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The Relationship Coaching Institute

Identity Loss: Identification with a Victim

& Borderline Personality Disorder

Relationships play a dominant and crucial role in our lives. Healthy relationships show caring, support, and respect for human equality and dignity. Unhealthy relationships often show dependence.

Identity Loss in Human Relationship Systems

The members of a relationship system act in ways to stabilize the system following a set of overt and covert rules. These rules control conflict and security. And where there are rules - there is loss of freedom and choice.

In some relationship systems, the cost of stability may be the loss of freedom and choice. This lack of freedom includes, totalitarian, military and prison systems - and dysfunctional families. Homeostasis in dysfunctional systems roles may require sickness, disability, exile or death. Disease has a function.

As choice is replaced by compulsion and compliance - members of a dysfunctional system unconsciously fulfill their roles - and lose their individual identity. This is systemic identity loss.

Systemic Identity Loss can be divided into:

  • Identity Bonds - behavior is bonded by fear of loss
  • Identification - behavior is identified with another person
  • Identity Conflict - behavior is sequentially identified with two people
  • Lost Identity - behavior is dissociated and lacks references to a sense of "self"
  • Identity Bonds refer to deep belief and emotions that bond a person to a system

Identification in a Relationship system

Identification refers to the unconscious acceptance of a dominant personality - either temporarily or existentially.

Children learn by identifying with people - and adults try to make sense of a senseless life. Many people act as if they are partially identified with other people. Identified people may feel normal, even when acting in ways that other people consider abnormal.

Are you identified?

If you are identified, you may feel something or somebody in or around or close to you that somehow directs your behavior and may feel protective. You may feel a sense of guidance and protection - not an invading entity.

Personality identification follows systemic rules...

  • A victim identified person expresses chronic anger or rage
  • A dead person identified person expresses chronic sadness or melancholy
  • A hero identified person expresses chronic fear or anxiety attacks

The symptoms are often easy to perceive – a victim identified person is generally suspicious and may enjoy annoying people; a dead person identified person is generally melancholy and may be obsessed with death; and a hero identified person is generally anxious and may avoid any type of change.

An identified person feels most intensely when expressing the unexpressed emotions of a role model. These emotional expressions may come as a massive relief, although perhaps with awareness of unpleasant consequences to come. An identified person may describe an experience of "rightness in a wrong world".

Reality Check

You said that my symptoms indicated that I might have "identified" with a dead person ... yes, my dead grandpa felt totally "me" - he felt more me than myself. AP

Identity Loss may be called Personality Disorder

Symptoms called personality disorders are often learned behaviors that helped survival, but are no longer appropriate. Personality disorders are different to behaviors caused by organic brain dysfunction.

Some people diagnosed with Personality Disorder show symptoms similar to those called Victim Identification in systemic coaching - complete with disabling identity beliefs and age regressed behavior typical of PTSD.

People with symptoms described as personality disorders can be difficult to coach until they are certain that they can trust you. Building trust is a primary coaching goal.

Soulwork systemic coaching can help motivated adults who wish to control these symptoms live an orderly life, set realistic goals and make realistic plans.

Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD)

A person diagnosed with BPD may experience intense anger, depression and anxiety for a few hours. These may be associated with episodes of aggression, self-injury, risky sex and drug or alcohol abuse.

People diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder often fear abandonment rooted in childhood trauma of abuse and/or neglect). They often believe themselves to be fundamentally bad, or unworthy.

They may frequently change long-term goals, career plans, jobs, friendships and values.

Some people with symptoms associated with Borderline Personality Disorder also show symptoms of other personality disorders.

Causes of Borderline Personality Disorder

Both environmental and genetic factors may predispose people to BPD symptoms. Many people with BPD report abuse, neglect, separation, or sexual abuse, usually by a non-caregiver. Adults with BPD are often the victim of violence or rape.

Treatment of Borderline Personality Disorder

Medications are often prescribed based on symptoms. Antidepressant drugs and mood stabilizers may be prescribed for depressed and/or unstable people. Antipsychotic drugs may be prescribed when there are distortions in thinking. Group and individual therapy helps many people.

Symptoms associated with Borderline Personality Disorder

  • suspicious and irritable
  • extreme mood swings (but not bipolar)
  • feel misunderstood and mistreated
  • unpleasant feelings of boredom and emptiness
  • self-destructive (may help control feelings)
  • see people as victims or victimizers
  • if they see you as a a victim, they manipulate you
  • avoids being alone
  • if they see you as a victimizer - they punish you
  • little sense of self - or of boundaries
  • fear of intimacy and partnership
  • prefer codependent relationships
  • relationship bond - "I am unworthy of love"
  • cannot make stable long-term goals

We note that people may show one of three types of behavior: Passive, Aggressive and Passive-Aggressive. Passive behavior is more often shown by women, while aggressive behavior is more often male. And some people are too afraid to show their anger - see Passive Aggressive

Passive Aggressive
  • avoids attention - they survived abuse by hiding and keeping a low profile
  • dependent, clings to helpers
  • prefer chaos to peace
  • focuses on feeling worthless
  • focus on the urgency of their needs
  • seeks attention - they survived abuse by being defiant and rebellious
  • manipulative, perhaps paranoid
  • pushes most people away
  • loners and rebels
  • focus on people's imperfections

There is a societal trend to look outside conventional medicine for answers to health care problems. While conventional medicine is preferred in emergencies, Systemic Solutions helps people prevent and resolve chronic symptoms, often as a supplement to conventional medicine.

Systemic Solutions for people with Victim Identification

  1. Gain trust (not easy - they may be the most suspicious people you meet)
  2. (Until you build trust, expect resistance to your assistance)
  3. Help them voice objections and disagreements
  4. Create clear and concise agreements so that they know exactly what to expect
  5. Agree to help them identify their goals (goalwork)
  6. Systemic diagnosis - gently expose their emotional reality
  7. Dissolve victim identification as a priority
  8. Dissolve limiting relationship bonds (beliefs about unworthiness etc)
  9. Dissolve trauma in which the identification and bonds were created

Consult your physician about any opinions or recommendations about medical symptoms or other medical questions.

Do you want relationship coaching or systemic coach training? We can train you to coach individuals, partners and teams to resolve a wide range of emotional, educational and relationship challenges.

Copyright © Martyn Carruthers 2005, 2009 All rights reserved.

Recommended reading: "Life at the Border" by Dr. Heller


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The Relationship Coaching Institute
 
 
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+1 808 328 9570

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Workshop

Systemic Coach Training  (Calendar)

Systems 1 How to evaluate relationship dynamics and recognize common entanglements
Systems 2 How to define life goals, identify blocks, resolve objections & plan for success
Systems 3 How to provide or continue goalwork using interactive metaphors and Dreamwork
Systems 4 How to dissolve the consequences of abuse and trauma, and rebuild motivation
Systems 5 How to change limiting beliefs and codependence for emotional freedom
Systems 6 How to recognize and resolve identity loss: recover lost qualities and lost skills
Systems 7 How to resolve therapist or spiritual damage and provide inspirational mentorship
Systems 8 How to coach partners to build lasting happiness and avoid partnership breakdown
Systems 9 How to coach parents to resolve family problems and to set and enjoy family goals
Systems 10 How to coach team leaders to develop teams while solving team problems
Specialty Advanced workshops and specialty training tailored to fulfill your goals and needs

Copyright © Martyn Carruthers 1996-2009 All rights reserved. These Systemic Solutions were primarily developed by Martyn Carruthers. We coach and train people to succeed by solving emotional and relationship problems. This information is for your general knowledge only. Please consult a physician about medical conditions and before changing any medical treatment. Link to our pages, but get Martyn's written permission to post or publish his work.

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