Abusive Women, Cults, Brainwashing and Deprogramming, Part I

Great article HERE

Every point in this article hit home for me, especially these points about myself.

• Dependency. An intense desire for a sense of belonging, approval, acceptance and a fear of being alone.
• Unassertiveness. Non-confrontational, people-pleasers who are reluctant to question authority.
• Gullibility. A willingness to believe what another person says without critically thinking it through or challenging it.
• Naive Idealism. The belief that everyone is good, has some redeeming quality or can change for the better.
• Desire for Spiritual Meaning. The belief that life has a “higher purpose” or that everything happens for a reason. Sometimes people are just abusive jerks and there’s no deeper meaning attached to it, but good targets keep searching for it despite all evidence to the contrary.

It's not about them. It's about us.

Interesting Story about Borderline Personality Disorder

This is an interesting story with many excellent examples I came across

For people with this disorder, small problems explode into catastrophes, friends become enemies, love turns to hate – often with breath-taking speed. Relationships crumble, jobs rarely last. And their families are along for the ride.

The small problems exploding into catastrophes hits home with me. One thing that people need to understand about the disorder is that Borderlines will constantly test your boundaries. From day one you're boundaries are being poked and prodded and tested to see how strong you are. If you show any weakness with a borderline you are lost.

At the same time, if you are firm with your boundaries, be prepared to lose the relationship/friendship forever if you hold firm. An example is when my ex told me would call me on a specific day. She made a specific promise. As usual that day came and went without a phone call, so when we spoke next, I asked her about it. A person in a normal healthy state usually isn't going to blow someone off without good reason, and if they do, they usually apologize and attempt to rectify the situation. That is NOT how it works with a Borderline.

They will create an excuse, usually imagined, that is designed to create guilt and pity for even questioning their behavior. For instance they were "too busy" and "things are going bad right now. It was too hectic". All designed to make you wilt in enforcing your boundary. My ex is a MASTER at this tactic. If you even question a little why they were too busy to dial a phone number for two days as promised you will be attacked viciously and personally, depending at what stage the Boderline Rollercoaster relationship has currently evolved into.

Lack of Substance

Thinking about the experience with my ex recently I was trying to wrap my head around what was missing. There is just something fundamentally missing from someone with BPD. They are play actors. They mimic what they think a meaningful relationship is. What they think love is. It's very hard to wrap my around, but they really do not know. It's foreign to them. A completely alien state of being.

My ex does nothing and has nothing meaningful in her life. Absolutely nothing.

No close friends

No real long term relationships. Her husband who was murdered abandoned her and his family for drugs. They were constantly fighting and on the outs the entire time they were together. He tricked her into getting pregnant.

She manipulates and betrays anyone of substance that cares about her in life. Not only that, she'll minimize the relationship afterwords to excuse her actions and make them seem less severe. Even though the person who just got betrayed feels like an icepick has just been stabbed through their heart. Literally.

She is completely unable to tell the truth. About anything. She is always the victim. Anyone who calls her out on her games is the abuser. Not her. Even though I've seen her full blown abusive rages and have been on the receiving end of her physical abuse, it is never her fault. Ever. You cannot have any type of rational conversation with her about anything. The conversation has to be about her and the drama surrounding her small insignificant world. Whether it be about other strippers she's jealous of at work and she wants to badmouth them, or the "mean" manager who wouldn't let her work because she was late.

Current events? Nope

Philosophy? Ha. Unless you want to listen to her drone on about reincarnation and Egyptians or something.

Politics? She doesn't know anything about them or even vote.

I won't even touch religion.

Her "job" is taking off her clothes and sitting on some stranger's lap topless for money. Somehow she's heroic for doing this because she's taking care of her son alone. Nevermind that's by her choice and any decent man that comes along who would be an excellent father figure is completely betrayed and destroyed by this emotional predator.

Lack of substance is the only way to describe it. She lacks character. Depth. Especially emotional depth. She lacks humanity. She has no real tangible identity. On the surface it can seem this way because of her appearance, but that's all skin deep. Just like everything else about her. It's skin deep.

It was my own issues that allowed someone like this to get so close to me emotionally in my life. I was starving so bad for affection I took any table scrap I could find. It was my own childish needs that were never met by a parent at a very young age. Never having a real father. Just someone who yelled at me or barked orders. Someone I wanted to never be home because his mere presence caused high anxiety. You were waiting for the pin to drop. You left a piece of food accidentely on the counter. You spilled water. You shut a door too loud. The TV was on too loud in your room. You argued with your brother as kids do. You got an expensive gift for your birthday and had to listen to your mother get screamed at for hours while you attempted to enjoy it and not feel terribly guilty for getting a present on your birthday.

You get the picture.

The Reality of Asking "Why?"

I was looking up information on an author I enjoy and I stumbled across his blog. I was shocked to read that he had just gone through the exact same situation that I had with someone that has BPD. Not only that, but it seems he is also on the road to self discovery like many nons out there.

It brought me some comfort to know that I am not alone in this experience. You read forums. You read the the replies. All of it seems like one long horrible dream of the same outrageous Borderline behaviors over and over to where you feel like you are stuck in a loop of madness.

I am going to try and make an effort to post more. I have been really busy lately and not had much of a chance, but I realize now I need to do it. Regardless if anyone even reads it. For my own recovery I need to put it down to paper so to speak.

The article and many others can be found HERE

Boundaries = War

If you're dealing with an undiagnosed Borderline, it really is a futile situation.

I understand there are some books out there that attempt to help you communicate with your BPDSO, but in reality, it can really seem hopeless, especially in the long term if they are NOT getting treatment.

An example for me is when I started to set boundaries. I'd be receiving poor treatment from my ex, and I would put my foot down. Immediately it became a (ME VS HER) war.

Immediate rage. Inappropriate anger. Black and White thinking. She was the victim. I was the aggressor. All because I said, "Treating me this way hurts my feelings. What can we do to work on together to make it stop?"

For doing this I was labeled the following:

1. Hypersensitive
2. Excessively Needy
3. Having no friends
4. Having high anxiety
5. Being a cruel tyrant
6. Any other personal attack trying to tear my self esteem that i can't think of at the moment.

Dealing with this over time, can have a serious damaging effect on the thinking of the Non. You begin to believe the outrageous accusations of the BPD. Over time, it breaks down your psychological defenses. You begin to question yourself. Believe them. If you're in this terrible place in your life, do the best thing for yourself and get out of the situation as quickly as possible. If you don't it can have serious long term consequences to your mental health and state of well being.

Now beyond being accused of many things that weren't true, it was done at a level of screaming and abuse that was incredibly inappropriate. My ex is an emotional, abusive bully. She uses the good nature of people that care her against them. It allows her to mistreat people who she knows aren't going to set their boundaries. That's why boundaries are so important when dealing with a borderline. You have to protect yourself above all things, even it means losing the relationship. That is where the self examination comes into play and you NEED to desperately question why you would stay in a situation where someone treats you like a piece of garbage for so long. Over time, my ex's "real" emotional investment into the situation became less and less as I was devalued more and more. as she pulled away more, I became more invested into the situation trying to fix it. Classic push/pull splitting. A cycle that will repeat itself with more frequency as the relationship progresses.

I need to put myself before anyone else. Look out for numero uno.

Few Excellent Lectures on Borderline Personality Disorders

I found a few lectures on BPD that I found quite good

Can be found HERE and HERE

There are also a few others if you scroll under "People who listened to this also liked..."

A Very Good Show about BPD and Co-Dependency

I've been watching this show lately called Intervention

You can find the link to the first part of an episode by clicking on the name.

I've been watching several episodes and have noticed the same co-dependent traits in the enablers that I've seen within myself.

A lot of things have jumped out to me from watching this show. A majority of the people with problems are Bipolar or have Borderline Personality Disorder. I've seen the same pattern of behavior that I saw in my ex.

1. Destructive chemical addictions. (primarily alcohol, but marajuana, pills, cocaine as well)

2. Self destructive behaviors.

3. Violent temper

4. Manipulation. Inappropriate anger/Rages.

5. Sexual promiscuity.

You can clearly see them masking the inner pain. Everything is a result of extreme inner turmoil and pain. The real lesson from this show to me though, are the enablers.

I'm an enabler. I just want to placate and do anything possible to make the person "happy". If I just give in. Sacrifice myself. Sacrifice my boundaries, everything will be fine. It's can be so hard to just say "no". If you really want to help the person you love with BPD you need to learn to say "No". Enabling them will just perpetuate the behavior.