Comments on: NPD vs. BPD and co-morbidity http://www.anythingtostopthepain.com/2008/07/22/npd-vs-bpd-and-co-morbidity/ Help for partners and parents of people with Borderline Personality Disorder - Non-BPs Fri, 09 Jan 2009 22:10:03 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.2.2 By: V.S. http://www.anythingtostopthepain.com/2008/07/22/npd-vs-bpd-and-co-morbidity/#comment-793 V.S. Fri, 08 Aug 2008 10:42:39 +0000 http://www.anythingtostopthepain.com/2008/07/22/npd-vs-bpd-and-co-morbidity/#comment-793 Also, given what I've seen of BPD I'd highly question your ability to tell whose husband has BPD and whose has NPD, APD or something else via email. People with borderline can seem incredibly narcissistic. The differences (as you note) are that someone with NPD will generally not self injure (beyond a manipulative show), actually try to kill themselves, and will not be abnormally impulsive. They will also tend to be consistently narcissistic. Someone with BPD can be narcissistic, but will only be that way some of the time. Someone with APD will never truly have empathy for another and has consistent disregard or contempt for rules, including laws. Most people with BPD are basically law abiding, though they'll make exceptions for highly emotional things or "unimportant" laws (like traffic laws). People with APD and NPD are generally more emotionally regulated than people with BPD, but for any discrete time slice, someone with BPD absolutely can look like someone with NPD or APD. "Ass"-like and narcissistic behavior is absolutely part of borderline personality disorder, at least for some people, and a history of abusing one's partner is a potential sign of BPD, not a sign that someone doesn't have it. (And just for the record, my husband was diagnosed by a rather well respected hospital. He isn't self-dxed) Also, given what I’ve seen of BPD I’d highly question your ability to tell whose husband has BPD and whose has NPD, APD or something else via email. People with borderline can seem incredibly narcissistic. The differences (as you note) are that someone with NPD will generally not self injure (beyond a manipulative show), actually try to kill themselves, and will not be abnormally impulsive. They will also tend to be consistently narcissistic. Someone with BPD can be narcissistic, but will only be that way some of the time. Someone with APD will never truly have empathy for another and has consistent disregard or contempt for rules, including laws. Most people with BPD are basically law abiding, though they’ll make exceptions for highly emotional things or “unimportant” laws (like traffic laws). People with APD and NPD are generally more emotionally regulated than people with BPD, but for any discrete time slice, someone with BPD absolutely can look like someone with NPD or APD.

“Ass”-like and narcissistic behavior is absolutely part of borderline personality disorder, at least for some people, and a history of abusing one’s partner is a potential sign of BPD, not a sign that someone doesn’t have it.

(And just for the record, my husband was diagnosed by a rather well respected hospital. He isn’t self-dxed)

]]> By: V.S. http://www.anythingtostopthepain.com/2008/07/22/npd-vs-bpd-and-co-morbidity/#comment-792 V.S. Fri, 08 Aug 2008 10:25:31 +0000 http://www.anythingtostopthepain.com/2008/07/22/npd-vs-bpd-and-co-morbidity/#comment-792 Alternate theories (none of which are mutually exclusive): More men with BPD are misdiagnosed with APD or simply written off as criminal (or maybe just "asses"), so that the actual numbers of men and women with BPD are more nearly equal (Makes sense if you buy into the school of thought that most spousal abusers have BPD, which is borne out by quite a bit of study now and goes a long way in explaining why anti-abuser treatment has been so hopeless. 95% of the men who chose to go to the same treatment place as my husband [the only place that will accept abusers without a court order in our area] re-abuse, no matter how hard they try to keep up with therapy, and even though they are in treatment by choice. The therapy pushes things like feeling bad for what you did, admitting it every week, in detail, and trying hard not to do it again. Obviously not very useful for the BPD-abuser) More women are misdiagnosed with BPD when they actually suffer from another mental disorder or none at all. There's a long history of psychiatrists diagnosing all female patients who don't get better relatively quickly with Borderline, as well as teenaged females who claim sexual abuse without proof, lesbians and women who seem "masculine" and other women who fail to fit stereotypes. Again, so that the ratio of men to women with BPD is much more even. More women are likely to seek support, esspecially public support and esspecially support to keep their marriages together, since in this society the woman is blamed when the marriage breaks up. Even if it's because he hit her, it must be her fault in choosing the guy or provoking him in the first place. If the problems are less severe, it's definitely her fault for not trying to keep the marriage hard enough. So they try harder and end up in more support groups. I doubt that it's just because many of those guys are asses for no reason. Generally when someone is chronically an ass and chronically mistreats the people they love, something is wrong with them. Alternate theories (none of which are mutually exclusive):

More men with BPD are misdiagnosed with APD or simply written off as criminal (or maybe just “asses”), so that the actual numbers of men and women with BPD are more nearly equal (Makes sense if you buy into the school of thought that most spousal abusers have BPD, which is borne out by quite a bit of study now and goes a long way in explaining why anti-abuser treatment has been so hopeless. 95% of the men who chose to go to the same treatment place as my husband [the only place that will accept abusers without a court order in our area] re-abuse, no matter how hard they try to keep up with therapy, and even though they are in treatment by choice. The therapy pushes things like feeling bad for what you did, admitting it every week, in detail, and trying hard not to do it again. Obviously not very useful for the BPD-abuser)

More women are misdiagnosed with BPD when they actually suffer from another mental disorder or none at all. There’s a long history of psychiatrists diagnosing all female patients who don’t get better relatively quickly with Borderline, as well as teenaged females who claim sexual abuse without proof, lesbians and women who seem “masculine” and other women who fail to fit stereotypes. Again, so that the ratio of men to women with BPD is much more even.

More women are likely to seek support, esspecially public support and esspecially support to keep their marriages together, since in this society the woman is blamed when the marriage breaks up. Even if it’s because he hit her, it must be her fault in choosing the guy or provoking him in the first place. If the problems are less severe, it’s definitely her fault for not trying to keep the marriage hard enough. So they try harder and end up in more support groups.

I doubt that it’s just because many of those guys are asses for no reason. Generally when someone is chronically an ass and chronically mistreats the people they love, something is wrong with them.

]]> By: Bon Dobbs http://www.anythingtostopthepain.com/2008/07/22/npd-vs-bpd-and-co-morbidity/#comment-774 Bon Dobbs Sun, 27 Jul 2008 04:16:45 +0000 http://www.anythingtostopthepain.com/2008/07/22/npd-vs-bpd-and-co-morbidity/#comment-774 I think the narcissist does mask feelings of inadequacy and self-loathing... however, I think BPD is an emotional disorder and NPD is not. I don't know too much about NPD, but my feeling about BPD is that it is a subclass of affective disorders and the tools that are effective with BPD are different than those with NPD. I don't agree that BP's have narcissistic feelings - they MAY have what seems like narcissistic behavior... but I think those are an outgrowth of a "flip-flop" (in a black and white thinking sense) of being judged. The basic mind-set is "oh yeah? well, what about YOU? Do YOU have a right to judge me?" It seems like narcissistic, but it's really a defense against deep shame. And perhaps it is a shame closer to the surface than those with NPD. Bon I think the narcissist does mask feelings of inadequacy and self-loathing… however, I think BPD is an emotional disorder and NPD is not. I don’t know too much about NPD, but my feeling about BPD is that it is a subclass of affective disorders and the tools that are effective with BPD are different than those with NPD. I don’t agree that BP’s have narcissistic feelings - they MAY have what seems like narcissistic behavior… but I think those are an outgrowth of a “flip-flop” (in a black and white thinking sense) of being judged. The basic mind-set is “oh yeah? well, what about YOU? Do YOU have a right to judge me?” It seems like narcissistic, but it’s really a defense against deep shame. And perhaps it is a shame closer to the surface than those with NPD.

Bon

]]> By: John Lucas http://www.anythingtostopthepain.com/2008/07/22/npd-vs-bpd-and-co-morbidity/#comment-773 John Lucas Sun, 27 Jul 2008 00:34:34 +0000 http://www.anythingtostopthepain.com/2008/07/22/npd-vs-bpd-and-co-morbidity/#comment-773 Hey Bon, I looked into NPD as a possible explanation for my wife's behavior, whom I now believe has BPD, as you know. Most people seem to argue that that there is a core of self-loathing that is masked by the narcissist, that the display of superiority is a means for denying their fundamental feelings of inferiority, and that the self-loathing itself is responsible for their need for others to idolize them and their desire to destroy the esteem of others, which is seen as a competitive threat. What do you think? I still struggle to understand the differences between these 2 disorders (although I do think that the narcissistic behaviors seen in many BPs is fundamentally different from actual NPD). Best wishes, John Hey Bon,

I looked into NPD as a possible explanation for my wife’s behavior, whom I now believe has BPD, as you know.

Most people seem to argue that that there is a core of self-loathing that is masked by the narcissist, that the display of superiority is a means for denying their fundamental feelings of inferiority, and that the self-loathing itself is responsible for their need for others to idolize them and their desire to destroy the esteem of others, which is seen as a competitive threat.

What do you think? I still struggle to understand the differences between these 2 disorders (although I do think that the narcissistic behaviors seen in many BPs is fundamentally different from actual NPD).

Best wishes,
John

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