• 💖 [Donate To Keep MyPTSD Online] 💖 Every contribution, no matter how small, fuels our mission and helps us continue to provide peer-to-peer services. Your generosity keeps us independent and available freely to the world. MyPTSD closes if we can't reach our annual goal.

Relationship When it's time to leave

With my partner, no. He was in the military for 20 years and did multiple deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia. He experienced the usual "don't have PTSD or we will discharge you" crap and "don't take any medicine to help any of the PTSD symptoms we have given you or we will discharge you" bullshit. They even denied him PTSD as a disability when he retired, even though it was in his chart and what he went through would give anyone PTSD. He really just had to shove down all of his trauma and it was bound to come to the surface eventually. I was stupid for thinking for so many years that he was surprisingly well adjusted instead of being more suspicious of how well he appeared to be handling so much trauma. We were in a great place where he was very excited about me and us buying a house closer to the ocean. He was delighted and moved my things into our home together. He was really proud of himself for a bunch of changes he had made to himself and he was genuinely happier than I'd ever seen him for most of last year up until November. He's always gotten triggered and kind of depressed around Christmas, but this year was obviously the worst it has ever been. I think that my partner is genuinely hurt and suffering and confused and he's asking for space to try to "unf*ck his head" as he told me. I believe him when he says he can't handle the strong emotions that I bring out in him and that he is terribly confused and overwhelmed. It doesn't excuse how he has hurt me, but he hasn't tried to use it as an excuse either, he knows that he has hurt me and that I was "an innocent civilian casualty to his effed up head," as he phrased it. It's of little comfort to me and my loss and how my life has exploded, but I get it. I also have a lot of compassion and patience with him because he IS going to therapy and trying to get on medication now. If he weren't trying so hard, I don't think I'd speak to him at all. I know how hard it is to go to therapy and do that work and, if he does do the work, he can start to regain his footing, and I hope that he does.
On one hand, I have CPTSD and I've always said that I will never abuse someone like I got abused and I have taken that really seriously. I don't lie or raise my voice or try to hurt anyone verbally or physically, and I make a real effort to be understood and to be polite and to explain myself if I do say something that gets taken the wrong way. But I am a people pleaser and I fawn instead of fight or flight or lashing out. I get it, though. Yesterday I got so frustrated from a pile up of negative things happening to me that I punched myself in the arm hard enough to break the skin and it's bruised and swollen now. I turn my anger and issues inwards and a lot of other people turn it outwards. It's the same thing, just directed differently, and people call me good for not hurting other people, but it's the same hurt inside and it's coming from the same place as someone who reaches their tipping point and lashes out at their loved ones. Disappointments and frustrations build up and feel catastrophic and deeply confusing and overwhelming to someone who is struggling with their mental health. My straw that broke the camel's back yesterday was getting a stale sandwich delivered from a food delivery order, which turned to this in my head: "Nothing ever goes right for you and nothing ever will. You can't count on anyone. You shouldn't have gotten your hopes up about anything. You are so stupid. What a waste of money. You shouldn't be eating anyhow. You should disappear. Now you have to deal with reporting this order and you can't even think. You're so crazy. It's so noisy in your head. How are you going to get anything done ever? Nothing good is ever going to happen to you again. You're better off dead." That's how quickly things spiral. It wasn't about the sandwich; it's that I'm lonely and I have cancer and I'm depressed from what's going on with my partner and I have a ton of stress from moving that I'm trying to be positive about, and I keep having flashbacks to my childhood home and hearing things, but the sandwich was the last disappointment that my fragile mind could handle for the day. It's hard for anyone to understand what's going on in another person's head or how close they are to falling apart at any given time and a lot of times it'll seem like something trivial happened and a person with PTSD lost it over nothing, but it's a buildup to that loss of control.
That said, none of it justifies abusing someone else. If the person with mental health issues isn't going to therapy and taking their medication and working on themselves, then that is on them, and they don't ever have a right to hurt the people who love them and who are trying to support them. I refused to put up with my partner's verbal abuse and gaslighting that suddenly popped up and I wouldn't want anyone to put up with any kind of verbal, emotional, mental, physical or sexual abuse.
How would it be for you if your partner were open and loving towards you? Would you be able to lean on him and maybe even sink into his loving strength? Would it help you make sense of the cancer? Or maybe even stop the cascade of negative thoughts and feelings before they took over?
 
How would it be for you if your partner were open and loving towards you? Would you be able to lean on him and maybe even sink into his loving strength? Would it help you make sense of the cancer? Or maybe even stop the cascade of negative thoughts and feelings before they took over?
We were together for 8 years where he was open and loving a majority of the time before his breakdown and it is the only time in my life where I have felt truly happy and understood, connected to another person like we were, but it didn't stop me from having mental health issues, no. When I trusted him, I slept very deeply next to him for the first time in my life, without even needing insomnia medication. However, he did not eliminate my trauma thoughts or flashbacks or urge to self-harm (in fact, during a 'conversation' where he took something his ex-wife said to him out on me and became verbally abusive, I hurt myself badly enough to need stitches and be put on suicide watch) and he did not eliminate the fact that I have CPTSD and DID and that I'm going to have flashbacks and anxiety and probably trust issues and abandonment issues as an undercurrent in my psyche for the rest of my life, among other things. I didn't eliminate his trauma or anger at other people either. It's the same way you can enjoy being around and love someone with a broken leg, but you aren't healing that leg for them and they're not going to get up and start running on it because you love them so much. You cannot expect healing to come from another person and it will not come from another person. Another person can help you establish a safe place and trust, but you have to be well enough in yourself to even begin to accept that. My partner has always had his flaws and trauma and he made mistakes with me, but I was still happy overall and we worked on our relationship and he made me feel overall safe and motivated enough to do a lot of things that I never thought I would be capable of doing (getting on a plane and traveling by myself, for example). He didn't want to go to therapy, but he listened to my therapist and we established a lot of healthy boundaries over time and figured out compromises that kept us from triggering each other. I refused to put up with him raising his voice at me or cussing at me at all (the incident where I cut myself badly enough to need stitches) and I made it clear that if either of those things happened again, I was done because I don't deserve to be screamed at and it triggers me very badly.
Put it this way, there is no one in the world who is more adoring and loving and doting than I am with my partner. It did absolutely nothing to stop him from having his current breakdown and being in the bad place that he is mentally and emotionally. It MIGHT have pushed off the breakdown by a couple years, but it didn't actually heal anything in him. I thought it did or it might be, but it clearly wasn't. He might get strength one day from remembering that I was loyal and loving and made him feel like a good person and that he was capable of having a relationship with a girl who loved him and tried for him, but he doesn't feel it now while the trauma has ahold of him more than I do.
Another thing that is really important is that I had already been in therapy for over a decade and I was already on medication when my partner and I met. I got myself on steady footing and I did therapy and coping work before we met. If he had met me before I did a ton of work on myself, it would have gone nowhere. If your partner is in crisis and didn't develop any of those coping skills that they teach in therapy and they aren't on the right medications, being loving and open will not take them or the relationship very far at all. No one can be perfect enough all of the time to completely mitigate someone else's trauma and triggers because your partner doesn't exist in a bubble with you and you will inevitably get frustrated or tired, which is human, and you will do something that triggers them or is too much for them to handle or accept. You have to understand what is actually happening inside of you and accept your trauma and acknowledge your bad coping skills while learning new, healthy coping skills before you can actually start to trust yourself or someone else. And if your person with PTSD is abusing you, then you cannot stay, because you are enabling their negative coping behavior which will wind up being a hindrance to them ever actually recovering. I removed myself from my partner recently because he was trying to blame how he was feeling on things that he literally was making up about me. I calmly reminded him of the truth, told him I didn't appreciate what he was doing and how it was all affecting me, and I told him that I understand he is trying to avoid thinking about his childhood trauma or combat trauma by blaming things on me and his daughter instead, but that he is wrong for doing that and I hope he figures that out in therapy. My love is not enough and I know that. I also know that I don't deserve to be hurt and that letting him hurt me wouldn't actually be helping either of us.
I hope that makes sense. I think I started rambling a lot...
 
Do you think I might be a link to the past by just being me?

with my hubs, it is not him, precisely. it is the passion he stirs in me. passion is not the world's most specialized nor stable phenom. as @LittlestBird 's partner put it, he's "the one thing that makes me feel EVERYTHING." on the good days, that is a preview of heaven. on the ptsd days? ? ? insert bad words of preference here.
 
I dare not leave until the police decide to drop this nonsense or take it to court in two months time. My reason is sadly one of self preservation; if she gets angry because I have ended things then who knows what she might say to the police. Once this is nolonger an issue I can leave her safely.
Just to be realistic...if you're describing her behavior accurately (and there's no reason to think you aren't), then she's not capable of remaining emotionally neutral when it comes to you/the relationship. She's either asking forgiveness or declaring war. So - staying with her isn't a predictor of her future behavior. She's potentially more likely to attack you, the more within reach you are.

I'd encourage you to do whatever you need to, to protect yourself - which may include documenting her behaviors as best you can.

There's a lot of discussion to be had around how closely related the diagnosis of CPTSD is to Borderline Personality Disorder - and all of the personality discrders are challenging to diagnose, certainly can't be effectively assessed by non-clinicians. That being said? The pattern of destroying the relationship, followed by restoring it (either by apologizing or by threatening self-harm) is very typical of Borderline individuals. When things are going well, they panic - and when things are going poorly, they panic. Their relationships are extremely unstable, and they generally won't be able to recognize this as a symptom of a larger disorder on their own.
 
Supporter here.

I'll be damned if I would be arrested and sit in a jail cell because my partner was in a psychotic break. And if I was, I wouldn't put myself back in that situation. Full stop!!

Untreated ptsd is my deal breaker. Ptsd relationships are hard enough even when people are working hard at recovery. It's a mental illness without a cure and can take years of therapy to become stable enough for a romantic relationship. It's like a toothache. It doesn't fix itself and only gets worse if untreated.

You are putting yourself in a dangerous situation. For you and her. If she calls the police again?? You could face much harsher penalties and end up with a domestic violence record. Because SHE isn't healthy. And what? Because you hugged her??

You asked for advice so I'll be honest and tell you what I would do. I would get myself somewhere safe and send her some info on ptsd along with a few phone numbers for therapy and also a 1-800 number for suicide. I say all of this after 10 years of living in a relationship with mental illness. You aren't equipped to deal with this. You can't be nice enough. Smart enough. Kind enough. Empathetic enough. Loving enough... She's sick and needs medical support.

Until she faces her past?? Her future will continue to be chaotic and dysfunctional. And therfore so will yours.

Sorry you're having to deal with this. I know how hard it is.

Good luck and take care!
 
You mentioned back in the beginning that she's beautiful. Other than that, what's in this relationship for you? Maybe this is just me, but it seems like, for a relationship to be worthwhile, BOTH parties bring something positive to the table. What does she bring?

I guess I'd have a real problem with her refusing to do therapy too. You can't reasonably expect things to get better (for either of you) unless she's willing to work on stuff. Maybe there's help for you through therapy too. I know there are a lot of supporters here who see therapists of their own and find it pretty useful. Before my ex & I got divorced we tried marriage therapy. The therapist began by saying "You have 3 choices. You live with things as they are, you change things, or you get out." (When I told this to a good friend, he added, "Yeah, and if you decide to live with things like they are, you don't get to bitch about it.")

I had some of the same thoughts @joeylittle expressed as I was reading along. She said it WAY better than I could have. None of this stuff goes away by itself. That leaves you with those 3 options.
 
Hey Guys,

Thanks for the last few messages. We did try to get back together, and she apologized and said it was all her fault. Then (what do you know?) the day after she simply ghosted me.

I realize now that I don't have to be over her for the relationship to be over. It's now ended and there will be no more communication from me. I deserved so much better than she was able or prepared to give. I can now see that I had made it too easy for her to behave in such a way.

For an empath the feelings of love in a relationship are vast; nobody who is not an empath could even come close to feeling it. I feel my love. I feel her love as though it were my own love. Two lots of love simultaneously is unbelievable. It is like an addictive drug better than no other (I've never done drugs so I probably can't really tell), which makes it all the more hard to leave her. And I can also feel how desperately sad, lonely, and very dark she feels - The other problem of the empath. Were I not cursed with being an empath (A Heyoka as it happens)
 
Update: She called to explain her recent silence was because her son is stressing her out. Within 5 minutes she was shouting a tirade of abuse down the phone.

That was all I needed to know.

She will never change while I am part of her.
I am out now.
It is not down to me any more.
It doesn't matter who she hurts now...
 
By definition. Disorders are pathological. That’s what makes the constellations of symptoms… symptoms… instead of normal human thoughts/feelings/actions/behaviors.

I realize now that I don't have to be over her for the relationship to be over
One of the most important realisations in dating, full stop.
 
Back
Top