I have to ask out of curiosity...

[lostdorothy]

I have to ask you all this because I have been curious about it. Have any of you noticed your pwBPD with glassy eyes that look like a dang dead soul stare? If you have seen this you know what I am talking about. It is like no one is home. The eyes are glazed over. Is this dissociation? What is the physical cause and what is happening?
Thank you all for your input. This has been such a mystery to me and I have not seen any posts about it before.

[Harley Quinn]

Can you give us some examples of when you saw this happen?  I did see a strange disconnected look in the eye of my ex on one specific occasion during a crisis.  It may or may not be what you're describing.  Others have described a blank stare in previous posts that I've read here, so I'd say you're not alone in experiencing a visible shift. 

Love and light x

[Pretty Woman]

Yes. I try not to pre-judge people but I can tell something is "off" by looking at a persons eyes. My eye looked dead inside, vacant. If I look at old pictures you can see the emptiness, that and she was always in the back of pictures as if to be "hiding" from the camera. My cousin, many years ago had a break. He was staying at my house and I remember describing his eyes as glazed over, like when a goldfish dies and floats to the top of the bowl. His eyes aren't like that anymore, however he is much healthier and has years of treatment behind him.

Interesting observation and one I cannot say is complete hogwash. I've noticed it myself!

Some say it IS a real thing and can be caused by ":)issociation and Dysphoria".

[Bianchi]

My ex's eyes would change significantly in times of anger.  I only recently realised it was because her pupils were dilating due to an extreme fight flight response.

[FlyFish]

Hi Lost Dorothy,

Yes, what I believe you are describing is dissociation and it is one of the nine signs and symptoms of BPD as laid out by the DSM. I saw this in my exBPD From time to time so I know exactly what you speak of. It is scary, not only for us but more significantly for them. The times I witnessed this her eyes were glazed over as you stated and she was just staring into blank space and her hands would sometimes shake. I would describe her eyes as hollow or empty and unfortunately from my experience there is not much we as partners can do once our partner is in this state. All I could do was hold her. If I tried to speak with her all I received in return was word jumble with no coherency to it.

In one of her moments of lucidness she described this as leaving her body almost as if she were floating. She said it was hard to control her coming back to reality. In research you will find this is often associated with past major trauma. In my case my ex was sexual abused in her adolescence. I don’t know if this was the direct cause for my ex to dissacociate but it seems to fit based on the research I’ve read. Coincidently she told me I was the only person she was able to ever open up to about this experience (not even her close family and friends knew). It is hard to find sympathy for my ex after her hurtful actions disrailed our relationship but I know deep down she was and probably still is in pain. Her dissociation was one of those signs of pain for me.

[Rightandwrong]

Yes, I have definitely saw something different in the eyes of my (now deceased) SO.

When we first met, I told him he had sad eyes.

As time wore on, I noticed how his eyes would narrow in anger and a psychotic hate. Man, those eyes used to scare me.

But also, when I looked at photos of him (during our separation), he had shiny, dark eyes that made him look evil. Perhaps it was the meth he was smoking, but his eyes were really the eyes of a psychopath, glassy and soulless.

My son noted that Connor MCgregor has similar eyes to his dad... .the look of someone who doesn't give a flying f... .and could happily destroy you with a few punches.

That is one thing that many people have said about him since his death - he was absolutely fearless... .

In the end though, in the last two years of his life, he was incredibly afraid, a nervous wreck.

Such a dichotomy, such a puzzle! But he definitely had scary eyes for much of our relationship.

[SummerStorm]

Yes, quite often.  In person sometimes, but most often in pictures. 

When she is single or just feeling abandoned or whatever, my BPD friend will post lots of selfies on Snapchat, looking for attention from anyone.  The problem is that she looks lifeless in all of them.  About a year ago, I clicked on her Snapchat story one day, and it was just a stream of pictures of her staring blankly, some with captions like, "I miss you.  Wish you were here so I could sleep."  I guess they were directed at her boyfriend, which I thought was weird because she could have just sent them to him.  But her eyes in those pictures, and in other pictures she's posted over the years, just look hollow and dead. 

Probably the most disconcerting picture was from a little over a year ago.  A month before that, she had broken up with a guy whom she really did think she was going to marry (I, along with others, thought that he might actually be the one, too).  She moved on to another guy right away, of course, but it was easy to see that she was just trying to fill a void.  One day, she posted a pic of her in bed, with the new guy sleeping on top of her, with the caption, "Laying in bed all day is just the therapy I needed."  She was staring blankly, with a completely empty expression on her face, and all I could think was, "This is the least happy and content person I've ever seen in my life."

She will throw on a smile when she's posing for pictures with other people, but it never really touches her eyes, if you know what I mean.  I told her this once, and she said, "That's really sad."  From that point on, she would post things on Facebook, saying, "I had a really nice day today.  For the first time in a long time, I felt my smile reach my eyes."  I guess she was trying to convince herself that she is getting better.  I don't know. 

[hope2727]

YEs absolutely. Mostly in looking back over photos. There was a definite pattern that even a friend of mine who had never met him cold identify. It was spooky looking back.