LTR Debrief #2 - A Cautionary Tale
First of all,
here's a quick update on the breakup. It's been even more painful than I expected to be honest. Next, I think another debrief of this LTR is warranted, as I've had a few new insights that may be worth sharing. That may be life-saving for someone, in fact.
I discussed my breakup with a good friend of mine who's an international playboy, fucked hundreds of women across the world, both first world and third. He told me two horror stories of borderline exes, and then just asked: "do you think your girl might've been BPD as well? Or no?"
Shit man, it's been years since I read about borderline. So I started to review a bunch of material about it. Some articles from our own blog,
here,
here and tangentially related
here, another article recommended by Chase (
here), two articles by Paul Elam (
here and
here), and more.
The conclusion was as shocking as it was obvious: yes, she is definitely borderline. In fact she has 80-90% of the symptoms described as "extreme" borderline. And all authors about this topic come to the same conclusion: nothing can be done. You HAVE to leave.
How NOT to find a girl-friend and start a relationship
So how in the fuck does an experienced guy like me (3-figure game lays and 8 previous LTRs, ranging from 6 months to 2-4 years) end up in a serious committed relationship with an extreme borderline chick?
I'm going to trace the psychology of gradual self deception coupled with strong infatuation, in hopes that it may serve as a warning, and so others may avoid the mistakes I made here.
I spotted a few red flags early on... namely: extremely promiscuous past, a bunch of tattoos, drinking and smoking weed. Of course I set non judgmental frames, which is how I heard the truth about these things. I told myself "what does it matter? She's just a fuck-buddy."
Due to other life circumstances, I wasn't able to spin plates, and so I got more and more infatuated with her. Eventually she started talking about "how great we would be together", and the same exact day she started some drama. So I was like "erm... yeah, but... no."
But, of course that was just my rational mind talking. My emotions had already been hijacked. I still tried to pull out, but couldn't stay away. Caught myself constantly talking to her, having sex with her, and getting more and more involved.
And guess what? The more I got to know her, the more she turned out to be my absolute dream girl! She has all the qualities I like most in women, and she has them in spades. Seriously, this was the most awesome girl I've ever dated. I still say that now looking back.
Of course when I started reading up on borderline again, I realized that these are just
typical symptoms of the borderline disorder. They will
mirror you and mold themselves into EXACTLY what you want. Plus, they're typically the best lays, the greatest sex you've ever had... times 9000.
Impossible not to get hooked. So I had the perfect girl-friend... but there was one catch. Once every week or two, she would start the biggest drama shit storm I have ever seen in my life, for no fucking reason whatsoever. And she'd keep it going for an entire day every time.
It was like Mrs. Jekyl and Mrs. Hyde... a complete mind fuck. I don't have a lot of patience for bullshit, so every time this happened I decided to walk. But just as soon as I'm almost out the door, she would apologize, admit that she realizes she has a problem, and that she'll change.
What to do? "She's perfect, except for this one thing, AND she's aware of it and willing to work on it." So we did, and she was very cooperative... I won't belabor the details, but there are modalities to fix this kind of thing, and we tried our best, with her full cooperation.
Deep down I knew she almost certainly won't change, but I truly loved her by this point... and it was mutual. Whenever she really thought I'm leaving, I could feel her despair. She really wanted to make it work, and she really tried so hard to change. I still believe that was real.
Eventually, after what was both the most amazing half year of my entire life, as well as some of the most anger and sadness I've ever felt, I had to finally come to a (maybe obvious) conclusion: "she's just like that."
I believe she can change, but it would take years and years of therapy. We uncovered extreme child hood trauma, 4x more than average, and very severe. I can't stay with her until she heals all that.
The situation was starting to get dangerous. It involved the borderline-typical suicide threats, a close-miss on a car accident, and escalating physical violence from her. I was lucky... exes of borderlines often end up divorce raped, in prison over false accusations, or even dead.
Let this be a warning to all
I wrote about the "danger zone" here: don't get a girl-friend when you're good enough to pick up hot girls, but not good enough yet to spin plates. That's the danger zone, where you can easily fall in love with a girl you haven't vetted properly yet.
Don't do it.
New Rule for Life
I'm going to make a new rule for myself. If this ever happens again, if I ever feel the first tinglings of infatuation for a girl I haven't known for at least 4-6 months yet, I'm going to eject. I'm going to block her, delete her number and probably even leave the city before it goes further.
I've done this once (blocked a girl I was starting to catch feelings for), because the girl in question was just too obviously trouble.. But all other times, I usually rode it out and it ended in tears every time except for once (which was pure luck).
I still love this poor girl to death, I still miss her a lot. I see her good side, and boy... her good side is amazing. She's an incredible woman, an incredible soul, and an unbelievably awesome girl-friend... 90% of the time.
I hope for her sake that she heals herself, which she promised me she will do. Some day she will make an amazing wife for somebody. But that day is not today, and that man is not me.
-Karea.
