Topic Tuesday// Borderline Personality Disorder Awareness Week 2023: Be the Difference // Tuesday 26th September 2023 5:30-7PM AEDT

Now for our next question for our special guests @Alex_Spectrum @BPDSurvivor

Why is the therapeutic relationship/ working alliance between clinician and the individual so important?

Hi @rye, thanks so much for your question.

Being a part of the MBT team at Spectrum I have to admit my knowledge of what is offered in the DBT space is limited. What I can do is talk with our DBT team and try to get a more detailed answer for you re RO-DBT and whether it is offered widely in Aus.

One thing I would say is that it sounds like you have a good understanding of yourself and some of the main challenges you experience. What I wonder is even if you don't find a specific RO-DBT treatment provider if maybe letting the person you are working with know about your history with DBT treatment and your sense of having issues with being ‘overcontrolled’ and ‘internalising’. My sense is that they should be able to work with you around this whether it's from a DBT framework or even in another modality such as MBT, SFT etc.

I hope this helps and I'll see what else I can find out!

For me, having a regular clinician was very helpful. In my life, I had been disappointed by people many times and so it was difficult to learn to trust people again. The therapeutic relationship was vital in re-teaching me the skills needed to be around people again in the real world. The skills of communicating, active listening, mentalizing etc were being transferred through discussion in each session. These individual sessions complemented the group sessions.

For me, the thought was participating in a group session was terrifying. Yet the preparatory work in the pre-treatment sessions were so helpful in easing us into it.

One of the hardest parts of MBT was facing each group session. Fancy having a room of borderlines together? To me, I thought it was a disaster in the making. But lo and behold, the takeaways and the learning from these group sessions was and is indescribable. Yes, it was very difficult, but it had such a profound impact on my recovery. It was as though, growing up, I missed being taught how to think in a healthy way, and to communicate my innermost emotions. So much so that I had to learn these skills as an adult while being carefully guided by trained facilitators.

Hi everyone

I’m new here and have recently been diagnosed with BPD.

I have made progress with my current therapist but would be very interested in group therapy. How do I go about finding groups in my area?

Onto our next question!

What’s happening for BPD Awareness week? How can I get involved?

@Alex_Spectrum @BPDSurvivor

No problems @rye! I'll get back to you asap.

I think MBT is great and we certainly work with people with some of the challenges you mentioned. But really it's about finding someone who you fit well with which I know can be challenging at times.

Hi everyone! I understand stigma first hand, and it sucks. I found out that I have BPD about a month ago, but I was diagnosed by my psychiatrist six years ago and he and my parents hid it from me. It really hurt when I found out, being kept in the dark about my mental health because they didn't want anyone to find out.

Oh goodness @BPD_Cat . That sounds like a really intense, painful, confronting thing to have your diagnosis kept from you. I'm so sorry that happened. I'm glad though that you know now & have found this space here with us this evening 💛