I Feel Suicidal

Last night, and rarely I dream of my wife, but I do. But in my dreams, I have the woman that I fell in love with. And my dreams, which I think are real at the time, are very beautiful. For the last 2 years when I have these dreams, I kiss her and cry. She asks why I'm crying, and I tell her I'm crying because I may wake up and none of this will be real. I explain that I think this may be a dream, that she may not be real. She smiles, hugs me, assures me she's real. This is where I usually start waking up. I used to wake up in bed feeling behind me to see if she's in bed with me, look for her, and then feel my heart skip and drop. Now I just wake up, eyes closed, and realize it was all a dream. I feel a little down but not as bad.

My guy

I’ve been there. I could have written those posts myself two years ago.

I had a therapist tell me to go on YouTube and look up Darren McGee covert narcissism, and Lise LeBlanc borderline personality disorder and covert narcissism

I went back to my office and put my earbuds in while I worked. The stuff those therapists explained hit the nail on the head for me so resoundingly that I thought I was going to throw up in my garbage can.

Maybe they’ll have some answers for you too?? Or maybe your situation is different

Thanks RDMercer, I read a description of BPD and it sounds like me. You're thinking that I'm also a covert narcissist?

I’m not talking about you.

I’m suggesting maybe you look at some of the things she’s done.

If you’re the one drained, feeling this low, who gave up everything that mattered to you, and if you’re “fawning”, begging for some closeness maybe she’s contributing some toxicity.

If she’s been gone, then back, hot, then cold, talks about sex and taunts you but doesn’t act until you find the magic combination of getting everything right…. That all sounds like manipulation.

It also creates a feeling of you being addicted to her.

I was.

A junkie keeps looking for the old high, but the highs get further apart and they aren’t as good, but a junkie will keep searching for them.

I'm just confused and scared. I feel like a leaf in the wind sometimes. No answers. Her last return she says all these nice things, calling me daddy, wanting sex from me, her telling me she's attracted to me, talking about a future together, etc. Then boom, she's gone again. And she talks weird, like I'm supposed to know and understand what I did wrong. I feel I was forced into submissive due to fear of her leaving and her talking aggressively to me, but very unclear about what she wants from me.

My guy, that is all manipulation. Some people are so deeply troubled it isn't even conscious manipulation, it's just how they operate.

Those tactics are so, so reeking of manipulation.

I spent 6 years in counselling of and on, 5 years in counselling regularly, tearing myself apart, trying to find what was wrong with me. NONE of us are perfect, and we ALL have some issue or some baggage.

But it wasn't me, it was her.

I hadn't done anything to play games, to manipulate, to give mixed messages, nothing.

What would happen if you did any of those things to her? Would she be with you, or gone?

What if you said, "I really miss music. If we're together I want an evening a week to pursue my music, and 10 Saturdays a year to play golf." Would that be an issue?

What if she said, "I want one evening a week to do something I get fulfillment from, and 10 Saturdays a year to do something that gives me peace." Would you support her?

What if you said, "I need to feel wanted and needed by you. Will you take part in my music, or just listen to me play maybe once a month? Could you take a turn planning a date night for me every other month?"

What if she said, " "I need to feel wanted and needed by you. Will you take part in something meaningful to me once a month? Could you take a turn planning a date night for me every other month?"

What if you said, "The communication between us really leaves me confused. If we're staying together, I want us to do maybe six counselling sessions together to sort this out, and limit our physical intimacy until we feel secure and safe together."

What if she said, "The communication between us really leaves me confused. If we're staying together, I want us to do maybe six counselling sessions together to sort this out, and limit our physical intimacy until we feel secure and safe together."

These statements above are really, really healthy statements. Try them on her. See how she responds.

At some point, you have to trust the evidence, not your heart, and not your sex drive.

Just one other quick note from my own experience.

I saw the same counselor from 2018 until present. Me and my wife split in January 2023.

In March 2023 my daughter and wife were attending counselling together. The therapist blocked my wife from attending further sessions, and blocked her from accessing further individual services at that clinic due to the manipulation she witnessed in the sessions with our daughter.

FINALLY, after 5 years, my therapist said, "If you need me to say it, it's not you. You have examined you enough. It's not you. I can't treat her, or talk about her, or diagnose her because of ethics and because she isn't my client or in the room with me. But if you need someone to directly tell you it's not you, it's not you."

If you are ASKING therapists to diagnose you and looking for the problem in YOU and they aren't helping you find answers..... Dude..... Maybe it's not you.

Seek therapy, self-examine, get meds, but if the professionals aren't giving you a diagnosis, maybe it's not you.

Yeah, at this point I have no clue about anything. I don't know what's real, what's wrong or right. I know I wanted to be with her in this place forever. I'm starting to believe love is not real, that I was foolish. My life was for nothing. 34 years of nothing. I'm left confused. I became who I thought she wanted, and now I'm alone wondering who gives a fk about me. Why am I here? My dog doesn't look happy anymore, I don't walk him. I'm sure he misses her.

In my mind I understand that I need to do something. And I plan to, just can't seem to make the actual physical effort.

She watched me kill myself securing our kids college fund and after I get them both to college is when I notice a change, not long after my son. I devoted my life getting their college fund for them, I figured we'd have more time for us later, after the kids are gone. I was busy with this for about 30 years of the 34 years, up until about 5 or 6 years ago(when my son went to college) when things went slowly downhill. I'm thinking she was planning her escape before she started "talking" to that younger guy at work. I feel used. Joke's on me.

Yeah

That’s what most likely happened. You were most likely used.

It happened to me too, and others on this forum.

You were there to fill a role.

Love starts with you. Love yourself and find things to care for yourself and give you some sense of fulfillment

If you weren’t a good person who believed in love, if you weren’t solid and reliable, this wouldn’t have happened to you.

Me and you aren’t that far off in age. @eskielover has been an inspiration to me in starting over. @Have Hope has been starting over at 50+ too.

What one person can do another can do.

She’s been bleeding you. Stop the bleeding. When you want to reach out to her, redirect that energy back to yourself to do or have something you want.

So, me thinking I was used to get the kids to college is not too farfetched? I really do believe this in my heart now, not saying she doesn't love me, but who knows.
I think some women don't believe in marriage but want a track record to show they were at least wanted by showing that they were married. I think some women actually find it an honor to say they're divorced. For most men, I think we see it as a failure.

So where are you in your journey? How's dating for you?

I haven't dated anyone else since I was 19. It's like coming out of a time machine. I saw my wife age from 11, I was dating her then neighbor. She became my girlfriend when she was 16. So, I always saw/see her as 16ish(even today). But I can imagine another looking at my wife and see her exactly for her age. So, looking at women my age(for dating) today sort of freaked me out.

"What one person can do another can do." "And today, I'm going to kill the mother F***er."

I think I have strong codependent tendencies.

It’s important to me to not generalize things. I won’t let myself think like that. There are good women. There are good men. There are good marriages. Love is real. I won’t let myself indulge any other thought.

When we split the kids were 19 and 14. I’ve been their only support since.

My friends have found my wife on dating apps. She flew to a concert for a 4-day weekend with a man a month after we split. Some of her friends also told me she had a man finance her apartment, damage deposit, etc.

Emotionally I want to believe she loved me and this is hard for her too. Rationally, she’d built a safety net before we separated and has been playing the field since. Our son also saw her out with a man before we separated and saw her out several times when she said she was working.

I am not dating. Early after my separation I had a woman, a good woman, express strong interest in me. But I needed to work on my codependency and she too had left a marriage where she was used and dumped. We talk a few times a week, but that’s it. She’s become a close friend but that’s it.

My wife and I knew each other since we were late teens. She’s attractive and I still see her as she was back then. It’s been hard to let go of those feelings. I mourned them. Chasing them away or ignoring them or moving on wasn’t the right choice. I actually had to give in to them and just be depressed for a while.

I’ve wished I was partnered often. But it’s healthier to be alone and more stable for me and the kids.

A year ago I was deeply hurting about this. Yesterday a coworker said “I think my wife hates me. Can you relate?” And WE ALL laughed our butts off. It was genuinely funny to me.

In my case, it’s not women, or love, or marriage, or relationships, or even me I have to view poorly. I’m not carrying that, and I’m not carrying bitterness. It’’s her. She screwed me over. And even THAT I’m not bitter about most days. She’s damaged.

A drowning person will climb on top of you to stay afloat. My wife couldn’t navigate life. I was a good raft until I started to sink.

Hey

Are you around?

I'm here.

I ordered a book Borderline Personality Disorder: Demystified by Robert O. Friedel, MD) and it was delivered this weekend. I read a few pages so far, going to read a few more pages today. I've never been alone, and I keep worrying what if something happens to me. What if I get sick and can't work, can't pay my bills? What if I need help with everyday things, some type of assistance, etc. I'm not really close to my family and I have no one here. My siblings are an hour away in another state. Me and my brother have drifted apart.

I hear you.

We live 5+ hours away from family. We have no one close to us nearby. I have one brother.

Being in a bad relationship can contribute to your isolation. It could have contributed to people close to you drifting away.

Not everyone has someone. What one person can do, another can do.

Start building your network. There can be a lot of community in music.

RDMercer

I've always had someone in my life, from my brother to my wife, never alone. I've never made real friends alone, as a single individual. It feels weird, I feel awkward, and I'm sure me feeling this way is the culprit of eventually being that way or executing my thoughts to existence.

But I agree with the suggestion of the music community.

I really hate that I miss my wife.

Will chime in here cause it all sounds so familiar to kinda what I went through in my life.

I never lived alone until I was 54 (17 years ago). Lived at home with my parents until I got married at 21. Stayed in the bad marriage 33 years. The last 13 years of those 33 were hell & I seriously tried to end my life so many times because I couldn't get a way out after my career ended with me having a breakdown & aerospace engineering had crashed so no jobs if I had recovered from the breakdown.

By 2007, I had no family left & my daughter had moved across the country so when a door opened for me to escape the marriage, I moved 2100 miles away where I didn't know anyone & bought a small farm with my inheritance. My now ex fought getting a divorce before I left cause he didn't want to give up anything so I walked out with nothing. Found out 11 years later he didn't want a divorce because he thought it would make him look like a loser.

Sadly he was so financially irresponsible that he ended up losing the house that finally ended up with equity & sold it for almost nothing before the final foreclosure date & just before the divorce was final that I filed in the state where I live. Walking awsy from everything saved my sanity. I found an outstanding Therapist here who helped me process my whole lifetime of living around dysfunctional family & heal from it all.

I live in a small town of 8000. Love it & know many in the community. Not as active as I was when I first moved here cause I just got an Aussie Shepherd puppy a year ago & his energy level keeps me busy at home along with farm sitting for friends when they need it.

Never would have thought that after getting my Accounting & Computer Sci degree in 1978 & having an aerospace computer design engineering career that I would end up in farming country & never feeling so happy & peaceful as I never felt before in my life. I do take care of my own little farm. Have learned so many great skills (many from YouTube) but nothing I can't do unless I don't have the muscle or it requires an expensive tool I can't afford.

After living around dysfunctional people all my life & 33 years of fighting in my marriage, living alone is a pure blessing. I can be with people when I want & I can just chill & relax at home. I have about 4 acres of field I mow & the rest is woods I can just hike around with my dog. It feels like heaven after thev1st 54 years

Eskie I am so glad you showed up here.

You're inspiring to me.

RDMercer

If you don't mind me asking, what led to your divorce?

Quote:

Originally Posted by cutman2000 If you don't mind me asking, what led to your divorce?

No problem.....lots of things led to it.

To start with there were issues even before the wedding that made me feel that I couldn't trust him to actually take care of a family financially even though he had the same degree (computer sci) as I was getting. I had all kinds of red flags going off with his attitude so I sat my demands before the wedding hoping he would back out cause my mom gave all kinds of excuses for his behaviors but this all hit me after the invitations had gone out. Ended up convincing myself it would be ok & work out.

He started off financially irresponsible & that never changed which only reinforced my determination to have MY career & be financially equal. 2 years into marriage I got pregnant & first thing he did was tell me I could blow off my career demand I set before the wedding. That was WAR for me & the marriage headed into the pits early on.

With having our daughter & my having my career, I was able to get lost in those things & pretty much just tolerate being married to him until aerospace engineering crashed mid 90's. Being home & his financial irresponsibility just fueled the bad marriage fire. I ended up having a mental breakdown & that made things worse. I knew I needed out of the marriage but everything financially had made it impossible & he fought getting a divorce which made me feel totally trapped & suicide seemed at that point like my only way out.

In 2005 I inherited my mom's house & the Trust she left me. My husband tried hard to get that money but left it in the trust cause I knew it was my only way out. I ended up leaving the state leaving everything from the 33 years of marriage behind because I knew if I didn't escape then, I never would.

Divorce came later after I was established in my new state & after I got the huge IRS debt paid off that he had created. It was a complicated time financially but gave me plenty of time alone to process all that had happened over the years of marriage. I was able to analyze that neither of us actually (in reality) loved each other when we got married. I also was trying to sort out if what he had done was intentional or whether he was truly as incompetent as his behavior was & if so, what mental issue did he have that caused this all to happen from the beginning & what dysfunctional reactions had I learned growing up with my dysfunctional parents. I found the best therapist ever who helped me process & learn much better ways of responding to stresses. Being alone helped me focus & understand without constantly being triggered by his behaviors.

Oh the list is still long of all the things he did before the divorce was final. Oh, he never responded to my lawyers & he actually ended up in contempt of court which I never bothered to pursue. Easier & cheaper to just walk away for me though I am still paying a lawyer to clean up a mess when he sold the house & that may end up in a court case next year if the loan holder doesn't get my name off the loan for the house I don't own.

At my age now, I would never even consider getting involved with anyone again. My life is now peaceful, I have everything under my control & don't have to worry about anyone screwing up my finances. I am quite capable of taking care of my little farm & am not in debt. The peace this gives me is worth living alone.....but guess not really alone with 2 dogs & 2 cats. I lost my horse a few years ago. Finances are going into home repair at this point.

I think what really hit me was that what I thought was love all those years actually wasn't, it was just tolarance. That was reinforced 11 years after I left when I was back in Calif for a court hearing & we had time to "talk" & I asked him why he wanted to get married & he said "because it was what he was supposed to do after he got his degree & career". Asked him why he didn't respect what I had said before the wedding & he said "he was sure I would change my mind".

Ah, all the real unsaid thoughts that go on while actually trying to live life the way we think it should go are usualltly the final stumbling blocks in the end. It blew my mind when I realized the red flags before the wedding were actually the same reasons I left 33 years later.

I also have been surprised because I have totally fit into the small town farming community I live in now & have never been happier in all my life. I know more wonderful people & have more good friends than I ever did when I was married.

I quit trying so hard with a lot of people in my life. Now I hear from people regularly to say, "Want to grab lunch? How was your day? Want to drop over? What are you guys doing on the weekend?"

YES, I am still lonely sometimes. I want someone who I know deeply. I like having a partner. Facing who she was/is has been very, very hard.

I have honestly thought that in a horror movie, I'd get eaten by zombies, because I'd be SO SLOW to trust my senses of what was actually happening.

One day when I was low I said some stuff to my son, and he practically whispered, "Do you not see all the good people that are in our lives now that we never would have had otherwise?"

Eskie is an inspiration to me. Have Hope is an inspiration to me. ArmorPlate108 is an inspiration to me.

What one person can do another can do.

BRO HUG!

RDMercer

A toxic person is never interested in your well being. Instead they are always using you to satisfy their needs. They attack your ego causing you to believe it’s your fault when things go bad and they are not happy.

But here is the result. When you are in this relationship it actually hurts your brain and it slowly renders you helpless because you don’t get a chance to heal the damaged brain connections that improve you ability to actually feel healthy and be independent
. It’s like constantly cutting a stem before a flower forms a bud and gets to bloom.

The best thing to do is stop the cycle and step away so you can begin the work of allowing your brain to heal and form healthy neuropathways.

Suicidal thoughts is an alarm that is telling you that you need to step away and heal. It takes time to slowly realize that the toxic person is genuinely disabling you. The toxic person does this to empower themselves and anyone that interacts in selfish ways is only using you and others and will never really care.

Wishing and hoping the toxic person will change and care is a total waste of time because these people don’t change. Instead these people are habitual users and disablers.

I was told the suicidal thoughts were an alarm that went along with feeling hopeless, and that a person feels hopeless when nothing they do is enough or right, or sufficient.

And especially when the way to make peace and strive for connection has been to make yourself even more vulnerable and open (fawn response).

You become unable to see a way forward, because the way forward has been blocked so many times in the past.

@ArmorPlate108 told me anger is the part of you that loves you and wants to protect you. So.... Be angry for a while. You deserve better.

@ArmorPlate108 also told me that setting boundaries means finding the edges of yourself.

Your boundaries are YOUR limits.

The neuropathway stuff @Open Eyes speaks about is true. I've read about that too. Your brain wiring actually becomes messed up over time.

Put up some boundaries and heal some. It's HARD.

If she suddenly comes back promising sex, expect that that is a short term power trip and her testing her ability to hook you again.

Dude, I can't explain the moments of peace I have now.

Quote:

I was told the suicidal thoughts were an alarm that went along with feeling hopeless, and that a person feels hopeless when nothing they do is enough or right, or sufficient.

Actually for me suicidal thoughts & actions were because I felt like a trapped caged animal with no way to escape & I saw this as my only way to escape. Had nothing to do with doing enough or right or sufficient. At that point I had no desire to make the marriage ok....I just wanted out & there was no way at the time for that to happen.

There are many deep reasons for suicidal feelings & actions & sometimes we don't even acknowledge them at the time they are happening. To give specific reasonings for someone feeling that way negates other reasonings that can actually be there underlying it all. We have to be careful when we say "this is how people feel when they have those thoughts" I didn't even know that trapped feeling was the cause until after years of good therapy & going back & analyzing my thoughts. Be careful limiting the reasons for feeling that way

Quote:

@ArmorPlate108 told me anger is the part of you that loves you and wants to protect you. So.... Be angry for a while. You deserve better.

Definitely, I got angry every time I felt that my plans for my life were being threatened or someone was actually trying to take them away. I was like that ALL my life & don't know where it came from cause my parents weren't anything like that. Lol....my mom was sure they gave her the wrong baby in the hospital because I always had a "don't mess with me attitude" when pushed too far.

Boundaries definitely define one's limit of tolerance.

I think when independence is at the core of your being it sometimes goes away when things feel impossible in life & one feels like no amount of fighting will help. I know for those last 13 years in my marriage everyone commented that "this is not the you we know". Think it was more my coping mechanism for the situation I was in at the time. As soon as I got out (immediately) my independent self was back stronger than ever so I'm thinking that it wasn't damaged, just put on hold.

Just some thoughts based on my OWN experience not on someone telling me this is what happened. I got angry at a psychitrist at an eating disorders treatment center I was in for 6 weeks. He kept telling me why I was anorexic & wouldn't listen to "my why". It was like I was blindly supposed to agree with his reason & HE WAS WRONG. Sometimes we listen but need to do our own analysis.....ugh, this is definitely my independent thinking I have has all my life but in reality when functioning, it has served me well