Q. Theory Question:
Could the chemicals released in the brain of a person who suffers Borderline Personality Disorder after stress be the same chemicals released prior to a Near Death Experience? Or even continues into the chemical Near Death Experience?
So the BPD physically and emotionally feels she is dying, or nearly dying; therefore an adrenaline rush kicks in, trying to "rescue" her from death. And her feelings are real because those are the same biological releases as during true life-death crises. Only these releases are out of control, too much too soon. The chemicals flood and "poison" the person' s body as if the person is preparing to die. Chemically facing death, she becomes numb.
Maybe the suicide urge comes when the chemicals get too similar to Near Death experience and the person gives up trying to stay alive. Or she feels as if she should be dying because her body is telling her she is almost dead, hence the feelings of terminal illness or fears of death threats from other people. Thus the confusion between fearing to die and wanting to die.
Perhaps these chemicals are meant to prepare normal people for death in normal dying processes. But in the Borderline crisis, the pressure shut-off valve for these chemicals is stuck open. So the person actually experiences what the body and mind feels during a dying process. Hence the panic, "I am dying, I will fight to live".
Like a deer who runs from the wolf, then collapses in its jaws - with fear so intense, it facilitates the death process. Maybe this is not a psychotic condition, but one wherein the person has confused biological responses to Near Death chemicals. Maybe that is why accumulated trauma causes this condition, because each trauma burns out this natural defense system.
Then the cure would be fixing the shut-off valve.
What do you think about this theory? Can experiments be conducted to test it?
A. While an interesting theory, there are other more medically based explanations.
While the majority of borderlines experience dissociate symptoms when severely dysphoric, not all do. These symptoms appear to be due to abnormal firing in the temporal lobes and limbic system. Many who attempt suicide have no NDE symptoms at all. (NDE = near death experience)
Dysphoria (anxiety, rage, depression, despair) is as bad as it gets, and BPD dysphoria untreated tends to get worse and worse. The sensation can get go bad that the individual's incorrectly perceives that only way out of their pain is suicide. The survival instinct is either mobilized towards ending suffering or negated. In my experience, virtually no one wants to die - they just want their pain to go away. When the perception is that the pain will never go away, suicide becomes a significant risk.