Safety and Insecurity in BPD

I have a list member who is a big fan of Al Turtle. Mr. Turtle (great name BTW) is a relationship consultant, not specifically dealing with BPD, but in relationships in general. What I found out through this list member is that Mr. Turtle and I came to the same conclusion about a certain experience. This experience is the “safe” and “unsafe” experience. While I deal with this on the BPD level, Mr. Turtle does so in general – and he calls the “lizard” of a person. The lizard is the emotional brain of an individual. Because it’s the primitive brain, it is lizard-like. I personally can’t go with the idea of the lizard – it’s just too cheesy for me. However, the idea of emotional safety is important to me. Mr. Turtle and I have come to the idea of safety versus insecurity to the same conclusion with different means. I have been considering this idea with respect to BPD. What I found was that, when feeling unsafe, a BP will be faced with four choices: run away, attack, submit or ruminate silently. What was pointed out to me was the opposite to the feeling of insecurity. That is the idea of safety. Most BP’s don’t feel safe most of the time… but sometimes they do. When they are feeling safe, they have four choices as well (thanks, Al Turtle and my list member!). Those choices are: mate, play, nurture and create.

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