July 17, 2012
Borderline Personality Disorder
BPD’s only seem to operate in two modes – black
and white, on or off, I love you or I hate you.
by CC
(henrymakow.com)
Your
latest guest contribution from Rosie completely nails what BPD involves
and I can vouch for what she’s saying as somebody who had a mother that
I now realize suffers specifically from BPD.
The book title Rosie
mentioned called “I Hate You, Don’t Leave Me” describes EXACTLY how my
mom was back when she was still in my
life. Horrible vicious verbal abuse telling those closest to her all
the reasons why she hates them and wants them out of her life, coupled
with physical abuse, but when you oblige and run for the hills, there she
is calling you on the phone in crying hysterics like a lost two year
old, begging you to come back.
So you go back, and then it’s back to
being icy
cold and hateful, including 180-degree Jekyll and Hyde personality flip
flopping from moment to moment, as well as delusions and paranoid
accusations against you about things that never happened, so you leave
again….and here comes the crying phone calls again. I used to call
it “push and pull.”
BPD’s only seem to operate in two modes – black
and white, on or off, I love you or I hate you. Their ability to love
and empathize was thwarted in early childhood due to abuse and
abandonment (which was the textbook case with my own mom – abandonment
started for her at age two, so a part of her never progressed beyond
that point, then later the abuse kicked in) and so as “adults” they
behave as a
lost, scared, spoiled and empty children always throwing fits, who can only take take take, and never give, and who don’t
understand the needs of others, and don’t know how to feel true love
and empathy for other people or pets.
“Love” for them is
needy co-dependent dysfunction. A case of “I love you because I need
you” not “I need you because I love you.”
People and animals are merely
objects that they project their own dysfunction and neediness onto. We
take for granted that we can love another person or an animal for who
they are, and not for “what emotional security and material gain can
they provide for me.” However for a dysfunctional, co-dependent
Borderline like my mom, they seem unable to experience that.
Borderlines
are also deathly afraid of letting the people closest to them get
close. It’s easier to heap physical and verbal abuse on them and keep
them at an arms length than to risk loving them and getting close to
them.
And that’s actually a bit sad, something to have empathy for I
guess. They’ve been denied one of
the greatest things that one can experience while here.
Another VERY important thing to realize about Borderlines is that they
learned the hard way as
children that life is a war zone; negative stuff is always coming at
them and there’s no protection from any of it in sight.
As a
consequence their over-the-top reactions and hyper vigilant paranoia and
delusions as adults are often likened to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
in nature. It really is like that.
As one of your readers noted in a
previous comment, it’s commendable that Rosie sought help and is able to
acknowledge her issue. That’s usually not the case for most people
with a personality disorder of any type.
In my mother’s case she lacks
the ability for self awareness and does not admit wrong doing at any
point, nor apologize for anything. She allows her disorder to lead her
around by the nose and never acknowledged that she has a problem.
And
because of that she lost a daughter 19 years ago who ran for the hills
and never looked back. She lost her son too.
I
encourage people to research this subject. Here’s the link to the
wikipedia page outlining the main behavioral symptoms of BPD for those
who aren’t familiar: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borderline_personality_disorder
Hopefully your series will make a few light bulb connections for readers
who may not have realized that a problematic spouse or family member has this specific disorder.
Comments for “For BPD’s, People are Merely Objects “
John said (July 17, 2012):
Rosie:
You can walk out of your illness with the help of a Christian ministry in Thomaston, Georgia.
Please read the books Rejection, Fear and anything else from their website that interests you. Also, you can go to a 1-week course called For My Life in Thomaston, GA and they will teach you how to be free of your illness. Many people have been healed there, but I’ll tell up front that you will have to COMMIT to practicing what they teach you, and getting completely healed may take some time.
http://www.beinhealth.com/public/programs/whatweoffer
http://shop.beinhealth.com/store/US/catalog/partlist.aspx?CategoryID=2
Good luck with it!
Henry Makow is the author of A Long Way to go for a Date. He received his Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of Toronto. He welcomes your feedback and ideas at
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