Borderline personality disorder

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Personality disorder - borderline

Relationships with others are intense and unstable, swinging wildly from love to hate and back again. People with BPD will engage in frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment.

BPD patients may also have uncertainties about their identity or self-image. They tend to see things in terms of extremes, either all good or all bad. Such people also typically view themselves as victims of circumstance and take little responsibility for themselves or their problems.

Other symptoms include:

• Frequent displays of inappropriate anger
• Recurrent acts of crisis such as wrist cutting, overdosing, or self-mutilation
• Feelings of emptiness and boredom
• Intolerance of being alone
• Impulsiveness with money, substance abuse, sexual relationships, binge eating, or shoplifting

Personality disorders are diagnosed based on psychological evaluation and the history and severity of the symptoms.

Review Date: 11/15/2006
Reviewed By: Paul Ballas, D.O., Department of Psychiatry, Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, Philadelphia, PA. Review provided by VeriMed Healthcare Network.