Bunnygirl

"LOL, I wasn't surprised at the spelling. You just seem to have a curious nature and good insights to contribute. I guess that doesn't line up with my preconception of a below average IQ."

Thank you, I love hearing things like this. I'm always self-conscious about how I come across to other people so it's nice hear this type of thing. IRL all I've ever heard people say is how "stupid" and "slow" I am so it really helps.

"As for the NPD, thanks for sharing. I don't think NPD is evil;"

We need more people like you. The people I've spoken to online are more understanding then I thought they would been considering how stigmatised it is. Ironically enough my NPD makes me very ashamed of myself. I think a lot about what other people would think of if they knew about the diagnosis so it's so nice to see people being so understanding. I just wish more people could look beyond my mental health and see me for the person I really am.

"I just think there's a lot about it that I don't understand. I was in a very long term relationship quite a while back with someone who has diagnosed BPD, and that was a very difficult relationship to navigate until I couldn't keep going in it. Unsurprisingly, she had an abusive childhood and the mental abuse filtered down to me. I'm not angry about that so much as sad that she wasn't able to seek or accept help."

That's ok, you not a psychologist after all. BPD is a difficult condition and it's ok if you just couldn't go on with the relationship.

"My next relationship after her has been to someone who I consider to be a very good person, but who has a lot of health problems and coming out of that has told me that she has dissociative disorder,"

Disassociative identity disorder is not a real thing but ok.

"which she describes like seeing the world through a thick sheet of glass. She's good to me, but I find that there's an underlying thread there where she doesn't seem able to realize how cutting her opinions can be to others, as she simply presents them as 'honesty', to a level that I find upsetting (and hey, no saint here - I've got my own stuff too). There seems to be a lack of empathy there in being able to acknowledge other people's best efforts if they fall short of her standards. I'm not certain that she has NPD, but given my attraction to the previous person with BPD, it may be that I unconsciously have a 'type'."

Women... Am I right? She seems to lack social awareness but not necessarily empathy. I don't really have empathy but I can understand what is and isn't a socially acceptable thing to do or say and from what I've heard she doesn't have any of the other NPD traits like need for admiration, sensitivity to criticism and fantasizing of success.

"I'd be interested if you could elaborate on what you were saying about having bars between you and humanity."

I did in the original post. It was something I heard somewhere else. Having NPD is like having a barrier between you and everyone else. All I think about is myself and all I talk about is myself. Everyone else is like a secondary character and it's hard for me to empathize or care about them. I can like someone and I can understand when there sad but I can't empathize with them. When I was 12 my grandma died and I felt sad for a bit but I got over it in like 2 days and I didn't understand why the rest of my family cared that much. It's a problem I've had all my life and that's a hard thing to admit with NPD. I remember when my therapist told I had NPD I didn't believe him for months. I thought it must have been a misdiagnosis because it was hard to believe I had something as awful as NPD. Over time I came to terms with my diagnosis and I now understand that this isn't normal and that there's something deeply wrong with me.