Posted by alexandra_k on October 4, 2006, at 22:44:05
In reply to Re: Opening up » alexandra_k, posted by littleone on October 4, 2006, at 21:37:16
> I bet that was a real painful realisation to make.
Well... That part was kind of okay. Because I knew I thought 'bad' thoughts sometimes. It makes sense of why. Of where it comes from. Makes it understandable and stuff.
> > I got to reading this book yesterday about attachment and projective identification and the like.
>
> Do you know what the title/author is?"The American Psychiatric Publishing Textbook of Personality Disorders"
There is an article on attachment and mentalisation in BPD.The harder stuff was about... Projective identification. There was something about mirroring in attachment. How attachment figures mimic your emotions and... Can't remember exactly... But that is supposed to be good. But when there isn't this kind of mirroring... Then sometimes you attempt to elicit (aka manipulate) others into mirroring your internal state. That is why sometimes when one is distressed one tries to elicit distress from another. Mirroring. But when the internal state is 'bad' and one elicits that from another then one gets to say 'the badness isn't in me after all - it is in you'. It is a way of coping with the badness inside. By externalising it. Maybe that is why people with BPD are thought to have bad boundaries. Because the bad in the environment gets internalised... Then it comes back out into the environment again. Hard stuff to think about...
> I think the real secret is to have enough ego strength to truly not be bothered by what other people think of you. Obviously I'm a long way from getting even close to that one.
Yeah. Though... I guess we are supposed to have attachments at various levels and stuff. Caring about what other people think is part of being human, I reckon. Maybe it is about... Trusting that other people aren't as likely to think the worst as I am. And trusting that other people have stable enough representations of me so that they won't judge me too harshly. And coming to have a stable enough representation of myself so my self worth isn't dependent on my performance at every particular instant...
> Are you talking each of these instances over with her when they happen?
No. It is hard to explain... There just isn't an understanding connection. I mean... I can give you an example. I was telling her that I worry about being stupid. About people evaluating me as stupid. And she was like 'but you know you aren't stupid or you wouldn't be doing what you are doing'. And I was like 'but I'm worried about being the stupidest person doing what I'm doing'. And I am. Because the goal posts have shifted. And... She didn't understand. She doesn't understand. Lots of examples like that. And she tries to focus my attention on how few people do what I do but she doesn't understand that that isn't the relevant comparison class. I'm not worried about the former comparison class I'm worried about the latter. I'm worried about fitting into the latter. I'm worried about their evaluation of me because their evaluation of me determines whether I get a job or not, whether I get good references or not, whether I get publications or not, and so forth. Whether they invest in me or not. I mean they are kind of invested already but they do talk about 'taking gambles' on some students and about how 'sometimes that pays off and sometimes it doesn't' and I've surely seen what has happened to some people who they decided not to invest further in. They end up becoming public servants. Which is okay so far as that goes but I'm not doing this to become a public servant. And... She doesn't understand. I kind of think she doesn't *need* to understand. But her lack of understanding seems to prevent her validating my feelings. And I guess I do need that validation so I elaborate and talk it through. When people directly attempt to intervene on my thoughts, on the other hand, I don't feel safe sharing what is going on for me. Sometimes... The process of expressing... I guess it is hard for clinicians to see me in distress and not attempt to intervene. Just to let me... Experience it. It is later... Later that I can rationally process what happened and what that was about. Then I benefit. I don't know. I guess I just think that we aren't particularly well suited.
> Thanks for saying that. I had thought I'd upset everyone.
No.
> I'm glad you were okay with it. I had thought I was making things bad for you.No. You are helping.
> I might post a new thread about it. I'll have to see how I feel. Sometimes I find babble real hard. I think that if I do post it, it'll quickly become very apparent as to why I was so concerned about you doing a runner.
Ok. I'll check the boards later tonight. Right now... I better do some work.
poster:alexandra_k
thread:689710
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20060926/msgs/691967.html