How Narcissists Weaponise Their Borderline Core

Borderlines are some of the most charming, loveable and seductive people you will ever meet. Being at their side is like sitting by a fire. There’s something deeply comforting and warm about a borderline, but you also sense that, much like a fire, if you get too close, you will get burnt.

Funnily enough, narcissists come across the same way at the beginning. They direct their fire onto you, lighting up parts of you you never knew existed. Of course, in reality, you are being brought under the wing of a dragon. But none of this comes through. The narcissist remains charming and as inoffensive as anyone you’ve met.

A Dragon Without Its Armour

No narcissist is a pure narcissist. Some have psychopathic states, while others have a weaker narcissistic layer, with their grandiosity more fickle than a thin crisp chip.

Narcissists are also adaptable. They can be haughty and arrogant with someone who idealises them, but gentle and loveable with someone who needs to be softened up. If the narcissist senses someone has low self-esteem, they will attract that person by remaining warm and attuned, knowing how easily such a person can get startled and run away.

A narcissist knows when to put on their grandiose false self like a suit of armour, and when to take it off and wear something more casual instead: Their borderline self.

When narcissists are in their borderline, they tend to be more feeling and vulnerable. Under candlelight with a new lover, they have little need to feel threatened. In such a state, their emotionality becomes real.

Borderlines feel emotions and possess empathy. Often too much of it. In the case of the narcissist, when their emotions threaten to overwhelm them, they can immediately put their suit of armour back on, reverting to their narcissistic state. This offers the narcissist a level of protection the borderline does not have.

Unlike the borderline with no skin, the narcissist can resort to being unfeeling and unempathetic at any time. That way they can remain detached from the plight of others, and with that, protect themselves from pain. In this way, the narcissist is luckier than the borderline.

So while a narcissist is mostly unfeeling and unempathetic, they can still access their borderline state when the threat is low and their idealisation of the other person is high. This makes them exceptionally dangerous to anyone who dates them.

When the narcissist displays a level of warmth and emotionality which is real, they soften up their target and deepen the attachment. Paired with love bombing, this can cause an impressionable target to fall quickly. Once the narcissist’s darker elements rise to the surface and the trauma bond sets in, the target is trapped.

Turning The Narcissist’s Weapon Against Them

The telltale sign of a narcissist being in their borderline is to pay attention to how they behave with someone other than you. Do they switch their warmth off when outside of your shared bubble?

Watch out for narcissists in a community which is also enclosed in a bubble. With lowered threat in their immediate environment, they may remain open and charming with everyone around them. Yet everyone needs to face the harsh world at some point.

The most powerful way to rock the narcissist’s cage is to challenge your fantasy-fuelled bubble. Express your wishes for more, or call them out on something. Refuse to go along with their demands, and politely state that you would like to do something else for a change. Any normal person would be fine with that, and will likely move quickly to compromise with you. Even a borderline would be glad to cooperate with someone who is offering to lead for a change.

The narcissist is a different beast, however. They are a dragon. The second you challenge their agenda, and introduce your needs and wishes into the bubble, they will switch off their borderline mode. Their fire might simply switch off. The room will turn ice cold, and you will be met with the real narcissist. They might also develop a fire-breathing rage, and attack you with it.

This is when you will have a difficult decision to make.