BPDFamily.com

I have to disagree a little bit with the implication that people suffering from BPD are incapable of love.  

I am certain in her way my ex loved me -this was likely, if for the sake of argument we accept my assumption of BPD, need based and our relationship would have continued to erode.  I am not implying our love was sustainable, healthy or we were experiencing the  emotion of love in the same way, but there was love.

She seemed to be the hardest on the people she loved the most.  Her grandparents, who stood by her hell or high water, certainly weathered a lot of storms -but I know she adores them.

Wicker Man

Do you feel there are several components to love?  How is it defined?

I feel love encompasses respect, affection, bonding, sharing, taking care of another, trusting they will take care of you. etc etc. Its more than just emotions.

If we base love solely on affection, then I would agree BPD are capable of great love... They can love you as deep as the Atlantic Ocean and up to the moon. They can gaze at you with child like eyes, and in that moment love you with every fiber of their being...

But sometimes love puts demands on people, and do you feel a BPD is capable of those responsibilities... Can you separate love from demands?  

  If you find yourself in a hospital bed, would they be by your side? Or view you as abandoning them and freak out... Can they put their needs aside, at least momentarily,  because they love you?

I would like to think with a lot of hard work, the right partner and therapy it is possible for someone suffering from BPD to form a lasting and healthy relationship.  This notion is theoretical on my part as I have no antydotal evidence and I am not a health care professional --however I would not like to write off nearly 2% of the population as being beyond hope and incapable of love.  

BPD obviously makes forming a lasting relationship difficult (... .here I have antidotal evidence) -but not impossible from my readings.  

My experience was brief and I saw the risks far too high to continue our relationship, but I sincerely hope she can one day find help, the right man and create a healthy relationship for herself.

It was the compassion I felt for her which initially compelled me to begin posting.  

Wicker Man  

Mine would be by my side, but not selflessly for me, but rather because it is obviously the socially accepted and immutable gesture to make that she can then tell people she did because she's that amazing of a person. It would also help her erase many of her previously cruel actions toward me IN HER MIND. It's sort of like the sinful abuser who repents for his sins on his deathbed. At no point would such a gesture on her part be about me, but rather something she can use to ascend to the lofty heights of the pedestal she has herself on.

However, if I hadn't unmasked her for what she is, I would be none the wiser to her motives behind such a gesture.

J

I have only known one undiagnosed person who very likely suffered from BPD.  There are high and low functioning people with BPD.  I am guessing many people with high functioning BPD significant others never end up here.

Were some of our current or past significant others monsters?  From what I have read here, absolutely yes.  Were we treated badly and worse?  Some of us, once again, yes.

However, I dislike overarching generalizations and damning statements which imply everyone suffering from BPD is incapable, or worse undeserving, of love.  My ex presented traits so similar to what I have read here on the boards it almost seemed as if someone had been watching my relationship and taking notes, but she is an individual.  She is a summation of her experiences, culture, and sadly her disorder. -I could not continue to love her, but I hope one day someone can.

If we use exaggeration and hyperbole we are essentially falling into a behavior which many of us disliked from our BPD lovers.  I can certainly understand the will to do so.  We, as a community, are in pain varying from discomfort to bone crushing dismay  --I understand the anger.

I would, however, like to put forward the gentle reminder every human being is an individual, and we should take a bit of care in using generalizations and projection.  

To address the hospital bed example... . I think if we were freezing she would not have hesitated give me the shirt off her back.  I think, however, if the rest was due it would never get paid.  For important issues I believe the cultural importance of family would have overridden even her disorder... . The day to day she was horrible E.g. I was at work 17 hours and she didn't make it out bed, much less out of the hotel to buy milk.  The shop was 1 block down the street... .

Wicker Man

Good discussion.  :)

Wicker Man,
You are right to encourage members to soften their tone when speaking of people with BPD. When we make people with BPD all black, we are essentially exhibiting a well known BPD behavior. One of the problems that is frequently exhibited on this site is that members blame the person with BPD to the point, that the member does not grow or change, because they refuse to do anything about their participation in the relational dynamics.

This makes sense.  When people are in extreme pain, feel lonely, and lost it is incredibly difficult to look within.  Through my experience with a BPD lover I learned of my own need for therapy.  My need is two fold -coping with the loss brought me in and learning how to better myself has kept me in therapy.

Wicker Man

I think this discussion leads to confronting a very sore point, it challenges the belief of having been loved in the r/s.

My ex was officially diagnosed with BPD, however the diagnosis fits like a glove in most respects, yet so does it nicely fit with APD. (anti social personality disorder). With her alcohol use being the dishibiting influence.

My ex associated "love" with having to endure "pain". The two were codependent on one another, couldnt be isolated. If there wasnt any pain yet, she created it.

So yes there is a capability of love, but the very meaning attached as to what love is, is what I feel leads to incongruence in the r/s. When I suffered as a result, she brought up the explanation of "tough love" as a way to exonerate what she did. She creates the hurt first, rather than to be the one to wait for what she thinks will inevitably hit her instead. She cheated on me before there was ever a chance, that she could "love" me and that I would have done it to her. Expecting me to stay, which I did, takes away the claustrophobia, she knows I cant love her anymore, it is sabotaged, but im still in her life. its emotionally safe ground now. Ironically, my staying with her in the midst of being hurt, is the closer form of love that she got, it exactly ties in with her very world paradigm of what love is supposed to be. It normalises - in her mind - the hurt of feeling abandoned from her parents.

Its all very sad, but thats what it is, the part of me staying around to enable it further is what my r/s with her consisted of. Nowadays I barely talk to her, more validation, and she has done this in every single meaningful relationship.

For her to feel love viz a viz to the way I regard it, would involve changing her own concept of it first. It would be the same as asking anyone to do the same. Asking a bit much I think?

my ex doesnt bother about "love" these days, the closest thing she has is trying to keep the remnants from her past who still have an interest in her hooked along, she can replay each time the good times and splice out the rest. She will have at any given moment in time a "favourite person" who she emulates their personality, an act of necessity not adoration, as she once did with me.

Again the fact that I still have contact but barely talk to her is a closer aquistion of "love" based on hurt, than the guys who try everything to win her approval by caring/respecting for her. Its why at so many times in the r/s she practically begged me to be nasty to her. the very rare times I did, reflexively, not intentionally, she was fine with where any other would have called it a day and left.

(https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/images/mb/love-intro-copy.png)

  Click here for more of this article (https://bpdfamily.com/content/my-definition-love-i-have-borderline-personality-disorder)

I believe this is precisely why the moderators split this discussion off and created the thread.  It is perhaps it the sore points we have to look at to learn and grow.

It is diabolically difficult for me to now try to access my relationship through the lenses of time and pain.  My view is by nature subjective and biased heavily by the tumultuous nature of events.  However, I am doing my best to sort out my perception of the relationship and how my nature factored into it.

My goal is self discovery and ultimately healing.

Wicker Man

Hi everyone,
Yes, I do believe that those with BPD or traits feel affectionate and passionate love, at times intensely for their partners, yet it is difficult for them to develop it further because of the illness. I do not doubt that my bp trait ex loved me very much, but he could not see it through because of all of his fears.
Zen606

Can an undeveloped toddler brain love unselfishly?

Love, like any other emotion or behavior of a pwBPD will show the same dysregulation as anything else.  Black/white, push/pull, hate/love

If we can accept that their anger is real why can't we accept that their love is real too?  Sure, it is immature but how is that different than anything else?

Anger is a much more simple emotion than love. A car cutting you off might make you angry.

As nons, and most others, we tie conditions to love. There are demands. I don't know if BPD's are capable of fulfilling those.

I like to think "love" is more than a childlike feeling that can change instantly. Similar to how A child might love a toy.  Forget their toy.  Get mad if someone else has their toy. Then forget the toy as if it never  existed. Then maybe one day play with that toy again if they are bored. That type of "love" is not what we as humans are after. It's like getting 10 percent of everything that encompasses "love"

Those expectations of love are what we as adults expect.  You are defining *their* love based on your definition.  It is too easy to get caught up in a debate about what love is, but generally that leads to a conversation around semantics.  The reality is, my pwBPD/mental illness (my mother) loved me according to her definition of love.  The fact that her definition does not match mine does not make her love any less real.  It was what she was capable of giving.

In expectations and demands there are limitations.  It is the limitation of their love that is the problem.  

My therapist treats several people with BPD and told me when love with people suffering from BPD works it can be an amazing experience.  Trying, difficult, but wonderful.  He also told me, in my case I may have done the right thing in ending the relationship due to extenuating circumstances.

Perhaps we should remember our forum.  This is a site devoted to people who are having difficulties with relationships in the best of cases and suffering from extreme trauma in the worst of cases.  Our collective view is going to be quite dark.

I have said before.  When my ex loved me she did it deeply, and when she hated me she showed just as much commitment and passion.  I could not stay in the relationship -but this does not mean I should make blanket statements about the disorder in general -I cannot and should not even attempt at diagnosing her.  I have been quite careful to always include 'undiagnosed' when describing her.

I am simply trying to suggest caution in exaggeration.  

Perhaps this subject inappropriate and I certainly do not want to cause our fellow members undue pain.  

Wicker Man

True.  I think even involving the word "love" confuses things greatly.

Are they capable of momentary deep affection and infatuation. I would say yes.

When I met my ex wife she did not have her kids. They lived across the country with the dad. There was a long believable story about why she did not have them.

In the end, slowly over years, and after talking to her ex husband she just dropped them off at school on day and disappeared. She did this several times over ten years. Would be gone for months. A year etc.

So would we say that that is motherly "love"?  Yes.  At times she would miss her kids. And she would have affection for them. But her own needs prevented her from caring for them. Being around them. Protecting them. Raising them.

Most people who do not understand BPD would not make excuses for her. "You are a crappy mom who doesn't care about your kids".

This is precisely the concept I was hoping to entertain.  

My ex loved her grandparents.  Now... .In her consistent love for her grandparents there were rough patches... . E.g. when she tore all of the flooring out of their apartment with her bare hands.  She was mortified for having done so, but I believe never stopped loving them.  I further believe her grandparents never stopped loving her -floor or no floor.  They accepted who she was, both the light and the dark.

Wicker Man

I accept/respect the uniqueness of everyone's situation here. That being said, (for Wicker Man) I don't think the "love" pwBPD feel for grandparents and little brothers is tatamount to the standard of love (i.e. expectation, etc.) they hold nons accountable to. After 8 mo. N/C I just see things with more clarity... .BPD love vs non love. I sincerely hope this does not come across as black/white thinking. I am very much a 'grey' area thinker(prolly why I may have stayed w/ xbf longer than I should have.) I suppose a r/s with pwBPD can be an amazing experience. But I think genuinely loving/committing to another fellow human being can also be an amazing experience. Everyone on God's green earth is uniquely special... .of course their love is real no doubt... .pwBPD are wired differently and so their definition is going to be different.

I can only speak to my experience and my wife is still untreated and undiagnosed (because she quit therapy once the therapist began to see that she was BPD).  This thread is so good and it is my belief that ANY one of us can only love to the level of love we know how to give.  BPD or not. BPD sufferers are not heartless but are limited in how they love.  Not all BPD will stay this way though, there is help and tools and I believe that if they want it bad enough... .it may be possible to feel and give the fullness of real love.  My wife chose to blame me and leave.

In the beginning of our courtship, I think my wife definitely felt the emotions that go along with love; for a good long time. She seemed to think the sun rose and set with me, still showed some selfishness occasionally and I caught her in (seemingly) white lies but I thought I could FEEL how in love with me she was most of the time so I never doubted we would last forever!  However, with the growth of a relationship and maturity in life, inevitably couples go through times of stress or indecision or change.  In 2017, we were talking about making some big decisions in a GOOD way (ie, contemplating buying a home, moving out of state, and she was about to graduate university). Those emotions and feelings of love she had for me were then put to task because I needed her tell me what she wanted so we could make decisions and she began disengaging.  She didn't tell me that maybe this was scary for her, all this change.  She let me believe she was happy and excited for these things.  Then this year, I found out I had multiple fibroid tumors and needed surgery. I would need her to care for me for up to 8 weeks. Suddenly, her feet were to the fire and she jumped ship within a month or so. For her, this was the limit of her "love".  She would have been fine if all had stayed the same forever but the demands of life showed the level of her devotion and commitment.

Her "love" for me was clearly a great example of what Husband 123 said earlier, "If we base love solely on affection, then I would agree BPD are capable of great love... They can love you as deep as the Atlantic Ocean and up to the moon. They can gaze at you with child like eyes, and in that moment love you with every fiber of their being... .But sometimes love puts demands on people, and do you feel a BPD is capable of those responsibilities... Can you separate love from demands? If you find yourself in a hospital bed, would they be by your side? Or view you as abandoning them and freak out... Can they put their needs aside, at least momentarily,  because they love you?"

Everything I have ever known or studied about   tells me it is NOT conditional, fleeting, or based on feelings alone. I learned the hard way that my wife's love was not real love.  It was the level of love she got at home... .her parents never supported her or encouraged her or believed in her.  It was the level of love she got in her friendships... .she was always finding friends who would use her and discard her when it suited them but would defend them to the death if I brought up any flaw in the dynamic there.  It was the level of love she got from her siblings... .who only suck up to ask for help then ignore her when she needs them.  For me, I cannot accept this level of love from anyone in my future.  It has been so hard to move on because I fooled myself into thinking she had that that deep-rooted, unconditional real love I had for her.  I now have to choose someone who will love me at the level that I am at.

Husband said it best, "I like to think "love" is more than a childlike feeling that can change instantly. Similar to how a child might love a toy.  Forget their toy.  Get mad if someone else has their toy. Then forget the toy as if it never  existed. Then maybe one day play with that toy again if they are bored. That type of "love" is not what we as humans are after. It's like getting 10 percent of everything that encompasses "love".

So WM, is it that you hold onto what could be and not what is? If only... .

Of course I wonder what would have happened if I had stayed with her.  

Is there a curative power to love?  Absolutely.  Could it have been enough?  I will never know.

Could my love for her, the support of her family and all the members in our compound been enough to assuage her fear of abandonment?  Maybe... . I will never know.

However, can I now say she is incapable or undeserving of love?  Absolutely not.  I do not wish to damn a fellow human being with the statement 'You shall not be loved'

Wicker Man

 I have enjoyed following this discussion even back when it was part of the much larger thread (which was split into three parts!).  I think this topic will always generate a lot of discussion and differing opinions based on individual experiences and that is exactly what I enjoy about it and why I decided to jump in.  These kinds of discussions are what makes this board so wonderful.  My opinion is based on my experiences with my mother, my ex and a former roommate.  I saw the same thing in each of them:  they were completely convinced that they could love and saw nothing wrong with the way they demonstrated or acted on it.  It fit their definition but not mine, so I accepted the difference left them to it.  

I think a lot of the difference in opinion also lies in accepting or not accepting that the pwBPD is who they are and act according to their own set of rules.

DEFINING LOVE Don't we need to say what love is if we are to evaluate it anyone's capacity for love (ours/theirs)?

So to start, what is the epitome of love that we seek to express ourselves? What is the epitome of love that we can hold for a person with weaknesses greater than ours (child, aging parent, a pwBPD).

To me, the purest examples or love can be found in a parents love for a child. I'm not saying all parents exhibit great love, but rather, if you are looking for role models, you will find some of the best here. For those with a spiritual view, this could include God's (father) love of us (children).

I see love as a seed that grows and changes in time with nurturing and care. In develops.

The word love is often thought to be a translation of the greek word “agape” which carries a sense of strong emotion and affection. I think this is an important and necessary start for all of us - the seed.

To me, the seed of love, if meaning should slowly grow in a romantic relationship to a higher level that I hope to achieve one day (and probably will never fully achieve). This love is to support another person in becoming who they want to be (not who I need them to be for me). To always see them, "get" them, appreciate them for who they are, even when they are not on their "A" game. To be strong for the relationship - which means to be strong for both myself and my partner in concert (not competition) with one another.

We can try to growth this type of love in life, but it will not take in most of our relationships - only in the right relationship.

Many of us have seen the words these words: love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails... . and now these three remain: faith, hope and love, but the greatest of these is love.

Is this a decent starting definition (in whole or part) for this discussion? If so, how far did the seed grow in your relationship (from your side)? Now that the relationship is over, what has that seed of love become?

Hard questions. I know.

I think this is a great starting definition.

I think this is the part that can get really difficult sometimes. To me it's a win when I sometimes don't get what I want as #1 in order to accommodate someone else--even if that #1 is really important to me. Recognising that accommodating the other person is #2 (and I still want it) helps me a lot.

Seed germination requires certain growing conditions. My r/s couldn't make it much passed the honeymoon stage. Looking back - knowing what I know now - even that was a little choppy. The seed unfortuneatly suffocated.

this is what i aspire to; it is more a commandment to me than the good bar setting that it is. it is the same love that i would hope to receive.

with every category (better at some than others) i frequently fall short.

every human is limited in some way(s) in their capacity to love. when i hear topics like this discussed, they always come down to exactly how unconditional the love of a human being can be.

if the above is the standard i try to live by, my ex and i were each better at some than others, better overall at some times than others, but we both frequently fell short. one of the hardest lessons of my life (it shook me right to my foundation) is that two people can love each other very much and yet fall short as a romantic pairing.

everyone is capable of love. everyone is limited in their capacity to love.  everyone should aspire to greater love.

Don't you think we all fit on a spectrum?  How would you rate your "loving" in your relationship with the exgf/wife against the definition above on a scale of 1-10 (10 being best). In what areas do you think you could have done more?

Maybe the question should be, are we capable of loving them? They loved us first. I will bet my paycheck on it.

I was ill equipped to know what I was getting into. I ran just as hard and head first into the relationship as she did.

She loved me first. I was hesitant, but she loved me first. I was there. I know. Of course she is able to love! She loves her daughter and our Son. She loved me until we couldn’t handle each other anymore.

It is a spectrum thing/Disorder, and this is why we shouldn’t go back and forth with each other. Our experiences have similarities, but are very personal and very different and we should be mature enough not to generalize.

Do people love? Are people with Borderline Personality Disorder, people? Come on. They love... .

JNChell,

pwBPD might have the capacity to love, but are they able to devote all that love to the person with whom they are in a relationship with forever?

Let's say you and I have a bucket filled with love. We chose to give all the love in that bucket to our pwBPD with the expectation that it would be forever given to that person and to no other person romantically.

More than likely our pwBPD has the same bucket, maybe even a bigger bucket, BUT they were not capable of giving to us all that love with the COMMITMENT that it would be forever. They gave it knowing they could either retract it or give it to someone else if they felt we didn't deserve it. That's not really unconditional love.

It sounds to me as though you're talking about the love your pwBPD gave you as existing in an instantaneous "Ah ha! There is/was" moment in time. Thus, technically, she was capable of it for at least a brief moment in time, but when you love someone it should be unconditionally everlasting. That kind of love I do not believe pwBPD are capable of.

J

Hey, Jeffree.

pwBPD might have the capacity to love, but are they able to devote all that love to the person with whom they are in a relationship with forever?

Short answer, no, they’re not. There is an exception to this, and we know what that is, but we also know the chances of them seeking therapy and becoming successful with it.

It sounds to me as though you're talking about the love your pwBPD gave you as existing in an instantaneous "Ah ha! There is/was" moment in time. Thus, technically, she was capable of it for at least a brief moment in time, but when you love someone it should be unconditionally everlasting. That kind of love I do not believe pwBPD are capable of.

Yes, this is beginning to become my understanding of how it went. I wouldn’t quite describe it as instantaneous, though. It was more like a love me today, hate me tomorrow cycle. Over and over and over... .Again, the resources are available for them, especially for a trait afflicted person like my ex that is lower on the spectrum. Unfortunately, I’m at a point where it’s time to accept that it is what it is, and understand that that isn’t going to happen, and I can’t do anything about it.

"love isnt a feeling, its an ability" - dan in real life

a dumb movie quote, i know.

but if love is a feeling, and capability of love is limited to the ability to sustain that feeling, i really dont know anyone who is capable of that.

i do think its an ability that everyone has. i also think everyone has a limited ability.

Thank you Once Removed. Yes we can learn to be more loving. I need to stop thinking of love as an overwhelming feeling that I cannot control. I believe the longing for love is the overwhelming feeling, and practicing being more loving with myself and others would definitely relieve the overwhelming feelings. It helps to remember there is more pleasure in giving than receiving, and for me particularly when loving children and animals.

Doesn't it make sense that we all fit on a spectrum and within that, our ability of love changes as we grow more emotionally mature?  

Personally, I have a hard time looking at this as a black and white situation. If this is my model for love (see definition in quote box), then I would rate myself as average at best during "before BPD relationship" and "improving significantly and still growing "after BPD". I have not achieved that lofty status, but am reaching and learning what it means.


My ex appears to be on a similar trajectory. She blew up her first marriage (he ultimately committed suicide over it), our relationship was great, but had some difficult aspects (and there were a lot of environmental stressors at the end), she had 2-3 more failed relationships and finally married again and has been for 7 + years.

Side note - her mother wend through 5 marriages before landing one that lasted for decades.

Can you give a reasonable honest assessment of your own short comings in love? It's humbling, at it is important self-awareness.

I think doing this, gives us a better ability to rate our ex's and understand where they were on the spectrum and what type of trajectory they are on.

It's a much more complex analysis than "are BPD people capable of love". I think it's a much more emotionally intelligent understanding of where we have been in life and what we can learn for it.

Hi everyone,
I think that those with BPD or traits are capable of love, however the mental illness that they experience distorts their thinking and throws many obstacles in the relationship path. It is a very sad thing to see someone really want a relationship but not be able to know how to balance their fluctuating emotions. From my own experience with a bp trait ex, he wanted to be happy but was so scared that he would sabotage himself, making it very difficult to maintain a relationship with him. His track record in other relationships made this clear.
Zen606

Interesting question. I've no particular insight regarding BPD but have asked myself since r/s ended a year ago, what is love anyway? Wanting to know when I really feel it, and how to assess when others - another - might feel it for me. For me there are two components:

1) Longing to be close to that person, although this waxes and wanes of course. But in general... .wanting them in your life, yearning to be in their company, know them more deeply than we do with casual friends.

2) Wanting what's best for them. This involves a setting aside of oneself.

Back to pwBPD, they seem to feel love on the 1) very, very keenly. This aspect of love is very much like need, and I'm not clear on the distinction or whether the two can be distinguished.

The more evolved of these people have a capacity for 2), although it seems very stunted because they're so self-involved. The more severe the BPD, the more I question whether there is ANY capacity for concern over others' well being.

When I think of the way in which a pwBPD loves it's different than that of most nons.

Whereas pwBPD choose to share their bucket of love with many anyones.

Nons seem to tend to share theirs with a select few special someones.

J

i struggle with what spacecadet mentioned.


for me, this is where my love can blend into codependent tendencies. had it before i came here, when i came here, and it still rears its head: i think i know whats best for everyone. inevitably, i often push it on them in some form. i get frustrated when it doesnt take.

there is a seed of love within that, i think. who doesnt want everyone to be happy, at peace, and living their best life? i have compassion for human suffering, or even every day frustrations. my faith commands me to help others who are struggling. to spiritually enrich the lives of others. to be a good example.

when im not careful, it can also be stifling, smothering, and disrespectful of another persons humanity and autonomy or even my own. i can be wounded (or at least pouty) when my efforts are rejected or impatient even when they are accepted. i do this in ways both big and small... .in the small cases its more trying to push my taste on them (im so obnoxious about this when it comes to music), or the latest concept ive learned that helped me.

my faith also commands that i help others selflessly. we learn a lot here about differentiation, about boundaries, about acknowledging and taking care of our needs, but i havent taken any of that to mean that i personally need to help less. learning about these things has helped me to help better and make it less about myself. not responding to that call (if there is call in the first place) with a rush to provide "whats best". to remove myself from the picture, at least as best i can.

have i improved? i am grateful that i can say yes. for starters, i am more self aware of my tendencies, i can catch them, and switch gears. i am a better listener. i have thicker skin when it comes to people rejecting my efforts, and i can take "no" for an answer even when its not clearly articulated. i better appreciate others, and what makes them unique. i better appreciate and understand their struggles (if they apply). when im helping someone struggling, i give far more mature advice. simply, ive taken some of the best aspects of my instincts and improved on them skillfully, and diminished some of the worst aspects in extent and frequency; they will always be a part of me and rear their head from time to time.

i have no idea what trajectory my ex is on currently. i think when we came together, we were on a similar trajectory... .in some ways we had learned from past mistakes and brought that into our relationship, and in other ways, we brought those past mistakes into our relationship, even made new ones. i think we learned a lot from each other, and in some ways, definitely grew together.

i encourage everyone to give this exercise a shot. itll be good for you  

Hi Jeffree
I agree with you about the BPD individual wanting to share their "bucket of love with many anyones". This makes sense when one considers their fear of abandonment, their need to have several possibilities lined up, just in case the partner leaves. I saw this clearly with my ex- when he sabotaged himself by telling me he no longer had to go to Walmart to strike up friendships with women, friendships that could jeopardize our relationship. He meant this as a compliment.

He is probably at Walmart right now, wandering through the aisles. For me he was the only one I wanted.
Zen606

once removed  

Well when you tend to have lots of the right answers... . 

I have something similar in my faith. At the same time, parts of the religious text I follow teach not to waste resources on undeserving persons. So I find the choosing bit hard. At the same time, putting limitations on myself and whom I help seems to improve my quality of life.
A high bar. I admire that.  :) I struggle with this too. Is the struggling whom we are to help? Today--while thankfully we don't often find people stripped and left for dead--to me, it's hard telling for whom we are to provide that care to. Complex methods and personalities make this job more difficult. In any case I'm so thankful many of us here are in that position of provision and not the other.

I think loving can sometimes be difficult.

Having grown up in a BPD family, I believe that I was groomed to want to help people I can't help. Indeed one of the biggest acts of love is not to rescue others, because when we do all the giving in a relationship, we are showing that we care more about their problems than they do and nothing changes. What is hard is to know when a BPD really needs help and when we are just plain rescuing them, and it is all so sad as they desperately crave having a loving person in their life that will do everything for them. I think sometimes the BPD feels our love and then maybe they do love us back in their own way; yet the loving feelings towards another are fleeting, and turn into hate when the fear of not being worthy of love and abandonment surfaces.

Well said. My mother had NPD and became more malignant as she aged. I went no-contact multiple times and gradually found a measure of peace there. It was easier in some ways because I was financially independent and moved across the country.

However, I married someone with "traits of" BPD. I look back and see how I was a magnet for him as much as he was looking for someone like me. It was good for many years until it began spiralling down. I actually thought that I could pull it out if I could just be a better spouse. Nope. Our long-term therapist (he had seen her as well) told me a full year before we separated that he was going to leave and predicted his suicide attempt and many of the things that have happened since. It's been uncanny how accurate she has been.

They do love, especially if they just have "traits of." They can be great partners and employees. However, when it gets malignant, you're looking at something else. When they are all about controlling and destroying, you have to step away.

Hi Meandthee 29,
I agree they do love, although once one realizes what is going on you start to doubt everything. Those individuals with bp traits can make great partners, for a while. My ex could be wonderful for 4 months, it was heaven to be with him, I thought him my refuge from the everyday world, and then something would happen in his head and he would self-sabotage. We went through 2 recycles. I could not stand another. Reminded me of my mother's behavior. Time to walk away from him -- NC for 7 months. LNC with my mom, a call every 6 months is enough for me.
Zen606

What is so insidious about people with BPD is the loving feelings don't last, yet they can have loving feelings for long periods of time until something triggers them into dumping hate onto a loved one. Healthy people get validated by their parent(s)/ person(s) who raised them so they are able to love under the most extreme circumstances. Viktor Frankl did not lose his capacity for loving feelings when he was put in a concentration camp; he indeed reminded himself that the Nazis could not control his feelings. Perhaps the path to healing for those of us who have/had a person with BPD so deeply affect our lives, is to strengthen our ability to feel love and compassion even under the most extreme circumstances, so we don't get triggered into feeling frozen by bitterness and anger. Perhaps this is why we are asking if a BPD person is capable of love. We want to feel the love of the BPD not the hate if we are indeed to heal, because the feelings of hate that are dumped on us will continue to just overwhelm us and paralyze our healing if we allow the hate to dominate our lives.

I've really enjoyed reading this discussion.  Now I'm going to chime in.   :)

I'm finding myself looking at this from three different angles of the question:

1) Are pwBPD capable of feeling long term emotional attachment?
2) Are pwBPD capable of choosing to put the needs/wellbeing of others ahead of their own (my simplest definition of love)?
3) Are pwBPD capable of sustaining an intimate relationship?

Of course, all of those questions apply to us nons as well, and I agree that all of these things lie somewhere along a spectrum with plenty of room for improvement all around.

I think the three categories are interrelated.  It's harder to choose to put the needs of another ahead of your own when you don't feel some emotional attachment.  It's harder to maintain an intimate relationship if you aren't consistently demonstrating a willingness to put the needs of your partner ahead of your own.

I am definitely aware that many of the actions I took that I believed were "loving", in that they put the perceived needs of dBPDxh ahead of my own, were often codependent and enabling and ultimately not the most loving things I could have done.  I know that I played a role that made it a lot easier for him to not recognize and seek treatment for his disorder and often I did so because it made ME feel better. 

I believe dBPDxh is as capable of all the definitions of love that we have come up with as I am, but I also believe that his disorder makes it less likely that he will choose to exercise that capability.  I believe that, barring a sustained effort on his part to learn to deal with his BPD, he will continue to discard relationships that don't center around meeting his needs.  I believe he will continue to choose behaviors that make him feel better in the moment but destroy trust.  I don't believe he will work towards a relationship that would consistently require him to set aside his own desires, as all loving relationships ultimately do.  For his sake and the sake of our sons I would love to be proven wrong.

Not to take this topic in a different direction, but I'm finding myself wondering if the question more relevant to where I am now is "Am I capable of recognizing the kind of healthy love that I want to offer and receive?"  I have known the "Love is patient, love is kind... ." definition all of my life, but have lived many years putting the label "love" on behaviors and feelings that I now see were not healthy or loving.  I've spent the last two years starting to put boundaries up regarding what I will not accept in a "loving" relationship and that has resulted in divorce.  I don't want to repeat my mistakes if/when I enter into other relationships and if I keep the same acting definition of love that I've had all these years, then there's not much hope for a different result.
 
BG

I am not sure that agape can exist in the emotional red zone (Dysregulation). Love is just not compatible with primitive survival instincts. True deep love is altruistic which is in direct conflict with typical narcissism experienced when anyone is fight or flight mode... .

But... .many pwBPD are not constantly dysregulating (I'm sure some are), which means there are windows of opportunity where we can experience a very deep personable, potentially altruistic love from them. Yes, some of these times will be in the shadow of guilt and remorse about their actions during a period of dysregulation but others will not. The idealisation phase is by it's very nature just a period where the pwBPD hadn't yet accumulated any emotional triggers or enough fear of loss such that they don't cross the emotional dysregulation line and were capable of love.

I believe the switching above and below the red zone means they are not capable of consistent love, but then since we are all capable of anger, capable of crossing the line into the red zone, we're all capable of periods where love cannot reside, but maybe longer extended periods where the ingredients for true love to flourish.