Borderline personality disorder (BPD)

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a complex, prolonged, and serious mental health condition. Individuals with BPD face significant challenges in regulating their emotions and impulses, leading to intense behavioural reactions triggered by even the slightest changes in their environment. The pattern of experience and behavior invariably commences during late adolescence or early adulthood and results in significant functional impairment or distress. Individual’s genetic, biological, and environmental factors significantly influence their BPD conditions. It is also common for individuals with BPD to suffer from other mental health disorders, including depression, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, social phobia, substance use disorder, or posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Approximately 2.2 percent of Canadians live with BPD (CMHA, 2023).

The manifestations of borderline personality disorder can exhibit variations among individuals owing to differences in predispositions and life experiences, and these symptoms may also change over time. Some commonly observed indicators of BPD encompass:

•   Profound feelings of depression, anxiety, or irritability that may be of brief duration, typically triggered by stressful events.
•   Intense anger or challenges in managing anger.
•   Overwhelming boredom.
•   A sense of not truly knowing oneself.
•   A highly unstable self-perception and emotional self-appraisal.
•   Persistent feelings of emptiness.
•   Contemplation of or engagement in suicidal thoughts or actions.
•   Deliberate self-harm, such as cutting or burning one’s skin.
•   Engagement in risky behaviors, such as excessive spending, binge eating, or problematic substance use.
•   Purposeful efforts to avoid abandonment or solitude.
•   Experiencing intense relationships marked by impulsive shifts between viewing the other person as entirely positive or entirely negative.