alone, broken and confused

Hi, I find myself here after 3 months of dating a man whom I fell head over heels in love with. The way things ended and how I feel now has left me thinking I have BPd...I have no support network and only my 20yr old daughter....Here's how it happened, any feedback would be greatly appreciated....I have nowhere else to turn

3 months ago I was a bit depressed and very lonely ( social anxiety disorder). I live alone and have no really close friends ( some aquaintences) I work 12 hrs a day 5 days a week and 7 hrs on the 6th...I hadn't dated in a while really with anyone who could have been serious....I had a boyfriend who did 14 yrs ago in my arms and have never quite recovered...

I placed an ad in the internet and met a man. He seeemd charming and kind He is 36 and i am 44...I came away with the overwhelming feeling that he was a kind man...I have social anxiety so had to take diazepam for the first few meetings. He was affectionate, attentive and kept his word on calling and meeting me etc....It transpired that the fancy dinners and not letting me pay for anything was a front and he was actually unemployed ( had been for a year) and was running out of money fast...I was patient with him. He had anxious but distant reactions to his situation and was a little cold with me at times...I managed to cope ok without reacting....

He pushed the speed of the relationship with declaring his love for me within 8 weeks..he romanced/pursued me emotionally in a way that literally swept me up in an emotional high .I was very calm (reactively speaking), full of joy and trusted him emphatically...he mentioned marraige, children. he told me I was his future, he hinted at moving in with me...he tried a few jobs but nothing stuck. he said he had a business idea but I slowly realised that I had became a sounding board for his financial problems....I started to struggle mentally and constantly tried to talk to him about my feelings...When we decided to have sex he was unable to maintain his erection. he jjust left me there in silence and stopped...he didn't speak of it until a week of this had gone on....I manged not to react although i was becoming confused and frustrated with the stuff that i relaised belonged to him to deal with....He told me he couldn't remember his past relationships and set up verbal barriers as to why i shouldn't ask about his romantic past...He flirted with a woman at a party we went to. he has made great friends with the two girls who live upstairs from him already and he has been in his flat only 8 weeks....he has many female friends....other than this he was quite open emotionally, or so it seemed....He was always available, wanting to see me every night...I wanted that too but when i tried to have some space i felt somehow guilty... He suddenly changed with me one morning, quite out of the blue by waking up really grumpy and angry. He ushered me out of his flat....I fell apart and withdrew for a few days. He had told me less than 4 days before that i was amazing and I so had him? Does this mean that I was discounting the positive and focusing on the negative as in BPD?

We got through this and then went on a nother emotional high. He wanted me to meet his mother and I was ok with this. I arranged to go for a drink with my gay male friend and he said he was meeting his ex that night...he then blurted out that this woman who was now 24 was 15 when he met her on a train and he was 28....He started to mention sex and clearly upon looking at me said you don't want to hear this do you? I broke inside emotionally...I have a 20 yr old daughter and the thought of a 28yr old man picking up a girl on a train threw me in the worst way possible....I lost all trust and respect for him but I already loved him...This girl is now 24 and he spent the evening alone with her in her flat...I didn't react until he called me at midnight to tell me they were alone as her husband was working abroad I went innto emotional meltdown and accused him of trying to make me jelous....

The next night i raged at him as he laughed at me when he saw my anger..i tried to break up with him but he wouldn't let me....Things went from bad to worse as i now was on high alert for red flags. I started to think he is a comitment phobe and would leave me..I refused to meet his mother. I was becoming increasingly unstable...I asked him why he wouldn't tell me about his past relationships and said i needed him to be more open..He remained evasive which I took to mean he was already one foot out the door...I broke up with him a week before xmas....Took him back on Xmas eve only to feel the same distrust and end it after seeing him only twice in two weeks.....I told all of my friends about what happened from my viewpoint, painted him black after intially telling everyone how wonderful he was...I saw him a few days ago and again went into the whole comitment thing and why did he push me to fall for him...he said he really did want to marry me but he needed a job I didn't believe it. I now believed that he was devoid of emotion. He was so cool, calm and collected

I went into emotional meltdown because I wanted him to make things the way they were...I didn't trust him but I do love him...is this I hate you don't leave me? On New yrs eve after we had ended or I had ended it again I emailed him apologising for everyhting that went wrong with us , took all of the blame and begged him to forgive me...I even said i think I am emotionally unwell and have BPD...His response was that he didn't think I was BPD, he thought it was just a few days of unclear thinking that led me to this place and if I was so what? he said that he loved me, not as a boyfriend but very much still as a friend and he invited meto continue to share my thoughts with him....

I left it there and tried to pull myself together...He texted me on NYD at 6pm and wished us both health love and happiness in 2010 and asked if we could keep in contact...I ignored it...He rang my landline and then left a message on the mobile asking me to call so that he could hear my voice and wish me a happy new yr.......I emailed the next day and said I was not ok to keep in touch..I hope he understood and wished him well

i have read so much on BPD and reactions. I am worried that my intense emotions and need to end it so abruptly means i have BPD....I am totally lost and am questioning my perceptions ....Any insights would be greatfully recieved

Hi,

I think it's awesome that you have decided not to keep in touch with him, because I believe that this relatiomnship is best left in the past. I have noticed that when relationships move too quickly in the beginning, they mostly end after a short time. It's like going to fast on road I guess - you'll eventually lose stability/control and crash. I can't say whether or not you have BPD but the prominent feeling I got from your post is that you are eager (or desparate) to feel loved, and that you need a sense of approval from people. This results in you feeling guilty for things that go wrong, even if they weren't your fault at all... ....Is any of this making sense?

The way that he treated you was bad, and now you have to move on. You're older than I am and I dont want to seem like I am lecturing you, but here I have presented my thoughts anyway.

Take care,
Kevin

Thank you, i didn't feel at al patronised by your reply. I'm v grateful...I so wanted things to go right with this man, I have been alone for a very long time. he suddenly changed towards me and it threw me...he moved things along fast. I am passive and did want to make him happy...

I did try and talk to him calmly, rationally many times. I only got angry when he actually smirked at me when I said it hurt me that he dropped the information about this girl out of the blue. I couldn't understand why he would tell em such a terrible thing...he had displayed some weirdness and to be honest I didn't know why he changed...I thought he was a comitment phobe and just wanted to sabotage the relationship.....

it was only when I was alone for days that I started blaming myself, any and all insights would be appreciated

Well, I can only speculate you must understand, but when you're 'alone' for a few days, you might be suffering that feeling of having nobody to love in your life. A relationship is not just abou someone loving us - it's also about appreciating the fact that we love someone too. So, when you're alone, you're starved of this feeling and I think it's only natural for you to look straight to the guy who most recently was in your heart... what do you think? Maybe next time if yuo get these feelings, just telephone a friend or someone else. You could arrange a cinema-trip or something. It's about replacing that feeling with something else.

Kevin

Thanks again...I guess my whole dilemma with this man was fear of abandonment...My problem is was my reaction justified in normal circumstances...I had no fears whatsoever and his being moody with me definately triggered something, then when he told me of this girl, I am clearly the mother of a 20yr old....Part of me knows my reaction was real and justified...I feared loosing him for two reasons...1, he had changed 2) I didn't feel the same about him

I went into emotional shock and meltdown.....I tried to feel differently but in the end i feared he was playing me and I ended it with him for the final time...One thing I did notice was that i felt anxious with him and when he called I felt the urgent need to get him out of my life

Anyone?

Rosemary, hello, welcome to the BPD forum. Sheesh, what an awful way to spend the holidays. I am so sorry you had to go through that. I agree with what Chucky told you. (Don't be misled by his young age and modesty -- he speaks four languages and knows as much about PDs as anyone here on Psychforums.)

I will add only that, even if you go to a psychologist, it would be difficult for him to determine whether you have a personality disorder based on only one three-month affair. The guy you dated was so quick to profess his undying love (at 8 weeks) that he likely was wanting to use you for something (perhaps a place to live). In any event, a whirlwind intense affair with a charming guy like that leaves even "normal" women in an emotional mess until they have time to recover.

My understanding of BPD is that, if you actually suffer from it, you will exhibit basic traits that were entrenched in early childhood and that started showing themselves sometime in your teen years. Yes, it is possible that they were not evident until you had a very stressful period that triggered them. Yet, it is hard to believe you reached the age of 44 without having many very stressful periods -- as occurred, for example, when you broke up with that BF 14 years ago.

My point, then, is that if you have BPD there should be many instances of you experiencing extreme fear of abandonment. Moreover, because that abandonment fear causes one to be jealous of any other people who might win your BF away from you, you also would have experienced jealousy. In addition to having a history of unstable close relationships, you also would experience an unstable sense of who you are.

If you don't see those traits when you look back on the relationships you have had, it seems likely that you are now suffering the same type of deep pain and loss of self esteem that we all have to suffer through at the sudden end of an intense affair -- especially when we walk away abused and confused by the type of mind games played on you. Even normal people, when experiencing serious loss and pain, can exhibit strong BPD behavior for a short time. Indeed, all of us exhibit all nine BPD traits at a low level rather often -- though not nearly as often or as intensely as BPD sufferers do.

Yet, because you are so concerned about it, I suggest you go to a therapist for a few visits to get a professional opinion. If you do, be prepared to describe your other relationships so the therapist has a prayer's chance of spotting a pattern of behavior. I hope this is helpful, Rosemary.

Thank you DowntownDC, yes there have been many experiences of fearing abandonment..The BF in question actually died...before that we had an intense unstable relationship and I left him after he beat me up very badly...I looked after him after this though when he was diagnosed with cancer and he died in my arms.... In the last 14yrs I have had 2 periods of 5 yrs without seeing anyone...I did drink up until 12 yrs ago but I haven't touched a drop since...the fear of abandonment and unstable interpersonal relationships seems to be the main thing with me

I dated a younger man for 6 moths and that ended badly, I can't remember why but I do remember painting him black....

I dated someone for around 7 months 3 years ago and the relationship was almost identical to this one....The man pushed the relationship and then alternated between extremes of wanting to be with me and being unable to commit..I recently found myself wondering if the inability to commit was more to do with my reactions to things than with their own stuff...

The next one was around 6 weeks, he too treated me rather badly ..I found out he was still active on a dating site and refused to answer his calls, put the phone down on him etc etc....

Then this one...I felt afraid that I was being played.. He did hint at moving in with me, he asked if we could get a mortgage and sell my home to move....After the first time he was openly hostile towards me i felt that i somehow 'rejected" myself. I keep wondering what was wrong with me to make him treat me like that. I kept wondering if he wanted to leave me, if he was sabotaging the relationship...it may just have been that he had been drinking the night before and woke up worrying as he had totally ran out of money as he is unemployed....I did totally 'fear" him after he blurted out the stuff about the 15yr old girl....This 'fear" stayed with me and never left....I do feel something "happened' to me..when he called me after we had reconciled I was convinced that he was ging to "dump" me and I ended it first because i would not have been strong enough to deal with that in a coffee shop in town...I was by this time convinced that he was trying to hurt me... I am still in emotional turmoil.....he texted me and asked could we keep in touch but I felt afraid to incase I had an emotional breakdown...

Does this sound familiar to anyone?

Anyone?

Rosemary, because none of us are psychologists, we don't try to render a diagnosis. We are not shy, however, about saying that a pattern of behavior "sounds like" one disorder or another. I suspect that the reason folks are not jumping in to do that for you is that, with all your exBFs being so abusive or commitment phobic, it is unclear whether you have BPD traits, codependency traits, or both.

Codependency, for example, could explain why you are so attracted to emotionally unavailable men. Moreover, being with such abusive men could cause some of the fears you describe. Hence, you really do need the input of a good psychologist who has time to work through all of that.

Have you seen one yet? Do you intend to go? If so, a psychologist trained in treating BPD likely would be equally skilled in treating codependency because, in some respects, they are two sides of the same coin.

Sorry rosemary1 - I did not reply yesterday because I was very busy. Plus, I thought that I could leave you in the safe hands of DowntownDC and his/her good advice to you. This website as a whole never sleeps and there are multiple new users signing up each day with various issues. I try my best to stay on top of things. If DowntownDC wasn't here, I would have replied, but I really felt that his/her advice would help you. I also wanted to mention that the BPD forum isn't the most active on the website, and you should generally only expect a reply a day or two after you post.

Having read what you've written just now, I believe that you didn't ever really like this recent guy for who he was (perhaps); and that all you sought was that feeling of love as I've mentioned already. If you manage to completely separate yourself from this past relationship (and every other one too), then you can surely move forward with newfound wisdom. Be sure that the next guy is one who you like for who he is, and not just any Joe Soap.

Kevin