A.J.'s BPD Podcast
A.J.'s Ebooks/Audio
Life Coaching
A.J.'s Blogs
Related Books
Borderline Personality From The Inside Out
Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) has at its very roots the the core wound of abandonment It is a relational disorder. Key borderline facts everyone needs to understand include attachment issues, fear of abandonment, lack of object constancy (objects relation theory), self harm, depression, and narcissistic defense mechanisms such as splitting, projection, and alternating idealization and devaluation. Borderline Personality Disorder is often at the heart of verbal abuse, physical abuse, domestic abuse, emotional abuse and intense unstable and often toxic patterns of relating.
A.J.'s Latest Ebook is Available Now!
Punishment and
Revenge in Borderline Personality Disorder The Unmastered Talionic Impulse - What Loved Ones Need To Know and what those with BPD will learn from
also if they are in an aware enough place to cope with any triggers that this subject might well bring up for them.
You can join A.J. Mahari to discuss interests, concerns, and issues about Borderline Personality Disorder and a wide variety of related topics as well as join in on discussion with others on A.J. Mahari's Self Help Information and Life Coaching Facebook page.
A.J.'s Audio Program Borderline Splitting - Understanding for Loved Ones
Punishment and Revenge in Borderline Personality Disorder
BPD Understanding vs Being Understood
Fault Vs Responsibility in BPD
It is important for both those diagnosed with BPD and those who have someone in their lives with BPD - family members, loved ones, relationship partners - non borderlines - to come to an awareness about BPD - Understanding Borderline Personality Disorder The Lost Self The Impact of The Core Wound of Abandonment because without a conscious and aware understanding of all of the aspects and ramifications of BPD the result for the borderline and the non borderline is the same - on-going pain and suffering. Pain and suffering that does not have to continue as it has been.
These relational schemas, schemas of toxic relating that are polarized in what is an absence of emotion regulation, cause untold pain for those with BPD and for the Non Borderlines who find themselves confused and in pain On The Other Side of BPD and who as non borderlines are on a journey of their own upon which they need to come to terms with the Full Circle Lessons in their own lives that can and will free them from suffering of what I call borderlines-by-proxy and find peace and stability in the self they are compromising or losing to the borderline and by recognizing and resolving The Dilemma on the Other Side of BPD by coming to terms with the reality of Borderline Love and overcoming their denial about the reality of BPD and love so that they can re-gain centre and stability in their own lives. Borderlines are relating from The Shadows and Echoes of Self = a false self in the absence of the lost authentic self.
The borderline false self is the root of Rage in BPD A rage that the borderline false self via its narcissism employs to try to protect the borderline from his or her Abandoned Pain. --© A.J. Mahari
A.J. Mahari is currently writing a memoir about her life and experience as a person who had two parents with Borderline Personality Disorder, as a person who was diagnosed herself with BPD at the age of 19 and from her perspective as someone who has recovered from BPD. There is a new section on her BPD Blog called The Diary - My Borderline Years
| Pain on Both Sides of BPD |
Audio Program "Preparing For Recovery From BPD" Parts 1 & 2 by A.J. Mahari
Audio Program Rage Addiction in BPD by A.J. Mahari (sold separately or packaged with Mahari's Ebook, "Rage and BPD")
At the heart of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) despite any and all other theories, in my opinion as one who has been there and had BPD, is what I call "The Core Wound of Abandonment". Abandonment trauma in Borderline Personality Disorder is the result of the core abandonment wounds that are central to the cause and course of BPD. It is the core wound of abandonment that for whatever reason or collection of reasons causes the arrested emotional development that results in the loss of one's authentic self and that I, from my own experience and recovery, conclude is the very essence and nature of what Borderline Personality Disorder actually is. You can read more about how I describe and outline what Abandonment entails and actually is in its broadest sense.
Punishment and Revenge in Borderline Personality Disorder
You can purchase a 2 hour talk A.J.gave to a group of Loved Ones of those with BPD (primarily) about tough love and BPD, BPD and Responsibility, Lack of Emotional Skin in BPD and more You can purchase this talk in audio or video format.
- Purchase all 3 of ebooks for NON BORDERLINES
- Non Borderlines - You can purchase 6 ebooks packaged together with or without audio.
- Those with BPD and/or Non Borderlines can purchase A.J. Mahari's 3 "Core Wound of Abandonment" series ebooks packaged together with or without audio.
A.J. Mahari is a woman who has recovered from Borderline Personality Disorder. She writes about it from, not only the inside out, but as someone who had Borderline parents and as someone who had a relationship with someone with BPD (after her own recovery) and knows first-hand the non borderline side of it all as well. A.J. knows and understands this personality disorder from both sides.
Many of my articles on BPD (click on BPD Articles) from 1999-2009 are available for your reading at no cost. I will be adding articles periodically as time permits and the rest of my writing will be made available at reasonable rates in Ebooks (PDF format) along with the information I make available in my Audio Programs
Along with offering hope that recovery is possible and more information on what it looks and feels like and how others can begin to recover this site will also seek to continue to bridge the gap that exists between worlds. The world of those diagnosed with BPD and the world of those who seek to understand them and who often have to make very tough choices about whether or not they can forge ahead in relationships that so far have caused a tremendous amount of pain and have not proved to be healthy.
This site offers hope. It is not unrealistic. If you have been diagnosed with BPD - hope, believe, and have faith that you can and will recover. I am now in the process of adding information to a new section on this web site dedicated just to information and questions and so forth - all about recovery from BPD.
How each person diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder recovers (or perhaps doesn't) and to what degree is highly individual and much more will be outlined about this in a new section I am working on now on this site, along with the over-all re-construction of this site that focuses on Recovery From BPD
A.J. Mahari on Fault Vs Responsibility in BPD
You can purchase A.J.'s entire video lecture at Phoenix Rising Publications
The Etiology of BPD
I will be outlining the etiology of BPD - its causes. I know that no one has the definitive answer about exactly what one thing or combination of things makes up the root causes of BPD. I, do, however, based upon my own experience, have some fairly strong feelings about this.
Many put forth that the causes of BPD are still not well understood, and it is likely that a number of factors are involved in its development. I can partially agree with that. It is the causative factors of anything that may, in fact, be biological that I have difficulty with along with the amount of medication being thrust upon borderlines.
One biological theory purports that traumatic experiences in early childhood may cause the hippocampus to atrophy which is thought to cause structural brain changes in individuals with BPD. I don't know. I would say though that isn't it just as likely that the effects of trauma on the brain that can cause changes in brain development are the result of the early childhood emotional and psychological trauma and not some genetic mutation in those with BPD. Further to this, I've had many professionals I've asked tell me that they believe that traditional psychotherapy can positively impact trauma-induced changes in the brain and build lasting changes that can address any such damage -- so why the big push with medication?
I think what needs to be focused on most is that there are likely a number of factors rather than coming down so strong on the side of the biological argument.
I've had BPD and recovered from it. I had some neurological testing done when I was borderline and I don't have any atrophy or any such process in the hippocampus of my brain. That is not to say that some haven’t obviously had that result but is that really what causes BPD or is it a coincidence? I wonder.
It is further theorized by many that this dysfunction in the limbic system of the brain may explain some of the emotional dysregulation which is inherent in BPD. That may well be, but, do we need medication to control that or can we learn new ways of thinking and believing that re-route the neurons in our brains and make the necessary adjustments or changes needed to recover?
I would assert that how one thinks and what causes the cognitive distortions and polarized way of thinking in those with BPD is far more responsible for emotional dysregulation then some physical problem in one's brain. I believe most BPD responses to stress and to relational difficulties have their main genesis in the core wound of abandonment.
I have written a 253 page ebook called, The Legacy of Abandonment in BPD - An examination of the core wound of abandonment and Borderline Personality Disorder that is a follow up to my first ebook, The Abandoned Pain of Borderline Personality Disorder which is a detailed history, from the inside out, as someone who has been there and recovered from BPD, of how and why the abandoned pain of those with BPD keeps them stuck in the agonizing and seemingly mystifying suffering of Borderline Personality Disorder. This ebook is also a precursor to the ebook that followed it, The Shadows and Echoes of Self - The False Self That Arises Out of the Core Wound of Abandonment In BPD Each ebook is available separately or all 3 can be purchased together with or without audio programs as well.
The core wound of abandonment is traumatic enough to perhaps cause some changes on a biological level. What I take issue with though as the biological theories are put forth is that there are not contained in those theories, or articles, the reality that many are recovering from BPD and that DBT Skills Training Schema Therapy and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy along with psychotherapy - talk therapy - can and will (in most cases) address the organization of thoughts based upon reactionary protective instinctual behaviour while under the stress of the trauma to the point where one can change the way they think and more or less reverse the damage and/or manage their way out of BPD.
© A.J. Mahari 2006
No reproduction in whole or in part without the written consent of A.J. Mahari. To seek permission to re-produce anything on this site or to link anything on this site please email me at bpdinsideout@yahoo.ca - I do not give my consent for anything I've written to be re-produced on any other website without my expressed permission. If you wish to link to an article I've written please link directly to the article page on this site - thanks so much!
Web Counters as of February 11, 2003
This web site is owned and maintained by A.J. Mahari © 2003-2009 All rights reserved borderlinepersonality.org borderlinepersonality.ca & bpdrecovery.ca
