If your partner’s mood changes more often than you change your underwear, then chances are they suffer from borderline personality disorder and are neck-deep in a borderline relationship. We’ll share tips for managing a borderline relationship.

What is borderline syndrome?

Experts suspect that the cause of borderline syndrome is an interaction between a genetic dysfunction of the brain coupled with a traumatic experience in social life, e.g. emotional or physical abuse in childhood.

Psychotherapists or certain classification systems can help you determine whether your partner really has borderline syndrome.

These provide information about the symptoms and list certain criteria typical of this personality disorder. If at least five of the nine characteristics from this list of criteria are met, everything points to borderline personality disorder.

Signs and symptoms of borderline syndrome

The main symptom of borderline personality disorder is the inability to control one’s feelings and strong emotions. In addition, those affected perceive their emotions much more intensely – whether positive or negative.

The latter are almost unbearable for people with personality disorders. Such situations often lead to self-harm, even suicidal thoughts, or mental illnesses such as anxiety disorders, depression, or eating disorders.

The impulsive behavior and emotional rollercoaster put interpersonal relationships to the test. While often intense, these relationships are also problematic, painful, and often accompanied by extreme jealousy.

How do borderliners behave when they love?

Living with a pathological borderline personality – someone who constantly and unexpectedly swings back and forth between emotional extremes – is difficult. Instability is often the only constant in a borderline relationship. New relationships are initially exciting and intoxicating for them. If conflicts arise, the mood immediately changes. 

Borderline personality disorder also fears being alone, while paradoxically, they cannot stay in a relationship for long. This is why they often jump from one relationship to the next. 

The irritability threshold of a person with borderline personality disorder is difficult to assess, even for their partner, making it very difficult to deal with them. Tantrums and attempts at manipulation are not uncommon. 

Some people with borderline personality disorder threaten suicide if their partner leaves them. This can quickly lead to codependency in the borderline relationship:

Above all, the inexplicable alternation between emotional appropriation and disregard is unfortunately a daily occurrence in a borderline relationship and regularly pushes the partners of those affected to their limits.

What kind of partners do borderliners choose?

Initially, the borderline person idealizes their new partner. But this can quickly change. The partner is either everything or nothing for the borderline person. Thus, partners are changed frequently and erratically. 

Borderline individuals also need total attention and total closeness, but also their freedom. The partners they seek out are often people with low self-esteem who play along with this game, either out of great love for the borderline individual or out of a lack of self-love. 

As a result, partners of borderline individuals often get completely sucked into the whirlpool and participate in all the chaos. On-off relationships are also not uncommon among borderline individuals.  

Tips for the partner of a borderliner

Many partners nevertheless show tremendous compassion and genuinely share their suffering with the borderline patient. Typically, these partners harbor the desire to help their partner, justifying and excusing their hurtful behavior and sometimes even giving up on themselves in the process.

This is only too human, but unfortunately counterproductive. Those who engage with the pathological extremes of the borderline personality disorder are more likely to reinforce their illness than to help them—and ultimately themselves and their relationship. Those living in a borderline relationship should learn to set boundaries and protect their own feelings.

The emotional rollercoaster and despair of the borderline personality disorder is not your own, so don’t get carried away. Ideally, you maintain calm, composure, and inner strength when emotional outbursts of borderline personality disorder occur.

Learn more about the illness and, above all, what you, as a family member or partner, can do to protect those affected, but most importantly, yourself. In many cases, psychotherapy or even temporary inpatient treatment is the best solution.

Relationship with a borderliner: The partner also needs help

Experts also believe it’s wrong to pressure borderline patients into therapy. If the affected person lacks self-awareness or even suffers from the pressure of suffering, their reaction is often impulsive rather than cooperative, making treatment of the disorder almost impossible.

Ultimately, however, therapy is the only way to live long-term in a  borderline relationship  , if those affected want it. Because a complete cure for borderline syndrome is not possible.

However, successful therapy can bring the borderline personality disorder (BPD) patient back from their emotional boundaries to the center of a reasonably stable life. Because that’s what they desire more than anyone else.

Help your partner achieve this goal by first helping yourself cope with the stress of their illness and protect your own mental health.

How long does a borderline relationship last?

A relationship with someone with borderline personality disorder is rarely long-lasting. Long-term partnerships can usually only exist in the context of therapy. 

The fact is that the intensity of the borderline relationship often leads to the relationship breaking down or to a kind of dependency developing in which both partners feel responsible for each other.