Online Con Report 2: SDS@OSU -- BPD vs CPTSD
Sunday, April 19th, 2020 05:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jesse_the_kSecond of several posts about the SDS@OSU Virtual Conference held the first weekend in April.
Communicating and Framing Diagnosis and Difference
Rachel Larrowe, a DePaul University MA student, presented a fascinating paper on "BPD, CPTSD, and Identity: the Discursive Construction of Diagnostic Possibilities." She deployed a very close reading of how the two conditions are defined which raised the following issues:
- There’s significant overlap in diagnostic criteria for Borderline Personality Disorder and Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. C-PTSD was considered and excluded from the most recent US diagnostic/billing/research tool, the DSM-5, while it is part of the rest-of-the-world tool ICD-10.
- People DXed with BPD often have terrible, traumatic childhoods.
- Quoting her presentation: What if so-called disordered personalities are the psychological consequences of childhood abuse? What if trauma doesn’t always look how the medical establishment and the media have taught us to expect? How can a disorder be post-traumatic if a child never experiences a time pre-trauma?
- There’s gender trouble here: CPTSD is more commonly DXed in men, BPD in women. CPTSD is partly defined by events people experience, while BPD is defined by how people are. Some of the behaviors unique to BPD, such as Individuals with borderline personality disorder make frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment overlap with how women are defined as needy and "too much."
- What if we could accommodate these needs? Her example: if I’m doubting my place in a relationship, could it be okay for me to text someone "I’m afraid you’re hating me right now" and they could reply with "🧡👍 all clear" and we’d all be good?
ETA: 23 Apr 2020, correct researcher's name and degree
Additional resources possibly of interest
Date: 2020-04-20 07:01 pm (UTC)And I'm glad someone is taking this stuff in this direction-- I've read several CPTSD books/articles that discuss overlap/similarities with BPD, so this seems like the next logical place to go.
citations: Janina Fisher, "The Treatment of Structural Dissociation in Chronically Traumatized Patients", in Trauma treatment in practice: complex trauma and dissociation. Article PDF here, book here, in Norwegian (?).
In her chapter, she cites Korzekwa, Dell, and Pain, "Dissociation and Borderline Perosnality Disorder: An Update for Clinicians" Korzekwa, Dell, and Pain PDF here, which I haven't read but seems potentially relevant, as well.
Also, definitely interested in your final bullet point! I feel like that's a thing that I can do with some close friends/my partner who Gets It, but it's still something that causes additional anxiety-- on top of the "I have an irrational fear that they hate me", the "oh no I'm being too needy asking them to confirm they don't hate me". Gotta say, being Autistic doesn't help with that, esp i/r/t body language/tone. ugh, humans!!
Re: Additional resources possibly of interest
Date: 2020-04-22 11:27 pm (UTC)I hear you on the anxiety -- and I learned "my needs don't matter" growing up.
Attending Society for Disability Studies events has demonstrated how we can create a world that does accommodate our needs. At my first one (2000) 90% of the accommodations were physical: interpreters, alternate formats, level spaces. Now the expectation is that most impairments aren't written on the body; that neuroqueer people are everywhere; that communicating through voice and text and sign (and space and time) is the way we want to go.
Re: Additional resources possibly of interest
Date: 2020-05-07 01:51 pm (UTC)