Borderline Personality Disorder

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Literature Review Your Name Name of the University Literature Review Borderline personality disorder is a psychiatric illness characterized by unstable behavior, moods and relationships. Since patients with borderline personality behavior display symptoms, such as depression, panic, anger, substance abuse, suicidal tendency and self-harm, scientists have identified dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) as the preferred method of treatment. DBT emphasizes on mindfulness and makes the patients attentive of a given situation. It aids in controlling emotions and minimizes self-destructive behaviors of individuals. DBT also improves the relationships among individuals and helps to seek a balance between the transforming behaviors…show more content…
258), DBT is a complex psychotherapeutic intervention, which implements some of the basic principles of cognitive behavioral therapy in consolidation with systemic and mindfulness strategies. The treatment aims at holding two distinct goals and assumptions simultaneously in the minds of the BPD patients. DBT makes use of verbal communication and trains the BPD patients in self-management skills. It focuses on the inner mental processes of individuals and associates their past difficulties with the current ones. DBT reduces substance abuse in BPD patients as it attempts making peace with the early life experiences of patients, which have contributed to their difficulties (Stoffers, Völlm, Rücker, Timmer, Huband, & Lieb, 2012, p. 260). Since a DBT therapist addresses the symptoms of BPD patients from a non-judgmental point of view, the patients tend to tolerate the treatment with patience. DBT not only helps the BPD patients to cope up with distress and disturbed behavior, but also allows them to focus on their surroundings. Although DBT fails to focus on the causes for emotional reactions of the patients, it attempts to alleviate the internal conflicts, which cause distress by allowing the patients to look at themselves and others in an objective perspective rather than an emotional perspective (Klein & Miller, 2011, p.…show more content…
It reduces the symptoms of depression and anxiety, and enables a better psychosocial living. There is a vast difference in the treatment of DBT administered to adolescents and adults. In adults, the therapist needs to dedicate most of the time describing the dialectic nature of BPD in order to make the patient realize that he suffers from the illness (Moran, et al., 2012, p. 238). Patients also promise using certain skills to avoid troublesome situations depending upon their understanding of the BPD. In the case of adolescents, the same approach does not work as the adolescents have not yet experienced the adverse symptoms of BPD. Following a similar approach leads to various difficulties during the treatment and worsens the symptoms rather than alleviating them. Therefore, the DBT treatment requires treating the individual behaviors of the patients rather than the illness as a whole. The structuring of individual DBT sessions ensures addressing the different behaviors and stages of treatment in a hierarchy based upon the severity and threat of target behaviors (O'Connell & Dowling, 2014, p.
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