Does recovery from Borderline Personality Disorder mean recovering lost relationships, friendships, or even family connections? In my experience the answer is often - no. It is important to grieve, let go and move on and to learn from past failed interpersonal dynamics so that they are not repeated in the future. What was then, was then. This is now. There are new people to meet, new relationships to forge and a recovered borderline has him/herself to fall back on in the meantime. Trying to turn back time can mean risking your recovery. It can mean falling back into old unhealthy patterns of relating. This, along with the reality of too much damage often done when one has BPD, means that moving forward is not only best for those you have hurt in the past, but it is also best for you as you continue to build your new life in recovery from BPD.
A person with BPD writes to ask:
"I was just wondering if, when you got cured of BPD, or at least were well on the way to recovery, whether you were able to heal any of the relationships that you had lost because of BPD issues? I have so many of those relationships, people that I miss and wish were back in my life. And if you did, I'd be interested in knowing how you went about doing that. Thanks a lot."
Let me begin by saying that I am sure that there is no rule about this. I am sure that some people may be able to go back, and or want to go back to past relationships and try again, whether those relationships are with family, friends or past love interests. This has not been my experience, nor is it a desire of mine anymore.
There was a time when I would have answered this question differently than I will today. Not only did I have to recover from BPD to understand what I am about to share but I needed a few more years of just living fully-aware of myself and in relationship to myself and in healthier relationships with others to know what my answer to this question is. My answer is, NO. I could only heal myself. I could not heal a relationship with anyone who either didn't want to heal it or couldn't heal anything because they still need to heal themselves.
Of course I share this answer after having tried in a couple of places, many years ago now, to re-establish relationship to a family member and a friendship with an ex-partner (that I left in the most tumultous period of my recovery from BPD)
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In the case of the family member, my mother, it became painfully obvious to me that she and I had not had a relationship (certainly not one with any health in it) in my entire life. Okay, well, there I was healed, better, etc so I thought well, I could try. In my trying it became apparent to me that the reasons why we had never had a relationship had much more to do with her than I. I had changed tons. My mother has not changed much at all. What that meant was that there still wasn't any common ground from which to work. In my recovery from BPD, one of the greatest gifts has been to come to understand that with most relationships, like childhood neighbourhoods, you really can't go back. If you do go back, so much has changed.
Life has a way of moving on without you and trying to go back when so much has changed, not the least of which is me and how I relate to others hasn't worked out for me. I have found too that since I have changed so much, grown so much and have healhty boundaries now that truthfully there isn't a relationship from my past that it would serve me well to try to go back to. I have said my share of "I'm sorry's" to those that I have hurt. To those who were open to such expressions. They were apologies offered and amends made without any expectation or really even desire to recover any past relationship/friendship with people I hurt when I had BPD. I have written some letters too. But that's about taking personal responsibility and was done without any desire or expectation to reconnect. I am a different person now. I have different wants and needs. Many of the people that I knew when I had BPD were also not well in their own ways. I have found it best, for me, in my life, to move on and to continue to meet and get to know healthier people.
I did not contact anyone who had set a boundary asking me to not contact them. When someone says they do not want to hear from you again, it is important to respect that and to know that they are not interested in hearing any amends either. They will have moved on by the time you work through enough to understand how much you have hurt them. All one can do, when making amends and/or apologizing to the aactual person or people that hurt is not possible, at this point of recovery from BPD, is radically accept what happened in the past and let it go, forgiving yourself.
Years ago, I did reach back one time with an ex-partner of mine. I had hurt this person a lot and I did feel very sorry about that. I wanted her to know that. I tried to relate to her in the present as the person that I am today. She was not in a place with her own issues that she could really appreciate this or meet me half way. She was still more in the past with who I was and her own issues. I have also since realized that my wanting to reach back to say I'm sorry was very valuable. My wanting to reach back to validate her pain and experience was very valuable.
My reaching back was not as much for her, though, as I had originally thought, it was more for me. And what was it that I so wanted? I had no clue. Only in retrospect do I know what it was I was seeking. I thought I needed her forgiveness. I wanted her forgiveness. It was not really something that she could give. What this experience taught me was that it was I who really needed to forgive myself. I have since worked on that and been able to forgive myself for those years in my life and for the behaviour, abuse and pain that I caused both her and myself. Having forgiven myself I feel absolutely no desire or need to have her be a part of my life anymore. I had forgiven her and wanted her to know that along with looking for her forgiveness. Eventually, she did give me that forgiveness. Oddly enough, it was long after I had come to realize I needed to my own forgiveness much more than hers. It was wonderful to be given that gift of her forgiveness but we do have to learn how to move on in life accepting our losses, forgiving ourselves and being okay with that because more times than not, in life, forgiveness or re-connection is not possible.
To me, my recovery involved a lot of grieving, remembering, letting go, and moving on. Before I could really move on though, I did wherever possible apologize for any and all pain that I had caused anyone in my life. I tried to make amends wherever people were open to hearing how sorry I was and/or to reading my letters. I made these amends with absolutely no strings attached. Saying I was sorry was a very big part of my recovery because it was about taking personal responsibility for the pain my "borderline" actions had caused others.
Things happen in life for reasons that we can't always know. The time that we spend with someone, or the time that our lives intersect is not dicated by whether or not we are ready to do the best with the time that we can. Sometimes we aren't. Sometimes we can't. The challenge here is to be able to accept that. To know that loss is a normal part of life. To then be willing to move on and let those people go is the difference between mental health and a lack of it.
Know that any regrets you have over past relationships are valid but that you do not need to reconnect with any person to work those issues out and to do better with others from here on out.
I am sure there are cases of people who go back to friends or family and perhaps are able to work things out as they get healthier. But this can only be done when the people that you go back to are also healthy. In my life, the people that I knew were not healthy. Simply put, most people that hung around with me or that would continue to be in my life in my worst borderline years, were not healthy. The healthy ones walked away to take care of themselves. I have never had any desire to reconnect with those who walked away from me. I understand why they walked. I applaud (and respect) them for taking care of themselves. Their walking away, over time, taught me so much about what I needed to change in myself if I wanted to have consistent relationships in my life. I have nothing to prove to them or to anyone else about my mental health now. I have moved on. I know different people. The people that are in my life now would not have given me the time of day when I was borderline.
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From my experience I believe it is best to let go and move on. I cannot undo the past. I cannot take back the damage I did to anyone when I was borderline. I have to live with that grief. I have to live with the knowledge of the damage that I caused in the replaying out of my own damage. It was the way that I found my way through it all to mental health. I am grateful for that. That has to be and that IS ENOUGH. I believe I lost the right to know the people that I hurt, lied to, manipulated, used and treated (often) so coldy. I am okay with that. As part of taking responsibility for my actions and my life I accept the losses that I have incurred and I let them continue to serve as a lesson so that I never again repeat those dynamics with anyone in my life now.
As you recover from BPD you will (if you don't already) come to know the pain of regret. It is deep and profound. You will also, as I have, come to know how to deal with it. I cannot say that everyone should do as I have done, but I can say that I have made the choices that I have made because in taking responsibility for my past I know that it would not serve anyone I knew or myself to re-engage any relationship that was attempted and failed with good reason. It is those failure and hurts that we must learn from. We then take that knowledge into future friendships and relationships and we do better. I know I have.
All I had control over was me. Learning to exercise personal emotional control and competency along with personal responsibility taught me that all I had a right to was my own life and my own mental health. What I needed to do was to heal myself. I have done that. It was not within my power and it was not my right to in any way try to influence anyone else just to try to ease my own grief.
Past relationships are in the past. I cannot heal what has happened in the past. I can only unburden myself of it as others unburdened themselves of me and my chaos when I was borderline.
It was the nature of my wounded inner-child to want to repair and or fix past relationships always in the quest for the mommy or daddy I needed but never had. It was like banging on my head on a wall. It felt so good when I stopped it. It felt so good when I learned to just grieve and let go of what wasn't a part of my past. Many of the people I knew in my past were people that I tried to live through because I didn't know who I was. They were people who I thought I needed to make me safe. Now, and since recovering from BPD I realize that they were people who I used and did not respect. The damage that does needs to be respected and left alone. My integrity, now, would not allow me to re-engage these people at all.
In fact, I have had some people from my past try to re-engage me in recent years. I, like so many others who were in my life in the past, have also declined to re-engage because I knew that too much damage lies between us. I am not who I used to be. I am different in so many ways from the person I was when I had BPD. Recovery means moving forward. It means accepting what was and making new and healthier choices. We really cannot capture what was. It simply was. It isn't what is anymore. I remember fondly the qualities that I liked about those who have tried to re-engage with me. But, I also am sure to remain cognizant that I knew these people when I had BPD, in what now seems like another lifetime really. And, that the ways that we related were not healthy for them or for me. That's not something I want to build upon in my life in the here and now.
Make amends wherever you can if you are so inclined but don't have any expectations as you do so. Look ahead. Don't look back.
Does Recovery Mean Recovering Lost Relationships? In my experience, NO. Recovery means that I gained the tools and mental health with which to build new relationships. Recovery means that I no longer need the past, the relationships from the past, or the people to whom I tried so miserably to relate to in the past. Recovering truly means putting the baggage down and recreating yourself - finding and living through your previously lost authentic self.
Even if there was a bridge to build back to someone you were close to as a friend, a relationship partner, or even family member, often the damage done just cannot be fixed. This too must be radically accepted as you move on in recovery from who you were when you lived through the borderline false self to who you are now, today, and to who you continue to aspire to be as you get to know your Self much better.
© A.J. Mahari
