BPDFamily.com

Here we go the can opener.

Its talked about widely {except for here}

It makes sense to me theoretically. They are failed narcissists, it stands to reason they would admire a partner with the traits they covet

Your thoughts.

Maybe it's only fair i start off and not be so glib open ended.

Narcissist is the 2021 usurped bogeyman term no one wants to get remotely near it's pariah status. As. Much as cultural popularised trends its meaning in objective science is distored.

Narcissism is not by itself a. Disorder. Narcissism is functional and healthy to an extent it exists within all. Like anything else, healthy in moderation and part of wider development.

Who will have the backbone to admit narcissistic traits in second place. Bevause I beat you to it and claim first?

Im fine with it because im. Savvy to the literate and terminology rather than cultural distortions. Im a scientist not a social scientist but nonetheless able to make sense of the fundamentals.

I gave direction and inspiration to my ex. Lock and key. A. Good much in. That regard. She was clueless. Directionless. Hesitant. Identity devoid. I supplied alot that was missing.

Sex and nights out on the town. Let's face it, not exactly an irreplaceable skill to offer, nearly anyone can.

I was a professional pastry chef. One night i taught her to make a simple Victoria sponge cake. Its the start you give any prodigy. Within a few hours her mother and entire social network was told she was now a pastry chef.

Enamoured but simultaneously feeling.

Sad. Sad. Sad.

For her.

I hope thats open and honest enough as far as the rules of forum stipulations go

Your turn

There are healthy narcissistic traits - healthy as they help to set boundaries - then there is unhealthy narcissism.

Borderlines see themselves as helpless victims of life, while narcissists are deeply wounded and insecure people who attempt to hide this through projecting the opposite.

They have almost identical cores - inferiority, "not enough", and a sense of helplessness - but deal with them in different ways.

It would make sense that they would attract each other - one wants to be re-parented, the other wants total admiration. But it also seems apparent that that would eventually destroy each other.

The fragmented/disorganized mind meets the self-obsessed mind = Kaboom!

Jaded7's ex wanted the dishes on the table at 8:54pm, at 9:07pm she yelled at him for putting the dishes on the table.  The BPD mind knows not what it wants at any given moment.  To generalize is to speculate, the end result is Kaboom, as Grumpy pointed out the pwuBPD cannot maintain relationships...end of story.

I'll tell you what someone with BPD does not want--at least not long term--and this is drawing on my own experience.  They do not want someone with a strong self-concept, someone who has boundaries and knows how to keep them, someone who will hold them accountable,  or someone with a good memory for things said.

Basically someone who will keep them in check and say, "No, this kind of behavior is unacceptable in a relationship (or in general)."

Adults understand that they are not going to be lifted up by putting other people down.  Children don't, nor do Adults who regress to that child-like state.

i dont look at the DSM description of NPD and NPD traits and see myself much, if at all.

i looked into narcissism, as it applies to myself, a lot, in my recovery, and it informed it a great deal. it all started with the term "narcissistic wound", which doesnt really have much to do with big n narcissism, and more or less means "ego wound", but has strong implications for all of us and how, and whether, we recover.

i also recall that when i was going through my breakup, i had a strong need to believe that everything my ex was doing revolved around me. what i mean by that is hard to explain, but, for example, i needed, badly, to believe that her profile pictures were posted to gain my attention, that the fact that her new boyfriend looked strikingly like me was about her difficulty getting over me - there were a lot of things, big and small, that would hurt me, and id spin them in the most positive way to suggest that it all had to do with her struggling to get past me. i posted about it at the time, and a former member actually suggested i look into NPD  lol

it is embarrassing, in retrospect. my explanation is that i went from feeling unique and special to feeling uniquely unspecial and was struggling to cope with that...as many of us do.

we have a very popular thread here. its a workshop on "from idealization to devaluation - why we struggle". a member that was very popular, that went by the handle "2010" contributed to it, and talked a great deal about the "lonely child" schema. members here, overwhelmingly identified with it. i certainly did, myself. when it was pointed out that the lonely child schema is, in fact, a narcissistic schema, everyone went quiet.

its a long read, but id encourage everyone participating in this thread to read it: https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=161524.0

along the way in my recovery, i learned four things that were very humbling, but ultimately helpful.

1. we mate with our emotional equals.
2. 50% of romantic partners of a person with bpd have a personality disorder themselves
3. most of us were not with someone that would qualify for a diagnosis of BPD
4. the prevalence of people with NPD traits romantically pairing with someone with BPD traits is legendary

i think those things have a lot of bearing on us, as a support group, if we want to help each other get to the bottom of our relationship, and learn the lessons that we want to take into future relationships. i see it all the time: if your ex ever suggested you have a mental illness, that must be projection, yet, thats what all of us here are doing.

codependency, which a lot of us are quick to latch onto, because its less stigmatized, has a lot of overlap with both BPD and NPD. it has many of the traits of BPD, and underlying is a need to feel one up and superior in a relationship, to someone who is weaker.

i know now that for me, that had a lot to do with the fact that i couldnt cope with rejection and breakups of the past, and it put me in a psychologically much stronger position to feel that i was with someone that was "incapable" of leaving me. i know now, that the fact that she was capable, was what hurt so much.

i know now that im a highly sensitive person with a degree of need to be mirrored and loved for the reasons i want to be loved. its something i will always need to reality check, and compensate for.

i can look at any of these things under the umbrella of codependency, narcissism, or a highly sensitive person, without overly attaching to any of them, and see what i couldnt see at the time, and how to have a healthier relationship in the future.

for anyone reading, you dont have to be a capital N narcissist to gain a great deal of insight as to why you are struggling, by learning the differences between healthy and unhealthy narcissism.

Yes Once, what you point out is at the core of it.  We can use these guidelines to assess behaviors.  It's the "yardstick" we all can use.  Many of us have been through therapy and these conditions weren't the driver of our personalities.  Our BPD partners likely will not ever willingly participate in therapy or continue it, so how would we truly know other than using the DSM measuring tape and empirically observing their behaviors?

I see it as fair to say, "There must be something wrong with all of us since we got into a r/s with someone w/BPD and stayed for a bit".  But I see this as an oversimplification and glaringly obvious, as we have admitted to our faults and are learning to accept them.

I read some of the thread you linked to, it's good and over 4 pages long.  Now I regret posting on Cromwell's thread here since you have invited us to go into a deep dark rabbit hole.  I appreciate that you have the perspective to remember that this was discussed.  I read through 2010's post.  I think these words are interesting as he speaks to the "Lonely Child"


This is some of the disaster we all witness and experience.  I thought I wouldn't necessarily score on the Lonely Child test that Skip whipped up on the thread, but I came back as 1.9 (1.5 being "normal" whatever that truly means).  If we use that as the "ruler" in this situation I'm going to be sucked into the scenario presented by 2010.

I didn't see the discussions in that thread that led to your #2 and #3 conclusions.  Is that just something you came across along the way?  So you would say 50% of the people on this list have BPD themselves and more than 50% of their partners do not have BPD?  That is what I'm reading in points 2 & 3.  That's interesting.

That "lonely child" schema hit hard. That describes me perfectly. I've often told my therapist in therapy that I attracted my BPD through wearing a mask because I don't think my true self is worthy of love. And that mask definitely would have appeared narcissistic to her - arrogant, dominant, etc - as I basically mirror the preliminary behaviour of my Mum's first bf (who was a classic NPD). I do this because, well, Mum loved him, so that must be who I have to be to get love. Definitely can't be me, as that version was rejected in favour of him!

Also, where did you find evidence for this:


I often pride myself on my ability to read others, and this statistic definitely doesn't match my perception of those who post about their BPD exes - either here, on reddit, Quora or FB.

Also! While I never score high on NPD or BPD tests, I did just score 3.8 on that lonely child test  red-flag

Also also  lol

The term lonely child seems to be associated with narcissism. But, because it scared me, I just did another narcissistic personality test, and I scored close to zero.

How do I make sense of that? Is there a second cluster of people "lonely child" is associated with?

Let's form the "Lonely Child Camp" over here I'm going to plant a  yellow-flag because I'm not sure what it all means either, but I am happy to join the encampment and be Lonely Together! :wee:

Do you have a link to the narcissistic test Grumpy?  Let's air them out.

I did this one:

https://www.psycom.net/narcissistic-personality-disorder-test

Grumpy one explanation I'd offer is you are a college student in psychology and know the mechanics of point scores behind the tests. I have to sometimes use POMS2 and I've learned how to completely skew the results to however I'd want them to. There is a. Correlation between people getting higher scores in IQ tests the more they do, it does not mean their IQ has increased they just more confident and experienced at doing the style of questions.

Hi Cromwell,

Yeah, could be a possibility. But I always strive to answer these things honestly, so I don't think it's that. I don't exude narcissistic tendencies. If anything, I'd say I'm closer to borderline that narcissistic.

I look forward to what more Once can tell us about the lonely child.

This is interesting and, yes, eye opening.
I think I agree with #1- I've come to find my emotions are all over the place now that I am off my antidepressants - very much like what I've seen described by BPDs. I remember feeling like we understood each other, that we knew each other's pain - both of us had been hurt, both felt broken. Both with abandonment issues. The biggest difference is that he had the ability to flick a switch and cut me off with no looking back.  Having said that, I sometimes wonder if I have a PD - therapists say no so I guess I'll go with that. I admittedly show a symptom of two but nowhere near the threshold.

Now the NPD/BPD thing is interesting to me (I haven't referenced thread but plan to)- I read about that way back when he told me he was BPD. It struck me because he had told me way before that his ex-wife was NPD. I guess a big part of it is when the BPD idealizes the NPD, it feeds the NPD.
Actually, here, this is from a Quora post I saved some time ago:
"People with borderline personality traits are subconsciously looking to be reparented, they desperately crave security and saving from their own suffering, emptiness and self doubt.

People with traits high in narcissism tend to (but not always) project an air of confidence and worldliness, they know how to do things and get things without fear, they seem like a real adult to people with bpd, who are still pushed around by their emotions and paralyzed by fear and confusion. Someone who seems to actually have their sh*t together (a rarity in their own life) is exactly the kind of mentor they have always needed.

The narcissistic person upon noticing the way the person with BPD looks up to them feels a huge ego boost, they will begin doing things in order to secure more and more attention which will elicit greater and greater idealization from the borderline individual, they basically feed each others desires until it turns into fireworks."

There's more in the post, about how the relationship ultimately breaks down and such, but I found it to be a fascinating dynamic.
What struck me most was the second paragraph because, while I'm in no way narcissistic, I know Mr BPD saw me as having my sh*t together, that I was a "real adult" and a mentor - he basically alluded to it a few times, that he "wanted what I have", that he was "jealous of my success".  Little did he know I was an emotional mess in my own right  lol  lol 

Makes me wonder if I wasn't such a mess, where we would be right now. Honestly, if I was stronger emotionally I wouldn't have put up with his crap anyway, so I guess I'd still be single but he'd be pining over me  :) *)

ILMBPDC and I have had a discussion of just what it is that our BPDex's did to us with their mirroring, etc...It triggers a "self-love" that is inside of us where we are essentially trying to love ourselves via our BPDex.  It's so complicated I can't really  put words to it, but it relates to the emptiness of our ex's and pulling us in and mirroring our own wants and drives back at us.   What I'm talking about here doesn't relate to any dictionary definition of narcissism or any other term that I've yet seen developed.  Yet, it was something I experienced.

I am rejecting all of Once's four points and replacing them with a set of my own.  These are open for discussion and I would encourage you to submit your own as well.

1)  The pwBPD is an Emotional Child who can't handle their own emotions let alone understand yours.  This makes them a volatile and unstable person, incapable of higher emotional states such as empathy or true love.

2) They seek out people that have something they lack.  In my case it was my Self-Concept and self-confidence.  She thought (as many others do) she could get it by cutting me down and taking it from me.  That's not how it works.

3) The Monster (Mr Hyde, etc...) wants to destroy you.  Once that emerges it cannot be negotiated with or otherwise cajoled. It wants to annihilate whoever is in it's path.  You being their romantic partner are likely the prime target.

4)  They have some control, enough to change their behaviors or seek help.  Most chose not to.

Self-Concept, Self-Confidence, Self-Control, Self-Awareness should not be confused with a term derived from the Greek God Narcissus.  When I see the prior traits in others I feel inspired, rather than threatened.  I don't need to "take" it from them.  I need to aspire to be more like that, to develop more of that within myself.

If there's any Greeks I find inspiring it's the philosophers like Socrates.  It's alleged he went around saying "Know Thyself, Know Thyself..." People would ask him, "Do you know yourself?".  He'd reply "No, but I know this not knowing..."

My BPD ex showed traits of covert or introverted narcissism. It wouldn't surprise me if she was looking for ways to further develop that and use it for further manipulation or better her, already advanced skills, of story-telling.

I took a test similar to Grumpy's.  I scored 3 out of 40 or in the bottom 6% of narcissists.  Now if I retook it, and more honestly answered some of the questions on leadership, let's say, I probably would be in the  6-10 range otherwise known as "normal".

So I shared my results, and Grumpy's his.  How about your's Cromwell, you seem to have a keen interest in the subject.  Where do you come out?

I felt seen. I felt like he was the first person to understand me, finally. That desire to be seen, to be loved for me, the desire to have someone see and understand my shadows and still want me...its strong. The realization that it was mirroring was a complete mindf*** to me. And it was one of the hardest things to let go of - I'm not sure I have fully let go actually.

I never saw #3.  If I had it might have been easier to let go. I 100% concur with the rest.

So one thing I didn't get was the "love-bombing" that many of you got.  I got the "cold shoulder" and pulling-away and getting "stood up" repeatedly.  So these are traits of both Quiet BPD and introverted NPD, it's hard to say what's at work.  I did get some cool T-shirts and a candy bar filled with THC ,which was legally purchased.   :)

If anything in this r/s I did the love bombing, I thought she had her sh*t together.  I never got the "ego boost".  I never got anything really other than a "Meh, that's nice". I often got nothing, silence.  If I would solicit a response it was a put-down or sarcasm or criticism.  Yet I was addicted somehow.  I tried harder and harder to please her.

Another Lonely Child here! Wow. It's one thing to know it; I've had hunches and realizations about it, but it's quite another thing to read it as a descriptive/prescriptive terms, to hear it expressed concretely. I even knew that these deep-rooted thought patterns affected my relationships, but understanding why I might have been so validated by my ex because of it is insightfully profound. It makes a lot of sense.

Christ on a cracker, so much of that thread could have been written about my relationship.
Definitely the Lonely Child aspects, definitely the point about "*Both need saving* Both need attachment to stave off the pain of being alone."  I actually thought that because we understood each other's pain and loneliness it would bring us closer together and we could heal each other. I am not a dumb person, I really don't know why I expected that to be the case but at the time it seemed to make sense. And his love bombing made me feel wanted, desired, loved, whole, for the first time in a really long time. 
I recognize this was a messed up dynamic from the start. I've said it a hundred times, but the best thing he ever did was cut me off so I could wake up and figure it all out. 

The Lonely Child encampment grows... yellow-flag  It's a hit Once, I mean, it's no 1966 Cyrkle hit, but close   :)


Giving myself a BINGO!  Yeah Wow.  How about a little "Cheese and Rice" to go with your Christ on a Cracker?

mmmmm, cheese.

Maybe you're a Cheesehead too?  lol (Slang for Green Bay Packer Fan)


Cheese and summer sausage on a crispy Christ-cracker!  I've written these words almost exactly several times in posts explaining my relationship with my BPDex.  I said 'I projected my ideal relationship onto her, and she was a blank canvas who complied.  She in return projected her shame and guilt onto me.'  Read on...


How does someone ever overcome this?

Ad meliora. I was diagnosed with personality disorder non specified. Two decades ago, the label washes out in a time frame like that as much as a garment in washing machine will fade the ink on the label away. The most recent update is I have no mental illness not even depression which i self reported with.

Narcissism. As much mild traits at times as the average, its. There but in the healthy form. It is functional and takes understanding to appreciate its importance.

Its a rabbit hole when you start psychiatrising things too much. The root issue in these after relationships is giving treatment for the emotional pain so the afflicted can self heal and find balance. From balance life can go on in new direction with hopefully more resilience from what has learned by the very upsetting experience.

So im. Not ignoring the test or your queustion, my answer to it, it doesn't matter its going off on tangents. Im healed this is to help others in their recovery. Im just a facilitator.

Cheesehead  lol lol lol
I started excerpting too, then realized I was excerpting most of it. We never got to the engulfment state because he cut me off before we got that serious but everything before that was textbook. I knew I was a lonely, neglected child, but seeing it written out like that was like someone was watching my life...eerie

What textbook

Stop hiding behind the elaborate emhellishshed psychiatry buzzwords and start facing the {soft} easily parry blows that have been directed.

The sooner the better Bevause the quicker youll be able to lead a more happier life

I have no idea is this is directed at me or at the thread in general (or honestly what half of it even is supposed to mean) but I, for one, am not hiding behind anything. I have thrown myself in the hellstorm of figuring out what my own issues are and laying them bare for all to read with the express desire to lead a happier life.
If you don't like psychiatry buzzwords, why are you even here?

Hi all,

So I would agree with ILMBPDC... I'm curious about what you say about 'we can heal each other'.. it's a collaborative approach that I also share with you, just because I think things like intimacy, trust, interdependence, and growing/collaboration are really important in life. Of course, these things are toxic when it comes to codependency (expecting the other to do things for you) or rescuing, but at the same time I don't think an impulse towards fixing situations is wrong. So honestly - and I'm curious what you think about this - I still believe it's possible to find a partner who has trauma in their background or who was a lonely or abandoned child and work through it.. it can be a rocky road, but at the same time the attraction is there for a reason.

If I was reflecting on my relationship I would say that my problem was that I was coming from this standpoint, whereas my partner wasn't. If I was always strong, knew where my boundaries were, and generally suggested these sorts of ideas (like a relarionship as a 'collaboration' between two people) my ex was enthusiastic. But she had no basis herself to look at problems this way, and I just assumed from the times she had been supportive or intelligent or resourceful that she did. I didn't realize I was dealing with BPD in the background, where many times she disappeared it was because of shame, anxiety, fear, or whatever else. I think real trust takes a long time to build and I think what's damaging about these relationships is that it really damages that fundamental trust.. at least for me, the trust that other people won't act in predatory ways, won't always look for their own advantage, etc.

As for your 4 points, Ad Meliora, I would agree with them.

1) I wanted to try and help and guide this child, once I saw she was there... but my ex also would never accept help from anyone, so this was a lost game

2) In my case this was my ability to be both strong and vulnerable, which she often commented upon, and also the first strangest comment I got when I felt she might be codependent 'when you're free it helps me to be free'. Never understood what that meant

3) I agree with this. I also got 'complete annihilation'. I still struggle with the hit to my self worth this took. At the same time, it isn't really us they are annihilating, is it? it's their frustrated relationship to their parents. Cold comfort I know, but I try to remind myself of that as it helps to detach.

4)I don't know. Maybe you feel this was true with ex. My ex said to me 'I feel like I have no control' when actually, she had control over everything (I was scared, confused, and had acceded this... instead of very strong asserting boundaries, which I think would have calmed her down). So I really feel like there were just 2-3 dissociated parts of my ex's identity that really weren't integrated or couldn't 'speak' to each other... instead of a personality as a spectrum, her personality was divided.. and this makes me feel very sorry for her.

I also say that cause of the mixed signals I would get, which I still honestly hope one day to understand. She wrote me 'I never want to talk to you again' and then unblocked me the next day. She would refuse to talk to me but then make playlists about how sorry she was and how she would always love *someone* etc. Just like two opposite parts of the same coin that never see each other. Drove me crazy, and I still get triggered about it.

I read the lonely child schema when I first arrived here, and it made things make so much sense to me. At the same time, from a critical perspective, since we are 'understanding driven', of course we like such a neat and complex description. Also, it made me feel very used to read I was just a 'part time good (sense of self)' for the BPD... and the article on this website, 'my definition of love', countermands that by saying the love was real for them, too, although then changed in very drastic ways.

of course, you should show love, not just say it or exploit it.. I'm not arguing with that. Just that the idea of being a part time good means that ppl with BPD are truly irredeemable.. that they just use people.. and, depsite the evidence to the contrary, I just don't want to believe that. I still hope, in general, for a better outcome, a better world, than that idea of using and discarding.

I have an extremely strong intuition, but I do not place my trust in it when I fall in love - which has been twice: the first time with my daughter's mother, who also had trauma as a child. We had a rocky short romance. 20 years later, we are now great friends.

With my current ex - my alarms rang off the hook, but I didn't know if it was just fear on my part. It was NOT just fear on my part. It's almost as if I was looking into a crystal ball. I sensed, and told my ex, "I feel that you're with me because I am good for you in the moment." She denied it, and told me she was committing to helping me feel otherwise. During our first rupture - because I did not care for her after a surgery in a very specific way (I had agreed to do it in that specific way, in all fairness, but in no way do I feel like the way I did care for her deserve that anger with which she responded) - I saw her coldness and callousness, which was the hallmark of the way her mother treated her. At a young age, my ex's mother told her, "You're a good girl, and if I wanted to be a mother, I'd want to be your mother, but I don't want to be a mother;" she then cut off almost all communication with my ex. Brutal. After that first rupture with my ex, I noticed her cold behavior and thought to myself, "Wow, my gf is acting just as cold and callous as her mother must have been to her." All my alarms were blaring, but I did not heed them. I, the lonely child, had found the one person in more than 20 years that actually understood me, so why should I heed them? Because of the love we both felt, our issues were not going to stand in the way. We understood each other.

When my ex ended it, it was the coldest, most callous thing I have ever experienced. "You are just using me," I told her, and then she yelled that we should break up. That was it. Over. Done.

Look, I made some mistakes in this relationship; common mistakes, I think, that we all make as we are getting to know someone, and are learning to "speak their language" of trauma. My mistakes came from assuming she was as independent as me, and could be so within the dynamics of relationship. For decades, I had forged my independence, rarely asking for help of any kind, not even as a single father with primary custody. I thought that type of independence, of flexibility, was the hallmark of adult behavior, as well as being able to accept when things didn't work our exactly how they were expected to work out.

This thread, more than others, has REALLY helped me see what happened and why.

Yeah Poppy, what you say makes a lot of sense.  Thanks for taking the time to write it down.  What I read from the lonely child is we also have this need to understand.  This need we had triggered the behaviors in our BPDexes so then we get into all those word soup terms like dysfunctional dance etc... which apparently Cromwell doesn't like (it's his thread so ok).  Let's just say we start going round and round with each other, but maybe it's just like two dogs chasing their own tails only to stop and growl at each other because it's seeing another dog in the mirror, their self, but it is another person.  For us, we assume they have a "self", we're learning they don't.  Now how in the f :cursing: can that be?  You, me, ILM, Grumpy, and everyone else have no way of understanding that type of existence.

We go on, we try to "fix".  They don't want to be fixed.  We try to "love" they don't want to be loved, at least not in the way we are familiar with.  We give up and retreat, and that's the last f :cursing: ing thing they want.  We do see them as childish and entitled.  They may be even proud of it.  We don't understand this is their 'language of love'.  We say, "What, a 50 year old woman gets to act like a 5 yr old and I'm supposed to love that? Gimme a break!"

It's all so more complicated than just the Lonely Child (LC) schema or whatever you want to call it.  That's why I pushed back on Once's points, but he has a point.  Cromwell likes to get at narcissism, I didn't see that at play.  After reading the lonely child story, that makes it look like falling in love with yourself is what's going on.  Again, it's all more complicated for each of us, but perhaps he has a point there too.

The first thing I felt after reading the LC story is sorry for my BPDex.  Seeing that maybe in battling me she was just trying to battle her own demons from childhood, which must be immense. (semi-haha)  It makes me want to contact her, even though I know that's just no good.  I was trying to think of what I'd say.  I like to write words and sometimes 'overshare' as my BPDex pointed out and disliked.  I really want to say "You're not a failure".  Our r/s = Massive Failure.

I can't even think of an analogy.  Ammonia and Chlorine, maybe.  Both are great cleaning agents.  Neither are "bad" per se.  You can put both on just about every surface and they do a good job.  Both readily mix with water and can be used in the same way.  Everyone knows (I hope) not to mix the two and it's easy to do sometimes because bathroom agents aren't always properly labeled with the active ingredient.  You see they don't have a WARNING LABEL on them, so to speak.  They meet, the vessels look good to each other.  They mix, and there's tremendous heat and next thing you know a toxic gas is released and everyone is gagging.  Our BPDexs just run away, blame us, and that's the end of it.  We are left injured, shell-shocked, wondering just what the heck happened there?

I agree with you here.  I think you joined the list at a good time.  I feel like saying where was this "Lonely Child" topic 3 months ago! lol  It was right there all along.

You can see from that dynamic that a lot of the problem is we want to understand and we can't understand a person not having a "self" it looks ridiculous even when I write it.  We can dig into it more as we talked about our tolerance for pain.  It may have kept us in the r/s a bit longer too.  We ground through it, so to speak, hoping we'd get to the summit.  We suffered and at the end it's just a "Whaaaaaa the f- :cursing: is going on here?"

You're right. And I can relate to so much of the emotional territory you outline in your post. What you describe is my experience too. But I also don't want to make a retrospective understanding that can 'draw all the threads together'. I say that cause I am 95% sure my ex was diagnosed with BPD from a former breakdown. Therefore, the writing was in the sand for her..as the Ammonia, let's say. But I didn't know anything about it. My 'Chlorine' was to presume she had that sense of self... and it's true we can't understand that worldview, but it's also a pretty damaging thing to bring into a relationship.. always checking the others mental health history or whatever. Untreated BPD just shouldn't date :/ that's partly my conclusion. Or: it takes two ppl to do the work, and I didn't fully. understand that before, to be very cautious about that. I don't know, I feel like being totally defined by 'ex of BPD trauma factory' is a designation that, while it applies to me, I also want to reject :) That's where's I'm coming from. But I can't deny my entry in that club either :)

Cromwell, thanks for answering.  And thanks for starting this thread, yes it is going off on tangents, but most do.  Besides, these tangents are helpful to others in their recovery.  The tangents are helpful to me.  Isn't that your goal as well?

That's good you see yourself as a facilitator of the well-being of others.  Admirable, commendable, but how about you and your healing journey?  Can anyone truly have too much healing?  I'm basically saying, can anyone have too much love? 

I will answer your question to ILM here the best I can.  The "textbook" is metaphorical, but there is an actual textbook: The DSM V.  Some behaviors will be ones easily traceable to BPD and NPD and stated in there or on this website. Others will be unique to our exes, others, and ourselves.  We spend a lot of time on all of these on the threads.  So "Splitting" is in the textbook, opening up 300 cans of Soup in a row, maybe not.  So "Mirroring" is in the textbook, a grown man taking a dirt bike off of Sweet Jumps is not.  Maybe the latter are crazy behaviors, maybe not.

For me, I would likely not be as magnanimous as you when I felt fully healed.  I'm spending time here rather than taking a nap, or listening to Daft Punk at volume 11, because I am seeking healing.

I feel like maybe if you felt like being even more generous with your time and experience you likely have even more stories to share that could help facilitate healing faster for some, like me, who are lesser informed on the self-work.

*mod*  Violating posts have been removed so that the discussion can continue ~ November 19, 2021, 03:26:39 PM CST by Skip

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Ad, to be very clear, these are not my points, my thoughts, or my theories. the views expressed are not those of once removed  :)


this is the basis of bowens family systems theory.

bowen was a physician during world war 2. the very short version is that he wondered why some soldiers came back from war worse off than others. his research revealed that it boiled down to an individuals level of self differentiation - self differentiation is synonymous with emotional maturity.

similarly, take a loving family that, for example has three daughters. two navigate life okay, or great, one develops bpd. why?

similarly, take four people that date someone with bpd. one gets out quickly. one struggles, but after processing their grief, bounces back. one struggles, for years, during the relationship, and afterwards. one never gets over it and a deep wound develops. why?

this is one, when ive seen it shared, or shared it myself, that gets a lot of pushback. i dont know if thats denial, or misunderstanding, but i honestly think a lot of it is the latter.

it was a hard concept for me to grasp. my ex and i did not manifest at all in the same way. she was prone to emotional outbursts, lashing out at people, higher than average jealousy, things im not. so how were we the same emotionally?

navigating life on a similar emotional plane is not the same thing as acting alike. you can have two very needy people, for example, with very different kinds of needs.

additionally, our level of emotional maturity is not something that is fixed or static or permanent. we can grow.

more here: https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=275714.msg12612781#msg12612781


its challenging to find a good source on this because most of my searches yield results that are about people with BPD.

i dug this up, but you have to pay to read the full article:


if youd like more, i can find it. its buried here on bpdfamily somewhere.

importantly, though, this isnt to suggest that 50% of members here have a personality disorder, any more than it is to suggest all of our exes have one.

most of our partners had traits of BPD, or another mental illness. most of us have traits of a PD, or another mental illness. 30% of the population, at any given time, struggles with mental illness (which may include short term mental illness). that number is much higher here. around 80% of the members here arrive clinically depressed, and experiencing cognitive distortions.

but yes, there are members here, on this very board, with personality disordered traits, or a full blown personality disorder. i think its something worth exploring about ourselves (i may not be "a narcissist", but i have learned a lot about my blind spots by discovering my own narcissism), and something to consider when we help others reach for detachment.


this one also gets a lot of pushback, understandably. we are all here because we were, or are, heartbroken over a very difficult person that we loved, and suffered over, and an explanation for that suffering means a great deal.

if your ex were diagnosable, they would most likely already be diagnosed.

there are lots of people with borderline personality. and then there is somewhere between 1-5% of the population that has borderline personality disorder.

borderline is a personality style. a set of traits, characteristics, and common behaviors.

those things become a personality disorder when those traits are causing severe distress and impairment on ones life. an eating disorder, a suicide attempt, seriously reckless behavior that lands you in psychiatric help that, along the way, diagnoses you and attempts to treat you.

it has nothing to do with the difficulty you cause in the lives of others, and everything to do with the difficulty you are personally experiencing in your life as a result of your personality traits. there are millions of difficult people that screw over everyone they ever associate with, but dont have a personality disorder.

its a little bit of a semantic difference. you can have subclinical bpd traits and be a more difficult, more destructive person in the lives of others, than someone that would, for a variety of reasons.

have you ever taken some time to read the son/daughter board? these are loving parents posting about a son or daughter with a far higher degree of dysfunction than most of us experienced.


mirroring is a normal human behavior that facilitates bonding. if i laugh at your joke, if i nod as you explain something, im mirroring you. if i validate your point of view, if we laugh at the same family guy joke, we are mirroring each other. in fact, according to freudian theory, personality disorders develop/we fail to develop a sense of self when our mothers fail to mirror us in infancy.

this is one of the most commonly misunderstood bits of terminology here.

it is common - extremely common - to hit it off with someone, to bond with someone, for whom you seem to have everything in common at first. you love everything they love, and they love everything you love. to be attracted to their quirks, to idealize what you will eventually find incredibly annoying. this is the honeymoon phase of a relationship when we all have rose colored glasses.

people with bpd traits just mirror other people at an above average level because theyre insecure, lack a sense of independence, and are desperate for approval.

people that date people with bpd traits (in general) have an above average level of need to be mirrored. the description of the lonely child is just that. they struggle when that mirror is not consistently held up, and struggle to get it back. we arent victims of a well thought out tactic. we overinvested in a fantasy.

having said that, i have read this notion that "we fell in love with ourselves" many times. for starters, i would ask if thats realistic. was there really nothing you loved about your partner? if so, what were you doing?

and if what you were doing was falling in love with yourself, what healthy person gets into a relationship to fall in love with themselves? doesnt that scream "narcissism"?

so, there may be a kernel of truth to the notion for some of us. there was a heavy investment and fantasy in how someone made us feel, and part of our struggle has less to do with the loss of them, and more to do with the loss of that, and what it subsequently exposes. but im always confused when i see it expressed as something to pat ourselves on the back for.


Ad, respectfully, these are feelings about your experience (there is not a great deal that is factual to them), and i would challenge you (all of us), at this stage, to broaden them if you want to heal and learn the lessons you want to take into future relationships.

if people with bpd seek something in us that they lack (seriously, who doesnt?), what is it that we are seeking? what exactly do we get from trying to make another person complete?


youre onto something, grumpydonut. keep digging.

the most ironic thing about my recovery was that when i realized how similar my ex and i really were (not necessarily specifically, but operating on the same plane), when i learned more about who i was and what i was blind to, how i saw myself vs how others saw me, put together all of my other previous failed relationships, it disabused me of the notion that i was a victim of anyone or anything, and that, in turn, helped me to heal, and to free myself from continuing to make the same mistakes. mind you, that took a few years, and some more continuing to make those same mistakes, but once i saw it, i couldnt unsee it.

Ok the thread is open and you took the time to go through my points, thank you.  I appreciate you also sharing the link on the "Lonely Child" as I think that's been helpful to many others.

I should've more clearly stated that my points were from my own experience, I intended to say that and see I didn't.  This isn't a "scientific" discussion on NPD so no sources are given.  I'll list my specific difficulty with the points you listed.

1, we mate with emotional equals.  In general this makes sense and I think any long term r/s this would have to hold true. Most people posting have had relatively short-term relationships with their BPDex's.  Here's where I take issue.  Do you know how to do Calculus?  I'm a bit rusty, but I'm asking because even if I know how to do calculus I still retain my ability to do basic addition and subtraction.  It is possible that two people at two different levels will indeed come together and stay together for reasons other than the mathematical abilities.  Catch my drift?
Especially if the one partner is really good at pretending to be good at math.  This will only buy so much time though.  I'm also thinking a bit about tromp l'oeil here.  Someone could have 20/20 vision but the artist is just that good, they can fool most (into walking into a brick wall, for example).

Point 2,  You still need a source on that, otherwise it is just like my points.  In general terms I think there will be people who fit together mostly because we're assuming Point 1 holds 100%.   I'm sure there are many who have a PD and even more who fall into that 20-30% who suffer from depression and more temporary forms of illness. As for my partner specifically (Point 3) she likely was diagnosed.  She was taking several anti anxiety/depression meds, but she would never tell me why.  She didn't want anyone to know.  Many partners would fall into this category.  As I said we have to do the best we can and say "Oh, I witnessed 8 of the 9 primary BPD traits, it might be slightly likely she has some form of a diagnosable PD"

I feel without acknowledging that there might be a high chance our ex's had a PD it diminishes the pain and suffering others have on this list.  You explained it, that yes some may not fit the clinical diagnosis, but many will.  We can't know.  While the people participating here have come for healing and learning about our selves and how we got caught up in this mess, our exes have not.  People are then told "Nah, they prolly got nuttin wrong wit 'em, just a jerk", is one possible take away without further explanation of the points.

I get it, without reading the other boards, someone with 3 or 4 traits can wreak havoc.  Fair point, of course that's true.

Point 4.  No source given.  It's just assumed and I'm sure there is some scientific backing and it makes sense.  Anecdotally, Grumpy and I took a test and shared results.  He said close to zero I said 3/40 (lower 6 percentile).  I can take it again and get a 6 or a 9/40 but still I'm in the normal range.  I don't have NPD yet I got taken by my BPDex via the lonely child scenario.  I don't score that high on the "vulnerable child" schema either, but yet apparently it was enough.  As posted it looks like you're saying, there's data supporting this and I feel this is true.

Certainly the microscope should be turned inward, but what about the BPD's moving about out there free-range?  Wreaking havoc on the unwary and unwitting.  No warning labels posted for others to be aware of and no intention of getting treatment.  What's the outlook and prognosis for that scenario?

Our exes are just out there roaming around, causing more damage unwilling to even start on this journey.  I know it is what you hear and see the most on this board and I am certain it makes long-term viewers of it bored, but to me it is still the fact and what people are coming here wrestling with as a primary adversary until they can get to the higher levels of thinking about their own pain, or causes of what got them in that predicament in the first place.

It's not the points so much as the approach, dumped on us for the already damaged and confused to further have to sort through to make sense of.  While we're already in a highly confusing situation lacking any kind of experiential reference point.

This makes me shudder. My ex started telling me that she wasn't using me without prompt after using me. I never accused her of it, but I could sense it and she knew I could. I flip flop between feeling of scorn and pity on this.

This is a good discussion, guys. I hope it continues.

Maybe the subject question to explore would be more complete if worded as:

Why are people on the BPD trait spectrum so often attracted to people on the NPD trait spectrum and vice versa.

This book delves deeply into the subject.

(https://bpdfamily.com/book-covers/0876306342.jpg)

(https://bpdfamily.com/book-covers/spacer.gif)

The Narcissistic / Borderline Couple Author: Joan Lachkar, PhD Publisher: Brunner/Mazel; 1 edition (February 1, 1992) Paperback: 242 pages ISBN-10: 0876306342 ISBN-13: 978-0876306345 (https://bpdfamily.com/book-covers/spacer.gif) (https://bpdfamily.com/book-covers/locate.png) (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=56788.0)

To add more granularity to the comments discussed earlier (thanks Once Removed)...  

1. We mate with our emotional equals.

I think of this in terms of being similar EQ score, but, of course, not identical in every element of emotional intelligence. This can be hard to see as we often over estimate our own EQ and tend to be blind to the areas where we are weak.

2. 50% of romantic partners of a person with bpd have a personality disorder themselves

This statement refers to clinical levels of BPD. So what happens when we are dealing with sub-clinical levels; traits? It's easy to see that 50% of the people here (involved with "BPD trait" partners) have, or are close to having, a diagnosable mental condition or substance issue. When you consider that 29% of the population over all has a diagnosable mental condition or substance issue, its not hard to imagine that in BPD relationships the incidence is almost twice the general population.  NPD Traits? Depression? Dependent personality issues?

3. Most of us were not with someone that would qualify for a diagnosis of BPD

I think everyone sees this... low levels of BPD can be devastating to romantic partner.

4. The prevalence of people with NPD traits romantically pairing with someone with BPD traits is legendary

Don't be afraid of this. People with BPD traits will go to great length to deny them for many reasons and the same is true for people with NPD traits. It's called "Anosognosia (https://bpdfamily.com/content/how-to-get-borderline-into-therapy)". I don't want anyone to think that I'm trying to convince them that they have NPD traits - not everyone here does. But I am saying don't be afraid of this and be quick to dismiss it. Knowing your own weaknesses is the first step to conquering them.  Don't run because of all the stigma and internet noise that casts NPD traits as Megalomania or malignant narcissist. Don't expect that having NPD traits is going to glaringly obvious to you or others. Most of the narcissism I see here is not the spectrum of the grandiose sub-type, but rather the spectrum of the vulnerable sub-type. There is a reason why audiences here often identify with the Lonely Child schema. Finding out what is driving your woundedness and how to work with yourself will be very freeing.

Anyway - some thoughts to ponder.

Thanks Skip.  That book sounds interesting and worth the read.  I watched the complete talk by Dr. Amador several weeks back and his explanation of Anosognosia, it was fascinating to me.

Well my "Lonely Child" also has the "Angry Child" to back him up.  The latter pushes back against picking on others, especially in a vulnerable position, or who lack a voice.  He cannot stand injustice, perceived or real.  I think those schemas helped me in past roles as community organizer pushing back against large multi-state polluters, for example.  Doesn't mean that I still don't see they are now outdated and outmoded today at age 49.

Believe me, I know you guys are trying to help.  I sincerely appreciate it.