That's very caring for her, great

First I read the last page of this thread, now I'm reading the rest. The above is probably 5:1.

OP, I haven't seen so many heartfelt, lengthy, well-written responses in a while. It is obvious to everybody who reads this thread except you that dating someone with BPD is going to cost you years of your life and do lasting if not permanent damage.

I had to stop here. Because you're being played and set up, and you've been warned.

Man, you've gotta read back over these sorts of things and really ask yourself what the implications are.

If you can't set this incredibly important boundary, despite all the warnings, then you are truly hopeless and all that will put an end to this is an absolute rock bottom crash and burn. Don't let it come to that.

dude, serious question, do you realize how you come off through this post? think about what you were like a year ago then read the quote yourself a few times. You clearly expressed you didn't want her to move in, but she's practically moved in anyways. You told her you loved her, now you are afraid to do things that you want in your own place. That's a pattern of an expert manipulator. I am going to take a wild guess here, remember the episode at the shrinks office where she made you look like a degen gambler? well I predict it is going to get worse. She will use that same theme into guilting you in playing less and just generally doing less of what you want and enjoy in order to please her. She now has enough tools to manipulate you into doing what she wants you to do. You will get to know up close what an energy vampire is like.

You don't even need to respond to this and just try to be aware when it starts happening, maybe some sense will finally snap into you before it's too late.

This is your only way out now.



(best clip I can find now that youtube sucks)

From my experience, not beeing 100% of the time with my gf was much better for our relationship. both of you having no jobs and living together will be a nightmare.

Poker perspective : your home is your workplace you have to set very clear boundaries right away. clark idea to ask her 3 free night is really really important.

Job perspective :
For You :
Get one , even if you are a really solid poker players, meeting some people and getting out of the house is really important with a BPD gf that will alienate from your family and friends gradualy. an additional income even from a part time job will be welcome at some point.

For her :
Dont start making excuse for her that you arent sure if she can handle customers and what not, if you dont want to end up taking care of a grown up kid you have to be clear that if she want to live with you getting a job is not optional.

She'll find it soon enough anyway

fyp.

Sadly, this is most likely true.

Don't put up a chick you've been seeing for 4 months to stay rent free.

Already being alienated away from what you enjoy and/or job.

Why's that your concern, she's an adult - you have to find her a job? You don't know what's real and what's manipulation. She may be able to get a job just fine and is using the BPD as a way to manipulate you into thinking she can't get one....so she can be home with you (or whatever other crazy reason).

How do you know she's really upset about her mother or it isn't more manipulation?

Bad idea. You're already going to therapy together after 4 months & you think it's wise to live together?

Who cares how she takes it; it's your place, is it not?


Are you even reading what everyone is writing here? This is like pissing in the wind. I still don't think you realize that while her feelings may seem completely genuine, it may all be 100% manipulation or 75% manipulation or 10%, etc - you get the idea. Point is, by the time you know this lunatic well enough to decipher between genuine emotion and manipulation, it's too late, your life/psyche is altered forever.

It's quite sad that many people (myself included) have spent time & energy to write out quite personal stories because we want to help you and don't want you to follow the same path we did. Yet, you continue with this crazy person when there's plenty of sane women out there.

She'll take it very badly and it will hasten the end. The double-whammy is not just assumed rejection by you but having to go back to her mother.
As for the therapists, remember the old adage 'most psychologists are kinda *****' and lack the bravery, insight or rigour to tell you what is actually best for you just now. Telling newly-in-loves that they ought to split for their own sanity will lead to a break down in affection for the therapist and damage to their revenue stream. Assuming they even knew why that was the only realistic option in the first place.
Visit Dr Google, really get to know what you're up against. And you're getting loads of good stuff here too, no psychologist who hasn't really been a victim of a relationship with one of these people can really understand the depths of the darkness it takes you to.

Minor nit here: I think most experienced psychologists will understand this. However, by nature and/or training, they are more inclined to conciliatory resolution of problems. As a result they will be especially prone to taking that route when their client tells them how much he likes the BPD gf and is in love with her.

OP will be making a big mistake (shocking!) if he fails to make it absolutely clear to the therapist that his primary reason for seeking help is to figure out what action is best for him rather than more nebulous questions such as how to handle the relationship.

I would think more people would be angry since OP figuratively **** all over them by ignoring the advice

I dated a BPD. They aren't exactly easy to be ridden of.

Probably an exercise in futility, but this will help with breaking up with her:

http://bpdfamily.com/bpdresources/nk_a110.htm

^ So be passive aggressive? Playing mind games is utterly ridiculous.

I wouldn't know. Closest I got to a BPD ex-girlfriend was one with bipolar disorder.

I just typed in how to break up with a bpd girlfriend into google and that's what came up.

I had one that sort-of fits the description. She didn't have violent/insane tendencies (which might refute her/my diagnosis), but was very smart, keen on emotions and manipulative. I likely have avoidant pd, so we meshed really well!, but anyways...she would come over on a Thursday and not leave until Sunday night. Which was okay I guess, but she also wouldn't leave my side. She couldn't comprehend that I needed to recharge my batteries at times, and interpreted it as me not caring about her [as much as she cared about me, as she often said]. I tried things like withholding my emotions (usually unconsciously), and sex, refuting things she said just to be contrary, not showing up when I was supposed to - or keeping my word, and being just an all-around dickhead. It made her cringe, but also hold on tighter. She was always on step ahead of me, and very savvy about it, often putting me in positions where I couldn't accuse her of anything because of plausible deniability/me being a giant ass if wrong. She isolated me from my friends (all of them made her cry at some point or another), convinced me that no one would love me as much as she did (actually true), faked sick to keep me around longer on one evening, faked a lot of things actually.

But she did make me feel really good a good portion of the time, and provided a connection deeper than I've had with anyone else. If she had been chucking plates at my head for misplacing silverware, stealing, cheating, lying about real things, it would have been easy to leave her. But it wasn't, and I still deeply miss her.

I really don't think it's fair to call her a "lunatic" or a "crazy person", yeah OK she has issues, more issues than the average person, but that doesn't make her a lunatic. It's not her fault she had a really ****ty upbringing, and it's not her fault that she sometimes has outbursts because of it. She has still overcome a lot of things, like bulimia, even though she didn't really have any support when doing so, so she is definately a lot stronger than some of you are making out.


I went to see the therapist today, and I didn't have to make an excuse why I was going out because my gf was out anyway, but it felt good to get a lot of things I have wanted to say off my chest, and I really did have a lot to say, and she wasn't really offering me much back tbh, and kept asking me in subtle ways if the build-up of all this has made me suicidal, or if I ever experienced suicidal tendencies-(questions like when I mentioned how my Mum told me that she should have aborted me, she asked "Do you agree with your Mother's comments?" and "If your girlfriend told you to harm yourself, would you do it?)".I don't know why, but I think she thought I was suicidal-(I'm not), which was a bit disconcerting. But then we worked on my assertiveness and that was it.



Anyway, when my gf came back to my place today, she had been to the hairdresser's, and-(to my surprise) had her hair dyed from dark auburn to extreme platinum blonde, and she said that she has called a piercing place, and is getting a "Monroe" piercing next week, and said she wants me to get an eyebrow piercing or something, and she was so positive and upbeat about everything, so I said maybe. I was pretty much taken aback by everything, and I really don't know what has got into her the past few days, but beforehand, everything she did was pretty much the same, she always had her hair the same, her make-up the same, her dress-sense the same, but ever since I told her that I love her, there have been no outbursts and she seems a lot more confident. Have any of you guys that were in a relationship with someone with BPD have them start acting more "out there" for lack of a better term, and do you think it means she is getting better?

Extreme positive while pleasant in the beginning are less pleasant once you understand that they are as unnatural as the burning rage when she is extremely negative and you are expecting to hit some low point soon. if you ask if she ll be normal some time , yeah i guess.

It never is.

What's fair Michael?

What's fair to you?

That's the most important question. You obviously don't care all that much about yourself and your own good b/c you fear being a lone way too much. I understand that you will be in a horrible place if you break up with her, but that's a prison of your own doing. Most normal people would be happy to be done with someone like her even if it means being alone for a little while. Well whatever, I wish you the best. I hope she get's better. I also hope you get better. While she might seem great, I'm pretty sure there are other fish in the sea that long term would be significantly better. I know you can't see that right now. I know it's tough to see past what you have now.

Oh, wow.

The shifting/unstable self-image/self-concept pretty common in BPD, without reading too much into it.
You're making a good insight I think when you're linking all this to how she feels after you told her you loved her.
I'm interested in the therapist....you're american, right? Paying for this? Sounds like a bit of a waster, this person. Sitting there, letting you do all the talking, not giving back the quite concrete and intelligent insights and recommendations you require and deserve. This will be excused as 'allowing the subject to heal through talking' or similar bs. And the insights, when they came, sound pretty dumb and possibly harmful. Move to dump unless that improves, I'd say. Could make a big difference to the outcome here. There's a lot of scope in psychology and counselling for this type of bs, imo.