Tips: Survive Your Borderline Enchantress

borderlines are drop dead gorgeous they are gorgeous and you drop dead so to prevent this unfortunate outcome do yourself a favor and listen to this video lecture what are my qualifications i'm a long time admirer lover husband of borderline women i had survived to tell the tale which not many men can say so i have a lot to share with you as to how how i had coped with these women and how somehow i succeeded to maintain relationships short and long over the span of almost 35 years i'm also incidentally a professor of psychology and the author of malignant self-love narcissism revisited and today we are going to discuss a variant of narcissists known as borderline people with borderline personality disorder now throughout this video i'm going to use the female gender pronouns when i say she he i mean she her etc but of course there are males they're men with borderline personality disorder actually we have a creeping understanding that there are as many men with borderline personality disorder as women and i even came up with a new diagnosis covert borderline which fits i think the male variant much better than the classic borderline so whatever i say in this video applies to you madams women who live who exist with or married to borderline men but for convenience sake i'm going to continue to use female gender pronouns okay before we start there are effective interventions and treatments for borderline personality disorder and i encourage those of you who are afflicted with this personality disorder to seek help and to subject yourself to diagnose to dialectical behavior therapy dbt to mindfulness techniques they've proven to be very effective but what i want to do today is share tips and advice on day-to-day survival with the borderline so what i'm going to do i'm going to describe features of borderline personality disorder how they affect daily life and how you can cope with them manage them survive should worse comes to worse let's start with the most basic foundation of borderline personality disorder it's known as abandonment anxiety or separation anxiety the borderline anticipates and projects and believes and foresees imminent abandonment humiliation and rejection by her intimate partner just allow me to change my chair it was like sitting on a squeaky chair and swicky squeaky chairs are great metaphors and allegories for relationships with borderline so i'm on a more stable trail right now and i can proceed with this presentation abandonment anxiety separation anxiety and borderline causes the borderline to preempt the abandonment causes her to initiate abandonment it's like the borderline is saying i'm going to abandon you before you abandon me the problem with borderline is that she interprets every behavior as a form of abandonment if you're on the phone for too long you're abandoning her if you're going on a business trip you're definitely abandoning if she wants something now and you're not this at her immediate disposal dropping everything else you're doing you're abandoning her she interprets everything as rejection and that makes life with her very mercurial very unexpected and to some extent terrifying a roller coaster so in your relationship with the borderline you need to establish rituals and procedures of presence of permanence of stability and predictability all activities that can be misinterpreted by the borderline as forms of abandonment abandonment and rejection you should aim and strive to do these things in her presence or together with her you should involve her somehow in these things when you are away you should call multiple times a day you should tell her that you're thinking about it you should tell her that you know she's constantly with you in mind and spirit if not in flesh and blood so you should when you're with a borderline you should establish a circumference an ambiance of presence constancy permanence stability and predictability you should engulf her you should engulf her and encompass her but not overbearingly not domineeringly not not by way of possessing her or controlling her or microcontrolling her because that's the paradox at the heart of borderline the borderline is terrified of abandonment which is equally terrified of engulfment of enmeshment of disappearing or vanishing into into you so if you are too much in her life if you're too intrusive if you are too much of an invader if you try to micromanage everything she does and says everyone she meets she will resent you for it and she will react by acting out it's a very very delicate balance a very thin line a thin wire between broadcasting to the borderline that you are there for her that you will never abandon her that you're not going to fade away that it's okay um to be away because that doesn't mean you're not coming back broadcasting this to her establishing your physical presence in her life unobtrusively and unintrudingly on the one hand and not becoming an overbearing overwinning uh all pervasive ubiquitous figure which she is going to resent and and react badly this is the first problem second issue is object constancy the borderline is unable to maintain object constancy she has something called object in constancy in common with a narcissist in other words when you're out of sight you're largely out of mind this is what makes it possible for the borderline to behave recklessly or for example to engage in promiscuous sex to cheat on you because when she is not with you physically you're gone you're out of her mind she she she doesn't have a stable representation of you which she can interact with when you're not there the narcissist has a snapshot of his intimate partner but the snapshot is so far diverged and so far removed from the reality that even the narcissist suffers from object inconstancy so the borderline needs your constant presence physical presence in her life to remind herself that one you exist and two you are she loves you the borderline's love and the borderline's ability to have object relations um is very very infantile it's like a baby with mommy when mommy leaves the room the baby starts to cry because mommy is out of the room mommy is gone forever he's never coming back it's like mommy's out of sight mommy is out period now of course objecting constantly in constancy leads to severe mental health ramifications and implications it is one of the core elements the core pillars of what we call identity the borderline is unable to maintain a stable core of identity she is a kaleidoscope she is shape-shifting she doesn't have a central pivot an axis around which she revolves you can't put your finger on what is or who is the borderline because there's nobody there there's a bit of an empty core and because it's in flux uh heraclitus the famous uh greek philosopher said pantale pantale means it all flows it's like you can never step into the same river twice and you can never interact with the same borderline twice identity disturbance means that you cannot pinpoint the borderline you cannot hold her hold her into anything her promises mean nothing her value is a transitory she acts in contradictory ways she violates her own self-imposed rules limits and boundaries which mean nothing they mean nothing because her identity changes all the time she's not the same person all the time this emptiness at the core of the borderline means that there is nobody there to regulate anything so she can be for example adamantly opposed to cheating but then she would go on a cheating spree she can be financial hold herself financially responsible and then reckless recklessly spend the entire fortune of the family you cannot trust the borderline to display a behavior which is consistent with any set of beliefs or values with a worldview with limits with boundaries with rules it's a chaotic sin and indeed we call the borderline personality a low organization personality a lowly organized personality a chaotic personality even high functioning borderlines have an identity disturbance because borderline therefore is as close as you get to multiple personality disorder to dissociative identity disorder and because borderline is indeed founded on dissociation as we will discuss a bit later you need to introduce object constancy into the relationship you need to help the borderline to stabilize your identity around you as an object you can become the pivot or the axis or the core of this or the center of the dynamo of the borderline's identity very simple things like mementos give her personal items of yours so that you can hold on to them when you're away many borderlines by the way carry such items in their purses to remind themselves not to cheat with other men establish a routine of programmed reminders say good morning every morning say good night every night send messages on a regular sketch schedule every every hour uh call her out of the blue but make it programmed in due time convert these activities into rituals rituals with timetables with schedules so that she can develop a sense of predictability and object constancy programmed reminders mantras sentences which you share with the borderline and when you say this sentence it triggers you it triggers your existence it triggers your presence in her mind so sentences which are common to both of you which evoke a meaning which is which is shared only by the two of you a closed universe very very almost like a shirt short psychotic disorder if you wish or a shirt fantasy in the case of the narcissist so in these sentences when you say these sentences to her she is reminded of your presence of your existence and of your meaning in her life the next problem with with borderline is decompensation borderline personality disorder is [Music] an extreme form of infantile defenses exactly like the narcissist narcissism is an extreme form of the fantasy defense borderline is an extreme form of a series of infantile defenses most notably splitting projection rationalization and projective identification so the borderline is surrounded it's she has a wall she has a firewall she has a fortification a fortress of ever active defense mechanisms and the aims of these defend the aim of these defense mechanisms is to falsify reality to reframe reality to recast reality in a way that will be eco-symptomic in a way that the borderline can live with can survive if the borderline were to face herself as she is if she were to face the truth she would not survive she needs absolutely to render reality more amenable more acceptable and she does this by filtering reality she impairs her own reality testing via her psychological defense mechanisms so under extreme stress when she anticipates humiliation and rejection when she is when she is um for some reason discarded when she has a fight with you when you're busy this is all very stressing for the borderline this stressors cause a process called decompensation the compensation is when the defense mechanisms of the borderline shut down one after the other tak tak tak tak tak all the defenses shut down at some point she is rendered defenseless she becomes skinless she has no protection and no isolation from her environment and from the unbearable and intolerable reality of her impending doom and catastrophized abandonment and humiliation and rejection at that point she falls apart she even may develop a psychotic micro episodes in other words very brief psychosis which can last a few minutes to a few hours and so you need to counter the borderline's propensity for decompensation you need to counter it by using techniques that we that are usually used in in tackling anxiety and panic attacks decompensation feels very much like a panic attack and we had developed over the decades very very powerful techniques to cope with anxiety disorders anxiety attacks and panic attacks and these techniques include breathing exercises including control breathing breathing into bags breathing with with counting and so on i encourage you to go online and read about breathing exercises for anxiety and panic they include journaling encouraging the borderline to note down to journal to write down all her cognitive processes when she is anxious or when she is panicking in other words when she is decompensating or when she is panicking she just write down what goes through her mind and then at the end of the day she reads these sentences aloud to herself so when she's in panic when she's anxious when she's about to decompensate she notes down what's going on through her mind and she reads it aloud to herself at the end of the day this feedback is very calming it's anxiolytic these are examples of techniques we use in treating anxiety in panic and they should be very effective with decompensation help your body lie to adopt these techniques on a daily basis it might stole off prevent or postpone eventual decompensation when the borderline decompensates she ends up acting out acting out is dysregulated uncontrolled self-harming reckless behavior and it is brought on by the self-states of the borderline one of the main self-states of the borderline is a secondary psychopath when the borderline is under attack when she's stressed when she's about to be or she expects to be humiliated and abandoned and rejected she brings forth one of herself self-states which is essentially a psychopath and that's a protector self-state it protects her from pain it is defined it's controversious it's angry it's reckless it's aggressive and it gets the job done the job of protecting her the borderline has several so states and they are separated by dissociative walls the dissociation forgetting the dissociation is not always total it's permeable and this dissociation helps the borderline to compartmentalize so when the borderline for example acts out when she misbehaves for example she cheats on you she is likely to attribute if she remembers the cheating because many times she will not especially if she's drunk or drugged but if she does remember the cheating she will attribute it to her other self she will feel contrite ashamed she will regret what she had done but she would still defend herself by attributing it to another self-state her impulsivity and recklessness are compartmentalized she would not feel fully responsible for what she had done because it wasn't her it was some other self-state that took over her so she's likely to say i don't know what came over me i've never done this before it's not me it's not like me i surprised myself i shocked myself etc etc you need to help the borderline to not act out because acting out is seriously dangerous cheating is the most benign option she can do really really crazy things she can wreck your car she can steal your money she can acting out is simply being out of control and because a psychopath secondary psychopathic state takes over the acting out is largely anti-social and psychopathic it's like your sudden you suddenly find yourself married to a psychopath or in love with a psychopath so you need to help her the first thing you should do is de-catastrophize one of the main processes in decompensation and acting out is catastrophizing the borderline anticipates unfavorable outcomes and consequences she foresees humiliation abandonment and rejection so she catastrophizes and she's reacting not to reality she is reacting to her catastrophizing imagination she sees the future the future is dystopian and bleak and she's reacting to the future not to the present you need to bring her back to the present through a process called de-catastrophizing you need to bring her back to the present you need to ground her you can ground her physically by hugging her you can ground her verbally by reassuring her that you're not about to abandon her or humiliate her or reject her on the very country very much in love with her you can bring her back to reality by reestablishing reality testing ironically for example by attacking some of her assumptions as untenable or fantastic or paranoid or delusional so there are many ways to de-catastrophize but you must absolutely defuse the time bomb of acting out by re-establishing reality as the yardstick and the benchmark of all her future behaviors you can do this also by mirroring her and she becomes aggressive and violent on the verge of acting out you can mirror her behavior mirroring has a very powerful effect on the borderline it calms her down she suddenly realizes what she's doing she's kind of wakes up from this too poor and the nightmare and she's back in reality another thing you can do is use techniques for impulse control redirect her impulses she wants to do a you redirect her to do b she wants to be aggressive with something you re redirect her aggression you re-channel her aggression and and hurl it use it in some other way redirection via reframing and via re-motivation there are many techniques for impulse control again i'm not going to review all of them you just go online and type techniques for impulse control you when you witness the decompensation and the acting out of the borderline it's clear that she is not acting out the way analysis would or the way a psychopath would it's not acting out because she's emotionless because she has no empathy because she's vindictive because she wants to hurt you or because she's goal oriented wants to take something from her acting out is very clearly highly emotional she's hurt she's hurting she's bleeding and she wants you to experience the same pain she wants to hurt you not in order to hurt you because but that you could share the experience of her pain she wants to have a shared experience of hurt with you a universe of hurt where both of you will belong so her acting out is about you actually and it is the outcome of something we call emotional dysregulation she she is overwhelmed by her emotions they're too strong for her she can't cope she's drowning and she's dragging you down with her you need to help your borderline with her emotional dysregulation number one teach her to talk about her emotions to communicate her emotions help her to verbalize her emotions number two ask her to label her emotions to call them by name because the borderline experiences her emotions as a cloud the emotions are diffuse very often she doesn't know what's happening she's totally disoriented in many cases she goes into a dissociative state she depersonalizes she derealizes or she becomes amnesiac at any rate she is very hard-pressed to say what's happening inside her head very often a borderline would tell you i'm having a brain fog it's a brain fog i can't tell you what's happening you need to force her to help her to collaborate with her to label her emotions you can ask are you feeling anger are you feeling envy are you afraid you need to help her to to call her emotions by name when this is done when she had gained a handle when she had gained a label she she comes down because just labeling the emotion provides her with control over the emotion and her problem is this regulation which is a fancy offensive word for lack of control she loses control over herself labeling helps her to regain control then teach her to externalize her emotions ironically the borderline acts out because she bottles up she bottles up emotions she's very wary hyper vigilant and cautious she's very unlikely to communicate efficaciously with you so instead she bottles up everything she acts pseudo stupid she doesn't talk much or she talks about irrelevant things or she or she diverts the conversation or she she kind of digresses and you know tries to avoid the painful topics teach her to externalize her emotions behaviorally to show that she's angry to demonstrate her envy or jealousy to act appropriately other negative emotions or positive emotions her to externalize behaviorally her emotions but also teach her to talk about her emotions and you can do this by using a variety of techniques one of the most powerful is known as chair work chair like what you sit on chair work you can ask her for example to put her anger on an empty chair and then to talk to the anger in the empty chair to have a dialogue with her own anger you can ask her to put her envy her hatred her fear on the chair talk to her abandonment anxiety interrogate the abandonment anxiety ask the abundant anxiety for help chairwork dialogue with the emotions via the the methodology and instrument of an empty chair and finally you can use techniques from cognitive behavioral therapy or you can attend cognitive behavioral therapy in order to negate in order to counter negative thoughts thoughts the borderline has negative automatic thoughts which leads lead to catastrophizing and lead to despair and depression and anxiety the borderline assumes the worst and because she assumes the worst the worst outcomes the worst because of this she sinks into anxiety and depression anxiety depression a very strong concomitance of borderline they are co-morbid with borderline very often and they are usually the outcome of these negative automatic thoughts which are which cbt is very successful at eliminate learn the techniques of eliminating automatic negative thoughts or simply attend a few therapy sessions with her having learned to control her negative thoughts having learned to label her emotions having dialogued with her anxieties and fears having verbalized what's happening inside her having externalized her emotions via behavior the risk of acting out the risk of emotional dysregulation and the risk of decompensation these risks are much reduced using these techniques one of the main problems with borderline is that she cannot as she cannot regulate her emotions she cannot control her anger borderlines are very angry and they're very they're angry in a very violent and aggressive way you need to to learn anger management techniques you need to teach your borderline to cognitively restructure cognitive restructuring is a major anger management technique it is simply teaching the borderline to think about things in a different way to consider triggers stimuli um provocations fears frustrations to consider all this in a totally different way maybe as positive opportunities for growth and learning for example cognitive restructuring established communication protocols very rigid and strict communication protocols if she wants to say something she has to say it according to the protocol no personal attacks no attacks on the other like if you want to say something for example if you want to say what you're doing is hurting me don't blame don't accuse don't say the way you're misbehaving is really bad instead say i'm in pain talk about yourself don't talk about her describe your own reactions your own internal state rather than attacking her that's an example of a communication protocol established communication protocol and adhere to them religiously communication protocols are very powerful tools which prevent a lot of misunderstanding and pain down the road finally introduce humor humor is the best antidote to anger whenever she's angry don't walk her don't invalidate her anger don't minimize her anger don't minimize her that's not what i'm saying but say something humorous that suddenly exposes the whole situation as irrational and if she's amenable to humor this will defuse the anger the borderline has what we call moodle ability model ability she's her mood is as disregulated as her emotions moodlability can be counted with physical activity a sleep schedule a series of rigid routines the routines provide structure provide a skeleton so rigid routines and with stress management techniques again i encourage you to go online and look for stress management techniques so model ability in the borderline is a serious problem mood swings very serious problem anyone who had lived in the borderline knows what i'm talking about this is not like three days of fun and three days of depression this is like one hour of fun in two hours of depression and then two hours of fun and three hours of anxiety and then three hours of rage and two hours the mood swings are enormous and they are they're never seizing and so if you want to survive with the borderline you need to regulate this you you need to control her mood she needs to control her moods and these are the this is what i've mentioned physical activity sleep schedule routines stress management techniques the the modes of the borderline are reactive they are not produced internally they're most of the time they're reactive regrettably she her reality testing is impaired so what she perceives is very often wrong very often deformed very often [Music] inappropriate inaccurate so by restoring reality testing you're going to reduce modal ability considerably but because it's mostly reactive you need to eliminate the triggers and the and the stimuli and the provocations in the environment and you need to structure her life you need to help her to structure her life so that she can reduce stress and the stress leads to anxiety anxiety leads to moodlability reduce stress and you solve an entire chain reaction the borderline outsources internal functions internal what is known as ego functions she outsources these to you the intimate partner of a borderline is her source of regulation he's the one with the hand on the key he's in control of how she feels her emotions her moods her reactions her explosions her love what the borderline does because she lacks in in a regulated inner world because her inner world is one gigantic gigantic twister what she does is she actually is telling you help me by regulating me be my external control be my external board of control be my user manual i'm transferring my locus of control to you the borderline says and from now on you are my god you are in charge of my moods my emotions my cognitions my happiness my unhappiness my aggression everything i do you are to blame everything i do you're responsible and accountable for even if i misbehave i misbehave because of you this of course outsourcing of course is extremely unhealthy it's extremely unhealthy first of all because it is counterfactual it's not true a lot of the a lot many of the dysregulatory behaviors and and emotions and moods of the of the borderline have nothing to do with you as a partner so attributing everything to you is scapegoating you don't let the borderline scapegoat you teach her to regain the locus of control transfer these responsibilities that she had given to you that she had abrogated transfer these responsibilities back to her do it incrementally do it gradually do not threaten her do not demand do not control do not chastise and castigate and criticize be nice be kind she is not well help her to recover provide her with increasing control over herself her circumstances her choices her decisions and gradually her emotions and her moods remove this locus of control from yourself and help her to regain an internal locus of control at the same time help her to develop and reward what we call autoplastic defenses autoplastic defenses is accepting responsibility for your actions and for the consequences of your actions alloplastic defenses is when we blame other people for everything that's happening to us that implies an external locus of control if you are to blame for what's happening to me then i don't i'm not in control of my life you are you want the borderline to regain control over life also by accepting responsibility for everything she had done everything that's happening to her and it can start with a very simple manipulation of language borderlines often say this happened to me you should tell the borderline no this did not happen to you you did it very typical cases when the borderline comes and says i was drunk and i slept with another man it happened it did not happen you did it you did it restores a sense of responsibility self-control locus of control reward these defenses reward this um these behaviors when when it's warranted when she does something good something nice reward her when she does something bad refuse to accept responsibility reject any attempt to put it on you you're not responsible for actions you're not responsible for her moods for her emotions for recognitions for her misbehavior for her aggression for her violence never ever accept responsibility but do it lovingly because you love her do re-establish a sense of control and and sense of personal responsibility and accountability lovingly the borderline exactly like the narcissist tends to idealize and devalue she idealizes you and devalues you on a daily basis these are very rapid cycles as opposed to the narcissist in borderline the cycling is very rapid she can idealize you and the values you devalue you several times a day the problem is if she when she idealizes you your god when she devalues you you're the devil and she doesn't feel bad when she is in the stage of devaluation she doesn't feel bad to betray you to cheat on you to harm you to undermine your interests so it's very dangerous when the borderline is in the devaluation phase because in this phase when she is devaluing you she is controlled by a secondary psychopathic self-state she's a psychopath you don't want the borderline to devalue you because she will damage you really seriously and badly you don't want her to idealize you either because then her expectations are unrealistic and she's bound to be frustrated and disappointed they devalue you you want to stop this cycle you want to stop it dead in its tracks you don't want idealization and evaluation you want a realistic assessment of who you are what you can give what are your limitations and you want this realistic assessment to be the foundation of your relationships you want in other words to restore reality testing insist on reality whenever she says something wrong counterfactual correct her insist to introduce reality at all times hundreds of times a day if you have to repeatedly on the same topic if you have to restoring a reality testing is the only guarantee that your relationship will not end in a self-annihilating nuclear mushroom cloud which is a typical way a relationship with a borderline ends ask me maintain the entire picture integrate her splitting when she says that someone is all bad remind remind her that this very person has good aspects good traits and had behaved nicely with her was kind to her negate her splitting negate her projection act against her defenses do not let her idealize and devalue you or anyone else integrate splitting maintain the entire picture serve as a reminder serve as a database serve as a repository of the totality of experience if she tries to cut to divide experience into black and white we call it dichotomous thinking black and white fallacy if she tries to develop the divide people and life into black and white reminds her that right of that life is actually gray and that people are always in between partly bad partly good help her because she's stuck at a very infantile stage she regresses to an infantile stage where mommy is all good or all bad you are all good and all bad etc help her to integrate one major problem with the with borderline and this is the focus of dialectical behavioral therapy frankly is self-mutilation which could lead to suicidality between 10 and 11 of people diagnosed with borderline personality disorder actually commits suicide it's an enormous rate so the borderline self-mutilates she can certainly delay by classically by cutting herself or burning herself with cigarettes this is dermatological self-mutilation on the skin is visible but there are many other ways to self-mutilate for example she can sexually self-trash she can self-trash sexually she can she can do horrible sexual things anything from i don't know gang bang to to sleeping with disgusting men that she finds revolting i mean she just to trust herself she can abuse substances she can behave recklessly and as a way to self-harm you know if you drive recklessly you may end up in an accident so there are numerous ways for the borderline to self-mutilate self-harm the ultimate is suicide you need to prevent this and prevention involves recognizing the warning signs of suicide and these include extreme mood swings feelings of hopelessness giving away possessions losing interest in activities that hitherto she found interesting talking about death or suicide saying goodbye to family and friends saying that everyone is a burden on her she doesn't want to see anyone so schizoid face withdrawing from friends and family all these things are signs of impending impending episode of self-harm the problem with borderline is escalation the borderline drinks one drink she she drinks 20. it's like alcohol craving writ large so she can't she can't regulate her behaviors when she starts to do something she has no intention to end where she usually ends she had intention to have one drink she she ends up being in a blackout alcoholic blackout she had an intention just to flirt with the men she ends up having sex with him in a dingy sleazy hotel she she had intentions just to drive into in the breeze but she ends up wrecking the car so she escalates if you see these signs they may lead to suicide because she can't stop herself there's no regulatory mechanism there so she starts with one intention and she ends up with totally different act you need to listen you need to be you need to be attuned to her you need to be like a seismograph do not judge her do not dismiss her do not discount or invalidate her feelings just be a good listener just sit next to her and let her talk to you encourage her and prompt her motivator and incentivizer to talk to you by being a kind soul by loving her truly encourage her to verbalize encourage her to sublimate her aggression some way do something punch a bag write a book read a book watch a movie go on a walk physical activity is always very important in all these things the problem with the borderline is dissociation she doesn't remember because she doesn't remember things she can't learn there's no process of learning there's no memory and because when there's no memory there's no identity and there's no identity there's no one there to learn so borderline never learns it's infuriating because she keeps repeating the same thing over the same mistake over and over again she keeps associating with the same people who had mistreated her disrespected her raped her again and again she does everything again and again the self-harm keeps repeating the self-mutilation the wrong choices the disastrous decisions the horrible people who had trampled all over her she keeps coming back for more because she has no memory she's totally dissociative she lives in the presence in the worst sense of the word she has she's discontinuous she has no continuity encourage her to develop continuity ask her to have to journal to have a diary where she writes everything that's happening to her everything she thinks everything she feels and then encourage her to read the diary the next day so this creates continuity at least cognitive continuity journaling is a very powerful tool mementos objects that carry memories or associated memories something with a smell something with a taste a visual thing that provokes a memory memory triggers like in the famous movie memento so memory triggers encourage you to place posted post-it notes on the refrigerator on the door on chairs all over the house post-it notes to remind her of things she wanted to do things she's thinking about cons i mean there's a close affinity between borderline personality disorder and patients with early early onset dementia it's very reminiscent of some phases of alzheimer's you need to re-establish continuity via memory encourage her to video record herself because video recordings are much more powerful than written notes maybe she should video record herself and keep these recordings for a few days watch them a few days later to establish this thin thread of memory and identity programmed reminders i mentioned before use them a lot reminder of this reminder of the ground her in reality by force by force of love and kindness drag her down she's floating she's like an air balloon you know a helium balloon drag her down ground her more her in a good way tie her to your wrist keep keep her with you she's worth it she's worth it because most borderlines are beautiful intelligent heartbreakingly tender women she's worth the investment in the effort if you're up to it and finally borderlines have transient paranoid ideation and they're very likely to make you the enemy the persecutory object if you insist on introducing the borderline to reality if you try to regulate her emotions and her moods you're bound to clash with her that's bound to be conflict as these conflicts accumulate she's going to begin to regard you as the enemy we call it the secretary object she's going to begin to develop transient paranoid paranoid ideation about paranoia she's going to begin to suspect you of malevolence and bad intentions she's going to be wary of you she's going to be suspicious of you she's going to interrogate you she's going to spy on you this is common in borderline you don't need to worry you just need to take it in stride it will pass that's why we call it transient paranoid ideation passes insist on reality testing when she's paranoid journaling question her doubt her counter her paranoia with your own paranoia mirror her use a secret code or an exit strategy and agree on it when she is not paranoid and when she is paranoid use the secret code or exit strategy or safe word for her to freeze and suspend her paranoia so when you say the word she freezes she doesn't continue with her power not ideation until it passes you need to counter all these things you need to fight being with the borderline is a prolonged prolonged fight on multiple fronts every possible front actually now some intimate partners some men because i'm using the example of a woman with borderline some men find it worthwhile because the borderlines have gifts to give which very few women do the borderline the typical borderline maintains her childlike pureness and goodness a typical borderline when she loves you you would never ever experience a love like that in your life it is total love she is immersed in you it's not like the co-dependent co-dependent depends on you so in the co-dependent there's a strong transactional element the borderline loves you essentially unconditionally like i would say a mother does but she loves you as a woman not as a mother a borderline is typically a woman's woman because she's very you know flirtatious seductive and such into this kind of woman i mean she's a woman's woman there's a lot it's a treasure typical borderline woman is a treasure but the price is very high and constant and you need to be on your toes you need to walk on extras all the time most men would say the price is not worth the price i'm one of the few who thought think probably will think in the future that the price is well worth the price i have paid a very big personal price for my exclusive choice of borderline women but whatever price i had received made all the prices i've paid well worth it not your cup of tea go away don't even start because you may you may get captivated and trapped avoid contact with borderline women they are very very alluring and addictive if it's not your cup of tea walk away if you can't do all these things that i just mentioned on a regular daily basis hourly basis i mean just walk away it's a full-time job it's a full-time maintenance job if you can and you're up to it a treasure awaits you at the end of the go for it dorothy

Channel: Prof. Sam Vaknin

Views: 81,504

Keywords: borderline, maternal, abandonment, high-functioning, empathy, social, cues, functioning, nonverbal, vulnerable, grandiose, self-confidence, self-esteem, compensatory, insecurities, compulsive, denial, insight, reframing, narcissism, psychopaths, antisocial, psychopathology, therapy, relationships, abuse, psychotherapy, personality disorders, cluster B, DSM, self, ego, object relations, verbal abuse, psychological abuse, sexual abuse, schizoid, inverted, shared fantasy, psychopath, somatic, cerebral

Id: wy7526-ysCM

Length: 50min 32sec (3032 seconds)

Published: Tue May 04 2021