What Do They Mirror?

[Before you can make things better, you have to stop making them worse...]

My knowledge on BPD mirroring is that they pretend  they are  the same as you. They say they like the same interests , music, art,  food etc. These can be classed as your "good habits"  However my question is, do they mirror what they think are your "bad habits"? In other words if you act like you are ignoring them, being aloof or seeming to be disinterested in them do they mirror those things and act in the same manner?  This is something i have never understood.

[Willingtolearn]

My knowledge on BPD mirroring is that they pretend  they are  the same as you. They say they like the same interests , music, art,  food etc. These can be classed as your "good habits"  However my question is, do they mirror what they think are your "bad habits"? In other words if you act like you are ignoring them, being aloof or seeming to be disinterested in them do they mirror those things and act in the same manner?  This is something i have never understood.

[mosaicbird]

Yes, I think they do to some extent. One of the things my ex was fixated on was 'never caring more about someone than they cared about her'. So if someone treated her in a distant way, she would repay them with the same amount of attention (or lack thereof), unless she was in a serious crisis where she needed affirmation now.

[id-crisis]

And then some!

When my ex perceived or imagined some form of insult or injury from me - he would multiply his own warped  version of that insult/injury X 1000 and punish me with it. RELENTLESSLY!

That is what our relationship basically became, a cumulative, repetitive cycle of punishment for all his perceived injuries x 1000   :'(

In the beginning, the positive mirroring was fairly short-lived because right from the off, I unwittingly threatened or offended him by standing firm over my boundaries - mild as they were  

It was one long battle. Not a relationship. I do feel deep guilt for not knowing better & for antagonizing the awful dance, but in my defense, I'd never heard of BPD. I don't think I would have fared better for either of us if I had known what I know now, he was just too damn good at pressing my buttons and manipulating my issues/weaknesses.

[daintrovert13]

I saw my ex quoting my exact words to her new person. I was beyond shocked. Always knew she looked up to my morals and values but come on now... .  word for word? I really think this new person is a relationship with "me".

[charred]

They mirror you by doing what you do, liking what you like, etc... .  but there is more to it than that. They build rapport through it, and they notice the intensity of your feelings about each thing, and adjust themselves accordingly, and to do that they pay intense attention to you... what you say, how you say it, and hang on every word. The web of N... website has a great quote;

"Simply put, there is nothing, nothing in the world, that can take the place of one person intentionally listening or speaking to another. The act of conscious attending to another person---when one once discovers the taste of it and its significance---can become the center of gravity of the work of love. It is very difficult. Almost nothing in our world supports it or even knows about it." ~Jacob Needleman

They pay hyper-attention to us, make us feel important, and that whatever it is we believe, really matters to them... .  and that is manna to our ego. It is exactly ego stroking... .  and is not authentic but an egoic/manipulative action that we at the time tend to discount... .  then we discount discounting it (ignore the  ) and eat it up.

That is what I see the mirroring as... that whole process. It is much more nefarious than simply pacing a person to get a little rapport, as a sales process... .  it is the overly-fast becoming a "soulmate" that so many of us have experienced... .  and then ran chasing after... .  never quite to catch, as it was an illusion.

[FogLight]

I don't know about they, but my ex mirrored a lot of things from others and I.

She suddenly had my taste in music when we started hanging out

Her sense of humor became sarcastic, like mine

She improved her vocabulary when texting me, trying to convey that she was smart like me (dumb enough to date her though  )

She copied phrases I used, would often parrot phrases I had used weeks before

She was calm and laid back like me when it was just us, but obnoxious and loud around groups, the total opposite

Her facial expressions would match other people's and mine to a creepy degree, especially in photos

She would also copy phrases from other people and overuse them like a kid with a new toy, suddenly be interested in a completely new genre of music and act as if she was a fan for years, suddenly be intensely interested in a new career option though she would never actually take steps to make it happen and the interest would fizzle out within a day.  Her sudden changes in interest would usually indicate who she had been hanging out with, especially so when she found my replacement.

She didn't really mirror my bad side.  If I was aloof, she chased me harder.  But when she had my attention, hers would wander.  I think if she felt that mirroring some bad quality about me would have won my approval, she would have probably done it.

[Scott44]

I lost my temper once with colleagues of the university where I was teaching.  Not a good example to follow, but when my DBPD ex wife saw me do it she became extremely negative towards the faculty, mirroring my frustrations.

[JonnyJon42]

When she would stop mirroring me i had the issue of i would lose interest which would make her run around behind my back looking for a new guy or group of people then her personality would change completely. In the last month before she left me for like the 5th time she turned in to a hippy out of noware. Her cousin after talking to her one night looked at me when she walked out of the room and said " What is wrong with her why is she acting like this" so that showed others see it too.

It shows how fragile they really are if you show any sign of disinterest they WILL in most cases find a new source and for most of the people this way it dont seem to take them long. It may not not be sex but they can find emotional affairs which in my book is just as bad as cheating with sex.


Ive also noticed that this switch can come when it seems like nothing has changed at all which to me seems like they are very keen on seeing ANY change may it be a trivial thing or a big thing all seems to be the same to them.

Just my 2 cents

[Willingtolearn]

The most weird thing my exBPDgf mirrored was her fashion in cloths.  On most occasions when she bought new cloths she would buy the cloths that the mannequin  in the store was wearing. She mirrored the shop dummy 

Another thing she did was if one of her lady friends bought a new coat or dress etc  she would have to go to the store where her friend bought the item from and even if she could not afford to purchase the item she would just go and try it on.

[charred]

My exBPDgf would act like whoever was around... .  when she was around some older black religious women from the south... .  she started acting that way... .  which was so over the top as to be embarrassing as it seemed phony/mocking.

Actually she seemed phony whenever she was being nice... clingy seemed real, and hater was real, so I think she was phony when nice. Wish I had noticed that much sooner. 

[tailspin]

 

From what I understand of the illness the "mirroring" is do to their lack of a core sense of self.  Mirroring is a survival technique our ex's learned at an early age and they have adapted and honed this "skill" to give the appearance of being "normal" and they use this skill to fit into a world that really makes no sense to them.

My experience is that yes, they do mirror both the good and bad because they really don't have a choice.  Once you've been identified as a surragate source of their "self" whatever they see is what you get.  

My ex would tell me "if you have a bad day... .  I have a bad day" and this really is mirroring at its most basic level.  If I was down and needed his support it was nowhere to be found because he was incapable of producing a response that differed from my own.  I quickly learned it wasn't in my best interest to have a bad day.

Mirroring is also manipulative during the honeymoon phase; they do and say what we want to see and hear.  It's a perfect circle until their attachment and abaondonment fear is triggered and then that perfect circle becomes the 9th circle of hell  

When we develop and enforce strong boundaries this mirroring loses its strength.  What we once thought was charming becomes a red flag.  Each person brings a unique set of values and opinions into a relationship; the key is to realize when these important qualities are disrespected and violated.  Boundaries give us permission to run for the hills when this happens.

tailspin

[daintrovert13]

She mirrored the shop dummy 

[somethingtolose]

From what I understand, the mirroring takes place completely unconsciously. In the Science of Evil, Simon Baron-Cohen says they have an unusually overactive mirroring system in the brain... .  we all do this subliminally without noticing, so I assume it's the same with them, I know my ex had a few identities that she was constantly at war with (the lack of consistency from day-to-day was so hard to understand at the time).