The Face of BPD (part 2 of 9)

Part 2 of my nine part series of what the diagnostic criteria (symptoms) of BPD look like in my own life.

Diagnostic Criteria #2: a pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by alternating between extremes of idealization and devaluation.

This one of the most recognizable aspects of BPD. It involves others who in turn notice the problem, and it is also such a chaotic and detremental part of one's life that it is hard to overlook.

In my own exploration and eventual diagnosis, the symptoms of chaotic relationship and "splitting" were impossible to miss. I could write on specific situations for hours, but will limit this post to a few key examples. Most of the following deal with romantic relationships, because I tend to have more unstable interactions with men than with other women, whether it be a boyfriend or just a guy friend (I will touch on this later in this post)

One of the first problems I noticed is a tendency to get attached to a person very quickly and be unable to detach from them. Many people with BPD report that they fall in love easily and quickly. This is true for me. I am extremely picky when it comes to dating, but when I do find myself having even a slight attraction to somebody, it spirals quickly into love and slight obsession. I used to see this at just being a romantic and believing in "love at first sight" but I know now that it is a part of my BPD.

Similarly, once I became emotionally attached to a person it is very hard to let them go by either ending the relationship or ceasing to be friends. Because I become attached so very quickly to the person I have overlooked vital flaws or intense differences in our personalities or values, which means I often care very deeply for a person with whom I am incompatible. The relationship is doomed from the beginning, though I fail to see it because I am so lovestruck. Intense disappointment and passionate fighting almost always follow, and the breakup or movement away from the person entitles a very intense grieving process. Hurt, sadness, anger, disappointment, and lack of confidence violently combine when a relationship ends for me, leading to intense periods of depression.

Unfortunately, chaos is a theme in every one of my past romantic relationships. Dramas run the gamut from intense jealously over a the other person's activities to making demands that were impossible to meet. I've often questioned whether I subconsciously create some of the dramas to keep the relationship interesting or make it feel more alive, and I think this is sometimes the case for me. However, I know that most of the turmoil in the relationship comes from the aspect of splitting.

Splitting was a complicated concept for me to understand at first, but most simply defined it is a very quick and often frequent cycle of love (idealization) and hate (devaluation) in a relationship. I see it clearly in my past relationships. For example, I once met and fell very much in love (quickly) with a guy I had met at bible study I was attending. We shared a similar faith and as I grew to like him, I placed him high on a pedestal based on the comments he had made about his beliefs and values. To me, he was good, one of the nicest men I had ever met with no serious flaws. However, once we began dating I saw that, outside of a "religious" setting, he was a very different person. It did not take long for me to drag him off the pedestal and into the realm of my hatred. In my mind, he was an evil person and I began fighting with him based on the issues I took with him. Eventually, we would work out the issues or I would see another part of him that shifted him back into my good graces. That cycle continued many times over the course of both our dating relationship and our friendship, until eventually the whole thing ended with a large fight and I spiraled into a depressive episode that took a lot of effort to overcome.

The psychological basis of splitting involves several theories I don't fully understand, and as I work through the process in therapy I hope to learn why I have developed the tendency to think in the black and white terms of splitting. I have also been exploring the reasons that almost ever example of splitting in my life involves men and not women. Some possible reasons I see for this might involve growing up in an all-female household, damage from seeing and experiencing sexual harassment during my teen years, or a very unhealthy love relationship early in my dating life.

However, regardless of the reasons, being aware that I "split" and knowing the signs of it will be helpful to me. In the future, I can recognize that I fall in love too easily and use my developing skills to control my thoughts and emotions to develop healthier relationships. I can distinguish flaws or personality aspects that I can live with in a relationship to those that make me incompatible with a guy. I can also now recognize the precursors for splitting and try to avoid the quick changeover from love to hate or from good to evil.

full list of BPD criteria here