burning wing Posted February 1, 2015 Report Share Posted February 1, 2015 M. Linehan has deveoped the biopsychosocial theory, according to which the reason of BPD is emotional invalidation. Others believe the theory of separation/individuation by Meanie Klein is correct. Some think people are born with BPD. Also a very important role is played by early traumatic experience. What do you think about all of it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Data Posted February 1, 2015 Report Share Posted February 1, 2015 I think its caused by a faulty attachment to your parents (or parental figure). If you don't develop that secure emotional attachment in early childhood then you remain in a kind of emotionally immature state, where you are unable to regulate your own emotions. Faulty attachment can be subtle. Some people are - tragically - beaten, raped, starved and neglected. The lack of a loving, stable parent is obvious. Other people just don't bond with the parent, the parent may be well-meaning but inept, because of their own issues. And it might look like a good home, but under the surface there can be real problems. Drug companies like to sell the line that it is hereditary, because that tends to send the doctors down the line that it is to be medicated, and not to be treated with costly and unprofitable (but often effective) talking therapies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kara. Posted February 1, 2015 Report Share Posted February 1, 2015 I think that there are several causes and that genetic and environmental factors play with one another. For example, a person with genetic predisposition for bpd may never develop bpd if the environment is a validating one. If this is not the case, depending on the genetic predisposition and temperament of the individual then that person will most likely develop bpd. I believe that repetition of trauma as well as not having someone to protect the individual is a big risk factor. An emotional invalidating environment can also be a big risk factor if the person doesn't get validated elsewhere. This can be often the case as children learn from early age to play the role of being disliked. I think that Melanie Klein has a couple of concepts that may be useful for the bpd but I think that any theory that centers around the pre-verbal period of life will have something to offer to bpd theory. Klein may offer some clues to the development of bpd but she certainly doesn't offer any solution, in my view. I prefer developmental theories that place a greater focus on the relationship and attachment and not so much on the internal world. It is the failed relationships that are the cause, in my view, of bpd. I believe that at times there are matches between babies and mums/dads that are not good matches. The same baby with another parent would be fine and another parent with another baby would be able to her him/her much more. Interesting post. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
walker Posted February 1, 2015 Report Share Posted February 1, 2015 when things run in families they say it's hereditary why on earth do they say that we don't believe it we don't believe for one minute that it is hereditary although we know it runs in families - which would make sense as children are being 'taught' their life learning by people who already have a distorted/different view of the world we DO believe that some people are born more sensitive than others and that they - given certain negative nurturing - are far more likely to develop bpd than those that are less sensitive we agree with others it is largely caused by traumatic events and/or parenting/caring styles which cause attachment difficulties certainly it seems that is the case for us although we are unsure why Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maddy harper Posted February 2, 2015 Report Share Posted February 2, 2015 childhood trauma. Thats what i believe causes b p d in adults and teens Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlie1986 Posted February 2, 2015 Report Share Posted February 2, 2015 I agree with karaindrou, I believe it's a mix. A genetic pre-disposition and environmental. I suppose like a lot of mental health conditions it comes down too nature or nurture. It's been a long time since I've read any of Melanie kleins theories of attachment so I'm not going to even pretend to try and remember or understand them. I do know that when I had to do my attachment assignment as part of my degree it triggered me to a point I didn't complete it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
walker Posted February 2, 2015 Report Share Posted February 2, 2015 sorry didn't I say it was a mix too? oh well Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlie1986 Posted February 2, 2015 Report Share Posted February 2, 2015 Sorry walker I didn't purposely try and exclude you it was just karaindrou's description is what made most sense to me and the explanation I indetified with most. Sorry if I caused offence. x Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
artemis84 Posted February 2, 2015 Report Share Posted February 2, 2015 Faulty attachment can be subtle. Some people are - tragically - beaten, raped, starved and neglected. The lack of a loving, stable parent is obvious. Other people just don't bond with the parent, the parent may be well-meaning but inept, because of their own issues. And it might look like a good home, but under the surface there can be real problems. I think this is HUGELY important to note. I am interested in finding out more about the (posited) causes of BPD. My T has really opened my mind to the idea that attachment issues might be the underlying cause of my un-wellness but like walker mentions and Data is talking about, I can't point to anything in my past and say 'that was it'. T says it was likely pre-verbal trauma but what kind of thing this might be I don't know. As it was pre-verbal I am unlikely to ever know I guess. I too think, like several people above, it is likely a mix of nature and nurture that amounts to us lucky (haha) few with the condition. I would like to read more on this in the future but I am also worried that I may find it very triggering. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kara. Posted February 2, 2015 Report Share Posted February 2, 2015 T says it was likely pre-verbal trauma but what kind of thing this might be I don't know. As it was pre-verbal I am unlikely to ever know I guess. I can send you some literature on developmental trauma when you wish and feel ready to read about it. However, I don't think that it is impossible to know because it happened during a pre-verbal time. There are many ways in which is possible to retrieve sensations, feelings, happenings from that time. Therapy helps doing this. Hugs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
artemis84 Posted February 3, 2015 Report Share Posted February 3, 2015 Thanks karaindrou, I would be very interested in reading more. I will PM you about it. Edit: I have just tried sending you a message but it seems your inbox might be full - can you PM me or delete anything? Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stellar Posted February 4, 2015 Report Share Posted February 4, 2015 Hi, I think to try and pinpoint one particular thing as the main factor as to the cause of developing BPD,is impossible.It is down to a number of cumulative reasons from birth to the now.Like the drip,drip forming of a stalagmite effect.Until one day,something has to give.Each person with BPD could hazard an educated guess as to their own personal choice,based on their own life experience.For me,it would have to be "abandonment"( to quote a word). The abandonment for adoption,for the unloving,abusive adoptive parents,plus connecting abusive others.The not belonging,not connecting,not being wanted by real or adoptive parents.The curled up,knees to the chin,in a cold bedroom of emptiness.Day after day,repetition,yearning for acceptance,but receiving nothing.I think this leads down many other avenues,including trust.The abandonment as a child i believe,has fucked my whole life up.I firmly believe that if i had been kept by a loving parent/parents,my life and diagnosis of BPD would have been entirely different.I may have actually made something of my life. That's my own personal opinion anyway Take care Stellar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burning wing Posted February 4, 2015 Author Report Share Posted February 4, 2015 I tend to believe more in the biopsychosocial theory of M. Linehan, considering emotional invalidation and biological factors. The thing is I've been reading a blog by a therapist who is specialised on BPD, and this woman bases her treatment on the theory of Melanie Klein and separation/individuation processes. When I'm reading her articles on BPD, I get triggered, because I think her approach is invalidating. She supposes borderlines are this way because in the childhood they were traumatised and they cannot take another person in their life, accepting them as they are, and not because people with BPD feel emotions with more intensity than others. She never pays attention to spitting and other symptoms of BPD which are believed to be the result of strong emotional reactions, she never notices dissosiation and believes paranoid ideation under stress comes not from the stressful emotion itself, but from not believing other people are kind. Impulsivity she leaves out of the question. And there are many therapists like her, who tend to work with such methods. I just see that through her ways of therapeutic approach she brings more pain on a borderline and very little effect. In my opinion, it's not a good way of treating BPD, and borderines experience only more invalidation through such things. This woman and others like her supposes the only way to treat BPD is to put a borderline under more pain and pressure of the reality so that in the end make them accept it. And that's all. For me, it seems that it's very important to pay attention of mental health services to the causes of BPD, so that there woudn't happen more misunderstading between borderines and the world. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
walker Posted February 4, 2015 Report Share Posted February 4, 2015 acceptance is KEY we think Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burning wing Posted February 13, 2015 Author Report Share Posted February 13, 2015 Acceptance surely is important, because BPD is about not being able to accept and validate one's feelings. But how can one accept his feelings when told they are not true? (or out of proportion). I think the way to acceptance of one's feelings and oneself is acknowledging the way they are now, acknowledging the intensity of them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
walker Posted February 13, 2015 Report Share Posted February 13, 2015 actually here we were talking about the acceptance of others - of mh staff, of therapists its called unconditional positive regard and yes it means meeting us where we are, with all the intensity and distress that involves, and them not judging us for it but we also need to do the same for ourselves, which is the most difficult of things Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carthraziel Posted February 19, 2015 Report Share Posted February 19, 2015 I have a thought or two, my first one is mostly relating to one of BPD's symptoms of chronic emptiness. I believe the chronic emptiness is the place in your personality where a stable parental figure is supposed to reside. But because of a lack of one for whatever reason, whether the parent was present or not, there is a hole where this stability is meant to be on which you can build everything else until the parent dies by which you should be well adjusted enough to be able to deal with this loss. I realised this because I realised I would pretty much feel nothing when my parents die, I would miss them as one would miss an aquaintence or a work collegue you get along with. But their deaths wouldn't uproot my existence as it would do with a more regular person. So the BPD person is left with this hole of which they are constantly trying to fill weather it's because of boredom or emptiness and when another person gets put there, then all disaster breaks loose because even if they are the best partner/ friend in the world, there is only one person who can fit that role in a persons make up. As for what causes BPD, obviously this is a big question, and BPD is a big subject within itself because there are hundreds of different variations of a similar thing so the cause for one variation may not be the cause for another. I can only tell my story as I don't have a detailed information bank of everyone who has BPD to draw any conclusions from. I believe the cause isn't a single thing, more like an allignment of other variations in a persons life. For me, My therapist and I spoke in depth about inherited trauma as well as pre-verbal trauma that is passed to the foetus when it has no way to contexulaising or understanding what is happening. And if this had been the only thing that had happened to me then I might have been alright. I may have had some bizzare problems but if everything else had been different I probably would have grown up tp be pretty well adjusted. This is reinforced by the conversation I had with my psychiatrist whereby he suggested that based on my descriptions of what I'd been like as a baby there was something wrong as soon as I was born. However again if this had been the only thing I believe I'd have been ok. My parents fall into the well meaning but ineffective type, they had their own stuff going on and it drastically affected me. I believe this set me on the course for BPD but didn't garuntee it. I was born as a highly sensitive person (this is a thing, it's a name for a person right at the end of the introvert spectrum), and as a HSP it means I am naturally deeply affected by what happens around me, as well as highly empathetic. It's automatic and is a natural echo of BPD's lasting moods and poor self regulation. But there are many HSP's who, with the right parental guidence, get all the positives without any of the negative side effects, so this on it's own was not enough to set me on the path for BPD but it definately helped. Then what happened next in my life where circumstances outside my control; my mother lost 3 children in a row so for 3 years my mum to and froed from hospital for vastly positive and negative reasons. Our home was a place of extended mourning and heavy emotions hanging in the air like a physical silence. Then my sister was born and I felt replaced and invisible. But again I do not think this experience alone was enough to cause BPD, on it's own it probably would have resulted in some heavy trauma, but combined with everything else, my parents issues, my natural dispsition and pre-birth trauma I thinkg these things aligned and caused BPD. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burning wing Posted February 20, 2015 Author Report Share Posted February 20, 2015 walker, I do agree that acceptance is very important and is the key to healing. And also I agree we should accept medical stuff and people we interact with, as well as ourselves. But the approach this particular therapist whom I was talking about is using doesn't seem effective to me. I believe inability to accept things in a borderline personality comes from inablitity to accept and feel one's feelings about the facts and people, so telling such a person his feelings are excessive and should not be felt isn't helpful. She writes in her blog that borderlines should learn to feel sadness instead of pain somehow and things like that. It's just we cannot get rid of our feelings, but we can accept them and situations that trigger the feelings and not act on them, I mean in time and this is a skill to learn. And this woman's approach comes from her believing in separation/individuation theory of bpd. Carthaziel, thanks for sharing and I appreciate your point of view. As for me, I used to believe inner emptiness was the result of the lack of internal parental figure as well. But then I started dialectical behavioral therapy which has been very helpful for me, I read into stuff Marsha Linehan has written and saw a movie shot with her help 'Borderline Personality Disorder: Back From the Edge'. I've read into her theory of emotional invalidation and through this search for information learned a lot about BPD which I actually noticed in myself and with the help of dbt am trying to change, and it really seems to work, although I'm still far away from recovery. Also my therapist explained to me how emotional invalidation occures and explained my inner emptiness and not knowing who I am though impulsivity and extreme emotions, and I tend to believe he's really got the point. M.Linehan said that borderlines get attached because they cannot regulate themselves, they need other people to regulate them. After talking with my therapist about it and learning more information I have come to think this is true, at least for me. So, my point is some approaches to BPD and some theories of its causes may do more harm than help, at least in some cases. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kara. Posted February 20, 2015 Report Share Posted February 20, 2015 burning wing, I'm not quite sure if understood where do you think your emptiness comes from. Carthraziel said from faillue to internalize the parental figure and you seem to be saying from self regulation difficulties. I understand self-regulation as learned from the relationship with the parental figure... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barebones Posted February 20, 2015 Report Share Posted February 20, 2015 I'm not good with explaining bit I believe its environment from around and childhood. Parents and people around. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barebones Posted February 20, 2015 Report Share Posted February 20, 2015 Sry and also chemical or genetic. We have a number of traits from bipolar and post traumatic stress. Sry I'm on phone writing as I don't have laptop much. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burning wing Posted February 22, 2015 Author Report Share Posted February 22, 2015 karaindrou, I mean it like this, well, as my therapist put it and as I understand M.Linehan puts it. When a person having BPD was a child, his parents or an important close person did a lot of emotional invalidation towards that person, I think you know what it means. Someone is born an HSP (highly sensitive person) and biologically is prone to deep feelings. But his parents or whoever takes care of him don't believe he really feels the way he feels or may even schold him and punish him for feelings. Kids cannot hold their feelings to themselves, if they are sad - they cry, if they are happy - they laugh, and they say out loud everything which comes to their head. But parents of an HSP or close to him people may not understand why he feels the way he feels, saying things like this, 'Oh why you are always such a cry baby, it's nothing, get over it". As for me, my parents used to punish me for crying when I was five. They beat me and locked me up in the room for hours because they thought I'd stop crying. Later on in my life, when I was 10-12 years old, my friends and classmates also used to tell me I was crying or angry for no reason at all, and teachers scholded me. So, a borderline personality learns that what he feels (and from that comes, what he thinks and who he is) is irrelevant, not true and shouldn't be felt at all. Whenever a person with BPD feels an emotion, he needs to immediately act on it to have the 'right' to feel it. Otherwise it feels like not so true at all. He needs to tell people how he feels to get some sort of confirmation or validation from them, saying 'yes, you're right/you have the right to feel this way'. And if he feels differently than the person close to him, he thinks that since there is only one right way to feel - than he needs to feel like that person, regardless of whatever he feels really. So, we make ourselves feel like those close to us. A person's Ego - what we lack and feel like inner emptiness - is based on one's feelings, but is different from them. Feelings pass like clouds, they are one day this way and another day that way. And deep inside of us there are 'us' - our opinion, our Ego, our wise mind. But since we always act immediately on the emotion we feel, we don't ever listen to that inside of us. We listen to what we are feeling at the moment, which can feel like the truth but is not. So, the more we act on our feelings and not on our real opinion, and make ourselves feel like a person close to us, the more empty we feel. Walker posted a topic about the 'alien self' and I think it isn't in contradiction with emotional invalidation theory, because when an important external figure projects his own feelings and needs on a child and doesn't really believe and reflect what child feels, it is invalidation. M.Linehan explains unhealthy attachment like this: Since a borderline personality thinks there is only one way to feel 'right' and it is really possible the way he feels may not be the most right way one should feel, he finds a person who validates what this person feels and treats him with love and compassion - which is sort of validation of one's existence - if someone thinks you should live, someone needs you, then there is a reason to live, otherwise there is no reason to live. If this other person feels sometimes differently, a borderline personality makes himself feel the way this person feels and surrenders to his wishes, desires and opinion. And so he gets extremely attached to that person, and losing this person equals losing oneself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PDBPD Posted February 23, 2015 Report Share Posted February 23, 2015 Neglect...intentional or other Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maddy harper Posted February 24, 2015 Report Share Posted February 24, 2015 My b p d was braught on by my mum. She use to beet me. Starve me if she thought i was putting to much wait on. She locked the fridge so i couldnt get access to food at night when she was sleeping. She put me on my furst diet when i was eleven. Thats where the anorexia comes in to play. She caused it. Cant talk any more about this right now as its making me sad. I never understood why mum cant stand me as i am. She called me a junky and a waste of space the other day so i put the phone down as i have her voice inside my head. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burning wing Posted February 24, 2015 Author Report Share Posted February 24, 2015 ohh maddy harper, you've suffered so much when you were young, I'm so sorry to hear these things happened to you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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