NOW, i know..

im new to this forum, and after accidentally stumbling upon a BPD symptoms list, i just found out a few days ago that my boyfriend of 6 years is most probably BPD. Again, im not a doc, but i think i know what im talking about. when u know someone like the back of your hand for 6 years.

The sickening wave of realization that hit me in the face was...... i really dont know what to say. Like NOW then u tell me its actually BPD. WTH. Im angry with myself that i didnt find out earlier. Im angry with him for putting me through so much hell and for a moment i thought i was goin crazy - and NOW i find out that actually he's the one with the problem. I mean at first i thought i wasn't doing enough, it was my fault, so i tried to please him and all, but when that didnt work, i knew there was something wrong with him already, but i didnt know the words to describe it. Now that there's a term for this sickening 'disease' that he suffers from - God, it just liberates me from all the feeling guilty all these years, and the confusion i felt. At least now i know that i am not "wrong" all the time, and that alot of problems we faced in our relationship was due to his BPD.

But at this point theres still a part of me thats unsure of whether i made an accurate assesment of my BF. Will relate certain events with him over the time ive known him, and will somebody please tell me am i overreacting, or is my cause for concern (and my assesment) accurate.

When i first met him, he was very nice to me and always very appreciative of what i did for him. But then slowly he became more and more needy and kept calling me on the phone. At that point, trying to be noble and self-sacrificing, i entertained him on the phone for hours, but we were ALWAYS talking about things that he wanted to talk about. I remember he actually got upset with me when i didnt want to entertain his calls! If i told him i was busy, he would whine his way into making me stay on the phone, while i was in the midst of attending to some other matter. Or if i was busy and called back later, he would punish me by making me feel guilty for not being there for him when he needed me the most. When i spent lots of time with my family, he would tell me not to spend so much time with them, or he would tell me that he "really needed to talk", just to get me to himself. Even on the phone with him was a timebomb waiting to explode. There was once where he was telling me something, but at that moment i had to pull away from the phone because my mom popped her head into my room and was asking me for a sec, but when i asked him to hold on for awhile, he became extremely irritated and offended. He accused me of not really wanting to listen to him, and that if i was not interested in listening to him, just let him know. Or at other times he would just simply raise his voice, "argghh i dont understand why everytime there is something impt i have to tell u, something crops up!!" and say "i dont feel like talking anymore!" and then hang up. At that point i felt so confused and guilty that i actually shouted at my mom to leave me alone and stop interrupting me when im on the phone, my friend is not happy. It was then she said smth i always remember " what kind of a friend is that? so demanding and unreasonable! i just wanted your attention for a few moments!". I spent the whole night crying terribly bad and even contemplating thoughts of dying. There have been many many similar incidents since. There was even a time where i was terribly scolded and spammed with angry threats that he was " so angry that i want to kill you" and " i really hate people like you who do something wrong and then try to cover up". That time i just had to pull away from the phone to flag a bus, or else i would have missed it. Good lord, i thought to myself. i get punished for pulling away to catch a bus. no words until today can describe how intensely injusti i was treated and the outrage that i felt for being "wrong", something that isnt even wrong in the first place!

another bad habit i have is being late, but i have been improving. We lived about an hour apart by train, so normally u would not expect a person that far to arrive exactly on the dot. Something about the way he responded made me feel that his response is abnormal. I mean, u wouldnt throw a temper at someone that u love for being late, especially when she lived so far away and u always ask her to come to your place. But not him. He would give me a black face and wear a disgruntled scowl and give me the cold shoulder when i arrived. There was one particular horrible incident that shook me at my core as a person and changed my life forever. I was supposed to arrive at 4pm. I arrived around 4.40pm. i knew i should have been honest about how late i would be, but i didnt because i so much didnt want to disappoint him. i just told him sorry, i would be late. When i arrived at his door, he was playing computer games, at the same time trying to restore a problem with his internet connection. He didnt even look at me as he unlocked the door and let me in. He was on the line with the internet service provider who was giving him instructions on how to fix the problem. He spoke very politely in his most gracious voice, even though he was really pissed that the connection wasnt working. He even thanked the operator for the help. After he put down, he continued with his computer game and pretended like i wasnt even there. After an awkward silence i broke the ice and tried to initiate conversation. What i remember next is just a blurry of events. He reprimanded me and scolded me in front of his father and sister, who were walking about in the house. They were too scared to stop or interrupt, for fear it might make him more angry. The shame and the humiliation and the embarrassment was more than i could bear. For the first time in my life, i stood up and said i wanted to leave. I had just spent an hour's journey to his home, and now i wanted to leave. he didnt say a word. just unlocked the door and let me walk out. i went. i wanted to go to the nearby beach to cry my heart out, but by the time i got there, there were no more tears to cry. Just an empty dullness and numbness and hopelessness. i sat down on a little cliff and stared out blankly into the vast blank unfeeling sea. Few days later we made up. He apologized profusely and wanted to make up. i accepted, thinking that i was ok already. Little did i know that i was very good at bluffing myself. The hurt and pain and confusion i had buried so well that i didnt even feel it anymore. But it was all unravelling. few days later after that incident, i met a nice guy at my church and we shared the same hobby - board games - and he had invited me and a couple of guys over for a game session. I did admit to my BF that i liked this guy a little, because i felt truly cared about and treated graciously. But nothing more than that. I wasnt the kind to cheat on my BF or jump ship, just that i felt a small liking for this guy. My BF begged me not to go to the game session. i told him that i was going for the game, not the attention, but my BF didnt think so. I still went ahead, thinking that i was really going for the boardgame. It was only after everything, i sat down and took a hard look at myself and i realised with horror what was happening. I did go partly for the attention. It just shocked me down to my core, because the ME that i knew would NEVER EVER have looked at another man other than my guy. I wasnt the wandering type, i was the loyal type. It just dawned on me then, how seriously i was affected by what my BF did that day to me, humiliate me in front of his family. It hurt me so so so deeply that i actually developed some feelings for another man, something i know in my right mind i never would have done. After i went, BF never forgave me for it. Even until today, a year later, he still harps on it and insists that i had " shown my true colours" and that "i thought i could trust u but even you do such a thing. after that incident i can't trust u fully anymore". He even said " before the incident, my love bar was full and i wanted to do special stuff for u, buy stuff for u and all that, i was at the peak of trusting u, but now i cannot trust u anymore", "what u did was unforgivable, u liked him, and u went for the game". I just felt so defeated and wronged. I wasnt unfaithful. i was loyal. i just drifted momentarily because of the intense trauma that he caused me. Its not like i slept with the guy or something. He should have understood that what he did that day was so bad that he actually "made" me become somebody i know im not. But he just didnt. Can anyone understand the intense pain i am going through?

anyway, at least now i know what the problem is. Its really him. I know i have my faults and issues too, but i think i have tried my best.

Hi,

I'm sure that I have read your message in it's entirety, and am I therefore right in saying that you are both still together? I must ask the following: How much more are you prepared to take? He strikes me as the type of pesron who cannot be happy unless he gets his way. He is the center of everyone else's world, including yours, and if that changes even slightly then he'd throw a tantrum. What he did you you that day when you arrived late was really something childish and immature... he wanted to make fun of you - but not only that - he wanted others to see him doing it to you just so that people could see that he's the strong one (and not you). Well, the reality is that he's a child and you're an adult.

I really do have to ask the question again though: How much more of this are you going to take? Even if he has BPD, that's no excuse for the way that he treats / has treated you. You know this already, but I just felt the need to remind you. A personality disorder isn't a 'disease' like others.. it's just a way of describing the personality of someone. For all intents and purposes, this IS him - it's who he is - and he will most likely require therapy to change how he perceives the world. It might be that he'll never greatly change how he perceives your relationship together, but it is your life and you have the option to stay or leave and look after your own sanity and wellbeing.

Kevin

Hmmm...

From what you have told us, I agree with Chucky... why are you still in this relationship?

But, I don't honestly understand how you have come to the conclusion of a certain diagnosis of BPD.

I'm baffled... sounds like he does have some kind of personality disorder, but there is so much more to the symptoms of Borderline Personality Disorder than those you are describing.

best wishes x

it does sound quite similar, although as the outher posters have sead, there is alot more to bpd than these sympoms alone.
i think that if it is bpd then it is understandable why you are feeling like you do, especialy when it may well be unbeknown to him.
you see, he (if it is bpd) proberly doent know why he doest the stuff he does, it is just what he knows to be real in his mind and hence, he acts in this way because of the way he deals with emotions and feer of abandenmeant, and this part is the bpd part.

noone knows them selves fully or why they do things, and untill he (if he is not already) finds out/exepts and gets help for it (thats if he has it) then he will not understand or get better.

so the hurt that he feels is true to him. but not true in the moment in which he feels it if that makes sence.
much like when you went to the game with your freind, you found out you were going for reasons outher than you thought you were, and you say it was his fault, but realy it is just part of not knowing every thing about your self given a particular situation.

its hard to understand it all realy, but if you are with this guy still, and wish to continue as long as it gets better (im shure your with him for a reason), mabe sudgest this to him gently and logicly and mabe it will help.

just my thoughts, hope all goes well. x

there were many times i actually suggested breaking up with him, but he kept chasing me and refusing to let me go, so i allowed him in again. the truth is im still with him only because i love him and i know deep down inside he's hurting from a lot of things, but he does love me. I know i mean the world to him, and im the closest human on earth to him. Even when i suggested a breakup, i still loved him, and was hoping he'd change, so it wasnt a REAL breakup in that sense.

yeah i know just the 2 incidents i have posted here are definitely not conclusive enough too point to BPD. Those are just the tip of the iceberg. But i have experienced incidents whereby he could be very loving and intimate with me one day, but the next day he would be in a very dark and evil mood, and for no reason he would start to recall all the bad things i had done/said to him and he would speak to me as though i couldn't be trusted. I have observed this has ALWAYS been the case. The more intimate we got, especially physically (i could do no wrong, i was an angel), the more likely he would turn around and pin me down and start to doubt whether he could trust me, and start to hate me (Like i was an enemy). in his own words, he said, "i feel guilty at the same time angry that i cant stabilise whether i still hate you or not, i think i dont, but yet i dont know where the darkness is coming from". Then the NEXT day he was slightly better, and by the end of the day he was back to normal, even saying things like "i trust you ok" and "i miss you very much", things which were the EXACT OPPOSITE of what he was saying just the day before!! Its like jekyll, hyde, then jekyll again!! Hence my intense confusion and mistrust of whether when do i take his words seriously. like do i believe the nice things he says, or the bad things.. i mean im fine with hearing bad things about me, everybody has faults, but certainly not praising and then condemning me the next second! He could say things like " i love you, you are the best person on earth to me. You are better than other girls, u dont play games with me" and the next day or next time when something bad happened, he would say something like "i hate you. You are all the same. Can't be trusted." So i'll be like what??!! So does he really trust me or not, im just wondering. Its like giving a toy to a baby, then taking it all away again. Im sure many non-BPDs have felt like that when their BPDs did this to them.

My BF has also been through many traumatic experiences in life: his mother walked out on them when he was about 10 years old, he had 2 failed relationships in which his previous girlfriends either rejected him, stirred up trouble for him or played games with him. To make matters worse, 2 years ago he was betrayed by a group of people whom he trusted and one of them was a trusted person he looked up to. He's just been through so much turmoil in life and i can tell he's in pain. Ever since that he has become worse, has very unstable mood and a volatile temperament. He also has alot of anger issues, he's so angry with what they did to him and he cannot let it go. He alternates between plotting revenge, forgiveness, seeking justice and redress and so on. This is why i tolerated all his 'nonsense', because i know its hard for him to trust people again. He was betrayed time and again by people who were close to him, whom he loved and trusted. but i can't tell u how painful it is to know that sometimes he cannot trust me, despite all the times i have proven myself to him, and despite the fact that i have been the only constant factor in his life, when so many others have walked out on him.

Another reason i have for believing he has BPD is that sometimes when we meet up, he'l say things like " i see you, i know u are here, but its like you are very far away. i cant feel you". It was so scary the first time i heard that, although by now im already getting used to him saying this. He always complains of feeling empty and blank.

Also, during or after a quarrel, he would relate a totally different version of the quarrel that we had, or a different version of the series of events that took place. Its shockingly inaccurate the things he "remembered" i said or did. I would be thinking to myself, am i loosing it, or did i really say those things?? the first few times i even admitted saying things i knew that i didnt say or do, trying to convince myself that maybe i was really forgetful. I thought he would let it go if i "admitted and apologised", but it just resulted in him pinning me down even more. But after knowing that this is one of the symptoms of BPD, im more sure that i KNOW what i said, and what i did not say. Come to think of it, there was even a time when we were talking about something serious, and instead he was humming and singing to himself. When i asked him awhile later to stop the humming, it was kinda irritating, he actually said, "what humming?". at first i thought he was joking, so i probed further, and asked him if he was aware that he was humming and singing to himself. he just said in an even tone that he wasn't doing anything like that. It was so eerie and scary to hear somebody doing that but totally have no recollection of it ever taking place. I was so freaked out i actually burst into tears on the spot. I told his father about it. immediately after that, my BF started humming again. I turned around and told him " see, thats it! u just did the same humming again!". Still he was not aware of it. If this is not temporary dissociation, then i dont know what to call this. either i am crazy and hearing voices, or he's not aware because he was dissociating himself.

i love him so much and i know he does too, but if he's going to carry on like this, im going to go nuts at some point. already i am very confused and tired. I cant take anymore of his instability, his ever changing words and emotions. i just want to be happy with him but it seems impossible, with his emotional instability.

at first i thought i wasn't doing enough, it was my fault, so i tried to please him and all, but when that didnt work

So what are you going to do, continue on with the status quo, break up, give him some tough love? What is the next step you are going to take?

the truth is im still with him only because i love him and i know deep down inside he's hurting from a lot of things, but he does love me. I know i mean the world to him

Self delusion at its finest. You are dirt at his feet, by no means do you "mean the world to him." You are justifying and making excuses for his mistreatment of you because he's "hurting."

There have been many many similar incidents since. There was even a time where i was terribly scolded and spammed with angry threats that he was " so angry that i want to kill you" and " i really hate people like you who do something wrong and then try to cover up".

This is more than borderline. This guy is a complete nut, and you have been indulging his behavior. Break up, sever all communication, and undergo counseling for yourself.

I now regret my previous words but this post has info in it that you other does not. Your boyfriend sounds insane. Me? I was projecting my ex onto you. I'm sorry.

Black Dove wrote:This is more than borderline. This guy is a complete nut

Are you entirely certain? My mom is BPD and has depression. Whatever else she may or may not have, I have no idea. She threw butcher knives at her first husband - either she has a terrible aim, or she did so half-hardheartedly, intending to miss. She did brandish them, though. She down-graded to throwing letter openers with her second husband (my dad) and again I believe she mostly missed with the metal ones, but not with the plastic ones. She still wielded butcher knives with him, though.

This is in addition to the unimaginable emotional and psychological cruelty. The things she could say were unreal. The harmful things she was capable of doing and then justifying and rationalizing it all. She'd frequently express in a rather dark manner and low, sinister voice how badly she "wanted to hurt me", with her eyes either deadened or burning, sneering with a bit of slobber drooling out the side her lip. Also, I was apparently "Sent by 'god' to punish her." (for cheating on her first husband with my dad, and remarrying) She wasn't fantastic to my other two siblings either.

But then, she'd turn around and be angelic to most everyone else. Many knew her as an incredibly kind, humble, compassionate woman. I never got why people were fooled by her charm and manipulation as I saw straight through it. It worked magic on everyone else but it seemed sloppy, obvious and transparent to me. I remember thinking how stupid they all were for falling for it.

Don't get me started on the ritualistic dances complete with singing about her wanting to off herself,.. or about death in general. Or, she'd just have a ritual song and dance about it being "meatloaf night."

In fact, don't get me started in general as that's all I've done here... gotten started.

My dad wasn't perfect either but he wasn't quite as bad, he just beat the $#%^ out of me amongst other assorted things. So, he was loads better to me than my mom.

(she wasn't schizophrenic, either.)

Apocallcaps wrote:Are you entirely certain?

No. It was unwise to speak with such certainty. In my opinion, he sounds like a typical controlling individual.