Borderline Personality Disorder: History, Understanding and Treatment

Borderline Personality Disorder affects an estimated five million Americans. Patients with BPD make up 20 percent of psychiatric inpatients and 10 percent of psychiatric outpatients (American Psychiatric Association [APA], 2000). The symptoms of borderline patients are similar to those for which most people seek psychiatric help: depression, mood swings, the use and abuse of drugs and alcohol as a means of trying to feel better; obsessions, phobias, feelings of emptiness and loneliness, inability to tolerate being alone, problems about eating.
There are four important objectives in underst…