New here and hoping to get outsiders view point on a puzzling friendship.

[Marc_nnm]

Hi all,

I'm a bit unsure about whether I should tell the whole story here or just go with the presentation and keep my main issue in a separate thread. Looking at many posts in here, it seems that people are just going ahead with the whole thing. But let me know if I should move part of my thread somewhere else.

I tried to keep the whole thing reasonably short but failed. So I divided it in a few sections. If you've got to read only one, I suggest you skip to the last part about my current problem.

Me

I'm a guy in my mid 30's. I have had a handful of significant relationships in the past, and I would consider myself a fairly well balanced individual. I'm not particularly gifted at meeting new people, although I've never really felt lonely in terms of social circle (maybe until the last 2 years, as friends going off in many directions makes them less and less available...), but overall I've had no issue forming meaningful connections with people. I have a group of childhood friends with whom I still chat regularly.

However, I've always been on the lower side of confidence when it comes to social interactions. It's easy to place doubt in my mind, I have a hard time with confrontation. To e clear, I have no problem being blunt or direct sometimes, but it requires that I be pushed far enough and for long enough that I become fairly certain that I'm right to put my foot down. I have a hard time with unresolved conflicts in particular.

Also, I would add that I am 2 years out of a relationship in which I was betrayed (for the first time in my life) in a way that totally blindsided me, and that I now have a hard time trusting anyone. Not just women in particular, just... anyone. I was shocked by the discovery of some of my ex partner's lies and manipulation, which triggered me to read profusely about it (a subject which had totally eluded me before), and I think I may have become a bit hyperaware, or paranoid about it... I might be looking for it where it's not.

Anyhow... This is why I am here. Because when someone seems to have a beef with me, I get thrown off, and fall into the rabbit hole of thinking over everything I've done, am I the problem? Do I deserve this scorn, should I apologize for... something? Am I imagining things? etc. I guess this is a bit vague, but hopefully it will become clearer when I describe the particular situation for which I am now joining this forum.

Context

As I said, 2 years ago (early 2019) my (now) ex left me completely unexpectedly for one of her friends after almost 5 years. It has been (and still is) a very difficult event for me, and has damaged me in ways none of my past relationships have. I spent most of 2019 in the gutters, but by the end of august, I started feeling ready to date again. I wasn't. I met a two women that were very kind and caring and on whom I have nothing but good things to say, but I just couldn't bring my heart fully into it. The fact that these were women that, by any objective measure, were very trustworthy, loving, smart, beautiful and interesting, and that I still just couldn't feel right about being with them, convinced me that I just shouldn't be dating at all, and wasting other people's time in the process...

It's in this context that, early last year, I met a girl who became my friend and who is now my roommate. I first met her because she answered a request I made for a partner in a sport I practice. She is much younger than me. In her early 20's. But when I first met her, I was quite sure she was probably around 27-28. It's what she projects. I've come to understand it's probably because her past is a bit heavy. She was adopted, and her adoptive family turned out to be a dysfunctional couple who adopted a child trying to fix themselves. The mother was bipolar, on and off her medication, and the father eventually fell into depression and became an alcoholic. As soon as she was able to, she left and traveled the world for some time. She hasn't spoken to her adoptive parents in years now, and the last time she did, they explicitly disowned her.

I suppose it's that experience that has made her seem much more mature than her age. Although her immaturity is very perceptible in some situations.

Let me be clear. I have no romantic or sexual ambition with this girl. When I first saw her, yes, I did. But once I discovered how young she was, I decided to draw the line.

She's very open about her very volatile and unrestrained sexual life and likes to have raunchy talks. And as we started seeing each other more often, the subject of our own interaction came up very easily. I told her I found her attractive but that to me she is off limits, and that anyway, from what I know of her, I know things wouldn't work between us, neither romantically nor sexually. And I'm not of a style she's attracted to anyway. The result of this is that we have developed a friendship I didn't really believe was possible before meeting her. We've become quite close, and having a female friend to confide into and spend time with, even though (especially because) everything always remains completely platonic, really made 2020 much easier and less lonely than it could have been...

One day she called me in tears saying she got kicked out of her place (that belonged to her now-ex boyfriend... that wasn't really her boyfriend, because she says she doesn't do relationships, but anyway...), and since I had a room available in my apartment, and I live alone, she moved in with me. We don't really have any problem in terms of managing the apartment. She's probably the best roommate I've had in terms of chores.

More context

But there are some behaviors that I am starting to have a hard time with, and I wonder if it's because I take things too personally or what...

As I confided things in her, she did the same with me. Most of last year, and early this year, she would often talk about the guys she's dating. Mostly negatively. Typically, she is very direct with guys and gets what she wants from them. But she idealizes them a lot. So she sees a guy she finds beautiful and "broken" (as she says she likes them). She becomes just about obsessed with him, goes after him, "gets" him, then within a week or two, starts expressing annoyance with him and moves on. Sometimes they do the same with her. Whatever else is true, the word "useless", "annoying" and "disappointing" get thrown around a *LOT*.

I noticed she also often seems to be reflexively possessive. On a few instances, guys we were doing sports with regularly and with whom she always seemed to have some kind of subtle, permanent flirt, eventually met someone else and stopped all hints towards her. And that seems to consistently result in resentment from her part. That's when some criticism of that guy will start to become very frequent (and usually, not long after, there's some kind of beef between the two I hear about in between branches, and then I don't see that guy around anymore), and the things she'll say about the girl this guy went with can be downright nasty.

I've tried bringing this to her attention a few times, but it doesn't get through. She always has a rationale as to why she's right in her resentment. And sometimes, the rationale can be uncharacteristically petty. I don't push it, but I don't hesitate to tell her I disagree with her criticism. She says she likes talking about these things with me is how I just laugh it off with her, and typically don't react negatively to her mood swings. Which used to be true.

The Build Up

Things have slowly started to change on that front.

What I react to with less poise is when she directs this type of criticism towards the people in MY life. Or even myself. I get a sense that when she feels a woman is of interest to me, it annoys her and so she trashes her. I've recently taken to Tinder, and she systematically denigrates every woman that matches me. A few times now, she's "jokingly" told me I'm ugly. Sometimes she'll hear a story about one of my friends and respond by really denigrating them with whatever she can.

Sometimes, she's started throwing jabs at me, and I don't understand why. She used to build me up a bit. Randomly saying I look handsome, or that she likes how "grounded" I am, stuff like that. But she's always had a tendency towards "negging". Randomly, she would throw a negative comment. Maybe about my clothes, or call me old. I'd noticed she did that with other people too. I wonder if it's deliberate. As if she liked throwing you off so you don't get too comfortable of something... I don't know. But now it's become much more frequent and overt.

My reflexive reaction to this has become to reflect it back onto her by pointing out something similar in her to what she just criticized in the other person. First because it triggers me to hear someone gratuitously talk down other people randomly, and especially people I care about (or obviously, myself), but also because I guess I was under the misguided impression that getting her to realize she isn't perfect either might get her something useful to think about.

It's not really working. Regardless, the attacks towards me have become more frequent. Attacks on my appearance, on my performance in sport, on my personality (sometimes comparing me to some of her lovers she criticizes). She also tends to exclude me. She'll say "hey we should do X this weekend". "Yeah sure that'd be cool". Then as the weekend gets closer, I'll ask "so are we still doing X this weekend?", and she'll be like "Yeah well I booked it with A already. But you can look if there's still places available."

The Current Problem [with close (but rather new, about 1 year old friendship) female friend who unpredictably became my roommate a few months ago]
And now I'm being (I believe) given the infamous "silent treatment". For no obvious reason I can tell.

2 days ago, she told me she might move out in a few months, that she has to make a decision because one of her friends who live in a bigger apartment has a room available. Internally, it stung me a little bit (because naturally, I tend to reflexively ask myself if it's because of something I've done), although I always knew her staying with me was probably a very temporary situation. I didn't comment on it. Just "ok well let me know when you've made your decision".

Yesterday morning, we went to do our sport together. She poked at me a few times saying i sucked, I fired back with similar comments. Kinda routine. After that, I gave her a lift to her job, and we just chatted normally in the car on the way there. Then nothing I know about happened during the day. She got back from work, I had a bag that encumbered the door. She didn't say anything. Not a "Hello" or anything. Went to the kitchen, I had 2 plates and a couple of spoon used there. She basically threw it in the sink and started cleaning them noisily. I went to the kitchen, she said she wanted to make cookies and didn't want any dishes in the way, I said "ok just let me do it, those are mine to clean", she seemed angry, said I was just getting in the way, to let her do it. I said fine, I went back to my work.

She cooked "aggressively" for about an hour, then came to me and very tersely told me to taste her cookies. I said no thanks (I have removable braces and it's just a pain to remove it just for a bite). She left without a word, went in her room. Didn't come out the entire night. This morning, I got up before her. When she got up, she still looked absolutely pissed off, didn't look at me as she did all her things. I stopped in front of her, asked her "everything alright?", she responded "I'm tired". - "Ok". I went back to my desk, she grabbed her stuff for work, and left. Tonight I know she was planning to go sleep at one of her friend's, so I won't see her tonight, and tomorrow she's going on ahike. So realistically, as it's looking, it won't be until friday night before I see her again.

When I see her angry like that for no apparent reason, I have to wonder... It's a small apartment, I don't want to be overbearing. Like... she can be angry, what business is that of mine... right? If I ask her, and she doesn't say anything... But I have a hard time letting this slip. Somehow it feels directed at me. I've been angry, and that didn't make me totally ignore the people I lived with in this way.

And maybe it's just my personality, but I just can't let it slip. I can't forget about it. It kept me from sleeping, and now it's ruining my day too. What did I do wrong? Is she really pissed off at me? Is it really all just because my backpack was in the way? Did I say something that upset her? Or did I do something that was misinterpreted?

The cynical and "paranoid" part of myself now is also parsing other options: is she doing this on purpose? To punish me for something? What should I do? Should I play the game? That is, be the one to go talk to her and be all "hello, is there anything I did to make you angry? If so I'm really sorry" and such? Should I ignore this behavior? Am I taking this too personally?

If anyone got to the end of this text, I'd like your opinion.

[xredshoesx]

welcome to the group-

after going through a bad relationship/ breakup and doing that self-reflection it makes 100% sense you are checking out relationships since then- both platonic and romantic with a different lens.  From what you shared it sounds like you made some very good boundaries with this roommate/ friend from the start.  It seems very planned- ie she started giving you the cold shoulder/ silent treatment/ poor treatment overall around the time she told you she was moving on, which almost seems to match the discard cycle that many other members have shared about when their uPD/ PD relationships came to an abrupt end.  i feel bad that you are hurt but this discard cycle is sometimes a blessing in disguise.

the friends/ other relatives boards may be a good place to start but feel free to share and heal about your relationship with the ex in separating/ divorcing section too -

hope to see you on the boards soon!

[IcedCoffee]

Welcome!

Sounds just about par for the course for a pwPD. You could have been describing an old, ex, friend of mine, whom I believe to be BPD.

You're lucky, you know. You've got nothing invested in the relationship, unlike many here! Just let it come to an end naturally, which it looks like is already happening. Observe her, learn from her for your future relationships, but don't let her get to you. DO NOT TAKE ANY OF HER BEHAVIOR PERSONALLY! You may feel bad and confused. You shouldn't. And anyway, she is suffering far more than any of us can really imagine.