We are back with our third and final installment on borderline personality disorder. Two weeks ago we introduced the 9 criteria for borderline personality disorder (here) and cleared up any and all confusion on what the criteria means by giving examples for each. Then because the rarest personality disorder is the one who only has one disorder, last week we introduced the comorbid borderline because the different types of borderlines you hear about on the internet are actually comorbid with another personality disorder. So, last week (here) we introduced the whopping total of seven known comorbidities out there. Due to the sheer number of them, we took a deep dive into the first three which are the sad ones because two out of three are comorbid with cluster C disorders.
- Comorbid borderline 1: BPD + Codependency = Quiet
- Comorbid borderline 2: BPD + Dependent PD = Waif
- Comorbid borderline 3: BPD + Depressive PD or MDD = Self-Destructive
Today we are moving on to talk about the last four. Or what type of borderline do you get when they are also comorbid with another cluster B disorder? You get the petulant, the impulsive, the queen, and the malignant.
Too busy to read the rest of the article? Listen to it on my podcast (here) available on all listening platforms. Or my YouTube channel if you want to see the woman behind this site (here) speaking on this topic. This series on the Cluster B disorders are written transcripts from my new podcast and YouTube channel. Having never written articles on these particular topics, it seems appropriate to maximize platforms in my quest to raise real awareness.
The following terms mentioned in this article are in Trauma Glossary 1 (here):
- Baiting
- Boundary Violation
- Enmeshment
- Flying Monkey
- Love Bombing
- Splitting Episode
- Unmask
Comorbid Borderline 4: BPD + PAPD = Petulant
So, first up is the petulant borderline, and what is their comorbidity? A forgotten cluster B disorder that was dropped at the publication of DSM 5 – passive-aggressive personality disorder. So, what happens when the walking, talking complaints department in passive-aggressive blends with the “my feelings are the facts” mentality in borderline personality disorder? Well you get a pathologically negative outlook on life itself.
With Hermit Borderline Reconsidered as BPD + PAPD + OCPD = Hermit
Now before we move on, I need to offer a slight retraction from last week when I introduced all seven known comorbidities and where the others you may not have heard of have come from. I stated Christine Lawson’s book Understanding the Borderline Mother where she names four types: the waif, the hermit, the queen, and the witch. The witch we know today is the malignant borderline and I argued that the hermit is actually the petulant borderline. And so, after scrutinizing Christine Lawson’s section on the hermit borderline and also the criteria for OCPD, I can see how this could have a second comorbidity.
So, if the petulant hermit borderline has traits of miserliness, tends to be very transactional in their dealings, has difficulty throwing out worn out or worthless items, is excessively high handed or self-righteous, you might be dealing with a second comorbidity – which would be OCPD with passive-aggressive and borderline. But before you settle on just hermit or just petulant, those are also where the differences end. Because all the other traits of the petulant or passive-aggressive borderline overlaps with the hermit.
Everything Else the Hermit and Petulant Have in Common
The petulant borderline is stuck in bitterness, pessimism, and resentment. They’re easily disillusioned due to their trust issues. They set their standards impossibly high so that they’re setting themselves up to keep “confirming” and “reconfirming” that life is dangerous, can’t trust anyone, and all of that. And of course, if you don’t live up to their impossible standards, cue in the splitting episode. So, as the hermit borderline has fear of engulfment and fear of rejection at the same time, the petulant borderline has deep ambivalent feelings about connecting with others and also fears losing their independence.
Now readers of Christine Lawson’s book know that she called this borderline the hermit for an obvious reason. This is the one that comes off as the most independent because they are a recluse. Well that’s a common side-effect in the petulant borderline due to their trust issues and being easily disillusioned. They tend to exist on the sidelines of social gatherings. So, this is the one most likely to isolate but unfortunately as a parent, they will also isolate their children.
The Petulant Hermit’s Emotional Jealousy
So, what the outsiders looking in might observe is someone who is living by the daily creed, there’s always something to complain about. And, “I’ll do it myself…grumble, grumble…Nobody else can do it for me…grumble, grumble, grumble.” Those living behind closed doors are seeing even more. This one will ruminate excessively with paranoid features. Every worst case scenario you can imagine, they go there. Well in this borderline’s mind they think that they’re being protective with the kids and maybe even admit to being a little overprotective. But in reality they are controlling, demanding, and holding their child back from making progress in life. They use guilt and anxiety to control others, especially their own kids. The petulant hermit is impatient, restless, stubbornly defiant, hypersensitive to criticism, and intensely jealous.
For example, say that someone is experiencing joy or had an amazing accomplishment that they’re proud of. Because of the excessive need for coregulation and validation that exists in borderline personality disorder – well, in their mind – you’re not being considerate of their feelings. “How could you experience joy while I am suffering in pessimism?” So, they might accuse you of being a braggart, being uppity, or even a narcissist. Another means of acting on their jealousy is to take the wind from your sails in some sort of way by claiming to have done something more amazing – real or imagined -compared to you.
My Own Lived Experiences
Some of my own lived experiences with my mother as the petulant hermit and the witch – also known as the malignant, which we will get into later – she isolated me. Any time I got a phone call from one of my friends, she had to be there listening because of her ruminating excessively with paranoid features. She was also always hyper-paranoid of me talking about her or doing something scandalous. She would always drill me every time I’d get off the phone. (I could never be on the phone longer than five minutes for whatever reason.) She would ask me, “So, what were you talking about when you said this?” and “What were you talking about when you said that?”
And so, another example is age 15, my first day at a brand new school. I was very proud of myself because I had made a whole clique of friends in a single day. So, when I came home, she wanted to know how my day went and so I told her all about the new friends that I had made. Then she said, “Well did anyone ask you out?” I said, “Uh, no.” She proceeded to say, “Well, I was asked out on my first day of school.” That immediately took the wind out of my sails. She couldn’t handle me being socially proud of myself. Â
George Washington’s Mother
An even better example is George Washington’s momster, I mean mother. Mary Ball Washington was very much the hermit petulant borderline. Most mothers would be proud to have a son whose credentials include commanding general of the patriot army, the founding father of the United States of America, and also our country’s first president. But nope, not Mary Ball Washington. If his life was not 100% centered around her, cue in the splitting episode because Mary Ball Washington was going to throw a fit.
Not only did she boycott his marriage to Martha, but she also complained constantly of his neglect and abandonment of her while he was leading the army in the Revolutionary War. She even went so far as to complain to anyone who asked her what she thought of her amazing son, she said that he should be fighting for the other side instead. Those are just a few highlights. I made a history comic Debunking the Spin Doctors with George Washington. In it, he shares his story of having a mother like Mary Ball Washington – stating the facts without the internet’s usual spin-doctored excuses for terrible mothers. You also get to see me in a colonial bonnet and shawl role-playing Mary Ball Washington herself.
Comorbid Borderline 5: BPD + HPD = Impulsive
The internet would have you believe that the impulsive is the narcissistic borderline. However anyone who knows how to read the 9 criteria for narcissistic personality disorder and knows what it means should conclude with, “Where the narc at?” The answer is, the narc ain’t there. However histrionic personality disorder is.
Now as it was said earlier on in this series that the most obvious difference between borderline and histrionic is with a borderline, you feel like there’s too much within them and it’s due to this severe emotion dysregulation. However with the histrionic, everything is superficial. You sense there isn’t enough within. But the other thing is that what the histrionic lacks in depth, they more than make up for in their energy. So, when histrionic blends with borderline personality disorder, you have all of this emotional chaos – too much within – and the high levels of energy that you usually see in histrionic.
And it’s called the impulsive borderline because they take the poor impulse control issues that all of the cluster Bs have to a whole new level. In a lot of ways, the impulsive borderline also resembles the disingenuous or malignant histrionic. Because that type also takes poor impulse control to a whole new level.
Love Bombing and Sex Bombing too!
The impulsive borderline is attention-seeking, dramatic, and flirtatious. The impulsive borderline is highly, highly sexual. In the honeymoon phase with any cluster B, you get the love bombing. Well, this one is not only going to love bomb you. They’re going to sex bomb you too. Lots and lots and lots of sex. They can’t get enough of you and it’s the best of your life.
Now we’ve talked before in this series on how the borderline tends to overshare early on. Well, the impulsive borderline is going to overshare their relationship history with you. They’re going to be very honest because it’s all impulse without thought of consequences. They’re going to tell you every bad thing they’ve ever done in their past relationships and follow it up with, “But it’s different with you. It’s because I didn’t have you in my life. I found my soul mate, the only one who truly gets me.”
The thing is, the most convincing liar is the one who believes their own lies. Well you’ve got to understand, this is the idealization phase before the devaluation. And so, it’s convincing to you because they are idealizing you. It’s not going to be different just because they found you. It’s a confession – a forewarning of the things that are going to happen later on in the relationship.
The Unpredictable Roller Coaster
So, impulsive also means unpredictable. You have no way of knowing what’s going to happen next. And so, it can seem so exciting in the beginning because this person is unpredictable. But that unpredictability in the impulsive borderline is a roller coaster – extreme good times and also extreme bad times as well. Because the splitting and the devaluation and the jealousy and insecurity is still very much there in this impulsive borderline. They are also very vindictive when there’s the threat of you leaving them. We’re talking in the case of false reporting – either with the police or to your job, trying to get you fired because they are impulsive. They’re not going to think first. They’re going to act and think about it later.
Comorbid Borderline 6: BPD + NPD = Queen
This one actually is the narcissistic borderline. The queen borderline is going to devalue those who don’t provide special treatment. And right there we can see “Aha – that’s where the narc is”. It gets better because you see, this is the fantasy image in the narcissist blended with the “my feelings are the facts” thinking in the borderline. So, the queen is preoccupied with the need to be mirrored. People must reflect the same interest as them. So, they can’t handle their child having an independent interest that is separate from them because they need to be mirrored. They seek attention, fame, and prominence and tend to shift their attention, depending on what degree of compliance they’re getting from others. To those on the outside looking in, you might see them act as a close confidant one day, only to pretend you don’t exist the following day.
Trophy Children
Children are on display like posed pictures. For example, on the queen borderline’s social media, you’re going to see everyone pose for a smile instead of the candid shots you see other parents capture of their child – where the child isn’t looking at anything in particular but you can see that the child is content, the child is happy. But for the queen, it’s all about display because before that camera flashes the queen is ordering the family, “We’re going to pose and we’re going to look happy!”
Another thing about their children is well, their children are trophies. They want to put them out there to make them look good as a parent. The child is to act as an extension of them – not the child making them proud by their own merit. For example, if the queen was a high school cheerleader, they would push their child into also becoming a cheerleader and winning cheer competitions. So, the queen gets to brag about the child winning a cheer competition while also bringing up how, “I too was once a cheerleader. She gets it from me.”
Slip of the Mask via Emotionally Overreacting
Outsiders looking in might see the mask slip off the queen when they show dramatic and histrionic reactions to seemingly inconsequential things. And you see as we move through the cluster B continuum, we see that – comparatively speaking now – the narcissist is the most held together of the cluster Bs. So, now you’re seeing narcissist blended with borderline. They’re not going to hold it together as well as we see in pure narcissistic personality disorder, because you’ll see the queen emotionally overreact. But those who live with the queen behind closed doors are seeing them completely unmasked.
The Queen Feels Entitled to Violate Boundaries
The queen borderline is intrusive and violates boundaries but this is because they feel entitled. So when we were talking about the hermit and petulant borderline, they’re keeping their children close to control them – their perceived threat of the world being this dangerous place. And also their excessive ruminations with paranoid features – being paranoid of what the child is doing, what the child is saying. “Are you talking about me?” being one of them. And so, with the queen, they’re being intrusive and violating boundaries because it’s a feeling of entitlement compared to where the hermit and petulant are coming from.
The queen is basically saying “Everything is mine. What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is also mine. Nothing belongs to you.” So, there’s the little subtle difference between the petulant hermit violating boundaries and the queen borderline also doing that. The queen also believes that rules don’t apply to them. They are above it because they got the narc in them.
And where the petulant and hermit borderlines are being overly demanding because they have standards that are impossibly high, so everybody is going to fail to meet their expectations – with the queen borderline, they have the same tendency to constantly move the goalposts on their children. But it comes more from a place of “I deserve more”. Think in terms of entitlement when we think of the queen borderline. Those are just little subtle differences there.
A Reminder Before We Embark on the Last Comorbid Borderline
Now before we move on to the last on our list of known comorbidities, I want to remind you that you shouldn’t feel obligated to keep the borderline you’ve dealt with or are dealing with in one type that we have named. I’ve heard many in support groups describe their borderline mothers as the queen-witch or the quiet-waif, etc.. For example, I know my borderline mother was primarily the witch or malignant borderline but she was also the petulant hermit behind closed doors. And yet when she went out into the world, she wore the mask of the queen, even walking with her nose tilted upwards. True crime buffs can see Teresa Knorr as another example. She was the impulsive, petulant hermit, and malignant.
Comorbid Borderline 7: BPD + ASPD = Malignant (Witch)
Speaking of the malignant, the last one on our list is the borderline that we were first educated on in Christine Lawson’s book way back in the day. She introduced this one as the witch. This is borderline personality disorder with antisocial personality disorder. So, now we’ve fallen into the most obvious unstable of the bunch. And just as a brief overview, antisocial personality disorder – AKA: the psychopath, sociopath – has an excessive need to unleash their wrath on others. What do you think is going to happen when it blends with borderline personality disorder, which is an excessive need for co-regulation and validation? Well let me just put it to you this way. If the petulant and hermit borderlines have emotions stuck on pessimism, irritation, and resentment, the malignant borderline is the rage-a-holic. Rage-a-holism and chaotic emotions constantly going off!
Now like all borderlines, because of their abandonment fears, they’re going to be merger hungry, which is another word for it enmesh with someone else. So, there’s that tendency to be clingy, and the malignant borderline is no exception. Their merge hunger is coming from a place of needing to unleash their need for control and project their own self-loathing onto their person or children. The malignant borderline is hostile and sadistically controlling. While I have heard of the other comorbid borderlines inflicting the kinds of abuses that don’t leave bruises, I have never heard of a malignant borderline that was not physically violent.
Malignant Borderline Looks or Acts Possessed
One of the key features in the malignant borderline when they are having a splitting episode, they may look or act possessed, or appear to have a split personality. I’ve heard from other children of the malignant borderline describing “doll eyes” or “shark eyes”, which is when the pupils dilate and the eyes go all black. I personally never saw that one in my mother, but because of her rage face, she was scrunching her eyes really tight. So I never had a chance to see if her pupils were dilating during her splits. However I can confirm the way my mother would act like she was possessed. She was downright feral in her behavior during a splitting episode.
The malignant also delights in other people’s suffering because they feel like the person deserves it. I remember my days as the parentified scapegoat in that house of horrors, how my mother would just have this smirk on her face the whole time she was completely assassinating my character and accusing me of the oddest desires, tendencies, and character traits that I knew I didn’t have. Well this might come as a shock to you but even as a kid, I had a mouth and I wasn’t afraid of using it. And so yes, I “talked back” to correct her because she had me all wrong. Of course she was baiting me into a beating as a means of justifying my punishment for “talking back”. I didn’t care because at least I wiped that smirk off her face.
Physically and Verbally Intrusive
The malignant borderline is also intrusive, domineering, and will violate boundaries just like the others we’ve talked about. I’ve heard of some children of the malignant whose parents actually took the door off their room so as to give them no privacy at all. The malignant borderline wants to barge into the child’s room anytime they want. So, if you have a door, don’t even think about locking it lest there will be even more intrusive questions. Mine would just barge in, not even knocking first and just start searching my belongings whenever she felt like it and asking intrusive questions.
The malignant borderline always wants to know what you’re doing and, “How can I use this in such a way to exploit or shame?” Children learn to survive by hiding their feelings, hiding their interests and their love of different people and things as much as possible. Because another thing the malignant borderline will do is try and destroy or hijack what is valued. There is also the intentional withholding of certain things, like pets disappearing – I’ve heard of this happening to other children of the malignant borderline. Also medical neglect is something very common you see in children of the malignant and some other types of borderlines in general.
Medea Mom Warning: RUN!
The following speech is not to downplay the abuse that the other borderlines are capable of inflicting. All I’m saying is the malignant borderline poses the greatest threat to your physical safety. Statistically speaking, the malignant borderline has the greatest potential to become the Medea mom and I’m not talking about the Tyler Perry movies. I am referring to the Medea from Greek mythology. Please read between the lines on what I’m saying. And while I know that not all malignant borderlines will shall we say, make headline news, there is still great potential for something like that happening. Think of Jodi Arias, Diane Downes, Teresa Knorr just to name a few. There are many other tragic examples but my point is Child Protective Services needs to do their job and get children away from them.
Grown children and partners of the malignant borderline should not walk away. They should run away from this particular type of borderline.
The Silver Lining for Finding Safety from the Malignant
The silver lining to getting a protection order against the malignant borderline is the fact that they are the most unstable. They cannot hold their mask up very long at all. In other words, they will show all of the reasons why you need that protection order and why you need to get away from this person.
Case in point, I’ve been no contact since 2009 and will be for life with both my mother and enabler father. I’ve never dealt with a single flying monkey because after telling my story to my closest extended family members, they believed me and it’s because they saw enough instability in my mother over the years to know I was telling the truth. So, they gave me their blessing for going no contact.
I do however understand that I was exceptionally lucky compared to other kids of borderlines who are dealing with flying monkeys despite the overwhelming evidence that they had an abusive parent. But don’t let anyone shame you into staying with an abuser just because your abuser is your parent. And don’t let your abuser or any cluster B disorder out there intimidate you into silence. The world needs your story.