[pennylayne]

Hi there...I'm new here and struggling with someone I started seeing about 7 weeks ago. I've been trying to deal with the issues on my own but I really have just no ability to tell whether I'm creating issues or if they're real and there's just a compatibility issue.

It started out ok, but my core beliefs were triggered very quickly with this guy. I kept my feelings hidden though and tried to deal with them alone. After a few weeks I was just finding it all too hard too cope with and felt too guilty about putting the issues on him as I'd started to show the cracks and so last week I ended it, telling him I didn't want to be a burden or a source of stress to him and I obviously wasn't ready to be involved with anyone. I told him I still wanted to be friends but my feelings for him are still quite deep and I've needed constant contact with him and I've felt sad when he hasn't been very attentive. He has kept quite flirtatious and seems to be trying to encourage me back into bed with him, even though I've explained that sex complicates things. I have major issues with sex and attachment (probably from being raped at 15).

I haven't told him that I have BPD, but I have told him bits and some symptoms. I have felt scared to go too in detail in case he abandons me, but I'm finding even this "friends" thing very difficult now because I think what I really want is to get back together and to have him accept me and try to meet my needs as he hasn't been this far. He doesn't do enough to let me know he cares and there are other things I would need him to do to make me feel respected and I'm really scared to ask for these things. I also hoped that keeping as "friends" would keep things light but I keep losing it and feeling really sad and looking for signs he cares. I get a strong feeling like he's only still talking to me because he wants sex.

The problem at the moment is that I think things are very tender right now...yesterday I became upset during IM conversation and was feeling invalidated so I told him I was feeling over sensitive and need to withdraw until I feel better. He then started being quite insensitive by suggesting sex would fix me and I blocked him as I was becoming quite distressed. I had no idea whether to make contact again but this evening I sent him a message apologising for cutting him off and explain that he was being insensitive and it was making things worse. I said he seems to be out of his depth with me and that it feels like he's trying to push me away...he signed on but he hasn't replied.

So I guess what I'm saying is I don't know what is best now. I don't know if I just try to leave it (as hard as that is for me). I can't stand being left hanging and not knowing how he's feeling...I feel like I need to say "goodbye" and assume he doesn't want to talk. I know he may be busy and then I worry that if I do that he will come back saying he can't drop everything to talk to me...I just need some confidence in what I'm doing because I have none right now and I always feel like I'm doing the wrong thing no matter what. Any words of advice would be appreciated...

[casurfer]

My suggestion would be to avoid getting physical with him, do things together to see if you can in fact be friends... and if he's interested in that, you can let things develop slowly. That way you can see if he just wants the benefits without the work in being together. I assume you haven't told him about the abuse when you were 15.... once you know he wants a relationship with him, that's when you would start to share more with him... don't divulge too much too early. Don't get too physical too fast. A lasting relationship depends upon trust and friendship and unfortunately that takes time to build.

[hamster-bamster]

Telling him that he is out of his depth with you was a ba-a-a-d idea. Do not judge him. Use "I" statements - tell him what you feel, need, want, desire, etc., but do not tell him that he is out of his depth with you. You are not a project or an assignment of his, hence using the "out of his depth" line on him was not called for. I would apologize for this one, since that indeed was a wrong thing to do. Hopefully being a little apologetic would earn you a brownie point or two with him. It would also be a Litmus test - if he is softened by and appreciative of your heartfelt apology, then good, and if he is not, then he is not worth your time. People's reactions to apologies give plenty of information you can use by way of character judgment.

Good luck, any which way it turns out. And, be sure to get some trauma therapy since the rape seems to have had quite a deep effect on you that you'd want to counteract.

[hamster-bamster]

PS not only might he be busy, but also...

... you have been sending him conflicting messages and he may not know how to react.

[pennylayne]

Thanks for the replies...I posted this a few days ago so things have happened since then and my post has only just been approved.

Hamster - He came back being quite sweet when I sent another message saying I was going to leave him alone and hoped he would meet someone well balanced soon. We've already been through enough that I can't really be bothered to "hide" who I am anymore. He triggers me constantly and so the way I see it, he either likes me enough to try not to trigger me or he doesn't and it's over. I've been trying to get therapy for some time but I haven't got the money to go private and the government health system isn't up to scratch.

Casurfer - sorry to say but we've already been physical. Happened ages ago and he told me he felt spending time together that way would make us bond far more than going out and making small talk. I got where he was coming from so I tried it for a while but it got to a point where I was feeling like I needed more and he needed to make more effort. I already had the feeling he wanted a relationship from a number of things he said. We haven't seen each other in almost 3 weeks and I invited him to come to the zoo with me a couple of days ago and he wasn't very interested and didn't suggest anything else except constantly hinting that he misses my body and wants to have sex with me...

I don't know...I'm at the stage now where I feel like it's just not going to work out. He's not attentive enough and with having the last 2.5 weeks talking to him only through text mediums it's been frustrating and upsetting for me. I feel upset every day. I have told him a bit more about my illness and yesterday when he just stopped responding during a conversation I told him that it's hurtful and rude to do this. It came out overly critical and he assumed I was saying goodbye and so he said goodbye...things got confused and I explained that I was just trying to express my needs and leave it for him to accept or reject. But he hasn't responded to that and I'm so sick of him just not talking to me. Fine if he's having trouble dealing with it, I never said he had to stick around but he has and he's just not trying at all. I tell him how I feel when I'm ignored and he does the same thing again. I end up in tears and it's so stupid...I have no idea what he's feeling and I can't cope being with someone who just won't tell me what they think or feel.

[hamster-bamster]

being physical indeed can make people quite attached to one another, so to the extent to which you are trying to prevent a bond from being formed, you are right to refrain from being physical.

That said, sex is a great language of communication (I do not mean words enunciated during sex - I mean the whole non-verbal stuff that is involved in sex), and to the extent that he has been hinting at missing your body, he might simply be saying that he is not particularly good at meeting your needs via verbal communication but might meet them via being physical. You cannot cope being with someone who just won't tell you what they feel, you wrote, but you are forgetting that verbal communication (talking, texting, etc.) is only one type of communication. Maybe he'd be able to tell you how he feels via being physical. Being physical is a very direct way of communicating - I can tell you that I am trying to relate how I think and feel to a man who is in another state and thus only words would do - due to lack of physical contact - and it is very difficult, time-consuming, etc. to say things in words. Physical love would be much easier - in my case it is impossible, so I try to use words, but I am well aware of the limitations of all things verbal.

I am not saying that the man whom you have described on this thread has the same depth of feeling for you as I have for the man in another state to whom I am trying to say things via words - obviously, it is not the case, as you guys have known each other for 2 months whereas we (the man in another state and I) have known each other for 2 decades, so it is apples and oranges - I am simply trying to say that words are not the only way to relate feelings. Not at all. Sex, music, paintings, etc. are all ways to relate feelings that cannot be related via the use of words.

[pennylayne]

Well, unfortunately things haven't gone well with this guy...he's been a constant trigger to my beliefs of being worthless and unimportant. Unfortunately no matter how I tried to be calm, things never got fixed and 3 weeks went by being in limbo and not knowing how he felt and not being able to get him to open up or discuss any issues with him.

I got upset with him one day for just leaving me hanging during a text conversation and I told him I didn't like it and he could make more effort or not bother contacting me again. He assumed I was saying goodbye and he said goodbye and sorry. I tried to explain that this was not what I meant but he didn't respond. I left it a couple of days and then sent him a message saying I didn't know what to do and asked him if I should just leave him alone. He replied saying he was busy and would talk to me later, but again didn't get back to me. So the next day I'd had enough and I said, "Sorry to bother you - it's obvious that you don't want to talk to me or are too busy, but being left in limbo is very painful for me and I tried to explain that to you. I'm done trying to communicate like this through text. All I really wanted was to find out where we stood and if we both wanted to work things out, but I guess your lack of contact means you don't. I'm sorry I couldn't be more relaxed - you have no idea what the past 3 weeks have been like for me. I hope you find what you're looking for x".

I then sent him another message a while later finally letting him know I have BPD as it may come in useful. I thought he may as well know in case he wants to understand what happened better...not that he has to, it just gives him the option.

Anyway, I never heard back...again. This was on Friday. I've now been trying very hard not to contact him and of course I can't stop obsessing. It's probably the fact he has said NOTHING to me since what I said. He's just ok with things ending like that?! I don't get it. I am thinking of approaching the subject of being friends, but only once feelings have subsided. But I don't want bad feelings right now and I'm wondering how it would come across if I sent him a message asking how he was and just trying to make "peace". Something like, "Hey are you ok? I hope there are no hard feelings and that once all this has blown over we can be friends...if you want that is. It's be good to know how you feel".

Any suggestions??