Walking on Razor Blades: Life with Someone with BPD Description

BPD is often misunderstood, reduced to stereotypes of moodiness or drama — but if you've loved someone with unmanaged borderline personality disorder, you know it feels nothing like that. 

In this episode, I break down what it actually looks like to be in a relationship with someone who splits, who swings from adoring you to discarding you in an instant, and how you slowly begin to disappear in the process. 

This isn't about demonizing people with BPD. It's about naming the impact of their unmanaged behavior — and why compassion for their pain does not require you to destroy yourself.

Transcript

 Welcome to the Your Not Crazy Podcast, hosted by Jessica Knight, a certified life coach who specializes in healing from narcissistic and emotional abuse. This podcast is intended to help you identify manipulative and abusive behavior. Set boundaries with yourself and others and heal the relationship with yourself so you can learn to love in a healthy way.
You can connect with Jessica and find additional resources, content, and coaching at emotionalabusecoach.com.
Before we begin, I just wanna make a quick note. At the end of this episode, I spend the last four minutes walking through the way people work with me and where to find resources, my links, and my courses. If you are a turning listener or are already a client, you can absolutely skip that part. If you're new or trying to figure out what kind of support you need, it's there for you.
It's the last four minutes.  Thank you so much for being here.
I was going through some blogs and things that I've drafted. What I typically do is when topics come up, especially on calls, I'll start making a list of like what people feel like they need or what I feel like people need to hear and, or the constant themes that are coming up. And so I was looking back and I, the way that I wrote it down was that, was walking on razor blades.
Life with someone who was BPD and I honestly think that based on when it seems I wrote this down, I was writing it about the relationship that I was in. And I remember feeling so much like I never knew who I was waking up to because BPD is often misunderstood and it's reduced to some stereotypes of either comparing it to bipolar or overly emotional or dramatic people, but the reality is far more complex.
And it is very painful for those entangled in relationships with somebody exhibiting unmanaged BPD. And this is unpredictability wrapped in like an intense relationship, but the relationship feels so much that it's built on desperation and destruction at the same time. And when you're in it, and what it feels like is like you don't know which version of them is walking through the door, waking up, responding to a text message, because very often they're splitting on you all the time.
I just did an episode on splitting a couple of weeks ago, I'll link it in the show notes. But when somebody is splitting on you, you are adored one moment, celebrated, and discarded the next. And so every conflict feels like a catastrophe, but when they go silent, it also feels like some sort of abandonment, and it probably does for them too, because now you become this constant walking emotional regulation system that you likely never wanted to be for somebody.
And, you know, for many of us or for me personally as a parent, I don't have the capacity for that and I don't want to have the capacity to be someone's everything in that case. I don't want to live a life where I'm always walking into an emotional landmine because I also don't want to live a life that there's constant explosions.
And so as I was thinking about this, uh, I was thinking about a client who said to me recently that his ex would say that he was her entire world and an hour later say that he ruined her life, but it would go extremely quickly. And so to clarify, because this is usually what gets me some hate mail, which is fine, not everybody has to agree.
But borderline personality disorder does not make somebody abusive, but many people and plenty of people with traits of BPD are abusive due to their actions and their behaviors and the inability to see the impact of their actions.  Plenty of people with BPD, especially those who are self-aware in treatment, working on emotional regulation, are capable of having meaningful, respectful, loving relationships, but that takes a ton of work on themselves and a ton of self-awareness.
BPD is really complex. It is one of the personality disorders associated in the same cluster as narcissism, antisocial, which is commonly called sociopathy, hysteronic, and then there's BPD. It is very painful to experience it. It is a mental health condition rooted in attachment wounds, emotional dysregulation, and the fragile sense of self, and people with BPD often live with immense shame, fear, and abandonment, emotional and sensitivity that can feel overwhelming, not only to them, but to those around them, but they are, or many of them, a good amount of them.
The people that I work with or the people that have suffered or been in relationship with somebody with BPD, it's usually that they are also engaging in harmful behaviors and a lot of time does, don't even see it because the pain doesn't excuse the harm.  And now just because someone's in an intent to cause harm doesn't mean that you weren't harmed, just because their behavior came from fear doesn't mean it doesn't traumatize you.
And because they have a diagnosis, doesn't mean that you're obligated to stay. And I think we become these caretakers of them and of their feelings and it leads us walking on eggshells, but eggshells doesn't even feel like it. It actually feels like walking on razor blades. I think it just feels like we become somebody who we're not because we always have to appease their emotions.
And I see a lot of people go through this and get stuck saying things like, "They're not a bad person. They're just struggling. They didn't mean to hurt me. They've been through so much and all of that could be true." But what's also true is that you're allowed to name the abuse even if they're in pain, you're allowed to set boundaries to protect yourself even if they have a diagnosis or even if they don't have a diagnosis, and you're allowed to leave the relationship if it's killing you, even if you love them, because compassion doesn't require self-abandonment at all.
The context of what they've been through can help explain the behavior, but doesn't excuse it. Whether the emotional instability comes from BPD, trauma, something else, entirely, it becomes abuse when you are repeatedly blamed, manipulated, or emotionally controlled in order to serve somebody else's emotional regulation.
And the purpose of this podcast isn't about demonizing people with BPD. It's like, tell me you've gotten hate mail without telling me you've gotten hate mail. It's, but it's about acknowledging the impact of their unmanaged behavior and what that can have, especially when partners are drawn into cycles of punishment, idealization, which is more like love bombing and, and just pure erasure.
Or someone is unwilling to seek help or refuses to take responsibility for how they affect others, their diagnosis does not protect them from being held accountable. And it doesn't obligate you to stay, but a lot of us fall into something that I call the caregiver trap.  And when you're an empathetic, trauma informed person who likely grew up trying to fix emotionally unstable people or walking around them, you are especially vulnerable here because you see the pain, you want to help and you rationalize the chaos by pointing to the trauma underneath, but here is the truth.
It's really not your job to regulate another adult's emotions. No amount of love will stabilize someone whose self-worth is built on fear or chaos or control. You can be trauma informed and still walk away. And so every time I tried to take a step back from my own wellbeing, I was told I was abandoning them.
I didn't realize I was actually really abandoning myself because every time that I would caregive or adapt or do something that they wanted just to ease the pain, I was moving further, further and away from myself and to the point where like I felt unrecognizable to me and that was terrifying.  And when I started to take care of myself, I was blamed for not caring about them.
And something specifically with people with BPD is splitting and splitting can become a weapon. And there's something really unsettling about splitting and the way that they turn on you because like I said, you know, what would be great is if we went through life and learned about these patterns, right?
We don't until we're in this position. And so I said earlier, I did a podcast on this, I will post it, it really goes to the ins and outs of splitting, but when somebody with BPD or similar traits can go from warm and loving to cold and punishing, that's splitting. And so one minute you're everything. The next year, awful, a threat, someone they need to protect themselves from.
When I was going through this, I kept asking, "What happened?  What did I do? How did I cause that? I only asked this question." Asking that question would never even get close to the core of the issue because splitting isn't always random. It, in some relationships it becomes a tool of control and it's a cycle that keeps you unstable, always scrambling to get back to their good graces.
And I remember the first time it happened, we were talking and laughing and suddenly a snap and his face would harden, the energy shifted, and just like that, I was the problem. Once you're on the bad side, nothing is enough, and that's when the chasing begins. So the moment I started trying to fix it, the game felt already rigged, and it was never about how he felt about me.
It was about how I made him feel about himself. He only cared when I was reinforcing that fantasy of who he wanted to be, but when I was overwhelmed or stressed or parenting, when I couldn't prop him up to be this amazing person based on however he was treating me, he used his emotions to regain control of me, and I couldn't fight against somebody's depression, their dysregulation, and, but I tried, and then trying to, I lost myself.
And so when you start disappearing, there's a kind of version or a kind of way that the emotional abuse comes in and it doesn't scream, it just erases you. But you become someone who tiptoes, who overexplains and who edits their tone in every text, and you begin to shape shift in real life. So you stop sharing your opinions, you second guess your jokes, you rehearse bad conversations in your head.
You apologize for things you didn't do, or you didn't intend or you didn't actually do, or you apologize for the way that they felt about it. And I think that's one of the most dangerous parts because you don't notice it at first, but it comes out in like a thousand tiny paper cuts until you don't realize you're bleeding out because the paper cuts are over and over and they're all the time and everything starts to trigger you too, but you give up that clarity that you have to avoid conflict.
You give up the rest to manage their mood and you give up joy or feeling joy or expressing joy because the other person could get upset until one day you look in the mirror and realize you have no idea who you are anymore. And I remember feeling how far away I felt from myself. And so my identity was built around keeping him regulated and that's not love, that's self-erasure really and I repelled against it like I probably was unrecognizable at the end to who I am right now and part of it, part of leaving, one part of it, one part of the many parts was that I needed to remember who I was when I wasn't defined by somebody else's needs.
And a lot of people will ask me, "Why is it so hard to leave if we know that we need to leave?" There's a lot of answers to that question and the main answer that I have for you is because you are trauma bonded and a lot of people will hear that and they'll say, "Everyone says that or that's what the internet says.
I'm telling you you're trauma bonded. I'm telling you if you're wondering why I can't leave this thing that is killing me, it is because you are in a trauma bond with them." I will also tag the trauma bond episode that is like the third episode I ever recorded, but listen to that. If I go into it now, I'll be here for another hour and a half explaining it.
But a part of it, a part of why it's so hard to leave is because when it's good, it feels like cosmic. It's like that you see parts of you that no one else has and you connect their pain and chaos and through highs of intensity, but intensity is not intimacy and love shouldn't require you to disappear.
And when you finally try and leave, the panic tends to ramp up, especially from the other person, but also is amping up in our own bodies.  So we're getting accusations. We could get people, they could stalk, they could threaten us, they could smear us and throw it all, you feel guilty because they're hurting and you still care and you don't want them to feel all those things and you just want to get back to that good feeling again because that's going to feel safe for you, but it's not actually safe.
And so there's so many episodes that I have that talk through unhooking yourself from the cycle of abuse. It's all over the Unhooked Private Podcast. It is in many episodes. So I don't want to repeat the same thing or the same part of what I've said, but what I will tell you is that the one thing that helped me the most, despite my resistance, was unhooking myself and seeing what I was doing and seeing what I was living in and hooking myself from the cycle.
That is what helped me more than anything. And I had to see it, I had to own it, I had to look at it, I had to take accountability, and I had to do it, and I had to do it even when it sucked, and I had to really see, like, am I aiding a cycle or am I removing myself from the cycle? And there were absolutely times I was aiding the cycle.
Like there were absolutely times that I was asking a question or, or something, especially towards, like, when I didn't need to. And so my biggest advice, if you're feeling this is like one, get some more education around this. And if you've listened to me before, you know, a lot of my content is around various cluster B relational patterns and/or head over to Unhooked or listen to some of the episodes on the cycle of abuse.
I think I had to see it, the cycle, like someone had sent me the cycle of abuse in a image. I think I had to see it like 10 times before I chose to say, "Okay, that's it, and I'm not gonna unsee it anymore." Because you can have compassion for so much trauma and still say, "This is hurting me and I'm not doing it anymore."
You are not abandoning someone by refusing to be their emotional hostage, boundaries are not bad, and you really don't owe anybody your own destruction in exchange for their survival, especially when they are an adult with resources, whether or not they see it. You do have a right to decide for yourself what you will do and what you won't do.
And so if you need support, if this hits close to home, you don't have to sit with it. I offer one-on-one coaching.  If you are navigating emotional abuse course of control, trauma, bonding, high conflict divorce, whether you're in it, out of it, somewhere in between, we can work together, you can book a validation call, which is a one-off, or you can just head over to Substack.
There's also a lot of goals there too about this. The link is in the show notes. And just remember that you tried to love somebody who was, who made you disappear in the process, and now it's time to come back to you.  If this episode resonated and you're realizing that what you're dealing with isn't just stress or miscommunication, there are ways to get support that don't minimize what you're experiencing.
I'm going to spend the next couple of minutes telling you about my offerings, because at the core of my business is one-on-one coaching. The podcast is something that I do because I do like being able to help a broader audience, but the truth is that the core of my work is really coaching and providing other offerings so that people can begin to heal.
At the center of everything I do is one-on-one coaching. That's where I slow things down, listen closely, and help you make sense of what's happening in your specific situation. It's not a template, it's not just based on theories, but it's really focused on your real life. Some people start with a one-time validation call that is a single focus session where we look at one specific situation or pattern that you're struggling with, and the goal isn't to fix your life or push you into decisions, it's to help you name what's happening, put it into context of reality, help you notice where you are in it and offer some feedback and tools to how to navigate it.
I also offer an intro call. The intro call used to be called the Clarity Call, and it's a short call where you can share what's going on for you, and I can explain how I work and whether I'm the right fit for your situation. There's no obligation to continue after that. It's simply a way for us to get on the same page before moving forward.
For people who need ongoing support, I offer weekly or biweekly coaching. This is especially helpful if you're navigating emotional abuse, trauma bond, high conflict divorce, or custody, and co-parenting with a difficult or controlling person. Ongoing work allows us to track patterns over time, stay anchored when things escalate, and make decisions in a way that protects your nervous system and your long-term stability.
All of my coaching options can be found on my websites, emotionalabuscoach.com and highconflictdivorcecoaching.com. Both links are available in the show notes of this episode.  In addition to one-on-one coaching, I offer several self-paced courses and programs. They're called Divorcing and Narcissist 101, How to Document for Family Court, the Emotional Abuse Breakthrough Course, Setting Boundaries with a Narcissist and Unhooked, which is my program and private podcast that walks you through the full cycle of abuse, helps you map it out in your relationship and shows you how to begin to break free from the trauma bond.
I also write on Substack where I explore topics like trauma bonding, emotional abuse, course of control, high conflict divorce, and the cluster B dynamics. There's a free option and a paid membership that offers deeper dives, Q&As and additional resources. Everything that I do and everything that I build is around one core truth and message that you're not crazy, you shouldn't feel crazy and that even though I can see patterns in what you're experiencing, it doesn't mean that it's normal.
It's not healthy. My work is really about helping you understand what's happening and begin to trust yourself again. All of the links that I shared are in my show notes, and I really appreciate you being here.
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