Setting Boundaries

I've been really proud of myself for setting boundaries recently.

Today a woman e-mailed me and wanted to know why I have taken her off my social networking sites.

I took her off when I broke up with my most recent ex.  This woman (supposedly a friend, someone I had done nice things for and offered emotional support to during her divorce) knew about our relationship problems, yet really disrespected me by flirting and being all over my ex one night when we were at her apartment.  And when we broke up she left flirty messages on his Facebook wall.

The co-dependent part of me would have added this woman back, repressed my hurt and negative feelings toward her and pretended to be friendly.

Instead, I sent a polite but assertive message telling her that she had hurt my feelings, I felt that she had disrespected me.  I explained why.  I told her that it may not be logical, she may not feel that it is rational or "right" but that after having my reality warped for the last 3 years I was going to trust my feelings and only have people around me that care about me and respect me.

She wrote back and apologized.

I feel great!  I want to practice being emotionally honest as much as possible.

My family will be my last great hurdle with this.  And a friend I've had since I was 12.

With my family I am so used to hiding who I am that I am really scared of being honest with them.

With my friend, she is very controlling and bossy and will not respect any boundaries I put up, I'm sure.  I have always ended up being very passive aggressive with her because of this.

But still, if I can work on all the other areas of my life then it will be much easier to face those final obstacles.

Dating

I went to a New Year's Eve party and two men asked me out.

I was proud of myself for going to the party.

I set boundaries before hand and felt like that really helped me to not be anxious.

My most recent ex always kept the upper hand kept me powerless.

So it felt really different and nice to be wanted and to have the power in an interpersonal interaction.

But I don't want a relationship so should I really go out on dates?

Both men were nice but gave me all the red flags I need in our conversations that night.

Looking back both my exes gave me those red flags as well and I chose to ignore them.

So I feel I should not complicate my life by letting these people into it.

But it was a nice experiment and helped boost my self confidence some.

Divorce

My ex husband is getting divorced.

This does not surprise me.

He said he has no money, no car, yet he was e-mailing me from his iPhone.

This also does not surprise me.

He asked me to take the dog.  At first I wanted to.  I pictured having my baby dog back that loved me so much.

Then I realized the burden not to mention the added connection to my ex.  When I let him take the dog three years ago I said goodbye to the dog.  I don't need the added pressure and stress in my life of taking care of an elderly animal right now.

Maybe that's selfish but really I suspect the ex is just sucking me into his drama as usual.  I spent 11 years taking care of him.  I don't need to do anything for him now.

I am almost positive that my most recent ex has Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

I don't believe my ex-husband does,  yet he has many of the same qualities.

He has bi-polar disorder.  He was manic when I met him and pursued me and swept me off my feet with gifts and overwhelming emotion.  I felt drunk when I was around him.

He is incredibly selfish.  But it almost just seems like a case where his needs and wants are so overwhelming that he cannot put anyone else first.

He is not totally without empathy, though.  He is very emotional and I have seen him do kind things.  But he often uses people due to his selfishness.

He is desperate to be the center of attention.

He has false pride.  When he's manic he has delusions of grandeur.  And he always has fantasies of greatness.

He is extremely dependent but does not resent the person he's dependent on.  He was always very effusively grateful and constantly telling me how much he loved me.

He wanted to get his way and was manipulative but not abusive and never intentionally hurtful to me.  

So, I'm not a trained professional, obviously.  But somehow I just know he wasn't NPD and I strongly feel my most recent ex was.

Relief

This morning I was arranging all my body wash bottles so that the labels faced me in the shower and it suddenly hit me that many of the behaviors I was afraid indicated my own narcissism were OCD.

The photographs to create an artificial, controllable reality,  negative obsession about my physical appearance, my fear of other people's emotions.

It's about control.

The need to know what is going on with the most recent ex, despite how it will upset me, is also about control.

I think the longer I am no contact the more this will fade.

Once this fades I hope I can get back to a place of peace, insight and healing and out of this place of anger and bitterness and pain. 

Anger

I am infected with anger.  The bitterness comes out in all my interactions.  I want to be free of it.

I am angry at myself, angry at my exes, angry at my family, angry at co-workers and my employer.

I am working on a list of New Year's resolutions.

I am going to lose 50 pounds.

I am going to stop coddling myself and start taking responsibility for my life and my actions and all my decisions.

I will not be acted upon anymore.

I will act, not just react.

He's Back

So, what has it been, 3 days? He's back on Facebook.

And he's already e-mailed me.  

He was whining that I deleted all his pictures from Flickr.

This makes me laugh and laugh.

He is pathetic.  I am done with him.

There is no possible benefit to my even being friendly with him.

I don't know why I was even a little afraid of him.  He's a coward.

He always has been.

Hmmm

The most recent ex has deleted Facebook and Myspace.

He must have found out I e-mailed the neighbor's wife about him.

But to delete the profiles...he must be assuming I'm telling others about him.

I just hope I'm not in any danger.

I'm hoping he's angry and done with me and won't try to get revenge or silence me somehow.