I knew better.....

Just a little bit of background for those of you who don't know me. About a year and a half ago, I moved 2,600 miles from everything I knew. The decision was totally impulsive and I've regretted it for a while. I have no friends here, no place I can go if I ever need help, and my husband and I are often at odds. More than once, I've started feeling trapped, like I needed to go somewhere, had to get away, and had absolutely no where to go.

Well, around Thanksgiving, I said a few things that my husband's cousin pulled me aside for. I've come to be fairly open about my messed up childhood...it's made it easier to deal with... and she overheard something. She seemed to care in a way I don't see very often.

In early January, I met up with her for lunch. We spent several hours sharing sob stories. She has gone through two divorces and had enough of her own, and we seemed to really connect. I decided to go a little further and mentioned a few BPD traits in a way that it couldn't be directly associated with BPD: "I don't really know who I am.", "When I get upset, I tend to 'phase out' (disassociate)". To every single one, she looked at me and said "so do I!. I thought I was alone in that." By the time I left, I had her pegged for at least four or five traits. I'm not saying she's definitely BPD, but she definitely had some traits there. On my way home, I made a decision, a decision I was stupid for making, but you have to understand, I've been pretty desperate to find SOMEONE here I can relate to, someone who would help me if I needed it or that I could just talk to. When I got home, I sent her a link, the DSM's BPD traits. I told her I'd been diagnosed with it and that she and I seemed to have a lot in common....which we did. She agreed with me on every statement I posed to her that represented the traits.

Well, she never messaged or called me back. I knew I'd screwed it up. She finally agreed to meet me for dinner, which was on Friday. She was standoffish to me pretty much through the whole thing. Turns out, she talked to her therapist as well as her ex (who's a therapist) about BPD and they both told her she didn't have it. In addition, and this just conjecture, they told her a lot of things about it...that BPDs were attention seekers, manipulators, turned on you, etc. I asked her if she'd be willing to let me come over if I ever felt I needed to get out. Last time I met her, she claimed to understand and would have said "yes" if I'd asked. Now she needed to "keep boundaries"!! Now, she has reason to not want to take me in...it could potentially cause a family conflict, but "keep boundaries"!! I have no friends here, absolutely none, and that's all I hoped to achieve from it. Now I feel as though I lost the only chance I had for a friend. It breaks my heart. I really thought she'd get it, but I knew better...and I still thinks she has traits...but you know the reputation of personality disorders! All I know is she's been officially pushed, and we weren't that close yet. I can make it stick. It makes me want to go back in to the shell I spent over 20 years of my life in...where I didn't have anyone and was okay with that....but I don't know how to do that part.

I'm really sorry. it really is sad that ppl treat ppl with bpd that way. Just know it's out of their ignorance. My borderline traits have calmed as I've gotten older. But at one time I thought I was just borderline and even some counselors treated me like crap sometimes. It's really unfair. What I've learned to do is just slowly get to know ppl. Then build up trust and just let them in a little at a time. I'm sorry u feel so alone. I do too sometimes.

I hope u get to feeling better.

I know that. I was desperate. I am not young. I am nearly 50 years old. I had traits very bad when young, and then kinda buried myself in life and had no friends. Something happened, a friendship, about 2 years ago, that brought it all back. That, coupled with my work, has been very hard to deal with.

I am so sorry. I know how much you wanted that friendship to work.

This is just awful. She's treating you wrong, and I am very sorry about the prejudices you have to face.

You don't have friends, someone seemed to care and I suspect somewhere around here you began to idealize her the situation etc.

I find this whole situation on your part to be dysfunctional, just by the fact you're paying so much attention to what you perceive are traits and you're fishing for that information. You're analyzing her.

BPD traits are only relevant if they present themselves in the proper context which is a pervasive pattern of instability in relationships. I don't get the sense her relationships are all that unstable. She's been divorced twice, so has 50% + of the population. It also appears she's on relatively good terms with her ex. I'm divorced and I hate the stupid ***** with a passion.

Regardless, you're fishing for commonalities which isn't really being all that honest because there's an ulterior motive behind your questions, which I suspect is the part I underlined.

So you get home send her the dsm traits on bpd, mention that you have it, and that the two of you seem to have a lot in common. You're leading her into drawing the conclusion that she might have bpd too, kind of like manipulating the situation. It appears to have worked because she then discussed it with her therapist, as well as, her ex who is also a therapist and both reassured her that she doesn't have bpd.

I think that you need to analyze this whole situation, and your process of thought what it was that you were trying to accomplish and how you were going about it, because it is dysfunctional. It's doubtful that it will change anything in regards to this situation, but it can be used to learn from so you can try and avoid it in the future.

May be reasonable on her part. You did try and lead her to believe she might have bpd, and also hesitant because of what she had been told by therapists.

This is wrong? How? We have dysfunctional ways in which we have learned to cope and part of those dysfunctions are to seek attention (we want to be loved), manipulate situations (to get attention / love), turn on people (when we don't get those things). It doesn't have to be liked but it's accurate.

This is what you REALLY wanted.. a friend, someone who'd be there for you, someone you could rely on and call on when needed blah blah blah.

I think her need to establish boundaries for her is completely rational on her part. She needs to take care of her mental health first. Also the fact she appears to be in therapy makes boundaries even more important I'd suspect.

The fact you have no friends is your problem and not hers. You lost 1 chance to have a friend and NOT the ONLY chance. You're still hung up on the fact you think she has traits of bpd. <-- that will get you nowhere with this, but I guess it doesn't matter because you weren't that close to begin with.

Now if you choose you can think I'm mean and hateful OR you can look at what I wrote and see there may be some validity in it.

What you wanted was a friend, someone you could rely on (good). You/we don't know how to ask for what we need so our dysfunctional interpersonal / coping skills kick in and **** things up (not so good). The key, I think, for you is to look at this situation, find your patterns/motives, so you'll have a better chance to be aware of them in the future and avoid this kind of situation.

I'm not going to cut up what you said. I know you're largely right. I'm just totally alone out here and was desperate in the way I behaved and acted. I'm just desperate for someone, anyone out here that I can trust and I thought she might provide that.
I fooled myself, regardless of whether it was dysfunctional behavior on my part of not.

This is rational, and logical and what you truly want/need. It's also where I think you need to honestly look at yourself and determine what was right, what was manipulative and what prevented you from asking for what you want / need so there's a better chance in the future that it won't happen again.

Maybe she would have. Maybe you idealized her, put her on a pedestal, thought she could provide you the love and attention and could be accepting of you and now you're realizing she is human. At some point all of us who idealize people are going to be faced with the realization these people we idealize are human.

this is illogical, and where you need to accept what has occurred. What about your behavior got you to this point. What can you change, so you have a better chance it won't occur in the future. There is manipulation on your part that got you to this point, and if you really analyze the situation you may find a consistent pattern of behavior that has occurred with others in the past.

The moral of this story is be honest with yourself, determine / find your pattern of behavior so you can be aware of it in the future and fight the urge to do what comes naturally to you and all of us.

I'm correct in what I say, I see the patterns in myself, and fight the urge to avoid them, unfortunately knowing this doesn't make me successful. I'm relatively close to your age, and to an extent I believe it's more difficult for us because these behaviors are so ingrained in us and through the years we've or at least me have become more jaded. I do believe if dbt had been around in my late teens or early 20's I'd be more different than what I am today.

That's why anyone in their late teens or early 20's who may read this if you have the opportunity to take dbt.. do it!

hi maranara, i don't think you made a stupid decision at all, after all we are impulsive, but i do think sending the link probably wasn't a good idea. maybe talking on the phone and exchanging numbers would have been a little less abrupt, that may have worked a little better and hanging out a lot more till you guys got a lil more comfortable with each other ( but hey, we make these impulse decisions and they always seem to blow up in our faces, right!) at least with me anyway. are we attention seekers??? hmm, i don't know about you, but i sure the hell am, and proud of it! i want all the attention i can get and not ashamed of it! manipulators?? i think that's a stretch, i may do things to get attention, but i think that's hardly manipulation. i don't believe we manipulate anyone, but if someone hurts me, i'll turn on 'em in a heartbeat so yeah, i'll turn on someone that screws me, wouldn't you?? but it's easy to make friends, you just gotta go out and meet people or go places people are at with similar interest (the hard part is getting motivated to do it) i would probably x her out, and i know it sucks but back to square one. hope this helps, stay strong!