Emotional blackmail and desperately need help

AlisaLight,
How are things going lately? Any improvement?
Did anything here help you?
Hope you're doing ok.

I think you need to educate yourself on what Bipolar is all about. I get a sense from your writing expectations that you think this is like he being diagnosed with the flu & when he finally "gets well" he will no longer have these problems you are dealing with now. What you seem to be missing is that THIS IS A LIFE LONG CONDITION. The mood changes will continue FOREVER. If lucky they will find meds that will help stsbalize those mood swings but in reality they NEVER work forever & this is something you will have to deal with forever if ylu choose to stay with him.

NO , there isnt a switch that changes him from one person to another. There IS a chemical imbalance in his brain that causes his moods to change. They can rapid cycle or it can change over long periods of time.

This is a life long mental ILLNESS just like diabetes or MS is a life long physical illness. Unlike the flu. It never goes away. Meds can help but they most times dont control it totally.

So, if you ONLY like him when he is like he was before he was in the hospital then are you planning on being around him knly when he is like that? What kind of relationship is that? A soulmate takes a person for better or worse. So you dknt want to be around his worst & he has no interest in being around you then either. What kind of a soulmate is that?

You have a lot of learning to do so that ypu can really determine if all these moods is something you can tolerate because whether you like it or not, this total package of moods is what you get when you get him. You dont het to pick & choose.

I understand what you are saying but honestly we can’t expect such devotion to this man from alisa.

She hasn’t see this guy for over a year at least, he does not want to see her yet another year, he lives in a different country, he doesn’t want to talk to her on the phone and they only communicate via her writing messages, plus he wants to break up with her.

Even if his stories are true (which is unlikely) it’s unrealstic to expect her to be devoted to this man simply because he has mental illness. It’s not like she married him for better or worse. They aren’t even a romantic couple. He doesn’t even want to be with her. Why is she expected to be devoted?

We cant but she is.

The thing is it has nothing to do with devotion to learn about their MI. It has to do with helping us come to terms with the situation.

I left my H 5 years before I researched Aspergers because many said his behaviors I describes sounded very much like that. I didnt have money to file for the divorce. The emotion I felt toward him was hate not love but emotions are emotions & understanding what one is dealing with can be the best help for the person dealing with the other person. In my case the research also helped me understand the father I had grown up with.

OP sounds like she thinks this is all JUST a temporary situation & its NOT. Coming to terms & understanding the Bipolar can actually make the break up easier to let go of the person if there is understanding that THIS is what you will be dealing with forever.

Yes I wondered if any of the hospital situation was actually true or just an act to get rid of the relationship & her. Could just besaying the NICE things to mske it sound more real... but she trust him So....in the scenario she is chosing to believe, she NEEDS to grasp the reality of what she is going with.

Good points. I see how it applies to situations when you are in a relationship with someone with mental illness. In Alissa’s situation I’d not be researching anything. She only knows what he tells her or what she can get from his abusive messages. It seems like he was always just fine until one day he told her he was diagnosed and then he abruptly started acting bad. It might be wise to travel there and see for yourself what he is really up to.

I think the problem here is that Alisa thinks that she is in a relationship while those of us who understand functional relationships KNOW otherwise. So for Alisa to handle it like the relationship she thinks she is in, it would be good to understand what she is being led to believe is going on. Im sure that when you think yourself in a functilnal relationship leaving it is as difficult as if it were actually a functional relationship for Alisa. The important thing is to not only have therapy to help but to take as many actions as possible to actually get in touch WITH THE TRUTH, whatever that may be & if it happens to be true that he really is dx'ed with bipolar then being aware & realizing what is being experienced now with all thebfluxuations in moods, this would be exactly what having a relationship with him will be like forever. Hopefully this would not be acceptable & realizing that person she knew will NEVER be there permanently EVER AGAIN.

If in reality he actually has bipolar is thisbwhat you want to deal with FOREVER?

If in reality he is lying about his condition to get you to break up with him.....is that what you really want to tolerate forever.

There comes a point where REALITY needs to be dealt with, not what one HOPES it will be or wishes it will be BUT WHAT IT IS & it is important to get in touch with that reality so that a WISE decision can be made forbyour future instead of sitting there wishing that in a few years things will be back to what they used to be like. Problem is with either scenario that is IMPOSSIBLE & will NEVER HAPPEN. That past relationship you are holding onto is NOT todays REALITY & its time to get in touch with what NOW is holding for you. You need to know the truth so you will be sble to quit holding onto the dream you are clinging to with wishful expectation that is not based on reality.

Hi Alisa, I think you have been getting triggered and frustrated in that you were looking for a certain kind of answer to help you FIX this problem and no one is giving that to you.
Mental Illness is pretty complex and a person can go along fine for a while and then almost suddenly struggle with a mental illness that frightens and confuses them. The behaviors you have described may be THOUGHT to be bipolar disorder, but he may have something more than that going on. One of the things you shared that stands out to me is that he had been in a relationship with someone and was in love and he got dumped and it devastated him. This may have triggered him to experience something he experienced earlier in his life where he faced another major abandonment and some of his symptoms could be trauma related and that could be part of why he got worse with the treatment he was getting that brought that out even more.

He may not WANT to be in a relationship at this point and he may really need the space so he can figure out what he is dealing with, how to manage it better and that can take a long time. It sounds to me like he was trying to tell you that he just doesn't want the responsibility of a relationship and just wants you to back off and just be friends. You are not abandoning him for agreeing to give him what he is asking of you. You know, you can love a person and yet come to a realization that this person is not a good fit for you to have more of a relationship with than just "friendship".

You seem to want to recapture what you had at one point with this individual and you developed your own idea of what you had that may have not really been the reality you thought. This is something that happens to a lot of people who see only one side of a person and perhaps not the side of that person who can actually BE and BEHAVE like a different person altogether. Huh, I dated my husband and developed an idea of who he was and married him and he had a whole other side of him he never showed me until AFTER I married him. I fell in love with Dr. Jeckle and never knew there was a Mr. Hyde there too and all that was involved with that reality.

There is nothing YOU can do that will fix this individual either, not even your LOVE can fix him. He has to learn about his mental health challenge and go through getting help where hopefully he can learn to better manage it. It sounds like he has been trying to tell you that too and you can't seem to listen because what you really want is that part of him that you embraced in your mind as someone you thought was a soul mate.