Story #19

My mother has always been hypercritical of everyone and everything around her. She never even has a kind word for herself. Once I learned to talk, I grew defensively sassy and "asked" to be slapped in the mouth almost daily. My father suffered under her tongue, but he was gone more than home during my childhood. He almost died of cancer when I was 12. My mother’s older sister was bi-polar manic-depressive with schizophrenic episodes. This aunt spent the weekends in our home almost my entire childhood. I had to sleep with my bedroom door locked. My parents had no social life. I had no example to follow. All I ever wanted was a playmate. According to my classmates the first twelve years of my schooling, I came from too rich a family to attend public school. I was ostracized. My parents transferred me to a private high school. We didn’t belong to the country club. I was ostracized even worse. I was one of those cringing kids always begging to be accepted. I didn’t know who I was or where I belonged.

I began drinking when I was fifteen. If I drank, I drank until I passed out. I bought my first real best friend, my horse, when I was sixteen, with babysitting money. I got my first boyfriend when I was seventeen. Within a month, he pressured me for sex. My previous only sexual experience was molestation at a party. He said I had to do it to prove I loved him. I loved him so much, depended so much on his companionship, that I gave in. I lost what little self-respect I ever had. I drank more. I became addicted to pot. I went away to college and slept around, just to feel someone’s arms around me, a gentle kiss, some indication that I was lovable. I ended up in a relationship with a guy who broke up with me every one or two months for over two years. The first half was punctuated by his drinking. The second half was in perpetual search for nightly AA meetings. He asked me to move out to give him some space. I took that to heart and moved out of his life.

I went away to grad school. Not all areas of my life were dysfunctional. I was using pot and acid socially. I continued to sleep around. I knew I was pursuing a permanent relationship, but on the outside it just looked like I was sleeping around. I got married to a disillusioned Catholic boy. His parents and siblings acted like they could never make up their minds about me. I hated going to mass with them and watching while everyone else took communion, and I knew ultimately that I would never be accepted unless I converted. My then husband developed a cocaine habit, so I divorced him. He had used violence a few times to scare me, though he never struck me. I hated myself toward him anyway. I could hear myself bitch just like my mother used to.

I got a boyfriend less than six months after the divorce. He turned out to be a serious substance abuser with all the symptoms of BPD. That is when I became acquainted with the disorder. Little did I know how much more intimately I would become acquainted with it. For almost three years, I never knew when he was going to be very good or very horrid and I would have to call the sheriff. If I hadn’t been so vigilant and fleet-footed, I think he would have physically abused me. What was a well-educated, attractive, sweet young lady like me doing with the likes of him? He was even in and out of jail constantly for drunken disorderly and abuse of controlled substances, including spray paint. He wrecked my car while high on paint when he was supposedly out looking for employment. I think it was our pets that kept us trying to stay together. He was the kindest most nurturing person toward both humans and animals that I had ever known. I became desperately dependent on his affection and attentiveness. We found a drummer and became a working rock band. Playing music with other people was the best interpersonal interaction I had ever known. But, my boyfriend became insanely jealous from the attention I got from playing in public. I tried to break it off. He stalked me and harassed me with dozens of phone calls a day. I let him back into my life and moved to a different county I knew wouldn’t tolerate all his shenanigans. Sure enough, the second time he was arrested, he was run out of the county and forbidden to return.

I entered a new phase of my life. I was so thoroughly sick of bad relationships that I learned to enjoy my solitude. I moved >back and forth across the U.S. by myself. But I wanted a companion. I met men online. I had four short-term boyfriends that way. Each time I broke it off as soon as I detected some defect in their personalities. I still don’t know who was >crazier, them or me.  

By the time I reached my late thirties, I thought I had sworn off men and relationships. That lasted about two years. Then I met someone kind and gentle and wise and very interesting. I was captivated. I soon found out that he was on probation for a DUI and marijuana possession. I know this was a bad sign. We began a long distance, weekend relationship because we work and live an hour away from each other. It’s lasted over a year now. He doesn’t use. He doesn’t drink. He quit smoking cigarettes our first six months because I threw temper tantrums all the time about it. He says I’m good for him. He is affectionate and thoughtful. I taught him to tell me he loves me. I taught him to hug me when I get upset. He grew up in an alcoholic broken home and had to enlist in the marines to keep himself out of jail. If I am not mistaken, he was previously married to a woman of a different race who used him for her green card and then got pregnant to hang on to his protection.  

He seems to love me because I am warm, affectionate, healthy, intelligent, uninhibited, but these are all useful qualities. If he has any feelings of irrational endearment, I am not aware of them. Sometimes I get so frustrated with our inability to communicate well, that I have little temper flare-ups from time to time that seem to cause him deep anxiety. I always feel sick with guilt after these little flare-ups. The worst thing I’ve ever said to him is "shut-up". I can’t stand it when he rolls his eyes or shows some other mild irritation with me. I take it like a full-fledged rejection. I’m sick with eagerness to please him. Whenever we are apart, I fear that the next time we are together, he will tire of me. When he gets angry about money or a backlog of work, and he wants me to stay away (maybe because he doesn’t want me to see his bad side) even though the chances we have to be together are rare, I feel like my whole world is falling apart. I start planning the impending break-up. My emotions take me down to an abysmal low. I can’t stop crying. I start packing. He looks at me like I am crazy, hugs me, and everything is all better for a few moments. Then the guilt overwhelms me and it takes days before I can forgive myself for my episode. I keep telling him that I need more reassurance. I’m afraid I will disgust him with my neediness. At work, I am a highly successful teacher because of my interpersonal sensitivity, insight, and empathy, and because I don’t depend on my job to fulfill my social needs. How could I be so emotionally mature at work and so infantile in my relationships?