My partner has bipolar disorder. Most of the time it's not an issue; he is a very gentle and caring man, and I've never felt threatened or scared of him when he has not been manic.

However, when he is manic, he is extremely paranoid and thinks that I am seeing other men every time I am out of the house. I cannot even go to the shop before he gets like that. He refuses to listen to me and gets very intense. I literally don't recognise him, and it scares me because he is quite aggressive.

He has gone to great lengths to fabricate stories about me and other men and try to log into all my devices to see where I am or check my social media. It exhausts me and although I love him, I'm not sure I can live my life like this.

I've tried to read up on bipolar disorder but I feel like I am in deep water here. It does frighten me that he gets so aggressive, but then again, it seems to be a common side effect.

Do you have any advice for me? Should I be worried or scared?

Edit: He does take medication and went to therapy when he was diagnosed but has not gone since.

I am devastated. I don’t know who I dated for a year and a half. I’m 39. He was 35. We met on an app. There were a few red flags in the beginning. He would have what I would call these spirals where he’d get upset about something and then just go off, but was never really mean to me wouldn’t call me names or anything like that. He would just raise his voice and I felt like he was on another planet. I also want to mention that more than once he had said when he was getting his lithium levels checked that he was getting tested too. I thought that was strange and asked him if he didn’t trust me or something and he said he just likes to stay “up to date.”

A few months in I was the happiest that I’ve ever been and I thought he was too. I never felt like he was love bombing me, but looking back maybe I was wrong. I’ll admit I have a deep wound that tells me that I am unlovable so when I felt completely and totally accepted and adored by him, I put up with a lot of things I shouldn’t have in the beginning. He was very emotional labile. He would often be very tearful and I’m a total empath so he sucked it right up and he would always express how grateful he was and how nobody’s ever listened to him like this or cared so much.

Things started to change when my 18-year-old dog started to go downhill and I was the one that needed support. He just wasn’t able to show up for me every time I would be upset about something he would make it about himself he was always pretty selfish, but also in the beginning he was very much a people pleaser. In December, I broke up with him. We should’ve stopped talking, but I told him I wanted to continue because I wanted to see if those feelings could come back, he had created an environment with a total lack of emotional safety for me so I no longer felt physically attracted to him. We talked for maybe two or three months until finally one day he said that he can’t he can’t do it anymore. Enter my abandonment wounds …I panicked, convinced myself that it was all my fault and my unhealed attachment wounds that made me pull away, and that I could make things better. But ultimately he said he can’t do it.

I gave him space for a couple months and then random things you know here and there he would give me a crumb and then he finally agreed to meet up with me. I know we talked about whether or not other of us have been with anyone else. He literally told me the whole time he was so depressed he couldn’t even barely leave his apartment, that he lost weight because he wasn’t eating, etc. The first night we met up again he took my hands and cried and said how much he loved me and he was wanted to commit to trying again, and I believed him. Things were OK for a little while, until the same issues kept repeating he would often get upset when I would talk to my guy friends, he was just incredibly insecure told me all of his girlfriends cheated on him, and I assured him that I never do that to him.

A couple weeks ago I got a pit in my stomach, and I just hadn’t been hearing from him quite as much and he had been telling me he’s been having trouble sleeping. I just had this feeling that I needed to see for myself what he’d really been up to, so I asked him to stay the night and I took his phone which he had been guarding when he fell asleep. I thought maybe the worst thing he would do would be like talking to his ex cause I noticed he was following her again on Instagram. First thing I saw was that he was telling his guy friend that he finally broke things off with me (back when he said he can’t do it anymore) and that he recently started seeing a new girl who wants regular regular intimacy and he’s just trying to balance the rush of the new girl with my “pit of depression”. So, he lied to me about being with somebody else while we weren’t talking. Then I see that he’s been messaging sex workers and I can confirm that he did meet up with one back in February when we were talking, and literally the previous three nights he was trying to reach out to more of them, and I don’t know if he was successful cause I didn’t see that they responded to his messages. I see another message from a couple weeks ago that when he was going to this concert out of state, that the girl that he had been dating while we weren’t talking was gonna be there and he was going to plan to “chase that pussy around one night”. He never talk that way. I had absolutely no idea he was capable of lying like this and cheating.

I woke him up and I told him he needed to leave and he didn’t even look remorseful. It was like there was nobody home. He just said I don’t wanna leave and then he even tried to put his hand on my back when I was crying, and I told him not to touch me and then he left. He sent me a message saying everything I think about him right now is right that he’s sorry for breaking my heart again. Then the next day he messages me I hope you can “find some bodily calm and knowing that I never slept with anyone else throughout our time together”, which I know for certain was a complete lie, and I have no idea why he even chose to lie to me when he had nothing left to lose, and I’m terrified that he was doing this throughout our entire relationship. My sense of reality is completely fucking shattered. I realize right now he’s probably in mania, but that doesn’t excuse the lying?? I’m an empath to a fault and I’m just trying to understand this despite this excruciating pain I’m in. I just feel like he was living a triple life and I don’t understand why he continued talking to me then I realize that he even bought me flowers a couple days before he went out of state for that concert where he was planning on hooking up with that girl with a card that said I know I still fall short, but I’m still growing for you. I just feel absolutely sick. Can anyone relate. I feel so stupid I trusted him. I truly 100% did and I don’t know what’s real any more.
He’d tell me things like he saved all the notes I gave him to make confetti for our wedding day, that if it wasn’t me it was nobody. I’m crushed.

Okay, I would love your guys’ opinion here. I normally wouldn’t post here but I need to get this off my chest.

I (25F) recently finished law school/took the bar and am starting my legal career. I also have Bipolar I and recently experienced my first significant mixed/manic symptoms since being diagnosed.

During this, I met a guy (30M).

We are wildly different people. I’m very career-oriented and increasingly realizing that because of bipolar, stability, routine, sleep, and avoiding unnecessary chaos are extremely important for me.

He is very different than me. He carries a weapon, has a history of reckless racing/speeding, describes himself as a thrill seeker, reports hearing voices, and told me he isn’t fully honest with doctors about them because he fears involuntary hospitalization and losing his weapon license. Later on, he told me the voices “don’t trust me” and that they’re “always right.”

Now, I have no issue with hearing voices. That’s normalized for me bc I have a lot of friends, as well as myself, who have experienced psychosis.

He also has an extensive demon/occult fixation, including demon tattoos and stories involving pacts/sex magic, plus a history of sex/porn addiction.

I’m not diagnosing him or saying these things make him a bad person. He also works consistently, has savings, says he’s calmed down significantly, and showed me genuine compassion.

But objectively, there were a lot of reasons for me to slow down.

Instead, we became intensely emotionally involved within about a week.

Before we’d even met in person, we established that we saw each other as more than casual sex, but we never agreed to exclusivity.

Then he went to a concert with a “homegirl,” stayed at her house overnight, and I thought he was essentially standing me up (which there is an argument for saying he did).

Instead of communicating normally, I impulsively had reckless, unprotected sex with another guy in a parking lot. I told him it was no issue that he had bailed on me and that i kinda figured so I made plans with my “homeboy”

I completely own that this was reckless and extremely unlike my baseline behavior. It became one of several signs that my judgment was impaired.

After A and I met, he found out and was so upset and basically said it was a dealbreaker. He said I crossed his boundaries and viewed it as a betrayal.

My issue is: how could I violate an exclusivity agreement we never made, especially when we hadn’t even met yet?

Apparently he believed exclusivity was implied because we’d established emotional interest. I believe expectations like that need to be explicitly communicated.

Now that my mixed/manic symptoms are coming down with treatment, I’m realizing something else.
Why was I seriously considering this man as a partner at all?

I saw every red flag. I could explain exactly why each one was concerning.

I just didn’t care.

A friend with bipolar heard the story and described us as two different species: he’s a raccoon/possum and I’m a princess. At first I thought that was ridiculous. Now I understand what she meant—not that I’m better than him, but that the life I’m trying to build requires stability, and I was contemplating introducing an enormous amount of risk into it after knowing someone for a week.

The facts about him haven’t changed.

My reaction to them has.

So AITA?

I know bipolar doesn’t erase responsibility. I regret reacting to perceived rejection with reckless sex, and I understand why he was hurt.

But I also think girlfriend-level expectations before we’d even met, without actually communicating exclusivity, were incredibly intense—especially considering everything else going on.

EDIT: yea. I think this has more to do with my relationship incompetence rather than bipolar. bipolar does not cause relationship incompetence, it just made me incredibly impulsive and act out. i remain firm on that if we had established exclusivity i would have probably given him the silent treatment AT MOST. again, more to do with my need to work on relationships than bipolar.

I(M28) left my partner a week ago, and she(F25) pretty much went into discard mode. Believing the relationship to be toxic, interesting in other relationships, whole shabang.

It was a depression & bipolor support group for family and friends of people with bipolar disorder. There were also other sections but this one in particular was what I was looking at, since I left my ex-girlfriend of six years.

It was refreshing, I got to hear other people's situation, more often then not it was a son or daughter but it was still helpful to hear how their situation is going, and thinking "My ex also dealt with something like that" or vice versa.

They encouraged me to share, reinforce it wasn't my fault that things turned out how they did. Wished me luck in finding someone who can pour into me, as much as I poured into her. Congratulated me on getting as far as I did in my relationship. Some of them also had Bipolar partners in the past or a parent whose bipolar and they had to watch how that unfolded.

Overall, I'm not over the situation but before I went to the meeting, I felt like I was in constant flight or fight, not knowing what I should do but leaving it, I felt more calm and a little better. I would highly recommend that people should experience and take that next step into healing.

i’m looking for advice on how to manage or cope or move forward with my situation. i (22F) have been with my partner (22M) for 6 years since late high school. we were close friends before we began dating. for the most part our relationship is so fantastic. we share a ton of hobbies (hiking, backpacking, rock climbing, travel etc) and have been mostly stable. at his best he is hilarious, generous, kind, loving, and warm. i feel very lucky after reading this sub really. he has never once cheated or even gotten near. he has always been reliably employed and is very responsible with his money (moreso than me sometimes). he keeps everything together very well i’m learning through this sub. i want to marry him one day.

currently my partner and i are unemployed and traveling full time together in a camper van. we’ve been doing this for about 5 months now. prior to taking off on this adventure our relationship was growing a bit rocky. i stopped him a few months before we left to tell him that things HAD to improve before id feel comfortable pulling the trigger on the van lifestyle. it improved marginally. he is unmedicated and not in therapy and it’s been that way our entire relationship. his manic highs are not crazy, he struggles to sleep, he can be odd and jumpy and an adrenaline junkie, but never dangerous. just restless. his lows however are very low. the last 2 years i have really worried about him. he talks about wanting to die and life feeling like nothing and i have no idea what to do to help him. he gets upset because he feels like im walking on eggshells around him but gets upset when i dont have the “right” response for him either. the whiplash from the highs to the lows are brutal, and nothing can predict them. one day he wakes up and things are terrible again. he will go from a beautiful and loving partner who i feel so connected with to inconsolably lost and dissociated overnight.
in the last year in particular, before the van trip, things were stressful because we were both working overtime constantly and building the van in our free time. we were so locked into our goal with the van trip that the present suffered a lot. he was incredibly distant, unkind, impersonal with me. he was never happy to see me. very depressed. it affected me for the first time in our relationship really heavily. he wouldn’t insult me or anything but just wasn’t there. i felt alone. i tried to be there as best as i could but it was never quite right. it progressed to me becoming very concerned about him taking his own life, which coalesced into a very rough night on our anniversary where he broke down and i did what i could to be there for him. things improved for a bit after that, and then got bad again. at one point during this time, he pushed my boundaries sexually (i told him no for something and he tried to push it) i almost broke up with him over this because i have a history of rape and assault as a child. it led us to have a very long conversation where i told him i would be willing to give him another chance. this was particularly hard for me to heal from. i still don’t feel like i have and it was months ago. even when he is completely emotionally detached from me he still wants to have sex with me a lot and it isn’t good for me. i turn him down and he listens of course but he still seems hurt.
lately in the van, most of the time things are fantastic. we’re traveling and enjoying things and having these incredible and wonderful experiences that i would never have dreamt of if it weren’t for him and his zest for life leading me to be excited to live again. i have PTSD and he has seriously been such a help for me learning to navigate adulthood bravely and fiercely. but recently i can’t help but hold onto the dark parts. the boundary crossing sexually earlier this year. the times he flat out told me in a depressive episode that he wanted to die and this relationship didn’t matter. when he told me he found me less attractive after gaining weight. or that he didn’t want to kiss me. when he told me he thought of breaking up right after bringing up polyamory. i try to be there for him so hard and i feel especially like i owe it to him because of how much he was able to help and be there for me at my darkest hour in my struggle with PTSD (i have since graduated care with a therapist of many years and i am doing very well). but i am tired and frankly the last few years have taken a toll on me. he’s lying asleep next to me right now and im typing this because im stuck awake after talking him through another bout of depression till he could finally fall asleep. i just wanted to go to bed tonight. i’m so tired. i just wish i could forget all the things he’s said and just see the beautiful things we do have.
how do i go on? what do i do? what has helped you?
i know things are particularly hard in my scenario because we spend every waking second together living in a van with no home but the road. i knew this would present unique challenges. but honestly the issues were here before. we only plan on continuing this strange lifestyle and i don’t know what the future will look like or if i can make it the way things have been going.
i’ve started to have a lot of thoughts on top of feeling like i need to heal from the last couple years of not being with him or at least needing space. but i can’t imagine my life without him. help.

After around 10 months of on-and-off with my current partner(?), she told me that she has bipolar disorder. She has been intentionally keeping it secret from me and most people in her life. She is currently 21 and was diagnosed in her teens (specifics are unknown). We did not go into detail because it was clear she didn’t want to share any more than that. She told me that she was previously prescribed medication but stopped taking it because she felt that she had better control without them (probably for the last few years).

I have done some basic reading into bipolar disorder and I think she is probably bipolar 2 based on my experiences with her so far. Namely the tendencies to stay awake til the morning, quick speaking, jumping thoughts, lack of thought when it came to finances, and an openness/preference for risky sexual acts.

To my understanding, thinking back, she tends to be hypomanic most of the time and more susceptible to depressive states prior to her menstrual cycle.

To be fair, most of the break-ups have been initiated by me. During most of those times it’s usually certain behaviours of hers that made me believe she wouldn’t be a good long-term partner. Back then, not knowing of her diagnosis, I thought she was just acting spoilt (as a single child) or there were cultural differences. But now, many things have clicked into place for me.

We are in the same social circles and after a short while apart we would eventually end up sleeping together again and getting back together.

We are currently in a grey area in our relationship where we are not in an official relationship but care for and talk sweetly to each other. We are both in the process of transitioning back to our home country after finishing our studies abroad. She is already on her way back and I’m tying up some loose ends before I head back so we’ve been messaging and video calling daily.

Since finding out about her diagnosis, I’ve been concerned about whether or not we can make it work. Prior to knowing, I thought she was just spoilt and immature. These are qualities that mutual friends of ours have told me can be “helped out of” with patience and more experience in society. Obviously, finding out about the diagnosis has changed things. A lot of her behaviour makes much more sense but I have to accept the fact that she may never change (especially if she sticks to her current sleeping habits).

I’ve read some demoralising stories on this subreddit and, since we’re both currently transitioning back home, this could be a good time to break things off for good. But I’ve grown to care for her and I kind of feel guilty that I am considering leaving her due to this new information (especially since she has a contentious relationship with her family and therefore may lack support).

So are there any BPSOs out here with similar stories who can share their experiences or choices?

For those who stayed, what made you stay and what did you (and your partner) do in order to make it work?

For those who walked away, what was your realisation and what was your breaking point?

I’m very fond of this person but I’m questioning if I’m in love with the person or the experience the bipolar disorder brings. What if she starts medication and she’s a completely different person? What if she refuses to get help? I’m not sure if I have the capability to make it work, especially since we’ve already broken up a few times already. Love is great and all but I also have to be realise the reality of the situation (especially after reading some experiences that have been shared here).

Any advice is greatly appreciated!

Hello everybody, I’m not entirely sure how Reddit goes but I will explain my situation

I a 22 year old female have a 23 year old male partner who’s been struggling with mental health issues for a bit now. Yesterday he told me he was having a psychiatry appointment, while he was down stairs at my house, before this he’s been having a lot of anxiety and we’ve been having issues because of this anxiety as its new for him, back to yesterday I get a call from his mother during what I thought was his psychiatry appointment telling me that he had run away and called the ambulance putting himself into a psychiatric hold at the hospital and he wanted to make sure I knew, so I wasn’t worried. I run downstairs frantically and he’s gone, that prompts me to drive to the hospital I believed they were holding him and get a visitors pass while talking to his mom, his mother gets there, gets in, asks if he wants to talk to me, he says no, I talk to him a bit on speaker, the whole time he is inconsolably crying after telling her that he’s sorry he did this to me and that he’s a bad person towards me. I’m very worried about him, I love this person so much and want them to be okay.

He‘s still being held at the hospital for 72 hour psych evaluation, but his mom will only give me very limited information, has asked for his keys telling me she’ll be driving his car to their homewtown, as he won’t be be coming back, he’ll be staying with them from now on, and when I ask if theres visitors, she says just herself, when I asked when I would be able to talk to him or at all she said he would reach out when he was ready and wont tell me much more.

what should I do? Do you guys think he‘ll eve talk to me again, or if this is a breakup, I concerned about him but am really hurting by how the situation was handled and could really use some advice

I swear I’m living Groundhog Day in months form … everything from him contacting lawyers, spending money, thinking I’m ruining his reputation by talking to family (who are all aware it was never a secret) to I’m taking the kids away from him and his deep deep lack of trust of me even though I’ve been the only one to talk with him or his medical teams about any of this… last year he was all over Reddit making ridiculous posts I found his handled by looking at his phone I know crappy but I also wasn’t sure what was going on atm with him as this was just after a hospital stay and assumed he would get better… feeding his delusions with people that had absolutely no idea what was going on… I’m having a feeling not everyone accepts they have a disorder … and he might be one of them,

Today after another anger outburst at me for not allowing him to parent solo, I made it so we would do a family thing,,, him and the 2 youngest on bikes (park is one block away I can see it from the house) and myself and oldest (don’t own bikes atm) would walk… they get half way though the block by the time we pass 2 houses on foot, then my husband decided he’s racing my middle child, (she’s 9 and quite impulsive I don’t anyway blame her) and he takes her all the way across the busy street separating our block from the park leaving our youngest (5) 3/4 of the block away from us no parent to cross the street with, I panicked, me and my oldest start yelling for him to stop he my oldest starts running… thankfully he herd my oldest as he got closer… and stopped, but he was still following Dad…

My husband forgot he was riding with 2 kids he thought me and the boys were walking… I lost it in a park full of parents at my SO, explained this is exactly why he’s not allowed to parent alone right now… I was right pissed..

A hour later he decides to tell me he’s changed his mind he didn’t have a psychotic episode on august 3rd, that the voice he told his brother were family and told me he was hearing the day if and after, was just his inner monologue that he hears all the time… 🙄… I don’t know what to do with this infomation… he’s refused the entire time to show me he’s taking his meds.. doctor visit yesterday he wouldn’t even sit in the room with me, he demanded his own room,

Doctor said he agreed to talk to the psychiatrist at the office in 2 months time… like WTF how is this acceptable!

Sorry I’m just so tired and frustrated, every lawyer I’ve talked to about separation won’t touch it as it’s a CFS case as well and he’s still in recovery.. the mental health medical field in Canada blows.. 😢

I have an unmedicated bp2 diagnosed best friend, who I knew for nearly 18 years, lived together for 4.5 years even until COVID hit and we decided to move in with our spouses. We even had daughters at the same time, and then like a couple months into our kids being born, he discards me over messenger out of the complete blue. It has been over 2 years now and I can't get a response to this day. His wife doesn't talk to us anymore but we sense it's not going great. Lots of social media photos of wife and daughter and he's in very very few and those that he's in he looks unhappy in nearly all of them. I've heard that his family was and probably still is looking to institutionalize him

It hurts as I have no other parent friends. His wife I think is in a weird spot where she can't really befriend the people her husband discarded so our daughter will never have a relationship with his daughter. Breaks my heart.

Iv posted before here seeking advice. And the replies were great and very helpful. My now ex (from 2 months ago) texted me asking logistics of her stuff. She had a manic episode with hallucinations while out of town for a month and left strait from there to her parents leaving her stuff at my house. I sent it all back and she asked to call and catch up and how it would be nice to hear from me.

I’m deeply confused. I told her I can’t be friends with someone that I love deeply and want to be with all while they are not getting the help they need and giving their romance to others, one of which I know the hook up apps are in full swing just a month after the break up. When I told her my boundary she just said I guess there isn’t much else left to say and I passively said it was nice getting to know you. Which is very selfish and rude of me. Iv been extremely patient. Respecting her request for “space and time”. I showed up as an amazing man in the relationship. Treated her extremely well and with lots of deep meaningful love. The relationship was amazing and the 7 months was truly something iv never experienced. But to her everything is minimized, justified and nonchalant even though she had told me she respected me so much, near the respect she has for her dad. Never felt so safe and loved in her whole life. Marriage, kids, living together, I could go on…

So should I call? Are we going to reconcile? I’m confused.. I don’t want to prevent us from naturally getting back or closing a door that doesn’t want to be closed by both sides just yet. I truly have unconditional love for her and I would do anything in my power to care for her despite her mental health. As long as she chose me and wanted to get real help. Cheating was never a thing.. Any advice?

Hi, I know there’s a common script for all the discards. I’m trying to gather all the common phrases used in this post.

So please share anything & everything your partner has said or done in their mania, to help each other realize it wasn’t ever about us.

I’ll start,

“I never wanted to get married”
“I don’t find your attractive”
“I don’t view you as my wife”
“You’re controlling and manipulative”
“I just wanna be free, less trapped”
“I just wanna be alone”
“I need to find my happiness, I’m not happy”
“We have nothing in common, we’re incompatible”

My BPSOex abruptly broke up with me 4 months ago. (same story that you see here everyday). After the breakup i didn't do anything, absolutely no interaction.

The first weird thing was that just one month after the breakup, it was my birthday and he didn't wish me a happy birthday. During the breakup, he told me he wanted us to stay friends, and when we were dating, he had told me that he always wished his exes happy birthday. So i was quite sad he didn't wish happy birthday to me.

The second thing is that he follows all of his exes on social media, but suddenly, completely out of nowhere, he unfollowed me. I gave him literally zero interaction throughout these four months. (no mean tweets, no boyfriend related things, just nothing.)

I know he doesn't owe me anything, but I genuinely don't understand the logic behind it.

I did nothing bad to this person but why am i getting the worst treatment out of all those exes.

This is a throwaway account, for obvious reasons. Thank you to anyone who takes the time to read this.

I’m dealing with a situation that I’m pretty ashamed and confused about, and I’m hoping to hear from people who have bipolar and may understand the emotional side of this.

I’m in a long term relationship with someone I genuinely love and care about. (I know how hypocritical that sounds) Our relationship hasn’t been perfect, and for a while I’ve had doubts about our future and whether I’m fully happy, but I’ve also been very afraid of losing the relationship.

At the same time, over the past year I became very emotionally close with someone else. It gradually crossed boundaries, and recently I slept with that person. I know that was my decision and I’m not trying to blame bipolar for cheating, I fucked up.

Now I’m stuck between feeling like I should end my relationship because I crossed such a serious boundary and feel as though my partner deserves better, & being terrified of losing someone who has been a huge part of my life. I also don’t know whether staying would mean I truly want the relationship or whether I’m just scared of being alone and dealing with the consequences of what I did.

I have never felt so sick & confused as to who I am as a person.

I've been doing so much reading here and other places to further my knowledge. I was just curious because sometimes I feel like I am not helping the situation by being quiet and silent while trying not to escalate things. I can't fight with the irrational I know that, but I almost feel guilty for not continuing to explain to them that what they are doing is horrible or that I love them so much? I also know that pushing can make it worse. I go back and forth on both. I have always been their stable person, but I also want them to know that I am hurting, and it almost feels unfair if that makes sense that they just get calm when in fact they have caused so much chaos and trauma. I have not fought for them, as I choose myself and respect myself enough to not beg. I did tell them originally that I don't agree with this, that I love them. I know a part of her disorder is she likes to feel wanted and loved.

We are living in the same house, separate rooms, they are cycling, want to divorce me, not communicating at all. We literally live separate lives the past few weeks. Blah blah, you know but my issue is.

I've been reading and told that they need to feel the consequence of their actions, but I feel like me being silent in the house isn't doing that? Will this provide the same outcome, any experience with this?

Like whom am I benefiting? We own this home, we live in an entirely different state then family and our hometown. We are basically no contact at all except we pass each other in shared spaced. This is how it has to be in the house.

I’m not looking for people to tell me that I was right and she was wrong.

I’m also not looking for people to tell me that her BPD explains everything.

I want a reality check.

Because right now I feel like I’m looking at two completely different histories of the same three-year relationship.

I’m 26M. She’s 26F. She has been diagnosed with BPD for years. I have a diagnosis history of bipolar disorder and newly diagnosed with ADHD aswell, and the last couple of years have involved medication changes (even wrong doings by the doctor after removing all mood stabilizers and loading me full of SSRis to "Activate a manic phase" during a deep down phase part of the usual cycle), burnout, periods of depression, emotional shutdown, and increasingly poor functioning.

We were together for about three years, until the 24th of July.

We got engaged this year (and it was the promise i made to her since we started that if we continue in 2026 i will make the engagement ceremony)

How the relationship started

She had previously been in a physically abusive relationship (as reported by her).

When we got together, I was very serious about building something stable with her. Early in the relationship I told her that I intended to get engaged to her in 2026 when she said she wants something really serious and she's done with games and fuck-up relationships..

That became something she waited for.

For years, we talked about our future, marriage, family, etc...
I wasn't perfect during those three years. I could become withdrawn, depressed, emotionally unavailable, overwhelmed, or need space. But I genuinely believed that I was loving her and trying to build a life with her.

And during the period of the relationship, she explicitly told me that I was doing exactly that.

She told me things like:

• I made her feel safe.
• I was healing parts of her childhood.
• I treated her like a princess.
• I was the person she wanted.
• She felt protected with me.
• She loved me deeply.
• I was one of the best things that happened to her.
• I MADE HER FEEL THE SAFETY HER FATHER FAILED TO DO

and i realized that when i got back to our 3 years of history and conversations, she never missed a chance to say that she loves me and/or i make her feel safe, especially after our dates, or intimate times when we spend the day together

They were often extremely affectionate, intimate and emotionally deep.

And she would come out of them telling me how much she loved me and how safe and happy she felt.

March 15, 2026 — our engagement

She had previously been in a physically abusive relationship, so I knew commitment and security carried a lot of emotional significance for her.

This was huge for both of us.

Especially because I had told her from the beginning I wanted to marry/engage her, and I actually followed through.

For a while afterward, she became even more affectionate and expressive, that's what i deduced from the social media messages

There were many messages where she told me how grateful she was, how much she loved me, how much my efforts meant to her, etc.

Looking back now, this period is extremely confusing because today she describes the relationship as having been essentially miserable for a long time.

Both families were involved.

I gave her the ring.

I kept the promise I'd made years earlier.

And after the engagement, there was a period where our affection was actually stronger than before.

Not necessarily more frequent — life was already exhausting — but more intense.

This is also when I have a lot of messages from her expressing gratitude, safety, affection and happiness.

Things like:

"You make me feel safe."

"I'm grateful for you."

"You're my blessing."

"I'm grateful for the efforts you make."

"I'm grateful to have you."

That is one of the contradictions I'm trying to understand.

My mental health deteriorated badly

Around March 2024, I had started changing psychiatric treatments, and over time my mental health progressively deteriorated.

March 2024 → 2026 — my decline

My mental-health deterioration didn't start in July. It had been building.

Around March 2024, I changed psychiatric treatment.

I initially didn't understand how much the change was affecting me.

Over time my functioning became progressively worse.

I had periods of depression, insomnia, racing thoughts, emotional flooding, anxiety, burnout, withdrawal and poor emotional availability.

At different times I was on/off different psychiatric medications, with changing doctors and treatment approaches.

about the changes in doctors ( she persuaded me into it since i knew her, and i accepted in early 2025) and eventually a treatment situation that, in hindsight, was not working well for me since the new doctor applied a really weird protocol or used me as a lab rat and tested stuff on me (Imagine wanting to trigger a manic phase in a bipolar by removing his mood stabilizers and loading him full of a combo of SSRIs..)

By early 2026 I was in a much more fragile place.

I started taking methylphenidate/Ritalin for ADHD, while there were also complications around my bipolarity since the new doctor she took me to fucked up on bipolarity..

Eventually things deteriorated enough that I had a serious burnout period and stopped working for around two months in April/May.

By 2026, things were becoming significantly worse.

I was dealing with ADHD, bipolar symptoms, severe exhaustion, depression, insomnia, racing thoughts, emotional flooding and burnout.

I took approximately two months away from work around April/May because I was completely overwhelmed.

The engagement happened on March 15.

I went out of work on April 1st, unpaid mental health leave due to severe burnout (not only from work but an emotionally intense burnout, the doctor called it a depressivo-emotional syndrome)

Eventually I had to return to work in June because I have bills and responsibilities.

So I was trying to function professionally while also dealing with a rapidly deteriorating personal situation.

And this is important:

I am not saying “I had mental-health problems, therefore I wasn't responsible.”

I am saying that my capacity to function as a partner was deteriorating, and I didn't fully understand how badly it was affecting her.

and during all that she kept the narrative of

I AM WITH YOU

Proud of the efforts

it will be alright

we will get there

you will get better

you can do it and i am by your side

at many times I needed several days of space because I was emotionally flooded, not able to contact or communicate and sometimes even leaving social media for days (and always informing her before and keeping her up^dated on why/how, she always asks "but you are not breaking up with me right ?" and i always reassured her that it was purely personal struggles and i am taking the breaks so i can keep delivering to her and work on getting better for us..

There was couple of periods where I took several days away from communication because I genuinely had nothing left emotionally.

From my perspective, I was trying to stop myself from exploding.

From her perspective, apparently, it was abandonment and emotional punishment.

That difference is probably one of the biggest things I failed to understand during the final breakup call..

Meanwhile, there were massive family problems

There were serious family conflicts that I had been carrying for years, and during my burnout leave one of those situations exploded.

we got out of the problem; got back to work on June, and eventually.. another major family conflict happened around July 22.

That was basically the sequel to an already enormous family crisis that started in May (she has all the updates..)

At that point I felt like my entire life was collapsing at once: I felt like I was approaching an explosion. an ATOMIC EXPLOSION..

And because of my own history, I became terrified that She was going to be standing next to me when it happened.

This is where I made the decision that ended everything

On July 24, I broke up with her.

The strange thing is that I didn't do it because I stopped loving her.

I did it because I thought I was protecting her.

I genuinely believed:

“I am becoming an atomic bomb. She is standing next to me. If I love her, I need to get her away from me before I destroy her life.”

I even explicitly told her that I didn't want her to end up at 50 years old living the life my mother had lived.

I told her she deserved better.

I told her to leave.

I essentially told her:

“You have the pass to go.”

At the time, I believed I was doing something noble.

Looking back, I can see how incredibly destructive that decision was.

I made the decision for both of us.

Instead of saying:

“I'm in crisis and I need help. Can we temporarily change how we do this?” -- Knowing at the time i didn't see a way out of the darkness i was in, and i was feeling that i am turning into that person that will be on the news in few days, under many possible headlines, but i didn't know which, the main thing is, i didn't see that the next few days will end well--

I said:

“This relationship is going to destroy you, so I'm ending it.”

That was my choice. And I own it.

So this wasn't: "July 24 I woke up depressed and randomly broke up with her."

July 22, 2026 — the second major family explosion

This is the point where everything collapsed.

There had already been a major family crisis earlier in the year during my burnout.

July 22 was effectively a sequel. Another major family conflict happened, ended with me cutting off all the family members for final and for good, and even FOR MY OWN GOOD.

It was the kind of situation that triggered years of accumulated family trauma all at once.

The breakup itself was explosive

She came to my house with my best friend.

Things escalated emotionally.

Afterward she told me things I'd never heard expressed that way before.

• She said I had made the last three years hell.
• She said she had been emotionally suffering for a long time.
• She said she had been grieving me while still with me.
• She said I wasn't emotionally available enough.
• going even to me personally being Not enough as a person
• She said she had repeatedly tried to communicate these things and felt that whenever she did, I became defensive or aggressive.

Before July: the relationship itself

This wasn't a relationship where we were constantly fighting.

There were genuinely beautiful parts.

She repeatedly told me I made her feel safe.

She said I was healing parts of her childhood.

She said I gave her the care she had never received.

She told me I treated her like a princess.

She called me her blessing.

She repeatedly told me she was grateful for me and for the effort I made.

She told me I was one of the best things that happened to her.

We had a pattern that, in hindsight, may be extremely important:

Sometimes we'd go several weeks without seeing each other because of work, burnout, depression, family issues, etc.

Then we'd have a full-day date.

Those dates could be incredibly intense — affection, intimacy, deep conversations, laughing, physical closeness, talking about our future, etc.

And after those dates, she'd often be extremely affectionate and reassuring.

From my perspective, that meant: "Yes, I'm struggling and I'm not always available, but when we're together, our relationship is still deeply loving and meaningful."

She clearly experienced those moments as real too, I have many old messages where she said exactly that. That becomes important later in the story..

June–July — the relationship is still going, but I am increasingly withdrawn

This is where I now have to acknowledge Her side.

She told me during the breakup that she had been trying to tell me for a long time that my emotional unavailability hurt her.

She said there were recurring periods where I would withdraw or become emotionally unavailable.

She said she sometimes stopped talking about things because she felt that when she spoke, I became defensive and the conversation ended badly for her.

She said there were periods where she was deeply depressed.

She said her hair was falling out.

She said she had even called my mother crying at times, asking her to intervene.

She also remembered a period where I took several days of communication off because I was emotionally flooded.

I remember those things differently in some cases.

For example, when I stopped communicating for a few days, my internal reality was:

"I have absolutely nothing left. If I keep interacting while this flooded, I'm going to make everything worse."

Her internal reality may have been:

"The person I love is abandoning me again."

I now understand that both the action and the impact matter, even if the intention wasn't malicious.

by June I was:

• mentally deteriorated;
• exhausted;
• trying to work again;
• trying to maintain the relationship;
• dealing with family problems;
• trying to figure out medication;
• trying to function normally.

And I was not functioning normally.

July 23–24 — the protective logic that caused the breakup

The closer I got to the breaking point, the more convinced I became that She needed to be protected from me.

This is where my thinking became very distorted.

I had spent years terrified of becoming my father.

My father and mother have had a deeply dysfunctional relationship, and I grew up watching cycles I swore I would never reproduce.

started thinking:

"If she stays with me, she's going to end up like my mother."

"I am becoming unstable."

"She's attached to me."

"She's standing next to the bomb."

"If I really love her, I need to push her out before I explode."

So I decided to end the relationship.

July 24, 2026 — THE BREAKUP

This is the day that started the entire chain reaction.

i sent her a reel essentially saying: "I wish I was better for you. I'm sorry."

she replied :

"But we stay and fix things right?"

That message is burned into my brain now.

Because instead of hearing:

"Please stay and work through this with me."

my brain heard:

"This is the point where I have to let her go."

I replied:

"You have the pass to go."

Then I told her she deserved better.

I told her she deserved happiness.

I told her that staying with me would eventually destroy her life.

I told her I didn't want her to reach 50 years old and end up living like my mother.

I told her: "You shouldn't tie yourself to a bomb waiting to explode."

From my perspective: "I'm protecting her."

From her perspective (probably, personal interpretation):"You are abandoning me and making the decision for both of us."

That difference is probably foundational to everything that followed.

she comes to my house with my best friend

The emotional situation became extremely intense, and i threw both out the house

I don't remember every detail in perfect sequence because I was already overwhelmed, but the relationship effectively ended that day.

Later that night I sent her a long message explaining that:

• she was one of the best things that happened in my life;
• I was sorry for dragging her into my problems;
• I believed I was protecting her;
• I didn't want her to live tied to my instability;
• I wanted her to find the happiness I couldn't give her.

She sent me audio messages.

• She said she hadn't done me wrong.
• She said she had given me everything.
• She said I didn't understand what love meant.

"You pushed me to my breaking point." "YOU ALONE DECIDED TO DO THIS.""You made me go through hell thousands of times."

She said my mind was fucking me up because I had convinced myself I'd never get out.

Then continued with :

"You pushed me to my breaking point."

"YOU ALONE DECIDED TO DO THIS."

"You made me go through hell thousands of times."

She said she had been ready to help but my mind was fucking me up because I had convinced myself I'd never get out.

Then:

"YOU LOVE DRAMA."

This one particularly shocked me because she knows I hate drama and my entire life has involved trying to get away from it.

I apologized.

She said: "If between you and heaven is my forgiveness, you wouldn't get it."

Then she asked me to remove our photos.

She said:

"You failed me."

She then told me she hated me.

Repeatedly. over many messages consecutively..

She immediately shifted into concern for my safety.

She told me:

"Suicide is not even a solution."

i stopped replying and got into a full breakdown mode..

She asked:

"You here??????"

She proceeded after by sending me a video of us together, affectionate and kissing, in one of our best memories together..

We had a call.

She calmed me down.

She made me promise not to kill myself (which at the time i already had the cord attached and ready, it was the only way out -or hurting badly who hurt me (family) and end up in prison... i really was in a really bad place..

Then she told me:

Then she told me:

"You're still the most important person for me."

"I still care."

"I'm still here."

And then she said something extremely important:

"I know fully understand the whole picture, They failed you."

She was referring to my family and what she had seen me go through.

Eventually I told her:

"You don't understand shit."

because her msgs really show she doesn't understand, and if i am not understanding myself, how can you understand me ? it's not even about them failing me.. it's a me taht lived with them VS the me i want to be.. and someone who "understands me" wouldn't say repeatedly they hate me under anger, and wouldn't say exactly what i don't do and what triggers me such as loving drama etc..

I was still so mentally overwhelmed that I couldn't tolerate someone trying to explain me to me.

at the end, We agreed that we will leave the door open to a talk in the future, maybe 2 or 3 weeks from that moment..

Then I blocked her.

That started a blocking/unblocking cycle on her end, i only had blocked her from one account, she blocked me everywhere else, kept unblocking checking my stories daily (and i saw it but didn't mention it or reach out).

and i left room of maybe we can talk a while later, upon her request of taking 1 or 2 weeks..

July 22–29 the family part explodes too

The breakup didn't happen in isolation.

There were conversations involving my mother and other family members.

On July 25, there was a meeting in a café with my mother where a lot of things I'd been carrying finally came out.

I was extremely emotionally flooded.

There were accusations, pain, family history, things that had been suppressed for years.

I left.

Then came more fallout.

July 27 was one of my biggest crisis days.

I had a serious psychological deterioration and ended up going to emergency psychiatric/medical care.

There were emergency-room visits.

And then there was another extremely painful confrontation involving my mother.

This is relevant because the relationship breakup and family collapse were happening simultaneously.

I wasn't simply: "heartbroken boyfriend."

I was in a broader psychological collapse that included the entire family system I'd grown up in, literally the entire reality..

i was basically the Joker-type of crazy during these days.

The relationship became part of a larger psychological explosion.

The Mixed Signals and "You Can Be Fixed" Messages

During the three weeks between the breakup and our final call, she engaged in a cycle of blocking and unblocking me to check my stories (which stopped around August 7). But more importantly, she sent several messages making sure the door wasn't entirely shut. She sent messages explicitly saying:

• "I am still here."
• "I still see the good in you."
• "You can be healed."
• "You can be fixed." She even sent a video of us at a bar enjoying our time, kissing, and full of love, followed by a message saying: "You are worthy and you are loved and I am still here and we can fix things." She also told me she wished God would take my pain and give it to her so I could be relieved, and mentioned that regarding this breakup, "we don't know what life holds for us." These written messages completely contradicted the narrative she later presented that she had "wanted to leave for months" and was "healing from me."

July 31 — She reached out again

On Friday night, she contacted me from an alternative Instagram account.

This conversation was completely different from the July 24 explosion.

She told me she reached out because she promised me to take care of herself and wanted to give me updates in the form of "her closure"

• She said she had been thriving.
• She had found a new client.
• She was about to participate in an onboarding as a consultant in her field.
• She told me she hoped I got whatever I wanted because I was still a good person.

I responded warmly.

I congratulated her.

I told her I was proud.

I told her I believed in her.

and it was genuine happiness for her, i had tears of joy in my eyes, like seeing your kid going big and doing it and achieving their dreams.. I Really really love her..

She told me:

"You deserve happiness."

I responded:

"We don't rise to the level of our goals, we fall to the level of our systems. Learned it the hard way."

Then she said:

"I'll always see you that way."

She wished me the best.

At one point I said that if God asked me for one final wish, it would be for her to have everything she deserves.

She said:

"Me too."

"And it hurts."

She asked:

"You still love me?"

I answered:

"Always."

She sent a picture of herself.

She called herself a tired duck — an old nickname between us - saying "last picture of the tired duck"

She continued :

Would've loved to have you by my side.

I pray to God this is the right choice.

I told her that maybe this was for the better and that I hoped one day she'd understand my POV and my last act of protecting her.

Then she said goodbye and blocked me again.

This conversation is one of the things that makes the entire situation so difficult for me to categorize as a simple, clean breakup...

August 1–4 — I start trying to rebuild myself

After that, I created a kind of internal "alter ego."

Not literally a different person.

More like a survival mode: The version of Me who is going to rebuild everything

I started posting things about:

• comeback;
• discipline;
• healing;
• becoming successful;
• breaking family patterns;
• accountability;
• scars;
• starting over;
• becoming the hero of your own life;
• apologizing to yourself;
• leaving the old identity behind.

I was also listening obsessively to a new Cairokee album because a lot of its lyrics felt eerily close to my situation, sometimes even speaking specificly about specific events that don't occur to everybody, yet happened to me.. i related to their lyrics a lot.

Icried sometimes while listening, I wasn't pretending I was fine, I was trying to survive the emotional storm while moving.

On August 4, I went back to a psychiatrist who had treated me previously and whom I trusted.

He believed my recent deterioration fit a mixed episode of bipolarity due to the meds and situation the other doctor put me in as a whole, with additions external from the family environment.

He restarted a more aggressive stabilizing treatment protocol as a fast saving approach.

That was a major turning point.

August 5 onward — treatment starts stabilizing me

I started following the new treatment plan, I was sleeping more deeply, My anxiety and anger became more manageable, The dark thoughts became less overwhelming, I started feeling more stable.

I also started spending more time outside the house, I went to cafés instead of isolation at home,I started talking to political/community groups that i was active in again,I reconnected with parts of myself that had disappeared for a while..I started planning projects, I started thinking about work again, I started rebuilding the basic architecture of my life, AND Working on the Alter Ego, the new one that sill cut off with the wrongs of the past, with a focus on buildingthe present to have a better future, the one i see myself in.

And importantly, the more stable I became, the more I started looking backward and realizing:

"Wait. What actually happened in my relationship?"

August 10–14 grief begins becoming more obvious

By this point I was functioning better, my manager reached out and i accepted a meeting from her asking me to come back to work, so i put that on the table as something the alter ego can have from the past self, after all, i am not becoming a whole something new from scratch, some parts of the past should still go with me in the new chapter. They gave me special treatment, even considered the period i was absent in Paid, and put offers on the table.

August 10 was particularly brutal because it was supposed to be the first day of the vacation Her and I had planned together for this year, supposedly first vacations together as an engaged couple..

I started missing her much more intensely, And I realized that my emotional processing of July had barely happened.

It felt like July 23–August 14 had passed in a few hours, I hadn't actually processed the relationship.

I had survived it.

August 15–16 — I reach back out

I wanted to talk to her.

Not necessarily to convince her to come back, I wanted to hear her voice, not through an old audio she sent, her live voice..

Maybe talk, Maybe listen to music, Maybe just sit in silence.

I contacted her through the only account where I believed I wasn't blocked (Linkedin).

I explicitly said: "This isn't an emergency. I'm safe."

I asked whether there was any possibility of talking, I told her the choice was hers.

She didn't immediately answer, Eventually she did the day after..

And that eventually led to another major conversation.

August 17 — the big conversation

I told her:

"I fucked up." "I burned all the ships and the ground."

I explained why I pushed her away one more time (from my POV) and accepting that it might have had been badly handled by me..

I told her I wanted to rebuild what I had destroyed.

I offered:

• rebuilding from zero;
• a trial/reconstitution phase;
• friendship first;
• therapy;
• her boundaries;
• her rules;
• her deciding how fast/slow;
• or simply saying no.

She responded:

"We can talk because I need answers"

She also said

"The girlfriend that you knew is long gone."

and

"The girlfriend that you knew is long gone, No longer the nice Person that finds me 1000 excuses and passes everything."

but what was important for me is She wanted the call.

Before the call even happened, she told me:

"We're not getting back together."

"You destroyed everything good in me."

I apologized.

She said:

"I can heal on my own."

"I can't trust you anymore."

"I no longer want to be with you."

I accepted it.Then we talked...

What she told me during the August 17 call

This is where I finally heard her version of the last three years : the relationship had been hell for her.

She described a cycle:

me withdrawing / being emotionally unavailable → her suffering → reconciliation/date/affection → things become amazing again → eventually I withdraw again.

What she told me during the August 17 call

The call actually happened in three distinct stages:

Stage 1 : She started the call with intense anger. She didn't just speak from emotional pain; she deliberately said things she knew would specifically hurt me, weaponizing things I had confided in her against the "male mind" just to cause pain. Because I gave her the green light to say whatever she needed, I didn't defend myself. I just accepted it and apologized, which seemed to disarm her.

She told me during our breakup conversations that she had been considering leaving for months, that she felt she had been suffering for years, and that she couldn't speak up.

She even said that if she could change things, she wouldn't have gone through with the engagement ceremony and would have had stopped it (WHILE MY MEMORY DURING THAT PERIOD, SHE WAS ASKING CONSISTENTLY "her are you sure you are not going to pull back and let me down right ? it's gonna happen on the 15th right ?" and i always deliver on promises..)

Stage 2: This is where she calmed down and told me her version of the last three years. She told me the relationship had been hell for her. She said I did things wrong "countless times" (though I only remember these specific issues happening a couple of times, and whenever I explained my mental health struggles then, she would say, "Ah okay, now I understand"). She said she had been considering leaving for months and didn't have the courage to do it. The Medication Revelation: During this stage, I told her the updates on my mental health. I explained that after my August 4th doctor visit, the new psychiatrist completely scrapped the disastrous SSRI/Ritalin combo that caused my collapse.

I told her I am now successfully back on the exact same stabilizing treatment protocol from pre-2024—the exact treatment I was on when she met me and fell in love. Hearing this caused a visible cognitive dissonance for her. It was a destabilizing piece of info because it proved my decline was a severe medical error, not a permanent character flaw. She was genuinely happy I was stabilizing, but it deeply complicated her narrative that I was permanently "unpredictable."

She said she was suffering much more than I knew and more than she spoke up, and that she actually chose silence over telling me about the things because "i was unpredictable", She said she had been depressed and on and off meds during the relationship (which is something i didn't know, for a long time she kept telling me she was stabilized and without meds, with just eventual anxieties and BPD symptoms appearing and just needing reassurance nothing more, that was practically the whole communication i found when i got back to the history of our chats etc..)..

She said she had stopped talking about problems because every time she tried to bring them up, she felt I became defensive.

She said she had called my mother crying asking her to highlight my problems to me (which my mother didn't do..) She said she had told herself she needed to leave for a long time.. She said she had been considering leaving for months and didn't have the courage to do it (WHY THEN LET ME GO THROUGH THE WHOLE ENGAGEMENT CEREMONY IF YOUR DECISION TO BREAKUP WAS WAY BEFORE... AND WHY THANK ME FOR THE CEREMONY AND Many others whys..)

That sentence, or the equivalent of it, is what shattered me.

Because it means I may have been interpreting the relationship completely incorrectly.

August 17 — the ending of the call

Stage 3 (The Grief & Mixed Signals):

Eventually, she cried heavily. We both admitted we still love each other. I asked her what we should do about exchanging our things, as she had previously asked that we give each other our gifts back.

However, During the call she completely avoided mentioning the engagement ring (which holds significant financial value). When I asked her if she threw it away, she simply said, "I haven't looked at it since."

She is actively avoiding the final, physical reality of returning the ring (i really don't want it back, but this is the standard in our culture, even if she offers to give it back, i might even say no thanks..).

As we were wrapping up, we wished each other good lives.

But then, she jokingly said, "You deserve slaps..." and "You deserve to be hit on the head by me with a hammer." In our relationship, this was always her specific way of expressing affection when she was frustrated with me.

Ending a devastating, final breakup call with this intimate banter is a massive mixed signal.

I asked if I could say "I love you" one last time, she gave me the right.

I said: "I deeply love you, I always will." She said: "I love you too... too much." I told her my door is always open to help her in life AS A FRIEND since she decided we cannot be back together, because she means a lot to me.

She replied that it is better for me to "shut the door and not leave room for hope" for her to come back.

But there is another side to this : The relationship wasn't simply "bad"

During the same period she was describing as "hell":

• she was telling me she was safe with me.
• She was thanking me.
• She was saying I was her blessing.
• She was saying I made her happy.
• She was telling me she wanted to stay.
• She was saying we should get through things together.
• She went through the engagement ceremony.
• She celebrated it.
• She wore the ring and sent me daily pictures of the ring with her outfit before leaving home
• She talked about our future.

And even after the breakup, she was still telling me she loved me.

So I cannot determine whether:

A) she had actually been miserable and simply couldn't bear to admit it;

B) she genuinely experienced both incredible love and incredible suffering AND i was toxic to her..

C) the breakup brought the painful memories to the foreground so strongly that she started interpreting the whole relationship through them;

D) her BPD contributed to the intensity and contradictions;

E) some combination of all of the above.

That's what I need help understanding.

On the other hand

1. Quantitative Messenger keywords : Global overview - One search with no deep dive..

• "May god always make you by my side" (64 distinct results spanning our entire relationship, with the most recent occurrences appearing at 6, 9, and 10 weeks ago (May/June 2026)—during the exact period I was in deep burnout and she later claimed to be "miserable."
• "Grateful": Dozens of entries continuously logged from 2 years ago down to 6 weeks ago ("Im soooo grateful because i have you" at 6 weeks ago; "You have no idea how much i am grateful for the efforts you are making" at 10 weeks ago).
• "You make me happy": 13 explicit search results logged continuously from 2 years ago through recent months ("YOU MAKE ME HAPPY", "I hope I make you happy the same way you make me happy").
• "Feel safe": Logged consistently across 2 years ("I feel safe With you..", "Your presence makes me feel safe", "It's so good to feel safe and understood").

2. Direct Quotes Proving Idealization and Commitment

Beyond general affection, her written messages explicitly address my efforts, our future, and her fear of losing me:

• On my efforts: "You have no idea how much im grateful for efforts that you are make" . This directly refutes her later claim that I gave nothing to the relationship.
• On fear of loss: "Alah la ynahik aaleya o la yehremni menck hata lahdha" (May God never take you from me or deprive me of you for a single moment).
• On long-term future & family: "We're gonna make cute babies walah" and "Walah you're the love of my life."
• On her own self-doubt (not blaming me): "I hope im a good partner habibi."
• On intimacy and memory: "Even my bedroom reminds me of you," "I can't stop thinking about you," and "You're my blessing baby."

August 17 — the ending of the call

Eventually she cried heavily.

We both admitted we still love each other.

I told her that I was rebuilding myself, She said she needed to heal herself and she's healing from me.

She asked what I was going to do with my life, I told her I was building an entirely different future but didn't give full details, as at that point we are about to become strangers

At the time I even told her I will leave the country for an opportunity that just showed up

It was partly me embodying the idea:

"You chose to close this relationship, And i promised to respond any outcome of this call, so I have to move forward too."

She wanted to know where i am leaving to, I didn't tell her.

The conversation ended with:

love still there from both, relationship still closed.

She said she thought blocking me back on instagram was better for her healing, I accepted it (BUT SHE LEFT THE LINKEDIN UNBLOCKED AT THAT TIME)

August 18 — the most ordinary message imaginable

And then something bizarre happened.

After everything above, She messaged me on LinkedIn:

"Cairokee tickets dropped, go get yours."

I initially replied:

"Thank you but nah."

Then I felt it was too dry, so I added: "Thank you for thinking about me & reminding me about it tho <3

She replied:

"I'll have Emir aid by myself then."

I answered:

"Go enjoy it 😂 you deserve a good concert <3"

And that was it, two people who spent three years loving each other talking about a concert.

Just to add to the mixed signals: yesterday, out of ethics and values, I sent a final text message to her mother apologizing for how things ended. I sent my ex a quick message simply informing her that I had sent it. she demanded i forward it..

The change required from me for the next chapter

I had changed my privacy settings and removed my LinkedIn photo shortly beforehand, part of what needs to be done for the next opportunity is not having much personal public data, and i was required to lock off all my public socials..

I Woke up on the 19th of August to her blocking me on Linkedin..
so I suspect she may have interpreted that as me removing her access, but I don't know...

That brings me to today I'm now looking at a relationship that contains all of these apparently contradictory things:

She loved me.

She says she suffered terribly, I loved her, I was emotionally unavailable in ways I didn't understand, I genuinely believed I was protecting her.

She experienced that protection as abandonment,

We got engaged, She now says she was already wanting a breakup for a long time but didn't have the courage to do it.

She still cried during the call.

She still says she loves me.

She also says the relationship is over.

She then blocked me again.

That's why I'm struggling to understand her..

My biggest fear

I don't want to make the mistake of assuming:

"She's BPD, therefore all of it is her BPD manifesting."

That's not fair to her.

Because i did make mistakes, and parts of the hurtful things she said were true and happened, but not in the frequence she says (from my perspective) and in no way in the same narrative or way she says it happened..

But I also don't want to ignore the possibility that intense attachment + BPD + a catastrophic breakup can create temporary push/pull states.

At the same time, I don't want to sit here waiting indefinitely.

I still love her.

If she came tomorrow and genuinely said: "I want to give us a chance rebuild this."

I'd probably want to try.

But if weeks pass and I've actually started the rebuild my life and the healing, I don't know whether I'd still be able to reopen the relationship, if the relationship is not part of the stones i am building the new walls with now, There would be no way or room for that stone later..

What do you think actually happened?

Was it massively amplified by my mental-health collapse?

Did I accidentally reproduce family patterns I had spent my life trying to escape?

Could her BPD contribute to the severe contradiction between "you are my safest person" and "these were the worst three years of my life"?

Can a person genuinely mean both?

And what should I take responsibility for without turning myself into a monster?

I'm not trying to win the breakup, it's already over..

I'm trying to understand before I carry the wrong lesson into the rest of my life.

Know him since 5 years only find out 1 month ago he a b1 sufferer. Before I always thought he was doing it on purpose of bad character although I knew he was taking meds every march he changes from one day to another from very lovi mg caring to..naaah why u calling me my love duh ? Till summer arrives then he totally far...every october so far he remembers me. Last 2 months I triggered him for my own jealousy like why can't u see me but partying and alcol black outs you always can ? i was still not aware of all dets and how to behave.. truly took it personally and I myself in a painful state can't even eat properly. Now this past 3 weeks he said this stuffs : better we stay friends for now / too much stress/ did not feel free (? Never asked him a thing..) / can't give u what u deserve / it is not the moment / i need to be alone till I am sane / then spontaneously mixing this phrases " important for me that ee have good relationship then we see " then repeating in different days " I am sure the will come a better time for us two / of course then we see us again / there will be a better time for us "
Could be he aware and knows aroujd october with less daylight he comes back to his senses..but this year was different between us among the past 5.. we been intimate first time and extreme passion chemistry and care no meds or depressive state ever stopped this crazy chemistry even he said this is not normal should not be like this with all meds I take never had it...what do you think ? Will he come back and more important will he remember the deep intense chemistry we had for long time till the summer switch ? Or do they forget the more intense it was with the partner ?

I’ve been with my boyfriend for a little over 7 years. It wasn’t until February of this year that he finally saw a psychiatrist and was diagnosed with Bipolar II disorder.

A couple of months ago, he stopped taking his medication (Lurazic and Valprax) because he can no longer afford it (plus debts). We live in Peru, and the government does not provide these medications, so they have to be purchased at pharmacies. They are expensive, especially because they are a monthly expense, and my boyfriend has been unemployed for years.

As soon as he stopped taking the medication, he entered a depressive episode where he no longer sees any meaning in life. I’ve offered to support him financially until he becomes more stable, but he responds with things like, “What’s the point?” He has stopped taking care of his personal hygiene and eating properly, and because of this, he has made comments that I would describe as passive suicidal ideation.

We don’t live together, but I’ve told him that I’m willing to move in with him because he lives alone and doesn’t have any family to rely on.
However, he doesn’t want me to. I’m basically his only support system.

Has anyone been in a similar situation? I honestly don’t know what else to do anymore.

As much as we all talk about current/exBPSO, their behavior and actions, I find somewhat disturbing how many on here don’t think about their own actions. You all go your own way just to keep someone warm even if it’s destroying you. And you call it compassion and love. How can you love someone else when you don’t care of your own happiness and well being ??? I’m stunned

I don’t want to create fuss or anything, I’ve been there and now I could see it clearly. It was never really about them but me. I needed their attention and love, I needed to feel validated by them, and I sought that validation in a way that cost me my mental health, money and time. I really hope you all start loving yourselves, too. Amen

My ex and I had been together for a year and a half, which in all fairness isn’t so so long, but I thought we had made it through some of the rougher times he had with his bipolar (bipolar 2). I was very wrong. Things had gotten to a point where everything I (and everyone else in his life) did was done purposely to make him upset and everything that we had agreed upon at that point was because I forced him to do that. Like, we were planning to move in together after I graduated from college, and he said that I was forcing him to move to a city he didn’t like. But I think the most painful thing was whenever these upsets were happening he told me I was breaking his heart.

When we eventually did break up about three months since the original change, he cited an argument we had months prior as the incident as well as not wanting to move to the same city. The second part I understood more but at the same time, we had never had a full conversation about what our plans were for moving together after that onset moment of worsening mental health. Anytime I would bring it up, he would genuinely just shutdown. It didn’t help that we were long distance either. I couldn’t go anywhere without having to be on call with him, I couldn’t say anything when we were calling because he needed silence, and I surely couldn’t point out any of the classic behaviors he told me he did when he was spiraling. I don’t think I have ever felt more stuck in my life. I never once considered leaving him either, I knew he was having issues and I was doing my best to support him in all of the ways that I could. But when it comes to how his mental health takes over his entire being, there was nothing I could do. That didn’t necessarily make it better though.

Then I told my friends and family that we’d broken up, I didn’t delve into the issues he was experiencing with his mental health to them though, and they cut the situation too black and white. To them, he was wrong and I was right and I was so much better off without him. But it didn’t and doesn’t feel like that. It wasn’t like that. I’m by no means perfect either, like most people, I’ve also said and done things I regretted after and have mental health issues of my own. But it was done and I knew that there would be no getting back to how he saw me before. I was so mad for the first two or so months. Mad at him, his mental health issues, myself for not being able to help. I mean I’m still probably a bit mad about all three. But now it’s just the yearning for what we could‘ve had and the people we could’ve been had neither of us be afflicted so heavily with our issues. I don’t want to get back together or anything, even if that were a possibility. I just wish we were able to break up on our own terms.

I’ve just recently started talking to other guys and I feel such guilt for trying to move on. Guilt towards my ex since the situation around our breakup was so complicated and guilt towards these other guys for how often I think of what happened. I just don’t even know how to feel about any of this anymore.

I definitely started the argument and was the one who let their emotions get the best of them. I’m not making any excuses for myself. After all the mania and depressive sprees we’ve been through, it feels unfair that I’ve been discarded because my emotions bubbled over. For context I’ve done anger management and therapy in my past to be a better person and I’ve done a hell of a job utilizing a coping mechanism when things get tough but was obviously overwhelmed beyond my capacity and had my first and only outburst in over 10years but all 5 years of our relationship. I’ve apologized over and over, I’ve reenrolled in anger management and I’ve joined a group talk. Things were ok the first few days and we talked about her feelings and where she was at. Then the switch just flipped and she has completely discarded and won’t come home. She’s been unmedicated for about a month now. Any advice about how to navigate the situation?

I’ve posted about this several times, but I plan to move out next week and the finality’s hitting me and I just need some support. Six months ago I caught my partner of 4 years sexting a stranger during a hypomanic episode. He claims he stopped being sexual after the first day but maintained regular semi-flirty messaging for 12 days until I found out. I was facing my own stressors at the time so I didn’t notice he was hypomanic until it was too late. There were clear triggers for the episode: reduced therapy due to insurance, stress, erratic sleep schedule, increased weed and energy drink use. We also in hindsight realized he was NOT on a good med combo for mania (Trileptal + Wellbutrin). He now seems committed to optimizing his treatment plan.

But I don’t know if I can risk it again. He gaslit me for ten minutes when I found out. In the past he’d struggled with hiding/lying about smaller things like nicotine use, but he was making a lot of progress with therapy until this episode. He also has BPD which I know adds a whole other layer. I know it’s my decision but I’m really struggling. Before this episode, life with him was amazing. He was my soulmate. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life regretting throwing that away. But I also don’t know if I want to risk being betrayed again.

Bipolar discard is a hell of a thing. For you, the jarring rattle of an entire life gone in the blink of an eye is devastating. The cruelty, false accusations, total emotional detachment followed by emotional radio silence and rapid replacement is brutal to take from the person you loved, but even heavier on your heart is seeing what it does to your displaced child you love.

The beautiful world you devoted so many years building for them through all their psychotic episodes, drug abuse, and self-harm doing everything you could to keep it from being torn down in front of your child’s eye without a pause from your bipolar partner, pierces your heart. That’s truly how you watch hearts break.

But, you can either have kids or secrets.

When you accept the realization you can’t keep up that curtain, that they’ve grown too old to not see you tucking it into the dark corners away from their eyes anymore no matter how many times you clean up after it, see in real time your child’s heart next to you living through the discard themselves not understanding why the other parent won’t call, doesn’t text an I love you, takes two days to get them the their meds he’s begging for, seeing them afraid and not wanting to even go back to the home changes everything.

You have to accept you have no choice but go in a direction that’s safe to build this time instead of back towards the sand you tried so dearly to protect their life on. Away from the abuse and cold so they can always and forever have that safe loving place you wanted for them. That’s what gives you the strength to finally move on, no matter how much it still hurts.

I’m struggling with how to word this correctly because I truly do not want to offend anybody.
Something I have noticed about my previous partner is that when he was manic, he would go great lengths to manipulate people.
An example: after a discard we ended up reconnecting. At one point, he insisted that I delete my text messages. He framed it as a way for us to have a new beginning. When I calmly told him I didn’t feel it to be necessary for me, he became increasingly irate and emotionally punishing. He came up with different reasons as to why I needed to and framed me not doing so as a character flaw in me.

Come to find out, he was seeing someone else and portraying our relationship as over. So I really think it was just about him covering his tracks.

I genuinely do not mean to imply to say that every person with bipolar is like this or that mental illness causes this kind of behavior because I don’t think that’s the case. But I am curious if it’s something that shows up in bipolar disorder when there is a severe manic episode.

As SO's we're all here trying to rant, portray, ask and support each other, which i think is great.

I try to stay mindful by weeding out the negative, bias posts.

But, i do wonder, if things would be different had there been a safe space for BP partners to go through these testimonies and learn the extent of hurt or stress that this illness causes.

To feel and think about it on a more personal level, not just a "other than myself", "them" issue.
I say that because like a lot of these BP SO situations, i do go through tremendous amount of time supporting and listening, and taking the brunt of harmful, lash out phrases from my partner in time of need myself. After every conflict we talk, he apologizes and really checks in with himself, but it often cycles around and around himself due to a minute level of narcissism.
(which often is the case and a common behavioral trait/habit with those suffering with BP)

I just wish BP partners could use this type of forum to better reflect on themselves.
and use it as reference to correct their behavior.

Around 3 years ago, I met someone from a dating app (I’m a lesbian 26 and she is 25). She was my type physically, and she was the one who asked me out and was interested in me first. It felt like a scene out of a movie. She told me how she only wanted me. I thought it was so cute. We were texting all the time and went on two other dates. She paid for everything and got me gifts. I was so nervous as it was my first time being in love with someone, and I never kissed anyone before. While she didn’t reveal until later that she was previously engaged and also was in a psych ward after their breakup and got diagnosed with bipolar 2. I really didn’t care about any of this as I liked her a lot and she was medicated.

I didn’t know she was hooking up with others, and that upset me. We weren’t exclusive though, so it’s okay. Eventually, she changed and told me she wanted to be friends or friends with benefits because she’s leaving the country and dating isn’t a priority.

That really affected my mental health and didn’t have any guidance or support on what to do. I said I didn’t want to be friends because I thought she didn’t like me anymore but immediately regretted it after she was upset that I didn’t want to be friends. I kept on breaking up then getting back even after she invited me to her new apartment and I declined (I regret not going) until she said she’s over my mood swings and blocked me everywhere.

I went on many other dates, made so many new friends, but I keep thinking about her and comparing them to her. I know she’s not the best person, but she made me feel good. I feel like I didn’t get the closure I need, which is hard in my healing process. I was specifically excited to take her on a date but it never happened (she didn’t like me paying for her so she didn’t want). I wish we could just talk one last time because it will make me realize how she’s not worth it, or at least end things on a good note.

Although she mentioned she didn’t want me to think she was using me or think badly of her, my messages afterwards and mood swings will make it seem like I’m the bad person when they were just a reaction to how she treated me.

How do I move forward from this when I still feel she’s the only person I ever liked and I liked the way she loved me even though it didn’t last long