Lived Experience Forum

[BlueButterfly50]

@CherryBomb

Yes, There are three levels of PDs

Cluster A, Cluster B and Cluster C

A is for paranoid, schizoid and schizotypal

B is for histrionic, BPD, narcissistic and antisocial

C is for dependent, avoidant,compulsive obsessive

Cluster A (the "odd, eccentric" cluster);
Cluster B (the "dramatic, emotional, erratic" cluster); and,
Cluster C (the "anxious, fearful" cluster).

So you can have all the traits for each cluster such as a BPD with NPD or APD.  Or you can have BPD and social anxiety.  People are never "pure" personality disorder, there are always overlaps between clusters and between PDs on each cluster.  We are very complex human beings and cannot be neatly packaged into criteria.

[Jacques]

Thank you @CherryBomb

i will be careful not to read into what i have learned about mental health,  maybe one day i will be able to seek help for my problems, and thanyou for setting this up, i have really enjoyed tonight and i hope you are able on the SANE forums to host more of them.

Thankyou @CherryBomb, @Raven, @BlueButterfly50, @PeppiPatty @astrengthinever and everyone else, you have all given me plenty to think about and look into, i and thankyou for the youtube links too, will watch them tomorrow.

Take Care All

Jacques

[astrengthinever]

Thank you and DBT is a help, but she only takes what she wants from it. Apparently mindfulness is only for old people 😉 . What I have found incredibly helpful is learning many of the DBT skill for me. It has helped me learn a language in which I can communicate so much better with her. Perhaps skills every parent should learn for any teenager. I have also learnt to understand how she really feels. And accept her feelings as her genuine feelings and not brush them off as non sense. Basically allow her to feel them. I was brought up in a very hard love family and thus was how I thought I should bring her up. Only now am I learning that this; for my darling, caring and highly emotive daughter, is the worst thing I could have done. BUT it is never to late to change and move forward. I love her for accepting my faults and embracing my efforts.

[BlueButterfly50]

@Shadow

That is what Marsha Linehan is doing at the moment.  Behavioural Tech is the commercial arm of her business and she is currently contacting school boards in Seattle and other places to try and get DBT skills into the classroom.  And a good place to start would be primary school.

[CherryBomb]

That's a really great point @BlueButterfly50 - people a very complex and they are hard to fit into a label/category. I guess another way to look at diagnoses is that that they are a name for a specific cluster of symptoms.

[BlueButterfly50]

@Crazy_Bug_Lady

Under stress we can feel really emotionally shitty.  When we are in pain we can sometimes feel like a child and just want someone to validate our feelings.  Nothing wrong with that.  When your feelings are validated it seems to lift a weight off your shoulders and some problems can disappear just on the strength of that.  Yes, BPD is real, yes it is treatable.  People need to be more compassionate with other people in everyday life.  We need to tune into others and see their pain.  I find people with BPD are very empathic and tuned in to others.  That is one of the great things about BPD is the ability to have empathy and compassion for others.  It is not all bad.

[astrengthinever]

An excellent book,... My bible.

[Shadow]

That's amazing!

[CherryBomb]

Ok we've only got another 10 minutes so now is the time to add your final thoughts.

[BlueButterfly50]

@astrengthinever

I spent a weekend with Valerie in New York as part of my Fellowhsip.  It was a Family Survival Skills workshop based on the book.  Valerie kindly let me sit in for the two days. She really manages to get people to understand the importance of learning the neurobiology, the fact that it is not the parents fault, and the fact that validation, validation and validation is the most effective communication.