And I’m super excited to be here with Sam Vaknin, who is the author of “Malignant Self-Love: Narcissism Revisited,” and he’s also a professor of psychology.-

Thank you for the plug.

Thank you for having me.

Excited to be here.

Shall we?

Let’s do it, yeah.

Let’s talk about covert borderline.

I’m eager to learn from you.

Yeah.

Covert borderline is a suggested diagnosis. It’s not accepted yet. It’s a diagnosis that I suggested.

My second, by the way, I proposed another diagnosis 25 years ago, inverted narcissist, which later became a subspecies of covert narcissism.

So this is the second diagnosis I’m proposing.

And the reason I’m proposing it is because there is a hole. There is a lacuna. There’s a gap between the classic narcissist and the classic borderline. There are borderlines who are very, very narcissistic. They are very grandiose, for example. They are not self-harming. They are glib. They are defiant, etc.

So there are borderlines who cannot be diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder. They don’t meet all the criteria, but they have very pronounced narcissistic traits and behaviors.

Lenn Sperry called it narcissistic style.

So these are borderlines with a narcissistic style or a narcissistic overlay.

Now, this is most common among men who are diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. Less among women.

So there was this gap.

And the diagnostic criteria in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, including the latest text revision published a few months ago, don’t cater to this gap. They don’t describe narcissistic borderlines.

The diagnostic criteria capture a sliver of women, capture a sliver of borderline personality disorder, which is essentially the emotionally dysregulated borderline.

But there are other types of borderlines.

And I try to plug this all by suggesting the diagnosis.-

What I think is interesting is trying to understand if the covert borderline is a hybrid, what elements are psychopathy? What elements belongs to narcissism? And do they take on more qualities of covert narcissism or classic or possibly both?-

No, they are mostly, they borrow traits and behaviors and the psychodynamic of overt plastic narcissism.

Grandiose, used to be known grandiose phallic narcissism.

So no, there are no covert elements in covert borderline, no covert narcissistic elements, in covert borderline.

The reason I coined the phrase covert borderline is because they can easily be mistaken for narcissists.

But they have very pronounced and strong elements of borderline.

For example, they’re emotionally dysregulated. So which is the main feature of borderline personality disorder.

Now narcissists are not emotionally dysregulated because narcissists don’t have access to positive emotions. And so narcissists are never overwhelmed by emotions.

The covert borderline is overwhelmed by emotions, does drown in his own emotions, gets dysregulated, acts out, etc. by the classic borderline.

But is often mistaken for a classic narcissist because for example, he’s very grandiose. He is very ambitious. He’s usually very successful and loquacious, eloquent. He is the center of attention. He is the life of the party and so on and so forth. So it’s extremely easy to mistake him for a narcissist, which he is not.

Now there are these one element common to covert borderline in the covert narcissist. And that’s pseudo humility.

Covert borderline is ostentatiously modest. Is in your face humble. He emphasizes his humility and modesty, renders them ostentatious and open, and leverages his humility, pseudo humility, it’s fake, leverages his humility and modesty to obtain essentially narcissistic supply.

So this is common to the covert borderline and the covert narcissist, but that’s more or less the only thing that’s common.-

If a covert borderline is emotionally dysregulated and acting out, would that be considered narcissistic rage or that’s just the acting out of the borderline element?

Narcissistic rage is not about emotions. That’s a very common mistake.

The word rage is very misleading. Or actually the word rage is appropriate because it’s not anger. Anger is an emotion.

Narcissists don’t experience anger. They experience rage.

And the difference between the two is the following.

Anger is intended to modify the behaviors of people around you. When you are angry, you’re trying to influence or affect people who frustrate you in order to induce them to not frustrate you anymore. Anger is a signal, is a form of communication.

Rage has nothing to do with the environment. Rage is intended to restore an internal equilibrium, an internal balance by engaging in displays that restore grandiosity.

Like if the grandiosity of the narcissist is challenged or undermined, he would rage so as to demonstrate his superiority or his ability to harm other people, his power, his omnipotence.

So actually the rage is intended to convince the narcissist that he is still superior in some way. It’s a form of internal dialogue, not external dialogue. The rage is intended to eliminate sources of frustration, not to modify their behaviors.

So there’s a very clear distinction between rage and anger. And rage has nothing to do with emotion and dysregulation. It has to do with cognitive distortions.

The narcissist perceives reality wrongly, filters it through his grandiosity and inflated fantastic self-image. And then he needs to protect this, to defend this by raging.

The rage restores his sense of Godlike omnipotence.-

Speaking about interpersonal communication, something I personally observed in a covert borderline was perceiving slights, disappointments, hurts, making accusations of someone being a liar or withholdingalmost a paranoia.

So is that because the court borderline is also looking through the lens of a distorted reality?

Like what elements of those issues belong to classic narcissism or BPD?-

Yeah, again, there is a lot of confusion between paranoia and hypervigilance.

Hypervigilance is typical of both overt and covert molasses.

Hypervigilance involves scanning the environment, other peoplefor perceived slights and insults, reframing input from the environment, speech acts, gestures, laughter, reframing these cues that emanate from the environment in a way that could be perceived as humiliating, shaming, insulting, etc. This is hypervigilance.

Paranoia is something completely different. Paranoia is the belief that you are sufficiently important to attract and to warrant malevolent attention.

In other words, paranoia or paranoid ideation, to be more precise, is a grandiose defense, a narcissistic defense. It is part and parcel of grandiose.

The paranoid believes that it is important enough to attract the attention of the CIA. So it’s a form of self-aggrandizement.

Nowthe covert borderline is paranoid, but he is not hypervigilant. And the reason the covert borderline is not hypervigilant is because, as distinct as opposed to the narcissist, the covert borderline has an internal locus of control.

In other words, he tends to believe that he is in control of his own destiny, that his decisions and choices matter, that he’s able to influence his life and direct it appropriately, that he’s not subject to outside forces that conspire to put him down and so on and so forth. So he is not hypervigilant. He doesn’t scan for insults and so on and so forth.

And when he is paranoid, it’s paranoia with an internal locus of control. Sofor example, the covert borderline can say, I know that I hurt him. I know that I hurt someoneand now he’s gonna take revenge on me. It’s a form of paranoia, but with internal locus of control, I made it happen. I made it happen.

If there is a conspiracy against me, it’s because I’m really doing something wrong. If someone takes revenge on me because I deserve it, I had it coming. I’m still in control, I’m still in charge.

I actually am a puppet master. I control people. I make them do things, including make them venture.

So these are subtle distinctions between the covert borderline and the narcissist, both overt and covert.

This is a covert borderline is not a narcissist. He’s not a narcissist. He’s grandiose mostly and resembles a narcissist.

But in very important ways, he’s distinct from classic and covert narcissism, sufficiently distinct to warrant or to justify a separate diagnosis.

So to be very clear, the covert borderline is not the same as a borderline who is also a narcissist.

We have comorbidities. We have many borderlines who are also diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder.

The comorbidity of borderline personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder is very high. We often diagnose these two disorders in the same person, but that’s not a covert borderline.

A covert borderline is a grandiosenear psychopathic borderline with the emphasis on the grandiosity.

While all borderlines are grandiose, in the covert borderline, grandiosity is a regulatory mechanism. It is a cognitive distortion that regulates the internal environment of the borderline, of the covert borderline.

So it’s very crucial, this grandiosity.

And in this sense, it’s similar to the narcissism, but that’s where the similarities start.-

What function does the grandiosity serve to protect the covert borderline?

Like I researched in some of your work, if I understand it correctly, the narcissist doesn’t really have an ego. There’s nothing there, right?

So what about the covert borderline?-

Similarly, the covert borderline is a false shirt. Exactly like the classic borderline. Classic borderline also has a false shirt.

And all three of them engage in fantasy, which leads me to the questions that you send me.

All three of them engage in fantasy.

The difference is the type of fantasy.

The narcissist fantasy is a shared fantasy. It’s a fantasy that involves another personand that person is allocated a role. And that person is supposed to fulfill the role, to conform to an image of that person in the narcissist mind that had been idealized.

So both members, both participants in the classic narcissist shared fantasy are equally important and equally crucial to the maintenance of the fantasy.

The borderline is a fantasy that involves her intimate partner, regulating her emotions, stabilizing her moods and generally serving as a rock around which she can construct a stable and safe life.

So her fantasy is other oriented.

In effect, the borderline does not see herself in the fantasy at all. The fantasy is 100% focused on her intimate partner. She disappears into the intimate partner. She merges and fuses with the intimate partner. And that’s why she develops engulfment anxiety or enmeshment anxiety.

This is the borderline’s fantasyis to disappear, to vanish. It’s a kind of death wish. It is sublimated suicide, suicide by intimate partner.

It’s like if the borderline finds the perfect intimate partner, she can rest in peace because he’s gonna take over her mind. He’s gonna stabilize her moods. He’s gonna make her feel safe. He’s gonna regulate her emotions. She might as well be in a vegetative state, in common because she outsources, relegates all internal functions to the intimate partner. That’s her fantasy.

The narcissist, as I said, is an intimate partner within a fantastic space. And both of them are collaborating in this shared fantasy. They’re both each other’s mother in effect. This is something I call dual mothership.

The covert borderline is a borderline.

First and foremost is a borderline.

So the covert borderline fantasy also focuses on the intimate partner. Exactly like the classic borderline.

Classic borderline fantasy is centered around the intimate partner.

The covert borderline is the same.

His fantasy revolves around the intimate partner and includes only the intimate partner.

And the fantasy is ideal, everlasting love.

That’s the covert borderline fantasy.

The narcissist shared fantasy is not about love.

It’s a common mistake.

The narcissist shared fantasy is about mothering, is looking for a mother.

So to summarize, the narcissist is looking for a mother.

The borderline is looking for external regulation, someone who will take over her mind.

And the covert borderline is looking for ideal love, essentially.-

Is there the same element of shared fantasy, limited fantasy?

Like what happens if someone starts to break away from the covert borderline fantasy of everlasting love?

Because it’s not working.

Maybe they’re seeing the emotional dysregulation. They’re seeing the crazy making. They start to pull away.

Is that the same?-

Nothing much.

The reaction of the covert borderline is much more subdued than even the reaction of the narcissist.

So narcissist can experience mortification in the wake of a shared fantasy that broke up. They broke up.

Borderline definitely falls apart. She decouples and says she loses her defenses. She begins to act out. She becomes a secondary psychopath. She does horrible things, definitely.

The covert borderline is very nonchalant about this. It’s very, you know, because the covert borderline’s fantasy is not about the ideal love, not the specific lover.

The ideal love. So he’s gonna say, okay, it didn’t work with this one. I’m gonna try it with the next one. It’s the ideal love that is invested. He’s in love with ideal love, never with any person.

So he switches among intimate partners very fast, much faster than the narcissist. So he will have a much larger number of intimate partners over the lifespan.

The investment in the intimate partner will be shallow. The narcissist’s investment in the intimate partner is intense, is huge.

The narcissist has extreme cathect, extreme emotional investment in the partner. That’s why the narcissist love bonds, love bonds, and you know, because there’s a huge investment in the intimate partner.

The borderline even more.

But the covert borderline is very shallow investment, if any, and switches very easily between, you know, between intimate partners.

Actually, he doesn’t have intimate partners. He’s in love with love.-

Is there still a grooming phase, any element of love bombing?

Can you talk about devaluing, discarding cycles?-

The covert borderline is seductive, glibly seductive. So he’s bound to be flirtatious, is very socially charming, is charismatic. So he resembles very much, if I have to make a comparison, he resembles the somatic narcissist. He is cold, he is greedily seductive, he’s promiscuous. His sexual life is uninhibited. He’s likely to be into kink and more. His relationships are unstable, including his marriage. He’s much more likely to be invested in his children than in his spouse, for example.

So the narcissist would go through a phase of love bombing and the psychopath would go through a phase of grooming. And the borderline would go through a phase of idealizing, extremely idealizing a partner, and uninhibited, or disinhibited sex.

But the covert borderline would simply flirt, minimally invest, seduce, and then move on, more or less. It’s a butterfly, it’s like the wind, a player, effectively a player, or as the British used to say 100 years ago, a cad, you know, C-A-D.

So that’s the covert borderline.

That creates dissonance in the covert borderline, because he once, he pursues ideal love. That’s his obsession, his obsession is ideal love, his fantasy is ideal love.

But he is not willing or able to invest in a relationship to reach the stage of an ideal love. He expects to have an ideal love on a first date.

And that’s why typically he would have sex and he would do everything within a first date. Because he believes in serendipity, serendipity, like fortuitous, it’s gonna be fortuitous. He’s gonna find ideal love by accident. It’s meant to be, it’s written in the stars, you know? One day he’s gonna walk into a bar and she’s gonna be there.

And hard work, hard labor is the antithesis, it’s the opposite of ideal love.

Because ideal love is a cosmic force. It’s very, it involves a lot of magical thinking.

And you know, if you have to work hard, to flirt, to court, to, you know, that negates the idea of ideal love. Because ideal love is spontaneous, it’s instantaneous. It’s like fireworks, it just erupts. It’s a force that puts two people together and it’s irresistible. It’s a very infantile perception of object relations and love, of course.

And so the Cauffier borderline, exactly like the Mouses, is very mature, very infantile, and developmentally arrested.