shakespeare,

A lot of people diagnosed with BPD are high achievers and they have often made it a point to "self empower with knowledge and skills" too. I bet that many of them get so they are well read and thrist for knowledge the way you have discribed about yourself too. However, all of that effort doesn't help the hole of understanding and being comfortable with "intimacy and love". It doesn't mean they are not empathetic or can't feel sadness when viewing a movie that shows sad things that take place. The truth is they "know" first hand the pain, but they never were able to experience the comfort to overcome with another, it just was not provided for them somehow. What typically happens is they begin to feel "apathy" when they get near that kind of scenario and it can get so uncomfortable for them that they "push it away" in unhealthy ways or they just don't "connect" because it feels so uncomfortable to them, unsafe and exposed. It's very sad really, because if you know what to look for, you can see that child in them that wanted it so very much and truly deserved it. That is "an injury" and not the same thing as NPD. It only "appears" that way because of the tendency to be "self absorbed".

When I was little my father was this "authority" that we were supposed to fear. I liked my father and decided I wanted to know him better so I braved it and climbed onto his lap and cuddled him. What I learned by doing that is that "he really was very receptive" and because of that I could get to know him even "more". My two siblings remained "afraid" of him and were a bit jealous that "I" could get close to him. My father was a very deep soulful man and he was always reading and learning and could be "self absorbed", but he was receptive too, if you knew how. I have no idea what made me so brave that way, but, I seemed to learn that some people need to have someone that can be able to reach out to them "first" and that they don't seem to know how to do that part themselves. Well, later on I had learned that my father didn't really have that happen to him growing up. His father was an alcoholic and his mother ran away when he was only around 12 or thirteen. Well, it must have been very dysfunctional in his home for his mother to abandon him and his sister and I did learn that his father was a "mean" drunk.

My father didn't physically abuse my mother, but he was often very critical towards her and "controlling and possessive". He didn't really know "how" to talk to my mother and still doesn't so my mother was very lonely. Although, I was there for her too paying attention to what was important to her and helping her and appreciating her as she did deserve to be appreciated. Oh, my father performed his designated duties and mother did hers, but that was "societal" structure and not really a "true" loving and caring relationship. I did see father "try" to be caring too, but unfortunately my mother tended to punish him by telling him he needed to be that way more etc, instead of just building on the efforts that he "did" try to make.

IMHO, if someone is "hurt" by criticism, it doesn't mean they have "no empathy", it means they are just "hurt". It means that it requires some "digging" with the "right kind of therapist" to help that person find that hurt and finally learn to "heal".

Anyone can learn all about the "labels" and what might appear to be symptoms of those labels and call themselves "psychiatrists or psychologists", but that doesn't mean that person is truely "qualified" to be able to "see the hurt" and focus on that instead of some damn "label".

OE