But what is empathy?

[tinkerbellsmom]

My BPD dd does not have empathy.  The biggest difference is that she seems to believe that when she is not around, I don't exist, my life just is frozen in time somehow. She also thinks that my feelings are tools for her to use to get me to do what she wants.  She can criticize me harshly for something one min. and then turn around and do the exact same thing herself  but somehow for her it's different. 

[fromheeltoheal]

You've helped me to have greater empathy and compassion for my stb ex.  It doesn't change my decision to leave, but it helps.  Empathy can keep up from just splitting them like they do to us... .understanding their core shame and profound alienation from being unable to connect, yet desperate to do so.

Yes.  And the other piece for me is that I was doing everything right, in that I was emotionally available, trying to make the relationship work, making her needs a priority; my heart was in the right place, and it didn't work not because she's a bad person, she's a sick one.  Then again lots of relationships don't work out, for lots of reasons, but at least I know I went into that one the right way, and will do it again the same way, only this time be much more aware and present to see what I'm getting back.

[fromheeltoheal]

The biggest difference is that she seems to believe that when she is not around, I don't exist, my life just is frozen in time somehow.

That's because a symptom of BPD is a lack of object constancy, meaning out of sight out of mind, literally for a borderline.  Mine once asked me to leave a dirty t-shirt with her, so she could use my 'smell' to connect me to her.  You could say it was romantic, but in her case she knew people ceased to exist for her when they weren't with her physically, and she was trying to do something about it, which I give her credit for.

She also thinks that my feelings are tools for her to use to get me to do what she wants.

Yes.  BPD is all about need fulfillment, getting needs met, by using another person, and the pain they're in justifies it to them.

[Blimblam]

I've been remembering and a entire series of moments that my ex would begin to dysregulate would come to mind. Basically anytime my experience was beyond the limits of her empathy/mirroring. What it was she connected to is how she could relate to the interaction and she projected her knight in shining armor fantasy world she lives in. At the same time I could connect to this fantasy as it exists within myself and I projected how I related to these parts of myself which has a lot more depth and complexity. I projected how I related to these parts of myself onto her and she projected those parts she could relate to onto me.

She has the 6 pack if crayons and I have the 107 pack.