The Push-Pull Dynamic in BPD Relationships: A Therapist's Guide
The push-pull dynamic in BPD relationships is driven by two simultaneous, contradictory fears: the terror of abandonment AND the terror of engulfment. The person with BPD desperately craves closeness and is simultaneously terrified of it — creating a cycle of pulling their partner close, then pushing them away. For the non-BPD partner, this erodes your sense of reality over time.
Too Close, Too Far — There Is No Safe Zone
THE PUSH-PULL DYNAMIC
Push-Pull Dynamic: A relational pattern characterized by oscillation between desperate closeness and sudden withdrawal. The person driving it simultaneously craves intimacy and fears it — so they pull their partner in to soothe abandonment panic, then push them away when closeness triggers engulfment panic. In kitchen table terms: you are never quite close enough, never quite far enough, and the goalposts never stop moving — because they’re not actually about you.
FEAR OF ENGULFMENT
Fear of Engulfment: The less-discussed counterpart to the BPD fear of abandonment. Because the person with BPD has a fragile or unstable sense of self, extreme closeness can feel like being consumed — as if they will lose themselves entirely inside the relationship. The more intimate things become, the more they panic that you now have the power to destroy them. So they push you away as an act of self-preservation. In plain terms: the closeness that was supposed to save them starts to feel like a threat to their very existence.
Let me tell you about Michael (name and details changed for confidentiality). He was thirty-four, a software engineer in Miami, and he came to therapy because he felt like he was failing his fiancée, Elena.
“I can’t find the right distance,” he told me, looking exhausted. “If I go out with my friends on a Friday night, she texts me constantly, crying, saying I don’t care about her and I’m abandoning her. So the next weekend, I stay home and plan a romantic dinner just for us. And halfway through the dinner, she picks a fight, tells me I’m suffocating her, and locks herself in the bedroom. I’m either too far away or too close. There’s no safe zone.”
Michael was trapped between the two core terrors of BPD: the fear of abandonment and the fear of engulfment.
The Fear of Abandonment: This is the most well-known feature of BPD. It’s a profound, existential terror of being left alone. To the borderline brain, abandonment doesn’t just mean sadness — it means annihilation. To soothe this terror, they pull you in close.
The Fear of Engulfment: Because the borderline individual lacks a cohesive sense of self, extreme closeness feels like being consumed. They fear that if they merge with you entirely, they will cease to exist — or that you will discover how “flawed” they are and destroy them. To soothe this terror, they push you away.
The push-pull dynamic is the borderline individual’s desperate, impossible attempt to find a safe distance between these two terrors.
The Pull: The Desperate Need for a Savior
The cycle almost always begins with the Pull.
When the borderline partner is feeling empty, dysregulated, or terrified of abandonment, they will pull you toward them with incredible intensity. This is often accompanied by the defense mechanism of splitting — specifically, splitting you “all-good.”
During the Pull phase, you’re idealized. You’re the Savior. They may demand constant communication, mirror your interests and opinions to create a sense of perfect alignment, share their deepest traumas very early in the relationship to fast-track intimacy, and tell you that you’re the only person who has ever understood them.
For the non-BPD partner, the Pull feels incredible. It feels like profound, soulmate-level love. You feel essential, adored, and deeply seen.
But the Pull isn’t about you. It’s about their need to use you as an emotional anchor to soothe their abandonment terror.
The Panic: When Closeness Becomes Dangerous
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As the Pull succeeds and you become closer, the dynamic shifts. The intimacy deepens. You become their primary attachment figure.
And this is exactly when the panic sets in.
The borderline brain realizes: Because this person is now my entire world, they have the power to destroy me if they leave. And because I’m fundamentally flawed, they will eventually realize I’m unlovable and they will leave.
Simultaneously, the fear of engulfment is triggered. The closeness that was supposed to save them now feels suffocating. They feel like they’re losing their identity in the relationship.
The anxiety becomes intolerable. The prefrontal cortex goes offline, the amygdala takes over, and the borderline partner must take immediate action to neutralize the perceived threat.
The Push: The Preemptive Strike
To protect themselves from the anticipated pain of your inevitable abandonment — or to escape the suffocating feeling of engulfment — they initiate the Push.
I’ll reject you before you can reject me.
The Push is often sudden, violent, and deeply confusing to the non-BPD partner. It’s accompanied by the “all-bad” split. You’re no longer the Savior; you’re the Betrayer.
During the Push phase, they may pick a massive fight over something trivial; accuse you of not loving them, being selfish, or being abusive; withdraw affection entirely; flirt with others or engage in reckless behavior to prove they don’t need you; or break up with you abruptly.
“The first time Elena broke up with me,” Michael recalled, “it was right after we had spent a week looking at wedding venues. We were so happy. And then we got in the car, and she just looked at me and said, ‘I can’t do this. You’re trying to trap me. I don’t even know who I am anymore.’ She made me pull over and she took an Uber home.”
The Exhaustion of the Non-BPD Partner
“She stands outside looking in, yearning for what other people take for granted. From her prison, the tiniest details of living take on a mystical beauty. In her aloneness, she fantasizes her emotions, but she has no ‘I’ with which to experience real feeling.”
— Marion Woodman, Jungian analyst and author
— Marion Woodman, Addiction to Perfection
Living inside the push-pull dynamic is psychologically devastating for the non-BPD partner.
The Illusion of the “Right” Distance: You spend all your energy trying to find the exact right distance to keep them calm — close enough to prevent the abandonment trigger, but distant enough to prevent the engulfment trigger. But because the triggers are internal to them, not external, the “right” distance doesn’t exist. It’s a moving target.
Hypervigilance: You learn to constantly scan their mood, their tone of voice, and their text messages to anticipate whether a Push or a Pull is coming. Your nervous system is in a constant state of high alert.
The Trauma Bond: The whiplash between the intense love of the Pull and the terrifying rejection of the Push creates a trauma bond. You become addicted to the intermittent reinforcement of the relationship — staying through the abuse of the Push phase just to get back to the relief of the Pull phase.
The Illusion of Control
The most dangerous trap for the non-BPD partner is the belief that you can control the dynamic by changing your behavior.
You think: If I just reassure them more, they won’t feel abandoned. Or: If I just give them more space, they won’t feel engulfed.
This is an illusion. You can’t control the push-pull dynamic because you’re not causing it.
The dynamic is a symptom of their untreated personality disorder. It’s a neurological and psychological loop playing out inside their brain. You’re simply the prop they’re using to act out the loop.
Until you accept that you have no control over their dysregulation, you will remain trapped on the rollercoaster — exhausting yourself trying to steer a ride that has no steering wheel.
How to Survive the Push-Pull
If you choose to stay in the relationship, or if you’re trying to navigate your way out of it, you must change how you interact with the dynamic.
1. Stop Chasing the Push. When they push you away, your instinct will be to chase them, reassure them, and try to pull them back. Don’t. Chasing validates their fear of engulfment and often causes them to push harder. When they push, let them go.
2. Stop Merging with the Pull. When they pull you in and idealize you, don’t lose yourself in the fantasy. Maintain your own limits, your own friendships, and your own hobbies. Don’t allow yourself to become their sole emotional regulator.
3. Hold the Limit During the Split. When the Push involves cruelty, name-calling, or abuse, you must set a firm limit. “I won’t be spoken to this way. I’m leaving the room, and we can talk when you’re calm.” Expect an extinction burst (an escalation of their behavior), but hold the line.
4. Reclaim Your Reality. Don’t let their emotional reasoning dictate your reality. Just because they feel abandoned doesn’t mean you abandoned them. Just because they feel suffocated doesn’t mean you’re controlling. Trust your own perception of events.
Professional Support and Next Steps
Navigating the push-pull dynamic of a BPD relationship requires significant support. The cognitive dissonance and the trauma bond are often too heavy to untangle alone.
When seeking a therapist for your own recovery, look for someone who understands the specific mechanics of BPD, splitting, and the push-pull cycle; who will help you rebuild your trust in your own reality; and who can help you explore why your own relational template made you susceptible to this dynamic in the first place.
Michael eventually realized he couldn’t fix Elena’s internal terrors. “I had to accept that I was never going to find the ‘safe zone,’” he told me. “The only safe zone was outside the relationship. I had to choose my own sanity over trying to cure her panic.”
If you’re exhausted from trying to find the perfect distance, I want you to know this: The game is rigged. You can’t win. You’re allowed to stop playing, step off the board, and find a relationship where love doesn’t require you to constantly calibrate your existence.
Ready to untangle this with support? You can explore trauma-informed therapy, executive coaching, or simply reach out to connect and talk about what would be most useful.
Warmly, Annie
- Linehan, Marsha M. Cognitive-Behavioral Treatment of Borderline Personality Disorder. Guilford Press, 1993.
- Porges, Stephen W. The Polyvagal Theory. W. W. Norton, 2011.
- van der Kolk, Bessel. The Body Keeps the Score. Viking, 2014.
- Fonagy, Peter. Affect Regulation, Mentalization, and the Development of the Self. Other Press, 2002.
- Herman, Judith. Trauma and Recovery. Basic Books, 1992.
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LMFT · 15,000+ Clinical Hours · W.W. Norton Author · Psychology Today ColumnistAnnie Wright is a licensed psychotherapist, relational trauma specialist, and the founder and successfully exited CEO of a large California trauma-informed therapy center. A W.W. Norton published author, she writes the weekly Substack Strong & Stable and her work and expert opinions have appeared in NPR, NBC, Forbes, Business Insider, The Boston Globe, and The Information.
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