Cluster Bee
In your first post above, I understand you to say that there are:
- hidden affairs (the cheater's partner(s) unaware of each other)
- visible affairs where one or both partners aware of each other.
Yes, this is an abstracted, idealized spectrum designed to better understand response strategies. I established this binary because I believed the original poster was responding appropriately for the more typical hidden affair, but inappropriately for the visible affair.
Upon discovering a hidden affair, expressing pain or even awareness of the affair forces the cheating partner to make a decision: either end the affair or end the primary relationship.
Obviously, real life is not so abstract, and actual affairs usually fall somewhere between these hidden-visible extremes.
PWBPD motivations for
secret affairs are:
Yes, the motivation is selfishness, but I did not mean to limit secret affairs to those with BPD. In fact, secret affairs are common and occur within all psychological categories. My purpose in establishing the hidden/visible binary was to propose solutions to each type. People with BPD may start with hidden affairs and gradually make them visible to their partners.
PWBPD motivations for
visible affairs are:
- reduce engulfment and abandonment anxiety, or
- too experience the thrill of living dangerously, or
- splitting/punishing.
To profoundly grasp the motivations of someone with BPD, we must return to her primal trauma. Instead of attaching to her and properly caring for her, her parents symbolically "cheated" on her by pursuing other interests and imposing emotional distance.
Her compulsion to replay this drama during adulthood drives her to reenact this dynamic in two ways. One way is by choosing abusive or emotionally unavailable partners, allowing her to replay her victim role. By accepting this abuse, she assuages her fear of abandonment.
The second way occurs when she gains a vulnerable partner. She will eventually visibly cheat on him, as her parents symbolically did to her, and assume the dominant parent role, "friend-zoning" her dependent partner. In his woeful pleas, she recognizes the pain she suffered as a child. This emotional separation between her and her partner / inner child helps dampen her fear of engulfment.
My first BPD partner was an unwanted child born to young college students. With exciting lives ahead of them, they couldn't be bothered to love and raise her, so she ended up bouncing between their unwelcome homes and her equally unwelcome grandparents' houses. In effect, her parents "friend-zoned" her through their physical and emotional distance. She spent her adult life redeeming her wounded child through the cruel treatment of her sexual partners. Alternatively, she had one-night stands with rough men far below her social status. Fortunately, I was only temporarily vulnerable due to the loss of my son to cancer, and I got out after a few months of experiencing the type of emotional pain she must have endured as an abandoned child.
3 options for the person being cheated on are:
- encourage the cheating
- act like you don't care about the cheating
- go no contact
Yes but the first option has two branches. A totally dependent partner will just have to radically accept his plight of being a partner to a cheating pwBPD and try to minimize his losses, by disassociating and even encouraging it. This approach kills the pwBPD's vibe of repeating the primal trauma but is no guarantee that she will not continue the affair just for the thrill of it.
An acutely dependent partner who still maintains a spirit of resistance can generalize the situation. He might say, "Oh, I didn't realize we were just sex buddies. As a man, I am totally into playing the field and not being tied down by commitment. So, yes, please go ahead and see that guy. There just happens to be a hottie at work who has been showing interest in me." This must be followed by real downgrades in the relationship, such as moving out and losing interest. A woman will always win this battle in the short term since, if she is remotely attractive, she has no problem finding willing sex partners. So no bluffing! This strategy, if executed without wavering, will likely destroy the relationship, which is in the man's long-term interest anyway.
The "act like you don't care" can easily degenerate into denial. If the pwBPD senses denial, she will up the ante with public antics until denial is no longer sustainable. The totally dependent partner will just have to accept his fate and try to distance himself from the pain.
The less dependent types can use this period of ignoring the affair to prepare their departure on their own terms. As counterintuitive as it feels, reacting emotionally to her cheating gains nothing in either case. It's like a BPD bird of prey and a dependent lamb. The lamb must accept that it is in the nature of BPD birds of prey to emotionally swoop down and carry them away as a meal by cheating. However, the less dependent lamb may finally recognize that he is dealing with a dangerous BPD bird of prey. Instead of staying vulnerable in the relationship, he can get away and seek shelter. In both cases, the BPD bird of prey is simply acting according to her essential nature and is not morally responsible for her actions. That's the nature of mental illness.
The third option of no contact is self-explanatory and is obviously the best response to infidelity. Leaving the drama means starting the process of dismantling the relationship. But this option is reserved for those who are not fully dependent.
The multitude of stories on these boards testifies to the near impossibility of sexually "domesticating" a young and attractive person with BPD. We may object to the term "domestication," but it accurately describes the process both partners in a monogamous couple must undergo. Due to her primal trauma, a person with BPD will lean toward being feral to monogamy throughout adulthood.
The overall strategic goal of these responses is to divert the BPD's compulsion to repeat her primal trauma through cheating. Through therapy, she may find less destructive ways to mend her childhood wounds. The lack of emotional response to her cheating means she will not recognize her suffering young self in her nonchalant partner. A secondary effect of some of these responses is to provide a path for less dependent partners to exit the relationship. For those who are dependent, getting her into therapy and other support is also important.
