Did you know that 1 in every 8 people suffers from a mental disorder? Mental disorders are conditions that have an impact on your thinking, feelings, emotions, and behaviour. There are a few different kinds of mental disorders that you may know about. This includes disorders such as eating disorders, anxiety disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, personality disorder, and bipolar disorder.

Mental health issues can stem from a variety of different factors. These different issues also require unique treatments to help you overcome them. This is why it’s important to understand the differences between mood disorder vs personality disorder.

Interested in learning more about mental health disorders? Read on for more information on these disorders, along with the available treatment options.

What Is a Mood Disorder?

Mood disorders are mental health issues that impair your emotional state. These disorders can impact your daily life by distorting your mood. This directly impacts the way you feel and behave, interfering with your ability to function.

Mood disorders come in a variety of different forms. However, these disorders are centralized around your fluctuating mood. Major depression disorder is a mood disorder that can put you into a depressive state for weeks, while bipolar may give you feelings of depression for an hour.

This is why receiving the right diagnosis for your mental disorder is important. Many of these disorders overlap in symptoms, making it tricky to accurately diagnose. Despite this, it’s important to see a medical professional to diagnose and recommend the right treatment for you.

Kinds of Mood Disorders

There are a few different kinds of mood disorders that you should know about. While bipolar disorder is often the most popular mood disorder, others include depression, anxiety, dysthymia, and seasonal affective disorder.

Depression is actually the most common mental health issue around the world. It’s a mood disorder characterized by feelings of hopelessness, worthlessness, and sadness over longer periods. These episodes can range from a few days to a few weeks at a time.

Bipolar disorder is another common mood disorder that includes depression as a symptom. This means that you can experience feelings of depression for short periods of time if you’re bipolar. However, there are different treatments available for each kind of mood disorder.

How the DSM Characterizes Mood Disorders

According to the DSM, mood disorders are mental health conditions that cause a prominent and persistent disturbance to your general mood. These disorders can range in how they affect you, but the primary symptom to look out for is disturbances in your mood.

It’s completely natural for your mood and demeanour to change throughout the day. However, it becomes a problem when your mood changes or shifts without any external influence to justify it. This indicates a mental health issue rather than normal, fluctuating moods.

Mood Disorder Symptoms

As mentioned above, mood disorders are responsible for the impact on your mood. This includes disorders such as depression and bipolar to name a few. Here’s a quick look at the symptoms of mood disorders:

• Lack of energy
• Feeling sad all the time
• Loss of interest in activities
• Feeling sluggish
• Thoughts of death
• Loss of appetite
• Difficulty concentrating
• Sleeping too much or too little
• Feeling worthless
• Racing thoughts
• Agitation and irritability
• Rapid speech and movement

How to Treat Mood Disorders

If you think that you may be suffering from a mood disorder, it’s essential that you visit your doctor. A healthcare professional will then listen to your symptoms and complete questionnaires with you. This will help understand your symptoms to see if you have a mood disorder.

The questionnaires will progress to try to figure out what kind of mood disorder you have. This is an important step, as it will help recommend the right kind of treatment for you.

When it comes to actually treating mood disorders, medical specialists recommend a combination of medications and psychotherapy. The medications will be prescribed to you individually to help tackle your symptoms. This tends to include mood stabilizers.

The second part of the treatment process includes talk therapy. This is where much of the growth and development occurs as you can communicate your feelings with a healthcare professional. This therapy can occur individually or within a group when need be.

Therapy works more efficiently than medications as it allows you to understand the root of your issues. Many people develop mood disorders from an early age without even realizing it. In this way, your therapist can help you understand your disorder so that you can learn to overcome it.

What Is a Personality Disorder?

A personality disorder is a mental illness that is responsible for creating and maintaining an unhealthy way of thinking and behaving. This kind of disorder goes further than mood disorders, as it impacts how you think and act in your daily life.

Personality disorders come in all shapes and sizes, making them difficult to accurately diagnose. However, these kinds of mental disorders can be treated with the right care.

The symptoms of personality disorders are familiar. However, they do expand depending on what kind of personality disorder you’re dealing with. There are different clusters of personality disorders, each with its own unique symptoms.

This is why it’s always a good idea to consult a healthcare professional to get an accurate diagnosis. This diagnosis is important so that you can get the right treatment.

How the DSM Characterizes Personality Disorders

According to the DSM, personality disorders are mental health issues that create a pervasive pattern of maladaptive traits. These traits include how you perceive yourself and others around you. These negative traits impact your emotional state and influence how you act and react to people daily.

In simple terms, a personality disorder is a type of mental illness that creates an unhealthy way of thinking and behaving.  Like mood disorders, personality disorders can influence your mood for a long period of time. However, personality disorders go further and inflict your way of thinking and functioning in society.

Personality Disorder Symptoms

Personality disorder includes a few familiar symptoms that are shared with mood disorders. However, this disorder affects more than just your mood but also the way you think and act toward yourself and others. Here’s a quick look at the symptoms:

• Fear of abandonment
• Pattern of unstable relationships
• Rapid changes in self-identity
• Shifting goals
• Reckless behaviour
• Negative thoughts about yourself
• Stress-related paranoia
• Impulsive behaviour
• Feelings of emptiness
• Intense anger
• Suicidal threats
• Sabotaging success
• Losing contact with reality

How to Treat Personality Disorders

Diagnosing a personality disorder includes a physical exam and a psychiatric evaluation. This information is then compared with official diagnostic criteria to determine what kind of personality disorder you’re dealing with. This can help direct you toward the right treatment.

In most cases, personality disorders are treated with both medications and psychotherapy. Medications are used to treat the symptoms of the disorder. These medications include antidepressants, mood stabilizers, antipsychotic medications, and anti-anxiety medications.

In addition to medications, psychotherapy is also used to help with personality disorders. This process centers around discussing your feelings and emotions with a healthcare professional. These sessions can occur individually or within a group for added support.

These sessions will provide you with essential skills training to learn the skills you need to overcome your issues every day. These skills will help ensure you have a sustainable recovery.

Mood Disorder vs Personality Disorder

As mentioned above, there are a few key differences between mood disorders and personality disorders. While both of these disorders affect your emotional state, mood swings are the primary symptom of mood disorders.

Personality disorders can include mood swings but also other symptoms that have an impact on your emotional state. A personality disorder can also trigger a mood disorder. However, a mood disorder can’t trigger a personality disorder.

Borderline Personality Disorder vs Bipolar

Bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder are two of the most popular mental health issues. Bipolar disorder is a mood disorder that’s characterized by massive mood swings. This disorder includes symptoms of depression, anxiety, self-doubt, difficulty sleeping, and feelings of guilt and despair.

Borderline personality disorder differs from bipolar, as it impacts the way you think and feel about yourself and others. Symptoms of BPD include the fear of abandonment, a pattern of unstable relationships, stress-related paranoia, suicidal threats, and ongoing feelings of emptiness.

The major difference between borderline personality disorder and bipolar is that bipolar disorder is centred around mood swings. BPD can include mood swings but has a larger impact on your health and well-being. This impact is not as quick as bipolar mood swings, as BPD can impact your emotions for days at a time.

Diagnosis and Treatment

When it comes to diagnosing mood disorders, medical professionals will complete various questionnaires. These questionnaires will closely examine your emotional state, mood, and your energy levels each day. This information can then be used to see if you have a mood disorder.

Personality disorders are trickier to diagnose and will require a clinical evaluation. This evaluation will cover your thoughts, feelings, emotions, and behaviour. Since personality disorders are linked to childhood development, some medical professionals may want to talk to family and friends before finalizing a diagnosis.

Can You Have Bipolar and BPD At the Same Time?

Yes, you can have bipolar and BPD at the same time.

Bipolar disorder is a mental health disorder that causes incredibly extreme mood changes. This can result in emotional swings from extreme highs to depressive lows.

While borderline personality disorder may appear similar to bipolar disorder, it’s classified as a personality disorder. This disorder affects how you think, act, and react to those around you. This is why you can be diagnosed with both bipolar and borderline personality disorder.

Diagnosing Mental Disorders

When it comes to diagnosing mental health disorders, the process isn’t as simple as a single test. Diagnosing bipolar disorder will require you to complete questionnaires about yourself every day. This includes listing your mood, feelings, and energy levels every day.

Diagnosing borderline personality disorder includes a psychological evaluation. This means that you need to go through a clinical evaluation with a medical professional before being properly diagnosed. In some cases, medical professionals will conduct interviews with your family and friends to get a better understanding of your situation.

Treatment Options

Even though many of the symptoms are shared between mood disorders and personality disorders, the treatments take slightly different approaches. This is because personality disorders require more attention to sustainably recover.

Personality disorder treatments place a bigger focus on psychotherapy as the disorder directly impacts how you interact with others. This focus doesn’t just help you improve your mood but also equips you with the tools you need to live a healthier, happier life.

Bipolar disorder can be treated with prescribed medications to help stabilize your mood. However, medication is often combined with psychotherapy to help you recover sustainably.

Borderline personality disorder is also treated with a combination of medications and psychotherapy. The medications are prescribed to help you manage your symptoms every day. However, the psychotherapy aspect of your treatment helps you improve how you interact with others.

Dialectical behavioural therapy (DBT) is also an effective treatment for BPD. This treatment option combines both individual therapy and group therapy. However, you should always consult a medical professional to help find the perfect treatment option.

Bipolar and Addiction

Those with bipolar disorder also tend to have a high level of comorbidity with addiction. Research from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration suggests that as many as 30-50% of people with this disorder may develop a comorbid substance use disorder.  The pathways contributing to this prevalence can be attributed to genetic differences, environmental and lifestyle factors, and self-medication via alcohol/drugs.

Borderline Personality Disorder and Addiction

Research suggests that 78% of adults with BPD also develop a substance-related disorder or addiction at some point in their lives. Due to the intense instability that those with BPD deal with, sometimes drugs/alcohol can be used to ease some of the symptoms. Unfortunately, the suicidality and self-harm risks with BPD may be exacerbated by the use of alcohol or drugs.

Seeking Professional Help

A mood disorder is a serious mental health issue that affects your emotional state. This can lead to long periods of uncontrolled emotional behaviour. When it comes to mood disorder vs personality disorder comparison, personality disorders refer to how you think, react, and treat the people around you.

While both of these mental disorders have serious implications for your health and well-being, treatment options are available for you. These treatments give you and your family the tools you need to become a better, healthier person.

If you’d like more information, please reach out to us today.