Hi William3693,
I would not say that people with BPD (pwBPD) "hate to lose an attachment." What they do is exhibit "frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment." That is, they are afraid of being *abandoned* to the point that they will imagine it happening even when it is not.
To be abandoned, one needs to be depend upon that person who abandons. You cannot really be abandoned by a stranger or an acquaintance. And one escape from being abandoned, is to be the first one to abandon. If you are the abandoner, you are not the abandonee.
When pwBPD are not in a position to leave first (i.e. have someone to leave to) then they will be frantic to prevent you from leaving them; and so this looks like they don't want to lose an attachment. But once they are in a position to leave first, and strongly (though perhaps wrongly) believe that you will leave, then they will leave you and eventually go no contact.
And why are their behaviors worse after every rc?
I believe what is happening between each recycle, is first they get overwhelmed by their imagined abandonment (i.e., they are convinced you will leave them) but after breaking up, we convince them that we never intended to leave them (because we didn't) and so they come back.
The crux of their issues is that for pwBPD, feelings of intimacy/familiarity are a big trigger for their fear of abandonment. So the closer they feel towards us, the more they feel their disordered fear that they will be abandoned. So after reconciling, the level of closeness and intimacy cranks up and they feel that they will be abandoned even worse than before. The next break up happens. The next recycle happens. And their disorder feelings only escalate (but only after oscillating between idealization and devaluation).
In short, because the level of intimacy and familiarity increases which each recycle (i.e. the more time you spend with them), their disordered feelings only escalate, and so their behaviors get worse.
I think I understand various reasons why they end the relationship but why the nc.
To understand how pwBPD can go NC, you'll need to understand what it means to "lack object constancy." Lacking object constancy is like not having any "emotional memory." When pwBPD are attached to one person, they can't "remember" how they once felt about someone else. There is a giant thread on the third page of the "Questions about BPD and BPD resources" titled "BPD BEHAVIORS: Lack of Object [Consistency]" that might be helpful to read in order to better understand this aspect.
They go NC because while they have someone else to need, it's almost like we emotionally cease to exist for them. The bottom line is that for pwBPD, they attach to people differently from how nonBPD people attach.
Best wishes,
Schwing
