The Unquiet Attachment

A blog exploring Borderline Personality Disorder through the lens of attachment theory, addressing diverse populations such as sex trafficked survivors, veterans, juveniles, and individuals with substance use disorder, infused with logotherapy and humanist philosophy.

Borderline Personality Disorder and Temperament Theory

Borderline personality disorder (BPD), as a concept, is often compared to a storm. It is highly unpredictable, full of intensity, chaos, and strikingly impacts those in its path. It usually manifests in early development and, from a temperamental perspective, can be understood as having a basis in biologically sensitive systems (Cloninger, 1987). According to the Cloninger psychobiological model, impulsivity, emotional instability, and risk-taking behaviors are characteristics of borderline personality disorder, which is characterized by inadequate harm avoidance combined with excessive novelty-seeking (Joyce et al., 2003). As previously stated, during development, relational and environmental factors might still have an impact on this temperamental sensitivity.

The same child who is high in novelty seeking and low in harm avoidance and is also placed in an invalidating or abusive system learns that connection, for them, means chaos. The storm becomes their normalcy. Reward dependence, in terms of low motivation for social approval, also impacts the ability of the person to seek and maintain relationships, thus furthering the insecure attachment and disassociation aspects of borderline personality disorder (Joyce et al., 2003). The lightning strike of borderline personality disorder, as explained by temperament theory, can be likened to a tree struck by lightning. It still has its genetically coded roots. Its branches show the years of living in a system that does not support safety or connection, but instead weathers like a toxic wind. The growth pattern of the tree is affected, and even if the tree survives, the lightning bolt will always leave a scar on the tree’s growth. To me, this symbolizes both the biologically based sensitivity as well as the context of systemic factors of neglect, abuse, or marginalization. To work therapeutically with change with this concept of borderline personality disorder, one cannot only try to “trim the branches” of some of these temperamental traits.

The tree needs safety, grounding, emotional regulation, and relational attunement in order to develop new growth. Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), for example, uses mindfulness and distress tolerance to dampen some of the reactivity of temperamental systems (Linehan, 1993). Survivors of trauma should be seen not as scorched trees, but resilient ones. Resilient trees still grow.

References

Joyce, P. R., McKenzie, J. M., Carter, J. D., Rae, A. M., Luty, S. E., Frampton, C. M., & Mulder, R. T. (2003). Temperament and personality in borderline personality disorder. Journal of Personality Disorders, 17(1), 39–53. https://doi.org/10.1521/pedi.17.1.39.32745

Linehan, M. M. (1993). Cognitive-behavioral treatment of borderline personality disorder. Guilford Press.