BPD Need help understanding borderline personality disorder(bpd)

[Anglesachse]

I have CPTSD. My therapist said if I lived elsewhere I would be diagnosed with BPD. It is a term. nothing more.

Your therapist is an idiot, to be perfectly blunt. .............

That sums that up nicely Anthony cocker. I think I would of prefixed the idiot with the F word to emphasize the incompetence of the aforementioned Therapist, but none the less you are spot on. And will most probably not recieve negative feedback for the use of the F.

I've researched a bit on BPD and it's different to PTSD. Yes there are a few similarities, but from what I've read they are very different disorders. Even in my limited knowledge and don't understand how they can be so easily mixed up by 'professionals'............

And some one who has made the effort to read up on it. Thankyou Shell darlin`. Makes a welcome change to the uneducated drivel that can otherwise be spouted.

Being a diagnosed PTSDler (Combat) and BPDler I can catagoricaly state that the two are very different, they do have a few symptoms that do over lap but both need treatment in different ways.

..............Hence, my original statement to the OP to set boundaries him/herself. (And I think that's valid feedback regardless of the "problem" person's mental health conditions, if any, as we can only control our own behavior anyway.)

Quite right your are Lisamaria. Due to our own inability to set boundries or borders it is even more important that the spouse or career to do so for themselves. Those Boundries will wane and dissapear over time as we have a unique knack (albeit unconsciously or unwillingly) of chipping away at even the most resiliant armour.

We also need to know and understand that crossing these boundries will have consequences. And so helping us to change how we react to certain feelings and situations.

 

[Lucycat]

My Therapist is NOT an idiot, he is very knowledgeable, compassionate and up to date. He has helped me greatly and I have made huge strides in my recovery. He is also backed up by a psychiatrist who is a specialist in trauma. The psychiatrist gave me the formal diagnosis of CPTSD although it was T who told me.

They believe that BPD does not exist as a separate diagnosis, and that all patients they have met, already so labelled actually had a history of trauma. Their 'BPD' was helped through therapy for trauma. It is trauma at an early age affecting basic development that gives rise to what appears as a problem personality.

I know this is not what is written in the ICD, but as with other discussions on here, medical knowledge is evolving and changing and time will tell if other mental health professionals agree with them.

 

[Girl3]

When I was in medical school, on the psychiatric rotation, the BPD patients were 'least liked' by the psychiatrists because the BPD patients were considered difficult to deal with, no medications really worked for them (back in the 80s, much fewer medications for anything), and for therapy to work, the BPD patients had to want to change their own behaviors.

Boundaries are one of the things they have to work on because what they percieve in their heads is what they assume is reality. BPD patients often do not take into account that you should have privacy, time for things other than "them and their problems", that you must 'jump to' any ordeal they present - and BPD patients thrive on 'ordeals', because turmoil creates an exciting dynamic. So BPD patients often can be like toddlers in their wants and needs, and they throw tantrums or threaten suicide, if not getting their way. Bottom line is that BPD patients feel justified in their wants and needs, and no one elses' wants or needs matter unless those needs are in line with the BPD patient.

BPD patients are often raised by a BPD parent - so they only know one way to act.

But like all personality disorders and mental issues, there are gradations. Not everyone is like the character Glen Close played in the movie "Fatal Attraction", but BPD patients have a whole story in their heads of how things are and how things will be - and when it doesn't turn out how they envisioned it, there is heck to pay.

BPD patients can be like the mad Queen of Roses in Alice in Wonderland. Everything is either all good or all bad, friends and family are either wonderful or evil, all depending on how the BPD patient 'feels' that minute. Many times the perception changes as a result of the BPD patient not getting her way. My first BPD patient in medical school was charming and pathetic - she wanted my home phone number so she call me sometimes, assuring me she would never call late or in the middle of the day since I was in medical school. Needless to say, this young woman called me at all hours, even at 2 AM. If I didn't talk to her she would threaten suicide. Eventually I became the most hated person, and she manipulated one of the nurses into giving the BPD patient her telephone number.

There are some great books out there like "Stop Walking on Eggshells" or "I Hate You - Don't Leave Me".
Read up on it so you understand how to deal with all the crises, help the person build boundary skills, and most of all so that you don't have to amputate the relationship needlessly.

Good luck with your endeavor - I wish you much patience.

 

[lisamarie]

They are absolutely very difficult to treat, and agreed, only a small percentage have success. There are many misdiagnosed as well, who get put into the recovered percentage, who never had a personality disorder to begin with. They're not common, yet the same issue with many disorders today... they're handed out like candy for monetary purposes in treatment.

Agreed that they are misdiagnosed....I work in the addiction treatment field and have seen people (women) diagnosed with BPD. Well, yeah, of course they have all the symptoms when they are using drugs, LOL. Instability in personal relationships, inappropriate anger, promiscuous behavior, substance use? All signs of a drug addict, haha.

The only other point I would make is that I'm not actually sure how much money has to do with it -- at least in MY area. The health insurance company that primarily funds our patients' care will not pay for treatment for personality disorders. Why? Because they are so unlikely to be successfully treated. True story.

 

[Anglesachse]

............They believe that BPD does not exist as a separate diagnosis, and that all patients they have met, already so labelled actually had a history of trauma. Their 'BPD' was helped through therapy for trauma. It is trauma at an early age affecting basic development that gives rise to what appears as a problem personality..............

If your therapist says you have CPTSD and claims that if you lived elsewhere you would be diagnosed with BPD then either he/she is wrong in your diagnoses or the next therapist living elsewhere would be wrong with your diagnoses.

Either one or both would be wrong. Allthough both have similarities, they are two different things.

It would be like me saying.
"Hey Forum, it is all in your heads, and you are all crazy get over it" and that is what we would have been told 30, 40, 50 years ago, or even 500 years ago. Just as a victim of year long Sexual Child Abuse and a 30 year old female who is a victim of Rape are not the same and should not be put in the same basket, there both have totaly different issues that need addressing in both cases.

A brush and a bucket of tar goes a damn long way and makes life so damn easy for dealing with sufferers. But it is of no help when trying to help sufferers to heal and move on.

Most PTSD sufferers do not show signs of High Risk Sex, they normally go to the other extreme and loose their Libido, the same as BPD sufferers rarely show sign of Aggression towards others unlike PTSD who may well be inclind to rip peoples heads off. BPD turn their rage and aggression against themselves culminating in self harm and excessive risk taking. Just as using suicide threats covers a load of Mental Health issues. And a lot of people who suffer from a multitude of illness`s hate the situation they are in and see no way out and wish to end it all.

You are correct however in that BPD sufferers generaly have a history that originates with a trauma of some sort. But it is a trauma that is usually very old and induced usually at a very young age, so young that the sufferer has no idea what it was, and rarely has access to it. Unlike a PTSD sufferer who in the majority of cases and with little help, more often than not can recall the event. I personally see BPD as the diagnoses given so that the symptoms typical to BPD that are being shown can be dealt with, and not just the traumatic event.

The BPD trauma at a very young age encourages a life style conclusive of risk taking and extreme Black and White thinking that is nothing like the effects of a traumatic event you witness at the age of 30 resulting in showing signs of Hightened Anxiety and Aggression. BPD trauma symptoms become engraved on the soul and mutate to that which most people will witness when you see a teenager cutting themselves. They evolve over the years and are what is hard in treating BPD. Dealing with the trauma when access is granted, like any other Mental illness involving Trauma is the easy part. (easy being relative) Once the sufferer wants to be helped.

The life style and thoughts that has evolved through, and past adolescence are what need changing. Not ever having known any other life, many do not wish to change. Why? because we are normal it is all you others who need help! That is what goes through the majority of our heads.

Are we right in that statement? Hell no, we need help like all others do, and the pain and suffering that our families go through is not intentional. But as Girl3 states:

...........the BPD patients had to want to change their own behaviors...................

No matter what illness, if you the sufferer do not wish to make a change, then all the therapie in the world will not help you. And you will live a shallow and hunted life hating the world.

 

[Lucycat]

Anglesachse, post: 420709, member: 10964"]If your therapist says you have CPTSD and claims that if you lived elsewhere you would be diagnosed with BPD then either he/she is wrong in your diagnoses or the next therapist living elsewhere would be wrong with your diagnoses.

Either one or both would be wrong. Allthough both have similarities, they are two different things.

Yes, he is saying the other therapist/psychiatrist would be wrong. That is my point. He believes that CPTSD encompasses BPD. That there is no need for a separate diagnosis. As I said before it is about very early trauma and the development of the young personality.

As a professional I have seen many clients diagnosed with physical ailments and then re-diagnosed with something different. It happens all the time. Doctors are human and with all the regulations in the world still have to make a judgment as to whether a patient meets the criteria for a diagnosis or not. Mental health is no different. Unless there is a blood test to prove a diagnosis, someone has to make a decision as to whether diagnosis A fits or if it is more likely to be diagnosis B (or somewhere in between).

I have known clients that deliberately seek opinion after opinion until they get the diagnosis they want to suit their needs. It is not an exact science.

 

[Girl3]

There are some fine lines between the creation of a person with BPD versus one with PTSD. A patient with BPD may never experience an actual trauma - but they may be raised by indifferent parents who act as if the child is a complete inconvenience in their lives, to whom they pay no attention unless there is blood spurting across the room, or if the child does something that gets "noticed" in the community. My own mother was raised in such a household, and so came to be a person that embodies BPD. Unfortunately for me however, she also had a mean streak - cruelty was another facet of her upbringing which she inflicted upon me.

Between her cruelty and my brother sexually abusing me - as well as inheriting the genetic code for developing PTSD, as my father probably had it - I developed PTSD, but not BPD. But at one point in my therapeutic history, it was suggested I might be...which distressed me terribly once I had gone through medical school.

Diagnosing is best done by experts over time. It isn't a qucik "check 9 out of 14 boxes diagnosis". BPD is a real, separate diagnosis that is treated differently than PTSD. (For instance, a BPD pateint will tramp all over the boundaries of others whereas a PTSD patient may fail to put up any boundaries.)

 

[anthony]

Lucycat, your therapist is misguiding you severely. I'm sorry, but that is the truth. Judith Herman originally cited in her hypothethis of CPTSD that it was a culmination of BPD and dissociative disorders. Judith Herman changed her mind as more came to light on this area, as she studied it further, then when Vanderkolk pulled it apart with knowns and devised DESNOS, which had the backing of Judith Herman. DESNOS shifted into the exact areas we now have in the new PTSD subtype diagnosis, being depersonalization, derealization and dissociation, beyond just symptoms, though purely based on trauma. None of those are BPD.

BPD is not about trauma, it has nothing to do with it. Most encompass trauma, when you wrap that word around life experiences, though it isn't required. Then you have the "what is traumatic" argument when a person knows no different. Your therapist may not be an idiot in the sense of smartness, though they are an idiot in their ideology and statements presented to clients, you being such one. Sorry... but you're delusional to continue thinking CPTSD is a diagnosis, and that it contains BPD, and that you even have it. It was old information, and incorrect at that. Write to Judith Herman and ask her for yourself... BPD if present must be diagnosed uniquely to the trauma. If you don't believe her, well...

Please ask your therapist for the diagnostic criterion in which they diagnosed you with CPTSD, because I know it doesn't exist. Even in drafts there was never a conclusive criterion or cluster agreed upon. Your therapist is deluded and lying to you. Not my issue... it is your life, your choices, but I am being bluntly honest. You are the one who suffers the injustice by misinformation. Judith Herman was one of the parties who agreed upon DESNOS for submission, overriding her original CPTSD.

A good friend of mine who's a psychiatrist taught me enough about BPD to spot it quickly here. Very few of those have ever remained on here due to what BPD does, the chaos they cause. It isn't their fault, it is BPD... but that's the nature of it. It is an all consuming illness that will draw anyone and everyone around them into a vacuum when in full swing, sucking them in. BPD is a very difficult disorder. Some people have mild forms of it, though they would also have major bouts as well. Those who succeed from it typically have years of exposure therapy, hands on, in life with someone walking them through basically reteaching them life and social normalcies, of whom they trust and listen to.

BPD is serious, and way beyond the scope of PTSD.

 

[piratelady]

I read once that those who self-harm are usually diagnosed with BPD. That is one thing that made me not want to tell my therapist about my cutting. Once I read what BPD was, I didn't really see it in myself, but I also self-harm - I did not want that diagnosis. There is a lot of misinformation out there, and unfortunately I think some comes from the healthcare professionals.

 

[anthony]

A lot come from people writing stupid shit online too, IMHO. Many who have no knowledge of the underlying diagnostic principles, and think diagnosis is just a tick and flick approach. Personality disorder diagnosis is possibly the most complicated of all mental health diagnoses. There are hacks creating websites daily, claiming qualifications and all sorts of nonsense, writing crap and some people listen to it. I say trust the experts... nothing lesser.

 

[Anna]

I say trust the experts... nothing lesser.

Indeed, a professional diagnosis.

What makes me angry is the hostility and discrimination people who have been diagnosed with BPD receieve. I have also seen, online some really nasty stuff about people who have claimed they have experienced someone with BPD (whether the person shared, or the person is making an assumption due to behaviour is not stated) and there are whole articles about how to get rid of this person etc etc.... The way it is written is just down right nasty.

This just enforces the view that all people are evil and you cannot trust anyone! When I got my diagnosis I had the BPD before the PTSD, and it is possible my self destruction put me into a position which caused the trauma. Question is, if I had not had the BPD would I have put myself into that position where I would have been traumatised? It is a bizarre paradox indeed. However, I do quite believe in the wrong place and the wrong time as well. Although self hatred, and destruction is not healthy for anyone, including the people around you. It is possible to learn how to deal with the paranoid, hatred of humanity (LOL) self destruction, being easily bored, but therapy does not work, the person has to change or want to change. To lead a normal life. There is always the fear of slipping back into old habits. You just have to have control and self discipline to keep on the straight and narrow.

The reason I got diagnosed with BPD was also the cutting, burning, alcohol abuse, hatred of humanity, distrust and paranoia, promiscuity etc etc... PTSD from the trauma, obviously which is why I was referred in the first place. Just the trauma triggered off a lot of the nasty parts of the BPD.... It is like if you have a mental illness, then trauma it can trigger off the nasty parts of any illness you have...

Ok I am rambling I stop now!

 

[Anna]

Saying that though, my therapist was very good. Although at the time I was young, still a minor and could not accept the cause of my problems was my toxic volatile relationship with my mother. Why always the mother? What about the father? that makes me mad too. They can do just as much or even more damage than your mother.... it is what it is I guess...