Behaviors associated with NBPD and BPD

[Depression = 72% of members]

Hey There,

I have't posted in awhile; I visit my family here on this site every now and then since my 5 year relationship has ended with NBPDgf. I am presently moving on from that relationship which has/had effected me so. As we all know they are captivating and charming at first, and it's that high that we are always willing to chase until the chase isn't worth the effort any longer.

I wanted to share something that I have read by Doug Bartholomew, MS, LMHC on the behavior traits of a person with NBPD or BPD. This may help all those that question themselves with the questions; was it me of was it them? Who was that person? Should I stay with this person or should I leave? Can I make a difference? Will they ever change? Bottom line; two people can't be in a relationship of oneness!

What are the behaviors associated with people with the traits of narcissistic or borderline personality disorders?

Doug Bartholomew, MS, LMHC (blog article)

This isn't going to be about diagnosing someone sight unseen.  That takes an individual assessment with a licensed professional, and even then that can miss the mark.  Even without all the criteria for a specific disorder these clusters of behavior - behavior, not symptoms - are what can ruin our lives and relationships.  So my focus is on this cluster of behavior, not necessarily any one diagnosis.  The diagnosis might be relevant if the person seeks therapy, but otherwise our focus needs to be on what they are doing to you.

While there are many long lists of the traits and behaviors of these groups of individuals, the following appear to be the most apparent.

Note

It is important to start with an understanding that no one grows up saying "when I grow up I want to have a personality disorder and cause my loved ones such fear and pain that they lose their identity and don't love me."  No one wants to be this way or have their loved ones feel toward them the way you might be feeling.  This is a  cluster of traits and behaviors which they have learned over the course of their lifetimes.  That doesn't make it okay.  If someone has epilepsy that isn't' their fault, but until they get their seizures under control we can't allow them to drive a car: if they have a seizure while driving they could kill a lot of people.

By the same token we need to have compassion for our partner with the traits of Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) or Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), while still not excusing the behavior, while still not tolerating or enabling it.  We need to have compassion for their lack of compassion, but still not let them violate our needs, rights, boundaries and identity.

Lack of compassion or empathy



The overwhelmingly most commonly mentioned behavior or trait associated with all the Cluster B Personality Disorders is a lack of empathy or compassion.  They seem unmoved by the effect their behavior has on their loved ones other than what is necessary to keep their loved ones engaged and around.  It is as if they were tone deaf or color blind to the feelings and experiences of others.

Because most of the skills and strategies and techniques we learn in the course of our lives for dealing with relations are based, to one degree or another, on the assumption that the other person to some degree or another "cares", we can feel really disabled, really crazy, when those assumptions don't work with someone who sincerely and genuinely doesn't care because they genuinely don't free what you feel, don't experience your pain or discomfort.

A relationship of one



Whether a person has the traits of narcissism or borderline personality disorder, the net effect is that they really are the only person in the relationship.   While the dynamics of what that is the case are different in the two groups, and the other personality types in Cluster B, the net effect is the same: they are the only person in the relationship.  What is good or bad in the relationship is measured by how it fills their need for attention, fills their sense of emptiness, not about how it meets the needs of others.

Over time everything about the relationship slowly or quickly becomes about them, not about you or the children.

A good example is the father who demanded that his sons play soccer, not football, because he was a good soccer player and could stand out as a soccer coach, but was a poor football player, so he wouldn't make a good impression as a coach.  The fact that his sons really wanted to play football and hated soccer didn't matter: all that mattered was what would make the father look good.

In another case a man's mother died on a Thursday and on Saturday his wife had the annual picnic for her office.   She demanded that her husband and children go to the picnic in spite of their grief and act happy and not talk about Grandma dying in order to make a good impression on her coworkers.

Loss of Self



Probably the most painful thing for me to watch as a therapist is what happens to someone who lives in a relationship of one for any length of time, and ends up losing who they are.  Eventually, as you compromise one thing after another, you become simply an accessory in the psychological world of the other person.   Your own needs, wants, and feelings become secondary to the other person's issue so long you forget who you are.

Depression, low self esteem, self-loathing, and emptiness are common complaints among people presenting for therapy who, come to find out, are in relationship with someone with the traits of NPD/BPD.

What is even more troublesome is when the recipient, the non-NPD/BPD person eventually buys into the world of the NPD/BPD and becomes like them, becoming manipulative, violent, abusive or blameful.   A different version of this is when they take the side of their partner and become suicidal.  After all, if their spouse thinks that they are worthless, that they are nothing, then that must be true.

Manipulation

Manipulation, in the literal sense of the word, isn't a bad thing.  It simply means you and I negotiate for what we need.   I agree to drop off the laundry and you agree to make some business calls.

What we usually mean, however, is when that negotiation violates our needs and rights.  For example if you fake an illness in order to force me to pick up the laundry whether I want to or not.    If I get you to make the business calls by threatening that if I have to do I will tell the $%^&* credit card company to %^&* of and they can take their &*(0 card and &*(0  it.   In a panic that I would ruin our credit by doing that you hurriedly agree to make the call.

In the case of people with the traits of Narcissism or Borderline Personality Disorders their need to meet their needs at all cost is so urgent that they often violate the needs of their loved ones to get those needs met.  Getting what they want is not just the most important issue: it's the only issue, because otherwise they feel their emptiness or lack of attention is unbearable.

One man agreed to let his wife get some elective surgery done to make her more comfortable.   Then he picked her up at the hospital in a 1964 fully restored Studebaker Avanti, a very rare, classic automobile.   When she objected he just said "I'm sorry, I thought that since it was okay for you to be happier it was okay for me to be happier too.  I'd be happy to return the car, but would you want to have your surgery undone?"

This is a good example because the minute the attention was on his wife's illnesses and needs he panicked, he felt he was going to be dis-existed and he had to do whatever he could, including manipulate her financially, to become the center of the relationship again.

It is important that I note that not all people who manipulate have the other traits of people with Narcissistic or Borderline Personality Disorders, only that it is one of the traits of those clusters of behavior.

It is also important for me to note that even when the behaviors are the same, the psychological reasons for being manipulative in the two groups might be very different.  Hopefully you can address the behavior and not be distracted or dissuaded by what the underlying motives might be.  It's not the motives which hurt you: it's the behavior.

Object constancy



There is an age when, if you put a child's favorite toy out of sight it will become distressed because it no longer exists.  Later, if you hide the toy, the child will look for it.  It still exists even if it is out of sight.

This is object constancy.  People with traits of Cluster B Personality Disorders and especially the traits of a Narcissistic or Borderline Personality Disorder, tend to manifest this a lot.  If I'm not getting love and attention today, I've never gotten it.  If I won the Noble Prize last week, what have you done for me today?

Many models of couples' therapy, such as the Gottman approach, refer to an emotional bank account.  I make deposits in your account, you make deposits in mine, so that we can weather the hard times.  In the case of this group of clients, however, there is no bank account because there is no object constancy.

In one case the husband told the wife "I love you and don't ever regret marrying you.  You are my friend and my lover and my wife and the mother of my children.   I don't mind being the sole breadwinner in the family because we decided together that you would be the stay at home parent.  But I need you to stop hiding the bills and give them to me so I can pay them."

Her response was to lash out in a rage.

"He's always criticizing me!  :)id you hear that?  It's all my fault!"

She didn't retain the good things he said so that she could hear the one negative thing.  It wasn't even that negative.  But she didn't hear it.

Rages

Rage is different than anger.  Anger is  a reasonable, proportionate response to an identifiable stress or threat or pain.  For example if I hit my thumb with a hammer, I will feel a certain degree of anger for a moment or two.  If someone steals my car and wrecks it, I will probably feel more anger for a longer time, but it will go away.

Rage, however, is disproportionate and usually due to an injury which is of psychological in nature.

One man flew into a rage one Christmas because his children had gotten him a gift that wasn't what he wanted.  The next year he flew into the same rage but because they had gotten him exactly what he'd wanted.

"If they are so &*() smart to be able to get me what I wanted this year, why didn't they do it last year?"

Rages for people with Narcissistic traits are often referred to as "Narcissistic rages" and the theory goes that the rage is because of a perceived insult to their sense of self.  In the case of people with the traits of Borderline Personality Disorder the term "splitting" is used and the cause, theoretically, is a real or perceived abandonment.

In either case, the effect on the recipient is the same.  The rages are severe, illogical, and unpredictable.

Everything you do is wrong, including doing things right



There are a number of psychological processes at work in this group of disorders, but the net effect is that it is very, very important to them that  you are wrong, even when you are right.   A common thing to hear, when you have learned to be absolutely flawless, is that "ohh, wow, so you so perfect, huh?  You think you are better than me just because you're always right?"

One man ridiculed his wife's appearance so badly that she went out and joined a gym and worked out and dieted and paid attention to her appearance and dressed nicer and his response was that she was vain and materialistic.

A woman chided her husband for his perceived financial failures that he worked hard and became successful and she ridiculed him for caring about nothing but money.

One man insisted that the reason they were late to something was that his wife had written the time down wrong.  When she proved she was right he accused her of being little miss goody two-shoes.

Criticism, emotional, psychological and verbal abuse, up to and including physical violence



Because it is so important to people with the traits of NPD and BPD to be able to be the center of attention, the center of all the deference and rewards in the relationship, and because of their over-sensitivity to perceived slights or injuries or abandonment, coupled with their lack of compassion or empathy, this group of people accounts for a disproportionate amount of the harm, abuse, and violence in relationships.  Whether they are vilifying you overtly with cruel words, engaging in crazy-making behavior or gas-lighting, causing you pain and suffering indirectly, harming you covertly by what they don't say or do, or assaulting you, the psychological dynamics are the same: to meet their emotional needs by making you the "bad guy" and then punishing you for being the "bad guy."

Nothing is ever predictable or safe or consistent



In both disorders, because the world is dictated by their internal state, not external reality, the relationship can go through huge swings.  Especially in the case of people with the traits of BPD, one of the diagnostic criteria is that their relationships are "intense and unstable" and "swings from idealization to depreciation."

This is a brief overview of some things to consider when looking at the question of whether or not you are in, or have been in, a relationship with someone with the traits of NPD or BPD or related disorders.  This is not a comprehensive list by any means but it includes some of the most commonly reported complaints from people seeking help in relationships with such individuals.

[Should I stay or...]

Hey There,

I have't posted in awhile; I visit my family here on this site every now and then since my 5 year relationship has ended with NBPDgf. I am presently moving on from that relationship which has/had effected me so. As we all know they are captivating and charming at first, and it's that high that we are always willing to chase until the chase isn't worth the effort any longer.

I wanted to share something that I have read by Doug Bartholomew, MS, LMHC on the behavior traits of a person with NBPD or BPD. This may help all those that question themselves with the questions; was it me of was it them? Who was that person? Should I stay with this person or should I leave? Can I make a difference? Will they ever change? Bottom line; two people can't be in a relationship of oneness!

What are the behaviors associated with people with the traits of narcissistic or borderline personality disorders?

Doug Bartholomew, MS, LMHC (blog article)

This isn't going to be about diagnosing someone sight unseen.  That takes an individual assessment with a licensed professional, and even then that can miss the mark.  Even without all the criteria for a specific disorder these clusters of behavior - behavior, not symptoms - are what can ruin our lives and relationships.  So my focus is on this cluster of behavior, not necessarily any one diagnosis.  The diagnosis might be relevant if the person seeks therapy, but otherwise our focus needs to be on what they are doing to you.

While there are many long lists of the traits and behaviors of these groups of individuals, the following appear to be the most apparent.

Note

It is important to start with an understanding that no one grows up saying "when I grow up I want to have a personality disorder and cause my loved ones such fear and pain that they lose their identity and don't love me."  No one wants to be this way or have their loved ones feel toward them the way you might be feeling.  This is a  cluster of traits and behaviors which they have learned over the course of their lifetimes.  That doesn't make it okay.  If someone has epilepsy that isn't' their fault, but until they get their seizures under control we can't allow them to drive a car: if they have a seizure while driving they could kill a lot of people.

By the same token we need to have compassion for our partner with the traits of Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) or Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), while still not excusing the behavior, while still not tolerating or enabling it.  We need to have compassion for their lack of compassion, but still not let them violate our needs, rights, boundaries and identity.

Lack of compassion or empathy



The overwhelmingly most commonly mentioned behavior or trait associated with all the Cluster B Personality Disorders is a lack of empathy or compassion.  They seem unmoved by the effect their behavior has on their loved ones other than what is necessary to keep their loved ones engaged and around.  It is as if they were tone deaf or color blind to the feelings and experiences of others.

Because most of the skills and strategies and techniques we learn in the course of our lives for dealing with relations are based, to one degree or another, on the assumption that the other person to some degree or another "cares", we can feel really disabled, really crazy, when those assumptions don't work with someone who sincerely and genuinely doesn't care because they genuinely don't free what you feel, don't experience your pain or discomfort.

A relationship of one



Whether a person has the traits of narcissism or borderline personality disorder, the net effect is that they really are the only person in the relationship.   While the dynamics of what that is the case are different in the two groups, and the other personality types in Cluster B, the net effect is the same: they are the only person in the relationship.  What is good or bad in the relationship is measured by how it fills their need for attention, fills their sense of emptiness, not about how it meets the needs of others.

Over time everything about the relationship slowly or quickly becomes about them, not about you or the children.

A good example is the father who demanded that his sons play soccer, not football, because he was a good soccer player and could stand out as a soccer coach, but was a poor football player, so he wouldn't make a good impression as a coach.  The fact that his sons really wanted to play football and hated soccer didn't matter: all that mattered was what would make the father look good.

In another case a man's mother died on a Thursday and on Saturday his wife had the annual picnic for her office.   She demanded that her husband and children go to the picnic in spite of their grief and act happy and not talk about Grandma dying in order to make a good impression on her coworkers.

Loss of Self



Probably the most painful thing for me to watch as a therapist is what happens to someone who lives in a relationship of one for any length of time, and ends up losing who they are.  Eventually, as you compromise one thing after another, you become simply an accessory in the psychological world of the other person.   Your own needs, wants, and feelings become secondary to the other person's issue so long you forget who you are.

Depression, low self esteem, self-loathing, and emptiness are common complaints among people presenting for therapy who, come to find out, are in relationship with someone with the traits of NPD/BPD.

What is even more troublesome is when the recipient, the non-NPD/BPD person eventually buys into the world of the NPD/BPD and becomes like them, becoming manipulative, violent, abusive or blameful.   A different version of this is when they take the side of their partner and become suicidal.  After all, if their spouse thinks that they are worthless, that they are nothing, then that must be true.

Manipulation

Manipulation, in the literal sense of the word, isn't a bad thing.  It simply means you and I negotiate for what we need.   I agree to drop off the laundry and you agree to make some business calls.

What we usually mean, however, is when that negotiation violates our needs and rights.  For example if you fake an illness in order to force me to pick up the laundry whether I want to or not.    If I get you to make the business calls by threatening that if I have to do I will tell the $%^&* credit card company to %^&* of and they can take their &*(0 card and &*(0  it.   In a panic that I would ruin our credit by doing that you hurriedly agree to make the call.

In the case of people with the traits of Narcissism or Borderline Personality Disorders their need to meet their needs at all cost is so urgent that they often violate the needs of their loved ones to get those needs met.  Getting what they want is not just the most important issue: it's the only issue, because otherwise they feel their emptiness or lack of attention is unbearable.

One man agreed to let his wife get some elective surgery done to make her more comfortable.   Then he picked her up at the hospital in a 1964 fully restored Studebaker Avanti, a very rare, classic automobile.   When she objected he just said "I'm sorry, I thought that since it was okay for you to be happier it was okay for me to be happier too.  I'd be happy to return the car, but would you want to have your surgery undone?"

This is a good example because the minute the attention was on his wife's illnesses and needs he panicked, he felt he was going to be dis-existed and he had to do whatever he could, including manipulate her financially, to become the center of the relationship again.

It is important that I note that not all people who manipulate have the other traits of people with Narcissistic or Borderline Personality Disorders, only that it is one of the traits of those clusters of behavior.

It is also important for me to note that even when the behaviors are the same, the psychological reasons for being manipulative in the two groups might be very different.  Hopefully you can address the behavior and not be distracted or dissuaded by what the underlying motives might be.  It's not the motives which hurt you: it's the behavior.

Object constancy



There is an age when, if you put a child's favorite toy out of sight it will become distressed because it no longer exists.  Later, if you hide the toy, the child will look for it.  It still exists even if it is out of sight.

This is object constancy.  People with traits of Cluster B Personality Disorders and especially the traits of a Narcissistic or Borderline Personality Disorder, tend to manifest this a lot.  If I'm not getting love and attention today, I've never gotten it.  If I won the Noble Prize last week, what have you done for me today?

Many models of couples' therapy, such as the Gottman approach, refer to an emotional bank account.  I make deposits in your account, you make deposits in mine, so that we can weather the hard times.  In the case of this group of clients, however, there is no bank account because there is no object constancy.

In one case the husband told the wife "I love you and don't ever regret marrying you.  You are my friend and my lover and my wife and the mother of my children.   I don't mind being the sole breadwinner in the family because we decided together that you would be the stay at home parent.  But I need you to stop hiding the bills and give them to me so I can pay them."

Her response was to lash out in a rage.

"He's always criticizing me!  :)id you hear that?  It's all my fault!"

She didn't retain the good things he said so that she could hear the one negative thing.  It wasn't even that negative.  But she didn't hear it.

Rages

Rage is different than anger.  Anger is  a reasonable, proportionate response to an identifiable stress or threat or pain.  For example if I hit my thumb with a hammer, I will feel a certain degree of anger for a moment or two.  If someone steals my car and wrecks it, I will probably feel more anger for a longer time, but it will go away.

Rage, however, is disproportionate and usually due to an injury which is of psychological in nature.

One man flew into a rage one Christmas because his children had gotten him a gift that wasn't what he wanted.  The next year he flew into the same rage but because they had gotten him exactly what he'd wanted.

"If they are so &*() smart to be able to get me what I wanted this year, why didn't they do it last year?"

Rages for people with Narcissistic traits are often referred to as "Narcissistic rages" and the theory goes that the rage is because of a perceived insult to their sense of self.  In the case of people with the traits of Borderline Personality Disorder the term "splitting" is used and the cause, theoretically, is a real or perceived abandonment.

In either case, the effect on the recipient is the same.  The rages are severe, illogical, and unpredictable.

Everything you do is wrong, including doing things right



There are a number of psychological processes at work in this group of disorders, but the net effect is that it is very, very important to them that  you are wrong, even when you are right.   A common thing to hear, when you have learned to be absolutely flawless, is that "ohh, wow, so you so perfect, huh?  You think you are better than me just because you're always right?"

One man ridiculed his wife's appearance so badly that she went out and joined a gym and worked out and dieted and paid attention to her appearance and dressed nicer and his response was that she was vain and materialistic.

A woman chided her husband for his perceived financial failures that he worked hard and became successful and she ridiculed him for caring about nothing but money.

One man insisted that the reason they were late to something was that his wife had written the time down wrong.  When she proved she was right he accused her of being little miss goody two-shoes.

Criticism, emotional, psychological and verbal abuse, up to and including physical violence



Because it is so important to people with the traits of NPD and BPD to be able to be the center of attention, the center of all the deference and rewards in the relationship, and because of their over-sensitivity to perceived slights or injuries or abandonment, coupled with their lack of compassion or empathy, this group of people accounts for a disproportionate amount of the harm, abuse, and violence in relationships.  Whether they are vilifying you overtly with cruel words, engaging in crazy-making behavior or gas-lighting, causing you pain and suffering indirectly, harming you covertly by what they don't say or do, or assaulting you, the psychological dynamics are the same: to meet their emotional needs by making you the "bad guy" and then punishing you for being the "bad guy."

Nothing is ever predictable or safe or consistent



In both disorders, because the world is dictated by their internal state, not external reality, the relationship can go through huge swings.  Especially in the case of people with the traits of BPD, one of the diagnostic criteria is that their relationships are "intense and unstable" and "swings from idealization to depreciation."

This is a brief overview of some things to consider when looking at the question of whether or not you are in, or have been in, a relationship with someone with the traits of NPD or BPD or related disorders.  This is not a comprehensive list by any means but it includes some of the most commonly reported complaints from people seeking help in relationships with such individuals.

[Skip]

I'm in love and she said good-bye... . I've read through many of the posts that had to do with BPD's running away and it gave me comfort in knowing that others have had this same experience, and it was also discomforting in knowing that this pattern of behavior is pervasive in their personalities... .

It's been a little over a year now… as you look back at the whole 5 years (relationship and post relationship) what have you learned that has helped prepare you to go forward?

[Should I stay or...]

I've learned what I don't want in a relationship!

Being in a relationship with NBPD is like being in a relationship alone. The caring one excepts to receive from their partner isn't there; no empathy or compassion.

Being in this past relationship has given me tolerance, patience and understanding. And, there was great love for her that I hold dear to this day.

Her love wasn't sustainable for than 3 months or less at one time, it was fleeting. She'd leave for a month or two only to return once again recharged and ready to go. Like an negative algorithm, ending up with less than more each time this would happen. Not knowing when it would end but knowing it will end, it's just was a matter of time. I'm tired!

I want love that's equal and mutual. I want caring, understanding and patience from another not just from me... .

[Skip]

What did you learn about you?

[Should I stay or...]

I've learned that i was more in control of the outcome than an I once thought. I was codependent, I could fix this if I had the right combination to the lock and key of her (brain), we all know that's a fallacy. A fixer! My control was knowing that the relationship was temporary, I understood it wasn't sustainable, as much as I wanted us forever... .Once bitten twice shy, be ready for the next shoe to drop, harden thy heart a little at a time. I became desensitized. I was in control to leave this relationship on my terms all the time... .