It is no accident that narcissistic and sociopathic personalities will seek, and often successfully attract, partners who have their own issue: a tendency to dread the idea of disappointing or displeasing them.
This is admittedly a generality, but it’s a pattern I’ve observed in my clinical experience, and it makes sense. The exploiter, who regards others as existing principally to satisfy his or her wants on a continual basis, must by definition find in a mate someone who is highly motivated—and especially, highly afraid not—to satisfy him or her.
Thus one often finds the pairing of an exploiter complemented by a partner who is prone, perhaps compulsively, to look inward to himself or herself as the cause of the exploiter’s dissatisfaction.
Clinically the goal is to encourage the over-accountable, overresponsible partner to examine this aspect of himself or herself. This is necessary given the fair assumption that sociopaths and narcissists are unlikely to genuinely reform their characteristically manipulative, selfish ways.
I’m often surprised in my work by the tenacious investment exploited partners make in solving the needs and complaints of their self-centered mates. Of course they’ll never succeed, but as long as they continue owning the exploiter’s blame for the latters’ discontent, they can keep trying, keep striving to be a better mate—to become, finally, the good-enough mate the exploiter has claimed to deserve all along.
Let us emphasize the futility of this scenario—the exploiter really doesn’t want a satisfying or, for that matter, even a perfect, partner; rather what he or she wants is a partner who, in his or her insecurity, will continue to accept on some level blame for the exploiter’s unending, habitual exploitation.
The exploiter, in other words, is looking much less for the perfect partner than the perfect scapegoat. For this reason the sociopath and many narcissists will recruit these qualities in a partner—qualities, for instance, of high self-doubt, high guilt, high fear of incurring others’ wrath or displeasure, and a strong tendency to self-blame.
Moreover individuals possessing these qualities will tend to be drawn to individuals who seem to be their counterpart in many ways—for instance confident, self-assured, powerful-seeming, unself-doubting, and perhaps unself-reflective. They may harbor the fantasy that the latters’ seeming strength and confidently entitled attitudes may prove a salutary complement to their self-questioning, self-doubting natures.
And this is certainly possible—this complementarity can theoretically work—in situations uncomplicated by sociopathy or narcissistic personality.
But when the more confident partner is a sociopath, or narcissist, this complementarity of personalities becomes a set-up. The less confident partner, whose tendency is to self-destructively accept the exploiter’s blame for the latter’s rages, discontent, abuse and general misery, becomes the perfect foil, the perfect dupe, for the sociopathic or narcissistic partner, who has it made, so to speak.
Again and again I encounter wonderful, thoughtful, emotionally generous individuals who are trapped less by their exploitative partners than the intolerable idea of themselves as failed mates. The result is their often intensified efforts to be found satisfactory by, and to obtain validation from, the exploiter.
The exploiter is, of course, incapable of appreciating his or her partner’s devotion. But even if not, he or she would intentionally withhold such recognition anyway; his or her object, remember, rather than to uplift his or her partner, is calculatingly the opposite—to engender hopelessness and depression in him or her.
On and on the cycle goes, until the vulnerable partner, just as the exploiter has sought, finally feels so low, incompetent and disempowered that he or she can’t seriously imagine a different future.
By now a form of despair has set in—the despair of expecting to be found just as wanting in future relationships as the present. Dangerous resignation follows this hopelessness—again, exactly the outcome the exploiter wants.
(This article is copyrighted (c) 2008 by Steve Becker, LCSW.)
Hey Indigoblue: Are we all Indi’s Angels … night Bosley.
wini try to be kind even to the s88t h88ds!:)~
suicide (threats) and attempts are very common with BORDERLINE PERSONALITY DISORDER it is their fear of abandoment – they need that feeling of connectedness and belonging to someone – even when they are doing us wrong and cheating and lieing and stealing they dont want to lose that security we give them – tis why they jump right in the next relationship so quick – the fear of being alone is overwhelming to them – that NEED they have is not love for us – it is because they dont love themselves – so they will do anything to (trick) us into believeing they love us – and I think they trick their own mind into believing that – until we are all used up of course and then on to next victim- and they usually have several possible future victims to ‘trick’ lined up and waiting… before I knew anything about BPD/spaths , I was like damn – the guy must really love me alot to take his own life to prove it —pity pity pity – i got smart and he got on with his hat full of tricks with somebody new – someday he is going to meet the wrong victim…….
correction “he didnt take his life” just a desperate attempt at controling mine…..
Thank God, I must not be a borderline after all. Phew!
Henry and Indigo, your exes cutting their wrists must have been an extremely powerful tool for manipulating you. When I heard my ex was “threatening” suicide after I turned him in, I immediately felt sorry for him. And he was just talking! This is what they want. They use your pity to manipulate you. Once you pity them, you are totally helpless to see through their act. It’s pretty diabolical. They all use the pity play. It’s one of the telltale signs. Your ex cheated on you, and yet he managed to manipulate you into feeling sorry for HIM. Funny how that works.
star google borderline personality disorder they idealize us one moment and devalue and detest us the next – i think it is some what different than people who are ‘cutter’s’ my x also overdosed on lortab one nite i found the empty bottle by the bed the next morning and I shook him and asked if he took them he said yes – i said well you didnt die – he was so pissed he asked me to take him to the bus station – and I did – was such a feeling of relief when i let him out – but 6 hours and countless calls later i went and picked him up – rinse and repeat….
Oh, Henry, I studied personality disorders all throughout grad school. Sadly, I could write a book on BPD. I became very familiar with BPD because when I first learned about it, I was convinced I had it. I was diagnosed with it once in my twenties. I have done so much work on myself over the years that the character traits are mollified, and most people view me as calm, kind, and even-tempered. I don’t do the self destructive things or the idealizing/devaluing of people like I used to, but when I was younger I did all kinds of acting out. I remember when I was 20, I lived with my first boyfriend. I would feel abandoned because he would go to work in the morning, and I’d throw his stuff around the room, destroying some of it. But you cannot imagine what I have gone through in trying to overcome this tendency. Still, the label has haunted me and I wonder if I will ever get to the bottom of it.
I have gone through so much abandonment rage that one time I just lay down on the floor feeling like I was going to throw up. Instead, rage poured out of me for several hours. I was beating my fists and screaming. I had no control over it. I still go through uncommon abandonment pain for no reason at all–just peeling off the layers of abandonment by my parents (they sound a lot like yours). I went through some last week. It just comes up in waves. Usually I feel numbed out for a while, then the pain hits like nobody’s business. It doesn’t even need to be triggered by anything. I could be watching a movie or meditating. Often it comes when I’m feeling good. It’s like God is saying, “Okay, are you ready to handle another layer?” I pray there is an end to it. I feel as though I’m peeling the layers off of an onion, but as I get down to the core, it’s really tricky. The tendency is to push everyone away in defiance. But I know that doesn’t help me. So I just try as much as I can to be with the pain. They say that if a BPD does not commit suicide, they will eventually outgrow it when they are older. I hope this is true.
I am not an extremely needy person and do not need to be around people constantly. In fact, I spend a lot of time alone and rather prefer it. I guess that makes me a little more high functioning.
oh- well i do suffer from low self esteem ‘ sometimes’ but i am beginning to see that it was the people in my life that nurtured my low self esteem to make them more powerful and keep me under control. I am sure i have some codependencey issues. But I take on other peoples shit because I am such a people pleaser. My mom has been a mental case all her life in and out of mental hospitals. But it was all about getting attention and she will never understand the harm it did too me and my sister. There was alot of insest in my childhood that I actually ‘blocked out’ and didnt deal with it until my sisters suicide. My father molested her, her whole life, and when she was a child and my mother found out about it she blamed my poor sister and would beat my sister. And what I have never been able to wrap my brain around is that my sister and father had a sexual relationship into her adult life. I just cannot grasp that. cant believe i am exposing my past on the internet like this. I have dealt with alot of trauma. My wholew life has not been screwed up however. I think I had it together pretty good before Mike came along. Nothing prepared me for that – I just wanted him out of my life from the beginning – but somehow he tapped into my mind and just drained me- when I finally got him out i was not prepared for where I have gone emotionaly – but i am making so much progress and living for me now – for the first time I come first……..
Henry, I’m so sorry about your sister. If you don’t mind my asking, what ever happened to your father? Did he ever go to prison?
I know when I dealt with all the physical abuse and covert sexual abuse in my past, I was able to forgive my stepfather before he died. Ironically, he was the person in my family I felt the closest to. I’ve read that sociopaths can bond with others to the extent they can control them. After dealing with all the trauma of the abuse, what I have left to deal with is all the neglect. I sometimes feel like I have an adult form of “failure to thrive”. Lucky for me, I went to a few meditation retreats in my early twenties and they literally saved my life. The philosophies and teachings “took”. It’s really helped me to get on a spiritual path, even if it is an unconventional one.