by Brittany Welch

Created on: April 02, 2009

Borderline Personality Disorder is a very serious psychological condition. A personality disorder usually rears its ugly head in adolescence or early adulthood and will continue over a number of years causing a large amount of stress and distress. BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder) can be associated with very specific problems in self-image, emotions, behavior, interpersonal relationships and thinking.

Borderlines tend to have an innately unstable sense of self. They report many "ups and downs" on how they view themselves. At any given moment they can oscillate between viewing themselves as good to seeing themselves as bad or evil.

One of the key features of BPD is emotional instability. Most sufferers of BPD may feel like they are on an emotional roller coaster with very quick and at times very violent shifts in mood. These persons may also suffer from intense anger and chronic feelings of emptiness.

The behavior of a borderline can prove to be very dangerous. They tend to engage in risky and impulsive behaviors including but not limited to shopping sprees, consuming large quantites of alcohol, drug abuse, promiscuous sex, or binge eating. Additionally, individuals suffering from BPD are more subjectible to partake in self-harmful activities such as self-mutilation or suicidal attempts.

Individuals with BPD usually have intense relationships colored by a lot of conflicts, arguing, and break-ups. BPD sufferers also hold an intense sensitivity to abandonment including a severe fear of being abandoned by a loved one. They may also attempt to avoid any real or imagined abandonment.

In stressful situations, people suffering from BPD may experience changes in thinking. This includes paranoid delusions (thinking that others are trying to harm them) or dissociation (feeling distant and or numb)

Although the exact cause of BPD is unknown, there is research to suggest that it is brought on by a combination of nature and nurture. A large amount of people diagnosed with BPD have endured childhood abuse (mostly sexual) or neglect. They also may have been seperated from their caregivers at an early age. Not all people with BPD have had one of these childhood traumas though. There is also some evidence of genetic inheritence and the differences in brain function and structure of persons suffering from BPD.

Below are the 9 criterion stated in the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders Fourth Edition) that identify BPD. To be considered a borderline an individual

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