How Do People with Cluster B Disorders Perceive the Feelings and Emotions of Others?
We perceive so much more than we think we do.
Not just the Cluster Bs. Everybody. We perceive and understand —
So much more than we know.
I’ve always been a big fan of Miss Marple. How someone would come to her with a mystery, she’d pull out her mental Rolodex, relate it to some seemingly unrelated resident of her very small town and —
Ta da.
Mystery solved.
And I think we’re all a lot like that.
So, this morning, someone made a comment on one of my comments. My comment had been a good one, even the post’s author had liked it. And it had meant something to a lot of people because it sort of stuck up for someone a lot of people might not have found terribly sympathetic. And then comes along —
A wasp.
And I don’t mind someone disagreeing with something I say. But wasps have a way of doing it —
In a very specific way.
So, it bothered me —
In a very specific way.
That I recognized.
So, I looked at this person’s profile and there were some red flags. And then I consulted my —
Mental Rolodex.
And there it was.
Aunt Edna.
Covert malignant narcissist.
Intrusive
Dominating
Shaming
But in a covert way.
So, she’d sort of sting and run. While her overt malignant narcissist brothers —
Never ran.
They stuck around.
For the fun.
She was a sniper.
They were the front lines.
And they were all different from the sociopaths. Who were almost —
Jovial.
But don’t cross them. Because —
And they would.
So, I recognized the pattern. But I also recognized the feeling. Because as I was reading this person’s answers, my chest was tightening up. And there was a clenching in my gut. And I felt like I was —
Retreating.
My body was —
Physically.
Pulling away from my phone.
So, my mind knew.
But my body knew too.
And that’s what I mean when I say —
We perceive so much more than we think we do.
And I was right. My mind and my body were right. As I investigated further. And at least on paper. This person seemed very much like a covert malignant narcissist. They had the family history. They had the attitude. They had the attitude toward their family —
Both past and present.
They fit my perceptions of what a covert malignant narcissist is.
And my mind —
And my body.
Perceived that from two sentences.
They had written as a comment.
So.
My experience with a particular type of person prepared me for encountering that particular type of person again.
But.
It also made me hypervigilant to that particular type of person.
In a way that probably isn’t useful.
Because it was a comment. A throwaway comment. On a comment. On a Quora post. And —
Anyway?
But that’s the way Cluster Bs perceive and understand the feelings and emotions of other people. In a way that’s —
Sometimes.
Too much.
And too personal.
The people with ASPD are always looking for someone to —
Get one over on them.
The narcissists are always looking for someone to dominate them.
Or
Hurt their feelings.
And the Borderlines are always looking for someone —
Not to like them.
Which makes them supersensitive to slights.
And —
Often.
Although correct about underlying motivations.
Too sensitive to those motivations.
And so constantly overreacting.
To things that don’t really matter.
This article originally appeared on Quora.
