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Tough Love Reconsidered with BPD
Does one use tough love with BPD? You can’t START with tough love, because first emotional trust has to be established.
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Emotional Validation with Honesty
A few months ago I posted a piece on the validating statement and earlier today I posted on the I-AM-MAD communication tool. While both recommend validation (actually one is a sub-set of the other), sometimes if you are new to validation the statements and questions that I recommend can seem (as Wandering Coyote put it in her comment) “so trite, so patronizing.” It can seem that way (or rote) if you don’t validate with honesty. If you’re “reading from a script” the validation will seem empty to the other person. The key thing IMO is that you really try and empathize with the other person’s feelings and not judge those…
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I-AM-MAD communication skill
Last week I wrote an email to someone explaining the value of validation and the stance one “should” adopt when using validation. Emotional validation is valuable when someone is experiencing an “emotionally dysregulated moment” (which in the ATSTP group we call “EDM”). These moments are common when someone has BPD or ERD. Anyway, I posted an anonymous version of my message to the group and one of my group members (thanks Tides!) edited it into what she called the “I-AM-MAD” communication tool. I will post the content of the tool below and upload the PDF…. Oh, quickly… The formatting came out a little wonky. And “IAAHF” means “it’s all about…
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A Critical Analysis of the “3-C’s” of Being a Non-BP
Often I see in the support groups on the Internet (especially the “Welcome to Oz” or WTO groups), people providing the “3 C’s” of understanding your role as a Non-BP. I’ve seen it quoted on BPD support websites too. These “3 C’s” go as follows: I didn’t cause it I can’t control it I can’t cure it While these statements are generally true, I’d like to take some time to analyze these statements and add a fourth “C.” I’d also like to tell you what you CAN do – rather than what you didn’t or can’t do. These statements help take the onus off the Non-BP for any responsibility for…
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Internet Searchs on BPD and Why you need WHINE
I have been looking over the keywords that found my blog in the past few days and have noticed that I’m getting more traffic from people seeking information, self-help, advice and assistance with their borderline personality disordered partner. Here is a (small) sample of of these search terms: helping someone with bpd bpd crazymaking levels of validation “self-destructive behavior” friend how to get bpd to go to psychiatrist bpd communication bpd and lying high-functioning borderline borderline how to convince ex i have changed are emotions painful for bpd invalidating environment, boundaries advice for dealing with someone with a bpd bpd dealing with love borderline girlfriend when she clearly has a…
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The validating statement revealed
This is an excerpt from pages 103-104 from my book When Hope is Not Enough: a how-to guide for living with and loving someone with Borderline Personality Disorder. This excerpt comes from my (long) discussion of validation and how and why to do it. In the book, I outline a six step process to validation. This is a part of “Step 3: Making a Validating Statement”: Examples of validating statements: – That must have made you feel really angry. – What a frustrating situation to be in! – It must make you feel angry to have someone do that. – That’s so difficult for you. – Wow, how hard that…