Skip to main content

Borderline Personality Disorder: Getting Help


People with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) have lives fraught with emotional upheaval and frequent crises. Often their work life is inconsistent. They change jobs frequently due to being fired or because of personal dissatisfaction. Relationships usually are strained. They frequently put others into no-win situations. Friends and family become burnt-out with the constant demands, radical emotional swings, self-centeredness, and impulsivity. Risky and self-destruction behaviors are the norm.

Friends and family members usually recognize their loved ones need professional help, before individuals with BPD see the need. Like people who have Narcissistic Personality Disorder, people with BPD rarely admit their need for help. Instead, they tend to blame their problems on to external circumstances or other people.

Randi Kreger in her book, The Essential Family Guide to Borderline Personality Disorder, identifies six stages family members or friends of BPD go through in the process of trying to motivate their loved one to get the necessary help. (Please note that the labels of the stages are mine.)

Stage 1—Denial: Individuals with BPD don’t see their need for help, but rather blame their family members or friends for the problems. They see others’ efforts to help them as controlling and abusive.

Stage 2—Threats: When a crisis arises, friends and family will use threats to push their loved ones with BPD to get help. They may say, “I will leave you” or “I will stop supporting you,” hoping such threats will motivate their loved ones to seek treatment.

Stage 3—Reluctant or Anxious Compliance: The threats often frighten sufferers of BPD enough that they apprehensively seek treatment. Unfortunately professional help usually isn’t useful since those with BPD are not motivated to change, but are only trying to secure the threatened relationship.

Stage 4—Relapse: Once the threatened relationship seems to return to normal, those with BPD lose interest in therapy and find some reason to drop out.

Stage 5—Reluctant Acceptance: Eventually family members and friends realize that coerced treatment is rarely effective and reluctantly accept that only their loved ones with BPD can decide to get help. This often takes several failed attempts to push those with BPD into treatment.

Stage 6—Disillusionment: Family members and friends of those with BPD come to realize that any effort to change their loved ones is only adding more conflict to their already troubled relationship. This revelation causes friends and family to become discouraged, depressed, angry, and disillusioned.

As outlined in Kreger’s six stages, it can be difficult to motivate those with BPD to seek treatment.  These individuals get into significant trouble before they are ready to accept help. This may mean several suicide attempts, psychiatric hospitalizations, legal trouble, personal bankruptcy, being fired from another job, or experiencing another relationship break-up (such as a divorce) before they recognize their need for professional treatment. Real change is only possible when those who are in trouble recognize their own need for help. No one can threaten, cajole, or coerce another into changing.

The next article will address the current treatments available to help those with BPD.

For more information on this topic, please also see:

            (Hazeldon, 2008)

Pin It

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Narcissism: Understanding the Effects of Narcissistic Parenting

Since Freud, researchers have studied various environmental effects on maturing personalities, and it has been well documented that parenting styles are profoundly involved in the shaping of children’s developing psyches. It is hard enough working with a narcissistic boss or living with a narcissistic spouse, but being raised by narcissistic parents has several serious emotional consequences. What are some of these effects? Dr. Paul Meier in his book, You Might Be a Narcissist If . . . How to Identify Narcissism in Ourselves and Others and what We Can Do About It , identifies four consequences of narcissistic parenting. They are: 1) the  development of a false self; 2) the desire to behave with perfectionism; 3) chronic habits of passivity; and 4) increased vulnerability to addictive behaviors. The Development of a False Self Since narcissistic parents unconsciously need others to help soothe their fragile sense of self, they naturally turn to any available relationsh...
11 comments
Read more

Antisocial Personality Disorder Resource List

This is the final article in the series looking at Antisocial Personality Disorder. I plan to start a new series discussing various aspects of Depression in January 2013. Hope everyone has a wonderful, happy holiday season! Resource List Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths go to Work by Paul Babiak, PhD & Robert D. Hare, PhD (2006) HarperCollins Publishers Not all individuals with Antisocial Personality Disorder (APD) are in prison, many are among us. They work and play alongside us. Babiak and Hare reveal the common ploys of psychopaths, especially in the corporate world. The authors provide detailed suggestions about how to screen for psychopaths in the interview process as well as how to protect the work environment from those whose main goals are to manipulate and exploit the workplace. This is an outstanding book for those in the business world who would like to become more aware of the subtle warning signs of psychopaths.   The Sociopa...
5 comments
Read more

Borderline Personality Disorder: Characteristics and Development of BPD

I recently came across a YouTube clip from the fourth season of Bravo’s The Real Housewives of New Jersey . In this episode Teresa Guidice exploded in a fit of rage and flipped over a restaurant table. I don’t watch the show or know if any of these women have a psychological condition, but I was struck by Teresa’s display of impulsivity and disruptive behavior. The scene takes place at a very nice restaurant. Teresa is arguing with a friend. When the friend becomes insulting, Teresa responds with rage. She begins a tirade while pounding the table with her fist and finally flips the table over. Several men rush to her side. She shoves one away, but allows another to comfort her. She then calms down and they end their conversation with a kiss.  In a post interview Teresa seems unaware of the intensity of her emotional outburst. She doesn’t realize she shoved her male friend. She is also out of touch with her table guests’ reactions of shock and confusion...
4 comments
Read more