One of the most well-known traits of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD, also known as EUPD or Emotionally Unstable Personality Disorder) is an intense fear of – and extreme efforts to avoid – real or perceived abandonment.

I have been diagnosed with BPD since 2016 and when I learnt that this was a trait of BPD, so much fell into place for me.

* Update (June 2023): When I wrote this post, I had a diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder. In 2022, this diagnosis was overturned when I was diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Whether the diagnosis of BPD was ever correct, I don’t know for sure. I may have had BPD at some point, or it could always have been a misdiagnosis. Many of the symptoms of BPD overlap with difficulties related to ASD, including Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD) and difficulty with social skills or relationships. In short, I do not currently meet the criteria for BPD. However, I am leaving these posts up, as I have received feedback that they have helped others who have BPD, suspect they may have BPD, or experience symptoms similar to those associated with BPD.

It helped me to understand one of the reasons why my relationships, romantic or otherwise, were such a shitshow. I’m always so convinced and so focused on the “fact” that everyone is going to leave me, that I often use one of the following coping mechanisms:

• Deliberately starting an argument in an effort to push the person away before they can leave me first

or

• Becoming excessively clingy, asking for pretty much constant reassurance that they’re not going to leave

or

• Becoming hyper-focused on meeting all of their needs, completely disregarding my own needs.

None of these is a healthy coping mechanism – trust me, I get it.

But although my rational brain knows that, my emotional brain can shout much louder than its counterpart.

I know that my extreme reactions to real or perceived abandonment are unhealthy and incredibly difficult for the people around me to deal with. I can see how hurtful it could feel if I “accuse” a loved one of thinking about leaving me, and I can see how deliberately starting arguments could be mentally and emotionally draining.

But I have some questions.

Where did this fear come from? Why am I so incredibly afraid of people leaving me? What makes me think that even the people closest to me will abandon me?

When it comes to BPD, there is this assumption that our fear of being abandoned is unfounded; that we have no reason to be afraid or to be preoccupied with abandonment.

I disagree.

A few years ago, I told my best friend of ten years that my work would not allow me time off to attend her week-long destination wedding in Portugal. I knew she would be upset, but nothing could have prepared me for her response. Or rather, lack of response.

She sent a short reply, obviously upset with me. I apologised profusely and tried to explain the lengths I’d gone to in order to try to be able to attend. Then she stopped replying. I messaged a few more times. No reply. She ghosted me. Ten years of friendship and she just cut me out of her life.

We used to be inseparable. She was my person. I couldn’t believe that she was going to end our friendship over something that wasn’t my fault. I couldn’t get the time off work. I lived alone, I needed my job, I needed the income, I couldn’t just up and leave. But none of that seemed to matter. She was done. She was out.

Of course, I was devastated, but it wasn’t until years later that I happened to mention her in one of my sessions with my CPN. She delved into the subject and I told her everything. She was uncharacteristically shocked and asked me why I’d never mentioned this before. I said I didn’t think it was relevant. My CPN then went on to talk about how we as a society are free to acknowledge the devastation of the breakdown of a romantic relationship, but we often don’t recognise how completely soul-destroying the break up of a friendship can be as well. She helped me to acknowledge that this loss had affected me massively and that this wasn’t something to push aside or ignore.

Fast forward to a few years later and I was in a romantic relationship with someone with whom I was very much in love. I’d been through a lot and I felt like life was really starting to look up. He was so understanding about my mental health and often reassured me that he wasn’t going anywhere – he even asked my dad for his blessing to propose to me. Not long after this, he took his own life. Of course, I was absolutely broken. On top of the obvious grief and loss, I felt abandoned.

With the passing of time and a lot of talking it through with others, I have come to accept that he didn’t see it as abandonment. His own mental illness was telling him we’d all be better off without him. He was in so much mental pain, feeling so much shame and guilt for his perceived “failures”, he just couldn’t cope anymore. But even though I now understand that, it’s still hard to see it as anything other than another abandonment. He did leave me, even though he said he wouldn’t. Yes, he had his reasons, but he was gone and I was left here.

Fast forward again to this year, in February I reached out to a close friend with whom I used to have daily contact and asked if we could have a catch-up whenever they had some time. They (seemingly) enthusiastically agreed and said they would message me within the next couple of days. I never heard from them again.

I waited and waited, feeling tempted to message again but then the self-critical voice in my head told me not to bother them, that they would message me when they could. It’s now been several months, and no messages ever appeared. They still follow me on social media but have just never messaged me back.

My mindset shifts back and forth from “erm, what the fuck, mate? Have you just forgotten about me?” to “Why would they message me? I don’t deserve their time. They just don’t want to hear from me.”

I am, and possibly always will be, afraid of abandonment, and the way I react to this fear is somewhat problematic. But why am I so afraid of abandonment?

I used to think it was just the way my brain was; that it was somehow just innate in me to expect, fear, and desperately attempt to avoid being left. But recently, I’ve actually found myself thinking back and seeing things a little differently. Is it really all my fault?

Of course, I completely accept that I’m not the blameless victim here and I don’t claim to be. I’ve done wrong, I’ve made poor decisions, and I take responsibility for that.

But I have started to realise that my fear of abandonment is a learned response.

I fear abandonment because I’ve been abandoned so many times – and it hurts! It’s not entirely unreasonable for my brain to fear – or expect -abandonment, even from those who are closest to me, because it’s happened before, several times.

People with BPD often lack the ability to regulate our emotions and have extremely low self-esteem – throw in several events where our fear (being abandoned) actually comes true, and it’s no wonder that we learn to expect the worst.

I’m not using this as an excuse to sit back and accept that I can’t change how I react to real or perceived abandonment.

I will continue to learn how to manage my BPD, but in the meantime, I hope that this insight into this element of this diagnosis will be helpful for those who love someone with BPD and find it difficult to understand our “irrational” fear of abandonment, or perhaps feel hurt that their loved one regularly asks for reassurance that you aren’t going to leave them.

I think a major part of my recovery is going to be getting myself to the point where abandonment (if it happens again) isn’t the end of the world. Believing in myself, loving myself, and knowing that my strength comes from within, not from someone else.

I’m still on that journey. But I’ll get there.

Do you have any experience of BPD and real or perceived abandonment? Maybe you love someone who lives with BPD and you experience this fear from the other side? How do you manage this? Let me know in the comments.

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