Personality disorders are a distinctive type of trait or pattern in behavior that can negatively affect your teen's ability to cope with everyday issues and stressors, explains Mental Health America. If you have a teenager who struggles with mental health or personality issues, treatment may include medication along with psychiatric and behavior-specific counseling, depending on the severity of the illness.
Borderline Personality Disorder
Borderline personality disorder can be identified by several characteristics that your teenager may exhibit. She may show instability with her behavior, mood, self-image and relationships to those close to her. Signs include mood swings, self-destructive behavior -- especially in dealing with her friends and sometimes family members -- and a changing self-image. A teenager with borderline personality disorder may find herself being unpredictable and seeing the world in extremes such everything in her life going from bad to good and back again. Her impulsive behavior carries into her friendships, and, if she feels threatened by others invading in her close relationships, she may quickly end things. Outbursts of anger and self-mutilation are for attention-getting purposes but often drive away close relationships.
Paranoid Personality Disorder
If your teenager displays signs of distrust of others and constant suspicion, he could be suffering from paranoid personality disorder. This disorder is similar to schizophrenia but not as extreme. According to Pub Med Health, common symptoms include fear that he may be exploited by others who have hidden motives and he may be in danger. He also may exhibit fear of unknown people, extreme hostility, social isolation and detachment from others. This can complicate his social life and ability to find trust in others to develop healthy relationships.
Anti-social Personality Disorder
It is normal for your teen to be anti-social occasionally, especially if she feels uncomfortable around a particular group of her peers. When her anti-social behavior leads to avoidance and isolation and is ongoing, she may have anti-social personality disorder. This type of mental illness is defined by MayoClinic.com as being an abnormal way of thinking in regard to relating to others. This type of illness can lead to destructive behavior in which she could violate others, behave violently, lie and also be prone to substance abuse problems. It may start as failing to attend school or work, lying about her whereabouts and failing to admit her destructive behavior.
Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder
If your teenager is frequently cleaning her room and demands to have her personal items in a particular order, it could mean she chooses to live a life of organization, and this is generally not a huge issue. If her preoccupation with cleanliness, orderliness and control begins to overtake her free time or invades into getting daily chores or school work done, it could be considered obsessive compulsive personality disorder, notes Psych Central. The condition spirals out of control when she cannot be in control of her environment or avoids social situations in which she cannot perform cleaning or repetitive tasks. If her obsession for personal objects forbids her from discarding them or replacing them with newer items, it can be a sign of the disorder. When she is unable to complete a task because she is stuck on a step or something being in a particular order, the end result can cause self-destructive behavior and extreme disappointment.
