We are here today with my bestie Katherine, whose father has passive aggressive personality disorder. She has asked not to be on camera but she doesn’t mind you hearing her voice.
Too busy to read the rest of the article? Watch or listen to it. Watch this interview on YouTube (here) or listen to it on my podcast (here).
If you’ve been following this series so far, we’ve gone through the cluster B continuum and I educated you on the forgotten fifth cluster B, which is passive aggressive personality disorder. It was removed at the publication of DSM V and just because it’s been removed doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. If you’ve followed this series, you know what happens when it blends with narcissistic personality disorder. You get the covert narcissist. When passive aggressive blends with borderline personality disorder, you get what’s known as the petulant borderline. When it blends with antisocial personality disorder, you get the covetous antisocial.
Now Katherine is here to help us make sense out of the 8 criteria. So Katherine it’s over to you. Introduce yourself.
Katherine: Hi my name’s Katherine. Thank you so much for having me. I am the child of two people with cluster B disorders and I am here to share my experience growing up with my father today.
Jaena: I’m gonna tell you. Some of these personality disorders, when we just read the criteria without fully understanding what the criteria means, we end up creating a stereotype. A lot of people – if they only read the criteria in black and white thinking – they come away with, “This sounds like grumpy old man syndrome”. No, there’s way more to passive aggressive than grumpy old man syndrome. So, I want you to just share anything that comes up, any experiences you’ve had.
Passive Aggressive Personality Disorder’s 8 Criteria
Criteria 1: Passively fails to complete both social and job-related tasks after directly or indirectly pledging to complete them.
Jaena: For example, “forgets” to water someone’s plants as promised, which subsequently die. So, you have anything for that one?
Katherine: No, not that one.
Jaena: Not that one? Okay.
Note: They don’t have to meet all the criteria for the diagnosis. Remember that all personality disorders must meet five or more. As you will see, Katherine has stories for all the other criteria.
Criteria 2: Complains that he or she is misunderstood and unappreciated.
Katherine: For sure. Growing up with my father it seemed that in all things that had to do with employers and family and friends, there was always someone who misunderstood him, got him wrong, was scapegoating him, lying about him, somebody was always attacking him, jealous of him and his talents. He would be laid off from jobs and it was always because his superior was threatened by his skills, or because someone blamed him for something. This also carried on into personal relationships with his parents, other family members, my mother at times, and neighbors, long term lifelong family, friends, and most recently me.
“I can give you an example”
Katherine: I can give you an example of one where I had been talking to him on the phone pretty regularly a few times a week, calling to make sure everything was alright. Keep in mind that I’m the one that generates the phone calls, OK? But I would ask to see how things were going and nothing was ever right and the place where he is living is awful. Everybody there is awful, no one’s good to him, he has no friends, there’s nothing to do, he feels trapped. And then when he noticed that I quit calling so often because I got tired of listening to the complaints and never hearing anything from him as to what he was doing to change his circumstances, he asked why I wasn’t calling.
I said, “Well because you’re so negative.” So then at that point he said, “Well I’m very sorry that you think everything I say is negative and I’ll just not tell you anything that’s going on here and then you won’t have to be faced with my negativity” – which of course, was extremely passive aggressive.
Jaena: Classic passive aggressive!
Katherine: And just made me want to call even less.
“He didn’t change anything about his behavior to make his life better.”
Katherine: So then the next time I called him, which was quite some time – like two weeks after that phone call – what I heard was “Oh, everybody’s wonderful here and I was hanging out with my friend Jimmy, and we were doing this thing here and it was so great. I’ve been going to all the activities and the dining room. The food’s been much better lately and everything’s just wonderful.” And that’s the recent experience.
Jaena: Wow, so it sounds like he actually listened to you when you said “Hey, I can’t do this. I can’t listen to all this negativity that you seem to be addicted to.” He’s like “OK, I’ve got to think here. I’m not going to hear much from my daughter if I keep acting like the walking, talking complaints department.”
Katherine: Yeah he did but the thing is that he didn’t change anything about his behavior to make his life better. His perspective was not really changed. He didn’t sit there and think, “Well maybe she is right. She has a point. There are maybe positive things about my life.” He didn’t make that at all. He just changed what he said to me so that I would keep calling because he still sees things the way he sees things but he’s going to tell me what I want to hear.
Jaena: Ah-ha, yeah, and sooner or later the complaints are going to start leaking into the conversation again. I’m quite sure.
Katherine: Absolutely.
Criteria 3: Is Moody and quarrelsome.
Katherine: Moody for sure and gets his feelings hurt easily.
Jaena: Yeah I’m sure he had his feelings hurt when you called out his negative behavior because passive aggressive is also known as negativistic personality disorder. I know why they didn’t go with negativistic because then you would have had a second NPD.
Criteria 4: Criticizes and scorns authority in an unreasonable and self-defeating manner.
Katherine: Well that one, I’m kind of on the fence about. It could be that he’s doing that because I’m sort of in a position of authority because I have to help him with his checkbook now. Or it could be that he’s just angry about his situation. I don’t know yet how I feel about that. But he sent me an e-mail the other day, asking me if he had permission to buy a bottle of Imodium AD because he was having stomach discomfort. I’ve never told him that he couldn’t purchase things. I’ve just asked him to limit his purchases and watch what he’s spending. And I felt like sending me an e-mail to ask me if it was OK to buy a bottle of Imodium AD was another passive aggressive move.
Jaena: Yeah. “Oh, I guess now I’ve got to ask you permission for everything now.” I mean, you’re the one who set him up in this…I mean it sounds very nice from everything that you described that they have to do at the assisted living home that he’s in. For him to find things to complain about and then to turn around and, “Can I buy this this little small dollar item?” Yeah, that is definitely a passive aggressive move.
Katherine: Absolutely, and it wasn’t even how he really felt because he turned around and bought a costume to wear to the Halloween party there at the place he hates all the activities at and didn’t ask me if he could buy that.
Jaena: Of course not, but he’s going to ask your permission to buy some over the counter medicine.
Katherine: Yeah, poor pathetic him.
Criteria 5: Believes that others are more fortunate and expresses envy and resentment towards them.
Katherine: Yeah, I definitely think that he comes to the table fully dressed in his victimhood every day. I cannot remember a time where he has expressed gratitude for what he has – his past experiences, his life, his family, or anything like that for many, many, many years. At one point, he was a very grateful person and felt like he had a good life when I was a child. But every time something happened that didn’t go the way he wanted it to, he felt sorry for himself and was being attacked unfairly. He just feels like everybody gets everything they want and need in life and he just gets the shaft. He’s not able to see that it doesn’t always go our way and everybody gets good times and everybody gets bad times.
As far as he’s concerned, he’s had nothing but bad times – and he’s had a lot of bad times. But as I told him one time, “Well, a lot of that had to do with actions that you and mom took. They weren’t other people’s causes.” And that’s the other thing. The ability to self-reflect and admit wrongdoing without being passive aggressive about it does not exist. So, if he’s sorry about something or he thinks he’s made a mistake then he’s passive aggressively sorry. “Well I’m sorry that this was so bad that I did and I should never…” Or he comes with a “Oh I really ruined your life and I should be damned to hell like Hitler.” And it’s like, really dude? I mean it gets real thick.
Jaena: OK, you just described criteria 8. We’re going to get there. Wow guys, remember that one when we get to the 8th criteria. Oh my goodness!
Criteria 6: Makes frequent exaggerated complaints about his or her personal misfortune.
Katherine: Yep, absolutely. I would never really know if my grandparents were the horrible people that he and my mother said they were or not. Because I was a child when all that was going on and I know that my grandparents loved me, and they may have had their problems. They may have been just like my parents actually, you know? But I will never really know because I only have my parents’ side to the story and I have my suspicions.
Jaena: It’s amazing how criteria 5 and 6 both kind of blend in with each other.
Katherine: It sure is.
Criteria 7: Frequently or constantly complains about his or her woes.
Katherine: Oh yeah, as the day is long. “This is wrong and that is wrong, and this is wrong and that is wrong, and this needs a solution.” They have to know that my father was in operations and logistics. So, if you had a problem, he had a solution. But he never seemed to have solutions for his own situation. That’s not to say I never saw him try, because I did. But when the same action got the same results and they were undesirable, he never thought that he needed to change anything about it to see if he could get different results and therefore, it just perpetuated.
Even as a young person, I would be stymied by the fact that my parents would just not get that maybe they weren’t doing it right or that they needed to go to someone else. Sometimes they’d go to someone else but my parents didn’t seem to reflect inwardly deep enough. Or maybe they weren’t able to at all to really make a change and it ended up just turning into self-loathing and self-pity – and in at least my dad’s case, alcoholism – which made it just even harder for him to function.
Criteria 8: Is alternately defiantly hostile and remorsefully apologetic.
Katherine: That one is difficult. I saw my dad be remorsefully apologetic recently and it surprised me, you know? I’d never seen it before and I don’t know that I’ll see it again. When my grandfather gave them our house because my parents lost the house I was growing up in, we moved into it. My grandfather was going to stay there but he ended up being kind of run off to Florida with his siblings.
They wanted to retire down there but I think he left sooner than he intended. Because the moment we moved into his house, my parents put him out of his own bedroom into a guest bedroom because they felt they needed the master because there was two of them and only one of him because my grandmother was gone. Even at the age of 13, I knew that that was wrong and I felt very, very bad.
“My grandfather went from a man who freely roamed his house…to sitting in the kitchen 12 hours a day watching a little tiny television.”
Katherine: It was difficult to watch. My grandfather went from a man who freely roamed his house and enjoyed all the rooms of the house that he worked all his life to buy and raised my father in, to sitting in the kitchen 12 hours a day watching a little tiny television and then going up to the little guest room that he had been sent to. Then he just left and left all his stuff. He took a suitcase of clothes and moved to Florida with his sisters and brother and it was painful.
I watched my father about a month or two ago tell me that in hindsight, he wished he had not done that to his father because after all, he had given them a place to live and not the other way around. It warmed my heart and at the same time pissed me off because we’re talking almost 40 years and I guess better late than never. But jeez, maybe he realized it sooner and just never admitted it to anyone. I was proud that he admitted it to me. I don’t remember having anything to say though.
Jaena: Yeah I mean, I can’t imagine doing that. I don’t care how many kids I’m bringing with me. Somebody opens their home to me and saves me and my family from being homeless, well I can’t imagine coming into anyone’s home and telling them, “Oh, you need to get out of your own master bedroom and let me and my spouse sleep there.” And I can’t imagine basically pushing anybody out of their own home that they opened to me.
Katherine: Yeah.
Comparing Overall Experiences of being Raised by Cluster B Disorders
Jaena: So, are there any childhood stories or anything you would like to share? Experiences growing up under a passive aggressive father?
Katherine: The times where my father was extremely self-sacrificing and generous without needing validation for it. For example, he had a collection of antique cowboy guns and he sold them so that I could go as an exchange student and see a little bit of the world. He never told me. My mother told me and that was a very authentic thing for him to do and to not ever really want me to know – but of course, she insisted on telling me at some point. But it was less that he would do things like that than he would do things where he knew there would be some kind of recognition. I think that it came down to a lack of self-worth, maybe caused by his childhood if the things he said about his childhood are true.
Embarrassment to Humiliation
Katherine: where he did things that he knew there would be some kind of recognition, whether it was serve the community or donate money or materials to erect a new part of the building or a church or whatever it was he was doing I always felt like there was some sort of need for gratification from public acknowledgement. I didn’t like that because it didn’t feel authentic. Then there were other times when of course, he did things that he didn’t need any kind of validation for. So, I have mixed feelings there. But my dad is a bit of a showboat and always has been. It’s difficult to kind of be around that energy when you know that’s not how you would conduct your own life. It’s a little bit embarrassing.
Jaena: Yeah, being raised by cluster Bs is humiliating honestly. Because the irrational behaviors that come out and the way of holding back their children is also off. It’s like you don’t want to confide when you’re growing up.
Katherine: Yes.
Jaena: Because I felt like it was a reflection of me in some way.
Katherine: Yeah.
Jaena: So. doing the best you can to simply endure and it’s like you want to keep it a secret.
Their Refusal to Look Within
Katherine: Yes, it was difficult because at times, there were things that were so likeable and still are things that are likeable about my dad. Other times it was just, “What are you doing??” Yet I can remember my parents just haranguing me with, “Well, you make sure that your behavior is this and your behavior is that, because you can’t make us look bad.” But they weren’t concerned with their own behavior. I don’t even think they realized that they looked bad or made themselves look bad or made my brother and I look bad. I don’t think they care. They just don’t have that ability to look within.
Jaena: Yeah, it’s incredible because mine was the same way. I was on eggshells the whole time. If we were around other people, I had to be on guard 24/7 – well, for however long she was in my presence while I was around other people. I mean, she would just give me these looks out of nowhere [making me feel] like, “What did I say or do wrong this time??” kind of thing. Yet here she was when she was behaving completely irrational, not even taking the time to notice everyone in the room is looking at [to my borderline mother] you like the odd one. Everybody is trying to figure out what’s up with you.
Katherine: Right.
Jaena: Yeah, it’s so ironic how they’re so busy judging other people’s behaviors, not taking the time to look at themselves, to read the room. “Hey, you’re misbehaving and everyone is seeing it.”
Katherine: Right.
Some Key Takeaways
Jaena: So, are there any other takeaways you would like to leave us with today?
Katherine: We’ve gone through all the criteria? [For passive aggressive personality disorder.]
Jaena: We have. We zipped through it.
Katherine: There’s a lot.
Jaena: Go ahead.
Katherine: I mean there’s a there’s a lot of criteria. But I think that there’s a lot of stories too. I think that’s the biggest take away from me. Being a grown child of people who are on the cluster B spectrum is that we are so likely as little children and even as adults to take in that everything that was wrong with them is wrong with us. That shame and that pain and the fact that it affects our self-worth until we grow up and we have that inner voice that says that we need to heal, and we heal ourselves.
It’s just for anybody out there that’s still struggling with that, it’s hard sometimes to look in the mirror and not see them and not see what they did. But there’s definitely a division between us and them. Their mistakes are not ours. Who they were or are, it’s not who we are. I think I know more people than I care to admit that deal with this every day and are still in their late middle age, trying to teach themselves that they are not their parents, they were not at fault, that they had no control over this behavior.
“Having those strong boundaries is the key to our own inner peace.”
Katherine: Sometimes the trauma goes in a different direction where it’s just lack of self-worth because of the way they were treated. I think most of us experienced that too. Again, it wasn’t our fault and we can’t control how others behave – and unfortunately they misbehaved quite a bit – and it’s not something that they’re able to change because their brains don’t work that way. So, the more work we can do to heal and the better we get at setting boundaries that we don’t let people like that in – or, if we’re their caregiver and can’t not be around those people, boundaries that keep us safe and keep us from having to take on their energy, having to accept what they say about it, or put up with bad behavior.
You know, I set a boundary with my dad. “If you’re going to behave this way, I’m not going to talk to you very often. I’ll call you like, once a month and we’ll have a financial check in and a health check in and that’s it. You can call me if there’s an emergency but I’m not going to sit here and listen to this anymore.” Having those strong boundaries is the key to our own inner peace. We deserve that inner peace because most of us were raised as children experiencing childhood trauma. As you’ve done so beautifully for so long and in this space and many others, the whole point is to be defeating childhood trauma. That’s what I’ve got. I hope that helps.
Confirmation Bias: Finding and Attracting Other Cluster Bs
Jaena: I think the primary core problem is when we’re raised by them, that is our baseline, unfortunately. Their imprint on us is all we know. And so, we have to kind of go forth and unlearn everything we learned in our childhood and learn and practice new information and boundaries. God that’s so important!
Katherine: Yeah.
Jaena: Because we are extra vulnerable to finding and attracting these toxic people just like our parents, and that’s when we arrive at confirmation bias. If we don’t understand what we’re dealing with it’s like, “Oh, my parents were right about me after all.” But that that isn’t right. We simply met people just like our parents.
Katherine: Yes. And well, I think one thing that’s really hard because…some of us don’t have kids, some of us do. Some of us have been married, some have not. But I think by the time a lot of us figure this out, we are well into our adulthood to know that we need to heal. So, we’ve already had destructive relationships. We’ve already been in a position where we’ve been abused. Some of us have married dysfunctional people, some of us have had children with these dysfunctional people.
So, we never get to leave the soup. We’re still in the soup and we’re trying to get out of destructive relationships that are toxic. Or we are trying to get children out of those situations, or we are trying to raise children so that they don’t ever have to deal with anything like that. And they can protect themselves by raising them with healthy boundaries and being able to recognize who’s a good person for us and who’s not.
“You don’t know what question is to ask, you just know that something feels off and you’re miserable.”
Katherine: Some of us are late to that game and then having our children grow up and see somebody treat us well is so important. Because if we don’t do that, then they cannot teach someone to treat them well. They cannot prevent bad people from coming into their life. So, what’s unfortunate is that many of us are finding this out later in the game. And so, whatever people can do to find out sooner, learn faster, be more aware earlier, the better off their future is going to be and that of their families.
Jaena: I know I was hungry for information when I was 18 and finally broke free of the house of horrors, as I call it. I had a lot of questions and unfortunately they went unanswered for a couple of decades.
Katherine: Yes, well you just don’t know where to go. You don’t know what question is to ask, you just know that something feels off and you’re miserable, and you know you deserve better. Then you fall into this cycle, as you and I both know, of the toxic – and I’m not saying that all therapists or psychologists or psychiatrists are this way – let me just say that as a disclaimer. But sometimes you fall into the toxic mental health healing pool, where you meet therapists and practitioners who do not help you but actually make the situation worse. And because you don’t have the questions, you don’t even know how to really assess if what you’re getting is what you really need.
On PhD Therapists
Katherine: That’s why what you’re doing is so important. Information that you’re putting out there – and it really needs to be seen by as many people as possible, and dare I say, even taught in a child-friendly way in the schools. Because you know knowledge is power.
Jaena: Yeah, I can confirm something. My first therapist was a quack and a narcissist. She also had a PhD because I know a lot of people out there – it makes sense on paper, per se – but a lot of people out there are naively believing, “Oh, PhD therapist. Go for that because you can’t go wrong.” Well, my first therapist did have a PhD. She was a narcissist.
They do not have mandatory psych exams for those who want to become therapists. So, you’ve got to look out for the cluster B disorders who are therapists, because they absolutely will retraumatize you. Fortunately, that was the only bad therapist [I had]. The bad news was, I avoided therapy like the plague for over a decade after her – naively believing they would all tell me the same thing because I didn’t understand what I was dealing with.
Katherine: Absolutely.
Jaena: Nobody knows what you need better than you do. I think that’s the best advice when they [bad therapists] go spouting off with weaponizing their degree, telling you what you need and you know it ain’t working for you, but they think they know better than you. That’s a red flag in itself because she was doing a lot of that on me.
Katherine: Absolutely.
My Open Invitation to You and Why Your Story is Important
Jaena: So, I thank you for this conversation and helping us understand the forgotten cluster B disorder and also sharing your story and your thoughts as well. That is very, very, very valuable. And I just want to give an open invitation out there. Those of you who, if any of my content resonates with you, hey let’s start a conversation. DM me. I’m all across social media. Hit me up in the DM’s. You could be the next interview. I’ve got multiple platforms. I’ve got YouTube, I’ve got the podcast. I also have my site where written transcripts of the interview – which Katherine will be added to my site as written transcripts of this very interview.
Because I believe this wholeheartedly. I can educate and empower. That’s my job but if we’re going to make positive changes in the world, your stories are the golden ticket for that. That’s how we raise real awareness. I’m just giving you the words and the empowerment so that hopefully you can come forward like Katherine has. Help us understand even more. Help us agitate for more positive changes. Imagine safeguarding future generations from what we’ve endured. The stories – your stories – have the power to do that.
Our Closing Remarks
Jaena: Anything else, Miss Katherine?
Katherine: Thanks for having me and I just want to tell anyone who’s watching this video, if you are not familiar with Jaena’s work, please check her out at defeatingchildhoodtrauma.com. What I have learned from her over the years – special shoutouts to her toolboxes, and her blog, and all the articles, and videos that are interesting, validating, and educational, and will have you feeling just so much better about what you’ve been through. Because now you suddenly have the knowledge and the power to know what to do with it. You understand it and it’s really revealing and extremely comforting. So, be sure to check her out. She’s also on YouTube, TikTok – you’re everywhere! – Facebook, Instagram…
Jaena: Threads, Twitter – well, X. [my Linktr.ee here.]
Katherine: So, check her out, because you won’t be sorry.
Jaena: Well, let me close by saying this because I always say it. Forged in trauma, rising as warriors.
This is Jaena Speaking to My Readers
First, while this was my first interview for YouTube and my podcast platforms, this isn’t my first ever interview. Nor is this Katherine’s first interview with me. Last year was when Katherine made her debut on this site. I was wrapping up my series on IFS therapy and grieving the recent loss of my Grandmother while at the exact same time, Katherine was grieving a highly traumatic breakup.
Learning what I had about how to use IFS to work through emotional overwhelm and also how to act as IFS partners, I asked Katherine if she would be interested in working IFS with me and possibly showing others an honest demonstration of IFS work as partners in grief. She said yes and this interview was the result. Katherine had always been a good friend of mine, but somehow, between working through IFS and also consoling each other in our grief, our friendship officially solidified into best friends.
Second, if you listen to the podcast or YouTube, you might notice something missing in these transcripts. I intentionally deleted the overkill of “you know” she and I both were guilty of using. Haha! I also dropped lots of “ands” so that the sentences would read more cleanly. There’s a pattern I’ve come to notice quite recently and let’s see if this might make you want to listen extra hard to people when they speak. You see, when most people speak (myself included) they tend to separate their verbal sentences with the word “and”. Funny how the word “and” helps us flow more easily when we speak and yet turn into run-on sentences when applied to the written word.