Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is a disorder which pervades throughout all areas of a person’s life. It makes relationships difficult and causes problems with impulsivity and emotional control. People with BPD are often seen as living chaotic lives and being hard to get along with. They are at a greater risk than the normal population for committing suicide and for having to be hospitalized for psychiatric reasons. It’s estimated one third of people in inpatient psychiatric treatment have BPD.
Living with BPD is like living in an ocean when a tsunami is occurring, except the tsunami is one’s emotions. The emotions overtake you and are uncontrollable. Anger is a prominent emotion displayed by people with BPD. Small slights can send them into a rage. This is usually due to a past which is filled with abuses and hurt, that small slight triggers something which causes all the rage over past incidents to come pouring out. Happiness, when it’s felt, is pure elation. Sadness though falls to the deepest of dark depressions. There are no moderation with emotions in BPD.
Just as emotions are taken to extremes by people with BPD, so is thinking. Things are entirely black and white for people with this disorder. People and things are all good or all bad – idealized or vilified. Someone can be put on a pedestal and then torn down in a flash the next moment. These thoughts flow along with the person’s turbulent emotions and often have no rhyme or reason.
The person with BPD can be helped to better regulate their emotions and clarify their thinking though. DBT therapy has been very successful. DBT, developed by Marsha Linehan in the United States, pairs Zen philosophy with cognitive therapy. It is quickly becoming a treatment for more than just BPD – depression, anxiety, etc. With proper treatment, people with BPD can learn to lead calmer, more fulfilling lives.
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I think and I have seen that many people with borderline disorder engage in self-injurious behaviors such as cutting, burning and small drug overdoses. Cutting is by far the most common act of this type of behavior.
About 9 percent of people with the disorder commit suicide. The most frequent means is by drug overdose. Both types of behavior may occur in the same individual. Cutting behaviors double the risk of suicide in people with borderline disorder.
There are a number of factors that increase the risk that a person with borderline disorder will commit suicide. Although nothing can be done to reverse some of these factors, others are highly treatable, and deserve immediate attention.
co-occurring disorders
antisocial personality disorder (higher in males)
major depression
substance abuse*
personality characteristics
impulsive aggression
poor emotional control
hopelessness
history and severity of childhood sexual abuse
age over 30 years
number of prior self-injurious behaviors and suicide attempts
no prior treatment, or extensive and unsuccessful treatment history