Why do people enable BPD behavior

[statsattack]

With my potential BPD ex realized that she couldn't do wrong in others eyes and they would always enable her behavior

What makes me sick is people would put their personal agendas above her safety

Aren't BPD folks the best politicians

[fromheeltoheal]

Hi statsattack-

In your first post you gave us what you called the Cliff notes version of your story; can you give us the whole one now?  It can be cathartic to tell your story, especially to people who understand and have been there.  To answer your question, some people enable borderline behavior, or anyone's behavior really, because they get something out of it.

[Repping305]

Forgive me I'm new and haven't been able to find your story.  I'm certainly one of those enablers (not for her but for someone else).

One reason is the people are fooled. They are lied to. Many with BPD appear to be very good at reading others and lying to them, spoon feeding them what they want to hear.  We are very quick to believe lies that flatter our egos or confirm our world views.

I saw one YouTube video by Sacha Stone titled "People with High IQ's are drawn to Narcissists" but in the video she is quite clear about the entire Cluster B Spectrum. (I'm not pushing this b/c it sounds self-congratulatory to say the least but when I saw her video, it was like hearing myself to the T).

For many enablers it's the sexual enticement, while that wasn't the case with me, she certainly tried and did it to other people constantly.  She could always get attention by using sex and she craved attention and would use it as a reward and punishment. 

I would also say that many like me know the person is sick, care about them as a person and about their "authentic side" (convincing themselves the side they want to see is the 'authentic' one), hope if they hang on long enough the person will ultimately get help or they'll be able to influence them to get help.  Or even get leverage on them, when they get into legal trouble, offer to help conditional on them getting treatment (which if my experience was any indication, is utterly stupid. She got treatment and learned to play "I'm working through DBT" really well only to throw it in my face later that it was done solely to keep me from leaving her life).

I find it impossible to believe (I don't mean to imply you're lying, just that you may have overstated things or aren't seeing the whole picture, she may well be lying to you and very likely is) that she can do no wrong in other people's eyes. At best, I would say can 'do no wrong' for a week or two then the ugly parts start to slip out.  Everyone is different but putting up with someone and supporting them anyway is a far cry from doing no wrong. And b/c you see them as injured and you're protecting them, you'll act as though they shouldn't be condemned.

It can be fear or blackmail. At first I was scared she'd actually kill herself. Then after 100 cries of wolf I saw she was too vain to do it, but could easily do it by accident (mixing benzos with alcohol and other hard drugs) or by an angry ex-fling or someone she started stuff with. She'd be so intoxicated she was an easy victim and had been exploited several times.  By that point, I had confided a few things to her and she threatened to lie and knew enough about me to make up some good tails - only b/c people knew me too well and what she described was too out of character was I able to keep from being truly damaged by it, but not for lack of trying on her part.

I knew pretty early on though there was something wrong. I knew I sounded like every other guy. I noticed how virtually everyone that knew her for any period couldn't stand her especially people in positions of authority. I knew she lied. I overlooked it thinking I could help, wait it out, maybe give her what she said she needed and it would change.  It didn't. And a big part was my background, having screwed my life up from substance abuse I am sympathetic to those trying to put their back together and promised myself I'd never turn my back on anyone that was (this is one exception I have to make). So I wrote a novel to a short question but I think your premise might be flawed and I think someone in there, I've probably covered most of the possibilities.

[Foolishwizdom]

My dBPDhusband grew up with both extremes. His mother praised him as the best and lifted him up in ways that counteracted her insecurities. Yet she coddled him and then would also harp on mistakes or errors. His military dad was hard on him also.  When my husband had a tantrum, his mom would enable and usually his dad would give in eventually too. Perfect to worthless to in control. For them, guilt and pride seem to play a part in why they enable.