Why is public awareness of BPD so scarce?

[Waifed]

It amazes me that its probably way more prevalent than 2% and you never hear anything about it. You see these shows like Snapped and other shows and many of the stories have BPD written all over the whether it be the "non" or the pwBPD "snapping".

[havana]

There is very little public awareness on mental illness in general. The money goes to breast, lung, prostate & colon cancer. Mental illness is in the closet. Think about ourselves. Were we aware of it?

[Lady31]

Waifed,

Yeah, I know right.  I was watching Fatal Vows earlier and it portrayed this "family man" who was to all those around him the perfect man.   His wife wanted a divorce and found someone else.  Long story short, he "snapped" and went where she was - shooting her, her grandmother and HIS TWO DAUGHTERS.

The neighbor talking was mentioning how he STILL can't believe that was even possible.  The guy was always outside playing ball with his son, very personable, etc.

I know now, even after all that has happened, I still have a hard time believing my exh is mentally ill and did all the things he did.  There are times I read back through old journal entries and see things he did I totally forgot about/blocked out and they shock me still!  I think when you encounter this type of thing, it's so chaotic, so confusing.  It seems the stigma for the mentally ill are those walking around with no personal hygiene and carrying on with gibberish not making any sense.  

I'm betting there are tons of people who have been in these relationships and never realized a personality disorder was at work. I also think that nons (with our personality make up) are more inclined to look the other way, make excuses, and not able to see the full reality.  I think some of us have actually been involved with full blown sociopaths - and the non's personality doesn't want to believe that the other person is capable of doing these things ON PURPOSE.  They just can't see how a person could be purposely abusing them, manipulating them and using them.

All that behavior is DEFINITELY NOT all spawned from an abandonment fear.  Sorry peeps.

[Waifed]

It is amazing, especially how they methodically suck the life out of you.  You are totally right about dealing with mentally ill people and not even knowing. I worked with my ex for 3 years before dating her. I never had even an inkling that she had this dark side of her.

I also have a cousin that we always joked was boy crazy. She sleeps with guys on the first night and exhibits many other characteristics of a pwBPD. She is 40 and never has been in a relationship long enough to even get close to being married. I just thought she was strange until I learned about BPD. I'm pretty sure her mom is BPD and her dad (classic codependent) married another BPD after my cousins mom. This most recent ex was an alcoholic and drug abuser and would leave for days with the local drug dealer. Their two children are really messed up (15 & 13). It is so sad.

I think it is much more common than 2% of the population and awareness would help motivate more people to get help.

[Suzn]

It amazes me that its probably way more prevalent than 2% and you never hear anything about it.

Things are changing, slowly. You have an awareness movement going on right now. Well known (now) people like Brene Brown, Oprah and Dr Phil (wrote a new book called "Life Code" all about who he calls "baiters" are opening the eyes of the public to our own awareness, in addition, awareness to personality disorders. New movies such as Silver Playbook Lining also. Not to mention Psychology Today magazine. A new magazine was just born called BPD Magazine. You can check it out here:  www.BPDmagazine.com  With well known authors and/or clinical backgrounds as the contributors, such as Dr. Perry Hoffman, Shari Manning, Rachel Reiland and Valerie Porr. The word is getting circulated.

I think some of us have actually been involved with full blown sociopaths - and the non's personality doesn't want to believe that the other person is capable of doing these things ON PURPOSE.  They just can't see how a person could be purposely abusing them, manipulating them and using them.

All that behavior is DEFINITELY NOT all spawned from an abandonment fear.  Sorry peeps.

Sociopaths are not the same, though there can be traits. Let's bring this back to BPD.  

[RecycledNoMore]

I found out about BPD whilst researching domestic violence, I was flabbergasted to say the least, Id never heard of it before, I often think about the thousands of people out there, labouring away in their marriges/ , r/ s, who dont know about BPD, who cant " name their pain", I shudder to think that could have been me.

[Dr.Me2]

I think it is due to fact that for many years even the T profession did not want to talk about BPD and BPD patients as they presented such a challenge to treat until a few years ago.

I read somewhere that even T had to take therapy to ground themselves when treating somebody with BPD.

[zkirtz]

I think there is a strong, if not medieval tendency to single the odd one out. Understandable because dealing with the odd ones is extremely difficult. But this is certainly not the best way to cope with a society wherein not everyone is as capable as mr and mrs Right.

I guess we should already start in primary school to teach children that not everyone is as "normal" as another and that there are diseases that can make a person behave differently, through no fault of their own. THat there is hardly a "normal" but that some are more "normal" than others and that this will always be.

Dr. Phill indeed really helps with understanding that. Although it does not help that he makes a freak show out of every story. And there is no follow up so that we never hear what actually happened further down the road and we all can believe that Dr. Phill magically solved every disease.

[Suzn]

I guess we should already start in primary school to teach children that not everyone is as "normal" as another and that there are diseases that can make a person behave differently, through no fault of their own. THat there is hardly a "normal" but that some are more "normal" than others and that this will always be.

What we can teach children is how to become emotionally mature adults. Since children learn so much by example our task is to become what we want them to absorb. Teaching them how to express, experience and identify their emotions. Along with what boundaries are, why we have them and how to enforce them.

Dr. Phill indeed really helps with understanding that. Although it does not help that he makes a freak show out of every story. And there is no follow up so that we never hear what actually happened further down the road and we all can believe that Dr. Phill magically solved every disease.

Possibly. This could be in part his perception of what the public can assimilate and/or the fact that a full history can't be shared in less than an hour. Nevertheless, even bad press is good press, it gets people thinking and talking.

[Suzn]

I read somewhere that even T had to take therapy to ground themselves when treating somebody with BPD.

It is common for a therapist to have a therapist to keep them grounded solely based on the nature of all areas of their profession. 

[Love Is Not Enough]

It amazes me that its probably way more prevalent than 2% and you never hear anything about it.

Things are changing, slowly. You have an awareness movement going on right now. Well known (now) people like Brene Brown, Oprah and Dr Phil (wrote a new book called "Life Code" all about who he calls "baiters" are opening the eyes of the public to our own awareness, in addition, awareness to personality disorders. New movies such as Silver Playbook Lining also. Not to mention Psychology Today magazine. A new magazine was just born called BPD Magazine. You can check it out here:  www.BPDmagazine.com  With well known authors and/or clinical backgrounds as the contributors, such as Dr. Perry Hoffman, Shari Manning, Rachel Reiland and Valerie Porr. The word is getting circulated.

I think some of us have actually been involved with full blown sociopaths - and the non's personality doesn't want to believe that the other person is capable of doing these things ON PURPOSE.  They just can't see how a person could be purposely abusing them, manipulating them and using them.

All that behavior is DEFINITELY NOT all spawned from an abandonment fear.  Sorry peeps.

Sociopaths are not the same, though there can be traits. Let's bring this back to BPD.  

I agree with you suzn. I bet BPD will be a household word in 5 years. It is appearing more frequently and I hope it has a positive impact for those of us that deal with it. I really hope that there are more treatment options in the future.

And please do not get me started on "Silver Linings Playbook". My uBPDgf LOVED that movie and I will purchasing it for her birthday this week. I want to accept the positive message of the movie, but I just can't get there. I think it is completely delusional to think that these two seriously ill people can just magically end up happily ever after. It took everything in me not to jump up in the theater and start yelling like a lunatic about how preposterous the story was.

I will also be purchasing "Life of Pi" for her, another delusional movie. Go figure.

[Suzn]

You are totally right about dealing with mentally ill people and not even knowing. I worked with my ex for 3 years before dating her. I never had even an inkling that she had this dark side of her.

This can be a huge topic Waifed. What I found after "coming out" of this relationship and growing self awareness was that people in general aren't "plugged in". We go about our everyday life, go to work, pay bills, raise children, etc... .with blinders on. Focusing narrowly on what's in front of us. Most people have a dark side or an emotionally immature side. We all have exhibited behaviors we may not be proud of at some point, we put a spotlight on those when beginning to see our role in dysfunctional relationships that we stayed in.

We can educate ourselves and become more plugged in to what's being done to share awareness of mental illness. We can get involved.

I also have a cousin that we always joked was boy crazy. She sleeps with guys on the first night and exhibits many other characteristics of a pwBPD. She is 40 and never has been in a relationship long enough to even get close to being married. I just thought she was strange until I learned about BPD. I'm pretty sure her mom is BPD and her dad (classic codependent) married another BPD after my cousins mom. This most recent ex was an alcoholic and drug abuser and would leave for days with the local drug dealer. Their two children are really messed up (15 & 13). It is so sad.

Would you have kept thinking your cousin was simply "boy crazy" and strange before this event in your life? Things have changed, the blinders are now off. 

I think it is much more common than 2% of the population and awareness would help motivate more people to get help.

You may be very right here. Imho, 98% on the "other side" may be a little generous but that is only my opinion. You have to account for the fact that this leaves out all the other PD's in the percentages. This 2% is only reflective of BPD.

I want to accept the positive message of the movie, but I just can't get there. I think it is completely delusional to think that these two seriously ill people can just magically end up happily ever after. It took everything in me not to jump up in the theater and start yelling like a lunatic about how preposterous the story was.

I have found everything is connected. Plug in.

"To criticize hope in any guise as unrealistic perhaps misunderstands the nature of hope. Admittedly, the object of hope is always about the future, and the future is always uncertain. But the feeling of hope can be sustaining in the present, and the troubled characters in Silver Linings Playbook offer an inclusive vision of that feeling that is that much more universal and powerful." ~Psychology Today

I will also be purchasing "Life of Pi" for her, another delusional movie. Go figure.

All part of self awareness. Profound, spiritual journey. How can we use public awareness of behaviors in general to our personal benefit? 

"I saw the movie as a metaphor – a complete metaphor for life and the struggles of man. We are all crossing a great sea, alone on a craft that is barely worthy. If that isn’t enough, we have a tiger to deal with. We all have one. It may be drugs, booze, women, neighbors, illness, pain, a boss, or other obsessions or objects of aggression. We have to respect the tiger, feed the tiger, and eventually tame the tiger if we are to survive.

We may hate the tiger – it wants to kill us, but in the end, it is our tiger, and as the movie tells us, when we look in the tiger’s eyes we see a reflection of ourselves. At the end of our life we understand that we needed the tiger.

If there were no tiger in our life, no struggle, we would not have been challenged and not developed the life skills necessary for survival. If you do not tame your tiger, you will never have the life you were meant to live."~Huffington Post

[Learning_curve74]

I think there is a strong, if not medieval tendency to single the odd one out.

I think this is also why people here may be skeptical about the 2% BPD estimate, though I personally believe it is probably right. It's easy to start seeing what you're looking for, and that easily colors our perceptions.

So, being that it's relatively rare, I'm not surprised most people don't know about it. I'm not sure it's really even important for there to be a lot of awareness. Are there any special social accommodations the general public can make for BPD?

[Learning_curve74]

And please do not get me started on "Silver Linings Playbook". My uBPDgf LOVED that movie and I will purchasing it for her birthday this week. I want to accept the positive message of the movie, but I just can't get there. I think it is completely delusional to think that these two seriously ill people can just magically end up happily ever after.

I watched it with my exBPDgf and she lived it too (I left in the autocorrect mistake "lived" for "loved"  ).

A movie or a novel has a set ending. Our lives do not, at least not until we reach death. There is comfort in "happily ever after" that we will never experience except maybe when we are living in the moment.

Being positive is not being unrealistic. It is having a positive mindset even when being faced with the negative. "I will get through this", "My past does not define me", "There is a silver lining in this" and other similar thoughts and feelings are still positive and life-affirming without being unrealistic.

[zkirtz]

What we can teach children is how to become emotionally mature adults.

I think we should and hope we will, but its effectiveness would depend on the level of irreparable damage done between the age of 0-3 .

Education of parents about the consequences of abandonment and negative reinforcement would also help. And adequate responses in case of child abuse.

I guess there is so much more to be done.

[Waifed]

The problem with public awareness is everything nowadays is so watered down to be politically correct they will probably downplay the severity of the disease so no one with BPD will be offended.

[zkirtz]

I wouldn't know about political situations, I think we're from different countries.

But I reckon there is a lot of truth to what you're saying in general.

An increased understanding of the disease may be adverse to an understanding of the suffering by the relatives. I think that is true for most mental disorders. Behind every patient, there is a family strifing for recognition.

And that is the story you´re not likely to hear at dr Phills.

No one wants to admit on public tv that he knows the disease, he understands it fully, hates it and is crying on the verge of burnout, about to leave/kill his alledged dearest. If you do then you're the freak.The outsider wants families to take care of their problems instead of shifting the burden to society. But some burdens are just too big to handle.

[fromheeltoheal]

There is very little public awareness on mental illness in general. The money goes to breast, lung, prostate & colon cancer. Mental illness is in the closet. Think about ourselves. Were we aware of it?

The World Health Organization says that 25% of adults meet the criteria for a mental illness at some point in their lives.  That is my experience; we all know people who are a little 'off', I've been pretty 'off' at times, and I knew something was 'off' with my borderline ex right from the beginning.

And then the psychiatric community does studies, conducts tests, develops and refines criteria for various illnesses for the purpose of diagnosing and treating, putting these behaviors and thought patterns into boxes, defining them.  We don't have the expertise to do that, but we are still very aware when something is 'off', and it's a broad spectrum, a continuum, with every person different, some folks clinical, some folks just exhibiting traits.  We all know this.  There is a stigma associated with mental illness no doubt, but we are all fully aware we live with it every day.

[LA4610]

I don't know why public awareness is so scarce. It seems like yall have some great comments, ideas, and opinions though.

I do know this... .I am 29 years old and never in my life had I heard of BPD until my ex turned my life into complete chaos. I could tell she had issues. She actually told me she had issues. Hell, I have issues. When she opened herself up to me I figured she had trust/abandonment issues, depression, etc. not a crazy sickness that destroyed the lives of everyone she got close to.

My point is people need to start talking about this. Ourselves included. We need to be careful about how we go about doing it, but we need to do it. These people are so so dangerous.

[fromheeltoheal]

I am 29 years old and never in my life had I heard of BPD until my ex turned my life into complete chaos.

Me either.  It started when in a fit of mutual dysregulation I called my borderline ex a 'psychopath'; I didn't even know what that was really, but the look on her face told me I wasn't the first person to call her that.  That motivated me to do a little research, turns out she's not a psychopath, but I eventually landed on BPD and NPD and the lights came on.  And the other lights, the ones not as easy to swallow, were the ones that pegged me as a codependent people pleaser.  Oh goody, work to do.

[maxen]

in AlAnon meetings (which i've started attending in the fallout) the word is used often enough, with no definition needed. i was surprised by this, and am hopeful that i may meet others IRL who know.

[zkirtz]

Naming! Yes! That' s another thing that does not help. Naming the disease is done as if this was the cure, an answer, as an explanation that excuses every strange behaviour. But this branding doesnt help the person or his family coping with this tragedy.

[RecycledNoMore]

I live in new zealand, ( no sheep jokes plz:)) there is next to no support for BPDs, and zero support for people like myself coming out of a r/ s with a pwBPD?

Another thing new zealand and japan apparently have the highest percentage of INFJs per capita, INFJs, according to the mbti poll here BPD family, have the highest representation amongst those of us in relationships with pwBPD?

Frustrating

[charred]

I think it is odd enough it doesn't register with us. I first heard the term borderline when I asked "who was that?" about a cute little knockout girl... and was warned by the doctors/nurses and everyone else (I worked at a medical center at the time)... to steer clear of her, that she was borderline and bad news. This was not my pwBPD... she was a very cute and friendly girl... who I heard later was a frequent psych ward patient, was known to police and was really considered to be a dangerous person.  However, being early 20's... .none of the words outweighed my eyes... she was a looker and I didn't feel fear, given the chance I would have tried to hook up with her. (Thank god I didn't.)

My pwBPD came in to my life and screwed it up a few years later... .and I never suspected BPD or would have known what it was... .certainly didn't know that was the hell I was experiencing.

Over 25 yrs later my pwBPD came back in my life... and unlike my totally hormone driven twenties... I was actually listening to what she said... .and only had the occassional  . She told me in grad school she had been diagnosed BPD... .then about how the T was great at first and turned horrible and she tried to get the state board to pull his licensing. (In retrospect... she told me she was BPD  , and did BPD behavior... .trying to ruin someone that was helping her. )  ... .and to me, the word borderline meant "almost"... like a borderline diabetic is someone "almost diabetic"... .they better watch their sugar. Well... the poor name aside, borderline is almost... .almost a full blown psychosis... .but the very name downplays the severity of the disorder.

Everyone that knows the horrific r/s they were in was BPD... .probably has plenty of awareness of it, for me I was in my late 40's before I had that rude awareness driven home.

We are talking about it like the current treatments are curing it left and right... .and very few are treated successfully, the diagnosis isn't made often as insurance typically doesn't pay for treatment as little is proven to give good results, and telling someone they are BPD... .sets them off ... .possibly to ruin you for telling them.  So they get told they are too sensitive, or have an unstable personality... then given a book or two and sent out the door (with a sigh of relief.)

I think of my pwBPD... .she was the strongest arguing person I have ever encountered... .we had a 7 hr battle once... .and it was horrible. The prospects for her getting better (at 50 now)... .are slim. She is "same as she ever was... .only more so" to quote her dad.

What would you say to warn someone... or raise general awareness? Trying to explain them and the effect on us... .makes us sound like we can't handle an r/s where someone disagrees with us... .in fact it sounds like we are insensitive and needy... .and they are pretty normal. The reality of the horrible gaslighting and being painted black... isn't seen by others for what it is usually.

Thinking back... if I had been ultra with it... .that first girl... would have had me asking questions... .what is BPD, how do you know, what do they act like, why shouldn't I want to date her. But a cute, hot girl that tells you how great you are and looks at you dreamily... .then all but chases you in to the bedroom... .doesn't seem like a danger. The danger is mixed in with what we REALLY want... .its how it all changes and the effect of it on us that is devastating. Who would listen?