Borderline Personality Disorder, and what that means for me.
It’s been a really rough couple of months – no a really rough year.
And I want to bare my soul right here, right now.
I don’t know if any of you know – it isn’t something I have kept hidden, but also isn’t something I have ever really shouted about, but I have borderline personality disorder. I don’t know if anybody knows what that is, it isn’t exactly as widely known as, say, bipolar or things like that. It is the most known of the personality disorder spectrum though. Just in case you don’t know, I’ll outline the key features below. Taken from Mind.org.uk:
What are the symptoms of BPD?
You might be given a diagnosis of BPD if you experience at least five of the following things, and they've lasted for a long time or have a big impact on your daily life:
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You feel very worried about people abandoning you, and would do anything to stop that happening.
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You have very intense emotions that last from a few hours to a few days and can change quickly (for example, from feeling very happy and confident in the morning to feeling low and sad in the afternoon).
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You don't have a strong sense of who you are, and it can change depending on who you're with.
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You find it very hard to make and keep stable relationships.
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You act impulsively and do things that could harm you (such as binge eating, using drugs or driving dangerously).
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You have suicidal thoughts or self-harming behaviour.
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You feel empty and lonely a lot of the time.
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You get very angry, and struggle to control your anger.
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When very stressed, sometimes you might:
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feel paranoid
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have psychotic experiences, such as seeing or hearing things other people don't
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feel numb or 'checked out' and not remember things properly after they've happened.
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Because you only need to experience five of these possible symptoms to be given the diagnosis, BPD can be a very broad diagnosis and include lots of different people with very different experiences.
I was diagnosed in December 2012, at 19 years old, and it was such a hard thing to take in. I was in a super dark place already – hence having to go to the doctor to get diagnosed – I’d just broken up with my boyfriend of two years, my parents were going through a super difficult divorce, I had to drop my life and move away from my parents (it was the first semester of university) and I felt so lost, it was unbelievably difficult. I went a little… I guess the word might be crazy – I left university early for the Christmas break and went back late, knowing that I had a broken personality.
For the last couple years it’s been semi-okay. It’s always there – I’m always a moody and my mood swings are amplified beyond the typical PMT side of things, but it’s been under control. Until this last year.
Maybe it’s because I’m in a relationship now, and I swore off relationships before because the stronger my emotions the harder it is to even deal. Last year I went through a really difficult bereavement, which tied with me not having enough sleep (working 70+ hour weeks) really messed me up. I was depressed, I withdrew from everything – not deliberately, mind, I just go through stages where I’m so numb and unmotivated that I can just… do nothing. I spend my days doing nothing and my nights crying because I’m not in control of my emotions. I’m needy, yet I push people away.
It’s hard to explain and to a lot of people I just sound like the typical woman, but it’s raw. So many people compare BPD to having emotion burns – people with physical burns feel unbelievable pain if you touch their raw flesh. I feel unbelievable pain if someone touches my raw emotions. It’s really hard to deal with. My relationships are unstable to say the least – the only people I have stable relationships with are my parents, even my boyfriend puts up with a lot of from me. I told him about my diagnosis on out second date, so he was always aware of the situation.
It wasn’t until about 3 months ago that it really really came to though. I received my university grade, and it . I have a retake to do but even that won’t salvage it. As well as that, I’d dropped my life consuming job for a 9-5 office job, but my boss was difficult. She insulted not just my work (which I know near the end I began to slack) but also made comments about my weight, my hair – I joined an expensive gym and got my hair cut for her but she was never happy. My suit wasn’t the right colour or I was wearing too tan tights. It was hard and it was a confidence knocker, but I dealt with it and then left when I got a new job. The new job didn’t work out though (they hired someone internally and cancelled my first day…) so now I’m unemployed, unmotivated, and frankly, right now I’m in one of the darkest places I’ve ever been.
I hurt, all over, I feel ill, but I know it’s all in my brain. I know it always has been. But I am a mess. My brain is broken, I have no direction in life, and just when I thought I was okay it turned out that I’m not.
I don’t know where to go from here – I won’t do anything bad – I’m actually sort of happy in life (another oxymoron, I know) because I have a settled family now and a great boyfriend. But when it comes to my personal direction, I’m lost, and I feel like I’ll never be secure because I’m always going to be up and down. I can’t predict myself.
And that terrifies me.
So now I'm sat here with no friends because I'm too unmotivated to make an effort, no direction and nothing to show for the last 4 years.
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