Why does PD mother act so nicely and try to please me (and others)?

[Stardust1982]

Hi.

This behavior baffles me. Why would a PD (Borderline with Narc traits) mother act so nice to you-on a consistent basis, with times when she is very abusive (emotionally, mentally, financially, you imagine how a BP acts and treats others). What is the reasoning behind her being nice? Is she really nice or plays a role and doesn't really want to care for others?

Thanks in advance.

[D.]

My understanding and experience is that all the nice ultimately always helps the PD.  So some "nice" things help us...but they also help the PD.  For example when I really observe and/or questioned uPDxh, all the nice ultimately came back to his own personal agenda.  That is still the case.  Nice to his new baby, she is a reflection of him.  Nice to me, ultimately he wants something.  Same w/uPDM.  Also, if people were abusive all of the time they would lose all contact, which they know and don't want.  The intermittent nice keeps us going back...at least imho...

[Stardust1982]

@C, that makes so much sense!! But it feels crazy while you're in it, looking at them acting so nicely. Knowing deep down how emotionally unstable and mean they truly are.

Thanks!

[treesgrowslowly]

Yeah, where I've landed on this is that it is a manipulation and one they are not honest about.

From what is written about NPD apparently this is how some of them think everyone is.

That 'nice' is always just play acting -  to get something out of some one.

Some of them believe this is how the whole world works.

They tend to also believe that you are solely responsible for your own pain and that they are not responsible for caring about how people feel around them.

Also you can see when they are nice and sometimes they have really predictable patterns. Nice right before their birthday or some other gifting holiday etc.

All in sum these narcissistic traits are awful to deal with. 

Trees