What does sadness mean to BPD patients?

Dysphoria is a core feature of Borderline Personality Disorder. Although a few studies have examined the nature of dysphoria in those patients, no research has focused on their experience of sadness. Considering the adaptive value of this emotion, an understanding of how BPD patients experience sadness is relevant to treatment. We conducted a qualitative analysis of the narratives of seven individuals with a diagnosis of BPD that have participated in a semi-structured interview describing sadness experiences in a relational context. Fourteen episodes were analyzed jointly by two doctoral students following Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis principles. Five themes were found: (1) aggression, (2) relationship broken off by the other, (3) undifferentiated negative affect, (4) self being defective, and (5) overwhelming experience. Surprisingly, sadness in a relational context was not associated with a representation of loss. The results suggest instead that sadness in those episodes is a non-mentalized experience that should not be conceptualized as sadness proper.