Teenagers with BPD are often angry, impulsive, and quick to believe that other people have wronged them. Young people with BPD often harm themselves and they have a high risk of suicide. Symptoms of BPD usually show up in the teenage years. Early treatment can help people with BPD manage the disorder better.
In fact, content analysis of DSM criteria by Geiger & Crick (2001) found five childhood indicators of BPD: hostile or paranoid worldview; impulsivity; intense, unstable or inappropriate emotion; excessively close relationships; and lack of sense of self.
In summary, temperamental traits in childhood, including relational aggression, impulsivity, low emotional control, and negative affectivity, are robust predictors of early onset of BPD.
Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a severe and heterogeneous mental disorder that is known to have the onset in young age, often in adolescence. For this reason, it is of fundamental importance to identify clinical conditions of childhood and adolescence that present a high risk to evolve in BPD.
According to the DSM-5, BPD can be diagnosed as early as at 12 years old if symptoms persist for at least one year. However, most diagnoses are made during late adolescence or early adulthood.
Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) can develop at an early age and if not properly addressed, they can carry this mental health condition to adolescence and through to adulthood. This mental health condition is often confused with Bipolar Disorder which also shows similar signs.
Stressful or traumatic life events
Often having felt afraid, upset, unsupported or invalidated. Family difficulties or instability, such as living with a parent or carer who experienced an addiction. Sexual, physical or emotional abuse or neglect. Losing a parent.
Belsky and collaborators observed that children who were physically abused presented a higher score of BPD symptoms at age 12 and were especially vulnerable if they had a family history of psychiatric disorders [83].
Children of mothers with BPD are also at heightened risk for exhibiting attention difficulties, aggressive behavior, and low self-esteem, in addition to major depression, anxiety, and borderline personality disorder itself.
BPD is thought to develop from a combination of an emotionally vulnerable child and an emotionally unsupportive environment (Heard & Linehan, 1993). An emotionally vulnerable child may have temperamental traits associated with BPD, such as emotional reactivity and impulsivity (Posner et al., 2003).
The most common form of adverse experience reported by people with BPD was physical neglect at 48.9%, followed by emotional abuse at 42.5%, physical abuse at 36.4%, sexual abuse at 32.1% and emotional neglect at 25.3%.
Your GP will not be able to give you a diagnosis of BPD – only a special mental health professional can do this. But they can refer you to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS), or your community mental health team for an assessment.
An estimated 10,000 to 15,000 babies in the United States develop BPD each year. There is no cure, but it can be treated and most babies go on to live a long and healthy life.
According to the DSM, borderline personality disorder can be diagnosed in adolescents or even children under age 18 as long as formal criteria are met. Symptoms have to be occurring for more than a year, and they must be “pervasive, persistent and unlikely to be limited to a particular developmental stage.”
There is also evidence to link BPD to other forms of child maltreatment, such as emotional and physical neglect. In fact, some research suggests that emotional and physical neglect may be even more closely related to the development of BPD than physical or sexual abuse.
Mothers with BPD may oscillate between over-involved, intrusive behaviors and withdrawn, avoidant behaviors. These behaviors may also manifest as oscillations between hostile control and coldness.
Results: People with Borderline Personality Disorder have a reduced life expectancy of some 20 years, attributable largely to physical health maladies, notably cardiovascular.
Most personality disorders begin in the teen years when your personality further develops and matures. As a result, almost all people diagnosed with borderline personality disorder are above the age of 18. Although anyone can develop BPD, it's more common if you have a family history of BPD.
Someone with BPD may go to great lengths to feel something, as well as becoming increasingly withdrawn and avoidant during an episode. Thoughts of everyone being out to get them and hating them are common during these times also.
People with BPD score low on cognitive empathy but high on emotional empathy. This suggests that they do not easily understand other peoples' perspectives, but their own emotions are very sensitive. This is important because it could align BPD with other neurodiverse conditions.
To punish themselves: Sometimes people with BPD appear to harm themselves out of a profound feeling or belief that they deserve punishment and abuse. Sometimes this belief appears to be related to the fact that they were abused as children and believed they deserved the abuse.
Children and teens who suffer from a personality disorder have problems maintaining healthy relationships and often blame circumstances or people around them for problems they have created. This behavior leads to a feeling of loneliness and isolation.