First let's be very clear about what Personality Disorders are. They are chronic and severe personality traits in people that are resistant to change and are sometimes life-long (though not always). Oh, believe me I have treated some doozies in PDs. But not necessarily BPDs. BPD's are given a huge bad rap. BPD is so very misunderstood by the general public that it is amazing. YES, they can be a pain in the ass. Because the reality of it is that they are extremely fragile. Yes, fragile. Fragile, frantic, suicidal, and desperate and have a degree of psychosis. But they are nothing compared to and are constantly confused with Narcissistic and Anti-Social Personality Disorder. People say BPD's are manipulative. Actually, I've only met one that was that way. Yes, one. And it’s not part the criteria for diagnosis and I tend to see that as a crossover into Narcissistic. Whereas for NPD and APD, manipulative is their MO.

So let's go into the criteria for BPD for this LW. Is she suicidal? Not apparently. Does she have a history of desperately seeking to not be abandoned in this relationship. Hmmmmm....Not hearing that! Does she do wildly impulsive stuff like drugs, overspending, sex with strangers, sexual or identity confusion issues? Haven't heard that either. Does she have bouts of anxiety, depression or mood swings? Nope. Chronic feeling of emptiness or what I call lack of identity? Don't know but haven't heard that either. Extremely inappropriate or out of the blue anger and temper? Haven’t heard that. Is anything she said truly paranoid (personally, I think writing to this column is an exercise in tempting paranoia considering some of the responses)? So, with that thought, I haven't heard anything out of the ordinary paranoid. Is she dissociative? If she were dissociative she wouldn't have the capability to write her responses, believe me. For most, dissociative means curled up somewhere in a fetal position. So, tell me what is BPD about this LW? Anything? Oh, meeting one criterion doesn’t count. You have to have 5 of the criteria or more.

What usually happens when I work with a BPD is that I get calls at midnight, and multiple messages in a row from "I'm desperate" to "I'm feeling better" to "I'm desperate" again and back again. I get rambling and repetitive conversation in therapy or they're intensely interested in my life. They often know little about proper boundaries because most of them are victims of intense child abuse, sexual, physical, emotional or severe neglect (all situations with no boundaries for the child). Children learn the boundaries of others by having their boundaries respected. No real identity - they're often "chameleons" in the sense that they'll take on the identity (clothes, mannerisms, etc.,) just to be liked (rare). They can't let go of a relationship, no matter how abusive it is or they can't get into one because they’re so afraid of the feelings of dependency. Scares the shit out of them. Constant suicide threats and attempts. The worst-case scenario for therapists are those that need some sense of revenge and constantly "grieve" or file lawsuits. But usually these are NPD's as far as I'm concerned with some "features" of BPD. Oh, people usually grow out of BPD as they get older.

Furthermore, women are notoriously over-diagnosed with BPD. And usually done to meet state/federal regs so a provider agency can get paid. I’ve seen them diagnosed simply because they were abused sexually as children, or because of a single-incident cutting behavior or in crisis about an event in their life such as sudden death of a baby and because they are exhibiting "black and white" thinking. Believe me, everyone exhibits black and white thinking (immediate judgments of good or bad) in a crisis or in severe grief. It's survivalist thinking. But the diagnosis of BPD follows these women around for the rest of their lives and getting the diagnosis changed is very difficult. A BPD diagnosis can get a woman's children taken away from her far faster than a NPD or APD diagnosis, even though both those are far more abusive. And chronic PTSD and BiPolar are notoriously misdiagnosed as BPD, once again, especially if the person is a woman.

So, perhaps hearing this you can understand my "bitter" response to this misuse. And "Anonymous BP Fetish" went out of their way to attack and sink the knife in with the BPD/NPD shit and furthermore "baited" the argument so any response from the LW was suspect. And then “bullied” any response. Classic narcissistic manipulation…by-the-way. So, as far as I'm concerned they fully deserve my “B&W attack”. I don't hear anything in what the LW wrote that comes even close to BPD. Her "rewrites" seem defensive to some rather "judgmental" writing here. Nothing, and I mean nothing that she has written or has said she has done strikes me as anything close to any type of PD. Immature and overly defensive maybe. But haven't we all be "guilty" of that at some point? And especially to the crap that's been thrown at her in this diatribe. What I read is someone who didn't look closely at the relationship she got into when she got into it (tell me any you haven't done this!), made the mistake of letting the guy's family loan her money for the car, said okay to having things paid for (tell me any of you haven't done this either) and then realized he's not all that she wants in a relationship but feels extremely guilty in getting out of it. Pretty damn everyday human if you ask me. It ain't rocket science and, furthermore, it ain't psychiatry! What I HAVE heard is a bunch of people going off the deep end because she didn't write a completely thought out descriptive letter and then projecting all their worst judgments and making her their scapegoat. Something to think about, folks!