++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I want to write a few comments while I am thinking about ‘the pre-Borderline child’ and Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) as I come to increasingly identify the operation of the disorder within my severely abusive mother.

First of all I would NEVER agree that the diagnostic ‘name’ for this disorder be changed in any way at the current time of scientific understanding except as follows:  Just as ‘Multiple Personality Disorder’ has been renamed ‘Dissociative Identity Disorder’ (DID), I do believe that with BPD it is not ‘personality’ that is the concern but rather profound disturbances with ‘identity’.  (i.e., my mother did not know the difference between herself and her children, especially me — nor did she have the physiological capacity to do so)

While I see no way for BPD to operate without dissociation, these two disorders would currently require separate ‘names’, though I believe that BPD would be more accurately described if it were known as Borderline Identity Disorder (BID).

++

Secondly, concerning ‘diagnosis’ of Borderline at any age and a future name-change:  I believe that scientific ability already exists to accurately SEE the Borderline condition by watching the operation of a Borderline brain as it operates in distinctly identifiable ways that are different from the way a normal brain operates while performing specific tasks.

Our current society will have to face significant ‘ethical’ concerns before we are willing to accept this as fact.  Yet I see being able to watch someone’s brain operate during scans so as to ‘diagnose’ conditions is in no way different than the ways scans are currently used to SEE all kinds of other physiological problems.

BPD IS as real a PHYSIOLOGICAL problem as is any other diagnosable disease.  As long as our society denies this fact we will remain in the Dark Ages regarding the actual and factual conditions that we refer to as ‘mental illness’.

“This is not rocket science!”  Given the advances in technology anyone who cares to look can identify BPD by watching the way the brain operates differently than normal while engaged in certain tasks.

++

Now, thirdly, I have found absolutely no reason not to believe that the BPD doesn’t exist as a so-called pre-Borderline condition in childhood.  Therefore, accurate diagnosis of this condition can also be made during childhood through brain scans.

If this is the case then the nomenclature of ‘pre-Borderline’ is inaccurate.

Even if this is true, I am still led fourthly to ask myself whether or not I believe that a ‘pre-Borderline’ condition within a child under the age of 12 could be effectively treated.

I have a two-part response — yes and no!

I believe in the future it will become very clear that not only can BPD be identified through watching the operation of the brain, and that these same altered brain operation patterns will appear in childhood, but that these alterations CANNOT BE REVERSED.  In other words, once enough of the wrong kinds of experiences have happened conception through (I believe) age seven, the genetic combinations that create these altered brain patterns of operation will have been permanently built into a BPD survivor’s entire body including their brain.

This is no different than the accurate diagnosis of any other life-threatening ‘disease’ in childhood (or in adulthood) that is treatable and manageable although it is not curable.

The distinct benefit of identifying BPD during childhood is that the long-term consequences of these changed patterns can be ameliorated to a large extent.  Especially because all operations of the adult higher cortex are built upon the earliest brain formation platforms, and because the higher cortical areas of the brain do not complete their full maturation until around age 25-30, any EARLIER intervention and treatment of the BPD condition can have (in my opinion) profound positive effects on the further development of the higher cortical abilities.  (See for example:  +MOTHERING WARMTH = SMARTER PEOPLE)

++

Once early trauma changes the course of development for a child so that the genetic combinations that lead to BPD have been triggered (for child survivors who HAVE these genes), I do not believe the condition of BPD itself can ever be ‘undone’.  At the same time I believe that BPD can nearly be eliminated from society as a condition through the elimination of infant-child abuse and neglect from our society (including most importantly severe stress and trauma from conception to age 2 — and through age 7).

++++++++++++++++++++++++++