what is emotionaly unstable personality disorder

[gnosis]

i have recently been told by a psychiatrist that i have emotionally unstable personality traits and although it is too early to make a diagnosis of emotionally unstable personality disorder,it is likely that i do have it. i have never even heard of emotionally unstable personality disorder. can you give me any more information? thanks.

[Roger Gould, M.D.]

Personally, I think all of these diagnostic labels are harmful and distorting.  Its just another way of saying you are anxious, have a hard time keeping an even temper, are easily upset and having a hard time creating good healthy sustained relationships.  If that fits, it only means you have some maturation work to do, but if it fits, you already know that..

[Sunny03]

What is the best way to approach the disorder from the standpoint of one who is married to someone who fits the profile and is not aware of it or denies to himself the fact that he has a relationship problem?  We have a relationship problem.

[WildDaisy]

Hello.



Emotionally Unstable Personality Disorder is the same as Borderline Personality Disorder.



I find the reply very dismissive as I suffer from this disorder and it makes my life very difficult indeed.

I take Celexa for the depression and am starting therapy soon to control the rage, mood swings and various other things.



I recommend a book called 'I hate you, don't leave me' by Jerold J Kreisman & Hal Straus for sufferers and for those in a relationship with a BPD I'd recommend 'Stop walking on Eggshells' by Paul T Mason. These books will at least let you know you a definately not alone.



x

[RockyTuesday]

Hello to all.  I'd like to thank Wild Daisy for her book recomendation.  I went to amazon and found that you can see an excerpt of Stop Walking on Eggshells there.  What I read was amazing.  This has been my life with my Mom, and not just me, her siblings, my grandmother, my Step-father and my Bio-father as well.  But, just one thing I'd like to ask those familiar with this disorder.  



Can BPD or EUPD be a predictable cycle? Can the instability follow a predictable cycle in someone with this disorder?



For example, My mom (an otherwise kind, generous, ambitous and sucsessful person) will be overly loving for about a week, then will be overly smothering, clingy and mushy for about a week, then inexorably she has the blowup and anyone close to her that interacts with her that day or few days (the blowup lasts from a day to a week, not usually longer) will get "it".  Whomever she lashes out at, she sees them as against her, and that she got verbally beaten up by that person, all things are their fault, etc...  And this will be followed by a "nothing ever happend" or "I was just kidding" reaction.  Then she goes back to being normal for a while.  I can tell, almost to the day, when she will blow up.

[gnosis]

all this stuff about relationships and that doesn't seem to fit my profile at all. they are basing this suspected "diagnosis" on the fact that i have unstable self image and goals, suicidal ideation and deliberate self harm. my relationships are more indicative of schizoid personality in that i am a loner, but then again i think i probably am lonely with it, find it hard to relate to others, but do not think that i have the type of traits in relationships that the author of this book and the people at bpdcentral.com or whatever it is are going on about, are they just making sweeping generalisations or does this mean that i probably do not have borderline personality? ( i also think i have periods of irritability, rage and chronic feelings of emptiness)

[Sydney0503]

May I suggest the Bible?  I too have had severe emptiness and irrational borderline "phsyco" mental stress and I strongly sympothise (spelling)?  But prayer and belief in Jesus Christ as a God that cannot lie and promises a fulfilling life of joy and peace...try Him.  You will not need Amazon.com, depressing analogies of hopeless people in endless physciatric diagnosis which by the way is expensive.  You can have fulfilling life and it is only a prayer away.  You are NOT insane.

[gnosis]

ahem well i have already tried the bible and i found the church just as empty and depressing and so was the doctrine. People there seemed to actually beleive in a little bloke sitting up there. After reading "The Jesus Mysteries" by Simon Gandy and Timothy Freke and "Jesus and the Goddess" by the same authors i realised what a con i had been sold and left the church. But yes i do agree that all these labels are not healthy and i certainly do not think i am insane and in fact am starting to think that, whatever problems i may have, there is nothing much wrong with me, and that other key figures in my life from an early age may well have just as much as a problem as i do.