First signs

The mental illness popularly known as borderline disorder is referred to in psychiatric jargon as an emotionally unstable personality disorder. This term already contains some references to symptoms that can be present in borderline disorders. In particular, patients with this disorder tend to be very moody and frequently have uncontrollable emotional outbursts.

They often act very impulsively and without first thinking about the possible consequences of their actions. Typically, borderline patients often enter into interpersonal relationships, but in many cases these relationships quickly break down again and are therefore very unstable. Patients often switch quickly between very strong emotional attachment and clinging to their partner in order to push him away and devalue him again.

Fear of loss, especially the fear of being abandoned, plays a major role in borderline disease. Other possible signs of a borderline personality disorder can be a recurring feeling of inner emptiness, self-harming behaviour or even suicide (attempted suicide). Often affected persons describe that they have the feeling of being able to feel better again through cracks or other self-harming behaviour.

Other potentially harmful behaviour such as excessive gambling, drug use, sexual activity with constantly changing sexual partners or extreme eating behaviour can also occur. In patients with a borderline personality disorder, so-called comorbidities, i.e. additional diseases, occur more frequently than in mentally healthy patients. These include depression, dependence on drugs or alcohol, eating disorders and anxiety disorders.

Borderline in children

Borderline syndrome is not easy to detect in children. During childhood or puberty, adolescents can already suffer from this disease and, contrary to what one might think, those affected do not reveal themselves only through self-harm. Often the disease also manifests itself through rapidly changing moods.

This is treacherous in that it is very difficult to distinguish this emotional instability from harmless mood swings, which can be typical for the difficult phase of puberty. It is therefore not uncommon that typical changes in character are not first noticed by parents or other family members, but by teachers or educators in kindergarten. This is plausible insofar as children at school or kindergarten must be much more adapted than at home.

If this causes them great problems because of emotional instability, it is often more easily noticed outside the home environment because of a certain social incompetence. Overtaxing oneself and the uncontrollability of one’s own emotions and impulses can also manifest itself in children through bed-wetting, sleep disorders and also eating disorders. The borderline syndrome has an enormously difficult effect on interpersonal relationships.

It is almost the same whether it is a partnership or a friendship. Most borderline patients find it very difficult to interact with other people, because they have enormous difficulties in assessing how they themselves affect others or what others are feeling right now. Dealing with their partner is particularly difficult.

The reason for this is that the self-perception of borderliners can fluctuate greatly between self-love and self-hate, and there is also an exaggerated fear of being abandoned. It is typical for borderliners in a relationship that they excessively idealise and exaggerate their partner at the beginning of the relationship, but it often only takes small things such as a delay to an appointment or other inattention such as the absence of a promised phone call for the person concerned to feel deeply offended. This usually has the consequence that the strong positive feelings that just existed turn quickly into equally strong rejection due to such a perceived offence. A borderline disease is therefore a very strenuous challenge for the partner and often a reason for separation.