BPD or not BPD that is the question...

[Depression = 72% of members]

I've been doing much reading around BPD and have tried to get away from the standard list of symptoms and explore whether my exudBPD married lover really does have BPD or whether she just has a few traits.

The issue of aggression puzzles me. I read a more in depth analysis on BPD and it talked about dysregulation in five areas of one's personality: Emotional, behavioural, interpersonal, cognitive and self. These are patterns of   dysregulation which form the basis of diagnosis for a BPD.

In the area of emotional dysregulation anger is listed as a major characteristic of BPD. Now, I never witnessed overt anger in my exBPD but she was the queen of passive aggression with me, which manifested itself in silent treatment and constantly telling me I was angry and aggressive. To some extent this was transference, some of it was right, I was angry at the way she treated me and I became hostile towards her. Since we were both married and hardly saw each other, I didn't really see the full picture, she may well have had the rages associated with BPD but I never saw them.

It also now transpires from my reading that there is not a total absence of empathy in a pwBPD. It's more that they have so much anxiety and fear going on in their heads and trying to deal with their dysregulated personality that they cannot deal with all of that and think of another person's needs at the same time. It has always confused me how my exBPD could be so lacking in empathy with me and yet appear to give it to her family. Of course I wasn't there to witness how she behaved with her family but I think my perception of the BPD is altering and I am questioning whether she was in fact BPD.

So my question is threefold. 1. Is that overt anger and rage essential for a diagnosis of BPD? 2. Did anybody ever experience anything resembling empathy from their BPD partner/sibling/child? 3. If somebody has BPD traits but is not fully fledged BPD does that mean they are less likely to dump you if you are reasonable with them?

[RomanticFool]

I've been doing much reading around BPD and have tried to get away from the standard list of symptoms and explore whether my exudBPD married lover really does have BPD or whether she just has a few traits.

The issue of aggression puzzles me. I read a more in depth analysis on BPD and it talked about dysregulation in five areas of one's personality: Emotional, behavioural, interpersonal, cognitive and self. These are patterns of   dysregulation which form the basis of diagnosis for a BPD.

In the area of emotional dysregulation anger is listed as a major characteristic of BPD. Now, I never witnessed overt anger in my exBPD but she was the queen of passive aggression with me, which manifested itself in silent treatment and constantly telling me I was angry and aggressive. To some extent this was transference, some of it was right, I was angry at the way she treated me and I became hostile towards her. Since we were both married and hardly saw each other, I didn't really see the full picture, she may well have had the rages associated with BPD but I never saw them.

It also now transpires from my reading that there is not a total absence of empathy in a pwBPD. It's more that they have so much anxiety and fear going on in their heads and trying to deal with their dysregulated personality that they cannot deal with all of that and think of another person's needs at the same time. It has always confused me how my exBPD could be so lacking in empathy with me and yet appear to give it to her family. Of course I wasn't there to witness how she behaved with her family but I think my perception of the BPD is altering and I am questioning whether she was in fact BPD.

So my question is threefold. 1. Is that overt anger and rage essential for a diagnosis of BPD? 2. Did anybody ever experience anything resembling empathy from their BPD partner/sibling/child? 3. If somebody has BPD traits but is not fully fledged BPD does that mean they are less likely to dump you if you are reasonable with them?

[once removed]

the label "BPD" can help or hurt in recovery.

how can it help?

it helps understand (not condone) and thus depersonalize hurtful behavior
it helps to know youre not alone, and that others have experienced volatile and confusing behaviors
we can learn what role our responses played

how can it hurt?

we can over pathologize behaviors that are human nature
we can tend to see all pwBPD as the same
we can tend to use it to paint our exes as hopeless and sick and ourselves as healthy and normal


BPD is a spectrum disorder. most of our exes are subclinical, meaning they would not be likely to receive a diagnosis. this does not mean they are not very difficult people. it does not mean they do not suffer, or that we did not suffer. it does not mean the literature, common behaviors, or the Detaching board lessons dont apply. it does mean that one size doesnt fit all. it means our exes are not necessarily the hopeless, helpless, broken people we often paint them out to be.

there is a 50% rate of male partners of females with BPD having a personality disorder of their own. its a sobering statistic. what does it mean for us? most of us dont have a clinical personality disorder either, but many of us have traits, our own emotional immaturity, and/or poor coping mechanisms.

at the end of the day, we arent in a position to diagnose. we are former romantic partners, with many biases and blind spots of many kinds.

what does this mean for you? use the label wisely, and it can help you in your recovery.

[RomanticFool]

Thank you. Very enlightening.

It's all so heartbreaking. I held onto her diagnosis because as she said herself in her last message to me, 'You diagnose me as BPD so you can justify my behaviour.' She was absolutely correct. She said she is more complicated than a label and I disparagingly denounced her as a classic BPD who wasn't complicated or in some way profound, but predictable in her emotional dysfunction. I do regret saying that now, mainly because it wasn't accurate.

Had I known what I know now that she is subclinical (and she told me her counsellor in rehab dismissed the notion that she has BPD) I would have just told her that she was inconsiderate. But that seems such a measly word. It doesn't begin to explain what she has lived through and what she has put me through. A riot in my tranquility. A hurricane on the landscape of my serenity. A nuclear warhead in my romantic idealism. That would be a closer description.

Without a diagnosis I am lost. I have to look at myself now and own up to the fact that my own very likely NPD (subclinical) traits have driven her away. I read today that a BPD pushes away the thing that he/she loves most. It is Oscar Wilde's 'Each man kills the thing he loves' from the Ballad Of Reading Gaol.

The whole area is much greyer than I had realised. There is no black and white definitive encapsulation of her personality, my personality and the situation. I am going to have to write a play about it or something to work through my own dystopian/disaffected/disguarded agony.

The truth is, I felt empty inside when I first got married to my wife and then this vision of loveliness, this apparently vulnerable waif/hermit came along and semi seduced me into becoming her shoulder to lean on. I say semi because the truth be told she was reluctant at first to make it sexual. I pushed that agenda, after all that is what was missing from my marriage. She probably would have been happy with a friendship but I couldn't do that, she triggers my sexual appetite so profoundly. So I seduced her into needing me as much as she seduced me and I hooked her as much as she hooked me. I wish I had been gentler with her, because I knew deep down she is a wounded butterfly. In fact one day she asked me to buy her a ring to signify our attachment and I bought her a ring with a butterfly on it. She was delighted with it. It signalled to me that she had evolved out of her chrysalis and into a butterfly - it signalled evolution of her from a lost soul into my own personal love object - when in reality the wounded butterfly was probably more accurate.

Now there is this infinite abyss where my hopes/dreams/fantasies used to reside. Her absence is the total destruction of my fantasy world and I am left once more with day to day mundanity. I know how to survive it, but my usual way of surviving it is to escape once more into another fantasy. My classic escapism is through cinema, theatre, writing, music, food, sport but my favourite one is sex and love - it turns out they are the most destructive of all because they involve other human beings in all their fallibility, unreliability and unstable inglory.

[heartandwhole]

Hi RomanticFool,

The pwBPD I was in a relationship was diagnosed, in therapy, and very aware of his issues. He was a kind and caring person. My experience was different from many on this board, and yet, there are similarities, especially in the depth of the shock and pain that I felt when our relationship broke down. It was also a long-distance relationship, so there were many things I didn't see. When we were together, he was triggered almost every hour by something I said or did. It was heartbreaking.

So my question is threefold. 1. Is that overt anger and rage essential for a diagnosis of BPD?

It's part of the DSM criteria, but as   once removed said, this is a spectrum disorder, and many partners have only traits and the not the full-blown disorder. In my relationship, pwBPD never raged, and only once expressed anger.

2. Did anybody ever experience anything resembling empathy from their BPD partner/sibling/child?

Absolutely. Very much. When his emotions were dysregulated, however, he was not capable of understanding or looking out for my feelings. He described it as if something took him over. Afterwards, when his emotions had calmed down, he felt a lot of guilt and remorse for acting in ways that hurt me.

3. If somebody has BPD traits but is not fully fledged BPD does that mean they are less likely to dump you if you are reasonable with them?

No such thing as a cookie cutter answer here. No guarantees with anyone, BPD, traits, or wonderfully healthy.    In my experience, a pwBPD puts much more weight on feelings in the moment than rationale.

heartandwhole

[Grey Kitty]

In most cases, a medical diagnosis is something where the root cause is absolutely known, and treatment is well defined. If you break a bone. If you have a staph infection, etc.

Most mental health disorders are more vague than that. The criteria for BPD overlap with a bunch of other disorders. There is no agreement on the root cause. Treatment isn't as clear and clean either, although there are things which absolutely work/help.

I find it much more useful to use the label lightly, and focus on specific behavior. (I've spent a bunch of time on Improving, where the focus is on what you can do better in response to the patterns of BPD behavior; As you aren't in contact, I can't offer that to you.)

Your anxiety about trying to figure out whether it was "her BPD / her problems" or "your issues" that ended this relationship is a rabbit hole that will just mess you up if you stay down there.

Try to accept that it is over, and be gentle with yourself about what you did wrong in this r/s--you've learned since then, and will continue to learn more about yourself, but don't blame yourself for not knowing what you hadn't learned yet.

[RomanticFool]

Thanks heartandwhole,

Funny thing is, when you get right down to it, pwBPD are that not much different to many nons when it comes to affairs of the heart. Ultimately it comes down to trust and the depth of the attachment. I guess because of their emotional unpredictability, it is harder to trust a pwBPD if they keep betraying you.

I think one of the reasons my connection is so co-dependently close is that the first time around I thought her hot/cold push/pull behaviour was to do with her being married. At that time I believed she really loved me but sacrificed her love for the good of her family. Like a Hollywood movie. Hence my nickname on here. Then, during the recent 5 year on/off recycle I knew it was something else. So I put it down to alcoholism. But the taunting when she was drunk and the constant rebuffing of my attempts to reason with her during her year of drinking made me realise there was more at play than alcohol. I felt if the shoe was on the other foot and it was me drinking to excess, it would make me want to be with her more. Rather than pull away, it would have made me want to be with her and probably brought out the obsessive in me. So in a way we were polar opposites.

I didn't really get the classic love-bombing at the beginning, it was more like a 'normal' relationship in that she needed coaxing out of her shell. But I did hear alot about her husband; not talking to her, not kissing her, not wanting her. In my recent angry email to her (before the final, softer one) I accused her of using me to spice up her boring marriage - and I actually think this is a more accurate assessment of what has been at play for 14 years. As somebody on here said earlier on, I was her sizzler. I was her adorer. She had manipulated me into putting her on that pedestal that I had refused to put her on first time around. Clever girl!

When we began the recycle I warned her that I would not accept her being distant this time. That was the pact. I told her that it had caused me alot of pain in the past and if there was any repetition of it, I wouldn't be able to deal with it emotionally (code for I would walk). So although I wasn't classically love-bombed, she did do alot of apologising for the past. The ironic thing about that is, trying to get her to apologise now for abusing me for a year and basically betraying the pact we had made regarding a potential future, is impossible. I thought when I first met her that she was a different person to the push/pull (I called it hot/cold back then) person I had known.

So I can conclude that she has done her version of the classic borderline behavioural pattern. It's just her version of devaluation is distancing, ST and finally making excuses as to why she can't see me, rather than the overtly aggressive abuse that some people experience. Any non BPD partner, on being discovered by their husband with their lover of 14 years, would be discussing a stay or go scenario. The husband would most likely be saying, 'It's either him or me.' In my situation that has never been on the table. I actually did bring up once us living together, this was a few years ago, and she asked, 'Where would we live?' I said you could come to London. She replied, 'I don't want to live in London.' OK I could come to your home town. Silence. It has never been on the table.

I am actually surprised that she sent me a message on this occasion. She has never really tried to explain herself before. The message was calm but she said the separation had actually been good for her mental health. She said there was 'hurt in the silence' and that she felt guilty. At first I thought she was talking about her own hurt, but I now think Skip was correct, she was talking about my hurt and her guilt. So I guess that is as close to empathy as she ever got with me.

The reality of my situation is clear: I have really just been her bit on the side all this time. Her escape from boredom and emptiness. Deep down I've always known it. My instincts are actually very good and if, before the current recycle, I had thought with my brain instead of my sexual organ, I may have avoided getting involved again. There was a moment when she told me her husband was still alive (I thought she had contacted me because her husband had died and she now wanted to be with her soulmate) - In that exact moment I thought,  'This is history repeating itself.' (In our first incarnation she was on a singles website and she never told me she was married until I had travelled 100 miles to her home town). So the truth occurred to me straight away, I just ignored it because I needed sex and the love fix I used to have with her. I think if I knew then what I know now about borderline, I never would have responded to her email asking to meet. That is called wisdom. It comes with age and experience. Unfortunately, not before.

The only thing I am still angry about is her assertion in her message that somehow I am more suited to a double life. I am worse suited to it in many ways because she was sleeping with her husband and getting the best of both worlds. I wasn't sleeping with my wife. We sleep in separate rooms to this day, though we are woking on changing that. I am probably the least cut out for an affair out of the two of us because I am more emotionally susceptible to love and sex addiction than she is. In fact she seems to be able to turn it on and off like a tap. No self respecting sex and love addict could walk away from what we had without terrible pain and longing - unless they are BPD - sufferers of a disorder who push away the thing they need most.

[RomanticFool]

Thanks Grey Kitty. Acceptance is the answer to all of my problems. Unfortunately, there is now a massive void in my life and as a creative person, my brain and libido are going haywire in trying to come to terms with it. I think writing will be the answer for me to work this through.

[once removed]

i forgot one: its not uncommon after this experience to start "seeing" "BPD" everywhere.

only about 9 percent of the population has a clinical personality disorder. however, around 30% of the population, at any given time, struggle with mental illness (which includes depression and anxiety).

the world isnt full of undiagnosed personality disordered individuals. it is full of difficult and challenging people - plenty of whom may have personality disordered traits. theres little to nothing you will read about BPD on here (splitting, black and white thinking, emotional immaturity and other poor coping mechanisms, weak boundaries, boundary busting, etc) that isnt human nature or something we cant relate to, its just that someone with BPD traits tends to take them to greater extremes.

with this knowledge, we have two choices. we can hang onto our hurt and crouch into a defensive position. we can "run" from anyone who shows any hint of "BPD" or "npd" or what have you (this isnt realistic in ones work place, church, group of friends, family, etc). or we can hone our emotional maturity, and we can learn new skills and tools for navigating a difficult and challenging world with difficult and challenging people, recognizing that at times we may be hurt or disappointed by others, but with better equipment to cope, and we can indeed thrive. it sounds like youre leaning toward the latter, RomanticFool, and i want to encourage you in that direction.

I think writing will be the answer for me to work this through.

write to your hearts content. thats step four (creative action) of the stages of detachment directly to the right 

[RomanticFool]

Yes, Once Removed, I am leaning towards emotional maturity. I do have to be careful not to blame the whole thing on myself though or normalise her behaviour too much. The reason I say that is because I am coming to realise my behaviour probably accelerated her withdrawal and that she isn't quite the sick puppy that I have been painting her.

However, it does not alter the fact that the relationship was unbalanced. I was more determined to keep it going than she was and she withdrew regularly and put me through hell at various times.

So yes, while alot of these behaviours are more extreme versions of human nature, I hope i never get romantically involved again with a person so intent on pushing away the very thing she needs and desires. This is a classic part of the behavioural BPD dysregulation and related to abandonment fears.

There is a tendency at the moment to view the world through the prism of BPD and I hope that calms down soon. I have been diagnosing half of my family and friends as having BPD traits (in my head) and I have to stop that right now.

The hardest thing to reconcile at the moment is that she may not be as bad behaviourally as I first thought and our estrangement is entirely due to me. I think that's what is called irony.