I was thinking about this topic, as a person with borderline personality disorder I’ve heard lots of relationships advice, and about self improvement and getting better before dating, and loving myself etc.
And honestly part of me sometimes still feels like I’m scamming people into getting attatched to me so they can suffer like it has happened and like how bpd stigma says it does.
And it makes sense in a way for a healthy dating environment that it’s in the best interest of everyone to date mentally healthy people, but there was this person I dated many years ago that I still think is the most beautiful person I’ve ever met (as in personality), who also wasn’t perfect, but that was the most perfect for me.
Loving someone’s imperfections sounds romantic, but loving someone’s imperfections that may be “symptoms of something” doesn’t sound as romantic or healthy or valid generaly.
On one hand It doesn’t sound harmful if that kind of love doesn’t become an obstacle to the other person getting better, but also doesn’t seem very natural to love this way a person that would be different if they didn’t have problem or illness X.
Maybe this is the type of reasoning I constructed because of still having a hard time believing I should be loved, but I have loved others like me, does anyone have a take on this?
I don’t think it matters being loved or feeling loved, if I think it isn’t natural and that I myself only do it because I see myself in others and am trying to show myself subcounsciously that it’s possible and genuine.
Going back to that person I mentioned, even if it didn’t work out I still think it was the most I loved someone to this day despite all the other healthier loves I had, and I don’t understand why.
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I think it’s pretty natural to love aspects of others that may cause problems within ourselves. We want to feel on the same wavelength to those we love; that they’ll understand and possibly accept those parts of us, even when they’re causing us problems.
Maybe it depends on your conception of mental illness – if you think of it as some alien thing that’s separate from your personality and can be eliminated with successful treatment, then getting attached to it within others is going to cause issues. If you think mental illness is the result of one’s natural tendencies becoming unbalanced, and that those tendencies will always be there to some extent even with treatment, then I think it makes more sense to love that within a person.
An example would be: I generally like shy, introverted women. I myself have extreme issues with social avoidance. But I still find that I like those aspects of them even when they’re managing them in a mentally healthy way. So it’s the difference between illness and personality type.
“If you think mental illness is the result of one’s natural tendencies becoming unbalanced (…) then I think it makes more sense to love that within a person.”
I like that, It makes sense to me from that perspective. :] I don’t think mental illness defines a person and mine doesn’t define me too, and It’s also not something I search or account for in people i meet.
Thinking more about this topic it seems like my dificulty reasoning this way is more an issue of me having trouble accepting that I can really be loved (despite being loved anyway) and tying to convince myself it’s because of this or that, and then in the end things don’t add up
I guess it’s a good sign if you can recognise that’s what’s going on for you.