BPDFamily.com

My h could not let me have a hobby of my own.  I'm an artist, like working with leather and enjoy training horses. 

I made him a leather belt for his birthday: he turns around, spends $100s of dollars on leather tools and materials and makes me a belt for Christmas.  I show him several pieces of art I'm working on and suddenly he wants to take an art class, draws a picture of us as a gift for my birthday.  I have a couple horses I'm training: he buys training books and is suddenly a "horse trainer".  I used to shoe horses for friends and neighbors: pretty soon he's talking about going to farrier school. 

What is this about?  An over zealous attempt to identify with me?  Taking mirroring a little too far?  At first I thought it was kind of cute and endearing, but then it got down right annoying.       

I might also mention that all the the stuff he made me/did for me etc. he made sure to post on Facebook.  Somehow the things I did for him never quite made it that far.

It's mirroring. They basically become you. Then you fall in love with yourself. It's very flattering. I don't consider it entirely creepy because everyone sort of imitates other people on some level. It's just sort of a fraud. It's a good way for a crazy person to trick you into falling in love with them.

I know what you mean!

When I was learning to weld, the ex wanted to learn too, he was in a different class that did some lower level welding, he always tried to " better" me, tried to out do me at every turn, compared what we were doing and always declared himself " the winner"

Another annoying thing, I liked to sing along to music, EVERY time he would join in and drown me out!, if I stopped, he stopped, but id sing along again and off he went, if I called him out on it hed say in a churlish voice " im allowed to"

Wth?

Everything was always a competition.

haha wow, childish much?  Speaking of childish.

My family owns a ranch and my *fiance (at the time), went into theatrics yelling at a neighbor/friend to shut a gate.  After which he very proudly said (chest puffed out and everything)  "I know what to do, I was raised on a cattle farm".  WTH?  What are we? 5 yr olds?       

Not stealing (you still have them, no?), but more like forming his identity by being exposed to the interests of a parental figure. My 3 year old son does this. He repeats things I say when I know he has little or no understanding of what I said. I could get him to say, "bpdfamily is a great website!" And he'd repeat it just because it was me saying it, despite having no real clue what I was talking about. He's doing it for approval and secure attachment.

Yeah that makes sense.  I felt like his parent/therapist/lighthouse in the dark/validator of his existence.  I wanted so bad for him to just have confidence in being his own person, that was Dr. Jekyll).  I didn't notice/didn't want to see Mr. Hyde but he showed up before too long.  Loud, obnoxious, over opinionated, wanted to punch everybody in the face, everybody was stupid etc etc.  I would cringe inside whenever I was around him interacting with people because I knew he would say something off color, rude or just flat out bizarre.     

I've noticed in the scant few emails me and my last BPDexgf have exchanged that she's copied my way of speaking, and the way I word things in texts/emails. There's a few words I use to describe things often hat I've all a sudden seen her start using, almost as if I wrote the emails. It's really weird.

Ditto. Spooky.

Yup "weird" is the word I found myself thinking the most.  When I started detaching from him he would copy almost verbatim things I've said in the past.  How all the ever wanted was (insert something I said).  How all the manipulation, lying and betrayal he lovingly bestowed upon me was "just something he had to work through".  He has sacrificed everything, including himself (not sure how that works), to become the person he needs to be for us and I left him hanging.    

I sense some guilt there... .I have some. I always knew I couldn't keep up the teen lover bit with mine. With two kids, careers, a house and her codependent obligations to her family, I indeed withdrew,which triggered the end. Even before that, I felt I could never retire into old age with this woman, so its probable I would have left her eventually. I own this part of it, and I feel bad for trying to mature a person who, by hrr own admission, is incapable of handling an adult, three dimensional r/s. Her exact words were, "I know you're the right guy. I'm just not ready for this." What I said was what she meant. My poor, lost, disordered daughter... .I do feel compassion, despite her lies, betrayal, and continued emotional abuse... .

Wow. Same here. The last time I saw him he really was repeating phrases I was saying, telling me he wanted all the things I'd said I wanted.  In the time we spent together he started taking on jobs similar to mine. It was so strange. Poor them.

Yep it's par for the course.   They mirror you to the point where it's creepy.  Liking your likes on fb, adopting your expressions and hobbies, following people and liking things that they've only heard about through you.  "Stealing your interests" and using them with their next victim to create some semblance of having their own identity.

When I first noticed it it was about six to eight months into our relationship.  Before that he acted like my typical emotionally unavailable boyfriend who made me work for his attention.  Then the mirroring started and I was confused.  I confused the behavior for his undying love and interest for me but at the same time was repulsed by it because it was so bizarre. 

After reading these boards I've come to find that more often than not this is a MAJOR indicator of Bpd.   

Yeah, I like a very particular niche of music - guess which one of us is going out to those club nights now? I avoid them because I know he will be there. It's 'his' thing, despite the fact I used to work with a lot of the DJs, before I even met him. I have to go a different city to see my friends gig now, so I don't run into him.

Ditto my love of Formula One. Thankfully, he can't afford to go to those, lol. Right down to liking the same teams/driver.

He'd often drop facts/anecdotes into conversation with friends that I'd told him - verbatim. Like, literally, word for word, claiming them as his own.

jbt846 that could have been written by me as well.   I discovered a really fun underground edm bingo scene where I live that not many had heard about.  It was a traveling show that popped up in various cities.  I went to the first one the weekend I dumped him.   We recycled shortly after and he asked what I had done that weekend.  When I told him, less than a month later I found out he bought a ticket to the event in his city and creepily went alone.   After that he became obsessed with it and made it a point to go all the time.  He got really creepy with it I subsequently lost interest in it because he just made it so not cool anymore haha.

What a freakshow he was.  Truly.

mine stole/borrowed/mirrored my spiritual beliefs, interests, friendships and work. 

Hmm. I find it strange that they continue with these hobbies and mirroring after the breakup. I did suspect that when I met him a lot of his interests were in fact from others he'd met even though he claimed that he had a lifelong dream which his family had forbidden him from pursuing although I'm a bit skeptical about that.  I actually liked his "interests" when I first met him because they were pretty different from mine.  But he destroyed the relationship he had that had inspired that key interest of so when I last saw him and he was with a replacement whose interests were totally different, he'd apparently put aside this "lifelong" dream... .Even though I saw a faint glimpse of it still being something he wanted, but that he was no longer pursuing.  I guess that's the other thing: it takes an identity to attach to and stick to hobbies ,interests, as sometimes it means working hard on something without knowing if it will pay off or not.  Kind of the same as with a relationship. They take investment work , sacrifice and sometime a leap of faith.   

  Just wait 'til she starts using the favourite expressions of your replacement and you recognise them as your best mates'.

I am passionate about running, and doing triathlons. Now she does them too. Even after this breakup, she will send me links to her run site showing how far she ran, etc. When we were together, she hated running... .now... .

mine started running before she met her paramour.  he's a  jock,  then they ran together and she became obsessed with it.  then she started logging calories and has what I call a borderline eating disorder,  obsessed with having the stomach from a fitness magazine model.  she's lost what little baby fat she had and now weighs less than when we first met.  she's petite, there's nothing wrong with her,  but obsessed with her appearance now, a  woman I'd say it's self conscious,  sure,  but it's now in overdrive. I  don't know if it's mirroring him,  but it's too gain approval to " keep" him,  since he's so much younger.  I've never criticised her about her appearance,  but once.  last month I commented about it and said, " you know,  you are a very pretty woman."  She thanked me and literally almost started crying.  She doesn't get its the outside I  never had a problem with... .