[iamanders]

Pax!
Some people seem to argue that personality disorders are a western phenomena. There is something called culture-bound symdrome for non-westerners. Could it be that personality disorders are a somewhat modern western culture-bound syndrome? I am aware that DSM-IV doesn't really say so but what do you think?
TCpsychiatry - YouTube

[wadingthruemotions]

I have read this reference many times in several different places on the internet. I don't have them saved so I don't remember which ones exactly but it comes up in google search.

So I guess that means its just all us?? That confused me a bit.

[here today]

I hadn’t seen the term before, so thanks for posting about it.

It makes sense to me, and I think my “history” would add some strength to the argument. I started out my mental patient “career” 50 years ago with anorexia nervosa (which I found already identified as a Western culture-bound syndrome), diagnosed with PDNOS and DDNOS 3 years ago. But the basic personality dysfunction had been there all along, and I do think it’s an outcome of biological temperament AND socialization/culture.

[iamanders]

there's an interesting article about Borderline http://72.52.202.216/~fenderse/transpersonal.htm

[here today]

Yes, very interesting.

Are you able to use to the culture-bound syndrome idea to help in your own recovery?

It suggests to me something I am already convinced about – that I need some kind of “re-socialization” after dealing (finally) with and absorbing the effects of childhood trauma that set in place patterns that ended up inflexible and dysfunctional.

And my most recent 11-year “crisis” – it followed my husband’s death, I gave up on completing a graduate school program, and my children grew up and left the nest. Given that I’m an introvert by temperament and had the maladaptive, rigid coping patterns – and then no social identity – well, yes . . . the notion that social and communal “rites of passage” can play a role in a person’s adaptation seems very interesting indeed!