What BPD criteria do you think affects YOU the most?

A typical BPD thread intended for vague personal insight: What BPD criteria do you think affects YOU the most?

The current DSM "outline" of the 9 criteria defining BPD: http://www.borderlinepersonalitytoda...main/dsmiv.htm

(DISCLAIMER: this thread recommended for those who've already been diagnosed/confirmed an affliction with BPD. Furthermore - for those who say "I don't know. I'm not a doctor." - Well, true - but you DO know yourself/your circumstances more than anyone else does, right? This is about insight! )

Now that we've got that out of the way... what is probably the most detrimental for me, out of ANY of the 9 criteria for BPD, is criterion #3 - identity disturbance. This is probably the one that has the most damaging impact on my life. I.e., one day I SWEAR I would be so sure/confident about who I really am and what my very qualities and limitations are, along with seeming to have things "figured out." It would be like that to the point of seeming like some kind of life-changing epiphany. But then, the next day - I wouldn't be so sure anymore. Then the day after that, it would be something completely different. The process repeats, over and over. Experiencing this is so bewildering and discouraging, ESPECIALLY when you're really trying to figure things out for yourself. After that criterion, it would be #6 (affective instability) and #8 (anger issues), respectively, as the most profound/impacting criteria. Everything after that seems to be considerably less impacting.

On the brighter side of things, there's a possible explanation (on Yahoo! Answers) for something like identity disturbance: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/in...2192305AAk0jtA

"You are in the stage of finding yourself. Who you are... maybe you have something calling for your attention and absent mindedly you are searching for what that thing is and you havent found it yet. But one day you will."



Anyone else wanna share...?

This is a hard one for me. It really depends on the day.The biggest ones for me are the two that I copy/pasted below:

5. recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, or threats, or self-mutilating behavior

7. chronic feelings of emptiness

I have attempted suicide more than once, a lot of it due to the feelings of emptiness

Mine is #5 when it happens it has the most impact

Number 1 is first; then number 6. Number 5 used to be bad, but in the past two years with my current T I think this part has been "cured". Number 1 causes me the most problem because I can't stand to be alone and then my friends, my husband, my lovers, my T all get annoyed with me because they give and give me their time and it's never enough so they get frustrated with me, which sets off the cycle of fear of abandonment again--(they are frustrated=they hate me and will give up on me). And what is wrong with me that I can't be by myself anyway? I hate that.

Number 6, affective instability, often upsets my friends and partners, too. It bothers my T; I might call her in intense pain and distress and then two days later send her a quick email to say I'm fine now. She says she refuses to be dragged up and down with me so now she ignores my affect much of the time, which is kind of scary. My husband hates it. One moment I will be content to sit and grade so he thinks it is safe to go try to do something by himself, but when he comes back "to check on me" in an hour or two I could be suicidal or crying hysterically or hurting myself in some way. He then wonders "what happened?" and often feels resentful that he can't walk off and do his own thing without having to worry about the consequences of leaving me alone two rooms away. And why should a grown woman have to have her husband "come check on her"? It makes me feel stupid, but I do need him to come check on me; anything could happen in my emotional mind or sometimes physical problems trigger emotional breakdowns.

..well I can easily identify with all 9....no worries there.

but for me I kinda see that everything on the list apart from number 2 .....

all these things are exactly what make number 2 happen so bad for me!

(a pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal realationships characterized by the alternating between extremes of idealization and devaluation)

and the effects of number 2 just send me spinning off into the others all over again and thats the cycle.

...and I'm pretty damn certain I have some serious flaws in my character anyway that have me doing much more devaluation than idealization.

...and then I aint no psych scientist either so who knows?