Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder : How to Identify the Symptoms

Dating someone with borderline personality disorder can sound really scary.

Dating someone with borderline personality disorder can also sound really serious. Especially if you’ve never heard of a “personality disorder” in general or have any idea what it actually means. Mental health as a whole can be very nerve racking if we don’t have a full understanding of what is really going on. I write this blog specifically because the majority of my individual clients struggle with a personal relationship with someone that has a personality disorder, specially Borderline Personality disorder… (and they don’t know it).

So What is Borderline Personality Disorder? According to psychiatry.org “Borderline Personality Disorder is a pattern of instability in personal relationships, intense emotions, poor self-image and impulsivity. A person with borderline personality disorder may go to great lengths to avoid being abandoned, have repeated suicide attempts, display inappropriate intense anger or have ongoing feelings of emptiness.” Studies believe Borderline Personality Disorder may be caused by trauma, genetics and/or learned behavior. People with this disorder may also have comorbidity which means they have multiple disorders at once (such as anxiety, depression, PTSD, etc).

Although this definition of borderline personality disorder is accurate, it may not be incredibly helpful because borderline personalities don’t always show up in this way. People that have BPD can be incredibly loyal, loving and empathetic. They can be self aware, empathic and compassionate. As their partner or friend, you may be their ultimate favorite person that they cherish greatly; but they may also easily become possessive or are very irrational at seemingly the drop of a hat. Your relationship with them may be just as pleasant as it is difficult and you may be really suffering as to understanding why. If you feel as though you are questioning your own behavior, morals and/or reactions often, and/or have been feeling an extreme uncertainty about what is going to make them happy again, you may want to read on. 

Here are a few examples of how you may be experiencing a borderline personality in your relationship.

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #1: Their Reactions Are Often Disproportionate to What’s Happening

You may find that you struggle with understanding their reactions at times and question if you are being insensitive. You may find little things, (like not answering your phone), set your partner through the roof. You are confused by their disporportionate emotions at times and can’t logically comprehend why they are so upset. You may find yourself asking “why are you so mad?” which may only make the situation more reactive. You may find yourself thinking “this is so irrational,” but you can’t calm them down. 

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #2: The Honeymoon Stage was ELECTRIC 

You felt electricity that was unlike any “spark” that you have ever experienced in a relationship before. The sexual chemistry may have been explosive from the very beginning, and/or your emotional chemistry was easy. You may feel as though you are addicted to this part of your relationship and often try your best to get it back. You’ve convinced yourself (and possibly friends and family) that the highs are way more valuable than the lows, and you do your best to hang onto the moments you two are in bliss.

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #3: They Are Never Wrong

Because your partner is often very black or white, you may notice a pattern that your partner does not accept accountability for their behavior, (which typically means they never apologize.) They somehow find a way to make you feel guilty about something you did that caused them to lash out in the way they did. Even after the argument has settled, you may still find yourself feeling invalidated for multiple occasions. The relationship often feels one-sided and as though there is no room for your needs or feelings. 

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #4: They Are Deep and Emotional

You’ve experienced vulnerable moments with them that have made you fall deeper and deeper in love. They seem self aware and able to articulate their experiences of the past in ways you may have never experienced anyone do before. They may have been in therapy for years and talk a lot about their past. You find this level of depth intriguing, when it is not projected at you.

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #5: Your Relationship Feels Like a Yo-Yo

You’ve never felt so loved and so hated by anyone, ever. This yo-yo effect in your relationship may lead to a lot of confusion, curiosity, hope and frustration for you. It’s a mystery and at times you may feel you are the only one that doesn’t get it, but you want to figure it out. You may find your inner child gets triggered a lot and you may get to a point when you feel like a defeated shell of yourself. 

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #6: You Have Anxiety, All the Time

You may find yourself constantly confused, which results to a lot anxiety and self doubt. You may not be able to identify the source of your partner’s shift in mood, or the level of emotion that is being expressed, so you walk on eggshells. You may start to analyze your own character and become insecure or resentful. You are often struggling with understanding the why of their negative or extreme reactions toward you, so you struggle with knowing how to assert your needs. You may ask yourself, “Am I crazy?” “Did I totally perceive this situation wrong?” “Do other people think I’m just a terrible person, too?” “Why does my partner do this? I would never do this to them.”

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #7: You Don’t Feel Trusted 

You don’t ever really feel trusted by your partner, even if you haven’t “done” anything to give them the impression you are untrustworthy. People who struggle with borderline personality disorder are incredibly vulnerable to the idea of abandonment. They want to be loved unconditionally (like we all do), but they often struggle with trusting full heartedly because they are often suspicious of people’s motives.

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #8: You Feel Guilty

You feel guilty often and probably take accountability for things that you don’t believe are for you to own; but you do this to keep the peace and to de-escalate the situation. Maybe you’ve always been a bit of a people pleaser so this dynamic may be somewhat of a comfort zone to you, even if it doesn’t feel great. You may become obsessed with the getting back to a good place with your partner so you can become the most special, beloved, and needed person on the planet again.

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #9: There Is No Room For Your Feelings/Needs

You feel as though you aren’t allowed to have needs because every time you express them, your partner completely dismisses you and refuses to accept they don’t offer these needs to you. They may turn a situation back on you and express in detail how much they do for you that you don’t appreciate or see. They don’t see your point of view, but expect and demand you to always see their’s. 

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #10: They Dislike Most People

Your partner may have a strong victim mentality and you start seeing it more and more in their personal life outside of you. Maybe they don’t have many friends because, “they are all back-stabbers,” or they complain constantly about their coworkers because they are all “bullies.” Maybe their family is the total “enemy” and the reason for all of their suffering. Either way, you can start to get a glimpse into their lens of the world, which is everyone is against them.

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #11: People in Your Circle Say, GET OUT.

You friends and family may have cautioned you multiple times about this relationship. If you have been transparent with your friends and families about your partner’s behavior, then most likely your best friends or close relatives have expressed their concern for you.  (Or, another example of dating someone with borderline personality disorder is the reluctance you may have to actually tell others around you the full story of what has been going on in your relationship because you’re ashamed, embarrassed and/or scared. So you often hide your feelings and confusion from close ones around you and try to process it all by yourself. You may also be in denial).

How to Tell if You’re Dating Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder #12: You Are Terrified to Even Think About Breaking up With Them

If you have questioned breaking up with your partner, but fear retaliation, their volatile reaction and/or them self-harming as a reaction, this is a strong indicator that your partner is struggling with BPD. 

So let’s say you relate to most of these examples. Where do you go from here? A part of you may feel a lot of relief, but you may also have a lot of fear about how to proceed. The tricky piece to many personality disorders like Borderline Personality, it is an ego syntonic disorder, (which means an individual is unaware of their symptoms). This makes healthy longterm relationships pretty challenging (if not downright impossible), because they are often incapable of recognizing their (negative) part in the dynamic. If everything is perceived from their eyes as your fault, you may never feel seen, understood or appreciated in your relationship.

Ego syntonic disorders are also limiting in treatment, such as accepting the idea that they could use individual therapy or couples counseling, because they often think everyone else is the problem. The counseling experience with borderline personalities can often play out where they refuse to come altogether, or participate but the moment they feel the therapist is not on their side they can feel abandoned or become volatile. Or, they could find a therapist that only validates their perspective, which may only perpetuates their victim narrative.

If there is willingness from your partner to want to explore help, there are specific treatments available such as PCH Treatment that are designed to support borderline personality disorder that have shown to be successful. Often medication can help for the other possible symptoms such as depression and anxiety, but there are currently no “cures” for personality disorders.

If you think you are dating a person with borderline personality disorder, my advice is to seek your own individual counseling. You can gain support in educating yourself on this disorder, as well as learn the tools to navigate your own feelings and explore your own blind spots, and understand what you gain from this relationship. From that point on, you may be able to navigate a conversation about supportive treatment with your partner or at least have more perspective about how you’d like to proceed.