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Years ago I dated a woman with a “high functioning” career and from outside apparently normal social life who in retrospect was clearly BPD. She was very good

Years ago I dated a woman with a “high functioning” career and from outside apparently normal social life who in retrospect was clearly BPD. She was very good at hiding her feelings during most casual interactions, and was clever and generous and fun to talk to when calm, but had almost a second personality which would come out when she became even slightly stressed which was bitter and entirely self-centered and extremely manipulative. She was at that stage of her life completely incapable of maintaining a close personal relationship, and she was frequently (on a daily basis) under extreme stress about perceived grievous slights from everyone around her that were to an outside observer inconsequential mistakes or misunderstandings, and she was harboring numerous long-term grudges. It seemed like she knew she had a problem, and during times where she wasn’t stressed out would regret her outbursts and seemed to wish she generally had better emotional control. She seemed generally pretty miserable about it, but maybe I was projecting based on the way her problems made me feel.

xenihn 8y ago
I dated a high-functioning borderline as well. It was a horrible experience, but in retrospect I'm (kind of) grateful to have learned about personality disorders as a result. I guess I learned a lot about myself too. I feel absolutely awful for people who date high-functioning borderlines and never learn about it. At least with the ones who are low-functioning, you absolutely know something is deeply wrong with them at all points in the relationship. With a high-functioning one, you second-guess yourself constantly. I really do think there needs to be more general awareness about Cluster B personality disorders. The occurrence rate among the population is low, but the nature of the disorder means a high-functioning borderline establishes relationships with (and potentially harms) a large number of people. It's hard for victims to seek help when they don't even know the name or nature of what they're dealing with.
- futureastronaut 8y ago
  People generally don't write glowing reviews of their exes, so forgive my skepticism of your and parent's anecdotes.
  - jacobolus 8y ago
    The event that ended the relationship was: I was talking to her nice (edit: male) roommate about politics or something at about midnight while she went to bed apparently in a good mood. Turns out that was unacceptable, and she came back out of her room 20 minutes later, started berating me for it while I was confused, escalated to shouting at me for an hour while I remained calm, and finally threatened to call the cops on me. I walked a couple miles home at 2 AM through a snowstorm, while she sent me 10 desperate text messages. I never talked to her again, though I spent months agonizing about it (to the point of panic attacks), because I felt guilty that she desperately needed help and I thought I might be able to help her through continuing to patiently and reliably engage with her (it didn’t seem like anyone else was around to help her), and I liked and respected her as a person, but decided I couldn’t take it for my own mental health. We only dated for a relatively short time, but it took me a move across the country and a year to sort out my feelings and start dating again. YMMV.
    - futureastronaut 8y ago
      For those taking notes, your girlfriend may respond negatively to going to bed alone while you have one-on-one time with her friend or roommate (or any other woman) late at night, especially if the other is being "nice."
      - jacobolus 8y ago
        Yes, it’s reasonable and entirely within the realm of normal human feelings to not want to go to bed alone while your boyfriend continues a conversation with your male roommate. It is reasonable and normal to feel upset that this desire wasn’t implicitly obvious to your boyfriend. But the typical response to a minor misunderstanding like that is to make the communication more explicit with a simple request that the boyfriend come to bed and share that you felt upset about it, trusting that your caring boyfriend will feel sorry, make a note and try to do better next time. Not to lead with accusations of ill intent and quickly escalate to a full range of emotional manipulation and threats of physical violence.
    - 8y ago
- zozbot123 8y ago
  > I feel absolutely awful for people who date high-functioning borderlines and never learn about it. ... I really do think there needs to be more general awareness about Cluster B personality disorders. But people are increasingly aware of it. The "creepy abuser" (male) and the "crazy chick" (female) are stereotypes for a reason, and both of these seem to closely match Cluster B. More specifically, people are also becoming aware of Cluster B's associated dysfunctional thought patterns, and how to mitigate those, or at least how to effectively counter e.g. the gaslighting, unprovoked outbursts/tantrums, fanciful accusations, etc. that result from such thought patterns.
  - xenihn 8y ago
    Right, everyone knows the stereotypes, but not everyone knows that there's an identifiable condition behind it, with signs and patterns that are identifiable and uniform, as well as support for victims. >More specifically, people are also becoming aware of Cluster B's associated dysfunctional thought patterns, and how to mitigate those, or at least how to effectively counter e.g. the gaslighting, unprovoked outbursts/tantrums, fanciful accusations, etc. that result from such thought patterns. I also like to think that this is true, but I still don't think awareness is spreading as fast as it should be. We'll get there, though, right?

xenihn 8y ago

I dated a high-functioning borderline as well. It was a horrible experience, but in retrospect I'm (kind of) grateful to have learned about personality disorders as a result. I guess I learned a lot about myself too. I feel absolutely awful for people who date high-functioning borderlines and never learn about it. At least with the ones who are low-functioning, you absolutely know something is deeply wrong with them at all points in the relationship. With a high-functioning one, you second-guess yourself constantly. I really do think there needs to be more general awareness about Cluster B personality disorders. The occurrence rate among the population is low, but the nature of the disorder means a high-functioning borderline establishes relationships with (and potentially harms) a large number of people. It's hard for victims to seek help when they don't even know the name or nature of what they're dealing with.

futureastronaut 8y ago
People generally don't write glowing reviews of their exes, so forgive my skepticism of your and parent's anecdotes.
- jacobolus 8y ago
  The event that ended the relationship was: I was talking to her nice (edit: male) roommate about politics or something at about midnight while she went to bed apparently in a good mood. Turns out that was unacceptable, and she came back out of her room 20 minutes later, started berating me for it while I was confused, escalated to shouting at me for an hour while I remained calm, and finally threatened to call the cops on me. I walked a couple miles home at 2 AM through a snowstorm, while she sent me 10 desperate text messages. I never talked to her again, though I spent months agonizing about it (to the point of panic attacks), because I felt guilty that she desperately needed help and I thought I might be able to help her through continuing to patiently and reliably engage with her (it didn’t seem like anyone else was around to help her), and I liked and respected her as a person, but decided I couldn’t take it for my own mental health. We only dated for a relatively short time, but it took me a move across the country and a year to sort out my feelings and start dating again. YMMV.
  - futureastronaut 8y ago
    For those taking notes, your girlfriend may respond negatively to going to bed alone while you have one-on-one time with her friend or roommate (or any other woman) late at night, especially if the other is being "nice."
    - jacobolus 8y ago
      Yes, it’s reasonable and entirely within the realm of normal human feelings to not want to go to bed alone while your boyfriend continues a conversation with your male roommate. It is reasonable and normal to feel upset that this desire wasn’t implicitly obvious to your boyfriend. But the typical response to a minor misunderstanding like that is to make the communication more explicit with a simple request that the boyfriend come to bed and share that you felt upset about it, trusting that your caring boyfriend will feel sorry, make a note and try to do better next time. Not to lead with accusations of ill intent and quickly escalate to a full range of emotional manipulation and threats of physical violence.
  - 8y ago
zozbot123 8y ago
> I feel absolutely awful for people who date high-functioning borderlines and never learn about it. ... I really do think there needs to be more general awareness about Cluster B personality disorders. But people are increasingly aware of it. The "creepy abuser" (male) and the "crazy chick" (female) are stereotypes for a reason, and both of these seem to closely match Cluster B. More specifically, people are also becoming aware of Cluster B's associated dysfunctional thought patterns, and how to mitigate those, or at least how to effectively counter e.g. the gaslighting, unprovoked outbursts/tantrums, fanciful accusations, etc. that result from such thought patterns.
- xenihn 8y ago
  Right, everyone knows the stereotypes, but not everyone knows that there's an identifiable condition behind it, with signs and patterns that are identifiable and uniform, as well as support for victims. >More specifically, people are also becoming aware of Cluster B's associated dysfunctional thought patterns, and how to mitigate those, or at least how to effectively counter e.g. the gaslighting, unprovoked outbursts/tantrums, fanciful accusations, etc. that result from such thought patterns. I also like to think that this is true, but I still don't think awareness is spreading as fast as it should be. We'll get there, though, right?