BOOMERANG LOVE, ROLLER COASTER GRIEF
AND MOST VALUABLE DOG

How do we make sense of our Borderline partner’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde behavior? How do we order our world when it turns on a dime from peaceful to hurricane, from zero to psycho in a heartbeat? The good part, the person we love, exists right alongside (or inside) the hurtful one.

Whether we decide to stay and ride the Borderline roller coaster – or bail out and leave the relationship – the grief is the same. We must separate from someone we love deeply.

If we stay with them, we separate emotionally. If we leave, we separate emotionally and physically, with all the finality and additional grief of the loss of dreams for the future, family structure, companionship, all of that.

Having to force ourselves to walk away from something we love is crazy-making. It flies in the face of all that’s human, all that our heart wants to do, and everything that our sense of just plain living on this earth would have us do.

Leave someone we love? We don’t do that unless forced to (war, famine and pestilence come to mind). It’s so unnatural. Our spirits are built to pour forth love, and heaven knows our Borderlines are good, deserving people. We wouldn’t have chosen them to be our partners if they weren’t.

But the person we love doesn’t stay in one place. They move around, hiding behind walls, throwing up barriers to our intimacy, lobbing hand grenades as they run away from us. And then the person we love comes back . . . penitent, sad, remorseful, tearful, full of promises (wishes, actually).

So back and forth we go in our grief. We’re like a boomerang – catapulting ourselves out the door of our relationship and then turning around and going back through the door again. “I’m leaving him today . . . but we have such a sweet love relationship . . . how can I walk away from that?” Or “I’ve left and she’ll never rage at me again . . . but I still love her . . . what’s wrong with me?”

Confusing, convoluted, roller coaster, stuck boomerang love grief. 12-step programs call it the Dance of Death because it’ll kill us.

I’m reminded of a story I heard once about a man who owned two dogs. The two dogs got locked into a vicious fight, and it was clear that the owner was not going to be able to stop the fighting. The only way to stop it was to shoot one of the dogs.

The owner said to his friend, “I don’t know what to do. These are valuable dogs. I paid a lot of money for them, and I love them both. But they’re going to kill each other, so I’ve got to shoot one of them. Which one do I shoot?”

The friend said, “I suggest you shoot the least valuable dog.”

Now I’m not saying that our Borderline partners aren’t valuable. But the reality is that we are caught in the downward spiral of their disorder. It’s a vortex that will suck us right down with them.

If our partners are not honestly making an effort to heal from their disorder, we have no choice but to choose ourselves. We are the most valuable dog at that point, and we are of no value to anyone – ourselves, our families or our Borderline – if we allow ourselves to go down with their ship.

And maybe . . . just maybe . . . our walking away from the struggle and leaving them by themselves will allow them to see that their feelings arise whether we’re around or not !

We will create lives of happiness for ourselves and our families. We are the most valuable dog !

* * * * * * * * * * * *

GOD, FOR TODAY, help me to control my boomerang love. Help me to step over, walk around, punch my way through my grief and take care of myself in whatever way I must. And help me tomorrow, next week, next month and next year.

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