[Splitting and BPD] Today I Learned...
[I'm going to try this again. I refreshed the page after multiple attempts to post my original post, then the whole thing disappeard. Oh well =) ]
Splitting
I'm pretty interested in discovering new psychology videos on youtube so they pop up on my feed quite frequently. One of these videos today was on "Splitting." I thought this was another word for split personality, but it's actually its own thing. Splitting, as described by the licenced psychologist in the video, is when someone starts to see people/things as either all bad or all good. She used the example of a child who thinks "Mommy fed me, mommy good" in one moment and "Mommy took away my favorite toy, mommy bad" in the next moment. When someone is splitting, it is almost as if they see you as two different people. This video was mostly about recognizing this in people with borderline personality disorder but as the conversation went on, they also mentioned anyone is capable of doing this, it is in our nature. But, usually, as our brain develops and grows so does our psychological behavior and we start to see that good or bad, mommy is mommy. Imagine the yin and yang symbol in motion, spinning until the black and white create grey. This is life. It's mostly grey. When someone is experiencing splitting, it's like they've gotten rid of all that was good or all that was bad in an instant and all of the sudden life is all black or all white, depending on the situation at hand.
Borderline Personality Disorder
When my therapist signed me up for Dialectal Behavioral Therapy, I went home and dove right into finding out more about it. What I found is that it is usually given to those struggling with Borderline Personality Disorder. She never gave me that diagnosis though. Maybe she wanted to see how I responded to DBT before saying anything which I really appreciate. Maybe she saw I was in a situation which might've been creating this extreme emotions and behavior. Still my curiosity lead me to watch another video which was about the 9 traits of BPD. I found myself relating to each of the traits mentioned. I think the difference is, whether or not these traits exist in me within extreme measures or not, might be what determines whether or not I receive the diagnosis. Either way I will be discussing this concern with my future therapist in this new location. I just feel extremely grateful to have had the previous therapist show introduce me to DBT regardless. You don't need to have a diagnosis to work on yourself and to practice mindfulness.
I'll include the two videos mentioned, just in case this post made you curious enough to learn a little bit more about these topics. Maybe you don't struggle with these things but a loved one does. And if that is the case, Something that the therapist highlights is, this[splitting] is not an excuse to use you as their punching bag or vice versa. Always remember you deserve a basic respect from those around you. Namaste
ǝɹǝɥ sɐʍ ɹoʇɐɹnƆ pɐW ǝɥ┴
This post was shared in the Curation Collective Discord community for curators, and upvoted and resteemed by the @c-squared community account after manual review.
@c-squared runs a community witness. Please consider using one of your witness votes on us here
I note that rather than a particular ideology, the West has been taught since birth to think - or fail to - in this way politically. Orange Man Bad and GEOTUS are both examples of splitting that are currently the dogma of opposing ideologies in America and the West today. It is the enemedia that constantly elicit and enforce these world views, and if one can consider things objectively it is blatantly apparent.
There was a post I read yesterday on studies that showed some folks are suffering a novel anxiety since the Trump presidency began, and they pointed out the extremely disturbing enemedia coverage of Trump, and how that has been just as novel, and correlates quite well with the syndrome. It seems some of us are so deranged by the information we consume that it may even kill us.
Thanks!
In my experience I would say that kind of both does and doesn't sum it up. It's actually a bit more dehumanizing and a lot less forgiving when splitting is occurring. When someone is going through this extreme black and white thinking, it's clear that there is no grey, but I think for someone on the receiving end of the behavior it feels more complex.
I would describe it almost like a more bipolar sense of attachment. When someone sees you as good, nothing else you've ever done matters. For example if mommy beat you ever day and was very much black or bad, as soon as you got given the toy the rest is forgotten. The opposite would be someone could have been the perfect friend and never done anything wrong, and then the one time they say no I can't hang out right now I have to go to work, they get immediately discarded and regardless of how long the friendship has existed or anything else it simply doesn't matter as it has ceased to exist in the mind of the person splitting.
In some ways it's kind of like the most brutally honest way to exist in the moment I suppose, but it makes it extremely difficult to form meaningful relationships with anyone and it drives a lot of people away. This person has some good videos that I watched a while back about it:
https://www.youtube.com/user/AutumnAsphodel
Thank you so much for elaborating on the description of splitting. I do feel like I over-simplified my description of it in my second draft of this post. Partly because in describing it in my mind, a lot of memories were coming to the forefront and I just couldn't dive into it without getting super emotional. I'd say I've been on both ends of splitting. It is very complex in my experience on both ends. In the moment I had no idea why I was doing what I was doing or saying what I was saying until hindsight was 20/20. And also on the receiving end, just getting bombarded by the other person's emotional state until I just start apologizing and begging them to just stop and no matter what the situation I just wanted them to give me the blame so they feel better.
I've run into a few of Autumn's videos in the past, thanks for sharing her page as well, I'll see what she has to say about it.
I had to do some digging, but a while back there were some really good posts about this I thought you might want to read.
1 , 2 , 3 , 4
I recall working as an employee for a person that my therapist suggested may have BPD. I finally quit when it became intolerable. It is confounding when months of excellent performance are suddenly irrelevant. It is worse when projection conflates BPD and miscalculations of the employer become faults of the employee.
I hope DBT proves beneficial to you, as it has to me. When the world becomes black and white, particularly when the light of hope fades to insignificance, I find the Earth under my toes grounding.
Thanks!
To listen to the audio version of this article click on the play image.
Brought to you by @tts. If you find it useful please consider upvoting this reply.
This post has been selected for curation by @msp-curation by @clayboyn and has been upvoted and will be featured in the weekly philosophy curation post. It will also be considered for the official @minnowsupport curation post and if selected will be resteemed from the main account. Feel free to join us on Discord!
Congratulations @staceyjean! You have completed the following achievement on the Steem blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
Click here to view your Board
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOP