Anakin diagnosed as "borderline personality" by scientists

Everyone says this. The fact is, BPD and other mental illness cause untold suffering and the public at large needs to be better educated about them. The mental health system in this country isn't all that great, and BPD destroys lives.

In the words of Jar Jar Binks, "any help we would be had."

I think I may submit this to the Technical Commentaries section on TheForce.net, and also to the articles section on BPDToday.com.

If anyone really wants to read any more, I will continue to post, but if not, I'll just save it for them.

--Linda.

 

Keep it going, please. I'm digging it, I'm sure others are too.

 

Wow...Daala's right. A Sith really is a Jedi who went off his meds.

This is the collaboration of the "waste of time" department and the "well kriffin' duh" department.

 

That's very interesting, LLL. What diagnosis do you think he has?

I also read that article and thought Anakin having Borderline Personality Disorder seemed like a shallow diagnosis of the character, and a bit off.

 

This is a perfect diagnosis, I must say.

 

There are two dynamics going on with Anakin in AOTC & ROTS, but i don't think they are any like this BP thing myself - the mental is a reflection of the spiritual/soul work state is a bias i hold though.

1)There is a split between his personal life & motivations as Anakin son of Shimi/crush on Padme with his visions relating to these & his Professional life as a Jedi with his professional relations with Obi-1 & Palpatine figuring into that. But Anakin is pretty self-aware about this right on through to end of ROTS & beyond and he early on is being deceptive about it.

2)He is less self-aware of the darkside both on a professional level & personal friendship level in the prequel trilogy ( as are the Jedi in their professional sphere), & from my POV, although we see this in his Jedi life in prequel trilogy, as per other posts:

http://boards.theforce.net/the_star_wars_saga/b10456/30933641/r30965840/
http://boards.theforce.net/the_star_wars_saga/b10456/30967138/p1/?21
http://boards.theforce.net/the_star_wars_saga/b10456/30697700/r30709180/
http://boards.theforce.net/the_star_wars_saga/b10456/30794015/r30967167/

...it is abit undeveloped in the presentation of his personal life falling away from the character, which is where alot of the sympathy & drive in the redemption of ROTJ is to me.


It is number 2 that stops number 1 from being worked out for Anakin. When Renegade Qui-gon & Obi/Jedi Council had dis-agreements & personality clashes, the darkside wasn't really involved between them - there wasn't alot of deception involved.

For Anakin the darkside was being bottled up via Palpatine substituting where Obi-1 wasn't as relates to 1, and also with 2 both on a galactic level with Palpatines's workings on the Republic/Jedi order as well as Palpatine feeding Anakin's deceptions in the 1 area into bigger and bigger personal issues.

 

Anakin is perilously close to APD, I think.

I'm trying to work that one out now. He definitely meets the criteria while a Sith. While a Jedi, however...

There's going to be a blog about this going up on PsychologyToday.com soon.

 

I thought he said "any help here would be hot".

 

You could be right. Sounded to me like "had" though.

With Jar Jar, who can tell?


OK, I finally put up a website about all this.

DarthVaderBPD.com

 

I read your article LLL. Thanks for posting.

 

Thanks!

More will go up eventually. There are two up there now.

 

I've read it as well. Thanks for posting. I'm sorry for not commenting; I'm just rather short of time currently.

 

I hear ya. I am the reigning queen of "short of time" these days.

 

PsychologyToday.com blog post a member of this community helped write.

 

Very interesting article and discussion. I like it because it allows for a discussion of BPD, which is an often misunderstood mental disorder.

I will have to bust out my DSM-IV and look at the APD criteria. I think it sounds closer to the fictional character's personality.

 

Close but no banana. (That's my story anyway and I'm stickin' to it! ) I hope to eventually post about it on the site but I have to wade through all the NPD stuff first.

Palpatine, however, is without a doubt APD. He's almost the worst APD you can get without organic brain abnormalities.

 

I agree with the Psychology Today article. See, Anakin just doesn't fit the profile of BPD as far as I'm aware, and I feel diagnosing him as such is just entirely missing the POINT. People with a mental ilness aren't JUST their diagnosis, and these French psychologists seem to want to make out every knowing choice Anakin makes into something he can't avoid.

As someone with a mental illness (well, two- severe ADHD and Asperger's Syndrome, a mild form of autism), I just plain find this desire to fit people into a single neat category based on perceived mental deficiencies insulting, especially when it's so obviously unfounded.

Anakin KNEW what he was doing. Did he have issues? Heck yes! But I sincerely doubt they add up to a diagnosis, and even if they did, that entirely misses the point of what the prequels are about: how one good man can go so terribly, terribly wrong.

 

Thanks. If you want, you can quote me on that one.

 

I'm a bit new to these boards, although I'm a "Star Wars" fan since 1977, a long-time TFN reader, and a weekly forcecast listener.

I'm also a clinical psychologist, and I treat clients who have BPD using the only valid BPD treatment we have right now (Dialectical Behavior Therapy). They're an exhilarating, tiring, and complicated population to treat!

For what it's worth, here's my take on the whole Vader/BPD thing:

First, here's the deal with BPD: The name "Borderline Personality Disorder" is a meaningless label. It reeks of psychobabble, and it tells us nothing about the actual symptoms. "Borderline?" Borderline of WHAT? Many psychologists who understand BPD are hoping to get the name changed to something like "Emotion Regulation Disorder." See, THAT actually tells us something! People with BPD are basically super-feelers. They have the same emotions we all have, but they experience them more intensely... the happy ones and the unhappy ones... nearly all the time. In "Spinal Tap" terms, their amps go to 11. Why are they like that? Some of it is probably genetic/chemical, and for many it's triggered by the environment.

Super-feelers with "normal" parents feel invalidated a lot of the time, because "normal" people can't possibly validate the intense emotions their "super-feeler" kids are having. To make matters worse, many super-feelers come from abusive homes (or traumatic environments... slavery in Mos Espa, anyone?) , and they grow up incapable of regulating their own emotions. As a result, they hate their own feelings, because having those feelings is a liability and a burden.

When people with BPD experience a feeling, it's like they ARE the feeling, and there's no end in sight (hence Anakin's super-intense emotions). That's why so many people with BPD do dangerous things like use drugs, drink, self-mutilate, or attempt suicide, as a means of regulating uncontrollable emotions. They tend to think in black-and-white; people and things are judged as "all good" or "all bad." They often feel betrayed and abandoned, even when neither one has happened ("It's all Obi Wan's fault... he's holding me back!!!"). Their relationships are intense and unstable, and they don't have a clear sense of who they are.

So... does Anakin have BPD?

Probably not, but he he's got LOTS of symptoms of it. Of course he does; why wouldn't he?

I adore the prequels, and I probably wouldn't change a thing about them (well... except maybe the stuff about how Anakin likes Padme better than sand), but let's face it: In the movies (less so in the EU), Anakin is surrounded by people who do nothing but invalidate his emotions. People like Anakin need to know that their feelings are VALID, no matter how intense or dramatic those feelings may seem. Palpatine gave Anakin validation. The Jedi gave him very little.

I'm not about to bash the Jedi for being who they are or acting how they did. At one time, the behavior of the Jedi made sense vis a vis defeating the Sith and protecting a galaxy. But Palpatine caught them with their guard down when he used raw emotion (namely Anakin's raw emotion) as the key agent for his takeover. That the Jedi shun attachment and emotionality isn't the issue. The issue is whether or not that mentality was effective in defeating Palpatine, and it wasn't.

Anakin had no choice but to experience a cavalcade of intense emotions, particularly after a lifetime of slavery and traumatic loss. By no fault of their own, the Jedi facilitated Anakin's unraveling when, one after another, they missed endless opportunities to validate his feelings. Instead of saying, "Yeah... it makes sense for you to be really upset, Anakin," they pumped him full of ideology ("attachment is forbidden") and told him that his feelings were the wrong ones to have. Mistake!

Treating BPD involves teaching people to balance their emotional needs with rational, safe decisions. Before Yavin, being a Jedi was all about the rational side, with little input from the emotional part. Qui Gon was the exception, as he embraced the "living force." People with BP

 

This is SO great you came by!! Pleased to meet you!

I am pretty sure...well, a close relative...has BPD. (They walked out of therapy and wouldn't go back.) Will bet real money what the diagnosis was. Have been researching my ASS off about it for years now. Am also trying to write a novel about BPD characters.

Have you checked out this link: Randi Kreger post on the topic. It explains how we came to our conclusion.

or, if you have time, this one: Website I made up out of stuff we didn't use for the blog post.

We know you guys are busy.

I love the points you make up there. I don't know a whole lot about PTSD, but afraid I don't agree with the DID part.

There is one sense in which the "borderline" PD name makes sense. If I can find the book it's in I'll post it.

 

Thanks! Likewise.

A "Star Wars" novel?

Yeah... I wasn't sold on it either, even when I was typing it! What made me think of it, though, is that Anakin's a heavy-duty trauma survivor, and sometimes people who've been through mega trauma develop those splits. We definitely see Anakin flash between "parts," even before he fully splits into Lord Vader.

Well, I know that it was defined as the borderline between neurosis and psychosis, but "neurosis" is such a stigmatizing and antiquated term. The whole notion of a "personality disorder" bothers me in the 1st place. I think it's an artifact of Psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysts dominated the field for ages (and kinda still do in NYC), and their clients tend towards high-functioning people who worry a lot but are grossly asymptomatic. Then along come people with BPD, and psychoanalysts have no treatment for it. So they call it a "personality disorder," and that gives them an excuse for leaving it alone; if it's someone's personality, then it can't be changed. Easy out.

 

I did a SW novel (unpublished of course, since the SW people won't speak to you unless you've published before) but that's about APD, not BPD.

The one I'm working on right now is set in this universe. It's the only way to get across what BP's and families of are going through.

 

Very cool. I had the honor of meeting Marsha Linehan not long ago. She's a life-changer for a lot of people; DBT is a fantastic treatment.