Mirroring

[VIDEO: "What is parental alienation?"]

So, I saw my ex yesterday... .  for the first time in months and in all honesty, he didn't even seem like the same person.  He's now mirroring a mutual friend of ours, who is the most obnoxious, immature guy ever.  My ex was usually quiet, but he was being loud and over-the-top immature.  I couldn't believe it.  They both kept feeding off each other.  It was so strange.  I know everyone says No Contact, and I believe in it too, but seeing this actually helped me a bit.  When we're apart, I only focus on the good times we had how I miss the person I thought he was.  Now, seeing him like this, it's like seeing someone who kind of looks like my ex-love, but is completely different (and someone I frankly have no interest in). 

[SarahinMA]

So, I saw my ex yesterday... .  for the first time in months and in all honesty, he didn't even seem like the same person.  He's now mirroring a mutual friend of ours, who is the most obnoxious, immature guy ever.  My ex was usually quiet, but he was being loud and over-the-top immature.  I couldn't believe it.  They both kept feeding off each other.  It was so strange.  I know everyone says No Contact, and I believe in it too, but seeing this actually helped me a bit.  When we're apart, I only focus on the good times we had how I miss the person I thought he was.  Now, seeing him like this, it's like seeing someone who kind of looks like my ex-love, but is completely different (and someone I frankly have no interest in). 

[apple]

That is the strangest thing the "mirroring" that is. I remember the exact moment when I was going through my divorce and thought " who the heck are you"

My exw was mirroring either her soon to be 4th husband which the marriage lasted 60 days or the people she works with.

[cookiecrumbled]

Wow.  Sarah, I am so glad you saw that, too.  :)id he speak to you?  It sounds like he and his buddy were acting like they were still in high school.  Boy, can I relate about assuming the best while in no contact as opposed to knowing what is actually going on.  In my mind, my boyfriend is at home alone, tormented and refusing to call me because he knows he will just end up hurting me.  When, for all I know, he left me for another woman and has been with her ever since or is is bar-hopping and sleeping around, etc.  We do not have mutual friends and live on opposite sides of a big city, so there is no way of knowing.

I hope this idiotic imbecile you saw last night helps you see that we don,t need nor want anything to that kind of person.  Would love to hear more details.


Cookie

[SarahinMA]

They were definitely trying to be cruel to me- talking about women that my ex had hooked up with after me, etc.  I can't believe they would talk about that stuff when I wasn't there.  It just helps put things in perspective.  I still feel sad and mourn him, but it really is like that person I knew is dead. 

[whatarideout]

but it really is like that person I knew is dead. 

mirroring is a means to survive for someone who suffers with BPD.

just like a chameleon in nature who mirrors the colours around itself in order to survive and avoid it's prey, a BPD mirrors the people around them in order to survive and create the illusion of having an identity(self).

the person you "knew" wasn't real, he just mirrored the colour that was you.

[GustheDog]

Yep, I saw my ex's "personality" change dramatically during our last month together. Acting differently, new interests that had never been present during our relationship, new figures of speech, new sense of humor, new slang in her vocabulary, new style of dress.

It creeped me out hardcore at the time. During one phone conversation, I thought I was talking to her sister – she sounded exactly like her sister, whom she had been spending lots of time with (one of her transitional objects) - and she told me, raging, that I was "super mean," and then hung up (this was the response I got for simply returning her missed call). Later, during a calm period, I actually brought this up and asked her why she was talking like that (her sister talks like a little kid in an ironic sort of way - thinks it's funny or something). She said, "yeah, I say 'super'. . . I say that all the time."

And I just told her, not in the 2.5 years we've been together she hasn't. Super weird.