HPD's - Creating jealousy to hurt people

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Everything you say makes perfect sense to me. Whether I like it or not. I think I'm a good judge of character and before I'd ever even heard of HPD, I'd pretty much figured out that her head was as you describe anyway.

I think back to some early emails I sent to her and many things that a wrote about what I thought of her state of mind are scarily accurate when I read through these pages about it. Maybe this explains why she has told me that she thinks that I understand her more than anybody else she knows. (Could be a lie, I know, but I genuinely think she recognises some of my thoughts were very accurate too)

I'm taking great comfort and strength from reading the input on this forum. It's helped me realise that the thoughts I had were not inaccurate or in my imagination. I feel better equipped to handle the situation for my benefit and I don't want that to sound selfish. It probably is on one level but it's all about helping yourself in this world. And that's exactly what she needs to do - and I've told her this. Even suggested there is hope for her because she recognises the problem. I don't think there's anything else I can do for her. She either helps herself or doesn't. I realise she can't be forced to do that. I just hope she does it sooner rather than later because if she can manage her mind better than she does at the moment, she would have a most beautiful interior to match her unbelievably beautiful exterior.

What's the best way to respond to jealousy games. Is it best to completely ignore them. Will this cause an HPD womant to increase the frequency of the games.

The woman I am seeing has repeatedly expressed an interest in sex with multiple men. Is this a jealousy game or does she really want this.What would the possible outcomes be if I arranged this for her.

where8 -

This thread is about 3 years old now.

I suggest creating a new thread over in family-support/

That written, quickly, it may just be something she wants in life and so you'll have to decide if you can live with it, or not.

As Xdude and others wrote upthread, the point isn't to hurt others, but to validate oneself.

I know a pwHPD in my personal life, and I find the best way to react is to make it seem as if the attention that she gives to others doesn't bother you.

I my opinion the answer to whether or not pwHPD wish to hurt others is

It depends on the individual in question.

Like everyone, people with personality disorders also have a complex mix of personality dimensions, such as aggression, varying levels of empathy, as well as life course acquired behaviors such as frustration, envy, and defensiveness. These artifacts of nature and nurture MAY combine to produce more passive, narcissistic or even antisocial variations of HPD, which is probably why Millon described an HPD spectrum that ranges from more a more passive, dependent presentation (Infantile or Appeasing), to narcissistic (Vivacious), to antisocial (Disingenuous).

And of course, the questions "do some people pwHPD wish to hurt others?" and "how can pwHPD improve their own lives?" are two different questions; the first question is an empirical one and shouldn't stigmatize or otherwise be mistakenly used to block the recovery process for pwHPD.

orion8591 wrote:It depends on the individual in question.

A good reminder that everyone is different and people rarely fit into any labels exactly.

Some general thoughts about jealousy -

"Intent" clearly matters to most of us, though in practical terms we need to defend ourselves regardless of intent. Still it's very evident in most of our legal systems that the 'intent' of a person is a big factor in our thinking, probably because if someone does not intend to do harm, we reasonably believe that they are less likely to repeat a hurtful behavior.

I suppose that's part of what 'disordered thinking' means too, and why others get frustrated. A disordered person may not 'intend' to do harm (or not be entirely aware of their intent), but even when explained many times why x,y, z is harmful, repeat the same patterns they know and cope with. Repeated behaviors can still hurt, regardless of intent.

On the flip side, 'jealousy' is a peculiar emotion, especially in some cultures where being jealous is viewed as an extremely negative emotion. Still I think for many of us we feel that jealousy is intertwined with romantic love. After all, if it was someone we didn't care about, they could evoke no feelings of jealousy in us?

For the same reason though, despite what anyone says regarding 'don't feel jealous', on an emotional level, if someone is jealous over us it can be an ego stroke too for the same reason. After all, if they didn't care about us at all, they'd not be jealous. From that point of view it's understandable why someone might actually enjoy making their partner jealous, even if they say that's not what they want.

I have to wonder how many NONs won't let go of their jealousy for fear that if they do so, they'll also stop caring in general. Likewise I have to wonder when someone is playing jealousy games, if their biggest concern is that their partner is jealous? or is the bigger concern that their partner will reach a point where they no longer feel jealous? or is that a want on some level too? It seems when it comes to push/pull relationships (the norm for some cluster B personality types), perhaps the person doesn't even know what they really want, or doesn't know what they want long term.

Ironically, if a partner was to let go of their feelings of jealousy, not only would they no longer be feeling hurt, but they'd soon enough learn if the jealousy is actually wanted/missed.

Moved to SOFF

Cracked