On the possibility of interacting with a woman with BPD

[Boilermaker]

I want to talk about the possibility of encountering women with BPD, because our forum members seem to have a special talent of digging them out although it appears extremely unlikely to encounter even a "single" woman with a BPD, during the course of one's lifetime.

Just a quick check on Wolphram Alpha shows that on average only
1 in 33,000 (yes thirty three thousand!) women has clinical Borderline Personality Disorder in the US. That is 0.003 % of the entire female population. Moreover, the average age of these people is 35, which means we are not interacting with HALF of them (above 35) anyway. That reduces the odds even more. If you dig a little more and check the age distribution, you see there's almost nobody younger than 30 with clinical BPD , on average, which makes it really surprising because almost all of these so-called BPD cases that come to our forum, involve women of ages between 20 - 30.

Now if you check people with scizophrenia it's one in 1300 (thirteen hundred) in females! So our valiant forum members must have seen way more women with scizophrenic disorders than those with BPD.

Just for fun, I checked people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and that returned 1 in 4500 females. The age distribution is skewed to the older range, but still, you have your moms, relatives and friends, is a female with pancreatic cancer a common sight? That is one in ~5,000, mind you.

The answer is no.

As for borderline personality disorder, it is an extremely specific, well-defined psychiatric disorder, and it is not your everyday illness like flu.

We should stop diagnosing women with BPD whenever they break our hearts. Because it is really unlikely that many of us have sampled that small a fraction. I should add that it takes 10-15 visits for a professional psychiatrist to diagnose a patient with BPD, under clinical environments and professional tests. Our resident psychiatrists might disagree but that really says a lot about our half-assed diagnoses.


References:
1)BPD
2)Schizophrenia
3)Pancreatic Cancer

 

[Borknagar]

I have dated a diagnosed BPD chick, and a chick that had some other mood disorder as well. I notice a lot of women do share a lot of the same characteristics as them. They might not be full fledged but it's pretty common for a lot of women these days do have some BPD characteristics even if they aren't full blown BPD

 

[Burroughs]

We should stop diagnosing women with BPD whenever they break our hearts. Because it is really unlikely that many of us have sampled that small a fraction. I should add that it takes 10-15 visits for a professional psychiatrist to diagnose a patient with BPD, under clinical environments and professional tests. Our resident psychiatrists might disagree but that really says a lot about our half-assed diagnoses.

Of course it takes 10 to 15 visits, doctors want to get paid!http://www.sosuave.net/forum/images/smilies//smile.gif

Equally possible is that women are just getting more insane by the day due to the complexity of modern world, a quarterly earnings centric industrial complex, and family breakdown with which their brains can't cope.

 

[Boilermaker]

I provided scientific data, based on more than hundred thousand patient visits ..

Of course, it is an estimate because "diagnosed" patients are another matter. But it is a rough, reliable estimate nonetheless.

Your reference is your personal experience, and you are basing your argument to your judgement ( you have no doubt..!)

You are probably not a psychiatrist, nor are you qualified at all to say anything about the validity of the quoted NHAMCS data ..

Your approach to the whole matter is subjective and unscientific, so we can't even debate.

 

[st_99]

I want to talk about the possibility of encountering women with BPD, because our forum members seem to have a special talent of digging them out although it appears extremely unlikely to encounter even a "single" woman with a BPD, during the course of one's lifetime.

Just a quick check on Wolphram Alpha shows that on average only
1 in 33,000 (yes thirty three thousand!) women has clinical Borderline Personality Disorder in the US. That is 0.003 % of the entire female population. Moreover, the average age of these people is 35, which means we are not interacting with HALF of them (above 35) anyway. That reduces the odds even more. If you dig a little more and check the age distribution, you see there's almost nobody younger than 30 with clinical BPD , on average, which makes it really surprising because almost all of these so-called BPD cases that come to our forum, involve women of ages between 20 - 30.

Now if you check people with scizophrenia it's one in 1300 (thirteen hundred) in females! So our valiant forum members must have seen way more women with scizophrenic disorders than those with BPD.

Just for fun, I checked people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and that returned 1 in 4500 females. The age distribution is skewed to the older range, but still, you have your moms, relatives and friends, is a female with pancreatic cancer a common sight? That is one in ~5,000, mind you.

The answer is no.

As for borderline personality disorder, it is an extremely specific, well-defined psychiatric disorder, and it is not your everyday illness like flu.

We should stop diagnosing women with BPD whenever they break our hearts. Because it is really unlikely that many of us have sampled that small a fraction. I should add that it takes 10-15 visits for a professional psychiatrist to diagnose a patient with BPD, under clinical environments and professional tests. Our resident psychiatrists might disagree but that really says a lot about our half-assed diagnoses.


References:
1)BPD
2)Schizophrenia
3)Pancreatic Cancer

I agree. Forget about diagnosing, just work on yourself and your game and everything will take care of itself.

If a chick is acting stupid weirdo crazy, i don't need to figure out why, I just know she's acting stupid weirdo crazy and as a DJ, should have no problems ejecting or relegating her to permanent FB status, since a DJ isn't supposed to feel attached to some girl that didn't go through time and your screening process.

 

[Die Hard]

Sigh... This discussion has been done many times before in different threads, so I'm not gonna spend much words on it.

Suppose the official clinical diagnosis of a killer psychopath is as following:

1. kills people regularly
2. has no remorse about it
3. has delusions of being a god
4. was abused as a child

Now suppose you meet some person who kills people regularly, has no remorse about it, thinks he's some sort of god BUT had a nice childhood... I would still call that dude a killer psychopath and would still advice you to stay the fvck away from him, regardless from the fact that he doesn't fit the 4th criterium.

In other words, I don't give a fvck about your fvcking argument, your scientific data and official diagnosis criteria. I'm sure the official definition of a car says it contains four wheels, but when I see a car with three wheels, I'll still call it a car. Likewise, when a bytch shows BPD behavior, I'll call her BPD, regardless if she meets every criterium that's needed to 'officially' classify her as BPD. Furthermore, when members of the board describe their girls' behavior and it fits BPD behavior, I sure as hell will put the label on them, regardless whether she meets each and every criterium needed for an 'official' diagnosis.

Thank you, come again...


Question for the mods: Shouldn't we get a sticky thread about BPD? Seriously, the topic is so indcredibly complex and the same discussions about the topic keep coming back time and again. It's like we're reinventing the wheel with every thread that deals about the topic. There's a lot of knowledge about the topic on this board, lots of members who know many details about it. Yet, when lots of information pops up in one thread, the thread eventually gets old and then a few months later some new members start debating questions that have already been answered in the former threads. Problem is, it often takes a loooooot of discussion to get to the truth about this topic.

I'd be willing to create an extensive and clarifying archive of all the important discussions and knowledge from past threads and put it all in one new thread. But only if it gets stickied... So what do you think of the idea, mods?

 

[K2000kidd]

Two women i've known have clearly shown signs/patterns of a BPD not yet diagnosed ie sexually abused by the fathers best friend, Jumps relationship to relationship while cheating with anyone that'll have her, Clearly has abandonment issues etc. BPD is usually diagnosed only AFTER seeking treatment for their behavior but can suffer thru most of their twenties and thirties with the condition before even speaking with a clinical psychiatrist. Notice that BPD are also diagnosed much later in life than say bipolar or Histrionic.

 

[squirrels]

Why do the latest generations have to constantly slap labels on women to describe why they're crazy? EVERY OTHER THREAD, BPD-this, BPD-that.

Maybe it's because WE are not confident that WE are the sane ones and we don't have the balls to just stand up and say, "I know who *I* am and this girl is/isn't too crazy for me". No, we need to armchair-diagnose women with label-able disorders so when we encounter behavior we don't understand, we can point to the label and reassure ourselves that WE are the sane ones.

I would love for you to find me ONE PERSON on this forum (or anywhere) who could not be "diagnosed with something" if you were to open up the ol' DSM-IV. I will show you the most uninteresting, mundane person in the world.

It doesn't matter what "PD" a person is...you either want them in your life, or you don't. Either way, stop relying on pop-psychology to make the decision for you. Grow a pair, make the decision, and live with the consequences. That's what being a MAN is all about.

Our parents and grandparents never whined about "BPD". They just shrugged and said, "women are crazy sometimes". If women were too crazy, men moved on. If not, they stayed and enjoyed the good times.

Here, every time someone comes out of the woodwork and talks about their bad experience with a psycho girlfriend, everyone else comes out and talks about how they empathize..."BPD is a serious condition! I feel your pain! You're right to be hurting from it! Here, give me a hug!"

You can either hug yourself up against Bob's b!tch t!ts, crying about how these women are ruining your lives...or you can take some responsibility for how you live your life and live it on YOUR terms, and if these allegedly "PD'd" women aren't a part of that, then stop wasting your and their time.

 

[Boilermaker]

^

I think I made my points very clear in the two posts above. You are not saying anything new.

You fail to give even a zeroth order guess, but you attack one that's based on 100,000 people because it's not the exact guess. Well, welcome to science. Nothing is exact and it's always an estimate based on some model. But it's much more reliable than, " I know what I experienced, oK??" .. Or I know what my friends "John, Alice and Bob" went through. Subjective, not quantitative, and not even wrong.

I completely agree with Squirrels, and he summarized the entire "raison d`etre" for my post.

Quit the pity party. You don't know if it's BPD until you see a diagnosis. It is exactly like having diabetes. You either have it or you don't !

 

[Boilermaker]

In other words, I don't give a fvck about your fvcking argument, your scientific data and official diagnosis criteria. I'm sure the official definition of a car says it contains four wheels, but when I see a car with three wheels, I'll still call it a car. Likewise, when a bytch shows BPD behavior, I'll call her BPD, regardless if she meets every criterium that's needed to 'officially' classify her as BPD. Furthermore, when members of the board describe their girls' behavior and it fits BPD behavior, I sure as hell will put the label on them, regardless whether she meets each and every criterium needed for an 'official' diagnosis.

..Another self-deluded resident psychiatrist. OK, brother relax, whatever you say.

I'd be willing to create an extensive and clarifying archive of all the important discussions and knowledge from past threads and put it all in one new thread. But only if it gets stickied... So what do you think of the idea, mods?[/I]

Oh please, no. Not you. You will call every one of those `b!tches` something and we won't know what to do.

 

[Boilermaker]

Move along folks. Nothing to see here. Just another know-it-all punk who think he has the world figured out.

Here is some advice for you kid......Go get some life experience, date a large number of girls and then report back. Maybe you will have learned something that you can actually share.

None of your links point out any relevant source and therefore are worthless. Where is the data? Would you care to comment on HOW that data is obtained if DIAGNOSIS is not a reliable indicator? Where does that %1 come from then ? Hmm.. Now you are resorting to sources when you need them. Lol

But I am glad that you actually took the time to look for some quantitative data, instead of belaboring your experience with BPD. Good ! We are improving. Next you have to learn how to find some reliable sources. Wolfram Alpha is one, with a real source. You can start with that.

I am wondering why this hurts you so bad. Do you have bad memories with women? You look like you are going to cry if your heart breaker wasn't BPD after all. (Newsflash: She probably wasn't)

I have learned how to live life through reason and skepticism. And bullies with limited perception like you have always been around to force "their" subjective and skewed observations to make themselves feel better.

On another note, why can't you be silent and get out of my thread if you don't have anything to contribute here?

Thanks.


PS:

On another note, that last quote you attribute to me is wrong, and rude on top of that. Those are not my words.

Oh don't lecture on courtesy when you have gone berserk. Sorry if it hurt your feelings I fixed that misquote anyway.

 

[Boilermaker]

Do I take the advice of this little boy?

I was going to take the time to respond, but it's a waste of time because you can't even make a single comment without calling names.

OK.

As always, just a young idiot with some stupid link ...

Is my source stupid because it doesn't agree with your rock-solid experience? What is experience? How many grams of experience do yo have? Does it increase with age? How come you ended up like this then ?

Please enlighten me some other time. But I don't think I have any time left to waste.

Please let others contribute as well (and some of them might actually chip in since you cried for help in your post above).
Don't hijack the thread with your juvenile insults.

Note on source:
(estimates based on 131748 patient visits to healthcare providers from NAMCS and NHAMCS, weighted for USA demographics, 2006 to 2007)

 

[Boilermaker]

Pot, meet kettle. When you start with insults, you get them back. You hijacked your own thread with insults. But back to the discussion.....

I have never insulted you personally. But if this is a way for you to apologize, I will take it and continue discussing with you.

AGAIN, you ignore the fact about how few BPD's even go for any sort of diagnosis or treatment. Why do you keep ignoring this???

I have never ignored this fact and outright accepted that whatever is shown is an "estimate". A guess. A conjecture. A starting point from real data, not from our very own bitter memories. That is the bottom-line to start this discussion. And that is the essence of my hypothesis. But the way I see it, you are using the words "experience, my friend such and such, that ex-of mine" less and less frequently. This debate is starting to look like a real one as you keep o doing that. Thanks.

The fact you keep ignoring is that your link only lists those that are diagnosed. That means something.

Yes it does. It means I might be missing a portion that is not diagnosed. But I still have a number that is BASED on real data. Now all I have to do is to keep in mind that this number is NOT exact. But I already know that.

There is a reason that most sites say 1-2% estimated cases of BPD. If you had read some books on the subject, or spent time with one, you may know these things.

What is that reason? Stop making wild guesses, and show me a site where there's a reference to that estimate. How on earth do you know why those sites cite that number? Experience can't be telling you this. When will you stop relying on your incomplete knowledge?

Assume for a moment that your 3/1000 suggestion is true. Let's bridge the gap to the 1-2% estimate, shall we?

A scientific estimate is not something we can resolve by logic. You can argue all day but until you bring me a website with real data that doesn't sound like "BPDHorrorStories.com" , we can't resolve this.

Assuming 2% of the population have BPD, but only 3/1000 are diagnosed with it, that means 15% of them actually seek treatment long enough to be diagnosed. I would be surprised if even that many get diagnosed, especially considering how vehement they are about nothing being wrong with them. But given the age distribution on your link (mostly older), then I suppose it could be true.

You start proving your claim by assuming it. This is just a guess. But so be it, it could be true. It is your wild guess. OK. Thank you. But you know what would be more informative? A REAL source with a real Data set.

It still compares fairly well with the statistics here on SS. A fair number of posters have encounterd BPD's.....to the point that I think it lines up very well with the 1-2% estimate. Not even close to the 1/33k that your link shows.

Why do you keep burying your head into the sand when it comes to this? What makes you think that random posters in a subjective discussion forum are the ultimate judges when it comes to diagnosing BPD? How can you be all scientific up to now and look over that bare fact ? Most people who come here are coming here AFTER major breakups and dramatic turns in their life, how can THEY be the rational judges of the sources of their torment? Your argument is beyond ridiculous here.

Next time you start making assumptions on the rarity of BPD, make sure you read some more on the subject.

Yes, I've read a few things and I have shared them. And unfortunately I have learned almost nothing from you, even after all this discussion. But I am eagerly waiting for a real, rational, no-brainer argument, or an estimate that grossly refutes my initial claim. I will happily take it and correct my claim if you provide that simple logical presentation.

Thanks for your suggestions.

 

[Solomon]

*Grabs Popcorn and watches thread while sipping on a soda*

 

[backbreaker]

lol how did i miss this


I agree with the OP and squirrels 1000000000000% percent.

every woman that does stupid things, irrational things, who has low self esteem, is not "BPD". She's a flaky woman who has probably lost interest in some way shape or form. just move on.

As squirrls points out, seriously why does it care? if she is doing things that make you think she is BPD and it turns out she isn't, are you going to ignore the signs and stay with her? probably not. It's really a circle jerk argument.

I have never dated a girl with any disorder. I've dated some crazy women. I dated a girl, and liked her alot too, the second her baby daddy got out of jail, the guy she swore she would never go back to under no circumstances, literally, picked him up from jail and stayed with him in a hotel room an entire weekend getting broke off in. I don't need to know she's "BPD" to know that's not a woman i want in my life. She obviously still has strong feelings for the guy. But don't bother calling me again. I dated a girl once that would not answer my calls or would not let me come over for about 3 days, becuase i took a girl from AA out to lunch, very harmless. She was that jealous. Took me 3 days to convince her nothing happened nor was going to happen.

But you know what, this is just what women do sometimes. "They are women.

I know one girl who is "BPD" and i know this because we were in aA together and i knew what medication she took and i had to take her to her doctor a few times. Would do any and every drug just to not feel antyhing. uppers downers, crack, coke, meth, alcohol, H, didn't matter. She just didn't want to be her. She tired to kill herself not once but twice. Violent and instant mood swings. She was also Anorexic. She flirted with any and every living organism with a penis, and to make matters worse, despite all the drug use, she was actually pretty easy on the eyes, so she got attention. The avg person would not have a clue she had done all that to herself. The second something wasn't right in her life, rather it be a guy rejected her, or her daughter, which she did not have custody of, would not talk to her, or she gained weight, she would have these violent hissy fits / mood swings and if they got so bad she would try to kill herself. shot her self in the stomach. Cannot possibly hold down a job, but becuase she is presentable and pretty cute, she keeps getting jobs to not hold down only to lose them weeks later.


That, my friends, is BPD.

 

[Scaramouche]

Dear All,
If age equated to wisdom,I would be a World beater,well on this
forum anyway,....I am not....sadly the passage of years make a young fool,an old fool....I still make the same stupid blunders in my
interactions with the fairer sex that I was making at 16....
I would contend that most Psychology is a Pseudo Science,it attracts nutters in itself...
R.D.Laing the famous Scottish Psychiatrist,was running one of the largest Lunatic Asylums in N.England some years ago....
He had an open Day,at which he dressed the staff as patients,and the inmates as Staff...
He invited,notables members of the Press etc...Visiters were asked who the looniest person was...
The most popular choice,by far, was the second in charge.
The whole thrust of this thread illustrates that Psychology,Psychiatry are Pseudo,almost fringe Sciences....
Ten years ago nearly half of all Student doing undergraduate subjects at my local University were attending Psychology lectures...That is really going to help if you are an Engineer,Accountant or Scientist.

 

[Boilermaker]

Thank you for starting to be civil, even as you continue to be condescending. Your "pity party" comment was an insult, and you know it.

I don't think pity party comment would be considered as an insult in any forum of justice, besides it was not directed at you.

As for being condescending, let me not even repeat your outright insults at me, because we HAVE actually started to debate since you stopped calling me a little boy.

I laid out four links with estimates that show 1-2%. There are plenty more out there saying the same thing. There is a reason they are called "estimates" That is because they do not have the data.

That doesn't sound right. Any kind of estimate is based on some data. Saying that there's no way to count BPDs who don't turn themselves in to doctors is no valid excuse for a REAL number as high as 1 %. That one percent itself has to rely on some quantifiable basis. You can't just say "Hey I don't know how to count them , so err, let me call it 1 percent.

You cannot diagnose someone who will not come in to seek treatment. There is no way for me to prove anything to you.

That 1 % number people estimated for you most probably relies on real data, similar to the one I provided. Believe it or not, people sit down and calculate these things, and they have to convince independent parties who are possibly very skeptical of any kind of guess. Scientific reasoning and rigor are providing us that estimate. And I asked you whether you have an idea how they came up with that number. You have drawn "Gödel" on me and claimed it is undecidable. Well, I don't think so. It probably has a very well measured basis, it is just that you don't know it.

This is precisely why I say you need experience, or perhaps some modicum of critical thinking to apply to the situation. You have not shared discussions or messages with any of the people that I mention above.

Again your gross assumptions and near certainties. How on earth do you know who I am? I have interacted and talked to many of the veterans of this forum, how can you speak with such confidencewhen all is available to you is a computer with a screen and a bunch of nicknames? It makes you look funny. Because, all due respect, you do not have an inkling of who I am, where I come from or what I do. This is the same attitude you have towards BPD, and then you blame me for figuring out the world with incomplete information.

You have no way of knowing the eery similarities between their situation and mine regarding ex-gf BPDs. I forgive you for that lack of knowledge.

Yeah, just like you - having no way of knowing who I am. When someone else does it to you, the logic is fairly obvious right? I forgive you for the lack of knowledge and judgment you are displaying here, too.

I understand where you are coming from. You see a "large" number of BPD posts here, you have never encountered one, and this website of yours suggests there are only 1 in 33,000 people diagnosed with it.

Therefore, either the people at SS throw this label around too much, or your precious website is wrong.

My precious website is a search engine providing data from a real health organization based on 100,000 patient visits. It is not just a "link" as you are desperately trying to put it. And If I have to make a choice between that and the judgment of heart-broken strangers I have never seen or known, you know which one I am going to rely on.

But again, both could be right. Diagnosed does not mean that is all there is out there. Have you ever read a book on BPD? How much material have you studied based on them? Any field experience?

To learn about special relativity, you do not need to hop on a spaceship and travel with a velocity of 0.5c. These days, you just google it. Apparently you have never heard of Wolfram Alpha. I suggest you try it.

Until you have studied them, and preferably interacted with one frequently for a couple of years, you will never understand why this gap exists, and why there can be both an accurate estimate of 1-2% of them and having only 1 in 33k of the diagnosed.

I disagree that in order to have an opinion, I actually have to date one. But I understand what you are saying. No woman has ever been able to do that to me, lucky me.

And a lot of women actually hurt me, but I never needed to label them to get up and move forward. And that is the fundamental difference you and I are having here. I never needed to read books on the subject, because I have learned early enough that blaming the world for my problems has
taken me nowhere.

 

[Boilermaker]

I think it's important to know when to stop in cases like this.

I will do that now.

 

[Atom Smasher]

Virtually all women display mild symptoms of BPD when under stress (they do not actually have BPD, rather, they display similar, milder symptoms of it). They are literally slaves to their emotion. However, there is a litmus test for the existence of the condition:

She departs from reality when in a conflict. Her emotions (fears, suspicions, speculations, everything else) actually become hard reality to her and she cannot be reasoned with and brought back until enough time apart passes.

Also, in conflict, she visibly and alarmingly turns in to a 12 year old girl right in front of your eyes. She literally seems to physiologically shape-shift as you're looking at her.

That, my friends, is BPD.

 

[Findog]

Here's my take:

- I don't think any of us non-mental health professionals are qualified to armchair diagnosis somebody as having BPD. When you read a list of the symptoms, it can apply to virtually everybody. We all from time to time exhibit BPD-like behavior. What makes a person BPD is how much stronger and consistent those symptoms are present. BPD is characterized by black/white thinking, abandonment issues and emotional instability. You can observe those things in other people, but it doesn't necessarily follow that they are BPD.

- Men in happy, stable relationships probably don't feel the need to post on sites like sosuave. I certainly didn't when I was with my ex. So while I think that most of us guys that come here recovering from a traumatic end to a relationship are too quick to throw the BPD label on our exes, and that label may or may not fit, it does NOT invalidate the fact that those of us who reach for the label BPD are doing so because we DID experience something that was clearly amiss. I know in my case that I searched for a label to put on my ex's dysfunctional behavior because I needed to prove to myself that the end of the relationship was on her and not me. I know that I kept up my end of the bargain and kept my side of the street clean. I wasn't perfect, but hindsight being what it was, I could not have anticipated our relationship ending the way it did. It took me too late to realize it, but finding the perfect label to describe my ex is not necessary.

- All we can do in the aftermath is look back and see what red flags we missed and decide what we will do differently in our next relationship. That's all we can control. I don't need a label like BPD, nor do I need to prove that my ex had a personality disorder, in order to make the judgment that something was amiss with the way things ended and she behaved in an extremely frightening manner. Trying to divine motives and figure out what she was/is thinking is a waste of time because I'm not a mind reader.

- Those of us with enough experience in the dating world can differentiate between a girl that is just stupid and immature and the more frightening ones out there that leave a vast amount of emotional wreckage in their wake.