Hi Sadly,
As always when stress hits him he turns on me and yet I still get surprised by it. Have just had the nastiest set of texts full of vitriolic comments, bang, out of the blue, am weird, swiping at him, nasty, you name it. I sent o e back saying what are you talking about but no reply.
I don't know if it helps know this now (maybe later) but people with BPD (pwBPD) "split" people; that is, they see them as either "all good" or "all bad" with no shades of grey. Now, this *includes* themselves. They will see themselves as either "perfect" or "worthless" with no gradation or balance between positive and negative traits. So when stress hits him, or whenever he receives information that leads him to see himself as "all bad" or "worthless" then it hits him pretty hard. This is why some pwBPD can be extremely depressed and turn to suicide. But at some point, it gets overwhelming for them and they "project" it outside of themselves. And instead of devaluing themselves, they choose to devalue other people (preferably those closest to them). This is one of their defense mechanisms which protects their fragile psyche.
Here's the horrible bit, I just curled up in the tiniest ball and sobbed my heart out. Thought I had got over that months ago, I have cried but not like that anymore. I wanted someone to hold me and hug me and love me and make it all better. I became a wee little girl again and wanted my mum more than anything in the world. I don't have anyone. My friends are hundreds of miles away, my brothers at sea, I am among strangers. I had to write this because I don't know what else to do. I don't like this. I'm not a grown woman with an engineering degree and a car and a home and a little cat, I'm a hurt baby girl and I want to be safe and loved. Help me this isn't normal.
Now if he was always like this, you wouldn't have touched him with a 10 foot pole. But obviously he was not always like this. In fact in the beginning he was probably never like this. Which leads me to describe another quality I've observed about pwBPD: they can be extremely adept at getting others to form very strong attachments to them. Part of it is their ability to "mirror" others, to get other people to believe that they are so well suited to be with them. They can have such malleable (changeable) personality traits; my exBPDgf once described herself as a "chameleon" which made no sense to me at the time because with me she was always consistently who I thought she was -- I didn't realize that when she was with other people, she was very different. This ability to change themselves to suit other people helps others form deep attachments to them.
I believe another way that they can connect so deeply with us is perhaps they are (can be) incredibly perceptive at ferreting out our vulnerabilities, our inner wounds. I wonder sometimes if they do not specifically seek out people with other deep (childhood) wounds. They connect with us at that level, and for a time, make us feel like they can heal those hurts. But they can't. They have their own wounds to heal - and they expect us to heal them without us ever having any idea what they are.
So, yes. I know that this fellow said hurtful things to you. But I am certain that if anyone else were to say such things to you, it might also hurt but not nearly as much. It is because *he* said these things.
Again, I don't know if this will be very helpful now -- but perhaps eventually. This fellow has helped you become aware that there is a part of you that has been hurting (perhaps for some time). Perhaps it was a part of you that you were only barely conscious of, or not even so. But it is there. And right now it is hurting.
The good news is that you are not a child. You are a very capable adult woman. And if you were ever to find a wounded hurting child, you would have many resources that you can make available to help this child. And you have found such a child. Your inner child, as they say.
I hope this helps.
Best wishes, Schwing
