Borderline - DEAN AMORY

2. Seek Professional Help
Facilitate the process of obtaining optimal help.
It may be necessary that you do the initial work
necessary to set up the first appointment. It may
also be helpful if you agree to go also. Some
people with borderline disorder initially refuse
to seek professional help. Provide them with a
copy of my book and suggest they read the first
two chapters. This may help them understand
their potential problems well enough to agree to
an initial appointment with a psychiatrist.
Other people with borderline disorder are steadfast in their refusal of help. This, of course, is a
major problem. Dr. Perry Hoffman, the founding president of the National Education Alliance
for Borderline Personality Disorder (NEA-BPD) offers this advice:
The best way of approaching this problem from my perspective is for one to accept that you
cannot get someone into treatment. Timing is important as to when someone might be “open”
to hearing the idea. But the bottom line is to free families of feeling guilty, and to understand
that they are not so powerful to effect that goal. Along that line, relatives need to get help and
support for themselves as they watch their loved one in the throes of the illness.
3. Support the Treatment Program
Once in treatment, encourage and support your loved one with borderline disorder to regularly
attend therapy sessions, to take medicine as prescribed, to eat, exercise, and rest appropriately,
and to engage in wholesome
recreational activities. If alcohol or
other drugs are a problem, strongly
support their efforts to abstain
completely from these substances,
and encourage regular attendance
in treatment programs or self-help
groups, such as Alcoholics
Anonymous. Remember, there is
little hope of improvement of the
symptoms of borderline disorder if
alcohol and drugs are abused. It is
very important that you remain
persistent in your efforts to do
everything possible to help reduce
the risk of this behavior, and not
enable it.
4. Respond Consistently to
Problematic Behaviors
Develop a clear understanding (it
may even be written) of the
realistic consequences of recurring, problematic, destructive behaviors such as episodes of
alcohol and drug abuse, physically self-damaging acts, and excessive spending and gambling.
Also, agree beforehand on how best to respond to threats and acts of self-harm.
These and other problematic behaviors are often triggered by stressful events that need to be