Waify BPD vs. Covert NPD

[Psuedonym]

Hi everybody,

First off, I wanted to say up front that this is not about diagnosing people, as really none of us can do that. But for me it's an interesting thought and perspective questioning exercise. When I first found out about PDs, I was convinced that my M (who I have affectionately nicknamed Negatron) was straight up BPD. Classic no self esteem, empty, always the victim, can't be alone, blah blah blah. My psychiatrist (who's very wise) first suggested that she might be NPD, which at first I didn't get, but as I learn more about the covert types, I've become more convinced that she probably is NPD (probably a combination of the two).

Here's why that possibility is important to me, and maybe it will help some of you. If you grew up with one of these clingy victim types, you might like me, have a really tough time shaking the guilt, obligation that stems from the belief that  this person is just so dysfunctional, not equipped to deal with the world, emotionally fragile, etc. that it's really not their fault that they're such a helpless trainwreck. But watching videos on covert NPDs really has changed my perspective. In this awesome new one by the awesome Les Carter he sums up what he calls the Fragile Victim Narcissist in under a minute (it's also the most dead-on accurate description of Negatron I've ever heard) : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOKmQRmwvdo&feature=youtu.be&t=440. And the main takeaway from that is the helpless victim persona is in fact an act – a very calculated and manipulative act that somehow turns you into their servant while they manage to appear pitiable and helpless.

Does that piss you off? Because it pisses me off, and it sure as hell helps me get over any sort of residual guilt I might be feeling. Anyway, this post is a bit rambly, but my hope is that it might help open someone else's eyes to the fact that the sad, pathetic, helpless victim in their lives might be more of a manipulative predator than they suspect.

[11JB68]

I see your point and agree.
When I thought my h had a combo of ocd and aspbergers I felt more guilty and responsible, sorry for him.
Understanding pd better, I've been able to look at his behavior more objectively.

[Thru the Rain]

This was great. I went back and watched from the beginning, and had pictures in my head of actual people I deal with as he was describing the different types.

I thought it was cool that you were able to link to the exact spot in the recording to queue up the right spot. I'm impressed!

[moglow]

For me, at the end of the day behavior tells the tale. I spent a lot of time early on trying to justify and excuse the inexcusable with one "diagnosis" or another. It finally dawned on me that whenever I'd dared to bring any of the behavior to mother's attention, she always had an excuse. However flimsy and see- through, if not outright ridiculous, mother inevitably blamed someone/something (anything!) else. She refuses to accept responsibility for herself on any conceivable level. Give her a bona fide diagnosis -not that she'd ever actually seek help- oh HELL no! She's just have a brand new scapegoat.


So for me, call it anything you want, but call a spade a spade and address the *behavior*.

[Psuedonym]

Good point, moglow. A rose is a rose and all that.

I think for me – and I know it's easy to get lost in trying to understand things in an acedemic way – her level of understanding of her own behavior has always been a ???? And for me as empathic person with a big imagination I am left with two distinct imagined scenarios.

1. Her behavior comes from a place of internal panic and feeling that without constant attention she feels like she doesn't actually exist.
2. Her behavior comes from a place of entitlement and superiority in which she is 'owed' constant attention because of her specialness ie, the best mother in the world!

Those elicit different responses from me. I know that I can never really know the answer to that question, but just realizing that the first answer isn't necessarily the correct one  is important to me, because in that scenario what I end up feeling is quite a bit of pity. Thinking 'maybe that's exactly how she wants you to feel' lessens that.

11JB68, that sounds like a tough situation. I'm glad that you were able to get over feeling guilty and responsible!

Thru the Rain, I just discovered this a while ago: if you pause a youtube video and then right click on it, it will give you the option to 'copy video url at current time'. That let's you start the video in the exact spot you want. Now you too can impress your friends!

[jenny wren]

Very interesting.

I have a friend who fits that description of fragile narcissist exactly. And until recently I felt very sorry for her and tried to help her and I was very confused as I watched her becoming more and more distressed and helpless the more I helped!  I've now stopped, set very clear boundaries and amazingly (or not so amazingly) she's now behaving like a competent adult. At least when she's with me.

I too had two ways of viewing her behaviour, exactly the same as your two senarios, Psuedonym.  However, I now think these two senarios are not mutually exclusive.

1. An infant has a genuine need for constant attention  without which they will die. An ignored infant tries various methods to gain attention and experiences panic if they don't get it. Without the parental mirroring the infant has no sense of self.  To be ignored is life threatening.

2. An infant is naturally narcissistic. The world revolves around them and their needs. They know nothing else.  They are entitled to feel that they are owed this attention.  They are indeed special and deserving of special treatment and attention. They need it to survive and grow into normal adults.

A parent usually meets all these needs and forms a strong bond. The child is then able to be gradually weaned from their need for constant attention and their need to be constantly held in special regard without causing them to panic because the bond provides a secure base.

If personality disorders stem from a disturbance in these early bonds will this not leave some people with both a sense of panic / a feeling of not existing if they aren't getting constant attention AND a sense of entitlement, a sense that they are owed this attention?

I think this is what I see in my friend. 
In end, she is not an infant.  She has to function in the real world and if she wants to keep me as a friend she has to behave like an adult which means I have to treat her like an adult and expect normal adult behaviour.

The rest she has to take to her therapist!

[Psuedonym]

Jenny wren,

Excellent points. I was thinking about that as I wrote the post. For me I think the existence of the manipulative/abusive side is really important because she's been selling the poor me/oblivious victim thing for so long. Here's another example:

If you called your kid fat, ugly, disgusting, stupid, and piggy, and then gave a long detailed list of what exactly made them all those things to anyone who would listen, you would be rightfully thought of as an awful human being and hopefully someone would step in and try to help your kid because said kid is going to grow up with a world of problems in life.

If you called yourself fat, ugly, disgusting, stupid, and piggy, to anyone who would listen, and then, in different conversations, prompted those people with 'doesn't my kid look exactly like me? don't you think my kid is exactly like me?" and then obsessively told your kid that everyone thought you were exactly like them, is that just as abusive? The effect is exactly the same on your kid, I can tell you that much, except instead of getting any understanding, all the sympathy compassion is heaped upon your poor, self hating parent.

To me, here's the big question: did she know what was she doing? Because she was either a) so oblivious that she didn't realize that dumping all her own self-loathing all over her only kid and then forcing this 'we are the same' narrative on said kid was going to be catastrophic for that kid's self esteem, or b) she knew exactly what she was doing but was being horrible with plausible deniability.

The evidence can go either way. There were more than a few people who in my childhood/adolescence who told Negatron about their concern for my 'inferiority complex', self-loathing, and depression. After my dad died in 2017 she told me that a not terribly close relative of ours said her clearest memory of me was me saying I was 'never getting married because I was so ugly' when I was a kid. She told me this not out of concern or regret but to say 'I don't remember you ever saying that' so I could agree with her. (I did not). Only sporadically did she actually come out and say things like (insert self-hatred here) and unfortunately, you look like me.'

I know that this question is one that is never going to be answered and at the end of the day, the effects of her toxicity were what they were, but for me that question still hangs out there: did she accidentally turn me into a self-loathing (that term seems mild), clinically depressed individual who then spent decades climbing out of that hole, or did she deliberately destroy her kid's self esteem because, hey, misery loves company is a cliche for a reason. It's a hard one to let go, even as I know that ultimately, rejecting all the garbage and rebuilding my sense of self is way more important than the motivations behind the behavior.

[SunnyMeadow]

Does that piss you off? Because it pisses me off, and it sure as hell helps me get over any sort of residual guilt I might be feeling. Anyway, this post is a bit rambly, but my hope is that it might help open someone else's eyes to the fact that the sad, pathetic, helpless victim in their lives might be more of a manipulative predator than they suspect.

Yes, it pisses me off! Very good breakdown by Dr Carter.

My uNPDm overlaps on several of his 7 traits. All the things I'm learning about these PDs are like a big, heavy curtain being flung open  I'm finally seeing how all interactions with my mother are calculated so she gets maximum benefit and supply. She should have gone into acting and been paid for her performances. 

Thanks for posting this Psuedonym! The name Negatron makes me smile every time I see it.

[Psuedonym]

The heavy curtain metaphor is a good one, SunnyMeadow. Love your username, btw. I use Negatron because I can't say or type it without laughing as well, and it brings some levity to an otherwise not funny situation. I think that being able to laugh about something makes it less powerful, which is also why I'm fond of our silly emojis. 

[absolutelynope]

I think for me – and I know it's easy to get lost in trying to understand things in an acedemic way – her level of understanding of her own behavior has always been a ???? And for me as empathic person with a big imagination I am left with two distinct imagined scenarios.

1. Her behavior comes from a place of internal panic and feeling that without constant attention she feels like she doesn't actually exist.
2. Her behavior comes from a place of entitlement and superiority in which she is 'owed' constant attention because of her specialness ie, the best mother in the world!

Hi, newbie here. I've found my people!!!!

I spent a few years trying to figure out if my mother was a covert narc, borderline waif or histrionic. With the help of a psychotherapist we *think* she's borderline. He thinks she's not aware of the manipulation. But sometimes the mask slips and I think that maybe she is aware of it but thinks that it's justified and there's nothing wrong with it; it's the only way she can get what she needs. Then another time she's so convincing I think she can't possibly be aware of it.

[Rose1]

My exubpdmil was a nagger, nasty and judgmental. To me. Maybe to her sil but I dont think to many others because she was very image conscious. And low functioning. Enfil did just about everything.
I asked her once why she kept pushing and behaved the way she did and she said "because that way you do what I want". Low functioning, not smart but knew what she was doing.
Big light bulb moment and it never worked again.
Exbpdh was high functioning, manipulative, lazy, enmeshed with his mother to the point of emotionally incestuous behaviout. But knew what he was doing. He tended to expect others were thinking the way he was and used that as an excuse to be nasty or very sneakily paying back. (The classic you must be doing what I imagine you are, so you deserve it). He held and still does hold grudges. And he pays back if he thinks he wont get caught or can deny it. Then he's the poor big victim of the whole world.
He turned into his mother but more covert. But he was always like that even as a child apparently. Would lash out if he thought he could get away with it. With me he slowly just got worse and worse. But he knows what he's doing.

[blacksheep7]

I watched the video  from the start.  I liked that Narcissism was divided into Seven Types.    My NM is mainly a covert/passive-aggressive but has many traits of the others.  A waify side  that my sibs don't see, only as aging.  I guess it is what stands out the most in their behavior over time.   My raging NF kept NM happy as she was on her own most of the time  to handle four kids and having no self-awareness had trouble to handle gcb and I as teens.
We had to endure her frustrations and emotional instability on top of NF  who was also absent physically and mentally.   We had no family here so my PD parents would have dinner parties with the neighbours and show off their superficial  charm.  If only they knew how we were treated in private......that's what pissed me off.

Now, she is an Entitled widow/victim.  I was able to see in my early adult years that her personality was superficial in public and private as she needed validation from her children.  A vindictive side to her, the Queen trait in BPD  that I discovered, it floored me!   

[Andeza]

The more I learn about PD's in general, and especially about BPD, the more certain I am. M is BPD, more specifically about 70% waif, 27% hermit, and 3% Witch. As my former enDad, now divorced and living free and happy, lol, slowly divulges more of what M was like early on, it just clicks. Of course she would never willingly disclose her previous life as a party girl, nor ever admit that all her makeitupitis is just to get more meds, but she doesn't have to admit to those things. I'm good at figuring them out.

Her behavior has become increasingly isolationist over the years. Once active in her church, she now hardly leaves the house claiming it's "my antisocial depression." Once promiscuous before marriage, she "rededicated" her life to Jesus and turned into a prude rather abruptly. Except... there's really no other evidence of that supposedly life changing decision.

Extreme fear of abandonment. Ironic then that pretty much everyone has done just that because they couldn't take her BS anymore.