Do borderlines and narcissists really forget?

[Our abuse recovery guide]

Do borderlines and narcissists really forget? My Mom who abused me emotionally and physically and has started smear campaigns against me has never owned up to her behavior . Any time I have brought up her abuse which was constant she says I'm making it up and that my dad snuck into my room at night and whispered it in my ear. So creepy and weird and not true. Also anytime I bring up anything bad she said or anything bad that happened to me she gasps and says stop making that up even if she was there when it happened. Do they really forget all the bad things they say and do when they are gaslighting you and deny it?

[Cloudy009]

Do borderlines and narcissists really forget? My Mom who abused me emotionally and physically and has started smear campaigns against me has never owned up to her behavior . Any time I have brought up her abuse which was constant she says I'm making it up and that my dad snuck into my room at night and whispered it in my ear. So creepy and weird and not true. Also anytime I bring up anything bad she said or anything bad that happened to me she gasps and says stop making that up even if she was there when it happened. Do they really forget all the bad things they say and do when they are gaslighting you and deny it?

[Notwendy]

I don't know if they forget. I think that when my BPD mother is dissasociated, she's in an altered state and doesn't think "she " is doing what she does. I also call this the "dry erase" apology- my own words. She does the hurtful things to get rid of her own bad feelings and when it is over, she feels better and assumes that you will get over it like she does. It's as if we wrote horrible things on a white board, then erased them. "poof" all gone- for her and she expects it for you too.

I wrote in another post how hard this is for me as when she's in her better state, she can be super nice and sweet sometimes and act like nothing ever happened and expects me to act like that too.

At other times, my mother is calculating and manipulative to get what she wants. She has lied so much to me that I don't trust that what she says to me is even true. I also have seen her "put on her act" with others. I know she's playing me sometimes and she thinks I have no clue. I also know this is different then her dissociated states. She knows what she's doing but pretends she didn't do it or denies it and this is intentional.

[Turkish]

Dissociation is real.  Hard to say what's that and what's lying "to survive" as Christine Ann Lawson said in Understating The Borderline Mother.  

I don't remember how it came up,  but I reminded my ex of the time I let then baby S9 fall asleep on my shoulder while she was cooking dinner.  My fault, of course, and I dreaded walking into the kitchen to tell her.  She internalized a lot of anxiety from her mother.  Baby had to be bathed or he'd get sick!

I backed out of the kitchen slowly and I heard her slam the refrigerator door. I put S down and returned to her eating her dinner angrily at the table,  a huge mess of broken glass and condiments on the floor. I cleaned it up, on my knees like a red-headed stepchild.  That was the only time I was actually afraid of her.  

When I brought it up,  she actually seemed distressed, "you see?  I don't remember things like that!"  She didn't remember the incident at all.  Unlike your mother,  she believed what I said.  

[Notwendy]

If I bring up anything my mother did, it causes her to dysregulate. There doesn't seem to be any point in doing so. It doesn't lead to the kind of closure or reconciliation I would wish for.

On rare occasions she has halfway apologized, but not really. I figure it's the best she can do. I try not to be resentful for her past behavior, but since she continues to lie and manipulate me, I can't just forget that she's capable of this and pretend she isn't doing it. I don't bring it up, but I am aware of the potential.

[zachira]

Good question! I think we often wish our family member with BPD/NPD would acknowledge how they have hurt us and sincerely apologize. Trying to get them to acknowledge any past wrong doings in my experience just ends up their denying everything and accusing us of making things up.
A healthy person has a coherent sense of self and is pretty much the same person most of the time, even when things are going badly. Some things to think about: 1) People who have BPD and NPD have split personalities. Some of them may meet the criteria for some kind of dissociative disorder, the most serious being Dissociative Identity Disorder, more popularly known as someone having multiple personalities. A person who has more than one personality truly does not remember the other personality when they are in one personality type. 2) To develop a coherent sense of self, a child needs a caretaker that is able to respond to their emotional needs. People who have BPD and NPD seem to have an empty inner sense of self and depend on the reflection of others to feel okay in the moment. This inner emptiness usually comes from having a caretaker who did not know how to help the child develop a healthy sense of self. The roles are reversed in these families with the needs of the caretaker taking center stage. 3) Women have a larger part of their brains devoted to emotional memories. This is why men often do not recall past relationship disagreements when a woman comes out with her laundry list. The man has truly forgotten the incidents that upset her so much and put them behind him. 4) People who have suffered emotional trauma, mainly in childhood, often mix the present and the past. They respond to what is happening in the moment based on the past.
Every person with BPD/NPD is different. There are many reasons why they are unable to take responsibility for how badly they treat others, particularly those closest to them. I find that most of them are so empty at the core and are always so busy grasping for air that they don't have the capacity to notice how their behaviors impact others. 

[Harri]

Hi.  I think it is important to remember that borderlines and narcissists are different in terms of what drives their behaviors and as such we can't use the terms as if they mean the same thing.

With borderlines, lying behaviors are defense driven.  Forgetting can be a part of this.

With narcissists, lying behaviors are manipulation and ego driven.  Rarely do they forget.

It becomes more tricky when there are co-morbidities and co-traits.

When a pwBPD dysregulates, they are unable to cope with their emotions and have little to no executive control.   I don't see them sitting and being able to deliberately plot and plan.  I do see them as being able to deny due to dissociation which is a fear/anxiety response and due to shame.  pwNPD are more deliberate in their actions and have no empathy.   Denial is more manipulative.

And then, of course, we have to account for what I call the jerk factor.  My mom, in addition to being uBPD and uSchizophrenic had this in spades.  

[Notwendy]

That's the hard part for me. My mother does both. The lying as a defense and the trick/plot one. She actually seems to enjoy the latter. It gives her a sense of power. I can deal with the first- I understand how her BPD is a factor. However, the other, she chooses to do. Sometimes it is hard to know how to respond.

[zachira]

Maybe we can say that people with BPD/NPD sometimes choose to remember and other times they just can't. Those with NPD are more likely to consciously act badly whereas those with BPD are usually more unaware of their behaviors. Neither people with BPD and/or NPD have much empathy or really care/realize how they have hurt others. It is all about them.

[Harri]

Exactly Notwendy.  It does make it hard to know what to do.  There are no easy answers when we have chosen to remain in contact, nor are there easy answers when we choose no contact or anything in between.   

Zachira,

Those with NPD are more likely to consciously act badly whereas those with BPD are usually more unaware of their behaviors.

Yes!     I also agree that pwBPD either do not realize or deny how they affect other people and the harm they cause and that pwNPD have no empathy and do not care. 

From what I have read, and I don't have a handy reference but I can look and ask around for one, pwBPD do in fact feel empathy, but because of their emotional dysregulation, lack of executive function and shame their ability to act appropriately is affected.  Rather than seeing cause and effect for other people, it does indeed become all about them in the way they manage.  Again, denial, fear and shame all come together and things get weird.   I guess the question becomes, does it really matter to us what is driving the behavior in terms of whether or not we accept it?  I would say no.  Does it matter in terms of how we respond?  For me it does matter, at least sometimes and that brings us to the challenge that Notwendy talks about.   

For me it comes down to looking at intent and trying to assess that.  Regardless, I won't accept unacceptable behavior whether BPD, NPD, jerk-factor, or anything else.  Intent, may however, affect the way I choose to respond. 

[Notwendy]

I don't accept it either way but for me it does affect the relationship.

People can do hurtful things, but they can also repair the hurt through a sincere apology and an attempt to do better. This doesn't happen with my mother. She doesn't take responsibility for their behavior and doesn't learn from it. It's the dry erase board. See, I'm good now, so all is good and you better go along with it.

If her behavior was mainly due to dissociation, and she was decent to me when she wasn't dissociating, I might be able to accept that she lost some control and was decent to me when she had control.

But she is calculating, manipulative and designed to hurt at time. Her behavior when my father died was calculating. She was angry at me and aimed to hurt where she knew it could.  She smeared me to her family and told them not to speak to me and to not reveal what she said. That's one of her methods. They stopped speaking to me. I was really sad about this, but then decided I had to move on without them as family.

I know what she said because she called up my husband and my in laws and told them the same thing. My in laws think she's nuts and they told me. I asked her about it and she denied it, even adding " I never lied to you" which is a lie.

I've also seen her put on her nice act to manipulate people. She has new neighbors- and she wants to win them over. She invited them over and did her "nice" act and it was so different and so obvious to me but not to them. She lies about being a wonderful mother and tells made up stories of what she did as a mother. Now they think she is the most wonderful little old lady ever and include her in their family celebrations. She's not dissociating when she does this- it is calculated.

[Enabler]

Howdy all,

This is an excellent piece on memory.

https://www.thecut.com/2016/11/remembering-childhood-trauma-and-abuse-that-never-happened.html

"The last step in creating memories is retrieval—that moment when you actually remember something. But wait, you might say, retrieving a memory is completely different from creating one. After all, you are just going through your metaphorical filing cabinet and pulling out a photo, right? No. Memory isn’t static like photos. It’s more like reassembling a picture from jigsaw pieces or making a photocopy of a picture and then looking at it. The point is that memory retrieval is its own sort of creation. And each time you make a copy, it looks a little different—a little more blurry and faded. So eventually you have to take a permanent marker and fill in some of the edges to make it appear sharper."

Memories by their very nature are malleable and easily manipulated. Since pwBPD or NPD have a tendency to ruminate a lot they have a tendency to pick through memories and photoshop them such that they are exonerated from guilt and shame... or in the case of NPD were far more successful than they actually were in reality. My guess is that this can happen pretty quickly in a pwBPD or pwNPD as they have an inbuilt filter which sifts out any of their own involvement in a situation.

Regarding this inbuilt filter, I think an healthy individual see's their own behaviour as well as those around him/her. A disordered person is incapable of seeing their own proverbial toes so their own actions are always seen at the mercy of external factors.

Interesting points regarding the masks... last night was a classic in Enablers house. uBPDw had her gaggle of local mums round for a dinner party, she was nice as pie to me in front of the friends offering me food and being ever so pleasant. Strange how the spitting venom beast who usually resides in our home was suddenly banished whilst there was an external audience!

Enabler

[Notwendy]

My BPD mother is different when there are other people around. I've seen the mask many times.

One way I have handled visits to her is to not be alone with her. If I have another family member with me,  she puts it on for them. Makes the visits easier on me.

I haven't left her alone with my kids.  She's tried to "lure" them off one on one with invitations "come see this new..." but we have discussed this- don't be by yourself with grandma.

I don't think she'd do something harmful to them, but she'd have their ear to herself and no witnesses. At that moment, she'd begin to triangulate and say something negative about me.

If there's a witness, she knows she can't, because then, she'd be accountable for what she said. She needs to have someone all alone, so that if confronted, she can deny it. I know she knows what she's doing when she does this.

[Enabler]

Guilt and shame don't exist if it's deniable... pesky witnesses! 

[zachira]

Enabler,
I love how you talk about how borderlines and narcissists photo shop memories to make themselves look good and not to feel any shame or guilt. Though very different in some ways, those with BPD and NPD have to control everything which includes having their version of events always reflect positively on them even if it means lying about what happened and tarnishing someone else's reputation.