splitting

My psychiatrist once said about splitting that the devaluation and idealization seems to come from a perspective that we as people with bpd have on ourselves, projected on who's around.

Basically meaning that as my self image shifts constantly and with that my self esteem, going from good, to very high, to very low, to acceptable, to the worst etc I then see the people around me through these lens, always, ending up treating them as I feel about myself.

Very often this leads me to be overly critical when particularly stressed out.
Does it happen to anyone else?
Also, when it happens I feel like I'm on autopilot and see myself critisizing but kinda like I could not stop or I don't really want to because I'm overly not satisfied with myself.

I found it really interesting but I would love to hear other perspectives too!

#Splitting #BPD #BorderlinePersonalityDisorder #idealization #devaluation

Hello, I have CPTSD(I am diagnosed) and I am struggling with black and white thinking. I struggle because there is this giult around that symptom.

I was listening to John Bradshaw and essentially, I had "lightbulbs" go off when he mentioned that we essentially put ourselves into a transe based in shame, especially with negative thoughts because we have imagined a partner(in my case earlier on in life it was "a idealized family) when enduring trauma to help us cope but that this person isn't realistic essentially and we split because as a child we registered people as "safe and unsafe".

Well, my "idealized image" is different then reality.

I made a family with my husband and our kids suffer from debilitating mental illness, this registers as "unsafe" for me and after years of being the safe person but not feeling safe(it's ongoing) I have been the non abusive safe person, while also not feeling safe myself, and at a given point this image of (an idealized partner), came to mind and splitting would occur, when my husband's defenses were up, *due to his past*, and how unsafe* he then felt*, due to how our kids are at times, how he would then be would register as *unsafe*, to me.

On the forefront I would be the person saying and doing "all the right things", working it out, using the appropriate communication(non violent communication) having the hard talks respectfully.

It would take a LOT to do this because he carries his own traumas and I felt "I was carrying this conversation, the one making it productive", because he's triggered in these instances but because of how I handled it, things would move on well, he would feel safe and then at some point after, I would have black and white thinking.

I know we continously go through trauma in a sense, given how unwell our kids are. I know I suffer with feeling isolated at times, and "like the capable one", because for lack of better words he "carries his past on his back, carries others from it on there", when he gets triggered by these situations, he can also hear things through his own internalized shame, when triggered by how unsafe the kids can make the environment feel.

These are private talks, we have had(no intense "scene" sort of instance)and good boundaries(as far as the kids are concerned).

Yet I find the "splitting" I go through, after, these hard talks, or even moments where I feel *sensative*, from the sheer stress(which also leads to splitting) at times if he registers as unkind(he's a logistican and can register as lacking empathy or mean).

Anyhow, when I go through this splitting there are elements of "a walking trance " as John Bradshaw calls it, that same sensation, of this sort of fixation, and shame based thoughts that present as a sort of *outer critic*, where he is not "this idealized parnter", and it's not something I would *choose to think like*, in good conscience and its hard to *work around or work my way out of*, it feels intense, and it's really quite out of character sort of thinking and I "don't recognize myself in it" and it's hard to work through.

Just wondering if you've experienced anything like this, what helped you. Please be kind. I work so hard to be a safe person/safe partner and these moments torment me, more then "hurt someone or something ".

#CPTSD #Splitting

I had my assessment tests today which I skipped. I called my person for support but they didn't pick up so i called my friend instead. And when my person finally calls me back and all i remember from that conversation is - 'go give your test or don't bother calling me today', which fired up my flight response. The last time my flight response triggered was when we were starting to become more serious and i broke up with them, saying horrible things to make them hate me. The next traumatic situation was where they put up an either/or situation - 'if you leave now it means we're breaking up'. I don't want to choose between two things anymore. When it was out up again today, i emotionally shut down and send them misleading texts, purposely calling them and being oblivious to what i have done wrong. Is this normal? This cycle of pushing people away and regretting it later? One day everyone will just get tired and leave me, with no chance of being back. #BorderlinePersonalityDisorder #Splitting #FearOfAbandonment

I was describing something to my psychologist about how if I’m feeling relatively calm, depressed (but not horrifically so), and I feel another part coming in that’s more wired, fast thinking, higher nervous energy, I’ll tell that past to stay away and “F off” because I want to stay in my calmer state.

She said it sounds like I have extreme splitting which confused me because I thought splitting was about seeing things/ people in black or white.

Does what she said make sense to anyone?

Thanks, Zel. #Splitting #parts

I don’t really tend to split on people. It’s the one symptom I don’t really have much of. Though when I’m very emotional it feels a bit like it I’m at least mentally able to recognise the complexities in relationships.

But I split on myself all the damn time. I’m either in love with the things I do, proud of myself for fighting my way through all the bad, and believe the art I make and things I do have value and meaning that is specific to me and my experiences in the world. Xx

Or everything I do is a terrible I’m worthless I havnt achieved enough, all my art is trite meaningless crap. Ect

Finding a balanced way to view myself feels much harder than finding a balanced way to view others.

My mind skips around like an old recorder
Scratches at each jump between
Times when I think I’ve settled on an answer
For what might seem a simple question
If it weren’t loaded

If I sleep with this keepsake tonight
Will holding it close to my chest
End up breaking it apart more later
Just like our first to last of five months in this home
Except boxes are, already, packed to leave
And one of two of us already left completely

I’m not sure what happpened to the you I got to see one last time
It was just four or five hours
But you were “back”,
You were “alive”
And you were kind
And I had missed you so
But that’s not why the tears streamed down my face
It was bc I knew the you that you’d replace
Would be the you that killed who you really were
And all we could have been
We wanted so much more
Than “could have beens”

I’m sorry I had to make the call
When just days before, you had kissed my face
But the Black Eyes returned within only days
And just like that,
The man I loved was replaced
With a punishing parent
From a patterned past
Don’t you know there’s a reason
Only Jesus should attempt to raise the dead

Black Eyes moved toward
And swiftly fell upon me
3 digits and a screen had to intervene
But they could only save me
And that night I felt the loss of death
There was nothing left in your eyes

May Jesus raise you up like Lazarus
May the One who is outside the bounds of
Space and Time and Death
Reunite us again
When we are ready

#BPD #Splitting #codependence #Loss #ComplicatedGrief