Alessandra's Vignette: Borderline Personality Disorder

1401 Words3 Pages

After reading Alessandra’s vignette, it is apparent that she has borderline personality disorder (BPD) (APA, 2013; Roberts & Louie, 2015). The symptoms that Alessandra presents are frequent tearful fits, yelling, chronic issues with her mood, frequent interpersonal problems with her husband, difficulty getting out of bed, “drama” with coworkers, inappropriate communication with customers, references of responding to others comments with suicide, and attention seeking with faking pain. To meet full criteria for BPD, Alessandra must first meet criteria A to F for a personality disorder, followed by criteria A for BPD. Criteria A requires that Alessandra has a long-lasting pattern of behavior or inner experience that deviates from cultural expectation …show more content…

It is apparent that Alessandra meets criteria B from her long history of psychotherapy to treat her mood issues and her dysfunction with her family. Criteria C requires that such long-lasting behaviors or inner experiences cause significant distress in important areas of functioning. Alessandra meets criteria C by the distress that her symptoms have caused her in her relationships with family, her relationship with her husband, and by her being fired from her job. Furthermore, this is made evident by her parents referring to her as a drama queen because her frequent relationship troubles and separations with her husband, and by her neglecting to attend work and inadequately preforming at work. Criteria D requires that the dysfunction can be traced back to adolescence or early adult life. The vignette does not provide much information regarding her past, therefore, it is difficult to determine if her symptoms were present in early stages of her life. With that being said, the vignette does note that she had been in therapy for years to address mood and family problems, which could be vaguely indicating that she has had a long history of problems; additional information is needed to confidently state that Alessandra meets criteria D. Criteria E requires that the dysfunction is not better explained by another psychological disorder. Alessandra meets criteria E by all differential diagnoses being ruled out; further analysis of the differential diagnoses and justification for her meeting criteria E is presented in the subsequent section. Criteria F requires that the behaviors or inner experiences are not better explained by the use of substances. It is difficult to rule out criteria F due to the vignette not stating nor denying a history of drug use. With that being said, and assuming that the vignette is only stating pertinent concerns, it is

Open Document