How Trauma Bond Robs You of Your Identity

Trauma Bond and The Loss of Self in Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD)

Anxious attachment style (AAS) is one of the main features of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), and one that has been linked to both neurological and psychological factors.¹

The term “favorite person” (FP) has been colloquially adopted to indicate a person on whom the Borderline patient develops an emotional dependence so strong that the very idea of losing that person is a trigger of immense disrupting potential. This example of anxious and insecure attachment is also referred to as a “trauma bond,” that is, a form of attachment that somehow mirrors a traumatic event that the person has already experienced and that has left a mark so deep that they are still struggling with the residual effects of it.

“Trauma bond” indicates a form of attachment that somehow mirrors a traumatic event that the person has already experienced and that has left a mark so deep that they are still struggling with the residual effects of it.

In the case of BPD, these events often involve personal neglect and/or abuse by the hands of a caretaker in early childhood, which, in turn, leaves adults suffering from BPD at a higher risk for abusive relationships.

Upon experiencing trauma bond, the individual is “dragged back” to their wounded child-self, their helpless and defenseless self, because they are re-experiencing the trauma they’ve already lived. Only, this time they think they can do something to change the outcome. Sadly enough, this is often a “motivational factor” in a person’s decision to remain in an abusive relationship: the hope that this time the person may influence a different outcome is a strong incentive for the person to persist in chasing after the abuser’s approval and affection. In a way, it’s like being trapped in a recurrent nightmare, where the dreamer thinks he has finally found a way to change the outcome, only to have their hopes shattered once again.

The Unraveling of the Self

Most medical literature examines the way that BPD and other personality disorders “disrupt” or “unravel” the patient’s overall identity, including their baseline personality, thoughts, and personal values.

Indeed, many symptoms of BPD are doomed to impact one’s “authentic” self and to leave it fade in the distance, eclipsed by the “Borderline Self,” a version of the previous self that is distorted beyond recognition by severe emotional dysregulation. The “Borderline Self” might be angry and aggressive² when the Baseline Self is a kind and docile individual, or it may be unable to process and regulate feelings of distress and grief when the Baseline Self is usually a calm, composed, and even slightly apathetic individual.

Many symptoms of BPD are doomed to impact one’s “authentic” self and to leave it fade in the distance, eclipsed by the “Borderline Self,” a version of the previous self that is distorted beyond recognition by severe emotional dysregulation.

In severe cases of untreated BPD, the Borderline Self might gain such dominance as to eclipse anything left of the Original Self — at least outwardly.

The Lack of Resources

For all BPD cases, the path back to the original self is a challenging, tumultuous, and painful process. It involves actively fighting the most challenging Borderline symptoms, such as emotional dysregulation and paranoid thinking, to a point where they hold little to no control over the Original Self.³ It involves teaching the Borderline patient those mechanisms of self-reliance that they’ve never possessed in the first place.

Naturally, this is easier said than done; not only because, in most countries, BPD patients have no access to the type of resources that they need in order to heal, but also because the most commonly adopted treatment for BPD is usually therapy, especially Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT). The problem with this approach is that it “tackles” the problem of BPD from a purely therapeutic perspective, when, time and time again, research has demonstrated that BPD is not only a psychological condition, but also a neurobiological one, with several brain imaging analyses proving that areas of the brain in control of emotional response, such as the amygdala and the limbic system (as well as the pre-frontal cortex) appear to be severely dysfunctional in Borderline patients.

The problem with the [therapeutic] approach is that it “tackles” the problem of BPD from a purely therapeutic perspective, when, time and time again, research has demonstrated that BPD is not only a psychological condition, but also a neurobiological one, with several brain imaging analyses proving that areas of the brain in control of emotional response, such as the amygdala and the limbic system (as well as the pre-frontal cortex) appear to be severely dysfunctional in Borderline patients.

The lack of a proper holistic approach to BPD has significantly stalled the possible advancement in its treatment, thus causing many Borderline patients to battle their deeply disabling symptoms, as well as the public stigma associated with their condition, in utter loneliness, all while facing the gargantuan amount of intrapsychic pain associated with the condition without as much as a palliative.

The Recovery Process

With all these factors contributing to the disabling and disrupting effects of BPD on one’s existence, the path to recovery can feel like fighting a violent storm on one’s own, with neither the knowledge nor the resources to do so.

Because of the way that trauma bond forces the BPD patient to re-experience a past traumatic experience, the loss that comes once the FP is gone can have immense disrupting effects on the patient’s life and sense of self.

In order for the BPD patient to “get back in touch” with their Baseline Self, it is fundamental to restore a mental picture of who that Self was and is beyond the trauma that they’ve experienced, because that trauma is what caused the patient to lose their sense of self in the first place. This process can often feel like mining for a diamond through layers and layers of hard rock and dirt, and then polishing the diamond so it may finally shine to its fullest brilliance.

In psychological terms, this process involves denuding the trauma and all its symptoms one by one, getting back to the person that the patient was when the trauma occurred, healing and nurturing that person so they may finally begin to correctly process their trauma, and then watching them gradually grow from there.

Mind you: a full recovery is something of a unicorn in the world of Borderline Personality Disorder. There are no known cases of a BPD patient fully recovering from all their symptoms, which is why the medical community tends to focus on reducing the symptoms over time or on gaining greater control over them. This approach, paired with the analysis of the traumatic experiences suffered by the BPD patient, gives one the highest chance of minimizing the disabling effects of their condition and beginning to reclaim their true identity.

And finally, once the patient starts processing their trauma bond and the “BPD lens” through which they viewed their FP come off, reality will finally come back into focus, and the grotesque visions of the past will be but a distant memory.

¹ While the research seems to overwhelmingly support the theory that affective dependence and AAS originate from trauma in the case of BPD, there is still no definite consensus over the nature-versus-nurture debate.

² Note that here the concept of “aggressiveness” is meant as a state of mind that can manifest itself in a number of ways, including — and I would personally say especially — thoughts or fantasies of aggressiveness and/or vindictiveness. It is not meant to indicate that Borderline patients have a tendency to be physically abusive.

³ While a lot of medical literature stresses the idea that recovery from BPD is possible, most studies seem to define “recovery” as a “reduction in symptoms over time,” and not as a “full recovery,” meaning that, while it would seem that symptoms can be significantly alleviated, there is no “ultimate cure” for BPD at the present moment. The author of this article is not aware of anyone who has ever fully recovered from BPD.

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