BPDFamily.com

Hi again and again! I was wondering do all pwBPD criticize others intensely, specially when they're angry?

I know this is a very toxic behavior, but I've realized whenever my partner criticizes me with anger (like about my favorite bands even, my friends, etc) it'll be harder for me to share stuff with him, and he is simultaneously angry that I don't share personal stuff and feelings with him.
What is the best way to face such situations?

Yes, one of the symptoms of BPD is inappropriate an intense anger.

I absorbed a lot of criticism from my ex. Something I only learned after my last break-up is that when my ex was most critical, it was because she was angry about something completely unrelated to the criticism. And I suspect that a lot of that anger was actually being driven by fear of abandonment.

But I couldn't see any of that in the moment. I only heard the criticism.

In my experiences with people with BPD, I experiened that people with BPD project their anger onto others by talking badly and incessantly about others either directly or indirectly usually with intense anger in their voices and body language. My mother with BPD is deceased. I found it did not work to allow my mother with BPD to unload her anger on me by listening to her criticize other people or me. When the criticism started, I learned to end the conversation quickly.

I have sadly the same problem with my dbpdw, where I rarely share many of my thoughts with her, because I have to filter it through whether it’s “safe” or “worth it” to do so, because my wife is jealous of anything and everyone I’ve ever loved. It started with not being allowed to mention my ex’s name - ok I get it - but I was with him for 14 years, we traveled the world together and did so many things… and I was told to never mention those 14 years. However it is also problematic for me to talk about childhood friends or teenage antics… or family. Finally, my wife wants me to tell her about my day at work etc, tell her about our time apart. But she doesn’t like it when I talk about colleagues or students or betray the fact that I like them in any way. In the early days when our relationship was online, I was accused “you love your cat more than me “ and “you love chocolate more than me”. I am also criticised for talking about our children or mundane things like the running of the household. Oh and I’m not allowed to say “I love you”. No wonder I posted on here the other day, “what do people talk about?”

The hardest aspect is not so much the denigrating itself but the desire for you to get on board with it and validate their view. Often the goal is to get you to validate being onside with them than the criticism itself.

Learning how not to validate the invalid without triggering an escalation, especially bringing it down on your own head, can be a challenging task.

That's how I exactly feel sometimes! Sometimes we're so close and I feel safe talking about anything with him, but sometimes I think what do people talk about? And those times I always thought there's probably a problem in me, or for real in out relationship until I found out I'm too insecure to share.

You're totally right. I was playing along with him in the past but I'm sick of the damage it has done to me up to this day.
I've tried to see his point of view without validating it, or disagree with him, but either way it just makes him angry. It's a real challenge.