Compared to this time last year things for me are a bit different. I have a much better & a different understanding, more compassion & more knowledge, less anger & so on, when it comes to NBM (she can still get to me don't get me wrong!). This BPD stuff, I'm finding is not only a bit disturbing but it's also particularly interesting to me now as an adult because I now understand it. But I am also able to look back & see how this 'pattern' has repeatedly happened since I was 10 years old.
I never noticed anything then because I was too young but from NBM's 2nd marriage up until now I can spot a pattern. I could before too but I never understood it.
It's a relief & it makes so much make sense but it's also a bit scary watching it 'again' and all unfolding right in front of my eyes. I have thought a lot of times to somehow get in touch with his new man that's on the scene and tell him what I think she's doing. He is a nice person from what we've seen & I feel guilty for not saying anything but also realize the repercussions which may come from this.
I could be totally wrong but I could be right on the ball, which I really feel that I am; this isn't anything I'd just take to if I felt the dots didn't connect.
It's nothing to be taken lightly at all , it's about real people, their lives & their emotions. It's not a game for the 'rest of us'. And I realize this isn't for her either but she doesn't 'appear' to have a clue. I also know it's none of my business and that in itself tells me to say nothing. And then I feel like an enabler. So yeah, a bit confusing on knowing what is the right thing in this sort of situation.
I have thought about going to see them, just pop in for a visit. Not to say anything about it all but just to pop in. I realize the game now has changed, well within me it has. It's pretty safe for me to go to her house, then leave when I am ready. To calmly take each time as it comes, and to realize she's not exactly a rational thinking person. & I also (think) I know how to deal with her better now when she does say something that's fiction. But keeping my own 'cool' is a big part of it. (for me).
He's pretty much moved in there now and on the weekends off they go driving around the place.
I know that he's asked her to marry him *alarm bells ringing!!* (#Excuse my french* but holy fucken heck!)
What is the rush here??? This is going to be marriage #4.
I talked to Aunty FOO last weekend (NBM's brothers wife) & they're both feeling pretty disgusted with her atm not only can they not believe that she's moved on so fast already from her last husband who only died last year but the way she is acting like a teenager again. All flitty in the head & so on.
( They've noticed 'something' else is not right also. I knew they'd have to, and I usually avoid seeing them because whenever I do get the chance NBM is usually there as well. I told my Aunty this & we're going to sometime, catch up. And if the next time happens to include NBM as well that's ok, I will be going along).
Basically I need to know what to do & the thought has occurred to me very recently on how long will it be before this guy turns on me like her last one did? but he might not either.
Will he believe her lies? I know I'm not going back there again. NBM & her last husband together when they'd have anything to do with me was like one of those storm cells way bigger & more than you on your own could handle.
I'd like to think this one, he has a bit more substance to him & he seems to be a bit more 'knowing' . I feel so sorry for him it's like watching an accident waiting to happen. It feels like I know this big secret & if you tell someone you don't know if they're going to label you the stupid one & say "good on you". It's not really a good place to be in even though I feel relieved to make some sense of all of the insanity for myself, which has gone on for most of my life or at least what I can remember. People who knew her before me have all said she was always a bit 'wild, different etc'. So I know for a fact this is not all in my head. And at the end of the day if i say nothing & watch her continue on her path of 'destruction' well then I am as bad as she is in a sense. It's enabling isn't it?? And enablers are sometimes as bad as the person doing the damage not only to others but themselves.
How a Borderline Personality Disorder Love Relationship Evolves
Love: The Vulnerable Seducer Phase
At first, a Borderline female may appear sweet, shy, vulnerable and "ambivalently in need of being rescued"; looking for her Knight in Shining Armor.
In the beginning, you will feel a rapidly accelerating sense of compassion because she is a master at portraying herself as she "victim of love" and you are saving her. But listen closely to how she sees herself as a victim. As her peculiar emotional invasion advances upon you, you will hear how no one understands her - except you. Other people have been "insensitive." She has been betrayed, just when she starts trusting people. But there is something "special" about you, because "you really seem to know her."
It is this intense way she has of bearing down on you emotionally that can feel very seductive. You will feel elevated, adored, idealized - almost worshiped, maybe even to the level of being uncomfortable. And you will feel that way quickly. It may seem like a great deal has happened between the two of you in a short period of time, because conversation is intense, her attention, and her eyes are so deeply focused on you.
Here is a woman who may look like a dream come true. She not only seems to make you the center of her attention, but she even craves listening to your opinions, thoughts and ideas. It will seem like you have really found your heart's desire.
Like many things that seems too good to be true, this is. This is borderline personality disorder.
It will all seem so real because it is real in her mind. But what is in her mind it is not what you perceive to be happening.
Love: The Clinger Phase
Once she has successfully candied her hook with your adoration, she will weld it into place by “reeling in” your attention and concern. Her intense interest in you will subtly transform over time. She still appears to be interested in you, but no longer in what you are interested in. Her interest becomes your exclusive interest in her. This is when you start to notice “something”. Your thoughts, feelings and ideas fascinate her, but more so when they focus on her. You can tell when this happens because you can feel her "perk-up" emotionally whenever your attention focuses upon her feelings and issues. Those moments can emotionally hook your compassion more deeply into her, because that is when she will treat you well - tenderly.
It’s often here, you begin to confuse your empathy with love, and you believe you're in love with her. Especially if your instinct is strong and rescuing is at the heart of your "code." Following that code results in the most common excuse I hear as a therapist, as to why many men stay with borderline women, ".... But I love her!" Adult love is built on mutual interest, care and respect - not on one-way emotional rescues. And mothering is for kids. Not grown men.
But, if like King Priam, you do fall prey to this Trojan Horse and let her inside your city gates, the first Berserker to leave the horse will be the devious Clinger. A master at strengthening her control through empathy, she is brilliant at eliciting sympathy and identifying those most likely to provide it-like the steady-tempered and tenderhearted.
The world ails her. Physical complaints are common. Her back hurts. Her head aches. Peculiar pains of all sorts come and go like invisible, malignant companions. If you track their appearance, though, you may see a pattern of occurrence connected to the waning or waxing of your attentions. Her complaints are ways of saying, "don't leave me. Save me!" And Her maladies are not simply physical. Her feelings ail her too.
She is depressed or anxious, detached and indifferent or vulnerable and hypersensitive. She can swing from elated agitation to mournful gloom at the blink of an eye. Watching the erratic changes in her moods is like tracking the needle on a Richter-scale chart at the site of an active volcano, and you never know which flick of the needle will predict the big explosion.
It is like you are a Coast Guard cutter and she is a drowning woman. But she drowns in a peculiar way. Every time you pull her out of the turbulent sea, feed her warm tea and biscuits, wrap her in a comfy blanket and tell her everything is okay, she suddenly jumps overboard and starts pleading for help again. And, no matter how many times you rush to the emotional - rescue, she still keeps jumping back into trouble. It is this repeating, endlessly frustrating pattern which should confirm to you that you are involved with a Borderline Personality Disorder. No matter how effective you are at helping her, nothing is ever enough. No physical, financial or emotional assistance ever seems to make any lasting difference. It's like pouring the best of your self into a galactic-sized Psychological Black Hole of bottomless emotional hunger. And if you keep pouring it in long enough, one-day you'll fall right down that hole yourself. There will be nothing left of you but your own shadow, just as it falls through her predatory "event horizon." But before that happens, other signs will reveal her true colors.
Sex will be incredible. She will be instinctually tuned in to reading your needs. It will seem wonderful - for a while.
The intensity of her erotic passion can sweep you away, but her motive is double-edged. One side of it comes from the instinctually built-in, turbulent emotionality of her disorder. Intensity is her trump-card.
But the other side of her is driven by an equally instinctually and concentrated need to control you. The sexual experiences, while imposing, are motivated from a desire to dominate you, not please you. Her erotic intensity will be there in a cunning way tailored so you will not readily perceive it.
“I love you” means – “I need you to love me”. “That was the best ever for me” means – tell me “it was the best ever for you”. Show me that I have you.
Love: The Hater Phase
Once a Borderline Controller has succeeded and is in control, the Hater appears. This hateful part of her may have emerged before, but you probably will not see it in full, acidic bloom until she feels she has achieved a firm hold on your conscience and compassion. But when that part makes it's first appearance, rage is how it breaks into your life.What gives this rage its characteristically borderline flavor is that it is very difficult for someone witnessing it to know what triggered it in reality. But that is its primary identifying clue: the actual rage-trigger is difficult for you to see. But in the Borderline's mind it always seems to be very clear. To her, there is always a cause. And the cause is always you. Whether it is the tone of your voice, how you think, how you feel, dress, move or breathe - or "the way you're looking at me," - she will always justify her rage by blaming you for "having to hurt her."
Rage reactions are also unpredictable and unexpected. They happen when you least expect it. And they can become extremely dangerous. It all serves to break you down over time. Your self esteem melts away. You change and alter your behavior in hopes of returning to the “Clinger Stage”. And periodically you will, but only to cycle back to the hater when you least expect it, possibly on her birthday, or your anniversary.
Borderline Personality Disorder is a serious mental illness.
**Speaking of birthdays/anniversaries, she chose her 3rd marriage to take place on the anniversary of her birth mothers death. 16th August 1974 she died, & then Mum & Basil were married on the 16th August 1997. At the time people questioned it but you tend to have no answers so you all let it go & stop wondering because there really is no logical explanation. Another thing, you'd probably want to grieve that day or at least have that day as a memory to the person no longer here but not not her. **
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