BPD vs Fragile NPD case studies.

Deef

Deef’s Spiritual Warrior Dojo

Sure, Keep thinking about throwing out rebranding ideas…
I think our group has already gone towards this new territory… just haven’t officially changed the brand fully…

Playing with metaphor of advanced gray rock technique into an aggressive cold shoulder strike… that’s a counter to ODV, but it might be a bit of a tough sell… we’ll see if i can develop it enough to fit it into Saturday…

Fryek

I’m not sure how it fits into the brand… i’ll have to work on this… but i like this motto for the members… like a team tee shirt.

https://www.noisebot.com/products/how-about-a-nice-cup-of-shut-the-fuck-up-t-shirt
or maybe it’s just my personal team?

had a shirt with this on it back in the day… wife made me get rid of it… but it had this woman on it:

NYE

I can’t put my finger on it, but there seems to be a mental / emotional / spiritual block for codependents to engage in spiritual tactical warfare against the Cluster B types. Perhaps it’s the 20th Century focus on the compassionate side of God that prevents Christian codependents from recognizing God’s love can also be cold and hard. It’s as if they think you must always be compassionate.

Deef

NYE you must always be compassionate.

Lee Hammock Your Niceness WILL be used against you like a Weapon
58s

Deef

spiritual block
you must always be compassionate. (injunction)

I’d dig in and see what ‘compassion’ and ‘nice’ means to you, or what society means when they promote that sort of behavior control prescription (injunction). It’s been twisted from the etymological origins, almost opposite from it’s origins.

In that sense, that’s why I like The Archons as a metaphor for spiritual warfare, but you could also use the fall of lucifer story from the old testament. similar warnings of this ‘hard to pin down’ nature..

I can’t put my finger on it

I’d argue this is because it’s shadow warfare…. secrecy, shame, deception… modern society has fallen for the trap of using language to influence feelings, perception and distort reality and truth. Now it takes an inordinate amount of effort to try to see through the fog of illusion/maya/trickery.

I sense that there’s also element of a direct encounter with malevolence & evil that’s a big part of the issue..
Jordan Peterson describes it better than me..

41s

Maybe modern society doesn’t honor and encourage the noble warrior class. Or darker forces have labelled that as dangerous to society, but without those protectors of virtuous fighting, it’s open season for malevolent forces to invade all in all domains of society.

Deef

Sam Vaknin’s best description of BPD he’s come across

1m07s

when i go into psychopathy, i ignore people and plot into future revenge
and am comfortable being alone for months
when i am grandiose, i switch into narcissism tendencies
i feel empty, no emotions left of my own
i can’t be alone, i need validation to breathe
i’m not good with any sexual rejection, i go into bpd rage, my narcissism will not allow rejection
when i go into my fragile bpd self, i’m like a burn victim filled to the top with empathy
and when it’s not returned
i go back to psychopathic tendencies, then histrionic for attention, and then back to narcissism
because i can’t accept that i’m simply not the best

Onnaloves

Deef damnnn this sounds familiar 🤣🤣🤣 my mother was BPD psychopath? She is much more mellow now. Still forgive her for all that crap.

Newbie

Deef ok so I won’t be offended if anyone disagrees lol but watching this leaves me confident that I am NOT borderline or narcissistic lolol (I didn’t think I was, but I sort of joked about it earlier) just really talking about feeling “insane” (myself) at times if not ‘on the border’ of it. Again, bad joke I know. But I really am poking at my own self (for the record.) Never to make fun of anyone or hurt anyone.

NYE

I feel like there’s some link between modern Christianity and codependence. My Christian upbringing emphasized the compassionate / loving part of God. And I was told to emulate Christ. “All people are worthy of God’s love.” And my understanding of “love” was that of caring and compassion. My Methodist Christian education totally neglected to mention that there was also a judgmental side of God. Practicing tough love can sometimes be the best form of love.

Deef

told to emulate Christ

I can agree with that but that’s also to live the truth, and not just play it safe.

Actual original definition of compassion, I use the pointer holding space because of modern distortions:

The English noun compassion, meaning to suffer together with, comes from Latin.
Its prefix com- comes directly from com, an archaic version of the Latin preposition and affix cum (= with);

Compassion is thus related in origin, form and meaning to the English noun patient (= one who suffers), from patiens, present participle of the same patior, and is akin to the Greek verb πάσχειν (= paskhein, to suffer) and to its cognate noun πάθος (= pathos).

and original meaning of nice (not know, ignorant, stupid):

Now throwing in an even more fuzzier poorly defined word of love. That’s more challenging, as the Greeks had like 5 to 10 different words for love, and God’s love is more Agape, which can be quite different than other loves.

I suspect BPDs would be good at a smothering type of devouring mother type of enmeshed love. A love that does not recognize separation or any boundaries.

Deef

Nice breakdown of Borderline vs Narcissistic primary defensive strategies:

Borderline Anticipates Rejection, then destroys the object through ‘Aggressive Decency’
1m34s

the borderline patient initially turns towards the object with insatiable need
eventually she feels rejected and then she rejects the object in turn
and then she fears object loss so the borderline is clingy and needy
she appropriates confiscates and adopts an outside external object
could be the twin flame then she anticipates rejection, real or imaginary and
then she reads it rejects the object and then she fears that she had lost the object

the borderline is primarily concerned with destroying the object through aggressive decency

if you’re more of a borderline you’re likely gradually to become aggressive
and the relationship will become more and more conflict-laden
it will involve approach avoidance there will be a lot of tension a lot of dissonance
you will retreat more and more into your mind you will preemptively reject the object
you will decompensate you will act directly recklessly for example promiscuously and so on
so if you’re borderline you will become a secondary psychopath you will react with aggression
these are not my words this is hartmann and seinfeld

Narcissistic Schizoid ‘Force the Fantasy on Reality’ Completely Repress hunger for Love
55s

typically the
schizoid endeavors to completely repress the hunger for love as long as the repression is effective
the schizoid relates to the outer object world in a realistic but emotionally shallow manner
if the schizoid person is threatened with massive regressive withdrawal
he may resort to an obsessive fatal attraction desperately clinging to object relatedness

if you’re a schizoid you will react with this obsessive fantasy
gradually will impair your reality testing so dramatically
that you will try to force the fantasy on reality
you will try to enact the fantasy, you will try to carry out

behaving in the real world as though your fantasy was reality

and this is very dangerous

Codepedents who fall into the victim trap, seem to fall into schizoid defenses.. become mini-narcissists in coping strategy… (but also therapy & self help often teach narcissistic defenses)

Onnaloves

Deef Codepedents who fall into the victim trap, seem to fall into schizoid defenses.. become mini-narcissists in coping strategy…

Ahaaaaa this is me. Ha! Totally knew it! ““Addicted to love” damn this is good validation. Cookie cookie cookie 🍪

Deef

The uptick of youtube exposure has given me the lovely opportunity for new BPD merges… oh what joy…. NOT…

But I can turn shit into fertilizer.. and I sense I’m getting close to a flowchart/roadmap for a common formula for BPD interactions, attacks, or the shame chicken game they play.

Some earlier observations:

Deef Borderlines are playing in shame bomb, shame spiral and everyone drowns type of territory.

Deef Emotional terrorism might be like shame bomb (despair/suicide/breakdown) chicken. If you cave to the ODV (Ostentatious Displays of Vulnerability) shame threat, then you lose.

So the primary guts of engagement is shame & chaotic.. vs narcissistic style is guilt, blame and very linear.

How’s it start?? how do they get an opening?? What’s the attention hook??

Expose humanity and vulnerability dump with mindfuck of both
a. suffocated invisible unseen
b. over-exposed hyper-visible (naked flashing exhibitionist flair)

Can’t help but pay attention when someone flashes you with their emotional raw nakedness…
But also can’t help but want to fucking breathe and have some of your own space, when another person is crowding you, suffocating your story, and totally running over your psyche…

This is amazing attention hook combo…. what’s a defense against this 1-2 combo???

Deef The challenge is that BPDs are great at button pushing, or getting a reaction out of others.
If you respond with no reaction, then that might knock them too much off balance. It might be seen as an invitation or challenge to look for more buttons?

I don’t have a good counter roadmap just yet, currently still mapping the territory…

But the guts of it, would be to hit them where it hurts… emotional intensity & abandonment.. that will knock them off balance.. but it will also invite chaos & escalation in the short term.

So here’s the 4 layers of a common formula of their attacks…

Shock & Surprise
a. Psychologically suffocate the other until they’re triggered to react or leave
Sow Doubt & Confusion
a. Play Dumb & Innocent (cover) while sowing doubt & confusion through emotional contagion & dumping
b. Make ignorance plea due to own blind spot,
“I genuinely didn’t realize you were drowning in my presence, and that I had my hands around your neck suffocating the life from your body.”
Guilt (Moral high ground posturing) - Aggressive Decency
a. Fixate on other’s trigger & over-reaction then pivot to moral high ground.
b. Claim & make a reasonableness plea (mask for judgment & hatred for your interruption & wanting to grasp for air)
Evoke Shame & dump (suicide/despair, abandonment/exile)
a. Competitive Victimhood - pivot to Victim Plea
b. Ostentatious Display of Vulnerability, signaling of suicide,despair & abandonment
c. Steal & hog the spotlight with Woe as Me pity story (long over-writing monologue of life of loserdom and horrific endless victim)

(masked agenda) to bait you, get you chasing them and to keep you in the game.
“Don’t leave me, I need you… (I’ll make you stay by terrorizing you and sharing hate, judgment and shame onto you.)”

Deef the borderline is primarily concerned with destroying the object through aggressive decency

BPD is interested in feeding off your non-being… your psychological space, emotional containment, sense of self… possibly feeding off your spirit & life force? It’s much different than narcissistic supply, that’s more about attention and a power play…. BPD wants to steal your spirit? soul? life experience?

Not fond of going down the demonizing path for them.. but it’s hard not to do some of this after a fresh BPD emotional merge… I want to purge them out of my mindspace,..
so it takes some aggressive hostility, to counter their fake aggressive decency..

Apologies for the savagery and harsh judgments… I have weak language skills and suck at the aggressive decency game.. I’m taking the side of shared humanity.

Fryek

ugh… this stuff is scary cuz I still have to deal with the full on bpd meltdown phase of being constantly attacked by an unstable bpd.

Deef

Excerpts from newsletter by Imi Lo, a specialist w/ BPD and also likely in the same spectrum, she combines both western and eastern philosophies.

https://www.eggshelltherapy.com/bpdparent/

THE TRAUMA OF HAVING A PARENT WITH BPD (BORDERLINE PERSONALITY DISORDER)

Having a parent with BPD can bring unspeakably painful trauma; Because of their immaturity and instability, they may stop you from separating from them, suppress your emotional expressions, and hamper your development and growth. However, having a parent with BPD does not mean you are destined to the same fate. You absolutely have the strengths and freedom now to free yourself from the cage of control and engulfment, and to reclaim freedom and health.

Does your parent often have exaggerated emotional responses? Could minor incidents set off disproportionate reactions like angry outbursts?

Have you been consciously or unconsciously ‘trained’ from a young age to tip-toe around your parents, or to mind-read what they are thinking, to not provoke an emotional spiral?

Do you feel that your parents vilify you for seeking autonomy? Either explicitly or in a roundabout way, do they make you feel guilty for having to leave home or having an opinion of your own?

Do they often think in black-or-white terms? For example, when something negative happens, do they either blame you and make you the enemy, or they create a scenario where it is ‘you-and-me-against-the-world’?

Have you always had to suppress or hide your thoughts and emotions for the fear of upsetting your parent? Do they always shut down the expression of authentic feelings? Were you ever allowed to be angry, upset, or disappointed at them?

Does your parent appear charming and loving on the outside, and portray a social image that is drastically different from what you see at home?

To have things happen their way, do they use desperate and threatening behaviors such as violence, escalating a tantrum, threatening to hurt or kill themselves?

Do they let irresponsible and reckless, seemingly impulsive behaviors take the place of responsible parenting? Some examples may be excessive drinking, overspending, substance abuse, reckless driving.

…
When you have a parent with BPD, the foundational structure that is required for healthy development is destabilized. Your parent’s hyper-reactivity, rage, and mood swings made focusing on your growth as a young person impossible. Often, the turbulent and imbalanced relationship with your parent continues to affect you well into adulthood.
…
To summarise, having a BPD Parent puts you at risk for the following types of negative behavior/ thinking patterns as an adult. Here are some possible consequences:

You have difficulty trusting other people.

You are drawn to abusive or highly critical people as partners as the pattern feels familiar to you

You are prone to becoming locked in co-dependent relationships

Or, on the flip side, you are highly phobic of dependency of any kind and would rather isolate yourself

You view life as unpredictable and chaotic; you are always waiting for the next disaster to hit and cannot relax.

You are physically hyper-vigilant; your nervous system is always on high alert. You are extremely sensitive to loud noises and sudden changes in the environment.

You often feel depressed and hopeless about life

You always put other people’s needs over your own, and feel unable to be assertive or voice your wants and needs

You feel defective and unlovable on the inside; even when you don’t show it, you always assumed you will be abandoned or let down in the end.

You are crippled by self-doubt and unable to meet your full potential at work.

You are confused about what you want in life, have an unclear career path or vision of the future.

You tend to self-sabotage— when fortune comes to you you immediately feel panicked or guilty, and will therefore unconsciously push them away. This may also manifest as chronic procrastination of important tasks or self-neglect.

A PARENT WITH BPD – FREEING YOURSELF AND RECLAIM YOUR LIFE

Whether or not your parent with BPD is seeking help for their mental health, you can choose to move on from the past and seek a more fulfilling life.

Although we cannot go back in time and change the past, you can still gift yourself with a future of love, authenticity, and freedom. Despite what you may have heard from your parent repeatedly, you are not responsible for their moods and reactions, their disappointments in life, or any grievances they have with their relationships. In contrast to the normative cultural value, you do not owe your parents and it is not your job to satisfy their needs. It should never have been your task to try and heal them, rescue them, or save them from their misery.

The journey of healing could be summed up by these messages:

I did not cause any of these.

I could not have controlled what happened.

I cannot cure their mental illness

It was not my fault that they are dissatisfied.

I am not responsible for their lives

They can survive without me

I do not owe them anything.

Fryek

Ugh… that is depressing how much of that resonates Parent with BPD… most of it.

Deef

Pulling this from a recent journal entry

Teal Swan is a good example of the wounded healer/light worker trap, that possibly many BPD’s fall into quite easily. As they do tend to be artistic, creative, and energy/spirit sensitive.
1m13s

for example the shadow side of my career is that

I’m doing this to stay safe

because for an extrasensory who’s walking through the world
watching every bypass and watching the discrepancy
between what’s authentic about a person and what they actually show you
that’s terrifying it’s basically the whole world becomes a wolf in sheep’s clothing
the more that I can wake people up the safer I am

almost my whole career is motivated by that terror

so it’s not like I look at the shadow side to say
okay I should quit my job today because it’s really just coming from me of trying to stay safe
or I have to somehow make that go away, so that I’m only here because of this reason
it’s that,
in all moments, I have to be aware of where I am relative to the person I’m sitting in front of,
see if I’m sitting in front of them, like, I have to say, if I have to stay safe I have to stay safe,
if that’s there, I have to become aware of it otherwise it’s going to take over
and then the way that I help people is going to be interesting at best.

this ‘have to stay safe’ part that’s going to take over, that is already in control.
She’s helping others driven by her personal agenda, which gets in the way of healing, and she knows this,
likely has done it multiple times, and still can’t help it. Because she’s being a fucking parasite on her clients.

Kudos to her for being aware that she’s driven by this terror of social safety (fear of abandonment reframe?).

But she still feeds off the role of being a healer (with the personal agenda to wake others up so she can feel safer), and really glossed over how she probably viciously abuses and traumatizes people when they trigger her ‘incessant need to be safe’, and to ‘control dominant narrative’.

Deef

A recent wondering about dealing with BPD vs NPD… Being non-reactive/gray-rock might be counter-productive or seen as an escalation with a BPD? while it works with NPD because they’re blind without reactions & starve without supply, so they move onto other sources.

But with BPDs, too much non-reaction might trigger their abandonment terror…

The challenge is that BPDs are great a button pushing, or getting a reaction out of others.
1m21s

If you respond with no reaction, then that might knock them too much off balance. It might be seen as an invitation or challenge to look for more buttons? Or they could trigger others around you, then you’re out numbered.

But doing the opposite of just reacting, or countering isn’t gonna work either. Or reacting to every single ostentatious display of vulnerability definitely isn’t gonna work, as then they’re pulling your emotional strings with all the hidden emotional threats.

20s

I’m leaning towards some sort of smoke screen type fake/distorted reaction, to offer some cover, redirect them, or dissipate the trigger attempt…. but that also feels like it can be an excessive energy expenditure… I suppose it’s close to a variation of Agree & Amplify…

Still a theory in progress…. I think I’m getting worn down with recent BPD explorations or merges. or possibly I’m having delayed reaction to deep dives in Feb.

Deef

Modern society is becoming more BPD, and this is a good example of the mood that’s in the air, and festering on social media.

1m14s

cancellation baby that’s what keeps me going

every time i see somebody get cancelled it make me feel good
social movements
i post this infographic, let’s not change the climate, it makes such a big difference

keep posting, keep shaming –> that’s what we all need to do more

keep shaming each other into submission = make the world a better place

Deef Being non-reactive/gray-rock might be counter-productive or seen as an escalation with a BPD?

Okay… I temporarily forgot that narcissists tactics are guilt and blame. While Borderlines are playing in shame bomb, shame spiral and everyone drowns type of territory.

So it’s not about a particular reaction, it’s more the mood and who’s got the spotlight. So in principle you have to throw shade on their spotlight, along with wrestling the spotlight away from them onto you or someone else. And that new spotlight can be on your own humanity (I prefer the I suck, sad baby stone wall) or you could amplify the other direction of how amazing someone else is, or how horrible someone else is. But redirect to other’s might be trickier, redirect to self centered wallowing, that’s easier.

That’s 1-on-1 dynamic, in a group that’s trickier, as they’re playing the whole crowd. Just have to get a few people triggered and chaos starts, then in Claudia’s example, she just dismisses, judges and shuts down any attempts at rationality or reasonableness.

Also these tactics are just to sour the supply, and get them to disengage on their own accord. And they still might do it abruptly with an parting insult. But you save time and limit your exposure.

The other side of whether you can get cooperation or insight from a BPD who’s motive is to dump or evoke shame. That’s harder to gauge. Can they be reasonable? Can they be sincere? They can be flipped into rescue mode if you can act out their shame better than they are feeling. But that’s not really productive either.

This power high isn’t from ego domination & control play that’s more Narcissistic, it’s more about shaming other’s into submission, exile, silence, darkness, etc. But maybe with a more altruistic healing the world type of cover story?

While maybe Narcissist tries to play parent role, vs BPD plays chaotic God role or society enforcer??

Still need to parse out the differences a bit more… but the principle difference of guilt tactics vs shame warfare, that feels like a good accurate distinction. But shame warfare is a fucking mess, and that’s even with my Chinese ‘saving face’ and ‘shame awareness’ skills.

Onnaloves

Deef guilt tactics vs shame warfare, that feels like a good accurate distinction. But shame warfare is a fucking mess, and that’s even with my Chinese ‘saving face’ and ‘shame awareness’ skills.

Lol lol lol amazingly my mother was diffused with anything that was superstition. So when I told her that I had ““the freaky” within me, she didn’t know how to handle that. The freaky is neither emotional nor push pull nor logical. It’s just what I used to enable my mothers sympathy and compassion - that I have no control other than to give into my inner freak. It was neither malevolent, nor challenging, but to her because she felt that I was possessed… she became diffused. And this makes me chuckle quietly inside. Because she listened to superfuckingstition.

Deef

What do you y’all think? Is this quite an accurate over-acting of BPD relationship dynamics? Except they wouldn’t be so explicit and obvious in their demands. Instead it usually is just a gradual escalation. The threats switched to joking niceness is also a common tactic of playing extremes. Cute graphics of the ‘Titty Bomb!’ one she gets called out! lol

5m30s

Emotional terrorism might be like shame bomb (despair/suicide/breakdown) chicken. If you cave to the ODV (Ostentatious Displays of Vulnerability) shame threat, then you lose.

Though… superstition might be an effective counter against a BPD, as they do tend to be more into astrology and other divination/new-age/spirits etc type of world. I’d have to figure out how to reframe some law of attraction type stuff to block and counter their ODV jabs.

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