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Megan talks with Bill about how he arrived at the high conflict personality theory and how he developed it from there.
Hosted by Bill Eddy, LCSW, Esq. and Megan Hunter, MBA, It’s All Your Fault! High Conflict People explores the five types of people who can ruin your life—people with high conflict personalities and how they weave themselves into our lives in romance, at work, next door, at school, places of worship, and just about everywhere, causing chaos, exhaustion, and dread for everyone else.
They are the most difficult of difficult people — some would say they’re toxic. Without them, tv shows, movies, and the news would be boring, but who wants to live that way in your own life!
Have you ever wanted to know what drives them to act this way?
In the It’s All Your Fault podcast, we’ll take you behind the scenes to understand what’s happening in the brain and illuminates why we pick HCPs as life partners, why we hire them, and how we can handle interactions and relationships with them. We break down everything you ever wanted to know about people with the 5 high conflict personality types: narcissistic, borderline, histrionic, antisocial/sociopath, and paranoid.
And we’ll give you tips on how to spot them and how to deal with them.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to, It's All Your Fault On True Story fm, The one and only podcast focused on high conflict human interactions, which usually involves someone with a high conflict personality. I'm Megan Hunter here with Bill Eddie.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Hi everybody.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
We are the co-founders of the High Conflict Institute in San Diego, California. In this episode, we'll talk about the high conflict personality theory that Bill created many years ago. But first, a couple of quick notes. If you have a question for our q and a sessions about your high conflict situation, send them to podcast@highconflictinstitute.com or on our website@highconflictinstitute.com slash podcast, where you'll also find the show notes and links. Please give us a rate of review and tell a friend about us, especially if they're dealing with a high conflict situation. We're very, very grateful and we're so glad you're listening. So let's talk about the high conflict personality theory. Uh, this is something that you came up with Bill and, uh, it, it's really been the foundation and the formation of everything we do at High Conflict Institute and it's really been your life's work. So, uh, we're all ears to hear about how it, you know, the, the genesis of it and, and how it's developed over the years.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Well, thank you for that. It really, I think, began for me in the nineties when I became after a therapist for years and hearing about families and started reading. And the books starting in about the 1980s, started talking about high conflict families and how they don't resolve their disputes. They just keep going, going and going. And I, because of my training and soc clinical social work, um, believe this isn't a family that's high conflict. It's a person, it's their personality. And I had been trained in personality disorders in 1980 when I was in training to become a clinical social worker. And the thing is, personalities are individual. Somebody has a personality. We all have a personality. And that personality disorders have some fundamental characteristics. The first and biggest one is it's an enduring pattern of behavior, which means the person keeps going. Then that's what personalities are for all of us, our personalities, kind of the way you think, how you manage your feelings, how you behave.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
And when you see somebody you haven't seen for 10 years, they may look a little different, maybe a different color hair or less hair, things like that. But there's still the same personality. There isn't a big change, although people do change their personality some, but people with personality disorders have a narrow range and enduring pattern of this behavior and some key characteristics. They have cognitive distortions that they see things in more, all or nothing terms. They jump to conclusions. They have emotional reasoning. And I, I worked with clients in the psychiatric hospital with personality disorders. Whenever there's a problem I had to solve, like they were, their, their spouse was gonna kick them out and I had to help them find new housing or their boss was thinking of firing them. And I worked hard to help them keep their job. And it's like every day there was a new crisis that because they were so rigid that they kept bumping against other people.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
So cognitive distortions and effective quality, which is emotions that they, emotions were out of proportion to the situation. So maybe I was five minutes late getting to the hospital to meet with my client who's residential there for a couple weeks. And they were like, Why are you late? You abandoned me. How did you do such a thing? And so I learned to expect exaggerated emotions and cognitive distortions, but also one of the big characteristics was interpersonal dysfunction and different from depression, anxiety, you know, schizophrenia, all those other disorders, personality disorders were interpersonal disorders. So they affect the people around them often in negative ways. And so I started thinking what they're calling in family court, high conflict families is really personality disorders or traits of people with these personality difficulties. And so I, I wanted to talk about behavior of course, but there's this collection of behavior that I could recognize so easily and I could, I, I knew like in family court, the judge is saying, Sir, I don't understand why you keep doing this thing that sabotages your parenting time.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
I'm gonna have to take more parenting time away cuz you keep doing this thing. Or ma'am you keep, you know, saying things to your child that are really harmful and I lectured you on that before and you keep doing it. Why is that? So I started teaching courts and lawyers and therapists and eventually we started teaching human resources rather than saying this person has a personality disorder, is this person has a pattern of high conflict behavior. It's not a diagnosis. And it helps people be practical, is focus on behavior and you can try to make behavior change, but for background it helps to understand personality disorders really are different and maybe, you know, 10% of adults in the world. And the latest diagnostic manual says about 10% of people according to several national studies. And so I tried to teach people, people that with these high conflict personality, cuz I, I, I made the focus personality and people say that I come up with that term. And I think some people may have used personality, but they mostly talked about high conflict families. I'm the one I think that made high conflict personality the focus of attention and, and the term hcp. And so for better or worse, people associate me with high conflict personality and hcp. So that's a little background is the connection with mental health and using mental health techniques to help manage these folks and maybe even help them resolve disputes and maybe even help them get better.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
I think that's really key, Bill, because you know, we've had conversations with a lot of people who have, you know, said that, you know, perhaps they, uh, you know, we, we shouldn't be labeling people. This is labeling people that, you know, it's very demonizing. And, um, you know, the longer I do the work, i i the more, the deeper it sinks in that this is truly this pattern of behavior. You know, it is sort of a personality. It's a personality and I I I, you know, I'm not saying it should be in the DSM five, maybe it should, but it shouldn't. I'm teasing. But it's, it, it is, I guess the important part is to really have an understanding that because they have this pattern of behavior, it, it requires everyone else to do things differently, right? Because they are programmed with a different set of rules that, that govern their operating system, so to speak.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
And I, I think it's so hard for many to really let that sink in and, and grasp that in, in their minds that you ha you have to do something different when something doesn't go as expected, when something doesn't go their way, when it doesn't go according to their, the rules of their operating system, they're going to go into that pattern, right? Um, that pattern of behavior of all or nothing thinking unmanaged emotions, extreme behaviors and blaming that automatic, I've, I've coined a term I think that, uh, you put in my mind a few weeks ago about the automatic, what is it? Automatic first thought,
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Oh, automatic negative, negative thought. The
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Ants, ants. Well, I translated that into automatic blaming thought, right? Mm-hmm. . And that's what the high conflict person does. So things don't go their way. They automatically blame, automatically glow into all or nothing. It's just that's how it happens. And it's, it's actually, it's just, it's how they operate. And so it behooves the rest of us, number one, to help ourselves know how to, man, we need to know how to manage this. It will bring down our stress and bring up our confidence. Number two, it is the, it's like unlocking a secret or kind of a key to help people that no one else is able to help, right? And that I think is where a lot of people get this backwards. They might get stuck on, Oh, you shouldn't use the word personality or oh, personality disorders. That's, oh, that's intense, that's serious. And yes it is, but if nothing else is helping, why not give this a try? And don't get hung up on the label, Get hung up on the, the behaviors and what you can do differently so that you can help a person that is not going to be helped by anyone else.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
You're absolutely right with that. And I think, I think the key about labeling is don't tell somebody you think they're a high conflict person or they have a personality disorder, but in your back of your mind, say, this person may be a high conflict person, which isn't a diagnosis. They may or may not have a personality disorder. That doesn't matter. It's the pattern of behavior. And so this person may have that, therefore I should adapt what I do. And that's the key. And I see so many people get frustrated, go, you know, I don't know why you're doing this, and can't you just cut it out? And if they realize this is, this is the person's personality, they lack self-awareness, they, they'd unlikely to change, especially in your single conversation, it would bring so much peace to the world. There's so much people yelling at each other about things that aren't gonna change or they're not gonna change that way. And so, and that's where like empathy, attention, respect, that, that, that technique that we use so much of the time really came from therapy and counseling. And in a lot of ways, this is parallel to helping people with, uh, alcoholism or addiction is we don't judge them, but we don't let them drive. And that's
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Right,
Speaker 2 (11:29):
Is don't judge people, but don't put them in charge of your life. That's where the trouble really comes.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
Exactly. Now, uh, are, are people with high conflict personalities typically diagnosed with a personality disorder or not?
Speaker 2 (11:46):
Yeah. Well, they're rarely because people, one thing about personality disorders is generally they're not diagnosed people. You know, someone goes to a doctor and says, I'm depressed, can you help me? And the doctor asks some questions, Yep, you fit depression and I've got some medication or counseling for you. People with personality disorders lack self awareness of their impact on others and of their personality disorder. So they won't see, they don't go to the doctor, say, Hey, I have a personality disorder. They go to the doctor and say, Can you help me deal with my nagging wife or my obnoxious husband? That's not about them. And so it's rare that people get this diagnosis, and that's why I'd recommend that we recommend that you notice patterns of behavior and adapt to what you do because you're not gonna be operating from a diagnosis, and that may never come. But in court presenting patterns of behavior and human resources, noticing patterns of behavior, this is, this is what to deal with. It's not judgemental. And that's, you know, people worry that I'm labeling people, I'm educating people, but I don't label an individual. And that's so important. I, I keep that to myself. I go, Okay, this person may be a high conflict person. I'm not gonna give that criticism. I was thinking of giving things like that.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Right. One last question. Is it all per, you know, everyone with a personality disorder, whether diagnosed or not diagnosed? Uh, do are all of them high conflict?
Speaker 2 (13:26):
No, I'd say maybe half. And what's interesting, the dsm, the manual has cluster A, cluster B, cluster C, and it's the cluster B personality disorders. And, and I'll mention it's narcissistic, borderline antisocial and history on those are the ones most associated with high conflict behavior. They may be very comfortable in conflict. And we, we've seen like in court cases, when the case is coming to an end, they try to find something else to keep it going. It's like there's a comfort, It's if they're not happy, but there's a familiarity with conflict. And so that's a characteristic and we have tips for managing each of those personalities. But a lot of people, even people with borderline north antisocial history on personalities, some are not by conflict people, they don't have a target of blame. They just, you know, create difficulty for themselves. And it's so sad. They generally don't have friends. They generally not happy. The methods they use don't work, but they can't see their part of the problem. They don't connect the dots. So I think our goal with the high conflict personality theory is help people understand and do what will be helpful for the people around the person and the
Speaker 1 (14:50):
Person themselves. It's a game changer. So thank you, Bill. That was a great explanation. And for anyone listening, I hope this has been helpful. Uh, you know, it's just understanding that high conflict personality will help you so, so very much. Um, and just remember, don't, don't be judgemental about it. Don't tell someone you think they're high conflict. Don't tell them you think they have a personality disorder. Uh, just keep those to yourselves. We call it a, a private working theory, right? Um, and I, again, it's, it is a game changer because like I said before, we, we just don't know what to do. We typically, you know, kind of run into to brick walls and, and dead ends when dealing with, uh, someone with a high conflict personality. Um, because we just, we just don't know what to do. And so what we do and everything we've, we teach at, at High Conflict Institute is about, um, learning to do things differently. Learning to stop yourself before, you know, going down that path of ending up in a big argument or, you know, kind of just getting very, very upset, um, or feeling like you have failed. And, um, you don't have to feel that way. And that's why we do what we do at High Conflict Institute. It just, it's game changing information and there's simple skills that, that we learn, but, um, they really work and can, can help a lot. So we hope you'll, you'll try them and keep listening. Thank you for listening.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Next week, uh, we'll be talking about the four, forget about it, uh, which are really one of the most important things to learn about high conflict situations. And we're getting a lot of feedback from, you know, people who take our trainings and consultations and things that this is really the most helpful, uh, thing for them. And it's a little bit different for everyone. But there are four main things you have to forget about doing when dealing with a high conflict person or high conflict situation. Otherwise, you'll get it wrong. So, um, in the meantime, send your questions to podcast@highconflictinstitute.com or submit them to high conflict institute.com/podcast and please tell all your friends about us and we'd be really grateful if you'd leave a review wherever you listen to our podcast. Until next episode, keeps striving toward the missing piece.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
It's
Speaker 1 (17:27):
All Your Fault is a protection of True Story FM engineering by Andy Nelson. Music, by Wolf Samuels, John Coggins, and Z Moran. Find the show, show notes and transcripts@truestory.fm or high conflict institute.com/podcast. If your podcast app allows ratings and reviews, please consider doing that for our show.