Cluster B is called the dramatic, emotional, and erratic cluster.
Antisocial personality disorder: a pervasive pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others, lack of empathy, bloated self-image, manipulative and impulsive behavior.
Borderline personality disorder: pervasive pattern of instability in relationships, self-image, identity, behavior and affects often leading to self-harm and impulsivity.
Histrionic personality disorder: pervasive pattern of attention-seeking behavior and excessive emotions.
Narcissistic personality disorder: a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and a lack of empathy.
First of all MLC is known to mimic all of the above disorders and I or other veterans on the MLC forum, have seen posters whose spouses have these traits.
Originally Posted By: Vanilla
MLC abuse strikes me as situational. The individual is transiting a life crisis and as a consequences exhibits abusive behaviour. Most often once the MLC abates the abuse is gone.
And how are we as posters or vets suppose to know this?
Originally Posted By: Vanilla
The type of abuse that I experienced is the result of a controlling personality and that is unlikely to ever change. These types of Abusers move from one victim to another. This is a control issue not a crisis issue
CONTROL is a frequent subject within MLC and personality disorders.
Originally Posted By: Vanilla
It occurs as a result of personality not situational. It is very hard for this type of abuser to change. They abuse because it achieves the result they need, control. They generally charm then abuse and repeat this cycle.
There are several levels of abusive behaviour and with this type of abuser there is escalation as they require more control. It is not always physical abuse but there is a definitive cycle. With a consistent escalation. It is deliberate and patterned. It repeats and it is predictable. It doesn't start suddenly in midlife, it begins from childhood and is lifelong. These abuses blame those they abuse and it is in their interest to have a source of narcissist supply. In other words the abuse makes the abuser feel good and better about themselves. When thwarted the abuser will often lash or intimidate to get what they need. They may even have a midlife crisis as well!
Abusers often use alcohol as a choice to excuse abuse, that too is control. They may also have addictions, and self control issues.
DB is many things, in and of itself it is that which works, providing and giving access to resources to assist in that growth, personal development and to repair marriage and relationships. It has it's philosophy and club rules. I agree Cadet that it is a Peer to Peer group, with the wisdom of crowds.
There are some situations, abuse, compulsion and addiction that require additional resources extra to DB. Abuse counselling is available but often that requires an initial acknowledgement of the abuse. A recognition of it in the sitch is essential, either by self discovery or by uncovering it through the process of DB and the discussions that follow. For me that was very traumatic and dramatic.
I am sure that with hindsight this is clear. There is a chain process through which we in peer to peer patterning help each other. I do read MLC threads and rarely do I see this escalation and pattern abuse.
Do I see abuse in many MLC sitches? Yes, I do, situational abuse, MLC starts and abuse begins, some awful behaviours too, denial of As, ranting, spewing and lying. This behaviour has a starting point and in many cases a finishing point. The type of abuse I experienced and I believe Z was also subject is not situational. These abuses will not have an end there is no crisis to be over. This is a personality issue. It traumatises and is hard to escape from. In fact my family and friends are truly relieved my M is over, in some cases warning me to be sure to protect myself in case there is revenge.
Sadly this is where I find myself, repairing myself and my very damaged sitch. It may take years to do this. The abuser feels justified in his abuse in his words 'I deserved it', and he 'doesn't care'. There is no conflict in the abuser, this wasn't a loving H who had a crisis. This was an abuser who targeted me and will go on to target another. Likely behaving in the same way. He certainly abused before.
Applying DB made the abuse much worse as it represents lack of control to the abuser. That applies to almost all techniques. The abuser enjoys the distress and confusion of the abused as it represents more control. So in that sense DB did work as it created so much distress that the abuse became evident even to me.
I need DB and I want to recover, this recovery is only just beginning. It may take many years to rebuild from the trauma and I need every tool I need. I for one am prepared to pay it forward. Like Z am prepared to work with this. But I am no vet, and I am very new in recovery, I haven't pieced and my M is truly defunct. I am in love with an abuser and traumatised by the abuse.
Several times other posters have asked me to examine sitches where there is clear abuse and/or addiction. In Z case, Susanna and Ralliced for AHW? There are several posters here who are recovering from addiction and repairing their R, DBing as LBS, they too deserve all the help and support they can.
MLC is a specific condition with its own patterns with cheese less tunnels and replay. The abusers we discuss here know where the cheese is and will do everything to get it. They are not in cheese less tunnels they have all the cheese and intend to keep it all. They take away another's cheese. They don't like the WAS to walk away because they loose control of the cheese. They will keep going until they need to move on to the next source of cheese.
As Z says living in this abusive type of R is trauma and destruction.
I believe midlife in general heightens problems that all people have, and your body attack the weakest area that it can find. So an abuser that enters midlife will have worse abusive attributes, an addict will become more addicted, and so on. My mother was bipolar and her disease went off the rails in midlife. Depressive people can have the same thing, all that being said I can not see how we can do anything other than work on ourselves. I see codependent, conflict avoiding, fixers as most LBS. This leads into a fertile ground for someone to create abusive behavior.
I understand V your point of view and my question is would you have recognized an abuser before you came to DB?
If you were to ever get in another relationship would you recognize an abuser?
