Ab Ovo - The Psychology Podcast

Personality disorders - Custer B (borderline, histrionic, narcissistic, antisocial)

In this episode, I talk about Cluster B personality disorders, which include borderline personality disorder, histrionic personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, and antisocial personality disorder.

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Duration:: 33m
Broadcast on:: 24 Jul 2024
Audio Format:: mp3

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In the last episode I described what personality disorders are so we already know that there is a mental health condition that is characterized by patterns of kind of inflexible thinking or inflexible behaviors that often leads to significant difficulties in life so I'm not going to repeat it if you want to know more about what personality disorders are you can click on the previous episode. I also described cluster A personality disorders which are characterized by kind of old or eccentric behaviors and in today's episode I'm going to describe a different cluster the second cluster, cluster B of personality disorders and it is sometimes called the acting out group and this cluster is characterized by dramatic and overly emotional thinking or unpredictable behavior and it usually includes a borderline personality disorder, histrionic personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder and antisocial personality disorder. So contrary to the cluster A where we had three personality disorders this time we have four. So let's start with borderline personality disorder because this is probably one of the most popular disorders because of many movies that portray such patients and the first one that usually comes to mind is of course girl interrupted with win on the rider and the angel in a jolly. However the side note from me the main character was not exactly the borderline patient although she was diagnosed as one but in general girl interrupted is usually presented as a movie depicting patient with borderline personality disorder and the Angelina Jolie in this movie is presented as someone with antisocial personality disorder. So we have two cluster B disorders here. Another movie could be fatal attraction with Glenn Close in which her character displays some symptoms characteristic to patients with borderline personality but first things first what are the symptoms? Well patients with borderline personality disorder experience, pervasive instability in mood behavior, self-image and general functioning. They often experience intense episodes of anger, depression and anxiety and these patients can fluctuate from being very loving and emotionally engaged to being very angry and even aggressive because of the slightest symptoms of rejection or lack of interest and this is very characteristic to patients with personality from cluster B that they require constant attention they love when something is happening and they are in the center of this and some people say that they love drama which is true these people usually engage in very dramatic situations. They usually engage in unstable relationships for example abusive relationships or they engage in an affair with married people because when there is no drama when there is relative stability they lose interest in such relationships. They require intense emotions so when there is drama they feel good I mean they feel both good and bad because borderline is like constant swing so they feel good and bad almost at the same time it's very rapid but when it's stable relationship you know married with children and so on this is too boring so no it's not fun to these people. In relationships these patients are often swinging between extreme closeness and extreme distance so at one moment they perceive the partners perfect one and next they devalue them and say they are the worst partner so relationship with such person is like constant swing and the same thing is happening with their self-image and self-identity at one time they feel like the world is the roister and skies the limit and suddenly they feel like crap worthless and they want to kill themselves. They also change their identity very easily so when they are in the relationship with a scientist they are so into science when they break up they hate science when they have new relationship with someone who loves art or they are so into art and so on and so on and this might be very rapid and sometimes it's hard to follow even for the close ones and also these patients have tendency to engage in very impulsive and potentially self-damaging behaviors just like substance abuse, unprotected or unsafe sex, reckless driving, driving and drinking and so on so everything that is intensive and everything that stimulates them in a very intense very hardcore way this is exciting and this is tempting to these people. Also this is very characteristic these patients they have many suicide attempts they rarely keep themselves and if they do it's rather by accident but they because killing themselves is not the case it's not the point to kill themselves the point is to behave like they want to kill themselves because it draws attention and if it draws attention it means they are in the middle, in the center of other people interest. So not suicides but suicide attempts are very characteristic to this disorder. Also these patients are very easily bored so as I mentioned before when the relationship is stable it's equal to being bored into them so there's too much stability they always do something to make it more swingable so they for example reach out to their ex-partners or they go out to the club and flirt with someone so there something must be happening constantly and I mentioned before that fatal attraction might be interpreted as a movie about someone with borderline personality disorder because these people often fear of being abandoned or rejected and this fear may lead to frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined separation and this is very important to say that it might be imagined separation because if these patients I mean these patients often interpret neutral behaviors of the partner like symptoms like signs of anticipated separation and they might might act very unpredictably so for example they will threaten with killing themselves and even though they perceive this relationship as boring and they might act like they are trying to ruin this relationship the fear of being abandoned is so hard that they will act very strangely so they will for example be very abusive toward the partner or they will be very controlling and so on and so on and being in a relationship with such person is extremely hard so this is often relationship with with a lot of anger a lot of fighting there might be a lot of violence maybe substance abuse and the general pattern of relationship is is I want you and I want you not I love you and I hate you at the same time it's all all the emotions of anger and love it's all going on at the same time and of course borderline personality disorder is not only about relationships but it is significant impairment in various areas of life like work self-care and so on and usually it begins in early adulthood so it can observe symptoms in adolescence but the complete borderline personality disorder is usually developed in early adulthood and I remember a patient with borderline personality disorder it was a transgender patient by the way but I'm not denying the diagnosis of gender incongruence but this patient was acting like like she was on a constantly on a on a fence like she wanted transition but she didn't want to transition she wanted to be a woman and she wanted to be a man she wanted to take hormone treatment but hormone treatment she perceived as harmful because she because it hindered her manhood and so on so she wanted it and she wanted not but this is this is a sign of what both patients the more important part is that she was she was in a relationship with a woman who was a sex worker and oh and by the way speaking of sex working the one more thing that came to my mind it's a movie called the monster I mean monster oh it's about the Eileen Wernosk was a serial killer and the main character is portrayed by Charlize Theron and she displayed beautifully symptoms of borderline personality disorder so if you haven't seen it I recommend watching it because this is this is a really good portrait of how borderline person can behave and coming back to the patient she described her partner in the worst words she described her as reckless dirty not worth a dollar as a thief who takes her money as a slut and so on and so really really really the worst words you can hear about someone and when I asked her why is she still coming back to her because this was the on-off relationship she said that she was the best partner she has ever had and that's it she's the worst and she's the best just like everything in patients borderline patient's life and in terms of therapy these patients are very difficult to work with because first the therapist must keep the borders very strict because these patients will be trying to cross the line every time they will keep calling the therapist outside working hours and if the therapist don't pick up the phone they will probably tell about killing themselves and threatening that they will harm themselves so if the therapist don't call back so as a therapist you really really need to be very resistant to these threats and it often happens that you are easily tricked into this dance so the person the patient shows the patterns of "I want it and I want it not" but also the therapist can engage in this dance so you want this patient and you want them not you want to help them but you don't care about them and these patients will often leave therapy and come back after some time so working with such individual requires a lot of patients from psychiatric and therapies because it's not or work for months it's probably a few years process or maybe a lifetime process sometimes but this is very very usually very very long therapy process another cluster B disorder is called a histrionic personality disorder and this condition is characterized by excessive emotionality and attention-seeking behavior and such patients are just like actors in life they often seek to be the center of attention and may behave in ways that are very dramatic sometimes inappropriate or seductive to achieve their goals they just must be the center of attention if not they may feel uncomfortable or unappreciated and even behave aggressively because people are not centering them they often engage in sexually provocative or inappropriate behavior to gain attention so for example they sit on the lab of people they just met they can kiss strangers after one dream just to gain attention of people around and these patients are also perceived as shallow and superficial by other people because their emotions change rapidly so they are right now they are happy and friendly in a moment they are very prickly and aggressive they also express emotions in an exaggerated very theatrical manner so when they laugh the whole neighborhood hears them when they cry the whole street must stop to see that they are crying so that's why it is called the histrionic disorder because they behave in a very histrionic way and like the patients with borderline they are easily influenced by people and by current trends and also in the case of relationships they usually perceive the regular relationship as more intimate that they really are so for example by the regular relationship i mean casual relationship with people so for example if a boss is nice to them in their heads they are building a story about having an affair with the boss and often they engage in such unstable relationships for example we've married people like exactly like people with borderline personality disorder so we've married people with bosses so they sometimes for prey to people who exploit them sexually and emotionally because they think when they engage in such relationship and because they are seeking attention people usually exploit them because people perceive them as sometimes promiscuous easygoing sexually interested and so on and so on so sometimes people with histrionic disorder end up being very harmed by other people and one very characteristic symptom of this disorder is the way of speaking they often speak in a way that is excessively impressionistic but lacking in detail so they almost never say in a direct and clear way and they use many difficult and exaggerated style of speaking but there is no merit at all and because of these dramatic behaviors and shallow or superficial emotionality these patients are often perceived as empty and stupid and they usually don't have close friends because they are also perceived as dishonest sometimes so therapy uh therapy is very um it's very challenging because these people even though they are very loud they are drawing attention they are usually you can imagine these people being in the crowds but they are really lonely quite often so they do not have real deep friendship or relationship although they sometimes engage in the relationship but but they usually are not stable and and based on very deep connection so consequently they don't have social support and in therapy having social support is very very important it's almost as important as therapy itself so this is very very challenging to conduct such therapy effectively and of course as in borderline personality disorder therapy is usually very very long process uh the third disorder in this cluster is a narcissistic personality disorder which is a mental condition characterized by constant need for admiration presenting themselves as the most beautiful the smartest person so these people are usually the picture of themselves is that they are the most beautiful the greatest the smartest the most intelligent the most important and so on and usually it's characterized by lack of empathy for others so these people are absolutely convinced they are superior to others and have an exaggerated sense of their own importance so people with narcissistic personality will talk about their talents and achievements even though they do not have evidence they do exist so they will apply for a senior specialist job even though they do not have any experience or any education in more to work in this field they want to be recognized as the specialist in martial arts after attending one or two classes of judo they usually fantasize about their power their brilliance other success and so on and these fantasies are usually strengthening their beliefs about themselves and because of their brilliance they of course require constant admiration for mothers and they expect to be admired by other people and if someone does not admire them or what's even worse someone confronts them with the reality they immediately interpreted as a sign of envy and narcissistic personality is sometimes understood as psychopathic personality because they often take advantage and take advantage of other people or to achieve their own goals they are usually not interested in recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others so they must be in the middle and they expect to be in the middle of everything they are absolutely sure they must have everything they want and other people are here to serve them or nothing else and these patients often circle around envy either they think that people envy them or and this is even more common they envy other people because they are convinced they deserve something more than other so when a neighbor has a more expensive car or bigger house the person with narcissistic personality would go crazy because they these neighbors do not deserve it because they are more stupid less educated and so on and this might not even be true but this is perspective and belief of this patient and these patients are usually hard to like because at first at first they are very sweet just like a psychopath there's a myth about psychopaths they're very sweet they're very charming but this is true in in the case of narcissistic people they might be at first very sweet but in the long run they are hoty and arrogant and in relationships you can often hear them saying that the partner should be forever grateful and happy that someone so special like him or her dedicates their time to this relationship they will also diminish the role of infidelity and explain it as for instance this is a quote from a patient and this patient said that other people in this case other other women also deserved to be with someone like him at least for a while and this is how this patient explained his infidelity these patients are characterized by saying I I I me my and so on my things are the most important I am the best I conversed always I should be and so on so they are often very abusive in relationships because if they don't get what they want they stop being sweet they start being very abusive aggressive they might tend to control their partners economically behaviorally emotionally and that's why they have trouble keeping relationships and friendships with people because they really don't care about others so in the in the long run they are not so sweet and not so nice the final disorder the fourth disorder in this cluster is called antisocial personality disorder which is characterized by a long-term pattern of violation of the rights of others in general these patients lie, deceive, break norms, break laws they don't care about other people if they think they deserve something they don't have a problem with taking it from other people and this might sound like the previous disorder so this might sound like narcissistic personality disorder but antisocial patients I mean narcissistic patients usually don't break or don't break laws they can control people using their emotions and they are more mentally abusive and antisocial people usually don't care they use violence they utilize they break norms they break laws and so on usually antisocial personality disorder can be observed in childhood or from childhood and it continues to adulthood so children with personality pattern with such personality pattern usually destroy things they abuse other children they abuse animals they steal toys from other children they are aggressive they violate rules and in the adulthood these people consistently break laws and societal rules and in consequence they are repeatedly arrested or punished in some ways and these people lie on a regular basis to gain and achieve their goals so they often behave aggressively impulsively without thinking about the consequences and if you are speaking of antisocial personality disorder and speaking of that it can start in childhood if you like movies about mental issues you can watch the movie with till the swinton the movie is called we need to talk about kevin it's a very good movie by the way and it shows the young guy by young child because this is a movie showing a young boy throughout no his ado adolescence and he has clearly antisocial personality disorder these patients often engage in physical aggression and assault so they are very violent and usually these patients are dedicated to achieving things and money easily and with minimal effort so if it's possible to steal they will steal instead of dedicating time to work and earn money if they need a bike they will steal a bike because they just want one and they don't care if it's property of someone else and the most important part is lack of remorse so they don't know the feeling of guilt and they don't understand the need of saying sorry whatsoever so they will never say they are sorry because if they need something if they want something they must have it no matter what these patients rarely keep the relationships you can imagine and if they do this is usually very abusive relationship and it is usually based on exploitation of others so the relationship is to serve them not to build something together not to develop the relationship together but these people as well as people with narcissistic personality disorder can be very charming and use this charm to manipulate other people so for example you may hear about people who engage in romance with someone online and stealing money or you may hear about people who that people were tricked into taking a huge mortgage for them on their name or engage they can engage someone in a coercive crime and so on and this is how people with antisocial personality disorder operate they just make use of other people and if asked directly about this behavior they would very likely say something like and this is a quote from a patient these people were stupid enough to do so so similar to narcissistic people they believe they are superior to other so they will explain all the situation with stupidity of other people and they will not say that they did something wrong so this is how they operate these are the four personality disorders grouped in cluster b cluster b is again characterized by dramatic acting out theatrical or antisocial behavior and thinking patterns and the final cluster cluster c i will describe in the next episode and for now this is all what i wanted to tell you about cluster b personality disorders and of course you can or reach out to me via all the social platforms and you can click on subscribe button to be up to date with the latest episode thank you for listening and until next time bye bye it's time for today's lucky land horoscope with victoria cash life's gotten mundane so shake up the daily routine and be adventurous with a trip to lucky land you know what they say your chance to win starts with a spin so go to luckylandslots.com to play over a hundred social casino style games for free for your chance to redeem some serious prizes get lucky today at luckylandslots.com no purchase necessary vgw group void were prohibited by law 18 plus terms of condition supply save on a riley break parts cleaner get two cans of the riley break parts cleaner for just eight dollars valid in store only at o'Reilly auto parts