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Borderline Personality Disorder May Be as Disabling as Bipolar Disorder

People with borderline personality disorder (BPD) tend to suffer similar deterioration of their psychiatric and physical health as those with bipolar disorder, according to new research published in the British Journal of Psychiatry.

“Despite the clinical and public health significance of both of these disorders, it sometimes seems as if BPD lives in the shadow of bipolar disorder,” said researcher Mark Zimmerman, M.D., director of outpatient psychiatry at Rhode Island Hospital.

“Bipolar disorder is a widely researched, well-publicized, well-funded topic. By contrast, BPD is seldom discussed and it is not included in the Global Burden of Disease study, a comprehensive registry that quantifies diseases by cost, mortality, geography, risk, and other factors.”

About 1.6 percent of the U.S. population has been diagnosed with BPD, compared with 2.6 percent of those with bipolar disorder, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. The study is the largest comparison of patients who have been diagnosed with BPD or bipolar disorder.

Diagnoses in mental health are very hard to come by accurately. In my life I have been diagnosed with depression, social anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, premenstrual dysphoric disorder, and bipolar II disorder. I have never actually been diagnosed by a practicing health care professional as having borderline personality, but I do fit the clinical criteria, and went through a very successful round or two of dialectical behavioural therapy, which is useful for BPD. So as to what my real diagnosis is, I couldn't tell you. My current psychiatrist, who has just starting seeing me, tells me that I do have a mood disorder of some sort, particularly because of how I have reacted to medicine in the past (Lortab and Paxil both made me manic, something that happens in people who are bipolar, for example). But regardless of what the diagnosis really is, me off my medication is not a pretty thing, although I am fairly high-functioning. Fortunately I am very compliant with my meds, and so I (mostly) stay on an even keel, although sometimes my hormones stir things up, like yesterday. My fear is what happens in two years if I have not found another job with health benefits, as mine is going away, and between the diabetes and the mental health issues, it is imperative I stay on my meds. I've also known others with the clinical signs of BPD, and having a relationship with someone with those issues is not fun. It is often described as 'walking on eggshells'--there is even a book on BPD with that in the title. Mix that together with someone who is either suffering from BPD and/or bipolar disorder, with two people with issues, and you get a very unstable relationship, indeed.