Does my ex-bf have PD or just your average *******?

Hi guys, I recent have a traumatizing dating experience, it's only 4 months of dating but it's quite scaring. I'd like to have your insight on whether I was involved with a man with PD or just an AH. Thanks.

The breakup was amicable. But the trauma came when I heard he got married in Nov., 3 months after we broke up, to a woman he said who is just "a friend" in need a place to stay, and I applauded him being such a great friend at that time (now I felt like an idiot)...It's not like I'm jealous or upset, I decided to leave the relationship anyway, but I felt betrayed (if he has PD) or played (if he is an AH). I want to confront him if he is an a**hole, he and his wife should know what he did is wrong. But if he has PD, well, I'll just try to let it go, life and his shrew wife will "take care" of him.

So I'll briefly describe what happened and annotate the strange behaviors in red:

I met him one evening outside a movie theater, he asked for my number and wanted to be friends. We went out that weekend, walking in the park and playing guitar. At the end of the day he pushed me for sex, when I turned him down, he complained in a childish voice: I love you. If we don't have sex, I don't want to see you anymore, and I don't want that. I replied: I can accept that. He left, I thought that's the end.

He called me the next day and the next...just catching up. We went out the next week, I saw him exchanging phone number with another woman while waiting for me (It didn't bother me then because we were not dating). He said he wanted to be more than friends, I said he has to give me time to like him.

He called me consistently everyday for a month and didn't push me for sex again, and was always punctual and kept his words, so I thought he might be worthy of serious dating. He was very affectionate, kissing, holding hands, and act of service etc, everything a woman wanted in a boyfriend.

Only one thing bothers me: I don't know him, he is like a pretty shell. When I tried to get to know him, asked what he likes, how is his family like. He said: I like music, I like you. I don't like to talk about myself. I replied I want to know what you like, I feel happy with you, I want to do thing to make you happy too. He said: you are perfect, you don't have to do anything. He never invited me to his place until I protested, because he had bad experience with crazy ex harassing him after breaking up. He always shaves his head, and I wanted to see his photos with hair. He refused because there were pics of him with exes that he doesn't want to look at. When I confronted him about this at the end of first month dating, he walked out on me,then came back a few days later and invited me to him place and showed me some photos.

He barely talk about anything concrete when we spent time together, but he is very social, he talks normally with other people, and I actually knew more about his life from him chatting with other people in a group setting. He does like talking loud in a group setting and appears overly excited, in one of my friends gather, he said to them: I love you guys so much, if you come visit _____, it's all on me! He literally just met them....

Later as we know each other better, he said his parents were abusive, he doesn't like his younger sister either, but no concrete reason why they were abusive. He said he loves sex, he watched a lot of porn since 9 years old. He had about 10 girlfriends in the past, the last one ended 2 years ago. All of these relationship didn't end well, he claimed some of them are crazy. After that he started to hit on woman on the street randomly and have sex with them one or twice, he slept with about 60 women this way. When we finally have sex, he seemed very excited, but I didn't enjoyed it, very quick and boring sex. One thing interesting for me is, the women I saw he had hit on are not that physically attractive...he is a somewhat decent looking guy.

He gradually doesn't call that often, which I'm not sure if it's because we were dating stably or he just has more distractions. When I asked his whereabouts, he said he went out with this group of friends or that group of friends. But I actually only met 3 of his friends. And I feel he doesn't have good character judgement.. He said this person or that person is really shy, when I talk with them, they seem totally natural. And I don't think these friends are that close as he made it sound like.

There are many factors leading to my decision to break up him. Believe me or not, these abnormal behaviors actually are not the main reasons. I only list them to see if they are personality disorder symptom. I found them clownish but not necessarily detrimental, like one time we went out to meet his friend, he started to chat another group of women, and literally chasing them 2 blocks in front of me and his friend!

About a month before we broke up, he mentioned he had a friend need a place to stay, he is going to take her in. He knows her about 2 years and she is not an ex. I asked him: you said no girls in you place. He replied: yeah, I know. I said: that's very kind of you. I knew about this friend though I've never met her, I asked him to bring her along in one of our outings, she didn't show up. She does know we are dating. It seems they didn't get together often until she "needs a place to stay".

I don't mind him helping friend, I have done that for opposite sex friends too. But the lack of plan and responsibility made me feel either he had ulterior motive or just retarded. He lives in a studio with a guest bed besides his own. He told me his best friend is coming in 2 months, I asked him how he will manage the sleeping situation, he said: one of us has to sleep on the floor then. I asked: so she is going to stay indefinitely? He said: I don't know.

The final straw made me broke up with him is when I asked him out to an outdoor movie. He was 30mins late, and I saw he was taking his sweet time chatting with a woman while walking towards me. It was a weekday night, so I let him go home soon after the movie instead of walking me home like we usually did, but I saw he stopped on his way 3 times to chat with different group of women. At that moment, I told myself it's over.

I waited a week to get ride of negative emotions so I can calmly broke up with him. I called him to meet up, but he was out of town in a wedding (without telling me). I told him to talk when he is back. He immediately sense what I wanted to do, and called back in an hour: I think I know what you want to say, you don't want to see me anymore, it's because something I did. I insisted talking thing out in person is more respectful. He said he'll call in a week. He didn't call for 2 week, I didn't want to drag it any longer and send him a amicable long text acknowledging our problems and thanking him for the good times. He replied: I'm sorry for how I treated you, for all the stupid and disrespectful way I acted.

That was it, it wasn't a nice closure, but at least no resentment and bitterness. It was early August.

Then I heard he got married early November to that "friend". All the crappy feeling came back, now combined with anger. I want to confront him. But I have so much confusions about him, I can't tell if he is really sneaky or having some deep issues:
case 1. He was intentionally playing me (and his wife too). I'm too smart to be controlled by him, so he went to an easy target, the woman who is easily manipulated and depends on him (he lied to both her and me about relationships). Based on some of his clownish behaviors, I don't think he is smart enough to play that game. But he also has that smart instinct about me breaking up with him...
case 2. He has some personality disorder, the woman took advantage of his need for attention and desire for sex. (She lied about loving and wanting to marry him so he can provide for her). There were so many suspicious things about her as well with my limited knowledge about her. The wedding is a rushed one, they even didn't dress properly. (I wasn't there, a friend showed me pictures).

So either I was played by him or by his wife. If he played me, he deserved to be yelled at. I don't care about the wife, if he is taken advantage of, I pity him, but he doesn't deserve me to fight with that woman.

Thoughts?

Welcome to the forum,

First of all, that sounds like a very toxic relationship where little trust can be built. He always has an eye for other women and is quite secretive. To answer the question of PD or AH... I don't think I know enough about the large spectrum of PD to guess what he might have, but im leaning towards a womanizer. I am very curious if he had a long time relationship before.... im doubtful.

Thanks Aries411 for the reply.

I don't think he had long term relationships before, he is 32 yo, he had first gf at 19, and the last relationship ended 2 years ago, so that's probably max 1 year for each ex gf.

I'm trying to let my anger die down now, seeking an answer I probably would never get doesn't do me any good. I think I'm probably more angry towards myself for not walking away the first day. I used to end a budding relationship around 3~4 dates if I felt there was something incompatible, which sums up my dating life for the past 3 years. This year I told myself to be more patient, and this happened to me...

curious4you wrote:Thoughts?

curious4you wrote:I met him one evening outside a movie theater, he asked for my number and wanted to be friends. We went out that weekend, walking in the park and playing guitar. At the end of the day he pushed me for sex, when I turned him down, he complained in a childish voice: I love you. If we don't have sex, I don't want to see you anymore, and I don't want that. I replied: I can accept that. He left, I thought that's the end.

You barely knew him and he:

1) told you he loved you

2) as a man in his 30s used a "childish voice" in a serious situation

3) said he wouldn't see you again if you didn't have sex with him

4) and then tried to make it seem it would be your fault for him no longer seeing you

How is it not "strange behavior" to bypass these red flags and speak to him again? - let alone let him call you to "catch up" and get together soon after

curious4you wrote:He said he wanted to be more than friends, I said he has to give me time to like him.

He called me consistently everyday for a month and didn't push me for sex again, and was always punctual and kept his words, so I thought he might be worthy of serious dating. He was very affectionate, kissing, holding hands, and act of service etc, everything a woman wanted in a boyfriend.

So you made him win you over.

What were you like as a girlfriend?

curious4you wrote:He never invited me to his place until I protested, because he had bad experience with crazy ex harassing him after breaking up. He always shaves his head, and I wanted to see his photos with hair. He refused because there were pics of him with exes that he doesn't want to look at. When I confronted him about this at the end of first month dating, he walked out on me,then came back a few days later and invited me to him place and showed me some photos.

He continues to be shady and wave red flags at you.
(that being said, "crazy harassing ex" can be pretty bad)

Did you two spend your time at your place then? or did you keep it on neutral ground?

curious4you wrote:He barely talk about anything concrete when we spent time together, but he is very social, he talks normally with other people, and I actually knew more about his life from him chatting with other people in a group setting.

So not in a place of trusting you or being able to experience closeness to you at that stage.

Red flag in context of what you wanted - but quite valid for him.

curious4you wrote:He does like talking loud in a group setting and appears overly excited, in one of my friends gather, he said to them: I love you guys so much, if you come visit _____, it's all on me! He literally just met them....

Bribing people to be liked.

Makes sense with all the other red flags.

curious4you wrote:Later as we know each other better, he said his parents were abusive, he doesn't like his younger sister either, but no concrete reason why they were abusive.

Helps explain his fear of intimacy and poor social/relationship skills

- Did you think it was unreasonable for him not to give you a "concrete reason why they were abusive" after only knowing him 4 months?
- If so, why?
- Did you think he was lying because he wouldn't go into detail?

curious4you wrote:He said he loves sex, he watched a lot of porn since 9 years old.

Not that abnormal (contingent on how he accessed it of course).

It probably wouldn't be considered "sexually deviant behavior" if that's what you're trying to get at.

Usually "sexually deviant behavior" refers to actually engaging with others or voyerism, exhibitionism, etc - rather than watching porn.

curious4you wrote:He had about 10 girlfriends in the past, [...] didn't end well, [...] After that he started to hit on woman on the street randomly and have sex with them one or twice, he slept with about 60 women this way.

Not abnormal.
Especially with possible abandonment issues and trust issues from childhood.

curious4you wrote:When we finally have sex, he seemed very excited, but I didn't enjoyed it, very quick and boring sex.

With all the work he put in - that was obviously against his nature - he must have been very excited.
^
(as in gave you "time to like him" by calling consistently "everyday for a month" and "didn't push me for sex again, and was always punctual and kept his words, so I thought he might be worthy of serious dating.
And he was "very affectionate, kissing, holding hands, and act of service etc, everything a woman wanted in a boyfriend")

Why was it boring?
Did you make him feel inferior as a result of him being "quick" or finding it boring?
Or did you try to find a way to make it more enjoyable for yourself?
Or...?

Do you find it abnormal that a man (who cared for you at the time) didn't last long your first time together?

curious4you wrote:There are many factors leading to my decision to break up him. Believe me or not, these abnormal behaviors actually are not the main reasons. I only list them to see if they are personality disorder symptom.
I found them clownish but not necessarily detrimental..

Why weren't these blatant red flags not a decision to break up?

Why were you even surprised by any of his poor behavior at that point?

curious4you wrote: one time we went out to meet his friend, he started to chat another group of women, and literally chasing them 2 blocks in front of me and his friend!

Red. Flag.

curious4you wrote:he had a friend need a place to stay, he is going to take her in. He knows her about 2 years and she is not an ex. I asked him: you said no girls in you place. He replied: yeah, I know. I said: that's very kind of you...

I wouldn't find this appropriate (but that might just be my personal values).

curious4you wrote:I asked him to bring her along in one of our outings, she didn't show up.

Red Flag.

curious4you wrote:I have done that for opposite sex friends too.

While in a relationship, you've had a guy stay with you for an undetermined amount of time?

curious4you wrote:.. I asked him how he will manage the sleeping situation, he said: one of us has to sleep on the floor then.

Shady as hell.

curious4you wrote:The final straw made me broke up with him is when I asked him out to an outdoor movie. He was 30mins late, and I saw he was taking his sweet time chatting with a woman while walking towards me. It was a weekday night, so I let him go home soon after the movie instead of walking me home like we usually did, but I saw he stopped on his way 3 times to chat with different group of women

Nothing new. Continued red flags.

curious4you wrote:I waited a week to get ride of negative emotions so I can calmly broke up with him.

Very cool. Very mature. More mature than I'd have been.

curious4you wrote:I insisted talking thing out in person is more respectful.

More respectful to you, not him, right?
- no judgement, just clarifying

curious4you wrote:He said he'll call in a week. He didn't call for 2 week, I didn't want to drag it any longer

disrespectful to you / predictable poor behavior 

curious4you wrote:he is really sneaky

You must know the answer to this one.

curious4you wrote:deep issues

Obviously he does.
All things considered, I'm assuming you do too (no disrespect intended).

curious4you wrote:case 1. He was intentionally playing me (and his wife too).

He was attending to other women directly infront of you and he was absolutely playing some games with you.
- Did you play them back?

However, when you put a man and woman under the same roof like that, bonding is often inevitable and with only one bed...
Maybe it was a way for him to get past his intimacy and abandonment issues.
--- I'm Not saying that cheating is acceptable
__________________________________


I doubt he has an actual personality disorder.

Deep seated issues, insecure, low self esteem, lack of relationship/social skills, fear of intimacy and abandonment, trust issues and all that for sure.

More importantly, my thoughts bring my attention to you and placing yourself in a position to be hurt for a long period of time.

You don't have control over him, but you can work on yourself to prevent (or at least greatly decrease the likelihood of) this type of harm.

From the first date you described, his poor behaviour was a constant in your relationship.
^
What was the pay off?

What do you have going on to make you think any of this was acceptable?

If you're insistent upon being with people who have "abnormal behaviors" and "personality disorder symptoms," it might be in your best interest to decide what you're willing to tolerate and what hurts too much / where to draw the line - and what the pay off is.

-- Fri Dec 27, 2019 5:23 am --

To note:
I'm not looking for answers to my questions. I was just thinking outloud.

Nothing much to add.

In the end if he does have a PD it still would come down to the thoughts written above. You can't change him, but you can try to figure out what attracted you, what you over looked, what you encouraged, etc. and why. If we don't do this, we are likely to repeat the same thing again with someone else.

DaturaInnoxia wrote:

curious4you wrote:Thoughts?

I'm not looking for answers to my questions. I was just thinking outloud.

Thanks DaturaInnoxia for the in depth analysis.

I agree, a lot of things you mentioned are reg flags in common sense. But some of these I don't really care.

I'm an introvert, I prefer low key intimate settings and dive deep with people I like rather than superficial socializing and small talks. I can do these things and people quite like me, I just have no desire to engage in these activities. But I know social life is a necessary part of life, that's why I like to date outgoing man, let him handle it and I fade in the background.

So in my case, I didn't mind him flirting around, I never felt jealous. I even told him if he wants to have sex with other women, just let me know, we can still be friends. Relationship is so much easier if people in it are honest and respectful. He said he didn't want to. I didn't mean to have him to win me over either, I don't care about the traditional courtship. It's really simply that I needed time for myself to know if I like or would like him. And time and money wise, we almost contributed equally, so there was no who won over whom.

The reasons I broke up with him were there was no emotional connection, different views on relationship, his disrespectful behaviors and poor judgment.

1. I was very open and honest to him from the very beginning, but he was secretive and mistrustful throughout, and these negative emotions are contagious, thus led me not able to trust and open up to him further. I needed that emotional connection to know if I like him, that's why I wanted to know him and asked about his life. (And I can't enjoy sex without feeling emotionally connected). I don't think it's too early to know why he thought his parents were abusive. Given he has so many negative opinions about all the people he had close relationships with, I would suspect the opposite. Like one of the example he gave me why he doesn't keep in touch with his mom and sister is they criticize him playing guitar all the time, he'd rather spend time with friends who love him more than they do. I disagree, I think it's because he doesn't know the proper time and place to play guitar, like not doing it to chase women on the street and disrupting dinner party (my first hand experience). And he walked out on me when I called out his secretive behaviors. There is a difference between people loving you offering constructive criticism and abuse, superficial friends love you for the good times or because they need you (maybe including the wife), but they might not be there in bad times. This is from me growing up with an emotionally manipulative father, but I'm pretty open and objective about it, it's more healthy and a sign that you have grown out that shadow.

2. I'm a very independent person, love mental and physical adventure, and try my best in everything I dive into. His philosophy is everything is taken care of, and I don't see him passionate about anything. I'm fine with that, people are different. But it bothers me when he said I can provide you. And he didn't want to use condom, saying let's get you pregnant. It really got me panicked, not that I don't want to have a baby, but it's very irresponsible to have a baby when you are not sure if you can build a healthy family together. We have enough stories that unhappy housewives acquiesced to cheating husbands because "he provides her".

3. I've already said I'm fine with the flirting. But when it comes to our date, we should be each other's priority. He arrived late because of being busy flirting with others, and misused my kindness of letting him go home early on flirting, that's very disrespectful.

4. Poor judgement. I like him being kind to others, I saw a few times, that's why I decided to date him. But there should be a limit. He tends to enable others, I don't think that's what a real friend should do. One of his friends is jobless, I suggested he should go back to finish college degree so he can have more options. He told him: you can stay with me, I can provide you. Same thing when he decided to take that woman in. I thought it would be temporary and believed him. Though I had a tiny bit of doubt because I once told him that I visited and stayed with a guy friend long time ago, he asked if we had sex. I felt very offended he would think me that way. If that's the first thing coming into his mind, wouldn't it be the first thought when his lady friend staying with him? Nevertheless I chose to believe his kindness. But he isn't an angel, he totally can say things just making himself looking good, I don't believe he mean it when he told my friends if they visit, it's all on him. He didn't remember any of their names. It was said at the high of the moment. And he manipulated one of them to take a huge roundabout to drive us home, I quite despised him for that. I realized he had gone too far when I asked if the woman was going to stay indefinitely. If he was a really friend, he should help her get independent instead of enabling her living on him. And she lives in our city, he is not the only one she knows, she has other female friends in our city, why she turned to a guy with a girlfriend living in a studio for long term accommodation if she had no ulterior motive? I helped several guy friends before, in these situations they didn't live in my city and they had a clear timeline. But I couldn't voice my suspicion because I knew he wouldn't listen as always, I just said: it's nice to help friend, but know your limits... If there was enough love and trust in our relationship, I'd ask him to move in with me and figure out how to help that friend together. I was worried about him, but I couldn't be his mom and lover at the same time, being honest with him meant I had to be ready to break up. So the end was inevitable, just needed a less complicated trigger.

You see, all these abnormal behaviors are just the facades, they can be red flags or not depends on who is involved. The real issues behind every relationship are always about communication, trust, respect and chemistry.

xdude wrote:Nothing much to add.

In the end if he does have a PD it still would come down to the thoughts written above. You can't change him, but you can try to figure out what attracted you, what you over looked, what you encouraged, etc. and why. If we don't do this, we are likely to repeat the same thing again with someone else.

Thanks Xdude, I totally agree with you. However, I'm at a loss myself. I don't know what type of man I should date anymore. My ideal is someone equally independent and well-rounded. I know there should be compromise, no one is perfect, I have my own load of craps sometimes. I dated introvert before, and really hated to be in charge of someone else's life and common social life. I figured I should date an extrovert, but their passion usually come and go very fast, while I'm typically slow in getting feeling and slow in getting over it, few of them are patient enough to wait for me to like them. I guess that's why I got in this mess, he did wait...

Curious4You, it doesn't seem reality-based to call him an asshole or say he has a personality disorder just because his deep-seated issues didn't match yours.

curious4you wrote:You see, all these abnormal behaviors are just the facades, they can be red flags or not depends on who is involved.

What I was attempting to do was point out all the reasons why the end result makes sense.

Your posts have described your own abnormal behaviors, poor judgements and red flags.

Your story's ending makes sense (not as in deserving or undeserving - rather in what you described leading up to it from the get go).

Either address your own issues instead of putting all responsibility on him, or

If you want to continue with whatever your looking for, learn to profile the mentally disordered traits or abnormal behaviors that will match whatever you have.

Either way you're unlikely to have much luck until you look at yourself, instead of pointing the finger.

curious4you wrote:Thanks Xdude, I totally agree with you. However, I'm at a loss myself. I don't know what type of man I should date anymore. My ideal is someone equally independent and well-rounded. I know there should be compromise, no one is perfect, I have my own load of craps sometimes. I dated introvert before, and really hated to be in charge of someone else's life and common social life. I figured I should date an extrovert, but their passion usually come and go very fast, while I'm typically slow in getting feeling and slow in getting over it, few of them are patient enough to wait for me to like them. I guess that's why I got in this mess, he did wait...

Just to be clearer than I was. There are times when someone feels (or has been) abused psychologically (it's just less obvious then physical cases), and it makes sense to start with facing that and sorting out what they did. You clearly know the difference though, and I get your thought above.

It seems semi-normal to me that extroverts may pick introverts and vice versa. You gave a good reason why. Long term? Works for some, not for others. Much of what was initially attractive can become a problem. It works the other way too. An introvert feeling overloaded by an extroverted partner long term, even if they enjoyed that partner taking the lead earlier on. At least you are honest with yourself that you need someone more outgoing long term.

DaturaInnoxia wrote:Either address your own issues instead of putting all responsibility on him, or

If you want to continue with whatever your looking for, learn to profile the mentally disordered traits or abnormal behaviors that will match whatever you have.

Either way you're unlikely to have much luck until you look at yourself, instead of pointing the finger.

I appreciate the critiques. I have been reflecting on myself these days. If you want to give me your opinion on what disorder or abnormality I might have, I'm all ears, that might help my future dating life too.

Just want to clarify that I'm not trying to put all responsibility on him or pointing fingers, I was honestly repeating the reasons I gave myself to make the decision, it's only for me. Had I intended to point finger, I would have told him all of them. I only mentioned I felt disrespected when he was late to the movie, the other reasons are not about me, it's not in my position to tell him unless being asked.

My original post asking if he is AH or PD is also for me to get better judgement, plus I thought AH should be called out. But PD, I don't have much experience, so I'd rather leave it as it is, and avoid this type in the future. My first suspicion of PD was when I called him out emotionally blackmailing me for sex, he was totally surprised and said he didn't know it was blackmailing.