Being a trigger vs. being painted black

[GreenEyedMonster]

Can anyone enlighten me on the differences and similarities?

In my situation I tend to think I'm more of a trigger than an actual enemy. 

Is it possible for that to change?

[sas1729]

This is an interesting question. Honestly I'm not an expert, but I can understand what you're getting at. I think I can best convey my thoughts through my own experiences.

While dating my BPDex, there were instances when she would say or do something that made me upset. She triggered some hurt emotions in me, but it's important to note that because of how our relationship developed these triggers likewise developed. Some topics, such as exes, became a trigger for me. Being compared to previous relationships in a way that made me feel inadequate resulted in this. But I never thought of her as the enemy. It was much more that certain topics would cause me to be upset. The negative feelings came more from my own perceived (created) inadequacies than anger at my BPDex.

On the flipside, there were instances in which I would become the enemy in her eyes. Enemy may be too simplistic. I was more of a person who purposefully did not care about her feelings. I was not trying in the relationship. I did things incorrectly. I did not listen to her, etc. There was anger and hurt in her expression, directed at me. I think that being painted black is when you become the focus of the person's anger, instead of negative feelings being directed at the self.

This said, there were things that I could trigger in her. And this was a distinctly different response. Instead of suddenly being attacked, I could see how she felt bad because of the trigger and tried to reach out to me.

In both cases the problem lies with the individual. Aside from intentionally avoiding triggers, you cannot do much I think. In my own case I have had to overcome some of the triggers that were created, and this was a conscious study to address my issues. I do not paint black and cannot really comment on that, since I think it's more a facet of BPD than anything else. But as for stopping being a trigger, there is not much you can do other than censor and edit how you act and what you say. But this is the cycle that I experienced in a relationship with a pwBPD.

[valet]

I agree with sas here.

The triggers are the underlying problems in how the relationship is perceived (these are things that have generally always existed for the pwBPD, stemming from childhood), while being 'painted black' is how the BPD externalizes their own internal struggle. 'It can't be me, because who would I be then? It has to be you.'

In a way, it is their mechanism to preserve their fragile sense of self. Although it is at the expense of the people in their lives that they care about the most.

The reality is that the pwBPD's efforts to 'hate' you are a projection of their own inner shame. It is their way of avoiding their own pain. This is why BPD is such a difficult illness to overcome.

[lm911]

Trigger=painted black. As simple as that. You can't be a trigger and painted white, if you are painted black this is because you were too close to them, meaning you triggered the disorder.

[fromheeltoheal]

Painting someone black is a response to them being a trigger.  To trigger someone, and it can happen with anyone, not just borderlines, in common lingo it's known as 'pushing someone's buttons', is to do or say something that causes an emotional reaction, positive or negative.  Borderlines have trouble regulating emotions, so they are easy to trigger when someone gets emotionally close, and a coping tool may be to offload negative emotions onto someone, thereby 'painting them black', misleading term really, bottom line is someone needs to be all bad and no good, black and white thinking, so a borderline can feel good, pure coping mechanism.

[GreenEyedMonster]

I am trying to understand this from the perspective of a pwBPD.

If I messed up or hurt someone as badly as many of the stories described on this board, I could never, ever look them in the face again.  But many pwBPD, including mine, seem to have no idea that it's not appropriate to just reappear after you have, say, blocked someone on Facebook as if they are a toxin.

So my understanding is this -- please correct me if I'm wrong.  "Painting white" is not some sort of "seeing the light," or coming to their senses.  It is equally distorted as painting someone black.  For any of us nons, painting black would probably last a long time because our embarrassment would make us not want to face our trigger.  But pdBPD seem to paint someone white when they need them, with little regard to the impact of their actions in the past.  Am I understanding this correctly?

[Gonzalo]

Triggering means that you've done something that activated a negative emotion, it's a thing that happens to everyone. "Becoming a trigger" means that you're close enough emotionally that you activate worries about abandonment and engulfment just by day to day life. Being painted black means that the pwBPD believes that you're a bad person who does bad things, it's often done as a means to cope with you triggering them, but it's not the same thing.

"Painting white" is not some sort of "seeing the light," or coming to their senses.  It is equally distorted as painting someone black. 

Is anyone actually perfect in every way, with no flaws or imperfections? They never get lazy or grouchy or angry, never forget anything, never have an unreasonable emotional reaction, never say the wrong thing, and so on? Of course painting white is as distorted as painting black; the core problem is that the pwBPD can't handle the complexity of real people with all of the shades and swirls of grey, and so resorts to 'black and white thinking', where each person is either all good or all bad. This is why they have such a hard time accepting criticism and examining their own flaws; to someone stuck with black and white thinking, accepting flaws means saying "I am an absolutely terrible person with no redeeming features", which leads to projection, denial, suppressed memory, dissociation, and similar coping mechanisms.

[fromheeltoheal]

But pdBPD seem to paint someone white when they need them, with little regard to the impact of their actions in the past.

Sort of.  It's easy to get a little confused by the jargon, and also start to think of a borderline as an alien creature when you get too deep in it, when really everyone does what borderlines do to some extent at different times, it's just very challenging to have the disorder, so the coping tools, which is what they are, have to be stronger to meet the challenge.

So just think of the 'painting' thing as seeing someone as all bad or all good, black and white thinking where there is no gray.  We do that too: if someone does something hurtful to us, we may remove them from our lives, and although we had some good times together, we focus on the sht they pulled to make them 'bad', to justify our actions and make it sit better in our heads.

And think attachments with borderlines, they're everything, since the disorder is such that a borderline does not have a fully formed self of their own, so they are dependent on 'attaching' to someone else to become whole, and if a borderline doesn't have an attachment, they can feel like they literally don't exist at all.  And once they attach, they fear getting too close, engulfment, and fear losing the attachment, abandonment, and all the behaviors show up as ways to cope with those fears.

So the coping tool of projection, take all the shame and self-loathing and 'project' it on someone else so they're the scumbag, is called 'painting black' around here, the person has to be all bad, no gray, so a borderline can feel good about whatever happened and themselves, and that may or may not have anything to do with the reality of the situation.  And then, if a borderline does that well enough, they feel better, they're done with it, although they still want and need an attachment, so may turn to a previous attachment to see if one is still in place, and as you say, have 'little regard' for their actions of the past because the coping tools worked so well that the events either don't exist or their meaning has been totally transformed so the borderline has nothing to feel badly about.  So why not?  See if there's still an emotional connection with that person, what can you do for her, what needs can you meet?  

The best way to deal with all that is to decide what you want and need, decide if you could get those wants and needs met by her sustainably, and act accordingly.  Take care of you!

[apollotech]

Gonzalo:

Triggering means that you've done something that activated a negative emotion, it's a thing that happens to everyone. "Becoming a trigger" means that you're close enough emotionally that you activate worries about abandonment and engulfment just by day to day life. Being painted black means that the pwBPD believes that you're a bad person who does bad things, it's often done as a means to cope with you triggering them, but it's not the same thing.

That's ^^^^ fairly close to my understanding of the differences between the two. Painting is more of a "decision" based mechanism than triggering; painting is proactive on the part of the pwBPD; whereas, triggering produces a reaction by the pwBPD. Painted black can become permanent: the Non can be painted black and discarded and the attachment dissolved by the pwBPD (IMHO, many times this is erroneously referred to as fear of abandonment.). Triggering (engulfment in this example) usually produces a temporary result---silent treatment, raging, etc. Painting someone black means the pwBPD no longer sees that person (the Non) as a suitable bonding candidate; the reason(s) can be real or imagined. One permanent gesture usually associated with painting someone black is the smear campaign. Communications being blocked by the pwBPD is another.

[GreenEyedMonster]

I guess it's the "painting white" part that I find baffling.

Painting black makes sense -- it's what teenagers to do teachers they don't like.  "That was a crappy class.  I hated that teacher.  She is awful!" = "She had high standards and I'm angry at myself for failing."  Both are immature, and pretty much the same thing.

My exBPD started out talking to me as a friend, sharing that he thought that all women were basically evil and out to get him.  He warmed up to me, and -- voila! -- women were great and he was ready to trust them again.  This despite the fact that he had dated several people since his last bad breakup, obviously trying to trust them.

I guess this is that "feeling are facts" thing.  If my exBPD starts having a lot of good feelings toward me again, it's likely that I'll hear from him, because his reality will suddenly be revised to reflect that fact that I was the best girlfriend he ever had.

He had a really hard time "keeping" his old girlfriend black, almost like it took effort on his part, which was interesting.  He said he had to go back and keep reading his journals about her to remember her as being awful.

[apollotech]

I guess it's the "painting white" part that I find baffling.

Hi Green,

What do you find so "baffling" about this? It's the same as painting someone black, but with the opposite characteristics.

[Gonzalo]

Painting black makes sense -- it's what teenagers to do teachers they don't like.  "That was a crappy class.  I hated that teacher.  She is awful!" = "She had high standards and I'm angry at myself for failing."  Both are immature, and pretty much the same thing.

I think your confusion is because that's not painting the teacher black in the sense people mean when they're talking about BPD. What you listed is probably a little bit projection, but painting the teacher black would be "That teacher is a monster, there's nothing good about her, you can't trust her, she lies all the time, she wants to ruin my life, she's probably covering for a child molester right now... .". It's an all or nothing judgement of everything about the person's character, not just 'I hate that teacher'.

[GreenEyedMonster]

The part that confuses me is really just that people/society can generally accept you changing your mind and calling someone "bad" than going backwards and calling them "good."  It seems like you'd need a good reason.

For example, if I told my extended family that I broke up with my exBPD because he was crazy and manipulative, then got back with him later, I'd be served so much crow for dinner I'd be eating leftovers for weeks.  I'd be put in the position of constantly justifying my decision, and admitting I was wrong the first time.  pwBPD don't seem to like to admit that they were wrong.

It also seems like pwBPD don't base "painting white" on concrete events and experiences so much as on needs and memories.

[apollotech]

It also seems like pwBPD don't base "painting white" on concrete events and experiences... .

Green,

That ^^^^ is true. That is one reason why it is a maladapted coping mechanism. It's destructive and not based on/in reality. I think you understand the concept, you just haven't accepted that it is a component of his disorder. We all paint (objectify) people to an extent, but not to the extreme that a pwBPD does; that extreme is abnormal.

[GreenEyedMonster]

I think it's because I'm an *extremely* rational person, and "painting white" after weeks/months of no contact is such a deeply emotional/irrational behavior that I can't even comprehend what it looks like from the inside.  I saw my exBPD do things like this, so I know what it looks like, but to me this is one of the things that really makes BPD seem "crazy" to me because there is just no way I can imagine doing something like this myself.

[fromheeltoheal]

Yes, mental illness can cause irrational behavior.  From your perspective Green, who you are at your core is relatively constant; even though you go through lots of emotions, under them is your stable sense of self.  Who you are is who you are.  Imagine if that wasn't the case, imagine who you are was a little fuzzy and seemed to change; what would happen?  You'd have an emotion, and who you are might change to follow it, who you seem to yourself is plastic.  So if you're having a bad day and think of someone you used to know as a possible solution to that, a possible soother, why not call them?  What happened in the past doesn't matter, hey, you were different then, and besides, you have a problem that needs to be fixed RIGHT NOW.  And how can that person help?

[apollotech]

I saw my exBPD do things like this, so I know what it looks like, but to me this is one of the things that really makes BPD seem "crazy" to me because there is just no way I can imagine doing something like this myself.

Green,

I am fairly rational as well. That ^^^^ is a non-acceptance issue based on your own beliefs/expectations. You see a duck, you know it is a duck, but you refuse to believe it is a duck because you were expecting a goose. It's not about you and your imagining; it's about him and his disorder. Acceptance will come, hang in there.

[Blimblam]

hi greeneyed,

Yeah the painted black and painted white thing I often see described on here  confused me too.  That is not how it was in my relationship. It more became that certain levels my ex and I connected on had now been 'contaminated' by childhood fears and for me to attempt to connect on that level with her triggered the fears. She had constructed a new narrative (seeked replacement attachments) based on those pathways of connection being short circuited and my attempts to work through that stuff with her would initially trigger her fears and she would have like little melt downs which led to her holding me in contempt for keeping that pathway available to her, while she had secured the narrative that it was my fault and that she needs to stay focused on positivity with other people.

[GreenEyedMonster]

Interesting.

When I think about it in terms of my exBPD's childhood issues and need for unconditional love, "painting white" makes more sense.

In a lot of ways, dating him was like having a child.  If you imagine, for example, a parent planning a vacation for a family, that is about how our relationship seemed.  The parent chooses the hotel with the water park for the kids.  The parent skips the gourmet restaurant and stops for fast food because of the kids.  The parent chooses the destination with a lot of kid-friendly activities, even though that's not her first choice.  The parent spends money on junk souvenirs that the kid will get tired of five minutes later.  She enjoys the vacation, sure, and doesn't necessarily resent her kids, but she knows that her needs come second.  Her enjoyment is vicarious.

Meanwhile, the child takes all of this for granted.  Never once does the child feel a pang of guilt over what the parent might be missing, or feel an obligation to make the vacation what the parent wanted.  The child's job is to enjoy himself.  He may or may not even say thank you.  He may even be unimpressed with such an expensive gift.  But he doesn't have any obligations to anyone else.  If the parent disciplines the kid for being a selfish brat, the parent "ruins" the trip.

My exBPD's childhood was defined by a sick (physically and mentally) needy mother and an absent, alcoholic father.  No one ever parented him like I just described.  He never got to be the child whose needs came first.  He was burdened with adult concerns almost immediately when he was born.

Our relationship was fine as long as I was the "mother" who was willing to live vicariously through him and not burden him with my needs.

So I'm imagining a little kid pitching a fit on a vacation, telling his mom that he hates this vacation and wants to go home.  :)oes this little kid have any moral or ethical problem with asking his mom where they're going on vacation next as soon as this trip is over?  Nope.  

And thus, my exBPD probably wouldn't have any problem asking me for another round.