BPDFamily.com

After my BPDh latest rage episode, I noticed a strange pattern that confuses me: He always stops raging when he gets me to rage back.
The first few days of his "Mr. Hyde" episode, I used my tools & stayed calm & validated but nothing was working. By day 3, I was in tears & telling him how hurt I was. By day 4 of his rage & emotional abuse, I was finally at the end of my rope & emotionally exhausted and I snapped & got extremely angry with him & shamed him for his behavior. I know that's a no-no with pwBPD. But weirdly, by this morning, he stopped raging and was apologetic. Strange!
It occurs to me now that this seems to be his pattern - that he will emotionally abuse and antagonize until I get upset & rage back. Then he sits back and watches me get fired up, seemingly taking pleasure in how mad I am at him & telling me I'm crazy. Then by the next day, his raging episode is over & he's calm & apologetic.
I really don't understand this. Does he crave being shamed & this is his way of getting it? Does he simply like seeing/feeling that he can control my behavior? Does he feel so "crazy" that he wants me to act "crazy" so he can feel better about himself? Whatever the reason, I don't want to have to go into a rage every time to get him to stop raging. Not sure what to do.
Anyone else notice this pattern with their BPD SO?

I've seen my H do this too. He will back off it I rage at him or if I am mean to him in my comments. I really don't know what causes it but I've come up with a couple of thoughts:
1. He likes to be treated badly or talked down to because that's how his dad treated him.
2. he likes to see me lose control because that means that I am just as bad a person as he is so the playing field is equal.
3. it just scares the crap out of him to see me like that so he chills out.
4. when I yell at him he sees me being authentic and he feels safe.

No matter what the reason I hate it when I do this. I am embarrassed and I do not want to act that way. I know there are better ways to express myself and if I've gotten to that point, I have not done well in taking care of myself.

Thank you for your reply, TH. You are always so insightful & concise in your posts. While I'm terribly sorry that you are enduring the same situation as I am, I must say that it makes me feel better that I am not alone in this. 
Re: your responses:
1. I really think you hit the bulls eye on this one. Same with my hub. His mother treated him (and still does) the same way as your hub's father. I've seen 1st hand how she antagonizes & psychologically abuses him (and others), then sits back & absolutely delights in their pain. Sick. Sadly, a rule of thumb in psychology is that ppl always seek out what is familiar, even if it hurts.
2. Yup. "I'm a terrible person, so I want you to be terrible too." Misery loves company.
3. Glad for you that when you get mad it scares him. That must be empowering for you! My hub is not remotely scared.
4. Interesting. I guess they were raised with so much lying/deceit that authenticity is a rare & comforting thing for them.

I hear you about feeling embarrassed about acting out/raging. That is not my nature either, although when the feelings initially start pouring out, I have to admit it's a catharsis at first. But ultimately I end up feeling bad about myself & my behavior. Let's try not to be so hard on ourselves with this. We are only human & doing the best we can under extremely stressful circumstances. 

Raging back at him has an impact, as you've seen. What it won't do is change the pattern of abuse--for him raging until you blow up IS the pattern.

My stbexwife had a different pattern--her mother was a mean, raging alcoholic (at least when drunk), and she was terribly afraid of conflict and raging. Instead of raging at me, she would provoke me, pushing my buttons (without raging, or even really raising her voice)... .and nothing I did would stop it. It only got worse and more provocative, more hurtful. Until I blew up and screamed at her. I've got a long fuse, but I've got my limits.

I decided that she was angry, but couldn't express the anger. The best she could do was provoke me until *I* expressed the anger, as I would finally be angry by that time.

Anyhow... .playing into this pattern didn't change anything, although after I blew up the provocations did stop until next time.

What made a difference was when I started enforcing boundaries and removing myself from the provocations before I got angry enough to blow up at her.

I could be way off on this, but it is my understanding that they can't regulate their own feelings so by getting us so dysregulated that we begin picking up the BPD rages (which apparently, if we live with them long enough we can pick up some of the BPD traits) then they can feel safe and more in control of their own emotions. Basically, they are trying to project their feelings onto us.  If we take the bait, they start to feel better and calm down.

I agree that this isn't the cycle we nons want to get caught up in or continue so after we recognize it, we need to figure out how not to participate in it.  As we all know, easier said then done.

H88