Defining the Male Waif

[Think About It...]

A few more traits for comparison and contrast purposes with anyone who would like to answer:

My exBF seemed to be so enthused in the beginning about starting a new life with me. But as time went on, he started making gloomy statements about both himself and life in general. He would call himself vile names when he thought I wasn't listening, like when he was in the garage or in the shower or bathroom. He told me he'd had thoughts his entire life about not really knowing who he was or what he really wanted, and that he thinks about death on a daily basis. At the end he was telling me that he would rather not be alive at all and just wants to do as little as possible until the end finally comes. It was weird, extremely unpleasant and devastating.

Do all waifs have these horrible, self-annihilating and life-annihilating thoughts? What's your experience?

[MarshaDole]

A few more traits for comparison and contrast purposes with anyone who would like to answer:

My exBF seemed to be so enthused in the beginning about starting a new life with me. But as time went on, he started making gloomy statements about both himself and life in general. He would call himself vile names when he thought I wasn't listening, like when he was in the garage or in the shower or bathroom. He told me he'd had thoughts his entire life about not really knowing who he was or what he really wanted, and that he thinks about death on a daily basis. At the end he was telling me that he would rather not be alive at all and just wants to do as little as possible until the end finally comes. It was weird, extremely unpleasant and devastating.

Do all waifs have these horrible, self-annihilating and life-annihilating thoughts? What's your experience?

[HowPredictable]

Do all waifs have these horrible, self-annihilating and life-annihilating thoughts? What's your experience?

I don't know about all of them, but mine certainly did.  Exactly as you describe:  frequent thoughts of death, plenty of feelings of low self-worth, and just wanting to "coast" through life in order to get to the inevitable end. 

Such a tragic way for someone to spend their life.

[MarshaDole]

Redberry, did he actually use some of those phrases? It's so odd how the express the same thoughts in almost exactly the same way. Here are some phrases I remember, and I'll post more as they occur to me:

We're like ants, just moving toward the inevitable end. The only difference is that we know the futility of life and they don't.

What difference does it make what I do anyway? I won't be alive 50 or 60 years from now anyway.

I wake up thinking about death and dying and how little sense anything really makes. Why not just get it over with sooner? (referring to death)

I don't want to get older and suffer. I already have a lot of physical complaints and it's all downhill from this point on.

[Clearmind]

Thanks for chiming in guys!

Getting to that stage of recognising it wasn't our fault was a huge weight off my shoulders - honestly it was that ah-ha moment where I thought thank goodness! Ok I oscillated between guilt/blame and being OK with going about my life. I was in neutral, transitioning and attempting to find my way.

This transition is an interesting phase and the 'feeling' for me was sometimes lost in the ether ~ I was caught between being consciously aware and still wanting to lay a lot of blame on my ex.

This 'laying blame' I went through created an ever increasing bond with my ex - I was reliving over and over the pain I went through whilst in my r/s. I was repeating that trauma and it became a comfortable status quo.

What are we wanting to achieve? Detachment, acceptance, indifference, apathy?  What is your ultimate goal?

How do we get there?

Does anyone believe that self trust plays a role in moving beyond our ex's? Trusting that we did experience abuse of varying forms, trust that we really did accept things when others wouldn't have, trust that we do need to be somewhat responsible for staying despite it all - importantly trust that we will never put ourselves in that position again? At point do we also need to be accountable?

Ok our ex's are not well! What is it about us that sometimes really does not trust let alone respect what we want for ourselves?

How will you avoid choosing a BPD #2?

You may not be at that stage yet and thats OK - consider it food for thought!

[GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENT: Are you on the right board?]

GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENT: Are you on the right board? This board is for members with failed or failing relationships that want to detach from their relationship and relationship wounds. If you are still analyzing the decision to stay, please post on Undecided: Staying or Leaving All members living with a pwBPD should learn to use the Stop the Bleeding tools - boundaries, timeouts and other basic tools - to better manage the day to day interactions with your partner. If you have questions on any of the tools, feel free to go over to Staying: Improving a Relationship with a Borderline Partner and ask for help. :-)

[MarshaDole]

How will you avoid choosing a BPD #2?

I've thought long and hard about this question, Clearmind. I think at least some of us on this forum
have the sort of personality traits that attract pwBPD. And, in turn, there may be some things about BPD that attract us, at least initially. In my case, there was incredible "chemistry." But the truth is that I should have gotten to know the man well over a period of a year or two before sharing a household with him, let alone talking marriage. If this episode has taught me anything at all, it's that there is simply no substitute for taking time to develop a relationship and maintaining healthy boundaries along the way.

I've been seeing a therapist for several months, and this is the very question we're going to explore over coming sessions.

I think one answer is that some aspects of BPD are pretty obvious when you know WHAT to look for. A history of chaos in interpersonal relationships, murky finances or erratic career/employment history, absence of longterm friends, a tendency to take up new interests with great enthusiasm and then drop them cold turkey, extreme panic, anxiety, raging or excessive anger following what most people would consider trivial irritations, a strong tendency toward inpulsivity and black/white thinking, etc.

When I look back, all the indications were there. I just didn't realize their significance. And besides, who in the throes of glorious infatuation wants to scrutinize red flags? Well, next time around, I may not want to look at those red flags, but my rational brain will insist that I do. not to mention my therapist, whom I will consult immediately should I ever find myself on the brink of immersing myself into another relationship without giving it sufficient time to develop in stages.

[dah1029]

I agree with you Marsha.  And I think we should keep this thread going beyond 4 pages.  It's really been helpful to me to understand this category of BPD.  I want to pay attention to my red flags rather than to push them aside.  And I conciously did that when I look back.  And I don't want to date a man that won't have his mood disorder treated.  When I first met mine, he was depressed. He had recently lost his wife so I understood.  But what was a bother for me is that he wouldn't get his depression treated, and wouldn't see a Therapist.  I got after him a few times early in the R/S about it because although I was sympathetic to his grief, his mood was getting to be a drag.  And as you know, early in the R/S, they want to live up our butts.  He especially because he didn't want to be alone.  So that depression was brought into my house everyday.  I was sick of the gloom, hearing about all the things he did with the dead wife, and yet kept my mouth shut because I would appear uncaring.  The few times I "clinically" approached him about seeing a doc or T, I was told I had a cold heart.  He eased up over the 2 years but I think he just put it all away because he knew I would end the R/S if his mood didn't improve.  Depression was one of the factors that brought us down last August.  But by then my kids and I were very attached to him so the demise was heartbreaking.  I'd rather cut it off at the knees early on next time. 

So in the future, I don't want brought into my house, what wasn't there to begin with.  I want to say, "Things sound tough for you right now, but I can't date you until you work through this period.  It's not fair to me.  We can be friends or you can seek me out in the future, but we can't date right now".  And leave it at that.  I don't want to hear all the cajoling and gaslighting.  I want to believe and act on my perceptions of a situation and do what's best for me and my kids.

[cocobell]

Exactly as you describe:  frequent thoughts of death, plenty of feelings of low self-worth, and just wanting to "coast" through life in order to get to the inevitable end. 

Yep... mine too! He hates birthdays because 'you're one year closer to death' and he frequently says gloomy stuff regarding himself and his life. He is coasting. He hates that his life is much the same as it was a decade ago, but he seems unable to change anything to make himself more satisfied.

CB

[Clearmind]

I agree with you Marsha.  And I think we should keep this thread going beyond 4 pages.  It's really been helpful to me to understand this category of BPD.  I want to pay attention to my red flags rather than to push them aside.  And I conciously did that when I look back.  And I don't want to date a man that won't have his mood disorder treated.  So in the future, I don't want brought into my house, what wasn't there to begin with.  I want to say, "Things sound tough for you right now, but I can't date you until you work through this period.  It's not fair to me.  We can be friends or you can seek me out in the future, but we can't date right now".  
….
And leave it at that.  I don't want to hear all the cajoling and gaslighting.  I want to believe and act on my perceptions of a situation and do what's best for me and my kids.

I fully appreciate Dah what you are saying!

You really want to avoid another man like you describe and I so get that. You want to be able to recognize future red flags – I also get that. You were also consciously aware of the red flags when you went into it and pushed them aside.

My question to you would be: what is it about you that consciously ignored the red flags and allowed this man to share your life? We all have exercised a choice!

At what point is it not about our ex's - its actually about us.

[Clearmind]

How will you avoid choosing a BPD #2?

I've thought long and hard about this question, Clearmind. I think at least some of us on this forum have the sort of personality traits that attract pwBPD. And, in turn, there may be some things about BPD that attract us, at least initially. In my case, there was incredible "chemistry." But the truth is that I should have gotten to know the man well over a period of a year or two before sharing a household with him, let alone talking marriage. If this episode has taught me anything at all, it's that there is simply no substitute for taking time to develop a relationship and maintaining healthy boundaries along the way.

Nicely said MD. What are our traits you talk of?

Oh I get the chemistry - in fact it was the chemistry that kept me there!   for me!

So the love was distorted ~ all the real stuff was non-existent and yes He Has No Idea Who I Am!

Thankfully I do now ~ It all seemed to be about chemistry, brain washing and conditioning that very little was actually about us. When relating together on regular terms, without the dazzle of chemistry and magical thinking, his personality actually bugged me. Which is completely opposite to all of the feelings that swirled around me.  . This is the reason why I went NC from the get go ~ I really have nothing to say to him ~ because I have no idea who he is either!

Who I fell in love with, and who he fell in love with ~ are not the same people ~ Now!

When I look back, all the indications were there. I just didn't realize their significance. And besides, who in the throes of glorious infatuation wants to scrutinize red flags? Well, next time around, I may not want to look at those red flags, but my rational brain will insist that I do. not to mention my therapist, whom I will consult immediately should I ever find myself on the brink of immersing myself into another relationship without giving it sufficient time to develop in stages.

Good question MD! Is love really about infatuation? Or is more about fantasy? What is it about the fantasy that is so appealing? We know why it was appealing to our ex's - seeking attachment - were we seeking the same thing?

I am aware I hijacked your thread  ! Its all food for thought. 

[HowPredictable]

At what point is it not about our ex's - its actually about us.

Clearmind, I agree with this wholeheartedly, and have myself invested considerably time, both in therapy and through my own reading, to try to enlighten myself as to why I would end up in successive relationships with not one,  but two disordered persons.

With that said -- and while I'm quite new to the Board -- I have tentatively concluded from doing a lot of lurking here that:

1) male BPDs are less commonly written about than female ones;
2) male waif BPDs are not particularly well-represented, either; and
3) male hermit/waif BPDs (which I believe mine was) are even less prevalent.

As such, it has been immensely helpful to see the common traits of these BPD sub-types listed, because the combination of flattery/vulnerability combo in these men is quite unusual amongst BPDs and (for reasons of our own, which do need investigation and untangling) is highly appealing to some women.

[dah1029]

Clearmind-- Thanks for the question.  I think I ignored my red flags out of codependence, laziness, enjoyed the idealization, and completely enjoyed his caretaking (which also could be very suffocating at times).  I was lazy because he was so readily available and I didn't have to do a whole lot to date him.  He was always available, always paying, doing projects around my house, anything to be near me.  I admit I took advantage of it.  And I liked the narcissism I developed under his idealization.  I see it all now.  And I see a person I became that is not a person that I want to be.  And I admit that alot of my seeking to get him back is about him meeting my ego's needs.  I realize that I became very unhealthy being around some of his behaviors.  His behaviors brought out the worst of mine.

[MarshaDole]

[Nicely said MD. What are our traits you talk of?]

I guess I'd start with a willingness to believe in the pot of gold (the fairy tale partner) at the end of our personal rainbow. And more importantly, the willingness to believe we've found it, or that it has found us. But there's also a willingness to ignore all the red flags jumping around us as we jump right into that fairy tale with both feet.

I think most of us nonBPDs are givers, often supreme givers. We radiate confidence and strength to our BPD partners, and then give and give of ourselves to them until we almost lose ourselves in the process.

We have a lot of empathy and compassion, which are wonderful attributes. But we sometimes go too far and fail to protect our boundaries and our values.  When we do that, we hang on to preserve a relationship instead of simply letting go. We're strong swimmers and rescuers who can easily let the drowning people pull us down with them. As they pull us down, we find ourselves forgiving the unforgiveable. Some of us have done that many times.

I have recovered from this last relationship in far less time than I recovered about 10 years ago from the another relationship I had with someone who very likely has NPD, although not extreme.
I think the largest element in cutting down the recovery time has been my willingness to learn about unhealthy relationships, suspend dating for a year or so as I regroup, and examine my own role in these two relationships that ended so badly.

One decision I've firmly made is that I will not combine households in the future with someone I've known less than two years or so. And I have a list of dealbreaking behavior that includes raging, excessive profanity, lack of friends, lack of empathy, neediness or inability to handle the stresses of ordinary life,  history of spotty employment, etc.

[Sabine]

Mine has 25 out of the 27, he's definitely cut from the waif cloth. I'd like to add one more and that is...

Cried on que
My expbdbf could cry at any given moment so that you would think he was feeling deep emotional sincerity about something. It could be a single tear slowly rolling down his cheek (very dramatic) to full blown balling "uncontrollably". (on the contrary it was VERY controlled)   

[NevestNA]

"2. Does it feel validating because you now feel like you were not imagining it?"

I'm new here and haven't written my intro post yet. I'll do that very soon, but I wanted to reply to this chain of messages. I can't tell you all how helpful the conversation has been.

I've been out of the relationship for almost 5 months, and have not responded to his attempts at contact for 2 months now. My relationship with him has been the most bewildering, painful experience of my life and also - paradoxically - the most enchanting and bliss-filled. I've always known on some level that things just weren't right, but it's taken me some time to move past the denial.

This chain of messages has helped validate my experience in so many ways, but the final tearing-down of the denial was in response to the descriptions of nail-biting. I don't know why something so small would be the final break from the last threads of denial. He had elements of *all* items on the lists, but it's the nail biting (nail and finger shredding is more like it) that took away the last bit of my shielding my eyes from the truth.

I cried for him when I read that symptom. It finally sunk in... This is the pain he must live his life in.

I've cried for myself many many times over the last 2 1/2 years. For the first time, this time, I truly cried for him.

Thanks to all of you for sharing. This has been so very helpful.

[MarshaDole]

My exBPD bf is a diehard nailbiter. Right down to the quick. Extreme.
I'm not even sure this symptom is in the textbooks, but judging from
the almost unanimous agreement on this site that mail waif BPDs have
this bad habit, it SHOULD be in the textbooks.

[redberry]

Redberry, did he actually use some of those phrases? It's so odd how the express the same thoughts in almost exactly the same way. Here are some phrases I remember, and I'll post more as they occur to me:

We're like ants, just moving toward the inevitable end. The only difference is that we know the futility of life and they don't.

What difference does it make what I do anyway? I won't be alive 50 or 60 years from now anyway.

I wake up thinking about death and dying and how little sense anything really makes. Why not just get it over with sooner? (referring to death)

I don't want to get older and suffer. I already have a lot of physical complaints and it's all downhill from this point on.

Marsha, he did actually tell me when we first started dating that he was abandoned in his previous r/s and I reassured him I would not abandon him.  Even typing that makes me feel illl because I assume he probably used the same line about me to my replacement, and i'm sure it worked on her too.

As for talk of death, that's not something I really experienced.  My personality is kind of zany, I guess, so maybe he knew that death talk wouldn't go too far with me  ?.  I say that because even though he didn't really talk about death, I got the feeling that it was on his mind in one way or another...  Or at least those same sentiments (what does this life matter?) because he always viewed himself in a one down position and would kind of give up on things--like it was him against the world and he was always the loser.  The part that you wrote about the ants resonates.  He would never say that, but that first sentence: "We're like ants, just moving toward the inevitable end" is exactly like something he would write in poetry or short story.  He would use a lot of comparisons in his writing and in some ways express thoughts of annihilation through writing without directly saying it or verbalizing it.  I always found his writings to be rather dark and filled with these epic battles--very much overdramatized, but seemed to be the closest I could get to figuring out what was going on inside of his head.  I think misery, failure, death, etc. was kind of the undercurrent.

A made up example...

What he might write...  The ache of movement was excruciating, I could feel my heart boom through flesh and tissue as every muscle contracted and expanded, setting my newly frail body in fatigued motion.  A slave to humanity, nothing more.  Begging and scrounging for coins to barter with the rich master, crying for his sustenance so that I might live for just one more day.

What he is actually describing...  Walking to the store after work to buy a frozen pizza.

You get the idea.  

[Daisy 4Me]

OK, this is kind of fun (not to mention reassuring)!

Here's the top one or two-word characteristics of my xBPD, he was Waif but also leaned toward Hermit.  These are in no particiular order:

1) Needlessly lied.
2) Impulsive, especially with money.
3) Unreliable with plans.
4) Too eager to please.
5) "Loved" me too quickly.
6) Zero friends.
7) Kept me at a distance from family and work colleagues (BPD Hermit trait)
8) Strange food habits.
9) Bit fingernails.
10) Constant stomach problems / anxiety.
11) Occasionally insomniac.
12) Mirrored me very well.
13) Great at sex.
14) Inappropriately extravagant gift-giver.
15) Pouty / moody.
16) Had a chip on his shoulder when dealing with others.
17) Unrealistic delusions of future success.
18) Weird sense of obligation to family.
19) Cocky demeanor hiding low self-esteem.
20) Actually said "I don't know who I am".
21) Frantic after break-up(s).
22) Constantly treaded on/Didn't understand my boundaries.
23) Felt threatnend by every other male in my life.
24) Had no ideas of his own.
25) Very attentive to personal hygiene.

Anyone else?

HowPredictable,

I related to so many of the things you listed above. But what I haven't seen mentioned before on these boards since I joined 4 or so months ago (maybe I just overlooked it), is #18 Weird sense of obligation to family.
I'm so glad you mentioned this because I wondered about it at the time. My BPDex would often say...I have to be there for my family. He would say it in a way that sounded defensive. As if his family relied on him and he would never let others in his life, except his family. But then other times he would tell me that we don't need our families, we only need each other and no one else. So he fluctuated between this extreme devotion to being there for the family (and shutting me and others out) & wanting me to abandon my family while he abandons his so that we could be together without intrusions from them. I thought it was strange for someone to regard his family in such polar opposite ways. But he did that.

[Daisy 4Me]

Mine has 25 out of the 27, he's definitely cut from the waif cloth. I'd like to add one more and that is...

Cried on que
My expbdbf could cry at any given moment so that you would think he was feeling deep emotional sincerity about something. It could be a single tear slowly rolling down his cheek (very dramatic) to full blown balling "uncontrollably". (on the contrary it was VERY controlled)   

Mine too. He would cry just out of the blue at something I said or did. Not sobbing, but tears and pouting. It used to really surprise me and when he saw my confused or shocked expression, he would stop the tears almost as quick as he started them. So, yes I believed it was controlled and that he was so good at hiding his feelings that he was constantly acting and never being genuine. I still don't know when he was truly feeling sad and when it was just a way to manipulate me to do what he wanted.

[HowPredictable]

. As if his family relied on him and he would never let others in his life, except his family. But then other times he would tell me that we don't need our families, we only need each other and no one else. So he fluctuated between this extreme devotion to being there for the family (and shutting me and others out).

Yes!  This is it exactly!  A strange fluctuation that I could not understand at the time.  At first, I put it down to some sort of cultural obligation to his family that I could not fathom (he's from a very different culture and background from my own), but after reading some of the excellent posts by "2010" on this board, I think it has more to do with the sense of servitude that waif BPDs have ...which is quickly followed by a sense of engulfment.  Apparently they struggle with feeling like a slave, feeling enmeshed into others' needs and craving escape, but then feeling shame and fearing abandonment if they do not do what is expected of them.  

It's a complicated and sad equation for them.

[redberry]

My exBPD bf is a diehard nailbiter. Right down to the quick. Extreme.
I'm not even sure this symptom is in the textbooks, but judging from
the almost unanimous agreement on this site that mail waif BPDs have
this bad habit, it SHOULD be in the textbooks.

Nail biting...  Absolutely!  I should have listed this as one of the traits in the original list.  His fingers were all messed up from constant nail biting or biting around the cuticles.  Also picking at scabs.

Another unusual trait...  Have you ever seen a little boy run up to a person of authority and breathlessly tell them how some other kid wronged them?  His face looking like it was on the verge of tears, running through a litany of wrongs like he was going to hyperventilate?  Little Bobby says "Ms. Redberry! Ms. Redberry! Sam pushed me off the swing, then he kicked me, then he threw my ball over the fence, and threw dirt at me!". This is exactly how my ex would act when he really thought somebody wronged him or wasn't willing to help him (like when the storage unit people charged him a late fee for yet another unpaid month of storage).  I remember looking at him as he was ranting and thinking he looked and sounded just like a little kid on the playground.  Of course, just like the kid was indirectly asking the adult to punish little Sam, my ex was always indirectly asking me to fix it.  Volunteer to pay the late fee, to call the storage people myself to try to work out a solution.  To rescue him (the victim) from yet another persecutor.  And I jumped at the chance to do it.  Over and over again...