Everyone has moments where they engage in high-conflict situations with others and feel frustrated, challenged, and unheard. For some, this happens often and is actually a mental illness called a high-conflict personality disorder.
Having this type of disorder makes it difficult to have healthy and peaceful relationships with others. The individuals feel as if others do not understand them, and they live in a constant state of mental chaos. Montare Behavioral Health provides an effective treatment program for those struggling with high-conflict personality disorders. We provide evidence-based therapies that help the individual challenge how they think and feel in terms of interacting with others. With our help, they learn new ways of seeing themselves and others. This results in a more peaceful co-existence for them and those around them.
What is a High-Conflict Personality Disorder?
High-conflict personality disorders fall under the classification of personality disorders, which are a type of mental health disorder. High-conflict personality disorders cause people to have difficulty getting along and communicating with those around them. It can impact romantic relationships, family ties, friendships, and relationships with co-workers.
Yale Medicine reports that approximately 9% of people in the U.S. have some type of personality disorder. High-conflict personality disorders typically begin to become noticeable when a person is in their late teens or early 20s. Their symptoms surface consistently, rather than just every now and then. Without a formal diagnosis from a mental health counselor, they can go years or decades without realizing they have a treatable mental illness.
Someone with this disorder typically does not recognize that they have a diagnosable illness. They believe that the way they act, react, feel, and think is reasonable. When others react to them in anger, confusion, or distress, it baffles the individual, and they lay the blame on them. Even if the individual tries to regulate their emotions and reactions, they find it extremely difficult or impossible to do.
List of High-Conflict Personality Disorders
There are five types of personality disorders that can impact a person’s life. While each one has its own name and specific set of symptoms, some of the symptoms overlap. All five types of personality disorders cause people to have issues with being high-conflict and not understand how to behave their way out of it.
The five types of personality disorders include:
- Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD): BPD causes a person to have tremendous instability in their relationships with others. They often see the world in terms of black or white, and filter their interactions with family, friends, and co-workers through that limited lens. This causes discord in their relationships for which they are hesitant to take responsibility.
- Antisocial Personality Disorder: Engaging in everyday or special social events proves challenging for someone with this personality disorder. They often act in non-traditional and combative ways that limit people’s desire to be social with them.
- Narcissistic Personality Disorder: A narcissist has an overinflated sense of themselves and is generally regarded as having a big ego by others. They view themselves as better than everyone around them, which results in failing romantic relationships and friendships, and difficulty having healthy interactions with co-workers.
- Histrionic Personality Disorder: This type of disorder causes the individual to have intense emotions that they do not handle in a healthy way. They rely on others to inflate their self-esteem and are disappointed when this does not happen.
- Paranoid Personality Disorder: The paranoia that surfaces with this disorder causes the person to believe others are out to insult or harm them, even without having reality-based reasons for thinking this. They often lash out and create situations rife with conflict.
How Can High-Conflict Personality Disorders Be Treated?
High-conflict personality disorders cannot be cured, but effective treatment from a mental health professional helps greatly reduce the symptoms. This allows the person to feel less combative and more in control of their emotions and actions.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) provides a person with the ability to gain control over some of their symptoms. It works by helping them identify their negative thoughts and emotions that end up resulting in conflict. They make the connection between them and their actions and learn healthy coping skills to use instead.
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) teaches people to recognize their behaviors that lead to conflict internally and with others. They can then begin to change them and enjoy a more peaceful co-existence.
Engaging in family therapy can also help educate family members about how their loved one feels and why they act the way they do. A therapist leads the family in calm discussions so they can learn to understand and support their loved one. It also helps the person with high-conflict personality disorder view themselves through the lens of those around them.
Contact Montare Behavioral Health to Treat a High-Conflict Personality Disorder
Do you have a high-conflict personality disorder and want to know how you can gain control of it? Living with this mental health disorder makes it difficult to get along with partners, family members, friends, and co-workers. Montare Behavioral Health understands the intricacies of this disorder and provides the right combination of therapeutic approaches to help treat it. Our compassionate team of clinicians leads you through the types of therapy that will help you change your mindset and get along better with others. We also offer prescription medications that help ease the symptoms of high-conflict personality disorders.
For more information, contact us today and let’s talk about how we can best serve your needs. We can explain our therapies and get you started on feeling better quickly.
Published 11/14/2024
