Easily bored, they may constantly seek something to do. They may display extreme sarcasm, enduring bitterness, or verbal outbursts. The anger is often elicited when a caregiver or lover is seen as neglectful, withholding, uncaring, or abandoning. Such expressions of anger are often followed by shame and guilt and contribute to the feeling they have of being evil. These episodes occur most frequently in response to a real or imagined abandonment.
Symptoms tend to be transient, lasting minutes or hours.
The real or perceived return of the caregiver's nurturance may result in a remission of symptoms. Physical handicaps may result from self-inflicted abuse behaviors or failed suicide attempts. Recurrent job losses, interrupted education, and broken marriages are common. Physical and sexual abuse, neglect, hostile conflict, and early parental loss or separation are more common in the childhood histories of those with Borderline Personality Disorder. Borderline Personality Disorder also frequently co-occurs with the other Personality Disorders.