Tools and the Borderline

Tools and the Borderline

I found this post to the thread “Author of Eggshells Workbook is a Moron” from a cached copy of the “Crazy Talk” web forum.

Unfortunately, the Crazy Talk board has moved to a new server and the old threads were not carried over. I guess Google will maintain it in their cache for a while. The thread itself is a quite interesting version of several borderlines’ views on the SWOE workbook. Here is a particularly insightful post responding to the idea that borderlines are “manipulative”:

I don’t think that, in most cases anyway, that the “manipulative” BPD behavior is deliberately so, despite appearances – thus it cannot be truly manipulative, by definition. These behaviors DO have a function and an objective, as do all behaviors (including brushing one’s teeth), but we do not describe ALL non-disordered people’s attempts to find or maintain love or get attention or avoid pain manipulation – only when it truly is just that.

I think a new word is called for.

More accurately, the behaviors in question are more like “tools”. Lacking a circular saw, I may try a hatchet to cut my board so I can cover my window and keep out the chill. It is not as effective, and is potentially damaging and will make a pretty ratty and half-assed covering, but it is the only tool I have to do what I need to do.

Granted, those with BPD/PD loved ones need to find ways to protect themselves, but applying such language ideas as “manipulation” does not give the “other” proper tools, either.

The overall effect is two people standing around with hatchets trying to make a straight cut down the length of an oak plank. Ain’t gonna work.