In psychiatry, a personality disorder is defined as a set of behaviors that impair thinking and behavior. One of the biggest issues with personality disorders is that they adversely affect your mood and emotions. “People with these conditions are likely to exhibit a wide variety of shifting moods,” says Cheree Ashley – Founder of Bright Future Recovery.
This is why those with personality disorders are often described as being, “moody.” You may find the person becoming irritated, angry, or depressed for seemingly no reason.
There are various types of personality disorders and they are broken down into what is known as clusters. For example, you have clusters A, B, C. Each cluster has different types of conditions associated with it. For example, in cluster B you find conditions such as:
- Narcissistic personality disorder: this involves a pattern of arrogant and self-centered thinking. These people also have a highly inflated sense of their abilities, looks, and self-importance, coupled with an excessive need for attention and admiration.
- Borderline personality disorder: people with this condition are characterized by highly unstable moods and emotions. They may also show unstable behavior especially when it comes to relationships.
- Antisocial personality disorder: these people are also known as psychopaths or sociopaths. This disorder is marked by a total disregard for others. People with this condition will lie, break the law, act impulsively, and do not care about their safety or the safety of others.
- Schizoid personality disorder: these people tend to have cold personalities. They do not desire or enjoy close relationships and will avoid social activities and interacting with other people.
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In fact, most of these disorders are defined by symptoms that primarily have to do with the person’s mood. For example, people with personality disorders may experience extreme bouts of anger, rage, or irritation. Quite often this happens for no reason, or for reasons which are not immediately obvious to the people observing them.
Quite often these moods will fluctuate extremely rapidly. It may also take far longer for these people to get back to their baseline. A good example of this is people with borderline personality disorder, who are known for their rapidly fluctuating moods. They are also known for something called, “borderline rage” which are periods of intense anger.
When it comes to moods, one of the worst mental illnesses is bipolar disorder. These people may experience rapid shifts in how they feel. The illness is characterized by alternating bouts of depression and mania. These people may experience overwhelming feelings of happiness, anger, or irritation. This may be followed by periods of extreme depression, sadness, or feelings of hopelessness. Both of these periods may be accompanied by physical symptoms. They can include things like elevated feelings of energy, changes in sleep patterns, and also appetite.
Many people with personality disorders are also extremely impulsive, which can also be seen as a type of mood swing. They will often do or say things without thinking, and this can have disastrous effects. For example, these people will often have significant problems with drug or alcohol addiction. They will use these substances impulsively without the slightest consideration for what they are doing to themselves.
The most important thing you need to realize about people with personality disorders is this: there is often no way to help them. Most of these people are completely aware of what they are doing and simply do not care.
This is why some personality disorders – such as narcissistic or antisocial personality disorder – have extremely bad reputations. In fact, these people are often regarded as evil and even psychiatrists have a very hard time working with them.
If you have someone in your life who has a personality disorder then you may have already noticed this. They will often go through emotional outbursts or mood swings and have very little regard as to how this affects the people around them.
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Dealing with these people can be incredibly challenging. The best way to handle them is to simply not engage with these persons. The fact is that people who have personality disorders will very rarely change. For them to change and take control of their moods is extremely difficult, and requires enormous amounts of hard work. As we’ve said, many of these people simply do not care and have very little regard for others. This means there’s no point in hanging around and putting up with their mood swings.
What you also have to understand is that these people will often become violent. Because their feelings and moods are so intense, they sometimes have trouble controlling themselves and this can result in aggression, breaking or throwing things, and acts of violence. People with personality disorders may also have a diminished sense of empathy. They have no ability to empathize with other people and do not care how they hurt you. This is especially true with people who have an antisocial personality disorder. In fact, these people can become exceptionally dangerous.
On the other hand, there are some people who are willing to take responsibility for themselves. For example, most people with bipolar disorder or borderline personality disorder are not in control of their moods, which is why they often seek out help in controlling their condition.
In this case, you may want to try and work with them. These are certain treatments that help with their emotional stability. These include things like therapy or medication. There are also alternative treatments that are shown to help. Ultimately you must realize that people with these disorders will always have problems regulating their emotions. Personality disorders are a chronic disease that the person will have to deal with for the rest of their life. And if you’re going to be a part of their life, then this is something you must be aware of.
