The role of co-occurring mental health disorders in the development of addiction cannot be understated. Understanding mental health and how it relates to substance abuse is key to finding the right help for a long-term recovery. Learn more about addiction and borderline personality disorder.

What is BPD?

Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is difficult to understand. People with BPD are often called dangerous attention seekers, which only makes symptoms worse. Living with this disorder is intense and mentally challenging for people in an already precarious situation. Symptoms of this condition include:

  • Fear of abandonment (real or imagined)
  • Patterns of instability or intense relationships
  • Impulsive behavior
  • Self-harm or other similar thoughts
  • Emotional instability
  • Feelings of dissociation
  • Stress induced anxiety and paranoia
  • Inappropriate, intense, emotional reactions

Self-medicating while this disorder rages through a person’s mind can happen quite often because it is hard to deal with the mental realities of what is happening. The compulsivity and emotional instability aspects of the disorder can cause substance dependency and addiction to develop quickly. The roots of addiction for people with BPD run deeply and require dual diagnosis treatment.

Recovery and BPD

Being diagnosed with BPD may seem like feeling trapped inside a box. Those living with BPD often feel invalidated or unheard because others who don’t understand tend to blame their feelings on the diagnosis. BPD does not negate the validity of a person’s thoughts and emotions. It does require responsibility for protecting your own mental health. While facing difficult emotions is a challenge, doing so helps build a solid foundation for your future. Both BPD and addiction recovery can be helped with the right life skills that promote a better means of living. Rather than suffer in silence, it is best to seek out treatment options which can help you move forward and support your healing journey.

The Springboard Center’s addiction treatment programs are tailored to meet the needs of each client. By utilizing a set of diverse methods of addiction treatment, we are able to deal with your addiction from all angles and concentrate on every aspect of your healing process. It is important to recognize that many of our services offer a group setting and environment, so that the client spends time with other people affected by the same chronic disease and problems. 432-620-0255