THE PSYCHODYNAMICS OF THE BORDERLINE PERS ONALITY-DISORDER AS A SEQUEL TO TRAUMA - AN OUTLINE (OR A PROPOSAL)

Authors
Citation
U. Sachsse, THE PSYCHODYNAMICS OF THE BORDERLINE PERS ONALITY-DISORDER AS A SEQUEL TO TRAUMA - AN OUTLINE (OR A PROPOSAL), Forum der Psychoanalyse, 11(1), 1995, pp. 50-61
Citations number
52
Categorie Soggetti
Psychiatry
Journal title
ISSN journal
01787667
Volume
11
Issue
1
Year of publication
1995
Pages
50 - 61
Database
ISI
SICI code
0178-7667(1995)11:1<50:TPOTBP>2.0.ZU;2-L
Abstract
The clinical and empirical results presented by various authors within the last ten years have supported the conjecture that very many borde rline patients, especially women, have suffered from real traumata: de privation, loss of a parent, physical and sexual abuse and incest. The se traumata temporarily destroy their ego functions and the ''good'' o bject associated with them. Through personification, the trauma can be defined as only a ''bad'' object or can be further processed by fanta sy, games and dreams. The strictly ''good'' object, formed as a respon se to the trauma, contains the restructured, fantasy-like, paradisiaca l time prior to the trauma and the hope for a livable future. Deperson alization can be induced as a splitting of the physical experience dur ing abuse, derealization as a metamorphosis of the traumatic experienc e into fantasy. The ability to repress can be hindered or destroyed, t hereby preventing traumata from becoming psychological ''abscesses''. Levels of fearful recollections up to and including hypermnesia remain as an ''open wound'' on the emotional surface, the defense or which u tilizes [Inscenierung] acting out, self-mutilation or substance abuse. All of the essential mechanisms and symptom formations of the borderl ine personality disorder are therefore understandable as sequelae to t rauma.