Just a Thought: How Different Parenting Styles Result in Different Subtypes of BPD
In group therapy we’ve been asked to dig deep and think about how our childhoods affected our mental health. We all know that if you had an awful childhood you’re much more likely to develop a mental illness, and BPD is no exception.
But imagine you have two people who suffer from BPD. One suffers from impulsivity and rages. The other suffers from quiet BPD: they meet the criteria for a BPD diagnosis but they don’t display “acting out” behaviors. How does that happen? What causes a split between “acting out” BPD and “acting in” BPD?
I have a theory. Keep in mind I could be totally wrong because I’m not a professional. And keep in mind that sometimes children with loving, good parents still go on to develop BPD because BPD, like any mental illness, has several biological causes as well. But there doesn’t seem to be much research on BPD, so I figure I’ll just put this out there.
As a baby or a toddler, you are entirely reliant upon your caregiver. You need to be fed, have your diaper changed, comforted when you’re upset. You can’t do these things on your own so you have to get your caregiver’s attention. So you cry.
For many people with BPD, their parents didn’t respond to their child’s needs. Or they outright didn’t care. If they hear you crying, they might not do anything. Or they may take their time. Or they may make it clear with their body language and other mannerisms that you’re being an annoyance to them. And they don’t spend time comforting you or holding you or creating a bond with you.
With parents like these, how is a child to get their attention? As a baby you can’t do much other than cry, but that changes when you become a toddler. You’ve learned your parents don’t care. You have to do more to get what you need.
So you throw a tantrum, scream, and rage. That ends up being more likely to get your parents’ attention, which is especially hard to do if your parents are neglectful or even abusive. Acting out gives you what you need, and having your needs met in this way may be the closest thing to validation that you can get.
Your behavior is immediately reinforcing. You are learning to act out in order to survive. You don’t know how else to express everything you’re feeling. Acting out is the only way you’ll be heard. This pattern of behavior is now ingrained into you.
Quiet BPD, I think, develops a little differently. If you have quiet BPD, maybe your parents were attentive. You don’t use acting out behaviors because you don’t need to. It isn’t a survival technique. You learn that your needs will be met. Your parents may have even been close to you.
But even so, something is still… off. Your parents give you affection, but if you start to voice your own opinion—if you express that you disagree with something they said—they explode. You’re not allowed to have a different opinion because it’s inherently wrong. Why is it inherently wrong? Because you are less than they are. Why are you less? Because… you’re you.
Maybe your parents rely on your for emotional support. But when you are in distress and ask for support in return, there is silence. Why don’t you get validation too? Because you’ve been taught that you are less.
If you do something wrong—let’s say you get in trouble for showing interest in romantic relationships or sex, or you don’t do well in school—that destroys your relationship with your parents. You’ve stepped too far out of bounds for them. Any mistake of this sort is unacceptable. You’ve shattered their perfect image of you (or the child they want), and now permanent damage has been done. There is hell to pay. They don’t just punish you. They become spiteful or even hateful. They may turn to abusive behavior. You’re not granted the same understanding that everyone else is. Why? Because you’re their child.
You’ve grown up learning that you are inherently worth less than other people. You’ve grown up learning you don’t have the right to be angry. You must dance around the emotions of other people, treading carefully lest you anger them or offend them and thus lose their affection. And these are all things you may have learned from your peers as well: unless you hold yourself to an unrealistically high standard in order to be accepted by your classmates, you are excluded or bullied or rejected or isolated. They can do and act however they so please and no one so much as raises an eyebrow, but if you do even a minor thing differently? You risk losing all the approval you’ve worked so hard for. Why must you work so much harder to have any worth? Again, because you’re you.
Whether you’ve learned this from your parents, your peers, or both, you resort to acting in. You may foster a deep sense of self-loathing. You may turn to self-harm or denying yourself food to “punish” yourself. You’ve learned that you must contain everything you feel. You’ve learned to hate yourself for everything, even something as minor as accidentally offending someone else. You’ve learned that when your parents are mad, when your friends are mad, it is your fault. You are responsible for appeasing others and meeting their needs. You are not allowed to fail in this regard. And so, you develop quiet borderline personality disorder.
All of this is just speculation. There can definitely be exceptions or crisscrossing of symptoms and behaviors and life experiences because we’re all different. But maybe we’re getting a little closer to understanding why we suffer the way we do.
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