Strong self-esteem helps you remain confident, strong and connect with other people. But if you have BPD, feeling capable and serving may be very rare. Instead, you may feel incompetent or worthless more often.
Although BPD personalities initiate a break-up as a way of seeking validation, because of the intense anxiety at play, they'll often express intense regret because of their abandonment wounding, especially if they're not met with the response they desire.
Some people who have been diagnosed with BPD experience chronic emptiness. “Chronic feelings of emptiness” is one of the nine DSM-5 criteria for borderline personality disorder. The experience of emptiness is an important criterion to target in treatment because the symptom can be devastating for many individuals.
A lot of people with the condition struggle with emptiness or worthlessness. Many with BPD report feeling like there is a void inside of them or like they don't matter. As a result, they often turn to sex, drugs, or food to try to feel satisfied.
This novel study found that for people with BPD, chronic emptiness is experienced as a sense of nothingness and numbness that reflects a feeling of disconnection from both self and others. It is associated with feelings of unfulfillment and purposelessness.
Some of the key signs and symptoms of borderline personality disorder are: A deep fear of being abandoned or unloved by those close to you. Difficulty in creating and maintaining a sense of self. You often feel empty, like there is nothing happening inside of you.
Loneliness may be common with BPD, but it's not impossible to overcome. There are many strategies you can use to feel less alone, such as joining a support group, taking classes, caring for an animal, and finding new ways to communicate with your loved ones. You may also want to consider engaging in therapy.
Feeling challenged, threatened, or disappointed can quickly cause them to devalue the people they formerly idealized. Rather than cope with the stress of ambivalence, devaluing functions to minimize the anxiety caused by ambiguity.
Part of their surprise almost surely stemmed from an uncomfortable truth: people with BPD are often regarded as hopeless individuals, destined to a life of emotional misery. They are also frequently viewed as so disturbed that they cannot possibly achieve success in everyday life.
According to HealthyPlace, selfishness in the case of BPD arises from unmet needs: People with a borderline personality often report being neglected or abused as children. Consequently, they feel empty, angry, and deserving of nurturing.
Cyclical Nature of BPD Abandonment
The fear of being abandoned often causes people with BPD to form unhealthy attachments. Sometimes, they may abruptly cut off these relationships, effectively abandoning their partners. Other times, they make frantic attempts to hold onto relationships.
People with BPD fear abandonment and have trouble maintaining relationships. Nevertheless, they tend to lie, which ruins trust and intimacy, fosters resentment, and harms the very relationships they fear losing.
Remember that splitting is a symptom of borderline personality disorder - while it can be difficult not to take their words and actions personally, remember that the person is not intentionally trying to hurt you. Splitting is something that they are doing unknowingly.
A person with BPD or NPD may lie to distort reality into something that fits with the emotions that they are feeling, rather than the facts. These personality disorders can lead to significant challenges with interpersonal relationships.
BPD Triggers Loneliness and Isolation
It may spring from your fear of being rejected or abandoned. This fear can make you feel lonely, even when you have a partner or loving family. Also typical with borderline personality is co-occurring mental illness. One of the most common is depression.
A person with borderline personality disorder is often unable to trust their own feelings or reactions. Lacking a strong sense of self leads to a sense of emptiness and sometimes a sense of being non-existent, which is another reason BPD hurts so much.
The Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is a case of a failed narcissistic solution. In BPD, the patient is aware that the solution that she opted for is "not working". This is the source of her separation anxiety (fear of abandonment).
Getting over a favorite person in BPD means that the person has worked through and overcome their intense emotional attachment to that individual. This can be a challenging process that often involves therapy and developing healthy coping mechanisms to manage feelings of abandonment and separation anxiety.
Many people who live with borderline personality disorder don't know they have it and may not realize there's a healthier way to behave and relate to others.
Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) often has trouble maintaining friendships. They tend to search for emotional caregivers and have difficulty grasping the idea of friendship. In any sort of friendship, they have unreasonable expectations for attention, validation, and compassion.
People with Borderline Personality Disorder have a reduced life expectancy of some 20 years, attributable largely to physical health maladies, notably cardiovascular. Risk factors include obesity, sedentary lifestyle, poor diet and smoking.
Bold – Impulsivity is a BPD trait that can be positively linked to being bold, courageous and having the ability to speak one's mind. Creative – The high intensity of emotions can be released into creative endeavours. Many people with BPD put their entire emotional expression into music, art, performance and writing.
In addition to the chaotic emotional life and fears of abandonment associated with BPD, a person with co-occurring NPD may also take advantage of or manipulate others while having little empathy for others' concerns. This combination can be incredibly destructive in relationships.
People with BPD may experience rage when they perceive rejection, neglect, or abandonment in a relationship. During rage, a person may say or do things that they later regret. This could lead to ending the relationship in the heat of the moment. BPD rage is often followed by significant regret and shame.