I was honored to be selected as a speaker for the 17^th Annual Yale/NEABPD Conference on BPD, held on May 6, 2022. The title of my webinar was, “Porcupine Love™®: Dealing with Dysregulated Behaviors in a Long-Term Romantic Relationship Where One Has BPD or Its Symptoms.” The 50-minute recording, based on the first three blogs on this website, is included in this post.

Presumably every close personal relationship in humankind encounters troubles or conflict. Research reveals that a major factor leading to relationships staying together over time is doing repairs after troubles or conflict (Gottman). Many experts in this area will talk about the general helpfulness of expressing one’s own experience and feelings in “I-statements” as a healthy way of sharing. But bpd-fed rage can make this very hard at times. What I am specifically talking about in this blog is the importance of doing a repair after troubles or conflict. I don’t have “the answers” and I welcome hearing how others do repairs in their relationships. In case it’s helpful to others, the 3 basic steps for the person making a “repair” (i.e. the listener) that we follow are:

• Active Listen.  This means that, after trouble or conflict, you listen to and reflect back what you hear about the other person’s experience of the incident, including their feelings. Example: the other person starts, saying, I feel hurt and angry when I hear loud volume and a harsh tone in your voice to me, because that’s disrespectful, and the listener says, You felt hurt and anger when you heard loud volume and a harsh tone in my voice because that was disrespectful to you.

• Validate. Example: the listener says, It makes sense you felt hurt and angry when I talked to you in loud volume and harsh tone of voice, especially from your life partner. Acknowledge your part in the situation, such as by saying, It’s true that I did speak with loud volume and a harsh tone of voice to you. Say you are sorry, if or where you are sorry, such as by saying, Sorry about that. I wish I could take that back. And,

• Ask, What can I or we do differently?

We developed this three-step approach to making repairs for each other after many years of trial-and-error. Many years of my tears and us trying to avoid repeating negative cycles. We found it helpful to have an “agreed-to-in-advance” approach. We worked to develop it during times when I was not in a bpd-state of heightened emotion. It helped us to be informed by marriage therapy and marriage courses and books.

Repairs need to go both ways in a relationship and doing a repair can be extra tricky for the individual in a couple who has bpd or other tendency toward intense emotional reactions. It’s hard for a person with borderline to tolerate hearing others’ pain related to their behaviors without getting dysregulated all over again, and possibly starting the downward-spiral-thinking again—such as with bpd-driven negative thoughts about what a horrible person they are, how they can’t do anything right, and wishing they were dead, etc.—rather than hearing their partner’s pain and helping repair.

We call this whole 3-step repair “a 60” because, early on, when I was giving this type of repair, it seemed like 60 seconds of active listening and validating was all I could do without becoming triggered with an intense emotional reaction. Listening for much longer than about 60 seconds was just not effective. I could do maybe 2-3 minutes at the most! The amount of time is crucial, in that you don’t want to cut off the “most important” or key feelings and experiences, but for a person with bpd, you also don’t want to “head into the depths of the pit” of deep and unendurable pain. In time, I gradually found ways to actively listen and validate for longer than 60 seconds or 2-3 minutes, but we still call this 3-step process “a 60.”

So, after trouble or conflict, we usually aim to offer “a 60” or ask for one, or both, for repair. As a practical matter, we do a lot of “double 60s” with me receiving the first one to help me calm down enough to give one. We are each sensitive to the other’s porcupine quills. If I need to repair for my emotional reaction, chances are, I first need to receive a repair for whatever triggered me to help me calm down.

Providing a “60” for the other is a caring gift and is not lightly done or given. It’s very hard to do. Usually, it helps to be well-rested and fed first. To provide a “60,” it helps to first be aware of your own feelings and why you are having them, so that you can hold them in check to make space to hear and validate the other’s feelings. This is extra hard to do when you have bpd! It has taken many years for me to “get the hang” of providing (as the listener) and receiving (as the speaker) 60s. A “60” is meant to be a tool for validation and repair. The three steps may sound simple, but they are definitely not easy, either in giving one or receiving one!

Please be gentle with yourself—if, in trying to give a “60,” it feels overly painful to listen, then it is not the right time to do it! It’s okay and important to gauge your readiness and to listen to that. Sometimes, I’m in so much pain from being triggered and believing I’m being “accused of being bad” that I just can’t listen right then. Bpd often comes with that “off-the-charts” searing emotional pain. It can feel like I’m walking in a fiery furnace. So I just have to say, ”I can’t do a 60 right now” and wait until it doesn’t feel like a fiery furnace any more. When that will be, one cannot say exactly, but you can try 20 minutes or an hour or so later, or the next day. It takes some inner strength to do even this self-monitoring, “self-gauging” step, and it certainly takes inner strength to do a “60.” I think it’s all about learning about yourself, reading yourself and gaining self-awareness, and not forcing yourself when you’re in a hellacious situation. We’ve found it helpful to stay in touch with your partner about when you might be regrouping for a repair, so they are not left waiting indefinitely. Just don’t let so much time go by that you don’t do the repair, as that can come across as not caring about your partner and the relationship.

Similarly, it can be hard for the individual with bpd to receive a 60 repair, as the person speaking about their feelings related to their partner’s behaviors. When speaking about a conflict or incident, once the person with emotion dysregulation starts talking about their hurt, it’s easy for them to go on and on about it, as the emotions you’re describing take over and you feel pulled into how hurt and angry (and justified!) you are. It can be really hard to stop yourself from going on and on because you may feel like you haven’t been heard by the other (YET) even if they are (FINALLY!) listening. This hurt can remind you of all the other times you felt this way, and maybe even call to mind some experience from your family-of-origin. Remember, you have journaling and therapy to help you on this.

A marriage or relationship is not a cure-all for bpd-level pain. Going on and on in a “60” reduces its effectiveness and can be too much for the “60” structure! If one goes on and on, we find this often does more damage than the original issue, all of which is the opposite of the goal of the repair. We have found that it’s usually helpful to do all 3 steps of the 60—1) active listen and validate the other’s experience of your behavior; 2) acknowledge what one did, and apologize if one wishes; and 3) ask, “What can I or we do differently?” Full stop. You just have to stop yourself and not go on forever in step one. It is very difficult AND you can do this!

To help keep your step one short, you will probably need to think about this in advance when you are not upset and, instead, just calmly thinking about how much you desire to be in this relationship and how the benefits of this relationship are worth the cost/pain you will have to face in stopping yourself when everything inside you is otherwise primal bpd—screaming, sobbing, and wanting to demand something from the other. Preparing in advance can help reinforce your desire to help repair the relationship without bpd-rage or hurt taking over.

I’m definitely not saying not to talk about deeper hurts, experiences from your family-of-origin or about how certain things happening in the here-and-now may tap into hurts you felt as a child or at other times in your life. It can be really important to talk about them in healthy ways when the time is right. I just think it’s most helpful and effective to pick another time to do that kind of talking or to fill in a journal or talk with a therapist. It doesn’t help me when I talk about them in the middle of a “60” repair. My experience is that bpd can magnify deep hurts and take over, and journaling or therapy can be a better help for those deep hurts.

I will also be writing blogs in the future on “Talk Sessions” and “Problem-Solving Sessions”

© Cathleen Payne

This is something each of you can consider doing for your partner to help them understand and know you better, especially for those times when emotions run high. Maybe you have never thought about describing these things before. If that is the case, you might need to journal a bit to ask yourself how you would put into words your responses to the following questions.

1. What are the physical sensations, thoughts, emotions and beliefs that you have when you are triggered or dysregulated?
2. Why is it so hard to “choose” your behaviors when you are triggered or dysregulated? Why is it so hard to stop yourself from saying harsh words or doing negative or self-harming behaviors?
3. What is your plan for yourself that you are going to put into place for when you are triggered or dysregulated?
4. What do you want your partner to know about you in advance, and keep in mind about you, for during the times that you are exploding/experiencing these triggers or times of dysregulation?

I am writing today to tell you what I’ve told my husband about what it is like being me, a person with the condition of bpd.

1. What are the physical sensations, thoughts, emotions and beliefs that you have when you are triggered or dysregulated?When I’m triggered, I feel like my thoughts about your words and actions go lightning fast into pain that is like a red-hot poker being jabbed in my gut over and over, every second that goes by. And this is accompanied by thoughts/beliefs that you are saying to me, “You don’t matter! You don’t matter!” with each jab of the red-hot poker, over and over again until the trigger subsides. I believe I don’t matter to the person I love most in this world! The emotional hurt is excruciating. It’s unendurable, yet I must and do endure it every day, or however often I get triggered as a result of having this mental health condition.
2. Why is it so hard to “choose” your behaviors when you are triggered or dysregulated? Why is it so hard to stop yourself from saying harsh words or doing negative or self-harming behaviors? When I’m triggered, I feel like I would do about anything to avoid feeling the unendurable emotional pain described above. Sometimes I think that it will lessen if only I can get you to agree how horrible the pain is; if only I can get you to say how I’m “right” about what I’m perceiving and experiencing. I explode in pain, and in my explosion I want to get you to see the excruciating pain I am in and see that I have “no bandwidth” in my brain for anything else, such as tuning into how I am affecting you in this process. It feels like I only have “brain bandwidth” for me, for trying not to feel the excruciating pain, for doing almost anything to “make it stop,” and for trying to get through these moments of pain, including sometimes by screaming, yelling, sobbing uncontrollably, slamming doors, throwing down the pen in my hand or verbally striking out with loud, harsh tones and negative words. For others, perhaps it’s cutting or self-injury–reacting in a way that is not rational and that just seems to be driven by something beyond myself and just seems to “come out of the pain,” and for which I later feel great shame and regret.
3. What is your plan is for yourself that you are going to put into place for when you are triggered or dysregulated? For me, I am trying to take a break from “talking when angry”–just STOP (DBT skill: stop, take a breath, observe, and pause) speaking; maybe I do a breathing exercise(s), a mindfulness exercise(s), or an “opposite action” or the TIP skill (change your Temperature, do Intense exercise or Paced breathing); maybe I write in a journal, ask myself what I am feeling and why, or maybe I ask for what I need as soon as I know what that is. Afterwards, I must ask myself if there is behavior I just engaged in that I need to own, apologize for, and repair. I might say to myself and my loved one, “I’m trying my best and sometimes I’m successful and sometimes I’m not.” I might have variations of in-between, where I start off yelling or speaking sarcastically or harshly, and then I catch myself and try to “just feel the pain” and know it will pass and remember that I will want to be in this relationship once it does. It’s a constant struggle to somehow get my behavior under control and repair.
4. What do you want your partner to know about you in advance, and keep in mind about you, for during the times that you are exploding/experiencing these triggers or times of dysregulation? What are the truths about your heart that you want your partner to know in advance about you, even for times when you are acting in ways that scream the opposite? For me, I say that when I’m “in” my bpd emotions, or triggered, I still love you and don’t want to hurt you AND know that I am so overwhelmed by pain that it feels like someone is stabbing me in the gut with a red-hot poker. For some, maybe it is like a parent is screaming at you “I hate you!” 6 inches from your face when you are 2 or 3 years old. Or maybe it is like you are a burn patient with third and fourth degree burns who gets touched and you jump sky-high. Or, for some women, maybe it’s like you are having back-to-back contractions in childbirth that are a 9 or 10 out of 10! Consider whatever image seems to put into words what you are going through. For me, it feels like it’s being done TO me, not coming from me or under my control. I say to my husband ahead of time, “Please know that my emotional explosions are not about you. It’s like my brain is doing something on its own, like a brain-flare-up or a brain signal that is hard for me to control.” (See Blog No. 1 for the picture of a sample brain scan of the borderline brain.) “I want you to know ahead of time, that I still love you and don’t want to hurt you. I am so overwhelmed by my emotional pain at these times that it feels like I am being stabbed over and over in the gut with a red-hot poker.” “I want you to know that the stuff that comes out of my mouth during those times is a reaction to my bpd brain wrongly believing that it’s being done TO me, rather than coming from me.” And, especially want them to know that, “Bpd pain is not a choice!” I also say, “When this happens, I will come back to you later, when I come down from my high emotions and behaviors, to hear what it was like for you and repair.”(Future blogs will be about using this knowledge about you and your partner in 60-second I-statement “repairs” or “regroup” processes.) HINT: don’t just share this one time with your partner. They will need to hear it many times over many months, and years, in order to keep it at the front of their minds during your emotional explosions. Sometime, when I know we are about to discuss something where emotions run deep, I say, “Just remember, I am particularly sensitive about a lot of things and that is totally about me and the way I’m wired. It is not about anyone else. Period.”

• The information in this email is not a substitute for medical care. You need to continue with your regular doctor. If you have serious mental health issues such as severe anxiety, depression, or suicidal thoughts, seek professional help now. Call 911 if there is a medical or safety emergency. The suicide prevention help line is 1-800-273-8255.
• © All rights reserved.

To the person with borderline personality disorder, I hear your pain—the agonizing, stabbing-in-the-gut-with-a-red-hot poker pain that utterly strips away anything but that stabbing and the desire to make it stop! Sadly, I’m not aware of anyone or anything that can make it stop, other than maybe some lessening of it over the passage of the years. [note: there is no medication directly for bpd, though some medications can be prescribed to treat some of its symptoms.] Yet, even further damage can be done from acting out of that stabbing pain, and it can be just as, if not more, painful in its own way.

To the person in relationship with someone with borderline personality disorder, there can be anguish, both in trying to understand why your loved one has painful reactions and why perhaps they lash out at you or hurt themselves. And this is on top of the usual challenges of any close relationship. Please know, often, there is no explanation for why a truly innocent look, word, or action from you, or innocent lack of saying a word, or doing an action, is followed by such a sharp emotional explosion, no matter how adamantly your loved one says to the contrary! Quite often, the ONLY overall rational explanation is that your loved one’s brain is wired differently. Take a look at the brain scan of a person with borderline personality disorder:

Brain Scan Copyright Dr. Allan N. Schore Amygdala Hyperreactivity in Borderline Personality Disorder … https://images.app.goo.gl/izQ54VvJP9j25knQ6 Images may be subject to copyright.

Their brain is just sending intense emotional signals for some as-yet-unexplained and not-understood reason, and the signals result in emotional sensitivity which is often off the charts. The suddenness and searing intensity of hurt is unbelievable to most. There is nothing we know to do to stop the bpd brain from sending signals like this! That’s it—that is often the only rational explanation for a seemingly irrational emotional turmoil or outburst or self-harm—he or she is HURTING! It hurts to feel this stabbing-in-the-gut feeling! It’s their “fight or flight” response, from deep in the “ancient of days” part of the brain–the amygdala. This old, core part of the brain perhaps kept our primitive ancestors safe from life-threatening dangers back then. Today, in the bpd brain, the deeply emotional amygdala can frequently and quickly take over, an “amygdala hijack,” and preempt the more “thinking” parts of the brain like the cortex.  While everyone experiences fight or flight responses at times in everyday life, I suspect an individual with bpd experiences them more often, more intensely and more out of proportion to the situation.

An early bite-sized family bpd story that we sometimes share involves me being with my husband at the dinner table. When he innocently asked me to pass a fork, I had a bpd “stabbing” episode and reacted loudly and harshly, believing he was criticizing me for the way I had set the table and that he didn’t love me. I know that does not seem rational, which it’s not, but I can assure you that my sudden pain was sharp and deep and real in that moment of feeling unloved. Once you understand the thoughts, feelings and beliefs I hold in that moment, it makes complete sense. My husband can validate me by saying, “Wow!I am so sad and sorry to hear how much pain you feel! And it makes complete sense that you would be overcome by pain when you think I am criticizing you and don’t love you. Man, that must be so difficult for you!”

When you have bpd, your brain intensely sends out sharp emotions and it hurts like hell! Sure, you might be able to categorize some types of interactions that particularly lend themselves to triggering the brain firing and feeling hurt (for me one example is a sudden change in plans), but bpd reactions commonly come up in everyday situations. And often bpd is more likely to manifest in the relationships with close family members. There is no explaining the horrendous depth and sudden intensity of the hurt. That’s why, when I try to explain what it’s like, I stick with “being stabbed in the gut with a red-hot poker.” Sometimes, it feels like I am being stabbed once every second for 60 seconds over and over again for a period of several minutes, like when you are having back-to-back contractions in labor that feel like they are happening “to you” rather than my your choicee. And they feel like they are never going to end.

In the moment, it feels like there is no way to “make it stop”—either for the person with the condition, or for their partner. There are ways to try to learn how to deal with it. I began experiencing this condition in childhood and my husband and I have contended with it since we began dating in law school. Unfortunately, I don’t and can’t even pretend to “have the answers,” but I have some experiences that I would like to share with you in the form of this blog, in case my journey might help to ease your way forward through this often-wretched, clearly pain-filled condition.

Please know you are not alone and that I believe your way forward, though extremely difficult, is possible. People get through many difficult life situations by focusing on what they can do today to make things better. I believe there are ways to help manage and thrive in a relationship when one of you has bpd, if you are willing to be educated, practice self-care, and learn some tips and skills for your tool belt.

I plan on regularly sharing some skill/tip/tool that has helped us move forward. Please remember, it’s not just the person with bpd who has porcupine quills; each individual experiences quills from the other!! Also though, it’s two porcupines who love each other and can look for each other’s loving qualities. Many porcupines mate for life–there’s much more to porcupines than their quills!

• The information in this blog is not a substitute for medical care. You need to continue with your regular doctor. If you have serious mental health issues such as severe anxiety, depression, or suicidal thoughts, seek professional help now or call 911 if you’re experiencing a medical or safety emergency. The suicide prevention help line is 1-800-273-8255.

• All rights reserved. (porcupine love, ™®)