Tempest in a Teapot: Borderline Personality Disorder

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0 height="100%"><tr> <td valign="top" width=160 BGCOLOR="#333333" TEXT="#F7F7FF" background="03cdedc2ddualp.png"> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Dr. Wade Silverman, Ph.D"><U><B>Dr. Wade Silverman, Ph.D</B></U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id8.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Contact Us"><U><B>Contact Us</B></U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id147.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="FAQs"><U><B>FAQs</B></U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id16.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="About Dr. Silverman"><U><B>About Dr. Silverman</B></U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id146.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Great links"><U><B>Great links</B></U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id3.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Mind Reader© archive"><U><B>The Mind Reader© archive</B></U></A></div> </td> <td valign="top" BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000" background="03d64643.png"> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#666633" FACE="Times New Roman" ><B>Dr. Wade Silverman, Ph.D</B></FONT>    |     <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#0000BF" FACE="Times New Roman" ><A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Dr. Wade Silverman, Ph.D"><U>home</U></A></FONT></div> <div>                                                   </div> <div> Tempest in a Teapot: Borderline Personality Disorder</div> <bR> <bR> <div> Certain individuals tend to make a mess out of their lives. They are not really evil, but still end up with many personal and legal problems. They are a psychologist's nightmare because they require high maintenance for relatively small increments of improvement. They usually arrive at a lawyer's office following a drug arrest, a DUI, or a messy divorce process. They may have fired several lawyers before coming to your office. They are volatile, demanding, inconsistent, irresponsible, and unhappy. Sound familiar? You are working with a borderline personality disorder. This condition manifests itself with five or more of the following characteristics: (a) impulsivity in such areas as spending, sex and substance abuse; (b) instability and intensity in interpersonal relationships; (c) avoidance of abandonment; (d) disturbance of identity marked by an unstable self-image; (e) Recurrent suicidal behaviors, gestures or threats; (f) feelings of emptiness; (g) inappropriate and intense anger; (h) stress-related paranoid ideas or dissociative symptoms; and (i) instability of mood. </div> <div> It is important for you to be able to determine when this client requires treatment. For when they are depressed they are at risk for suicide. Otherwise, they are merely management problems. They require you to set strict guidelines for appointment times, paying of bills, and for providing you with documentation. It is essential that you set limits on them by charging for missed appointments, after-hours calls, and repeated correspondence. If you are not willing to risk losing a client, do not work with a borderline client. Otherwise they will take up ever increasing periods of your time. </div> <div> One of the hallmarks of a borderline personality is chronic anger. Thus, they are difficult to manage in mediation settings and sometimes even in the court room. You must micromanage their conduct for their own self-interest. This might include specific instruction about decorum.</div> <bR> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>