Effects of dating a borderline?

MrEmMak, for the third time no animosity or judgment here. Just reporting what I see and asking questions. No problem.

I appreciate your response about those who date someone with BPD. These people I'm talking about were generally very social before and *appeared* happy. Now they are less social and appear unhappy. Whether they had underlying codependency issues I'm not sure, but I know a change has taken place with regard to how they interact with thers and it's a little unnerving to watch it impact their friends and family.

If you say you've seen these normal, happy, socially full people with good, healthy relationships fall into a zombie like pattern after meeting and dating a BPD person long term, I'd say your situation is very rare or you have a very biased sense for the people you're supporting and have failed to see their prior insecurities and lack of support.

It's not much of a conversation simply because your situation happens so rarely it would be hard for us to give you insight.

To use a typical non-type phrase, healthy people don't usually seek out, let alone stay, with unhealthy people.

-- Thu Jun 23, 2011 4:46 pm --

ranger8877 wrote:MrEmMak, for the third time no animosity or judgment here. Just reporting what I see and asking questions. No problem.

Again, subconsciously confrontational. Ranger, your situation is rare. Norms don't get involved or stay with people with BPD very often. There is more than one type of invalidated personality out there. Ours happens to be the self-destructive / interpersonal relationship destructive type so it gets more attention. The other types though, they're not supported by the people you consider healthy (non zombie like relationships) or they'd be with them. And that doesn't mean not supported in the traditional sense. It means supported in the sense that the other person needs. Normal personalities don't often have a clue. Their belief is just common enough, they accept it as fact. That's why clinical co-dependents, narcissists, borderlines, OCD, Histrionics, Anti-socials and schitzoids are so hard to treat. Normals don't have a clue how their normal thoughts and emotions just don't apply. They're always surprised with their family members fall into these destructive situations. Their thoughts and emotions are confirmed enough, it would be very difficult for them to realize the exceptions have validity too. They beat down exceptions and don't even know it. Chances are, your zombie like friends were beat down by your regular, everyday healthy people before they met their BPD person. Even when they try to get supportive and help their family/friend pull away, they're still unknowingly unsupportive. The person attempting to support and the person feeling even more unsupported don't even know it's happening. Beneath all of this supposed conscious understanding of the human condition is this very unknown unconscious/sub conscious world. The only reasons normals thoughts and emotions are accepted as "healthy" is because they're common and accepted in the, "we all think it so it must be true" fashion. Reality though, reality of the human condition of all people, not just the ones deemed balanced or healthy. . . . I have a feeling that reality is a little different and in the next 50 years, while I'm still on this earth (unless I die unexpectedly) I have a hunch the accepted ideas of the human condition (as western science defines it) will change drastically. Like what Linehan did with DBT, I think more understanding for other personality types will lead to big breakthroughs in otherwise untreatable or very difficult to treat people.

The very nature of your average, every day therapist, makes the personality disordered person even worse off. The very nature of your normal, everyday parent makes the personality disordered person worse off. There is very little acceptance for the uniqueness of a good 10% of the population. They're jsut deemed unhealthy and difficult to impossible to treat.

MrEmMak, I'm glad to hear that this isn't something that is common. I am willing to believe that either or both of the two people I am talking about have some underlying issues which could explain why they are acting so unusual given the right set of circumstances with a borderline. I thought one in particular may have a screw loose and this may be confirmation of that.

Personally, I've never dated a normal person. They've all had a disorder of some kind.

I am currently forming a relationship with a person diagnosed with BPD. Here are a few of my thoughts.

Call them co-dependent. Normal relationships are give/take, give/take. People who don't take, don't give any satisfaction when a person wants to give.

I believe this is a legitimate concern, but a stereotype that need not always be true. I wanted to be careful mine does not fall into overly unhealthy patterns, largely out of respect for my partner. I think we're both committed to it being as healthy as we can make it. In my situation, I know that it does have a strong mutual component, with give & take in both directions, as any healthy relationship must. My partner has helped me in very deep and profound ways, and I've accepted what they've given me with gratitude and not infrequent marvel at their wisdom and insight. I've trusted them with my own pain, bared my soul to them, received their support and caring, and tried to change myself for the better. Support and caring goes both ways in roughly equal amounts. Is that a codependency? I don't believe so.

Just because things can fall into unhealthy patterns doesn't mean they must. I think if one is willing to poke one's head up from time to time and sort of steer away from the biggest potholes, a BPD/non relationship can be relatively healthy. It doesn't mean it will be a perfect thing, or easy, or always smooth sailing, but nothing ever is. Non/Non relationships are not perfect either, and they also have ups and downs. Humans are human: imperfect, with our own needs and wants and fears. In the end all we can do is our best. There is strength in accepting imperfection.

In the beginning, I was frightened of engaging on a deep and emotional level with a person with this diagnosis. It helped to be honest with my partner about it: "Look, I'm scared..." Now, I'm not afraid any more, largely due to good communication with and help from them, a willingness of both of us to be open, and being humbled by the amazing strength they posses in the face of something that can be frightening and isolating.

So... the effects? At least for me, there has been learning, true mutual support, friendship, profound conversation, and a better acceptance of myself and my own flaws. I cannot know the future, whether it will work out, but I hope it will, and I do my best. I owe both myself and my partner no less.

I agree, justaperson.

First of all, not all non borderlines function in the emotional spectrum of what we might call normal, or maybe 80% brain chemistry/environment.

So, when you call yourself a non, it doesn't mean you're in the normal spectrum either. There are a lot of ways to be emotionally out of balance that are nothing like BPD. BPD just happens to be one of the most obvious.

If your partner is BPD (and I doubt she meets many of the criteria anymore if your relationship is as healthy as you say), then odds are (very, very high odds) she still has the temperament that is the main cause to BPD. Temperament doesn't go away. I like to compare people to cat/dogs. BPD people are like cats often times. Distant at times, but loving in their own way. Most people are dog people. Dogs constantly give emotional satisfaction by constantly needing/giving love and attention. So most likely, even though your partner is living in a way that's natural to her and not mal-adaptive enough to call a disorder, she's still a different cat, so to speak than the average person. The fact that you're really happy with her shows you're just as happy (if not more happy) with a cat than a dog. That's absolutely OK. There are many people who are, it just so happens the majority are dog people though. So you're an unusual non, whether you be more of a giver than taker emotionally or not, either end of the spectrum puts you off kilt from norm and makes intimate relationships with the average person more difficult.

That's why we gravitate to each other. It's very easy for you to accept her because if you've been a little different your whole life and don't quite know why, chances are your BPD partner loves you just as you are and you know it. You know your BPD partner has been a little off for most her life and chances are, you love her just as she is.

Both of you seem to be very functional in life as well as in your relationships. That's kind of what I'm shooting for. I don't want to be normal. I just want to be me in a way that works. Sounds like your wife is that way. Congrats to you two!

Thanks for the insightful reply, MrEmMak.

And you're absolutely correct, I am also emotionally out of balance. It's something I'm working on, again with their help. I think it's too early to know how the thing will really work out, but at the moment, we're both doing our best. There certainly have been rocky spots. It's healthier now than it was before. I just know I mean to give it my best try. If it doesn't work, then live and learn, and I'll hopefully at least leave the experience with a friend.

Out of curiosity, what makes you guess my partner is a "she"? It might be a man - I think men also can suffer from BPD. Also I might or might not be married; I didn't mean to imply that either way by "partner", which I meant a bit more generically than the "wife" sense in which you interpreted it. No worries or offense taken - just trying to keep this more abstract about the ideas involved rather than specifics of my situation.

I don't want to be normal. I just want to be me in a way that works.

There is considerable wisdom in your words about being you in a way that works. I like that thought a lot.

Tbh, what OP described seems like the effects of dating a narciccisst.

potato500 wrote:Tbh, what OP described seems like the effects of dating a narciccisst.

Very true. Narcissists are very good at attracting normal people. On the surface, they can appear very normal, perfect even. I could easily imagine a very normal, socially satisfied person getting involved with a narcissist and staying for a period of time thinking it would be like it was.

BPD though, that's an easy one to spot. Not many norms (not nons, but norms) get involved with people with BPD, or so it seems to me.

MrEmMak wrote:If your partner is BPD (and I doubt she meets many of the criteria anymore if your relationship is as healthy as you say), then odds are (very, very high odds) she still has the temperament that is the main cause to BPD. Temperament doesn't go away. I like to compare people to cat/dogs. BPD people are like cats often times. Distant at times, but loving in their own way. Most people are dog people. Dogs constantly give emotional satisfaction by constantly needing/giving love and attention. So most likely, even though your partner is living in a way that's natural to her and not mal-adaptive enough to call a disorder, she's still a different cat, so to speak than the average person.

Em, you know I love you. <3

But, really? A person with BPD must be dysfunctional in relationships, or else they "don't meet the criteria" anymore?

I think you may be thinking a little too narrowly here. You seem to be completely ruling out the possibility for a person with BPD to learn trust with a single individual, and learn how to functionally co-exist with them? I certainly think this is possible, and I speak from personal experience.

I have a very, dare I say it, functional and beautiful relationship. But I don't have any other relationships, I fear abandonment so deeply that I sabotage/cut off each new individual that I have met over the past 7 years.

But I have learned, painfully, how to trust this individual. But it has taken a LONG time to get there, and a lot of pain was sustained by both sides.

-- Fri Jun 24, 2011 7:00 pm --

MrEmMak wrote:BPD though, that's an easy one to spot. Not many norms (not nons, but norms) get involved with people with BPD, or so it seems to me.

This, I agree 100%.