Personality Disorders are mental disorders characterized by inflexible, deeply ingrained, maladaptive patterns of adjustment to life that cause either distress or significant impairment in functioning. Generally recognizable by adolescence, these disorders cannot be formally diagnosed before age 18.
TYPES OF DISORDERS
- Paranoid
- Schizoid
- Schizotypal
- Histrionic
- Narcissistic
- Anti-Social
- Borderline
- Avoidance
- Dependent
- Obsessive-Compulsive
TREATMENT
People with personality disorders may be receptive to various kinds of therapies although some schools of thought classify personality disorders as untreatable. Yet, Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) has been proven effective with Borderline Personality Disorder and can be modified to work for other disorders as well. The success of treatment depends upon many factors including the person’s level of insight, circumstances, motivation and severity of symptoms.
DBT is an evidence-based practice that helps identify the thoughts, beliefs and assumptions that make life harder and helps people learn different ways of thinking to make life more pleasant, leveraging the concepts of mindfulness, relationship effectiveness, distress tolerance and emotional regulation.