Do I get to fuck your Girlfriend?

In my life, I'd observed on occasion, a witless or uncouth man come on to my date, but never with the frequency or astonishing level of disrespect I experienced when in public with Tina.

We'd gone to our frequent watering hole, the Buffalo Bar and Grill and as was our routine, we were shooting pool and drinking whiskey. We struck up a doubles game with a couple men. One older, one younger. It was a typically good time, but Tina was disappearing for extended periods, ostensibly to the restroom. I assumed she was having some digestive trouble. She was gone for quite a while when the older man turned to me and said, "so if I win this game, do I get to fuck your girlfriend?"

"Excuse me?" Words had vibrated my eardrums, but that could not possibly have been a string of cohesive English.

"If I win this game, does that mean I get to fuck your girlfriend?" Unabashed, he restated his proposition.

I was overwhelmed - not initially with anger, but astonishment. I felt like I'd slipped into the Twilight Zone and though I now heard, registered and comprehended his words, I couldn't fathom the situation. It was so completely alien. I had to clarify what exactly he expected to accomplish by speaking to me about the love of my life like this. "What the hell is wrong with you? Are you trying to pick a fight with me?" Up until this point, everything had been friendly and nothing seemed amiss.

He grinned a gray-bearded, drunken grin and shrugged. "Yeah, he said. Then do I get to fuck her?"

"You get to die, fucker!" I snatched up my pool cue and flipped it tip down, fully intent on cracking it over his head and then jamming whatever was left in my hand right through his eye, but when I drew my arm back, it did not strike. The younger man we'd been playing with was standing behind me, my wrist caught in his meaty grip. He was taller than I and probably about double my weight. He grappled and quickly had both my arms pinned. I felt impotent. I could not break free of him and he disarmed me of the pool cue. "I'm going to need that," I said, suddenly calm and no longer struggling, but still intent on carrying out my initial plan to jam that cue into the old man's eye.

"I can't let you hurt him." he said.

"Did you hear what this mother fucker said?" I was righteously indignant.

The young man seemed embarrassed. He nodded. "Yeah, but he's my dad."

I understood his dilemma.

"Look, he's trashed. I'm going to take him home."

I was mollified and son urged drunken father away from me.

All this went on while Tina was away. I refilled our drinks while I waited alone by the pool tables. Some time later, the vulgar old man - now in a Vikings jacket - approached me again with his son. I sprang to my feet.

"I thought you were getting him the fuck out of here," I demanded.

"He wanted to come over and apologize."

"Yeah," said the old man. "I'm sorry. I'm pretty drunk." I nodded, prepared to accept his apology and move on with my night, but then he added, "but I still want to fuck your girlfriend."

That time, I leapt straight to rage. I yelled "I'm going to kill you, you piece of shit" or something appropriate to to situation as the son lunged to interpose himself between his dad and I.

"I'm so sorry. I didn't know he was going to say that," the son said as he pulled his dad away, towards the exit.

"Get him out of here," I said. "If I see him again, somebody's going to have to call the cops."

"C'mon, Dad. Let's find Mom and I'll get you home."

His wife was at the bar with him. I shook my head in amazement. Tina finally returned, having missed all of the excitement and I related the highlights.

"I would have handled that old man, myself," Tina said. "You don't have to get yourself arrested defending my honor."

I explained "fighting words." A man talking about another man's lady like she's trash is a provocation that can't go ignored. To me, crazy talk like that is the same as a direct threat. Someone who'd say things like that is dangerous and capable of anything. Even taking the insult to honor out of the equation, self-defense becomes immediately necessary.

We went out into the cold to get our nicotine fix. Sitting at a table on the patio, we watched the man in the vikings jacket being guided to a car by his son. A woman a step behind was repeatedly hitting the man with her purse, all the way across the parking lot.

We laughed.

It was one for the book.

Why???

Tina pulled something amazing out of me that I didn't know existed and then she killed it. And when that special something was killed, so too was my capacity for love, affection, trust, faith and optimism.

It's as if my affection was an organ that's bloodied and battered from abuse and it's raw and hurts to be touched. I don't want to be touched by anyone. I don't want to be close to anyone. It hurts.

I have a mental disorder. I was raised in an on-again-off-again broken home with an alcoholic father. I was inadvertently raised to be codependent. My mental disorder makes me kind, patient, helpful, accepting and accommodating. It also makes me very tolerant to abuse and my memory of distressing events susceptible to erasure. It apparently also makes me far more gullible than I thought I was.

My nice-guy, codependent personality made a match with a cluster B personality type like Tina seem supernatural in it's power.

My whole sense of reality and faith in my own ability to reason was then destroyed by years of gaslighting, lies and manipulation. My faith in my fellow humans is lost. I don't trust anyone. I don't believe anything.

My understanding of morality has been compromised. My whole world has been turned upside down and inside out.

I know people wonder why I can't just get over it and move on. I ask myself that. I was used and abused by a terribly sick person, just leave her in the past and move forward, right? The damage Tina and her mom inflicted on my psyche doesn't merely linger, though. It affected me through and through. It's emotionally and mentally crippling.

I'm suffering a form of post traumatic stress disorder. I'm angry and sad and most of all disappointed in myself - for being so fucking stupid as to allow all of this. At the same time, something like Stockholm syndrome haunts me. I still feel a pull towards her!

I have a dilemma. What do I do with Tina's sparkly diamond and white gold engagement ring? It's tainted. Poetically, I've considered disposing of it in a septic tank, because I now feel I'd be better off marrying an actual piece of shit than a selfish lying addict doing her best impression of one.

When we broke up, I was wondering aloud why I'd put up with so much shit from her for so long to that point. "You're not worth it," I said as I packed my things. She later said that I had I called her "worthless." I don't remember saying that and I don't believe I called her that, but she said she felt worthless. I believe she misheard me. She's not worthless, but her current worth - how she's chosen to spend her life - has no currency in my world. Her chosen use to humanity is as a fuck hole for dirtbags and as long as she goes untreated, that's all she'll be.

On more than one occasion, Tina said "sometimes I feel like the only way I could make a living is on my back." She also spoke of "considering" stripping as a vocation. I didn't take her literally on any of that, but perhaps she was telling me a truth I preferred to ignore and perhaps she was exactly correct.

She was completely unable to hold a job in the three years I knew her. She was full of excuses about why.

In general, I find tattoos vulgar and distasteful, but in a way I appreciate face and neck tattoos because they so clearly mark a person as someone for me to avoid. I wish Tina carried an obvious mark, along the lines of a scarlet letter, not to mark her as an adulteress (which she is), but to warn good people away from her evil.

There are stories, things I've been told, things I've figured out, that I'm hesitant to write because they could cause collateral damage in the relationships of others touched by Tina's wake. Perhaps deservedly so, but I'm not certain.

As I've learned about borderline personality, narcissistic personality disorder and other "cluster B" disorders, I've been amazed at how other people's experiences mirror my own. My emotional connection to Tina was more intense than anything I'd experienced before. I thought there was something cosmic about it, that it must have been meant to be. We were a perfect fit, drawn together like magnets, connected like complex puzzle pieces and inseparable.

Now I see that in a way, we actually were made for each other, but it wasn't a match made in the stars. Our personality types, each shaped by childhood trauma make a "perfect," irresistible match that (lacking treatment) is psychologically preordained to play out in exactly the way it did for us.We fit like a key in lock and it could only open the one door. We were trauma bonded, each only half a person, emotionally but together, we felt complete.

I've learned a tremendous amount about borderline personality disorder and the psychological fallout survivors of BPD relationships invariably suffer. These excerpts from an article I came across do a better than decent job explaining what occurs in a romantic relationship with a personality disorder in the mix:

Borderline Personality Disorder: Is believed to occur due to neglect and/or sexual abuse suffered by the BPD as a child, resulting in the emotional development of the child being halted at a young age and unhealthy coping behaviors being formed which leave the borderline struggling to maintain relationships, in particular romantic/intimate relationships in adulthood. There seems to be a genetic component as well, and debate is raging as to whether someone needs to have both: a.) the genetic predisposition, b.) suffered trauma via neglect and/or sexual abuse to trigger the BPD disorder.

Borderlines are only victims until they enter intimate relationships then in most cases they become the abuser and should be treated as such.

The Phase 1 Lovebomb/Idealization phase with a Borderline is arguably the most intense of all the Cluster B Idealizations which makes the borderline the most dangerous predator of them all. This is especially intense if Histrionic is included in the mix.

Each disorder may have different internal dynamics but for their victim it always results in some version of the Narcissist Abuse Cycle (Idealize/Devalue/Discard/Replace/Hoover).

Recovery for their victims takes years and affects them for life which is why Cluster B’s especially Borderlines must be labelled and treated with such extreme caution, to protect the general population.

A Cluster B with Histrionic in the mix is the hardest of all to recover from as they have the most powerful allure/sexual magnetism which is intoxicating to men and impossible to forget.

Borderlines can ONLY be judged from their actions, NEVER their words!

Regardless of what you may have read or heard elsewhere, Borderlines do not"get better" with age, unless they've entered into (and stuck with) core trauma focused recovery work. The longer these core issues go untreated/unresolved, the more entrenched they are, and the deeper and more habituated the one's defenses and acting-out behaviors become. I have read and seen personally how the acting out behaviors can mellow with age to be replaced by Paranoia and Jealousy. Age can't heal the borderline disordered personality, but hard inner work can.

Untreated Cluster B’s are the closest thing to the Vampires we see in our popular fiction. They don’t feed on Blood. They do feed on their victims souls and on a particular form of energy called “Proximate energy”.

Borderlines and Narcissists attract each other like magnets. In most cases the Borderline will eventually tear the Narcissist apart, so you can imagine what that means for a relatively normal, loving human being.

Cluster B apologists will usually try to re-frame victims stories as a normal relationship that went bad and the victim is just a bitter ex.

Cluster B apologists will usually try to minimize victims stories by arguing that the bad ones are a minority and that each case is different. The reality is there are clear, measurable and quantifiable patterns of abuse which are consistent with the Narc abuse cycle and concur with the majority of survivors stories.

Cluster B apologists will always ask for statistics. This is a ruse. BPD is the most complex of all the Personality disorders, one most trained councilors don't even want to deal with. There are few reliable statistics. Therefore examining this disorder is best done by reading Victim and Survivor accounts to look for patterns which once again are consistent with the Narc abuse cycle and concur with the majority of survivors stories.

Cluster B apologists will argue that only highly trained professionals are qualified to diagnose a Cluster B. The reality is that >90% of Cluster B’s will never step foot in a councilors office. The partner of a Cluster B is therefore the most qualified person to diagnose the condition, having been put through the Narc Abuse Cycle.

Triangulation: Creating some form of drama or chaos, with the Narcissist in the middle, generally involving two rivals, and manipulating them into a conflict with each other. This either done for the entertainment of the Narcissist or as a way to deflect blame/accountability from themselves.  

If you finally get the strength to leave before you’re truly broken as I did a whole new horror unfolds as in the stage 4 Replace phase they replace you with a new target/victim before you’ve even packed your bags… They’re literally sleeping with someone new within hours as they can’t bear to be alone as it means they would have to self-reflect, something a BPD/Narc just won’t do. If covert BPD/Narc they may wipe all trace of your existence. If comorbid you can expect a mixture of the two tactics.

BPD sufferers essentially grow up to be emotional toddlers in the physical bodies of adults… who will make adult decisions based on a 3–5 year olds understanding of consequences, responsibility and morality.

“It's crucial to understand that the partner or friend of a BPD individual is typically core-damaged in precisely the same ways a Borderline is. They share the same vibrational frequency since childhood, because they're core traumatized in the same ways. This is what initially magnitizes them to each other, and keeps them trying to 'get it right' with one another, against all odds.”

Even a short relationship with a Borderline can cause permanent damage to their victim's emotional and spiritual well-being.

End Result: They leave their victim unsure of what is real and what is not… (Councillors call it “The Fog”, a mixture of Stockhom Syndrome and Cognitive Dissonance) (FOG is an acronym for Fear Obligation and Guilt, which is how personality disordered individuals manipulate others), and you’ll be conditioned to accept things you would never in a million years accept if you were thinking clearly, and your friends and family will be scratching their heads in amazement.

Adrian O'Paicigh is the survivor and author of the above excerpts. He has written and compiled an extensive library of information about BPD. I recommend exploring his articles for anyone interested in or having a run-in with the disorder. It's very insightful. 

The Bachelor Party Guys

As I recall and write my stories (and there are so so many of them), I'm forced to confront the biggest burning question, "what the fuck is wrong with me?" There was no one holding a gun to my head forcing me to stay in the humiliating, abusive relationship I was in with Tina. There were many times when it would have been obvious to any outside observer that I should have ran fast and far. So why didn't I?

I felt an emotional connection to Tina that was unlike anything I'd ever experienced in my life. It was powerful.

When Tina wasn't being a complete asshole, she was smart, witty, charming and complimentary. She flattered me. She stroked my ego. We never ran short of compelling conversation. She was an intellectual match. I loved her. When we were alone together, it seemed like impossible magic. Introducing other people into our world brought out a different Tina, or Tinas. She changed her personality like a chameleon changes colors around some company. Now I wonder if I ever really knew her or if I was just enamored of the chameleonic reflection of myself I saw in her as she adapted to my "colors."

It was a month or two after she'd accepted my first marriage proposal and the two of us were spending some time alone in the top-floor apartment of the Buffalo Hotel. Newly engaged and excitedly planning our wedding, we drank copious amounts of whiskey, smoked a lot of cigarettes and had a lot of great sex. It was a blissful, care-free time. It was winter and we'd been spending a lot of time in the small apartment. We were quite happy, but decided to brave the cold and get out for a while.

I drove her to the Buffalo Bar and Grill, where we were becoming known as regulars. There are a few pool tables there and another of Tina's favorites: A claw machine game.To my amazement, had I won her a stuffed animal on my first try on our first visit to that bar. I found some cosmic significance in that. It was meant to be.

We got our usual order to start the night: Two Nordeaster beers and two double shots of Windsor. The bartender was always really friendly to us and poured rather too generously, but we weren't complaining! I always tipped really well.

After we shot a game or two of pool and tried our luck at the Claw machine, we went out for a smoke in the chilly night air. When we got back inside, there were a couple guys shooting pool at the table adjacent ours. We struck up a conversation with them and wound up taking them on in doubles eight-ball. They were very personable and decent players. Tina and I admired the custom-made cues they'd brought to shoot with.

At some point in the night, it came up that Brendon and Sam were only visiting the area for a friend's bachelor party that was coming up.

Tina took a tremendous interest in the bachelor party, pressing them on what they had lined up for entertainment. It became apparent that it wasn't going to be the cliched strippers and hos kind of bachelor party and the guys didn't seem very interested in discussing that any further but when drunk as Tina was, she lost any ability to read social cues and pressed on. Insisting that they had to at least have a stripper if they were going to show their buddy a good time before he tied the knot. She said she could hook them up with a dancer.

"You know a stripper?" I asked, a little surprised. I remembered her talking before about thinking about trying it out herself. Some of Scott's friends had told her, "I'd pay to see that."

Tina just nodded, barely acknowledging that I was even there anymore, so wrapped up in the bachelor party discussion that she wouldn't let drop.

We'd bet a round of drinks on the outcome of our last game with Sam and Brendon and we'd lost. I excused myself to the restroom and stopped by the bar to order a round of beers. I went back to the pool tables to tap Tina for help carrying all the drinks back and saw her doing the thing she "never does," for at least the third time since I'd started dating her. She was exchanging cell phones with Brendon. It appeared that they'd each just finished adding their contact information and they were just then swapping phones back.

I was a bit drunk myself at this point and didn't make anything of it at the time, but recalling this night on the following St. Patrick's Day led to a pretty big blow-out between Tina and I on the subject of obtaining other guy's phone numbers.

We'd gone to Rich and Thea's to have corned beef and cabbage and go out bar-hopping in White Bear Lake. It was a pretty small group. Chris was with. His wife stayed home with the kids. Richard's kids were out around town, too, but we didn't really see much of them.

I was probably fairly drunk by the time the argument started. I started asking questions about why Chris and Tina were texting each other. I think that night, her excuse was getting weed from him, but later she told me it was about arranging for all of us to go shooting together (something he later vehemently denied when casually I brought it up).

Chris, hearing all this as we walked between bars admitted to texting her. "Yeah, I texted her, but I would never..."

"Fine. You wanted to buy weed - even though you're well stocked and I thought your mom bought all your weed for you, but whatever. What was your business with those other guys at the Buffalo Bar I saw you exchanging numbers with, then?"

She usually had explanations, but she didn't have a ready response. She did remember their names, though. "Oh, you mean Brendon and Sam?" She said their names with a certain fondness, a sly smile curling her lips.

Rich, who'd been walking ahead of us suddenly turned and hollered, "shut the fuck up, Dan!"

Rich was very slow to anger. He'd never raised his voice to me in the decades I'd known him. I respected and trusted him. That stopped me in my tracks, stunned. If Rich turned on me in anger, I must be way out of line, I concluded. I clammed up, shamed. I must have been wrong about all of that.

Tina looked approvingly at her new defender and we continued on our way to the next bar. More whiskey will solve all this!

Why didn't I leave her then and there? There were many times that question should have been seriously considered. I always gave her the benefit of the doubt. I preferred to assume there were innocent explanations. She often had excuses or scapegoats. I tended to believe her, but never entirely, I suppose. I drank away memories of embarrassing moments. She reassured me of her devotion with sex and flattery (yes, disappointingly, it appears that I am that stupid). Our relationship carried on, but I've actually lost track of how many times we "broke up" over incidents like this, always to reunite. We didn't immediately call it quits after that night in Buffalo, but when it came up on St. Patrick's Day and we argued, we were separated for a few weeks afterwards and then it was me, doing all the apologizing.