted, abusive delivery!
I’m having so much trouble letting my ex go. We went out for nine insanely volatile months, and It’s been over four months since I last saw her. I (stupidly) called her this week after more than two months of NC.
I’m pretty sure I’m obsessing over her because of her beauty. She is so beautiful and I want her so badly. Physically she is everything I dream of. She really is. I have never been so attracted to a woman like this in my life. I was ga ga over her even before I ever met her in person (I first saw a picture of her on my friend’s Facebook page) and I’m more obsessed with her now than ever. She just got back from Cuba and updated her profile picture….OMG!… and that’s how I ended up on this page.
I like to believe that, aside from her terrible attitude, behaviour and abusive ways, she is the perfect woman for me. I mean I like everything about her: her interests and activities, her all around taste, her career choice, her humour, her ability to socialize, her intelligence, her background (she’s Cambodian), the way she walks, the ways she dresses, her diet, etc, etc, etc. Again, I have never been this attracted to a woman like this before!!! I know I am crazy!!! I know I’m crazy but I can’t seem to stop it.
Anyhow, I called her this past Monday after over two months of NC. I wanted to know how she was doing and where her brain was at, and quite frankly I was hoping that she took time to reflect on our past relationship and missed me. But no. Although we spoke for an hour, she was quite cold, hard, insensitive, blaming me for everything that went wrong, etc. She was also very pushy and said many things to provoke me (but I remained calm and cool). She believes, for some crazy reason, that I was the abusive one (OMFG!). She’s convinced herself that I was the abusive one and never cared for her or treated her well. She makes me feel like I was such a bad BF. She doesn’t recognize any of her destructive and abusive and destructive behaviour. Not a thing!!!! She also told me that she she had moved on and basically made me feel like a loser for still caring. She did end the conversation by telling me “we’ll talk” and I haven’t heard from her since.
You know, I don’t really regret calling her because now I got confirmation that she is a b***h and that she hasn’t changed one bit…..but I still want her!! I would take her back even if she treats me like garbage. It’s so sad. I feel pathetic. I feel weak. I feel powerless. I feel like a loser. I feel like a loser because she can get any guy she wants. I’m nothing to her…I felt insignificant the most of the time we went out but now it’s worse…. now I’m completely insignificant.
Im going through the same thing right now. I am accused of being the abuser and actually feel guilty for wanting out. I know, how pathetic to feel guilty about leaving my abuser. I guess thats what happens when you have been mind screwed for so long
I’m having so much trouble letting my ex go. We went out for nine insanely volatile months, and It’s been over four months since I last saw her. I (stupidly) called her this week after more than two months of NC.
I’m pretty sure I’m obsessing over her because of her beauty. She is so beautiful and I want her so badly. Physically she is everything I dream of. She really is. I have never been so attracted to a woman like this in my life. I was ga ga over her even before I ever met her in person (I first saw a picture of her on my friend’s Facebook page) and I’m more obsessed with her now than ever. She just got back from Cuba and updated her profile picture….OMG!… and that’s how I ended up on this page.
I like to believe that, aside from her terrible attitude, behaviour and abusive ways, she is the perfect woman for me. I mean I like everything about her: her interests and activities, her all around taste, her career choice, her humour, her ability to socialize, her intelligence, her background (she’s Cambodian), the way she walks, the ways she dresses, her diet, etc, etc, etc. Again, I have never been this attracted to a woman like this before!!! I know I am crazy!!! I know I’m crazy but I can’t seem to stop it.
Anyhow, I called her this past Monday after over two months of NC. I wanted to know how she was doing and where her brain was at, and quite frankly I was hoping that she took time to reflect on our past relationship and missed me. But no. Although we spoke for an hour, she was quite cold, hard, insensitive, blaming me for everything that went wrong, etc. She was also very pushy and said many things to provoke me (but I remained calm and cool). She believes, for some crazy reason, that I was the abusive one (OMFG!). She’s convinced herself that I was the abusive one and never cared for her or treated her well. She makes me feel like I was such a bad BF. She doesn’t recognize any of her destructive and abusive and destructive behaviour. Not a thing!!!! She also told me that she she had moved on and basically made me feel like a loser for still caring. She did end the conversation by telling me “we’ll talk” and I haven’t heard from her since.
You know, I don’t really regret calling her because now I got confirmation that she is a b***h and that she hasn’t changed one bit…..but I still want her!! I would take her back even if she treats me like garbage. It’s so sad. I feel pathetic. I feel weak. I feel powerless. I feel like a loser. I feel like a loser because she can get any guy she wants. I’m nothing to her…I felt insignificant the most of the time we went out but now it’s worse…. now I’m completely insignificant.
Dude, I’m not going to pretend to be Dr. Tara, here. But I will try as best as I can to share with you. Take your relationship and multiply it (literally) by 20: I had the same relationship with my wife of 15 years. She’s the mother of my two kids, and she still, objectively, is the hottest woman I’ve ever seen. She, too, shares the many qualities you describe: socialization, intelligence, etc. I stayed with her for so long, tolerated the abuse, felt the sadness and loneliness because I, too, clung to a romanticized notion of her being the only one I could ever want. Baloney. I was flipping channels on yet another night spent alone while she sat on her untouchable perch and came across “Gone With the Wind.” My ex happens to bear a fairly striking resemblance to Vivien Leigh (but prettier), and I thought to myself, rather proudly, “I married freaking Scarlett O’Hara!” And as I watched, I recognized all of Scarlett’s selfish behavior and two hours later, thought to myself, rather nauseously, “I married freaking Scarlett O’Hara!” Like Scarlett (a well-known BPD, by the way), these women are too sick to EVER feel true intimacy, love, empathy, etc. You may not be there yet, but I promise, you, too will “return to Charleston” and frankly, not give a damn. Good luck.
Even the physical evaluation may change over time, as you get some distance from it and get to know other women and have a better basis for comparison. It wasn’t until several years after my CBX and I divorced that I realized I was never really that attracted to her physically — she had OK looks, but nothing special. And, ahem, I also came to realize that she wasn’t really that great in bed.
And that evaluation was from how I remember her at the age of 30. I haven’t seen her in over 20 years. My observation over time has been that most Cluster B women don’t hold up well in the looks department. They have a lot of bad habits that take their toll after the age of 30 or so: drinking, drugs, tanning beds, junk food, laziness. A few years ago, I had the experience of bumping into a bullet that I had dodged back in my ’20s. All the guys were hot for her back then. Well, now she looks like death warmed over: too much sun, too much drinking, too much laying on the couch watching soaps all afternoon. But she still thinks she’s the A-list hottie she was when she was 22.
I am glad to see you writing again, Dr T. Your articles and the sadly absent podcasts (a lot of work, but so valuable to listen to) provide an abiding source of clarity for so many who have been trampled by sociopaths.
I am also always intrigued by how appropriate your picture choices are. This picture is not, as many think, of the mummified remains of a Roman from Pompeii or Ercolano. It is a plaster injection into the space in the hardened tufa, the volcanic ash cooled again to stone, where there was someone, but whose body is long since dissolved. Put differently, it is an image of someone who is not there. And like the sociopath who has hurt so many of your readers, it only becomes human-like when one of us projects that quality onto it.
By the way, the most well-known of these castings are not of ancient Romans, but of 18th century diggers who cut their way into the stone looking for treasure, and succumbed to the poison gases. It is dangerous to look for treasure in the spaces where the sociopaths live.
TRUE!
That’s an excellent way of putting it.
+1
This site is invaluable to helping me try to keep my sanity. I try to be objective in all my thoughts and continue to wonder what I did wrong to cause my marriage to go bad. I was mentally abused for years and despite having two young daughters, I had to leave the home I bought before I met her before I went crazy.
I believe a married a sociopath and my desire for kids caused me to overlook signs that were there from day one. She had been married before for 8 years to her college sweetheart and indicated she been in a relationship where she reluctantly engaged in BDSM sex to please him but she told me she hated it. Our sex life was non existant and she just laid there making it clear from her movements that she wanted it over. Its frustrating because she is like a Ferrari but with a four cylinder engine. I thought I knew how to drive it. I had never been with a woman who seemed to be somewhere else when we did have sex and who did not know how to take a proactive involvement. We are both 40 years old so its not this is our first relationship and until this one I always enjoyed sex.
Sexual issues aside, every day to day mannerism from her was fake from the hugs to the “welcome home”. She showed no emotion. Never got upset, never got angry, just isolated herself from me. She was a stay at home mom while I worked a very successful business that I built myself. I tried talk to her about day to day life and she had nothing to say. I was staring at an empty soul.
Over time I encouraged her to go back to school and work etc and gave up my evenings and weekends so she could attend classes. After the second baby was born and she spent more time out of the house, she spent all her free time on her computer and didnt come to bed until well after midnight. Our house was a mess and she didnt keep it clean at all and if social services had come over, they would have taken our kids. She would not stay home when I was there and took the kids to endless birthday parties, activities, or had me watch them so she could do things. She didnt want to do anything as a family yet would socialize with downtrodden women and their kids. I ignored it but watched her destroy all my personal items and our home knowing I was a person who was clean and valued everything I own. As someone who has strong communication skills and must talk to people from all walks of life in my job, it was frustrating my conversations with my wife were short or non existent. Her words sounded like I was talking to someone with a high society voice and rang hollow. I always felt that she did not care one bit about me.
Ultimately things came to a head when we took my oldest daughter to a dance and our next door neighbor, who always came to our house, bought my kids gifts despite being broke, and came to every activity at the holidays like she was a relative, came to an activity and my mother was there. My mother from a distance gave my wife so much support with help or babysitting etc yet was ignored by my wife when my mom wanted to see the kids. The neighbor upon me getting out of the car, pulled my kids from my hands and walked through the whole parking lot holding my kids hands like they were her own. Not only was that improper but she didnt wait for anyone else and we walked behind her at quite a distance to get the entrance of the school. When we got to the front, I got upset(and I rarely yell and am very calm day to day) as I saw my mother being disrespected and my wife blaming me for saying anything about the neighbor taking the kids from my hands and acting like they were hers. When we got home, she spent four hours next door comforting the neighbor leaving me to stew when I did nothing wrong. This is one of many examples but then I knew the marriage was over. That was four years ago.
I would then spend months at a time for the past four years sleeping in another room praying as to whether to stay or leave after similar actions by my wife made it clear I did not matter and it was all about her and being with her friends and their kids while overdosing the kids on activities. What made me finally leave was finding a recording device where my wife had been recording our day to day activities hoping her bad behavior would drive me to get violent so it would be on tape and she could use that to keep the kids from me. I had never been anything but a calm man and there would be no reason for her to think I would be mad so the mindgames had to be amped up to get me to react. Every time we talked it had been recorded all while she was telling me she wanted to go to counseling. I did once only to see her bash me in the session so I stopped it.
I thought the mindgames of trying to get me to leave was bad enough but once I finally decided to leave, I stumbled on two flash drives she left out in the open and I copied them hoping they had pictures of my kids on them(she takes pictures of everything the kids do to the point of overkill) so I would have some memory of my kids. Instead of it being pictures, it was 2000 plus pages of pornographic writings in Harry Potter prose in the most graphic sense. I could not believe it as my wife had been a sexual prude and would get offended if she heard a cus word on tv and the kid was in the room she would turn the tv off and take the kid out of the room. I am no prude and love sex etc but this porn was beyond sick. I was not like Penthouse letters but worse and graphic. She used our kids names and their cousins and even her cousin the preachers name as characters. I could not believe not only she wrote that stuff but the sheer volume of it. Now I know what she has been doing on the computer the past four years. I could not believe I married someone who showed no interest and no ability in conventional sex yet was writing volumes of rambling stories in weird language where people went from talking to having graphic sex and she couldnt even use names of characters that were not our families.
I had to move out under the cover of night as she would not agree to sit down and go through our stuff and tell the kids like adults would do once we decided to seperate. She should have been happy that I was moving out yet wouldnt let me take my stuff and destroyed many of my personal items and stole things such as tshirt and other personal items from me that had no real monetary value but were personal. It pained me to leave my house that I bought and filled with no help from her yet I had to allow my daughters some sense of stability.
Once I moved out, she wouldnt let me see the kids regularly and for example offered me two hour evening visits saying that I could not have three hours because the kids needed to be home in time to do homework etc. I would pick them up and drop them off at the park after my two hours and instead of taking them home, she would play with them in the park. The kids hug and kiss on me and I cant explain to them why I see them so little. Wife seems unfazed by the fact I have volumes of her porn writings, recording devices she placed in the house, and pictures of our home showing it looking like a hoarders house.
The court will sort out custody and all that as we have just recently seperated but I am really questioning myself as to what I did wrong to cause my wife to abandon me emotionally and not be there physically. I am a successful professional man who makes good money and never treated my wife poorly and encouraged her and paid for her to go to school while giving up any free time I had so she could do an activity. Now she shows such hate for me, keeps our two young daughters from me and is going to get quite a bit of money in a divorce because I have done well.
I am pretty confident yet humble but I realize that I have some problem as I tend to be attracted to very pretty yet emotionally unavailable or abusive women. I married this one out of my desperation to have kids as I approached 40.
I am so thankful to read all these posts and comments as it makes me feel that I am not alone. While I am not perfect, I dont understand the motives of these women who want to date you and even marry you, yet once you are married, any approach to them to discuss issues only drives them away further, cause them to blame you, to use sex as a carrot to destroy you mentally, and become so emotionally detached from a man they chose to have kids with, that it makes me wonder if I am the cause of all of it.
Even if I am going to be financially ruined and have been emotionally destroyed, I am happier to be away and thankful that I have the support of my mom and comfort from others who confirm when I tell my story to objective strangers that I married a sociopath and that it is not me.
I do hope the court will give me atleast 50% custody as I live in a very conservative small town and the judges will hopefully see the fact wife writes porn with her free time using kids names as characters is not healthy for them even if she is a good mom in terms of taking care of the kids day to day needs. I just wish I could find the boyfriend she likely had so I could get out of alimony but these women are smart and when you look like a model, you wont have a problem finding another man to pay attention to you and accept your fake words even if the actions you show early in the relationship make it seem like you are a loving caring woman.
Please post more articles as its ones like this one that really hit home as I know my best move was to leave crazy even if it has ruined me financially and emotionally because I thought I was a good partner but now I wonder.
So many words of wisdom here. Hi all, I’m currently very much a lurker on this site. Not quite ready to start gouging out from me the horrific stuff that brought me here in the first place, suffice to say that I’m also very much *STUCK* too and I still spent about 99% of every day obsessing over it, even though it’s been a very long time that I kidded myself that I could have done anything differently and that it was anyway *my* fault. I know it was her. She’s crazy, y’know? 😉 It still doesn’t stop the pain though. How *duped* I feel. What an utter f**king MUG I was. I gave her everything, and she dumped all over me. In just over a weeks time it’ll be exactly six months since it all ended and I (by a complete fluke) had my WTF moment and realised that the girl I was supposed to be having a wonderful love affair with was actually a two-faced, lying, manipulative slag – and had done an incredibly skillful job of turning two of my oldest friends utterly against me (even though they were still being nice-as-pie to my face). I know what some of the above posters mean when they say they get that horrific feeling of pure *dread* whenever they see a pic of their ex. Six months on, I still have the CB utterly blocked in every way on Facebook as I just can’t bear to see or hear about what she’s doing lately with the bloke she replaced me with. Makes me feel physically sick. Keep up the good work Dr T. Will speak more properly on the forums soon… 🙂
Yes Pheenix, the feeling of being duped is common among those who have been vicimized and taken advantage of. ‘What if?’ we had done this, that or the other differently, ‘what if’ we had seen the red flags, or, we saw them and ignored them.
Whats worse is men don’t have a forum to express their grief. Al contraire, men who express grief privately or publicly are often ostracized as being weak and deficient. We are emasculated for being taken advantage of.
For women its okay, no, its encouraged they express their grief when they are taken advantage of by men (whether real or perceived). Magazines, TV, Movies, and really any place where women congregate you encounter women expressing their disdain for the men who allegedly took advantage of them/mistreated them, and, disdain for men in general. This behavior is condonded by society.
So men are not just victimized in the ‘victimization phase’, they are victimized again in the subsequent phases of this by being admonished for ‘allowing’ a woman to take advantage of/misteat/abuse him, and that speaking up about it makes him weak and deficient man.
Until attitudes, rules and even legislation changes, its going to continue to be an uphill battle for men.
I ran across your web sight while I was dating a man who told me things about his ex that sounded like emotional abuse. First I should include that after a year of dating him and noticing that his ex was doing things to keep engaged with him (I could tell she was trying to get him back), I was shocked when he told me over the phone that they were going to reconcile. That lasted a month and he called and apologized. The next 18 months have been spent with us going in/out of relationship/friendship/no-contact, etc. Always in a vicious cycle of him trying to fix things with his ex. None of this made sense. His low self-esteem, “Cybil” personalities, and fears/worries/anxiety, whenever she is around him. He is a very career oriented man, highly successful, a leader and community high profile person. Moving on…I found your articles and wen site and decided to send him the links. He was STUNNED and went through all of the feelings you described of a man who comes to realize he has been in a abusive marriage. I really thought this would help him disengage, but instead he went running back to show her and stand up for himself. This has been happening over an dover again, and somehow she keeps reeling him in every time he tries to break free. He stopped telling me what she said each time to get him “thinking”, which means he goes back, Usually it’s something to do with the kids (ages 22 and 26, the older being married), one day they will be grandparents, you owe me, it’s our time to be empty nesters, you promised to take care of me, you can’t do this to me, you are sinning against God, God doesn’t want us apart or we wouldn’t be still connecting, if you love me you wouldn’t leave me, the kids don’t function well when we are apart, it’s all your fault, it’s all my fault, you are evil with a sick sexual appetite, I made you, I stayed with you through the difficult times, no one wants you, you can’t do it without me, etc. We remained in contact and started to date again, but he retreated and went back AGAIN! I’m done, I can’t take this anymore. Then I saw your new post and I was thought OMG, Dr. T nailed it again. He won’t leave CRAZY ever, it feels like the insanity gets worse as they use reason after insane reason to keep this cycle going. I just finished a book about commitment-phobic men and that was also spot on for his pattern of behavior. So I am thinking…ok, does his commitment issue stem from his dysfunctional abusive marriage and subsequent cycle of returning to it, or is his commitment phobia the cause of it, are they even related? Btw, his father beat him as a child, and he is the youngest with two older sisters, raised in a small town. The two of them grew up together and dated a little in HS, then he joined the army right after graduation and they married right away with no real ceremony. They had problems in their marriage with affairs on both sides, and later on became swingers for a few years, then broke up off/on for several years before getting divorced. So yes, this is a stupid and insane relationship with him for me to even stay involved in, but I still care about him, especially because I can understand how abusive people can make people and weak, fearful, and bury the person who is trying to get out and live his life. Is their any hope for him? Should i send this article to him even though I told him I can’t have anything to do with him because is never going to go away or leave him alone?
Dear girlwhocares123,
Thank you for writing this. Of all the things I read today, your’s had the most meaning for me.
This is because it helps remind me to do the work I need to be able to “see” a woman like you.
I cannot answer your question about giving up on him. Most of us do move on, the bigger question is how long. I’m only a month on my “road to recovery” from her… but feel like I’m just beginning. Everything can be great until something reminds me of her and then it’s anyone’s guess how things will go.
Maybe you can at least comfort yourself knowing that you are not crazy enough to attract him???
Thank you, you made me both cry and laugh. You made a good point. I’m not crazy, and I recognize that he can’t handle healthy relationships. I’m working on moving forward without him. It’s been ok this week. This morning I’m a bit low. He is on vacation with her. We were going to take that time together and now for the second time he has taken her instead. Honestly, I am disgusted and have lost all respect for him as a man. Sadly, I have no more compassion or sympathy that I used to. I understand the complexities of her behavior and manipulations, but I find it difficult to exert any additional understanding towards him. There has been no contact for a week (he’s in Vegas with her), so while that is helping me, I’m also aching at the thought of them doing this dance again. Don’t people want to be happy? Why do they want to live in such misery. Instead of imagining them miserable, I tell myself they are blissfully happy and excited to be back together. That actually helps as I don’t wish him to be sucked into losing his life to this sickness. I’d rather him be in a loving and wonderful marriage with her. That’s weird I know. 🙂
You are onto something Bazian.
It makes me think of two women prior to dating my last unstable partner. There was nothing wrong with those two women, but I did not feel that (ahem) special spark. Next time I think I’ll hold out for the rational ones.
Hi girlwhocares123,
I can tell you – as someone who made the agonizing decision to leave an emotionally abusive woman, that it hasn’t been easy to move on. For me personally, although I didn’t engage in the back-and-forth pattern (mostly because my ex was from out of the country, and I finally had enough and put her on a plane back home), but have constantly questioned if I did the right thing and have dealt with a lot of grief and guilt. The healing process takes time. What I would do in your case is take the focus off of him and place it squarely on yourself. Meaning, why are you continuing to relegate yourself to this type of relationship/treatment? Why is it that you feel you need to stay in this one? These are tough questions, but we have to ask ourselves hard questions sometimes. I had to ask myself for example, “why do I value myself so little to continue to be treated so poorly by someone who I’ve done so much for and given so much to?”…I didn’t like asking myself that, because the obvious answer was I didn’t think enough of myself to believe that I deserved better. Like me, and most others on here, you’re probably a very loving, caring, and empathetic person, but we (people like that) need to be careful not to be taken advantage of because personality disordered individuals are attracted to us like a moth to the flame…So take care of yourself and love yourself and do the thing that is best for yourself and for your highest good – even if it’s painful. You were not put on earth to be treated the way you are and you can’t save him – he has his own path. Good luck.
Thank you. I’ve been struggling with the self esteem and self worth issue. I am worthy of a kind and loving relationship. Surprisingly I am actually a very strong independent woman. I’m also very boundary driven with my children, I’m a leader and do very well with people. Yet I let myself be an emotional doormat in serious personal relationships. See above. I’m working on it. I’m awesome, now I need to hold firm and not let a man who has his own personal problems suck the life out of me. Honestly, I’m hurting, but I’m trying to stay positive and regain my own inner strength.
Thank you for this. Things that I know but tend to forget. I often wonder how many of us are trying to “fix” the relationships of our childhood with BPD parents by selecting mates with the same characteristics. My situation: my mother died when I was very young and my probably BPD father disappeared from my life when I was 14. Her new love/next vic was raised in an orphanage. They select their victims very well.
Wow Dr. Tara – what a great article. Like many who have posted on here, I have been feeling stuck as well – still two years after ending my engagement to my ex who demonstrated most (if not all) of the behaviors of this type of abusive personality. I’m so glad that you touched on the part of the equation of guilt and blaming ourselves when you write, “I’m not perfect. There are things I could have done differently. No one’s perfect and becoming angry and hurt in response to being abused is a natural and healthy response.” This has been big for me because she had a habit of just steamrolling over any boundaries I had. She’d push and push and push my buttons. Most of the time I would try to talk rationally and/or calmly (and even sometimes remove myself from the environment, i.e., go for a walk), but there was… Just. No. Getting. Through….Anyway, as a result I would (regrettably) occasionally get pushed too far and lose my temper and raise my voice, which I know now is exactly what she needed to transfer blame to me. I would always immediately apologize for raising my voice, but frankly felt like I was being neutered and never being heard by someone who claimed to “love me so much…” This kind of interaction was just crazy-making. I eventually started feeling like I was losing my mind, when a therapist friend of mine sent me some literature on the “cycle of violence,” which apparently happens in abusive relationships, then the light started coming on for me. Around that time I found your site here and received an immense amount of help, support, and understanding from you and your community members. In any case, I’m still healing and do still feel stuck sometimes more than I like, but your site definitely helps clarify and put things in perspective, so thanks for that. I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say in many cases, it’s lifesaving.
Hi director17,
i read your article reg engagement and personally it provided clarity in my life.I was engaged to who i now believe a NPD person for 6 months and ready to get married. She was so hellbent on marrying me and mut enormous pressure to do that in a few months time. But I could sense a coldness and detached persona from her that made me so hesitant to jump on a marriage rightaway . One of the episode was when she made me return a engagenment ring for a a bigger carat ring because she deserved better. I just asked for a few more months of engagement before getting married but she percieved that i did not care for her and threw a rage and made it so ugly that i had to call off the whole thing. A Part of me feels secure with what happended but another part of me still hurts so bad thinking i should have just married and given her what she wanted and she would be loving with me .
Do u feel the same given you are were in the same situation.
Hi concerned3,
I’m glad you were able to get some clarity from my comment. This site is so valuable for that very reason. I’ve gained a lot of perspective and have developed a clearer understanding of the type of relationship I was involved in by visiting this site, reading the articles and comments by others. Anyway, to answer your question, yes there is some similarity in how I feel to what you’ve described. I know on an intellectual/logical level that I made the best decision, but of course I still hurt and experience feelings of regret. I had invested a lot of time, energy, and money into my relationship and it was difficult to let that go. More importantly though, I had to value myself more and re-examine what my definition of love was. Just the few things you’ve mentioned sound familiar…the detached persona, the raging and the entitlement are things I experienced as well with my ex. Before I found this site and began reading up on different personality disorders, I just thought my ex-fiance was immature, and even though I’m sure that’s part of it, all of the other personality aspects couldn’t be ignored. Anyway, hope you heal your heart and be confident that you were wise to see the signs and made a decision in your best interest.
“Just. No. Getting. Through….Anyway, as a result I would (regrettably) occasionally get pushed too far and lose my temper and raise my voice, which I know now is exactly what she needed to transfer blame to me.”
That sounds really familiar. It was indeed “crazy-making”. She was able to manipulate people I knew into seeing what a horrible and abusive guy I was. In addition to “dicarding” me when she realized I saw through her BS, she managed to manipulate others into ostracizing me too. I had a good reputation in that circle (of my professional colleagues) that’s now gone. I don’t hear from any of those people any more. But she pulled some other crap after we split that I think opened some of their eyes to her nuttiness. And who needs fair weather friends, anyway?
Hang in there, director. you “feel” crazy. I think that that’s a good sign that you’re not.
My ex had a habit of picking at her thumbnail beds until they were deformed. It also happened to be the perfect analogy to interaction with me. She would push until I was raw and ugly.
She too noticed I wasn’t ready to tolerate anymore BS and was done with the relationship. She attempted to justify her position through guilt and insults as though it was her decision, decreasing my value in her mind and simultaneously making me crazy.
yesterday, i took a little spur of the moment out-of-town trip to St. Louis. It was a beautiful day. CB and I made a trip there, wow, three years ago. It was a short business trip to grab some medical supplies, (she’s in the same profession as I). I made a little side trip to the zoo while I was there. It was hard not to think of her. It made me really sad. I was missing her. Well, not her, but the mask that she wore for me. Yeah, deeply and profoundly sad. Longing, regret, missing her. But then I remembered that I don’t like liars, phonies, backstabbers or gold-diggers. I remembered that I have a gift for what I do and that she envied me and resented me for it. I remembered that she laughed at me while she was breaking me.
I wondered if yesterday was the anniversary of some event in our r’ship – maybe that’s why I felt so sad. Does this missing, obseesion, shame ever go away? Will this get better? I know she won’t.
Smeagol, I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately – and your comment provoking even more contemplation. What I think some or many of us men who become entangled with psychotic, sociopathic and abusive women is this:
Instead of building our own self-esteem and self-worth on our own work & action, we rely on the ‘quick fix’ of the ‘love/desire/sex/attention’ we received from these women. Its an instaneous high to feel loved, desired, admired etc. Then comes the abuse, berating, ostracizing, and other abusive behaviors from our partner. Well, we are so locked into the relationship emotionally like an emotional Stockholm Syndrome, we’re willing to endure anything for this quick fix, for this temporary high of feeling loved/desired/admired.
Part of it too, I believe, is some of us grew up in dysfunctional families w/ weak or no boundaries and where people were abusive & unkind to each other. The patterns, for some of us, are set early in life and this insanity is what we consider ‘normal’.
This is my theory anyway…and I’m certain this is part of the core that’s been my problem in attracting Cluster Bs/Borderlines/Sociopaths. They know I’m emotionally wanting and am easy prey. But that’s changing, and I’m building my own self-esteem independent of what anyone else thinks or says of me. Its true independence – and something these sociopaths fear the most; you becoming completely independent & therefore, immune to their manipulations & tactics.
Thank you for sharing your comment, it’s been 10 weeks since I asked my non emotional abusive girlfriend to move out and 6 weeks since I last saw her. I am stilling to my no contact policy for the protection of my sanity. This evening I drove by to meet a friend and noticed that there was a church close by. This is the first church we went too together. I started to tear up, I was so much emotional pain and all I could think of was contacting her and begging her back. I do realize why I was attracted to this person due to issues in my childhood, your comments hit so close to home with me that they do give me some peace and closure. I am so happy I had my breakdown tonight, I realize I have to fix myself and not fix someone else, all I could think of was my daughters, they deserve a healthy dad, I am the only caring one in their lives. I should mentioned that my ex-wife was abusive to me as well. In fact my ex-girlfriend is a copy of my ex-wife, except she never hit me but the brain washing and mind games are the same. I came very close to contacting my ex-girlfriend however I chose not to. I am strong and I want to heal, I want to someday meet a woman that will love and respect me as I do for her.
This site is saving my sanity and dignity, thank you to everyone! I am still sad, however I know this will pass.
HELP!!!!
I am STILL struggling with the breakup. I thought that I could really get through this and go no contact. I last saw her 1 month ago when she came by to talk (and try to get some belongings that aren’t hers). We have had a hell of a past year. I can’t figure out if I did the right thing or not. I loved her! She has a wonderful daughter and I loved her like my own. The thing is, she is battling for custody with her 1st ex husband. We dated for 8 months and she told me she wanted to get married before the custody battle a year from then. To me, it was an ultimatum. I didn’t really like it and I have fought it since. The whole past year has been off and on breakups. Breakups that have been so hurtful. I’ve been kicked out of her house over 20 times for not complying to her marriage demand. She would threaten to go back to her 2nd ex husband because he wanted her back. I wasn’t sure what was going on or if she really loved me for me through all of this. I wanted a relationship! And I fought so hard to understand her point of view. I tried to get some sort of compromise from her about marriage. I wanted to get a good base relationship going.
In the beginning, I noticed that she was an emotional person. I didn’t really mind as she opened up and cried. I was feeling sad for her. She would tell me how her 1st ex husband physically abused her. I would hear about her ex boyfriends before me. It didn’t bother me at first but then it started to get really upsetting. Almost every time we would be laying in bed after sex, she would want to talk about past relationships or something to that extent.
I had a good paying job and worked early in the mornings and got home mid afternoon. I tried my best to take her and her daughter out to dinner, to movies, a few small vacations and a big vacation that we agreed to pay half on but later got into a fight about. At the time she didn’t have any money because it was all going to the lawyer fees. I had the income to help out where I could. She accused me of not helping in any way. To her I was “Never there”, “Selfish”, “Uncaring” to name a few. I paid for practically everything we did because I felt it was right. Even if I did this, It was a constant bombardment of hurtful words from her if I didn’t marry her. (It got to the point we were breaking up every weekend). I would have to leave her house in order to gather myself. We would have great moments together both alone and with her family. But if somehow the subject of marriage came up, I knew I was in for at least an hours plus worth of arguments. The arguments usually started with something completely trivial that could have been resolved in a matter of minutes. Suddenly I would find myself in a fight about her not being happy with me because I don’t love her enough or how she likes to be loved and her ex loved her better than I do.
I developed some sort of physical pain because I got to stressing out about it so much. My family has been there for me, as well as a therapist I’ve been talking to about it for months. I couldn’t figure it all out. I couldn’t and still can’t figure out if she really loved me. Or if she wanted to be married for some other reasons. It hurt that she would tell me that her previous boyfriends loved her more than I did. It hurt that she didn’t want to compromise on anything. It hurt that she triangulated love with her 2nd ex-husband and threatened to leave me for him.
She got mad at me after I told her there was an opening at the jewelry store we looked for a ring at. We found something she liked. I put the ring on hold. My ex told me that there was an opening at the store. I told her that when I put her ring on hold I asked the manager about the open position. I told my ex they would like to talk to her. She became so infuriated. I thought I was helping out. I had some car troubles that same day and needed to replace some big parts in my car. I had the repairs done. She got pissed at 2 things that day. One for not getting her approval to get repairs done because it was ‘OUR MONEY’ and Two for asking her to apply for the job at the jewelry store. I got yelled at on the porch in front of the whole neighborhood for almost 2 hours. I was in a blur. I couldn’t understand. I thought all the things I suggested were good ideas and would help out immensely in all aspects of the relationship.
All I wanted was a big RESET BUTTON of some kind to take us back to where we could resolve the conflicts and become happy together. I did all that I could to show her I cared. There was just no getting through to her that I was there for her. I wasn’t perfect and I know that I apologized and tried working through the issues.
The last time she showed up, we had an altercation and she ended up texting some crude things to my family. I was told to get a restraining order but I didn’t because she has already been thru enough court stuff with her ex.
I’ve purchased a few books and have read them. Emotional Blackmail, Narcissistic Lovers, The Wizard of Oz and other Narcissists. It’s like I’m still stuck and I’m looking for some apologies from her. And the crazy thing is, I have this wishful thinking that she is sorry for what she did and wants to apologize but for some reason she doesn’t know how.
I sometimes think that I was the Narcissist in the relationship because I didn’t want to get married that soon. And the things she accused me of being has really gotten to me. My therapist says that I’m codependent and I have tried to solve the problems in the relationship that aren’t my problem.
What else can I do about this? Was I a problem here? It’s driven me down a really dark street in my life and I want to get past it.
Not wanting to get married to soon was not an act of narcissism, but rather a lone act of good judgement. You seem to have ignored all of the other red flags and pursued a two time divorcee who is not even divorced from her last target and is fighting him for custody. I’m guessing she is trying to deny him 50/50. That should tell you all you need to know about this woman right there.
YOU DON’T GET INVOLVED WITH WOMEN WHO MALICIOUSLY DENY THEIR CHILDREN EQUAL ACCESS TO THEIR FATHERS. EVER.
Unless you have concrete proof (not her tales of “victimhood”) that her husband is a drug abusing violent man, there is no reason not to split custody 50/50.
Have you been involved with this type of woman before?
When/where did you come to believe it is you job to fix/save women?
What would it mean to you if you were able to “save” her? That you really are a good guy? That you’re lovable? That you’re “good enough?” That you’re a “hero?”
Where did you learn to put your feelings and needs behind everyone else’s?
What feelings/ego gratification are you trying to recapture by not letting go of this woman and seeing her for who she really is rather than who she once pretended to be?
Gordon. As a guy who has also lived through this type of situation, and who attracts this kind of woman, I would say stop rationalizing, and just put it to you straightforward:
GTFO (Get The Fuck Out)
The initial red flags – Yep, I chalked those up to normal behavior for some reason. Probably because I thought she was the one. I knew something was not right with the rage fits and doing circles around me in confrontations. I said to myself, “I think she’s a little too good at this.” I started getting defensive and I didn’t want to but I felt the need to. It seemed like that was the only way we attempted to solve anything. Fighting.
Her 1st ex-husband bought one of the most expensive bulldog lawyers the first time around and got 50/50 (3 weekends and 2 dinner visits a month plus a week of summer vacation time). He wanted more custody and to lower support payments. There was even a psych analysis of the whole family and it MIRACULOUSLY ‘wasn’t completed by the doctor’. I think I stepped into something with her I didn’t know how to handle. I needed clarification about what was going on. I didn’t have concrete proof. I couldn’t find myself to trust everything she told me about their marriage/divorce. On top of that lay her hurtful rages and marriage demands.
My previous relationship I was involved with an alcoholic that raged. She shit her pants once after an all nighter. I was unhappy but I stayed in it. I proposed to her (because she gave me an ultimatum) and we were engaged for a short while before she admitted to cheating on me. It was all about her. I extended out so much that I nearly lost myself. And it has been a similar person with my ex, except she wasn’t a drinker. She is the quiet sweet girl and a victim. But little did I know she was a rage filled entitled teenager of sorts if I didn’t marry her. She wanted a man to treat her ‘special’. I don’t think she really wanted to work on the relationship. I thought I could help her get past the hate she had for her ex-husband. I wasn’t “generous or loving enough to save her and her daughter from the evil ex-husband”. I feel deep down she knew my buttons. She knew I was Mr. Nice Guy. My self esteem dropped to a negative number that I’m embarrassed to admit. I was trying to gain her acceptance the WHOLE TIME. It was more than just about her marriage demand. It was HER!! But I loved her.
I played Stupid Hero. I felt accepted by her family and later on I figured it was because I hung around through the hard times and loved their daughter and grandchild. I felt good about helping where I could. But then I took some steps back. Lots of hoovers. No real apologies. Countless hate texts. I just don’t understand how someone can be so hurtful. I think I have a problem balancing and creating boundaries. It got me into some serious trouble this time. I know I was dealing with someone who had some personal issues. After the stories I’ve told my therapist, I’m sure I could fill 100 pages at least. I just alternate between ‘what if I did this to show her I still care’ to the ‘GTFO man, you’re better than this.’
Thank you Dr. T. I found this site a year ago by googling ‘verbally abusive girlfriend’ after getting the marriage ultimatum and I think reading articles and comments has shed light on something that has probably saved me even more heartache and possibly from getting wrongfully put in jail.
“Having borderline personality disorder is not an excuse for what she did to Travis Alexander,” Willmott told the jury. It is a reason “that you have to be merciful.”
Quote from Jodi Arias’ defense attorney, Jennifer Willmott, during the penalty phase for stabbing and slashing Travis Alexander nearly 30 times, shooting him in the head and nearly decapitating him.
http://news.yahoo.com/arias-asks-jury-her-life-prison-193824363.html
But Borderlines are nice people and should be empathized with and understood…
So twisted! Who does that?… oh that’s right.. psychopath’s do that.
I sometimes joke about the ex, and the other Borderline/Clusters/Sociopaths that I’ve attracted in my life, but after seeing and reading the case about Travis Alexander & Jodi Arias…it really drives home how dangerous these people are, and Jodi Arias scarily reminds me in many ways of the ex wife. I use humor as coping mechanism, but always gotta remember things can go ugly quickly and it may not just be a matter of your emotional/financial health, but indeed a life-and-death situation.
Hello,
Thank you all for what you do. Dr. T your calling it like it really is in our really screwed up culture of PC, feminazi, crazy, stranglehold, that pervades our culture, is very supportive.
This article really strikes home with me.
I’m finally realizing just how screwed up my parents really are (mother, extreme overt manipulator control freak, father, extreme covert manipulator, control freak), which has manifested my seeking a life partner whom is ( by her own admission) the Master Manipulator.
I’m finally realizing I was the frog trying to “love” the scorpion. Problem is, our definition of love is different. I thought love means unconditional support in growing to be a better person (and what better way to do that than having a “team mate” on your side) to help each other “win” in such a naturally competitive world. Her definition is merely, love me unconditionally, even when I’m bad, and allow me to do whatever I want, and assume all the consequences for my bad decisions. As well as respond by saying, “Thank you, may I have another. Meanwhile, constantly allow me to tear you apart, so I can feel better about myself.
She has masterfully used the unbiased,completely fair minded legal system to her advantage, removing me from my role as a father, and has placed new guy, whom seems to understand her definition of love, as what it really is, meanwhile, she still has the advantage to feed her narsassistic rage and control two make herself feel better about herself, at my expense.
I have contacted every possible “legal” entity for assistance in her continued bad behavior, only to be met with the most supportive response, “She seems to know just how far she can go without doing anything that we can do about it.”
Well, she finally stepped, seemingly “over the line”, she tried to force her way into my house, when I chose to disengage from the impending rage. The law enforcement agency finally took a report, with the intent of filing charges for trespass. Though, I had to prove that the incident was also domestic violence, in order to get the officer to file a charge of domestic assault 3rd. The only reason I was able to do so, was because I’m a retired police officer myself and was able to prove to him that his definition of “family” was wrong. He reluctantly filed the additional charge for me, but flat told me that the prosecuting attorney won’t file on the domestic, and will most likely take the trespass under advisement, since it’s such a “minor” crime.
This leads me to ask a question, if she is made to feel some discomfort by the legal system, what’s the likelihood that she will try to manufacture an instance to bring similar or worse action upon me?
I can easily see her doing something like coming on to me sexually, only to cry rape afterwords, or worse, claim some crime against my children, whom are so afraid of her they willingly do her bidding, even though they know it’s wrong, and really not want to hurt me, but fear her wrath to themselves more than their fear of hurting me.
I’m afraid if she would come on to me, I don’t think I could resist her advances, which would leave me like a sitting duck.
What’s my next step?
If she somehow gets near you, activate your anti-crazy shields and don’t let her control the conversation or advance on you sexually. So do yourself a HUGE favor and don’t talk to her because you’ve been through a lot already. She’s looking to be enabled and that’s not cool. She needs help and you are in love with someone that doesn’t give a shit about your feelings bro. She’ll be using this ‘new guy’ as a punching bag soon. You deserve better.
I don’t know about you but almost every time there was an effort on my ex’s part to contact, I was the one wanting the hugs and apologizing. I figured it was because I wanted to work it all out and be happy together. It just wasn’t happening because anything I said or did to appease her – didn’t even matter! She was very hurtful. Abusers only hear their demands in their little pea sized special universe and do not think outside the box.
Be strong, friend.
Has anyone experienced their BPD suffering from strange illnesses? Mine diagnosed herself with “adrenal fatigue syndrome” and found a wellness MD to treat her symptoms……of course the doctor does not accept insurance (because ins companies wont pay) and it was all very expensive: special vitamins, other supplements that were sold by the doctor and prescriptions that had to be filled at compounding pharmacies.
Its a catch all disease originating in the wellness community where (they claim) the bodies adrenal system shuts down because of severe emotional and physical stress. The Mayo clinic has called BS on this and it is not a recognized medical diagnosis.
They suffer from fatigue, weight loss, hair loss and a variety of other “victim” like maladies (and she is a Waif). Of course every time she would get caught in a deception, omission or outright lie and get caught, my “anger” would would stress her out and she could manipulate the situation and turn it back on me because I was making her sick.
Could it be all her inner emotional turmoil manifesting itself in physical ailments?
good article about waifs:
http://gettinbetter.com/waif.html
victims of CBs have many physical ailments, abusers usually don’t. Abusers can fake victimhood but they cannot hide their good physical health (it betrays them 🙂 ). Waifs are bit different, they deliberately do things that will make them look poor and abused.
I think that adrenal fatigue syndrome is reserved for the real victims, maybe dr T could tell us more about it…
“A Borderline waif is often hypochondriacal. Illness and ailments are usually the direct result of years of unresolved emotional trauma, which cannot help but manifest in the physical body. They’ve learned that people generally respond with sympathy to victims–whether their unfortunate plight is due to health or financial setbacks. You’ll feel guilty if you don’t do whatever you can to help this person, even if it’s finding them lodgings, a job, food for their kid or dog to eat, paying for their car repairs, etc. What you don’t get, is that the list never ends! You’re never off the hook for bailing them out of one drama or another, and even when they swear “this is the last time,” they’ll still turn to you for help the next time there’s a need. A sucker is born every day–and the brutal reality is, if you won’t come to her rescue, the next ‘hero’ she bumps into, will. Borderlines are extremely resourceful, and there’s always someone around who’ll pick up the pieces of their pitiful life. Problem is, he’ll be used and discarded, precisely as you have been.” -from Shari Schreiber
Thanks cicak ……. Dr T and Shari Schreiber have helped tremendously and I have read this article many times. I was wondering if other Non’s have experienced this weapon from the Waif.
Seems like these “Wellness Doctors” just feed the BPD’s narcissism. They pump them full of expensive supplements, thyroid medicines, meds to manage cortisol levels, etc. As I stated, Adrenal Fatigue Syndrome is not a recognized medical diagnosis and Endocrinologist have been published basically calling it “witch doctoring” with great potential harm because many of the supplements are not FDA reviewed, etc. My ex was obsessed with staying “young” and even said once “I will fight aging until my dying day”. She is 45 with bleach blonde hair, fake boobs, and applies rub on tan year round (she didn’t like to sun because it would age her skin).Hell, she diagnosed herself and would call in symptoms and the doctor would just phone in prescriptions to the compound pharmacist.
my mother is a Waif and she can manipulate any doctor into prescribing her whatever she wants, especially young and inexperienced doctors.
If your bpd really suffers adrenal fatigue she would certainly benefit from thai chi and chi gong. I never really liked alternative medicine but these things, combined with healthy lifestyle, helped me a lot with some problems i had that are similar to symptoms of adrenal fatigue.
Maybe this isn’t the right article to add what I’m about to comment on, but I feel it’s pertinent.
Seems to me that what these women truly desire is a “real” man. What I mean is either a man who’s either able to generate substantial income, very exciting and confident, maybe has a dangerous profession, just basically a confident “masculine, man.
What happens when they find one? They proceed to “change” him, to woosify him, and turn him into the exact opposite of who he really is.
If the man resists, it’s immediate conflict, until he either leaves her or winds up in jail. If he capitulates to her vision of what she’s trying to mold him into, she no longer respects him and he becomes EXACTLY what she doesn’t want in a man in the first place. Then the belittling begins and ultimate destruction of (what’s really fairly fragile), the masculine ego.
Just more of the self sabotage that they can’t seem to avoid throughout their miserable existence.
Plummer, I have a dissenting opinion on your perspective. In my experience, both personally and through friends, acquaintances, this & other websites, in general – these women look for ‘weaker’ men who are ‘easy pickings’.
Men who have low self esteem, a need for approval, lonely, less social power, etc. are much easier & tasty targets to abuse so they can feel better about themselves. They are predators and predators go for the easiest prey. Wolves usually don’t go for the strongest buck of the herd, they go for a sickly one or a younger, slower deer.
I do believe these women can & do dump ‘weaker’ men for ‘stronger’ men, as a temporary ‘upgrade’. However, from what I’ve seen, these ‘stronger’ men are often rife with their own problems including Borderline Personality, career criminal, drug addiction, physical & emotional abuse, etc. The ‘upgrade’ is often a ‘downgrade’ in reality.
The dynamics of the relationships & situations vary of course, but I believe in general these women look for men who have issues that already ‘cripple’ or ‘disable’ them in some capacity, which makes it easier for these predatory women to swoop in and take control of the situation. These women are eerily keen on seeking & finding these weaknesses in men & exploiting them. Just as any good sociopathic opportunist does.
Well then,
I guess you just put me in my place. Here I thought my exsociopath chose a pretty good catch from the start.
When she moved in on the second night after our first date, she had already known that I owned 3 houses, a already veteran police officer of 9 years ( I was only 27 at the time), I had a gorgeous Harley, a 98 mph boat, and several cars. What she didn’t know that I had no personal debt, other than home loans that the rental,
income was so net positive, my housing was free, as well as a IRA with 20k in it. I was also working for a friend of mine learning the plumbing trade.
Didn’t take long and I was paying off her car, as she was about to lose it, financing her custody battle over her daughter, all the while, not noticing that I was slipping into debt.
13 years later, after I had bought her three new luxury Suv’s, maintained her $6000 per month credit card habit, that she refused to even look at, she decides that her best friends husband is more worthy of her affections than I am. I retired early, as my now 7 am plumbing company was tapping $1,000,000 in gross sales, numerous years in a row.
So, I guess I’m a weak minded panzy, easy mark. Actually, what we fought about most is the fact that I held her accountable way more than she got away with. She is ultimately looking for enablement, not challenging her to be better, while giving unconditional support, which is true love.
BTW, I’m only joking with the smart ass tone of this post. I do get what you mean, as that is exactly what she has in her best friends husband right now. Wonder how long it will take before she figures out he’s not worth of her respect either.
Well “theplummer”, “cuatezon”just held up a mirror to your face and apparently you don’t like it. A real man takes care of his business and doesn’t brag about himself on either a first date (and have a lady move in the second day) or in an online post. You were an easy mark for her if you gushed all this to her after meeting her for that first drink ………and she milked the big, bad, macho real man for 13 years? I have read hundreds of replies on this and other sites and 99% have a theme in common; I am hurting, confused, and I want to heal …… your “resume” reminds me of my ex fiance declaring yourself a pot of gold and blaming others for what seems to be your bruised ego and teenage finger pointing. You are still looking for attention and validation. Looks like she capitalized on your “macho” over compensation with the “hey, look at me” boats, fast cars, etc. Honestly, you sound more like one of the BPD’s (and like I said, my Barbie ex) then one of the real men truly looking to gather themselves out of the ashes and find themselves again. And I am sure the smart ass tone is a true reflection of you and your attitude in general. There is no difference in a male walking into a bar bragging about his toys (and I bet always the loudest in any group he is in) and the BPD with her fake boobs pushed up to her chin and 6 inch heels …. both are lost souls looking for each other.
Your right, about the bragging type in me, that’s one I’ve been working on for the last 18 months. But your wrong about me telling her everything on the first date, innocent enough as I didn’t reveal to you that we had been talking extensively for months prior to me asking her out. I only asked her out when I got a phone call from a “friend” that informed me that she wished I would ask her out. So, our first real date was probably months prior, but was formed in the “friend zone”.
And no, I’m perfectly content in laughing at myself now, as I’m the only one responsible for not picking up on the glaring headlight of the impending train wreck that my life has become, just because I thought I was “man enough to handle her”, and show her a better life.
Maybe I was too forward with her too early, but when you spend time talking to someone, you naturally reveal yourself to others.
Your bitchslap here is well taken, my friend, I prefer being told without the sugar coating, I think that’s a waste of time.
Thanks again for caring enough to “square me up” again.
I could sense a guy who could quickly fall down that slippery slope again if he didn’t take a long look as to what he was responsible for in this as well. We allow these ladies in and out of our lives and its up to us to get help. Its not something we can do alone. Professional support and validation from our brethren like here on this site. I was so relieved to read others’ stories and feel validated as to my own experiences. It was embarrassing to look back and see what I allowed a Barbie doll to do to me. I had to own the fact I volunteered for this pain. It takes time but merely allowing the months to go by without actual work is wasted time. That weak link is still there unless you come to grips with it and fix it.
My daughters, who were 15 and 12, when I ended things with my ex-fiance were the ones who bitch slapped me. They saw through everything but I didn’t listen. Its also been 18 months for me and I want nothing to do with her. I had an emotionally/physically abusive mother. Barbie had a passive father and a bitch of a mother. She competed for attention from her Dad with her Mom, and was jealous of all women, even my daughters. These women get their hooks in by instinctively finding our weakest link. I have chosen not to date much during this time so I can fix that weakness or brokenness from my upbringing that made me vulnerable to her kind.
Barbie has tried repeatedly to initiate contact over the last 18 months and I have held firm to no contact. I saw her at an intersection recently and we made eye contact. First time in 18 months. I felt surprise, but that was it. I turned left turned up my favorite radio station and smiled to myself.
Glad to see you’ve come out of the FOG. Keep up the good work!
I myself am having issues that are beyond the scope of this website. You see I’m a died in the wool Catholic and this site is pretty much secular, so I have to be careful how I take the advice given here. RELIGIOUS TALK REMOVED BY SITE ADMIN.
RELIGIOUS TALK REMOVED BY ADMIN.
Continued best wishes in your struggle my new friend.
Plummer – I don’t mean to pick on you, but I must respond to the Catholic dialogue here. I don’t want to see you suffer indefinitely. I too was raised Catholic, went to Catholic High School, married in the Catholic Church, and when I got married it was for life to my wife.
This old school Catholic thinking kept me in a hellbound marriage, and nearly destroyed me as a human being. I stayed with her through kicking, slapping, stealing, cheating, lying, emotional abuse, emasculation, betryal, use-and-abuse of every sort. Hallucinations, accusations, stealing my mail, turning my family against me, using the kids as weapons against me. I simply do not have enough time or room her to go into detail, but you get the picture.
I suffered enormously b/c of this woman, and b/c I choose to stay in the marriage for so long thanks to my old school Catholic beliefs. I thought God would rather have me get kicked, slapped, stolen from, become emotionally and physically ill, and even perhaps die, rather than divorce and live.
Bottom line is, Jesus Christ doesn’t want you to suffer and die b/c of a sociopath. You have a right, and an obligation, for self preservation.
I’m not sure if I’d be alive right now if I hadn’t separated & divorced. I definitely would be seriously physically ill, as I was showing severe stress signs & depression, pre-diabetes, etc. All of it went away when she went away and I got help.
So if you have kids, then do whats right for you & your children to be a good father. Self-preservation will make you a better person, and father. You may also live quite a bit longer which of course benefits your children too. God does not want you to suffer unnecessarily. Thats an old Catholic-control trick and something you may want to let go of. It took me years to do so, but I’m in a far better place now that I did. Peace.
Wow. Plummer I think you misinterpreted my post, and/or I didn’t clarify. I’m one of these easy going, kinda passive, nice guys, i.e., ‘weak’ in a predators eyes. I wasn’t insinuating that you were weak or a wimp. Nor am I.
What I was trying to convey is that many male victims of these female predators appear weak, are often a bit passive, and often caught off guard and unprepared for the storm. Many of us have low self esteem. Sometimes that low self esteem & insecurity displays itself in passiveness & inability to set boundaries, like me…or…perhaps in your case, in overly macho and boastful expression.
Either way, we’re human and these female predators WILL find your weakness my friend, and they WILl exploit it…and they WILL enjoy seeing your emotional distress and downfall. Make no mistake about it, they are cunning & know what they are doing. Just look at the Jodi Arias murder trial over in Arizona. She’s a confirmed diagnosed Borderline Personality – a creepy kind of creature that many of us here have lived with & mated with.
Cuatazon, it’s all good. Like I clarified in my first response, I was only joking, really. I’ve read lots of your responses here and I know how sincere you really are. That’s why I don’t like written conversation, voice inflection gets lost in the conversation.
As far as the “old school Catholic thing”, I was trying to articulate(apparantly not very well) that one CAN live in both worlds, you don’t have to give up your faith to get rid of a problem. You just have to be willing to give it more time to work out.
By the way, no Catholic teaching would EVER teach you to stay in abuse, they would always tell you to seek safety for you and the children! They would condone you separating for a time, through much prayer and reflection, you would be lead to a right resolution.
Old school Catholic as you put it, does have an avenue for relief though, through the annulment process. That’s where I’m at right now. I want to know that I’m doing the right thing. I only wish American Catholic Churches had the same policy as the rest of the world, which is to seek annulment before seeking a legal divorce. Sure would help with the exit strategy if the policy were reversed.
Again, it’s not all for not. I am becoming a better person for what I’m going through. Even though its pretty rough right now. I probably wouldn’t be here writing this today if not for the strengthening in my faith.
Moderator,
Is there a problem with my last two posts? I see that they are “awaiting moderation”, while a post responding to my post by acute on has already cleared moderation. His response doesn’t make sense without mine being admitted.
I’ve read the rules for commenting and I don’t believe I’ve violated them, unless expressing my faith beliefs is somehow a violation.
I wish you would allow them to stand as they are, simply because there are many of us believers that may not understand or accept either Dr. T’s advice, or they may believe they have to give up on their faith to accept her teaching. I’m an advocate that both can be maintained simultaneously.
Cautezon’s response to me (that has already been allowed) is a perfect example of why my posts are important.
Hello theplummer,
I am aware that cuatezon’s comments don’t make sense with your comments removed. I unapproved your comments because this is not a faith-based site.
There are people of many faiths, agnostics and atheists who come here and if I let your comments stand about Jesus being your lord and savior, then it opens up the floodgates to more faith-based talk that many readers find offensive. It is enough to say that your religious beliefs make divorce an unattractive option and leave it at that.
I will re-post your comments, but if the religious talk persists, I will remove them and all subsequent comments will be held in moderation instead of automatically posting.
Kind Regards,
Dr Tara
Hope I didn’t cause a commotion. I’m a very spiritual person and believe in God etc.
I probably don’t communicate it too well, but the point I was driving home is the religious dogma/rules kept me in a very bad situation and I got no support, help or understanding from religious people on dealing with a sociopath. On the contrary, I mostly got more guilt & shame. Just what I need. Not! Many pastors, priests, rabbis et al are in denial about sociopaths and don’t know how to deal with it.
in my opinion, both ‘weak’ and ‘strong’ can be victims. Even some of the strongest, smartest and most capable people can have deep chilhood wounds. I think what most victims have in common is good personality, high moral values, honesty…and that’s important, not the ‘macho-alfa-real man’ thing…
Well said cicak. I agree.
I agree, my values landed me in deep poop. But not because I had them, because I had someone abuse them. I was strong determined and even good looking. Now all I feel is guilt and regrets, the what ifs and all that. I compare myself to her down grade boyfriend and wonder if I was the crazy one. Wish me luck in court.
Ok, so I left four months ago. Filed for divorce, she took the kids away from me and cut all communications from them. When she was served she filed a c.p o. And Ihhaven’t spoken with the kids for a long time. The judge said I can text about the kids but she won’t respond. Any suggestions? ( she was a nurse trained in behaviors )
Tripium, I understand your dilemna with values. I too had them & was taken advantage of for being ‘chivalrous’, ‘patient’ ‘kind’ and ‘understanding’. Read: Abused, Abused, Abused and, Abused. Victims often feel guilty, thinking of the what ifs, if I had just done this differntly, just kept quiet, just ABC. But we’re not responsible for others’ behavior. While partners do influence each other in a relationship, our ex-sociopaths make their own decisions and we are not responsible for that. Took me a long time to absorb this truth.
Your ex is engaging in PAS (Parental Alienation Syndrome). Its an awful thing to do, its a form of psychological abuse/child abuse. The mental health guide DSM V(?) that just came out now officially recognizes, albeit in a watered-down way, that PAS is mental illness kinda deal. So in laymans terms in took the ‘mental health experts’ 30 fucking years to declare PAS as real and PAS is destructive. Incredible.
I suggest reading up on PAS. It helps you put a face/name to the disease & what your ex is doing. Its not you; its her. There are more & more PAS support groups forming around the country. There is even an international PAS organization you can find their website on internet. Good info & lists support groups. Get emotional support asap. My first experience w/ PAS was back in the early 90s, when people were in severe denial about PAS and female abuse against men (including my own serious denial). I went at it alone for a long time. It was very depressing and the abuse & injustice by the legal sytem only made it worse. So I strongly suggest getting connected, as you’ve done here on this site, and getting the support.
Document everything. Every text, email, call, etc. Record ALL calls/communication with your children & ex. Never know she could spontaneously say something to you that would incriminate her with the court/therapists. I hope things come along better for you in this situation.
Hi. I have now read this 5x and I have to say it “clicks” with me and is a life changing article. My parents were of the driven variety, nothing was ever good enough and as for physical show of love like hugs etc…It just didn’t happen, in fact it still doesn’t, hugging my mum is like when Sheldon on Big Bang Theory hugs someone, it is so awkward.
Concequently I have sought love from women that at first appeared so loving and normal but slowly turned into complete nut jobs. I guess they have a sixth sense way of sensing our need to be loved both physically and emotionally. Interestingly she did have an abusive mother as well, in fact the abuse was still continuing when the mother felt like it, and for this very reason I made excuses and was sure my love could “fix” her.
But alas it cannot and the crazy just gets worse and worse. The more they get you right where they want you the more the screw turns. Yes you blame yourself…the but if and what if scenario was something my own daughter was sick of hearing. One day she just told me point blank “dad she is nuts, no you cannot ever fix her and if you keep going back you WILL end up either dead or arrested for murder yourself!”
So I got out and now I read an article like this and it is like a translator for all the messed up feelings and what ifs that I still carry around with me.
And for that Dr T you deserve a large Thank you from all the people on here. You bring order to minds that have been through the ringer. Thanks for the answers.
Pretty sure I fall into this category of feeling stuck . Although I have made mistakes she will make sure she brings them up anytime and anyday . A lot of double standards. My hardest part is the kids side she is not the emotional bully to the kids as she is to me . The other is we have 2 kids with Autism and I believe she has Asperger’s as well. as a lot of aspie characteristics are about not social very “logical” . My biggest issue in my head is that she has cut me off from any friends family etc.. Feeling lost and border line depressed. I know my kids would e devastated for a while and I don’t think they see the struggles I go through with her. Im very inspired to “run” when reading these articles just always wonder if maybe I didn’t fertilize the grass enough ??
Hello Everyone….This is a new post as you seem like a wonderful group of people and I hope that you can provide some insight.
I have known my ex for over 10 years now and was actually with her for approximately 8 years. I have no children but she has 2, one from a previous marriage and the other from an ex-boyfriend (girls – ages 17 and 11). We broke up late last July after I felt that once again she was ignoring me. She has a very toxic personality, very negative, victim mentality, signs of instability and all that would go along with that. Her ex does not pay child support and she has had a difficult time handling her bills. DID I MENTION THAT I MET HER AT WORK AND AS OF LAST FRIDAY, SHE HAS BEEN AT THE SAME COMPANY SINCE THE BREAKUP. She has now gotten a new, very risky job in terms of salary potential.
For the first months after the breakup she would make a point to flaunt herself and walk by my office, bump into me in the parking lot and tell me how wonderful her life was without me. She broke down in October and told me that she wanted me back but that she really has no time as the ex no longer takes the children on the weekends and scheduled weekdays of the parenting plan. Another point there as our relationship was somewhat part time as we would spend our alone time every other weekend and on the designated week nights. I would come over on the alternating weekends and by dinner on Saturdays. The girls are not parented well and are somewhat out of control and were not necessarily big fans of mine. I am successful, have a good job, home and nice car and nice things in general. She always wanted us to get married but I did not know if I could handle moving the girls in. I have been divorced once and felt that this was the recipe for divorce #2.
At work she would tend to visit me throughout the week and we would go to lunch every so often however, all too often she would be obnoxious, angry or mopy telling me how much she missed me but did not have the time for me. She has also used work to plant stories with people in my department telling them that she has been seeing a guy who is 12-13 years younger than her. When confronted she would say that it was a lie and she never said such things. I am a dope as I would continue to cater to her whims and would obsess on when or if she would contact me at work.
She would not contact me after work or on the weekends. One of her daughters was diagnosed with a serious eating disorder after the breakup and has been in therapy and treatment since. We have been in communication more so at work for the past few weeks and she has found a new job that she starts tomorrow. It should be a blessing as she can no longer bother me at work but again, I will miss her in some strange way and feel that void.
Fast forward to this weekend. On her last day on Friday we left at noon for a company function and had the rest of the afternoon off. As she made her rounds saying goodbye to coworkers, I overheard one of my reps say, “You’re still seeing that one guy though, right”. I was walking to the restroom and kept walking. I came out and heard her mention “there are pros and cons to it”. My assumption would be pros and cons to dating a neighbor downstairs. Also, I have been on match.com since last fall and she would troll the site I guess to see if I was on it. She brings up repeatedly that I am actively looking for women and that I don’t care about her. It has actually made me limit any match.com activity.
When we left last Friday, I told her that I heard what my rep said about the “guy”. She flipped out and stormed out of my office. I followed her to her car as we were supposed to be going out that afternoon to run together and have lunch. I sat in her car and she said that she had no idea what I was talking about regarding what I thought that I heard. She then said that she would “plant” this information to attempt to make me jealous, after all, I am on match.com and how should she feel. I said that I was going to my car and would leave her alone. She stated that she was violent and didn’t care who she hurt. She hit me somewhat hard on the side of my head and attempted to swing at my chest but I held her back. We agreed to attempt to go out that afternoon as I told her that I would buy her a couple of workout tops for her new job. BTW, while standing in the parking lot upon telling her that I was leaving she said, “Give me some f***ing money…I’m broke and today was my last paycheck”. We met at the shopping center and she would not get out of her car. She pulled a knife out of one of her boxes from work threatening to hurt herself. I grabbed it and took it away. Honestly, I doubt that she was going to do anything. While I was talking with her the phone rang and it was for another interview for her new profession to which she answered perfectly cool, calm and collected.
We bought the shirts and tried to put the drama behind us. We did run together which was nice. We had a 5K planned for this morning which we had never done together as I took it up after our breakup. She had always been a runner and texted me last weekend that she wanted us to sign up for the race for this weekend.
After running Friday we had a late lunch and she left shortly after. I look at my behavior of being so supportive and giving positive strokes while all she could do was talk about herself. I feel like a sucker. We did not hook up either. We also had plans for yesterday and she did come over in the afternoon and we went to lunch and shopping for other things for the new job. One of her kids called and she had to leave and cut the afternoon short. It came down to today. She came to my home at the agreed time and she told me that I was lucky that she was even there as she hurt her leg. She was a royal bitch and when I was unresponsive she would say “so you are mad at me too”. She complained about how miserable her life is and if I could spend a day in her shoes I couldn’t handle it. She and her oldest child constantly fight and evidently had it out all night the evening before. It was a very dramatic horrible drive to the race and she also informed me that although we had plans to go to breakfast that she had a change of plans as she had to take the youngest to the ex’s for fathers day.
I really had nothing to say to her and told her that I just wanted to run the race. The race started and she was juking in and out of the 1500 people. I could not keep up with her path so I took my own path on the outside. Turns out I beat her by 1 minute. She was livid and talking about what a failure she is and how could I do this to her. We got back to the car to leave after driving to get her car. She was so nasty and I realized that this could be closure as I can now follow NC since she is no longer at work. She started complaining again and talking about how she had to go and I said “There were a lot of firsts and lasts this weekend and it has been interesting to say the least beginning with Friday and what I heard.” She said “What is that supposed to mean?” I told her that it was clear that she had been lying to me for quite some time to which she became angry. I told her that I would leave her alone, we hugged each other and gave each other a kiss and I told her that I loved her and wish her the best.
Do I really think that she will contact me or not? Hard to say but perhaps these potential last moments/days together where I confronted her will cause her to stop. I NEVER contacted her at work for the past 10 months. The longest that we went was almost 2 weeks but then she would show up and have some reason why she had to talk to me whether missing me, her life sucks or whatever else. This is toxic and I couldn’t marry this person in this state of mind but she has been this way more or less since the beginning. We broke up a couple of other times but would get back together and she would return to her normal self within a matter of days. I’d like to know anyone’s thoughts about this. It should be clear that this is good for me and that this last does of negativity and lying should put me on the right path.
I am really sorry for the novel. I just wanted to get the general idea out to everyone. Believe me, there is much much more that I have not included but would really appreciate your feedback. Thanks for reading.
Robroy, thanks for sharing. So you’re not married to her, and have no children with her. Here is my recommended course of action to take immediately:
1) CYB – Count Your Blessings, and;
2) GTFO – Get The Fuck Out
Get out before you ended up married, shacked up, and/or procreating with her.
I can’t add much more than this.
Cuatezon…Thank you for your feedback as it is very simple but very true. She cannot procreate any longer as she had a historectomy several years ago after an auto accident. Yep. Marriage would lead to divorce and this is the type of woman who would laugh in my face as she would take my home and half of my stuff. At this point I am out and she is no longer at the workplace as she started a new, risky career a few days ago. The best thing that will happen is to not be contacted by her but my instinct tells me that once the dust settles and she is over the initial excitement she will attempt to get in touch. I have to be prepared to avoid, ignore and move the fuck on. Thanks again for your thoughts. Much appreciated. I am dealing with someone who is not all there.
Hello Everyone,
I happened to come upon this site after some crazy episodes with my ex. Not sure where to start but I will be as brief as possible as some items, I feel, are constant cliches. Met this beautiful girl “online” about 10 years my junior ( was 39 and she was 29) last Jan 2012.
Everything started off great she was smart (was working on her Masters and now she is applying for her PHD, business minded (I put her in charge of one of my business as she was free and not working at the time), beautiful/sexy admired by others, she was helpful, great cook, and of course sex was out of this world. She had a bubbly personality and my family loved her. A few months into the relationship she put a time limit on a year as to when we would be married, which I found odd. I had never really wanted to be married, even in past relationships, but I seriously thought I could go through i with this woman as she had all the right qualities that. She even had my dad thinking, “hey you should look at marrying this woman.” Fast forward a few months, I learn she is on ADHD medication, medication for sleep disorders, and also depression medication. She has only been in one serious relationship and that ended badly for whatever reason. I was basically her second boyfriend and she was 29 years of age. The rest were a slew of dates. I also find out that she is completely estranged from her mother and they have not talked to each other in over 12 years and they only live about 15 miles away. She has it out with her father over a minor disagreement, who she breaks off total communication from for about two months, only to rekindle a few months later. She fights with a couple of friends and breaks off communication them, and she fights with me a couple of my business clients and then the final straw my family. I had taken her to visit my family in June, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. All three events that that everyone thought went off relatively well. My family took her in and treated her with respect and love. Everyone laughed, shared had fun and then all hell broke loose the day we were to leave.
As we are getting ready to leave my mom and dad’s on Christmas Day she goes off on my mom over the littlest of things that happened back during Thanksgiving and over the Christmas holidays. She even requests to talk to my sister over events that happened back in June that my sister had no idea what she was even talking about.
During the Christmas Day meltdown with my mother we were all in complete shock. During the “meeting” my mom tries to rebutt my ex gf’s objections and she tells my mom to be quiet and to let her finish. This happens all under my parents house and as we are getting ready to leave. We had stayed at their place, ate their food and overall had a great time for about a week or so. My parents and entire family is shocked by her behavior and decide to cut off all communication with her, while I hang in there with her and fight amongst my ex and my parents. I basically choose to be stuck in the middle of all this drama all the while having her work for me (which she still does to this day but on reduced schedule)
A couple months past and she is pregnant with our child. She pleads to get married and I refuse as the issue with her emotional outbursts and the fight with my family leaves me feeling beyond uncomfortable. She continues to go off on my family (telling me that my mom is a bitch and a psychpath) sending them psycho babble e-mails justifying her actions and her emotions on her counseling sessions and her behavior over the holidays. She calls to apologize to my family and basically receives no response and blames me and continues to bad mouth my family. I could go on and on, as there is more but when we learn she is pregnant she basically tells me that she does not trust my family, me etc. It is almost like she is projecting her hatred and issues with her own mother on to mine. There are so many others things to type, craze filled text messages, threats, bad mouthing my family, the list goes on and on and I am sure has been repeated on these boards numerous times. Basically, I tell her that I will be there for the child and that we need to work on logical steps to resolve stressful situations, getting along being friends. I get different attitudes and emotions day to day with her. I get called names, a liar, non trust worthy, a victim, then I get love and hugs.
and they I get the nice treatment and told that I am loved while on the other head she plays the victim and tell me what man would walk around with a woman who is pregnant with his child and no marry her!!! The horror!! She plays the victim. Her friends, that she is not estranged from, see a wonderful caring human being and see me as this great businessman who is scared to marry and does not want to take the responsibility. They do not know the underbelly of this woman. Anyway, I have so much more to type about this woman. It has been very stressful the past six months and the addition of the child has only added to it with my family, her constant marriage talk and her emotional lashing when things do not go her way. Although, I am excited to be a first time father, I feel it will be a struggle raising a child with this woman and her emotional baggage. Although, she has basically project managed the birth and the needs/care of the baby to what seems like her exact science, the ability to take care of a small rescued dog was outside of what she could handle. Even after all of this, I still miss her and want to be with her and I have been through a lot. Anyway, more to follow, even after this long rant.
Tek, thanks for sharing. Challenging situation for you I’m sure, yet there is plenty to be hopeful/thankful for. You haven’t married her – GOOD CHOICE. Really, can’t emphasize enough thats a good move to not marry her.
You’ve got a liability on the business side. If she’s running the business, I’d demote her to a clerical position where she can’t do too much damage or get her a job with some other employer. If she gets angry, well, when she gets angry with you in the future, she could slander you with your clients and other employees and cause a lot of damage, steal money, etc. etc. Limit your business/financial liability there.
Under no circumstances should you marry her. If you do, it will be exponentially more painful emotionally, financially and legally. She’ll get half your ass-ets plus alimony. Courts/judges/psychologists will crucify you and shame you to no end.
Get a DNA test on the child. If its your child, you should consider getting full custody. Start documenting everything right now. Record calls, save voicemails, keep the emails, etc. Do all you legally can to document her behavior and instability. If you can’t get custody, maybe split custody then or some other generous visitation arrangement(?). Again, courts/judges/lawyers/psychologists are not your friend in this situation.
Hope this helps and try to keep your sanity as you navigate this situation.
Thanks for the reply Cuatezon,
It has been overly dramatic being around here on a almost semi-daily basis with business and with her pregnancy it has been amplified, since my last posting. To be brief it all came to a halt this past week when we were working and she continued to bag on my family and threatened that my family would not see my child without her around. She called me something lame and then I told her that the should be lucky that she had a job, and a good job at that. She basically quit on the spot after hearing those words, flipped me off and told me that I could pay all of her bills and blah, blah. I told her that this is the reason why I do not want to marry or be around you and that we need to make logical/rational decisions with our child as the child will obviously cause stress and we have to handle things in the correct manner. I took a good three to four day break, after she fired off a crazy emotional e-mail to my family and her dad, and then heard from her last night. She played the guilt trips that she was stressed and cried because I told her that I did not want to marry her. I told her, in the most basic manner, that I am only repeating what you have been saying to me on a repeated basis. So it has been peaceful and the business has been humming along fine without her. Granted she put a lot of the procedures and policies in place while we were dating and I was also working a primary business, but business has to move on. am very glad I did not decide to marry even though she can tug at my heart strings from time to time and basically says that never wanted the responsibility of marriage etc. I basically take it day by day and try to remain calm. I plan on getting a DNA test and rights to take care of my child, this despite the fact that she has repeatedly told me that she will not keep my child from me etc. Stressful situation nonetheless but hopefully it will get better with time. More updates to follow…
het tek
let me give you some advice
DONT give her 1 penny towards the child until you do a paternity test, there was a case in PA. I believe where a guy was paying child support and then found out the child was someone else from his wife being unfaithful, guess what? joe judge told him, “you pay 1 payment you pay for life” I think it was on 60 minutes, look it up online, its the law of the land, and having 2 children from two different moms( which doesn’t say much for me) I actualy side with the judge, otherwise every bpd man would be in court trying to get out of paying, and exposing there children to that would ruin them for life, so good luck, and trust me, I know, these people were put on the planet to test us, you will pass the test, but its tougher than joining the navy seals,
Tek, I’m watching the Clint Eastwood classic ‘Play Misty for Me’ as I type this (its been re-running on cable TV the past month like crazy, not sure why, maybe we’re influencing cable TV programming now?).
Sounds like you’re on the right path. I do detect some nostalgia/reminiscing (“she tugs on my heart strings”). In my own experience, this was my own personal red flag that I ignored, meaning, I still had weaknesses/vulnerability and reconciled with my ex on various occasions when I could have escaped with less damage. So, I’d recommend getting some counseling from someone who is well-versed in Borderlines/Narcissists/Sociopaths. It helped me see some things I was doing that I wasn’t quite aware of.
Keep preparing for the birth of the baby, and I echo ‘Mustbedumb’ regarding child support. Don’t do anything that acknowledges paternity, including giving her money. Maybe you could give her cash on the side for now & never acknowledge it. That way your conscience is clear for now but she can’t trace/prove you’ve been paying her. Better yet, talk to an attorney now!
Keep us posted.
Thanks for the article.
I was raised by a verbally/emotionally abusive father who terrorized both my mom and the kids. Sure enough when I met my wife I found the female version of his personality. Thankfully we did not have kids of our own.
I put up with so much abuse I won’t catalog it here, suffice to say a couple weeks ago I got fed up, and made it clear to her that I would not be supporting her and paying for her school if she continued to abuse me, and that she’d better quit school and look for a job if she did not apologize for her most recent abuse.
Instead of any kind of apology she went to a lawyer to file a divorce. Good. I’ve had enough, 18 years of crazy jealous bullshit, emotional, and verbal abuse. She even got physical twice, both times claiming she wouldn’t do so again, but we did get to two times didn’t we.
I’ll need to stay strong, and realize that I put up with the abuse not because I love her so much, but because my childhood taught me that abuse from a loved one is normal, acceptable…
It took my poor mom nearly 40 years of abuse before she finally left my dad. I’m so glad my wife is so confident that she can find another victim that she is releasing me because I final asserted myself. Its so ironic that it took her actions to file for divorce, but now I enthusiastically agree its what I want.
I am looking forward to the peace that can be had alone. And some day down the line finding a women who can love me for me, and not abuse me – I will not ignore the warning signs again, I know how it starts, and how it ends now, we all die alone (she was fond of reminding me that with out her I would die alone) but at least some of us can die with peace and dignity, two of the many things she tried to take from me.
Thanks gain,
-toonice
Thanks guys for the support, and I will take the advice. this site is very helpful for the extremely busy males who deal with issues such as this. It can be a very tough ordeal to go through and sometimes I wonder how I got into this situation. I still have feelings for this woman even after everything we have been through. She has a way of making me feel bad over things I have said (says she has been overly stressed/crying) since I told her I did not want to marry her. Something she has repeatedly said to me. Anyway, I will continue to research this site some more and figure out why I feel such strong emotions at time over this woman.
Tek, I’m not a counselor or expert per se. What I read in your words though are two things. FOGS – Fear, Obligation, Guilt, Shame, and, some self-esteem issue. Shaming/Guilting is a major weapon these women use on men. Especially since its very easy to Shame/Emasculate a man in public or in front of friends/family. We are vulnerable. Arm yourself with knowledge this is her tactic, and, that a lot of society falls for this tactic. Folks may shame/blame you for not marrying her. But being aware of whats happening and knowing to avoid that pitfall of making decisions based on guilt/shame can save you TONS of heartache. I’m telling you from my own experience.
The reason I say self-esteem issue is b/c these women find that smallest chink in our armor and exploit it. Whatever will make us weak in the knees and play to their whims. Social shaming? Playing on your chivalry/good heartedness. So you can be a successful, wealthy, good looking, great guy…but if/when she finds that chink in your armor, that weakness, tug at your heart strings, then you’re vulnerable. Via the school of hard knocks, I’ve learned to not give a shit what others think, including the predator herself. So no matter what happens, whatever I decide to do in a relationship, I’m free of guilt/shame or what others may think. I still struggle sometimes and wonder what others may think about me, will they believe my ex-Hitler and her lies, manipulation, charachter assasination? But eventually I come back around and just know that I need to be okay with myself, and things will be fine.
Hope this rambling of mine makes sense.
The hard part for me was when it all started to come together… I found out that she had been meeting my friends behind my back and was in contact with my family, isolating my relationships, and destroying my credibility. Starting rounds of conflict and taking pride (acting hurt/empowered) in it, for the world to see. Crocodile tears, poor her, especially for my friends to see. I made it clear, clear as day, to EVERYONE — It’s over. She was abusive.
Sunshine is the greatest disinfectant (quote)… Put an end to it.
I cut those people involved out of my life. I realized that she cared very little for me. The fun, for her, was to stir as much conflict as possible. She wants you to feel hurt. They live on it.
I realized that who I loved was dead. Gone. Forever. ‘It’ was never really there to begin with. She crafted a personality, and what I saw at the end was her. I know she is with someone new. I was prepared from past experience and from what others have said, to be gutted and heartbroken about it. I was surprisingly relieved, excited. I only wish good things for the new one– no ill-will.
It’s hard to get past the facade, but when it sinks in, you’re left with good memories that were really only your creation, not tied to this –person (or thing).
She said, “You only ever were in love with yourself” while I was dumping her. It wasn’t painful, I wasn’t baited– I just let it sink in. She just told me exactly who she is.
They want misery, they want you to ruminate on them, they want to keep you in it and to think that they are the first thing on your mind and that you just can’t let go. It’s all ego, all inflated narcissism and a grandiose view of themselves. Because the truth is, when all is said and done, you DON’T think about them, at all, you move on, and you become much happier in your life and new relationship without them. There are better picks out there, much better, and, in the words of someone else, “You get all of the good without the bad.” It’s not about her anymore.
Wipe them out of your life, and whatever bile, maliciousness or games she wants to play… is only hers alone. You’re happy now, and on your way, doing your own thing.
“Special Snowflake”….(not) HAHAHA… I LOVE that!!! And Rhonda Rattlesnake… so true.
Super useful article…. ties together a couple theories I have. One, that we all seek a familiar & comfortable level of risk in our activities…. including how we choose our mate. So (emotional/physical) risk is maybe an attractor pheromone that we unconsciously detect… and need to perceive differently. Cuz the absence of it may turn us off (too safe) rather than reassure. The second, that everyone (initially) tries to get a partner who will role play what we/they know (from whatever parental/familial relationship was had). No matter that it’s unhealthy… it’s just how the puzzle pieces fit together.
“just slip out the back Jack, make a new plan Stan, no need to be coy Roy… just get yourself free”
And choose better.
I married my husband 12 years ago and lived with 9 years of confusions about our issues. I thought he was the most amazing man, good husband and responsible man and I am the selfish wife because I wanted to work and and to study ( I come from the culture most women are housewives and lady of leisures and normally men are controlling). Eventually after losing my good health, I saw a psychiatrist who told me that my husband more likely suffers from BPD and only option for me is to LEAVE unless he wants to attend a therapy for YEARS and possibility of improvements might be achieved. I still was very naive and felt very sorry for him and tried to help him by standing besides him. Unfortunately, they are not enough infos about males with disorder and I have to read most articles which are about women. Thank you Dr T for this great website which really helped me to know my real husband. As a medical student I was interested in knowing this disorder and noticed that this disorder some kind of misunderstood.
3 years ago I asked him for divorce( I can’t divorce him), still I was not sure and I thought I was doing the wrong decision. He told me that he can never find somebody like me to replace. I thought he was really in love me. Haha. I do understand now he meant he can’t find somebody like me to USE.
Since 3 years ago he took his mask off and is really scary how I was blind. He took all my money all these years when I used to work ( I was willing to give them to him because I thought I was helping my husband). He took all the finance control because he told me you can’t save and you spend them all which was not true. Even I did not pay for the bus ticket and used to walk for an hour to go to work. I used to buy him clothes and nice shoes because I always felt sorry for him because he has a very wealthy parents but never spent a penny for him. I wanted everything for him but with smallest disagreement, he used to rag or kicking or pushing me or kicking me out of the house. I used to thought I need to be more patient and understand him. Never called police, as a woman I was embarrassed to say I am in an abusive relationship and he has a high functioning job ( I was worried about him).
He never bought me anything for all these years even birthday presents. He used to tell me because your standard is high I don’t know what to buy for you. Haha
They know how to talk to you and use your weakness against you. He transferred all his money to his mum’s bank account and a house we had overseas put it in his mum’s name as well. I can’t tell you how he destroyed me health wise, financially, emotionally. I was in the verge of kicking off the medical school!
Still our divorce going no where after 3 years because he doesn’t want to give me a penny.
There was no affection or sex all these years, I thought because he is 10 years older than me might be the case. My reason to write a little bit of my story is that to share my experience to you. The only way it did work for me was to learn about this disorder really well and I tested on him. I can anticipate his behaviours now unfortunately is too late. But I always noticed something was strange about our marriage and that was relationship between Dad and daughter not husband and wife although I come from a different culture. My husband without his mask, is so selfish, cruel man with no humanity. I can’t believe how much I sacrificed my life for a crazy man. The person I loved doesn’t exist. Crazy women are the same which I think easier to recognise. Please pay attention to their body language, facial expressions and the way they talk.
It is really heart breaking, one of our friend who has a crazy wife, again he doesn’t understand how deceitful, lier and user she is, and trying to entrap him. I have to stay strong although I’m trapped.
Thank you again Dr Tara.
Thank you so very much for this article Dr. T
It’s almost as if it were written for my own situation
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
After 10 years of “dating” my now wife, she applied enough pressure to convince me to marry her. I did so knowing “something was wrong” After 2 1/2 years of marraige this “something” had me contemplating suicide as my only way out. I feel only by the grace of God did I finally find the courage to walk out of my home two months ago.
While trying to indentify this “something” I stumbled upon your blog. It was like being smashed in the face by a bag of bricks. I have read post after post, comment after comment, and it has been a shock how similar my experiences have been.
I am doing my best to enforce my own No Contact policy, but it is not easy. The FOG is very thick right now in the form of threats, guilt, shame, seduction, ultimatums….etc.
Thank you Dr. T and all those who have shared their own painful stories. I can now see the magic trick for what it is. Emotionally abusive sleight of hand.
Hopefully with patience and dedication, I can “undo” the damage I have allowed to consume me.
Wow first comment ever, anyways i just broke up with my girlfriend for just the overall shitty way she treated me the constant conflict the packing and leaving me once or twice a week the need to call my phone when I was at work excessively(+-50) on several occasions and ever since she has left I have this overwhelming sense of disgust withyself for allowing that kind of treatment to last as long as it did. The depression amd anxiety and self worth are really to become an issue. When she would get angry she would yell call names become physically violent. And I knew when she was about to go off i would plead with her to just stop calm down and well talk when were not upset or angry because regretful words are said out of anger I’ve learned but that would never happen. I resigned myself to the garage and away from the rest of the family. And when she would leave it would really get me emotionally it hurt and I would plead convince persuade her to stay. And I should not have it took close to six months of these episodes for me to just become indifferent I wouldn’t react anymore but I still cared it’s just that when the woman you love is packing her bags again and telling you how much she fucking hates you. Youre just hurt and after hurt after hurt you ar just that one suspended misery prolonged agony and now that it’s over I Miss her I find myself blaming myself that maybe i shouldn’t have had those emotions that she didn’t hurt me that bad. When she left she was begging me not to have her leave begging me to work on it and I feel bad that I have no desire to endure that again. She has made very clear a huge weakness I have a substantial flaw. I allowed her abuse to be tolerated it wasn’t until my self worth and esteem and confidence were non existant that I realized that serving was wrong. And not without outside prodding from family amd coworkers. My question is how do I deal with the depression anxiety self hate. Or am I overreacting should I just snap out of it? I feel weak and low.
Maybe I’m not the right person to comment but if you are in a relationship that you are suspect she suffers from BPD traits please RUN instead of walking away. The longer you stay the more difficult to get out. All my family used to tell me my marriage is wrong but I ignored them. The only way helped me to understand what’s going on in my relationship to learn about this disorder really well. Here is a link which is really helpful http://www.gettingbetter.com. It took me 2 years to reach my level of intelligence. The more genuine and nice guy the more you will be taken advantage off. It’s extremely difficult to come out of these relationships and I have to say you are not weak. The person you love, doesn’t exist. It’s all false self mask. The sooner you out, it will prevent you from future heart break. After 12 years I’ve become a shadow of myself and reached to the point I suffer from anxiety disorder, depression, high blood pressure and many others. I found swimming helps with anxiety and take tablets for my depression. I’m at the end of my divorce process and start to feel great. My psychiatrist promised me after 6 months when everything finished you will ask yourself why I did put up with him for so long!! Sorry English is not my first language.
It was about four years ago after ending an bad relationship. I met my now ex. She was very beautiful, caring, loving and was in search of a good man. She had been in a relationship that had turned bad. She had an 8 month old son who now considers me dad. Our relationship started off great. We fell madly in love. We had one problem that I thought would get better with time she had controlling parents. Their relationship was great one min and bad the next. The yelling and fighting was more and more. I was even told by her mom to get her out of her house and take care of her a couple months into our relationship. She begged me not to leave. I stayed by her and soon begin to even fight for her. I protected her from her parents hurtful comments and abuse. We later got the news we were to have a child. It was my first and her second. I jumped into action. I wanted to be the best dad I could be. I asked her to marry me shortly afterwards. She of course said yes. We moved in together. She cooked, cleaned, showed love and affection. The birth of my first son. It was damped by her mom. She wanted to take over. What we should and should not do. It was my first born but her mom got mad because I stayed with my now ex non stop at the hospital. She wanted me to leave. The time she was there. She tried to Convince her to not give the child my last name and to change the middle name. They didnt like the middle name. She did not agree with them however she just brushed it off as if it was no big deal what her parents tried to do. As time went by I came across more and more emails from her parents telling her to do this and that and to leave me. They felt like I was cutting her off from them. I didnt see how because I paid for vonage phone service so she could talk to them internationally. I tried to make a mends with them even though it was clear they didnt want anything to do with me. They felt like I wasn’t go enough for there daughter. I was the only income in a four person house. I cooked, cleaned, paid bills, never went anywhere without her and the kids. I never cheated. I never had any alone time and I was ok with it. We kissed and said I love you every night and morning. We held hands. We did everything together.
After a while we started to fuss more and more she started to be very moody and mean. Every time she spoke to them we fussed over some thing they wanted and thought. I stayed there and gave my all. I told my self her parents will back off. They never did. I was told our relationship wouldn’t even last 5 years. I was no different then the rest. They blamed me for everything she did wrong. She forgot to send a birthday card. It was my fault. Every time they came to the u.s they expected her to stay every day and night with me. They excluded me from everything. It was to the point that when she was around them she wouldn’t talk to me. She left and called later and maded up an excuse why she had to stay the night. Many night I stayed home alone. No call or text or even no welcome home from work because she wasti busy with them. I understand the distance was a problem but I didnt understand why I had to suffer because her parents decided to live in a different country. I was punished for having a great relationship with my mom and sister. She wanted the closeness but never had it with them without being submissive to their wants and needs.
As time went by she begin to live a double life. I was the outlet for her anger and resentment. She felt the need to chose between me or her parents. She ultimately chose them after being told they would leave her forever. She told me I love you. When they leave it will be ok. Don’t give up our home and leave. She turned to me every time she had a blow out with them but when they were ok. She chose them over me. She didnt understand that the anger I had was because I felt excluded, done wrong, cheated, over stressed, and undermined. I was good enough to be there when they were not. I was good enough to support and care for her and my family but not good enough for her to set limits on their involvement in our life. The emails from her parents. The phone became more and more then a visit now I’m trapped in a cycle of mistreatment. I was left by her. I’m going through court hearing after court hearing about my son. She wants to move to another country and hiding it with I just want to visit. She doesn’t answer unless she wants or needs something. She still uses my insurance. Everyday I’m ignored and lied too. Four months ago she decided to stop coming. She was coming a couple days a week then leaving for days. She was constantly in and out. I always had to be available when she called or texted or needed me or came. When I needed her she wouldn’t there. One example was on Mother’s Day she decided not to let me be there for her until the blow out with her parents. She came I did something special for her brought her a ring she have been wanting for months, steak dinner and so on. Father’s Day I received nothing at all.
Two children are stuck in the middle of this who do not understand. They say things like mommy daddy. Mommy come to dad house. Mommy get in your car and drive to daddy house. It hurts me but she just ignores it or hang up if I talk about it with her. She says she is doing what’s best for the kids because of the fighting between us. She doesn’t realize the root of the problem is her inability to set limits for her parents and to stay true to me. She have told me that she could not handle what I’m going through so why would she put me through it and the kids.
She won’t get her things from our house. She won’t drop court. She won’t talk to me. She won’t come. But she doesn’t want me to move on. She doesn’t want me to move. She doesn’t want me to let go. She always say what about me. She call me shellfish. She says that she miss me and cry all the time. She have always had the option to come back and be with me in our home. It’s her decision. I’m stuck in a bad situation.
I got to month 8 of no contact with my ex GF and then she called me. She said she hated the thought that she would never be able to talk to me and wanted to be friends. That was a big mistake. a lot of the old feelings came back. I tried to be open with her and said we probably both had damaged pasts. We got along great and then tonight she started bringing up the past, things I had done or my ex wife had done, how tortured she had been. I knew nothing had changed at all . She said she hoped I had been dating some powerful woman that could put my ex in her place. Later as I was driving home she called me and said she hoped she didn’t say anything to hurt my feelings. I said it didn’t, but she was wrong I didn’t need a powerful woman to battle with my ex I just needed someone to love me and I was theirs. What a miserable life that would be to constantly have turmoil. I guess my point is that she will never admit any part of our problems. Anytime I gave an inch she continued to move in on me and remind me how my ex controlled me how everyone manipulated me. If someone wanted a relationship how hard would it be to say she shared part if the blame she over reacted on occasion, but nothing she did was wrong, it was all caused by some external party. Im short I should have said yes we can be in friendly terms, but we broke up for a reason and if would be better for us to move on
Hi tanker, everyone. I have been “lurking” here for a couple months now, learning so much and having some core beliefs shaken and my eyes FINALLY opened! I think tanker summed up the entire experience with BPDs, CBs, in a nutshell with the words, “What a miserable life that would be to constantly have turmoil. I guess my point is that she will never admit any part of our problems.” Yes. Exactly when your gut feeling is that you are doing the very best you can, you love the other person sincerely and yet you feel constantly stressed, miserable, heavy-hearted and life seems like one big jail sentence, then you need to analyze your relationship with a clear eye and a healthy dose of Dr. T’s wisdom. SOMETHING IS TERRIBLY WRONG and it is NOT you! It’s the other manipulative, crazy bitch (or bastard) in your life! You were not like this before. You have changed and you cannot see it clearly.
My formerly kind, patient, happy, intelligent creative friend has become a mean and surly reclusive snob these past several years, separated from his lifelong friends and now only friends with “her” friends. Outsiders can see it but not him. 🙁
Thank you for posting this Dr. T
I have been out of my relationship with a partner of 6 years (and we have a toddler together) with similar attributes 5 weeks now. I am glad I sought out resources like this site. I always had hunches that some thing was more wrong than I admitted, but I made a lot of excuses up for not leaving her. I get visceral reactions to her texts and when I get near her house or places she frequents. I am working on me right now and trying to address unpleasant emotional responses with rational narratives I write out for such occasions. I remind myself what I think when I don’t feel threatened emotionally by some situation that reminds me of her. I don’t want to feel like this for another month. She can tell when I am pulling back and she gets nice for a second, tells me she is struggling with our break up too. Sex is her sharpest tool, and I am glad she hasn’t offered it. That would be the biggest mistake I could make right now and I feel weak. It was all I had for the last 6 months with her. I thought I wanted to replace her ASAP up to just a week ago and realize that would be a huge mistake. I am not ready. I am just mad I don’t have the relationship I need now with someone loving. Grief is rough, but it is liberating. She was never it. I created an illusion. Your article hit it spot on. Thank you.
So I finally had my first full blown BPD among other things (likely NPD, Histrionic etc.). I notice that I’ve had similar relationships in the past; but nothing compared to this, she was full blown and I didn’t even realize it until I had kicked her out, pulled a family intervention, she went to therapy after a drug, sex and alcohol meltdown and I began to research it the second she told me she’d been diagnosed and her therapist told her to look it up.
This has put me on a psychological research quest to understand my own problems and hers. All the questions a recovering bpd relationship suffer has. I realize now that I have severe PTSD but know that I can get through the FOG. I now understand I’m a ‘rescuer’ and that I didn’t properly qualify this woman.
Difficult and eye opening, to say the least – I’m searching for free counseling or other type of victims/recovery counseling, but just lurking on these boards has helped alot. I didn’t realize how rampant this particular societal/parental issue was, how susceptible I was to their ‘charm’ and had absolutely no clue how much damage these people can do.
My feelings of compassion for these types of individuals sometimes overcomes my own sense of importance to self which means, I too, obviously have my own issues. I just feel bad because it’s not actually their fault and they blame themselves. When I met my bpd ex-fiance, she and I were on top of the world and she’s stripped nearly both of us of everything – Picking up the pieces is difficult, although a life changing experience.
Even though my bpd ex doesn’t show remorse for any of her major transgressions; I know that they’re really tearing her up inside and I try my hardest not make her feel any worse about herself. The abuse just got to be too much to handle and she blamed everything to everyone on me.
I’m about a month out and still trying to go NC. She wouldn’t let me break up with her, it took almost six months. And she’s still trying to come back and use me as her emotional punching bag even though she’s going to therapy and what not. At this point, I’m just trying to find a community or some type of free recovery counseling in my area. Stay busy and avoid her.
It’s nice to find a forum where abused Men can come, that’s run by a Woman and many Women even contribute too. Best Information I’ve found yet.
Kindest Regards,
MTN
Mnila1, good for you getting out of that relationship. As I’ve said to many others here, thank your lucky stars that you did not have children with her. Really, thank your lucky stars.
I say this kindly, but it sounds like you’re in a bit of denial. You say its not her fault, its out of her control, and it tears her up inside. I think you’re kidding yourself. BPDs, and especially NPDs (Narcissists) enjoy inflicting pain on their victims. They get pleasure from making you feel smaller, less valuable, and isolated. It makes them feel superior and in control; due to their hyper insecurities & fears. Do a few of these nasties feel a pang of guilt once in a blue moon? Maybe. If they do, its short-lived and back to the business of seeking & punishing their victims.
We aren’t always responsible for the way we feel, however, we are all responsible for the way we behave – from the words we say, the overt & covert forms of emotional abuse & invalidation, to the more obvious physical and financial assaults we experience as victims of these pscyhopaths.
Make no mistake, these people derive pleasure & enjoyment from making you suffer. Part of our recovery (me too), includes acknowledging this & to stop being a pushover for their emotional manipulations/feel sorry for them.
I know these kinda sound like harsh words, but IMO if you don’t stop excusing their behavior or feeling sorry for them, you are highly likely to fall back in to that ‘rescuer’ or ‘white knight’ mode and happen all over again. Its not easy, I know, b/c sometimes its still hard for me to believe & accept there are sociopathic women who will use & abuse you then throw you away. Very difficult to accept.
“It is not my responsibility to feel bad about this. If you had approached me honestly and asked for help, then of course I would have offered it. But you fooled me into loving a fake persona, and then laughed in my face when you tortured & abandoned me.”
http://www.psychopathfree.com/content.php?274-It-s-Not-About-You
“If the descriptions of high-conflict, Borderline, Narcissistic, Histrionic and Sociopathic women on Shrink4Men resonate with you, your “love” is more than likely nothing more than an incredibly damaged, self-obsessed, emotionally stunted, psychologically immature, entitled, manipulative, selfish, empathy challenged, blame shifting, unaccountable, abusive child or teen in an adult body who is incapable of love.”
did you meet her? that’s unreal honestly.
what i find compelling is that when you achieve some distance from a relationship like this you begin to see it for what it was. this person had you under a spell. not hearing her version of events gives you clarity and reminds you that you are the sane one. i recommend ‘no contact’ and distance and let her continue her craziness with someone else. the hurt will fade and you will feel a sense of relief. i have yet to hear anything from her but i’m aware of hoover tactics and will be prepared to ignore them when things inevitably go wrong with the new guy and she comes sniffing for attention from me. goodbye crazy, hello me
Great article, Dr Tara!
Right now I’m in this painful stage.
Really like to read the Reality check section, it’s full of truth.I feel liberated from such a burden while reading it.
I’m in week two of no contact and is really painful,and it will be very painful to cope with the loss, but reading your articles and the comments is helpingme to open my eyes. I really want to heal from this.
Dear Dr. Palmatier and readers
I recently found your site and thank all of you for the great articles and comments, I’ve learned a lot and would like to share a little.
I’m 28 years old and recently ended a year and a half relationship with someone who was very likely BPD. For a little context I admit that I am very inexperienced/innocent and there was a fifteen year age difference and she has children living with her. When we first met she was incredibly sweet and the way we met seemed like it was meant to be and we very quickly fell in love. She told me she saw me in a dream in heaven and everything seemed so amazing I was totally in love. She had recently ended her marriage to a very abusive second husband (this I know is not made up I had independent confirmation from others he is a genuinely cruel sadistic person as well abusive towards the children) and told me how I showed her true love. I was was a virgin at the time and was so in love she was my first and I viewed it as giving her a special gift. Her ex stopped paying child support right about when we first met and she had just quit her job so I was anxious to help in any way I could.
About 3 months in I noticed a change. It started when I invited her to a banquet at my synagogue. She said was interested to learn about Judaism and she was welcomed totally and everyone LOVED her. But then a few weeks later she started accusing me of having an affair with the Rabbi (who is a lesbian)and several members of the congregation both male and female. I was so stunned at first I didn’t know how to respond so I just tried to explain that it wasn’t true in logical terms. It didn’t work so eventually I just gave up and quit going abruptly and didn’t return to services for seven months. I dint even respond to members who called or emailed me because by now she was checking my phone and email. I was terrified of losing her by now and thought if I was patient and accomadating this would blow over. I was teaching preschool at the time and even though I had stopped going to services she was still convinced I was cheating with the Rabbi. She got into congregation member directory I had and looked up the Rabbis address and saw that she lived twelve miles from the school I taught so became convinced I was seeing her at my lunch breaks (during this whole time I had no contact with her, the Rabbi at all and was allowing my ex to see my email and phone any time she wanted including letting her have my phone for entire days.)Then it started to get frightening. She insisted on driving me to work very day even though I said she didn’t have to. She would go on hour long tirade against the Rabbi even occasionally using violent anti semetic language and graphically describing the acts she believed we committed. This was more hurtful and confusing than anything else. Even though it was completely untrue I began wondering what I did that may have set her off and spending a lot of time praying for strength to be able to be patient and show her love.
By now the stress was starting to show at work and my principal could clearly see something was wrong and generously offered me a leave of absence. By now I was so broken down from the accusations I just didn’t go back thinking that would help but instead the hardest part of all began the violence.
I thought things would get better now but they didn’t she began accusing me of looking and staring at other women constantly even accusing me of going to the bathroom to masturbate in public. I truly didn’t want to be with any other woman but her but was also wondering if I was doing something wrong so I got in the habit of walking with my head down and never making eye contact with anyone in public. Around this time she made it clear that her ex (the abuser) wanted to get back together and very loudly let me know how wonderful he was he carried the nuclear football on airforce one, was at Guantanamo, was going to get her a huge house, she wouldn’t have to work, could start her business, etc. and I was totally emasculated by now and she started calling me faggit. I was desperate to keep her so I gave her and her daughter the last money I had and full account access and ended up being 700 dollars negative in the bank.
I didn’t see this as abuse I viewed it more as a test because she hadn’t been violent and I spent a lot of time praying for her and praying that I would have the strength to show her love and be patient with her. Then one night as I was getting ready for bed she showed up at my house at about 1045 at night I invited her in and she screamed at me saying she saw a girl leave my house and go running down the street. I genuinely didn’t know what she was talking about and just told her I ve never been with anyone else and loved her. I was very tired by then and layed down to go to sleep and she kept screaming demanding to know who it was I was seeing I calmly told her I was seeing no one and she began shaking me violently. I replied again I wasn’t cheating and then she hit three times in the eye and got up walked away. I just stayed there and told her again I loved her and would never hurt her she then threw a glass candle holder at me and then left. I was hurt by the whole thing more that she thought I would hurt her than anything else. The next day she texted me throughout the day saying what a real man her ex was and all the things he was going to get her and ended by saying “i’m going to look at my new house house fag” I was totally devastated and felt like a failure in every way. We reconciled awhile after that and she told me that there are”demons who put visions in her head” she seemed so hurt I made the choice to pray even more for strength and be able to show her love and be patient with her. Things were better for awhile but then it started again with the accusastions and she left saying she “couldn’t give up what her ex could give her for someone like me.” So all I would get would be occasional texts from.
This continued for awhile until she showed up at my new job out of the blue one night. She seemed like she was doing so well she was working and had a new car. We talked and I moved in with her. But then three weeks in she quit her job and I started to get worried but still prayed and tried my best to have faith that love would help us through the challenges. But then she began having stomach pains and accused me of poisoning her. I tried calmly responding like I always did but then out of the blue she accused me of giving her the date rape drug and allowing twenty five men to rape sodomize and torture her. I had almost gotten used to the accusastions but his extreme I didn’t know how to even respond. She even went so far as to go the ER and file a police report. Throughout it all I stuck by her as best I could. We ended up getting into an argument later where in complete seriousness she accused my mother of murdering several people and ended splitting my lip and giving me a black eye. I was so hurt and confused I didn’t know what to do. I began wondering if I was insane or something was wrong with me but I still wanted to stand by her side. She hit me several more times and finally I simply walked out the door in tears and didn’t go back. I ve had about a week now of no contact but still find myself thinking and wondering a lot of whether I could’ve been more patient or done things differently. I’m still very hurt and confused. I want to point out at no time did I EVER hit her back or call her names and find myself being proud of that if nothing else. To this day she is the only woman I’ve ever made love to and I felt that was special which is why the cheating accusastions hurt so much. I don’t know what toll this all well take on me but I do feel there is some hope. I’m starting nursing class for a new career in January and will get the chane to volunteer in Israel later next year.
I know this was long but i’d appreciate any insight any of you may have. Thank you for reading.
Hey everyone, I’m new to this site and trying to figure it all out so bear with me. I’m a 30 years young as of tomorrow, single, never married and no kids. I ended a four year relationship this past September with a girl who, as I’m finding out, a lot of you had. Right after the break-up, I was in heaven for the most part. Sleeping well, no more headaches, no more awful text messages…nothing. Christmas came along this year. I started to feel what most people feel. Its a first without her, and it sucks. I let myself get sucked into a deep depression, and obsessed about it. Reading all your comments and posts have me in a different place.
We started dating shortly after a mutual friend introduced us. This friend had warned me though…”She has some baggage from childhood and a shitty relationship with daddy.” OK I thought, I can handle this. Shes cute, in school to be a nurse, nice car, good prospects, and loved to fuck. Me, being a fairly outspoken, opinionated person at times, started to see the baggage coming into my life. I would get frustrated; frustrated to the point of anger. We would fight, she would weasel her way between me and my brother, my friends, and finally my parents. This got me more angry, and extremely resentful. I developed a passive-aggressive behaviour because of this. When I’d get sick of fighting, I would become silent. When I’d be in a fighting mood, fists went through the wall, never hitting her, but the wall, something outside, break a coffee cup, etc… She would tell me I have an anger problem and need help. This got me more fired up. We would talk about what made her feel this way, I felt like a father figure/councillor. Her response was always “you talk and laugh with other women, you don’t love me. You take his/her side. You never do anything for me, you don’t cuddle me, when we make love, you think about someone else, I found a porn mag at the bottom of the drawer (why was she snooping anyway?) How come the bottle of lube is slowly getting empty, are you masturbating?” etc….. I could write a book! When she finally did pass her nursing and got a job, she lost it; in a few different cities at that, because of complaints from patients, staff and management. Never took responsibility. Yet I still loved her.
When we were on a stable time in the relationship, things were very, very good. She was giving, sweet, sexual, tuned into me and my life, etc… Something would always change. I would be grumpy one day from work, come home, and vent to her about it. Then the cycle would start over. “You’re ideas for business are stupid, you just wanna be friends with your employees, you’re not a good boss, you shouldn’t need to work late, 8 hours is enough” I was slowly losing control over my own life. Yet I still loved her and couldn’t let go. My friends and family saw this change, and encouraged me to leave her. It took a loooong time to FINALLY gain the courage. But I did it.
I am now trying to move on, dating other women, having fun and meeting people. Can people really change? Even after all the bullshit, I still have very deep feelings for her, even after 6 months. If she lived in the same city as me, we would likely still talk, even hang out. That’s my story!
Hi bigdee30 I was reading your comment and am interested in hearing how things are going now? Have you moved past your ex? I am in a similar situation and wondering if there is actually light at the end of the tunnel
Dr. Palmatier,
I’m so pleased to have found your site. What amazing insight! I’m a lesbian just coming out of a relationship with a person I believe to have BPD. So much of the information your articles resonates with me. I particularly appreciate the article on hostile dependency.
Regarding this article on obsessing over an abusive ex, I’m wondering what, exactly are the common speech patterns and tone of these women? I just find this interesting!
Thanks for this forum Dr T. I’m moving forward. It’s been difficult.
Steve
Thanks for such a great article .This has been a very eyeopening for me .I had been in a relationship with a woman who at the time 2009-2010 just seemed very selfish and crazy . We broke up almost weekly and she seemed to like to draw me in with love then spit me out with verbal abuse …I took it because I’m a recovering alcoholic (3.5 years sober now ) who was newly sober and the child of a mother who is seems to be the poster child for BPD and a very emotionally distant father . Our relationship started out normal and I was so excited that a beautiful tall Brazilian woman would want me, she told me she loved me in our second phone conversation and that I was a “Gift From God” (something she said a lot as you will see religion matters when it suits her purpose) a total red flag but I was just getting some self esteem back after a stint in treatment so I ignored it ,besides what could be wrong with a woman loving me lol
She neglected to tell me until we were seeing each other for a week that she was married ,but as she said it was a loveless marriage. So again I let it go because she was so loving an attentive to me and she was going to get divorced
Not long after those first weeks she began to start putting me down, since treatment I had gained some weight and she started calling me fluffy and pudgy ,I started working out and within the next few months was down to 7% body fat with a six pack then she started calling me show off and wanna be model …again still not good enough she started saying she preferred me fat and that I was clearly looking like this to attract another woman .
After about a month she went home to Brazil apparently for visa reasons she had to go back for 30 days renew and return to the US ,while gone we stayed in contact via Skype and text ($800 phone bill)…but often she would disappear for hours without returning texts she said she was at church but her FB showed her checking in with some man at clubs, this guy was a very handsome race car driver ,when I asked her about it she became irate and said she was bringing an old friend to God because he needed Jesus ….I had my suspicions but ,I let it go I wasn’t there and had no proof besides check in’s at a club she said was where the Small town socialized …
After her return she said she was going to seek a divorce and we could be together of course her husband found out about us and he made my life hell with death threats maybe it was her cell phone bill …but I kept ignoring the obvious …within a week of her return she moved 1500 mile away to Florida, a normal man would see she used me to get free of this marriage but again I was told it was for her safety. All was fine until the usual started she would call 3-4 times a day at first professing her love and that we were bound by “God’s” will but eventually the calls became less and less ,we started commuting a few times every few months back and forth it was always super passionate, I honestly felt like a piece of meat and when it was time to leave she would get cold and start an argument ,she said it was easier to hate me than say goodbye… after some time she began acting shady and saying that after a long talk with her pastor she believed we weren’t going to work out and that God had other plans for her. I relapsed the first of many ,this caused me to lose my job of 14 years
As any good Codependent would do. I sought treatment in Florida just minutes from her home .She said she wanted to work things out and be part of my recovery. I made arrangements for her to be part of my family therapy. She never showed up always gave an excuse and said I was the crazy one why should she have therapy .Once my treatment was up I decided to go to a sober living environment in Florida and get a new job. She then started telling me she needed to see me she missed me so much but she would just show up use me for sex and leave .I confronted her about this half jokingly saying why don’t you want to spend some time with the love of your life ,her response floored me she looked me dead in the eye with her empty cold stare and said ” You’re not the love of my life he’s at a baseball game tonight”…She apparently was seeing her best friends (the woman who gave her a home in Florida until she found a place) ex boyfriend that she(the friend) was with for 10 years she said she wanted to be with him and I should get on with my life ….I kept at it refusing to see she was evil she could charm anyone and I was her pawn.
Eventually I left Florida moved to LA ,once my plane had landed I had several horrible text messages about what a weak man I was and how could I leave and not fight for my woman…I went right to the airport bar .
After a month of push and pull love me leave me …I went back to treatment this time in California while I was in she proceeded to torture my family (my sisters in Cali and 76 year old mom back east )with 50-60 crazy phone calls a day and also calls and texts to my cell phone that was left with my sisters while I was away. The Calls followed a crazy pattern first was nice, second was evil what a weak piece of crap I was , third was an apology this was the pattern over and over for hours a day for a month.
I was being sheltered from this while in treatment until she sent LAPD to my sisters house at 6 am on a Saturday morning to search for me because I was in danger she told Miami PD that I was possibly being held hostage….. Did I seek a restraining order ? Of course not I was flattered she loved me so much …..We tried again she went to ALANON and did the good thing for about a month we made plans for her to come out After one final horrible visit to LA she left me said it was too hard to say goodbye all the time…Within a week she found another gift from GOD and after 8 weeks she married him ….My torture was over or so I though ….
After 3 years she started calling again her marriage was falling apart he was a drug addict and had several affairs with both men and woman the first during their honeymoon …She was crushed and claimed that she missed me so much and that she used to dream her husband was me when she kissed him … I was now sober and strong enough to know this was BS all she wanted was the void to be filled. I said sorry for her loss and asked to be left alone ….after 6 months she called again on the anniversary of our first meeting. She said she had no Idea it was our day but it seemed quite convenient she would call on that day after months of no contact. She said that after her horrible mistake of a marriage (which I later found out was her 4th) she knew I was the one and wanted to change, then immediately she made a few attempts at phone sex and tried to lure me to Florida and get me to put that we were together on FB (she kept dropping hints at how it would destroy her ex if he saw her on FB with me) I saw this flag and said no and said she needed to find support from someone closer that this wasn’t good for either of us and that I didn’t want to be used as a way to hurt her ex husband …
She sill kept calling saying all the right things but I was firm. Besides as it ended up she would find an easier way. A plan B in her attempt to not be alone and get back at her ex she found a new “Gift from God ” this was a man she met at a Christmas party for single Christians . And I was now back to being nothing . She thanked me for my friendship and support and wished me well (typical when she had a new man I was of no use to her) …I said you’re welcome and then repeated that she needed to let me get on with my life ….
She stopped contacting me for a while about (2 weeks) over Christmas but this relationship apparently was another roller coaster and was on the rocks by New Years. He has several issues including anger and drinking and had just ended his own bad relationship at Halloween that had him end up in anger management classes. I was again pulled in as support actually more likely just to fill the void. I found it funny she said she couldn’t ignore the “Red Flags” she kept calling seeking support she said he was lying and cheating but I think this was just all in her head like all the others he was messed up and chased her like a puppy.
Again she wanted to change and said she would hope we could be friends while she was getting heathy and maybe more after .Eventually she went to a therapist and a psychiatrist and was diagnosed BPD and also Sex and love addiction, she was also put on meds for depression. She said she wanted to recover and be relationship free and needed someone to help her be strong because when it comes to men she’s weak and as a good alcoholic I said I would be her support since “I knew how important support is ” to recovery.
The ride began again it was a horrific month full of hours spent on the phone all night long she was crying and sobbing and said several times about how she wanted to die she claimed that being without the touch of this man (Christmas gift) she barely knew was like a death sentence again reaffirming how little having me in her life meant to her but still she tried to lure me to Florida to take care of her needs physical and emotional and again I said no …
After about 5 long arduous weeks that really took a mental toll on her and somewhat on me also, I received a very strange text telling me that she couldn’t be in a relationship with me (we never were in one) she asked to be my friend she often did this to free herself from her own perceived guilt because she was going to be with someone else and knew that yet again she was using me she always denys it but that’s always what happens …
I have since found out from a mutual friend that 3 weeks ago a concerned person from her church told her that she didn’t need therapy she just needed Jesus . This wonderful friend also told her that the pain she was feeling over this “curse she was diagnosed with” was God’s punishment for ignoring the wonderful Christian man he sent her at Christmas, so she took the easy road and went back to him cause that’s God’s will and her addict mind saw an easy solution, she then quit going to therapy and stopped taking her meds. Just like any addict the easy way out (using her drug of choice men) always brings comfort …
She doesn’t know I know about any of this and she calls talking to me like we are still gonna be soul mates someday and leaves voice messages telling me recovery is wonderful therapy is going great and always ends with “call me back baby love and kisses” …I don’t answer the calls and texts and she seems oblivious as to why I stopped talking to her she just texts and leaves voice mails every few days. I think she may feel I know but since I haven’t tried to call her out on it and she has her drug of choice she doesn’t push it and Quite frankly she doesn’t need me at the moment.
I suspect she will be back once this relationship fails they always fail and since she never lets go of anyone really. I guess I know she will always try to be part of my life. However, I will not go back and I now know after reading this and lots of research that I have my own part in this and I except that I was easily manipulated because of my years trying to impress my mom and dad and I can continue to work on that ….Thanks to articles like this and her diagnosis I can put all the question marks away as to why she was and is how she is, as a codependent those questions were always keeping my mind spinning how a person could be so heartless and how I could never save her …
Sorry for the long post I guess I just needed to get this out and get some feedback and suggestions …
Short update …She now realizes I’m not taking or returning her calls she called twice last night then this morning sent a text ” Hope you’re well .What kind of friend is this that you are being ?Are you not talking to me anymore ?Guess you’re just like all the rest ….
As usual using guilt to try to provoke me …while she still is seeing this other guy …
This is the first time I have ever seen my life written out clearly. I have been struggling daily for 5 years. I met my ex 5 years ago and felt he was the love of my life, the only time I have ever felt a connection so strong. He is an alcoholic and I became pregnant after less than two months. Well needless to say he choose alcohol over me and our son over and over and over, even missing the birth for alcohol and a party. He treated me terribly for years, but always telling me how he wanted me and I was the love of his life on the rare bits he was sober. When our son was 7 months old and we werent talking due to his drunken binges, I met a “normal” kind man and married him after 4 dates. From the day I after I got married I longed for my ex. I have been married to my husband for 4 years and still long for my ex every day. He has visited my son with me present maybe 7 times a year and each time stares through me making me long for him more, but he still didn’t step up as a father by any means, it felt like he cared more about me. Well now our son is 5, my ex is married with 2 more children, and he just called me asking to sign my son over to my husband. I haven’t been able to eat or sleep feeling this rejection. Each rare visit for our son I felt the connection and secretly held onto that feeling. He has been saying horrible things about our son “not being worth the stress anymore of visits.” I have been ruined over this man for 5 years now and now this. I feel terrible for my son and don’t want my issues to effect him. I am foricng myself to let the step parent adoption go through and let my son have the dad that has always wanted him 100%, my husband. But my heart aches and for some reason, no matter how mean, and sick he can be, my ex is in my head and heart daily. Please, if there is any words you can give me to bring me any form of peace please let me know. Thank you and God Bless
That intense sense of connection may be the tip of one very big iceberg.
Poke around the Index, Why Men Are Attracted to Crazy, Emotionally Abusive Women (February 17, 2009) may be a good place to start. Are You My Soul Mate? Defining the One (January 19, 2009) is another good one but the link may be broken.
If you look at Shari Schreiber’s articles on the link here, she talks a lot about what attracts us to these kind of people. It often goes back a long way.
25 years ago I was involved with someone who I thought understood me like no one else ever had or ever would. It was like she could see right through me. After a lot of research and some professional help, I learned it had nothing to do with her and everything to do with me. Once I understood what attracted me to her, that feeling went away.
You may want to check out the Forum. There are a lot of parents posting there about some of the things you’re talking about with your son.
Thank you for your response. It’s interesting you wrote those dates, this all began for me february 2009, and has been detroying me inside ever since. I have gone to therapy for it and have never come to an understanding to bring any peace. I will read those articles thank you, I am desperate to understand this to find any form of peace.
With the right resources and the right help, there’s a good chance you can find what you’re looking for. I used to think that relationship was some kind of cosmic mystery worthy of grand opera. But, for some cruel cosmic twist of fate, we’d have been happy together. It turned out to be nothing like that.
Another thing to keep in mind, not all therapists and resources are created equal. Some are better than others. If you’re open to trying it again, check out the Service link above. She wrote the articles.
Thank you, and yes the therapist I went to did not understand anything I was saying so it led me to feel more alone.
Thank you so much for the insight. I was in an abusive relationship and still long for her but have resisted trying to get back with her. I keep reminding my self of the lies, disrespect ,secrets and ,cheating that has been going on for years. Never apologized for the hurt I’m feeling for 6 weeks and counting. She is already on to her next victim .
Hey guys,
First of all thanks Dr T. for this excellent article. For the moment, I find myself stuck with my exGF who was some personality disorder traits..
Yesterday I attended a therapy session and after working on myself, the psychologist asked to do a small list of stuff that my exGF had put me through. I was sincere and felt deep sadness as I explained in detail my ex’s behavior. I was very objective, and even though my ex needs to be “checked up” in person to get a proper diagnosis, my psychologist told me she had strong anti-social disorder and borderline personality disorder traits.
This disturbed me and left me sitting down in my hole. My therapist recommended that I should look up for any things that can remind me of her and get rid of them to help me get out faster from where I am. It hurts to do it because I still love my ex and wished I could help. First thing I did as I arrived home was open my computer and look for old emails, conversations, or other stuff from her to delete it permanently.
I was left in shock as I found a conversation she had with a friend on hers using a chat application. That day she was with me at my place and asked for my computer because she could not sleep. The chat app is set to save all conversations, so I found this disturbing and nasty little conversation. I am going to translate it for you guys because it was in spanish, the conversation is about me:
EX-GF: I’ve been with him 6 months my dear, LOL…I’ve managed to stay with him a long time..incredible but true.
FRIEND OF HERS: I feel the same way about my relationship. Sometimes I panic, but our one year anniversary is two months away.
EX-GF: Yes! I feel panic too! It is terrible! You know, I am so addicted to chaos that when you find something good, you want to sabotage it no matter what because that’s what we’re used to do. That is when I find out that I was the one scared of commitment and not all the “assholes” whom I’ve been with.
END
What hurts the most about this conversation is that she somehow acknowledges that she has some kind of trouble that keeps her getting into short term and intense relationships. “6 months” meant she has not been in relationships longer than this and somehow managed to stay with me for 10 months more. I have heard of how some this gals might try to contact you again and recycle the relationship, I’ve been tempted to talk to her again to help her out but I know it will not work. It seems she feels “cool” for sabotaging things up and embraces chaos.
I gave all I could. I brought peace to her life, I am not a party animal type of guy and prefer to pass my weekends up in the mountains or somewhere far with true friends and family when you can regenerate from the week’s stress and pass times you can remember fondly. Now I know an extra thing that tips off her sad disturbance. What should I do? I am tired of spinning around this horrible place.
Keep reading. Start with the Doc’s earlier articles and work your way forward. Also, check out the Forum, you’ll fit right in.
I’d also hang on to that chat. That’s a confession. If you want to pull that string more, use the link to Shari Schreiber’s site above and check out “THERE MUST BE A PONY IN HERE, SOMEWHERE – Sorting Your Way Through the BPD Madness!” About 1/2 to 2/3 down there’s a paragraph about them “telling you what you need to know.”
Mellaril, I went to the website & read through Shari Schriebers site a bit. Very good stuff – especially where she describes the various types of BPDs, e.g., The Witch, The Hermit, etc. She also correctly states not all BPDs have all the traits or the exact same traits. Its obvious Shari Schrieber has great insight & instinct into BPDs.
However, there were several of her comments that made me pause. Example: “For women: if he doesn’t call again, do not assume it’s because he finds you lacking. It may mean he doesn’t think he’ll measure up, and you should find someone more confident.
For men: nearly every heterosexual woman leaves her house in the morning with a secret wish that an appealing man will notice her, and start a conversation. It validates that we’re alluring/attractive, and makes our day (and sometimes, our whole week)! Offer a sincere compliment, and notice how it lights us up (and creates opportunity for more contact).”
She also mentions things like making boys into men and whatnot. These kinds of comments, to me anyway, indicate a somewhat reductionistic, old school, marginalizing attitude towards men. Just b/c a man isn’t chock-full of confidence shouldn’t necessarily be a deal breaker. In fact, many BPDs are full of flattery & boldness – Shari’s comments could cause women to play right into a BPDs hands.
Hopefully I’m not over-analyzing or miscroscoping her comments & website, but I did get this vibe of it being somewhat reductionistic & stereoptyping.
mongoose…. she -may- have some self awareness but she ain’t gonna change anytime soon. and the change ain’t gonna be easy. odds are… she’s gonna fight that change every step of the way.
I had a similar experience with my ex. she seemed almost ready to admit her stuff. that was right when we broke up.
it’s been a few years, and I read a lot here and other places. now I can say something absolutely certain – there is no way that woman I dated will ever objectively understand her behaviors. I look back now and I realize every day that I was in a losing battle. there were SO many issues and behaviors that just were not right. I get that now, but back then I was just like you… I thought “if only she would control her temper”.
now I understand a new responsibility. we connected for a little while, but she really is mentally unwell, for whatever reason. the rest of my life is mine to create.
I think a Borderline will seek a Rescuer, rather than confront and address her infirmity.
And later, the Rescuer will be transformed to Victimizer, to more properly suit her unresolved Victim Identity.
it’s better to get away before you are accused of being the Victimizer.
there is a lot of days ahead of you where you will take a deep breath and smile and understand that breaking up was the best thing for you.
Just came upon this brilliant piece as I fall right square into its tenets
My Bpd/npd was a knockout a beauty breathtaking
The beginning was a fairy take but within weeks yellow then red flags bizarre behavior that was unaccountable
Break ups reuniting until I the lies and deception and explosive behavior escalated
She said she was a nurse then she said she was a BDSM dominatrix then the truth came she was a high end escort
Senators mayors congressmen
I confronted her and she threw it back to me
I then discovered my health may be in jeopardy as escorts are with many clients and bbbjcim if you know the lingo is not safe sex
You are right it’s not about her it’s about me and my abusive past thanks
The no contact rule applies here after I realized she was having sex with 10 men a week for almost a decade
OMG!!!! I recently broke up with my mentally abusive ex. What AceOne said it exactly what happened with me. I am a 53 year old professional attorney. But my ex was unemployed, house in foreclosure, massive credit card debt with expensive taste and demands. I spent nearly $80,000 over the last two years for trips, dinners, cloths, jewelry as such. But nothing was never good enough.
She broke up with me and blamed be for everything. I have been sitting around saying What If, What if I bought her that dress? What if I told her I loved her more, What if I was kinder, What if I took more time off from work, so many what ifs but I never seemed to make her happy. While she ended the relationship with me, we still kept in contact. I finally said no more. Within a minute after closing the relationship, she called. Told me I treated her better than anyone else in her life, that she still loves me and misses me. I tried to stay away, but than she friended me on Facebook. Stupid me I accepted. Two days later, she posted photos of her and her new boyfriend in Hawaii. I reacted, sent her a message told her good bye, never to contact me again. Within a minute she called me. Same thing but I was the one who broke her heart, I hurt her, all my fault. I defended myself, she yells at me and tells me I refuse to take responsibility. This coming from a woman who as not worked in six years and demands LV purses. I’ve been an emotional train wreck since Friday. I googled about emotionally abusive women and found your article. My God, you saved me. I feel so much better. You described her to a tee. Thank you, you are my inspiration..
Wow, so I’m not insane, as she kept telling me? Checking in here with a relationship with a BPD woman: her child-like feminine charms and ultra knock-out looks took me completely by surprise. Mind-blowing sex, felt like I was 19 again (now in my late 40s). I was the “greatest” thing (idealization) that had ever happened to her, wanted to be my partner, my next wife. Was in the same profession – seemed like the first ideal match in my life. Initial weeks together in bliss – surely this is my soul mate. Fell deeply in love with each other. Soon, I committed to her, left my family. Once we moved in together, she immediately distanced, devalued me, denounced everything I said and did, ended sex completely, talked about BDSM, tried to take over my job, tortured me emotionally, and blamed everything on me. Utterly devastated, I suggested we take a few days off from each other just to chill and try to get some perspective. She freaked and left. The next day she wrote that I had abandoned her. Hardly a week later, she had another guy in her snare, and was flouting her new savior in my face. I’m still traumatized. A slow recovery. Cj
Checking in here 3 months later. It’s been a slow recovery, but I’m putting the pieces together. Realizing that I’d projecting my anima, the feminine aspect of my own soul, on this ideal woman who invited such projection. Was very much in love with this missing or forgotten part of my own soul, not her. A gift to force me to integrate these parts.
The tearing and abusing that seemed to come out of nowhere was very devastating – still a bit PTSD. Articles here have helped tremendously. Doing family constellations sessions, and Jungian shadow work sessions. There is life after a Borderline. Take heart, cj488
I didnt realize this site was for men but I found the article and comments all to be so familiar. My issue is that I dont know if its me or him. I am 37 years old. I grew up watching my dad abuse my mom. I met my husband when I was very young (14). It was cute sweet innocent love at first. We had a son by the time I was 17. We both still lived at home with our parents. I finished school but in the meantime he would always put me down, call me all sorts of names, hated all my friends and talked about my family. Several times when he had our son he would use him as an excuse for me to miss class while I went to college. He showed up at jobs arguing with me. It was horrible, verbally, pysically and emotionally. I still loved him and thought that he was the best that I could get. He has cheated on me numerous times throughout our relationship, majority of it in the earlier years. We finally got married in our mid 20s. He wanted to have another child, I still was skeptical just because I wanted to start a career first. I also started building new relationships with friends and co-workers as well as my family which he did not like and tried to break me down all sorts of ways. I did give in and have another baby, a daughter who is 9. After I had her the names started again and the belittling. I started to clam up again, feeling horrible about myself. One day at work I got attention from a coworker of the opposite sex which made me feel great but later I reacted on it. I felt so horrible and still do but the attention that I lacked from my husband is what I craved from this other man. Since I had my daughter my husband has not been physically abusive but continues to be mentally and verbally. Why cant I let him go. I feel that he has improved since our younger ages but yet I have gotten worse since I cheated. Overall its not a healthy relationship and everyone sees it. I worry if I leave the kids will be hurt from it but yet I worry that they will be hurt from it if I stay. I worry that I wont find someone that will “love and adore” me the way he has and does. What if I regret leaving if I do. Ughhhhh i can go on and on. I just wish I had the stregth to leave when I was 18.
“…becoming angry and hurt in response to being abused is a natural and healthy response.”
Thank you so much for stating this. My ex made me feel so guilty for getting mad and upset when she pulled her crazy antics of insecurity and jealousy. The breaking point was when she contsanly told me I had to quit the gym because there are other women there. I had to find an all male gym. LMAO!
Thank God for articles and resources like this.
I got out of an abusive marriage four years ago, and sometimes I slip back into the “what if/ should have”…even though I got with a healthy partner and had a second family. I am still with my partner, but sometimes I find myself replaying old episodes.
A few days ago, my ex-wife’s new husband called me regarding some arrangements about my kids (mind you, even up to two months ago, my ex-wife was still inviting me over to her place “to see the kids whenever” and that “they need their father”) and yes I have visitation and all worked out (so I didn’t go over there) and I felt a twinge.
So I read this paragraph and it snapped me right out of it…
“If you enforce boundaries, hold them accountable and deliver effective natural consequences for their predations, they will move on to find a new unsuspecting target to feed upon. That’s how it works, no matter how patient, loving and kind you are. It’s the law of the jungle.“
Thank you.
Also, five years ago when I decided to separate from my abusive ex, this website helped me tremendously!