These days, more is known about borderline personality disorder than ever before. It’s a relatively common condition, and many individuals have it or know someone in their family who does. If not, they may know a friend, neighbor, or coworker with it.
If you are wondering whether someone you know has it or you think you might have it yourself, it’s helpful to take a borderline personality disorder test. That can reveal whether you or someone else has the condition and whether it’s impacting how you deal with the world.
In recent years, some medical professionals have theorized that borderline personality disorder might have a connection to memory loss. We’ll discuss that in the following article.
What Exactly is Borderline Personality Disorder?
First, let’s define borderline personality disorder so you know what we’re discussing. Borderline personality disorder is usually marked by severe mood swings. Someone with it will also usually have a tough time forming stable relationships with others. They will typically demonstrate impulsive behavior as well.
This condition makes it difficult for the individual who has it to connect with others in loving, healthy ways. Their unpredictability can make it difficult to love them since you never know how they will behave from one moment to the next.
Is It Connected to Memory Loss?
Years ago, there was no reason to think that individuals who were diagnosed with borderline
personality disorder would have problems with their memory, or at least not because they had the condition. However, doctors comparing notes on the condition began to notice that some of their patients with this disorder were self-reporting memory loss issues.
Doctors began to study the phenomenon. They noticed that BPD patients had no verbal memory loss issues if they were tested during conditions with either no distractions or only neutral distractions. However, in clinical conditions where the doctors introduced so-called negative distractions, they began to suffer cognitive dysfunction and memory loss.
What Does This Mean?
To reduce this phenomenon to its most basic elements, one could say that if an individual has BPD, they might suffer from memory loss if there are negative stimuli surrounding them. That does not apply to all forms of memory, though.
The kind of memories that seem to be impacted are those resulting from autobiographical or episodic memory. These are kinds of memories where the individual remembers the details surrounding their personal experiences.
In other words, if someone has BPD, it’s more likely they will remember less about details surrounding incidents in which they took part if there were negative stimuli around them. Why this happens isn’t clear. It’s something that medical professionals will doubtless continue studying in individuals with this condition.
Nothing says that if you have BPD, you will need to remember the details associated with these kinds of events. If you’re ever called upon to remember the minutia of an event in which you took part, though, and you were surrounded by negative stimuli, don’t be surprised if you notice this phenomenon.
