I'm 19, and I've had 4 long term relationships, including my current one, and 2 short term. The first one destroyed me, because I was 16 and he was 30 and he blew me off constantly, would disappear for weeks at a time, he was violent and had rage issues, but when he was nice he was so goddamn nice. I felt like we were on equal footing despite the age difference because he was just as poorly adjusted as I was. I felt so special and happy and lucky to be around him. I was so in love with him I cried every night for over a year, and I wanted so fucking bad to marry him. The relationship started because he greeted me with, "Hey, bitch."

Anyway, since then almost every relationship has been destructive, mostly on my part. Some of the dudes were crazy, some assaulted me, some threatened suicide, but I was the constant crazy variable. But I'm the type of crazy where it's primarily emotional and I know I'm crazy and I acknowledge it and I don't light their house on fire or anything like that. My boyfriend actually said one of his favorite things about me is that I fully admit that I'm crazy. I remember the one totally normal, sweet, kind guy I was with before my boyfriend--he was the only one whose company I loved but whom I could never handle dating cause I didn't feel connected to him, because he wasn't an angry, controlling mess. He was too nice and too calm and too good. I can't handle being the crazy destructive storm to some guy's perfect little cottage.

I always expect my boyfriend to be my father. My father wasn't always there when I was growing up and played clear favoritism so I have serious "daddy issues." My boyfriends are always at least a little bit older, and I always deep down expect my boyfriend to be willing to take care of me when I get sad or feel crazy. I'm not unreasonable and I never demand something from a partner but I do feel hurt when they don't seem to want to take care of me emotionally. I'm great at asking to talk about their feelings or helping them out, but I have trouble remembering that they are a person with different emotional needs than me.

I'm in a normal, healthy relationship now with a super well-adjusted and understanding dude but I can't seem to relax and just enjoy the calm. I remember how I felt about my exes and those relationships. I remember feeling as if I wanted to cut off parts of my body if my first ex wasn't there to see it. Two of my exes would punch the wall next to my head. Most of my exes sexually assaulted me. One of my exes gave me a big knife the night we met. One of my exes had sex or raped or who knows with his younger brother when he was a kid. Don't worry, we broke up like the day after he told me that, although for many reasons. He also brought his knife when we went to a presidential inauguration. One of my exes got so irresponsibly wasted we had to sleep on the grass in a public park the night I drunkenly said I love him for the first time and felt it because he spent half an hour yelling at me about how I don't care about him. I always used to feel as if my best relationships are when they make me cry almost daily, and then they fix it. All those relationships drove me insane but that's my comfort zone. I NEED that danger and excitement and anger and emotion in my relationships to be happy. I love that feeling I get when my heart starts physically aching cause a guy hurts me emotionally. I hate those situations, but that feeling is so bittersweet. I feel most comfortable when every day I have to wonder if this guy is too evil for me to stay, or if this is too passionate and special and alive for me to leave. I fall in love with abusers. Yet I also feel angry when men don't give me respect. I feel crazy. The worst example of this was this 45 year old alcoholic veteran dude I obviously never dated or had anything with, but there were strange circumstances and we ended up needing to spend the night in a motel and he threatened to rape and kill me and got super drunk and called me a cunt all night but then every so often he'd turn super nice for a few minutes and I hated it and it pissed me off, but part of me felt happy and safe and loved waiting for those moments of kindness. It's like I love to be with abusers because then I can stand up for myself and feel some self respect. When a guy is too nice to me, I feel pathetic and I feel like a child, and I feel as if I don't deserve it. The more anger a guy shows, the more of a connection I feel with him, and the more admiration I feel for him. I feel like I need a relationship that constantly makes me think and wonder and change my mind. I need to be with complicated, wild men. How can I allow myself to stay in this relationship and stop subconsciously trying to end it like I always do? My mind is always just too frenzied to think clearly and to realize this is the healthier option. How do I stop being selfish, and become selfless enough to let myself stay in a healthy relationship because it's better for me, my partner, and those around me? How do I become selfless enough to be okay with living in a nice little house with a dog and a baby and a husband?

The way I am now, I need to destroy and create and learn and teach and verge on blowing everything up only to put it back together, especially when it comes to my relationships. I always feel so restless, like I need to go outside and run around a field and get drunk and cry and laugh and meet new people, and normal relationships don't always fulfill that feeling.

I can be entertained enough sometimes by just talking to a boyfriend because I have some interests I'm insanely passionate about and I love discussing them and I love learning new stuff but that type of relationship doesn't seem super easy to come across either. I can't find many guys with super intense interests that they wanna talk about, maybe cause of my age group, or maybe cause they're too busy with work and stuff to figure out what they love, but either way I need that. Sometimes I can handle being emotionally mature, to an extent, but I need passion and I need stuff to think about and I need stuff to learn.

Also...my pattern has always been "be super clingy cause you're scared they're gonna leave and then lose all feelings and get bored and hate them and leave." I think that's a combination of the BPD and the result of my first relationship. How the fuck do I fix that? &amp; how do I stop blocking out the feelings I get for people? All this stuff happens every damn time.