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BPD

Billy

Crazy Diamond
Joined
Oct 20, 2009
Messages
1,192
MBTI Type
INFJ
So I heard something about it, I spent the last several hours scanning around facebook being all paranoid and angry for really petty reasons and i came across something about BPD borderline Personality disorder, and so i wiki'd it to see the symptoms and bingo, they described like issues I have been battling with since early childhood. From black and white thinking, splitting, paranoid thoughts, pushing people away, disassociation, SI, fear of abandonment, early childhood sexual abuse, so on and so forth, anyone here know anything about this disorder? Help me please before I break off a relationship with someone who is actually good for me and I actually feel like I can love.... because I am not going to take any more stabs at relationships after this one, I will just accept being a loner for good.

i dont have insurance right now so i cant afford to see a doctor, i just want to know more about it.
 

redacted

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 28, 2007
Messages
4,223
So I heard something about it, I spent the last several hours scanning around facebook being all paranoid and angry for really petty reasons and i came across something about BPD borderline Personality disorder, and so i wiki'd it to see the symptoms and bingo, they described like issues I have been battling with since early childhood. From black and white thinking, splitting, paranoid thoughts, pushing people away, disassociation, SI, fear of abandonment, early childhood sexual abuse, so on and so forth, anyone here know anything about this disorder? Help me please before I break off a relationship with someone who is actually good for me and I actually feel like I can love.... because I am not going to take any more stabs at relationships after this one, I will just accept being a loner for good.

i dont have insurance right now so i cant afford to see a doctor, i just want to know more about it.

If you don't have the resources for therapy, just do as much research as you can. I suspect my mom has BPD, and one of her biggest problems was giving up and just letting herself be that way. If you are curious and continue to self-question, you're far ahead of the curve (especially since I assume you're in your 20s).

And please do some work on yourself before having kids. My childhood sucked.
 

Billy

Crazy Diamond
Joined
Oct 20, 2009
Messages
1,192
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INFJ
If you don't have the resources for therapy, just do as much research as you can. I suspect my mom has BPD, and one of her biggest problems was giving up and just letting herself be that way. If you are curious and continue to self-question, you're far ahead of the curve (especially since I assume you're in your 20s).

And please do some work on yourself before having kids. My childhood sucked.

I am highly analytical of many thing, but most especially of myself, I understand myself and rationalize many thing inside me, and most often can spot the triggers, but my natural tendency to shovel things under the rug to keep everyone from knowing just how bat-shit insane i probably am makes it tough to get those issues aired out.

I dont plan on having children, I wanted to, but I dont know if I would ever have the courage to do it and do it right. I say that after leaving an 8 year relationship a few years back, no marriage, no kids.
 

redacted

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 28, 2007
Messages
4,223
I am highly analytical of many thing, but most especially of myself, I understand myself and rationalize many thing inside me, and most often can spot the triggers, but my natural tendency to shovel things under the rug to keep everyone from knowing just how bat-shit insane i probably am makes it tough to get those issues aired out.

Your analysis might lead you to many more negative self-character judgments than are useful, though. One thing at a time. No one is perfect, and you aren't either. But not everyone is crippled by their imperfections. That's really the issue to work on.

If you actually have BPD, even this back and forth suggests you're on the right track. My mother would have been entirely incapable of this during her bad years (she probably couldn't be diagnosed anymore, she's leveled out a bit in the last few years). It is possible to get your coping mechanisms back on track, but it will take a lot of work... you have to accept that many of the ways you view yourself are much too harsh and lead to lashing out, which you then analyze and feel even worse about, making you lash out more, etc. It's a big loop, and you CAN break it.
 

Thalassa

Permabanned
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May 3, 2009
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The fact that you even want to manage it is HUGE. A lot of people with borderline personality disorder are impossible to treat because they want to say everything is everyone else's problem.

The main problem in relationships is that people with BPD can go from worshiping to devaluing their partner in a way that can be abusive. It's like always going from intense love to hate instead of there being an in between, coupled with an overwhelming fear of abandonment.

If you can look for triggers and accept your condition and talk to your partner about it, I'm sure you can make progress.


I just want you to know that you can get psychiatric help through the state if you don't have insurance. You might want to check into that.
 

rav3n

.
Joined
Aug 6, 2010
Messages
11,655
Billy, be careful with self-diagnosis. Many descriptions of disorders contain relatively normal behaviour just not to the degree that manifests within someone who has the personality disorder.
 

Rebe

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Billy, be careful with self-diagnosis. Many descriptions of disorders contain relatively normal behaviour just not to the degree that manifests within someone who has the personality disorder.

I agree with this. I thought I had BPD a year back too. I definitely have some deep issues, as you do too, but is it BPD territory, that's hard to say, esp. without professional guidance. You know what they say about people suspecting they have all these kinds of medical illnesses because they do research on the internet and zomg they have all of the symptoms ... but it turns out they don't? I say calm down, do some more research, talk to your close friends and perhaps even your gf, share the fears, the thoughts, get some outside information. It's hard for us to say over the Internet. I could describe myself in a way that'd make me seem bipolar, but I am not. I see mental illnesses as a spectrum from normal to whatever the illness may be, it's not a yes or no box. :hug: And I agree that it's excellent for you to be so aware and so willing to change to become healthy.
 

Chloe

New member
Joined
May 1, 2009
Messages
2,196
So I heard something about it, I spent the last several hours scanning around facebook being all paranoid and angry for really petty reasons and i came across something about BPD borderline Personality disorder, and so i wiki'd it to see the symptoms and bingo, they described like issues I have been battling with since early childhood. From black and white thinking, splitting, paranoid thoughts, pushing people away, disassociation, SI, fear of abandonment, early childhood sexual abuse, so on and so forth, anyone here know anything about this disorder? Help me please before I break off a relationship with someone who is actually good for me and I actually feel like I can love.... because I am not going to take any more stabs at relationships after this one, I will just accept being a loner for good.

i dont have insurance right now so i cant afford to see a doctor, i just want to know more about it.


i think bpd is very controversial topic, bc it gets diagnosed way too often. as you can see many criteria match even Ns, and introverts. so unless you are throwing ashtrays into head of people around you, treatening suicide, crying few times a day or you are very conflicting and self hating .. i wouldnt call it BPD.
you might as well need a therapy besides that. i suggest if you feel bad you should get money somehow and do it.

mental health is spectrum, you can walk PD line but not cross it, i find diagnosis totally useless

Personaly i know a few people who have been diagnosed without any reason whatsoever,because they've been told they will be sick forever and all the common crap, and now they are happy (less than 2 yrs from diagnosis), really normal, beautiful people. Many people in early 20ies show bpd symptoms.



as much as self-diagnosis is crap, professional diagnosis can be a crap too. in psychiatry i'd call them all "professionals" not real professionals.


as for what happens in the mind of BPD person:
it's just like any other low self esteem, but to extreme. They are so removed from their core, real self, and unaware of their real feelings and needs, so they operate from defenses, trying to involve everyone else in their dance, they lack real reflection you might say. Most BPDs extremely lack real self reflection, so it's extremely important to them how you react to them etc.
 

Maizy

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Sep 16, 2009
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If you can't afford it, there are community clinics and resources and such to help. Some centers serving uninsured or people who have a low-income will charge on a sliding scale based on your income. It's worth looking into. This link may help
NAMI | Find Support

There are places out there that offer counseling for uninsured Fredericksburg Counseling

Or, there may be a chance that your employer has an employee assistence program.. which offers a few sessions of free counseling and can perhaps refer you to some other resources.

Good for you for wanting to take control of this and help yourself.
 

ThatsWhatHeSaid

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I agree with the warning issued by Metaphor and Rebe about diagnosing yourself. It's dangerous. But the biggest reason it's dangerous isn't because you'll be inaccurate. It's because disorders aren't actual THINGS. The correct way to think about disorders, imo, is as a set of cognitive/affective/behavioral patterns, and patterns are nothing but reliable cause and effect relationships. If you can really remember this, then you can investigate all you want because they're no real danger of confusion. If you see patterns you like/dislike, you can figure out the cause and address it as best you can. (That's something that'll improve as your understanding of yourself improves.)

The danger is when people make diagnoses into THINGS. They treat them like objects or viruses that you can get, and then they think they have this thing called BPD disorder. It's not that they don't have the symptoms (meaning, the patterns); it's that that's ALL they have. When they believe they have a disorder, then they get confused. I would be confused too. Uprooting something abstract like a disorder is trickier than uprooting a set of cognitive-behavioral patterns. The patterns are there. You can touch them and feel them. The disorder is only an abstraction.

The other problem is that when you find a disorder and start reading about it, you can easily convince yourself you have symptoms that you don't actually have, in order to remain consistent with the diagnosis. That leads to lots of confusion.

In sum, look at yourself. Look and see what patterns are already there, and address those. Don't bother trying to diagnose yourself because it's a waste of time.
 

redacted

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 28, 2007
Messages
4,223
I agree with the warning issued by Metaphor and Rebe about diagnosing yourself. It's dangerous. But the biggest reason it's dangerous isn't because you'll be inaccurate. It's because disorders aren't actual THINGS. The correct way to think about disorders, imo, is as a set of cognitive/affective/behavioral patterns, and patterns are nothing but reliable cause and effect relationships. If you can really remember this, then you can investigate all you want because they're no real danger of confusion. If you see patterns you like/dislike, you can figure out the cause and address it as best you can. (That's something that'll improve as your understanding of yourself improves.)

The danger is when people make diagnoses into THINGS. They treat them like objects or viruses that you can get, and then they think they have this thing called BPD disorder. It's not that they don't have the symptoms (meaning, the patterns); it's that that's ALL they have. When they believe they have a disorder, then they get confused. I would be confused too. Uprooting something abstract like a disorder is trickier than uprooting a set of cognitive-behavioral patterns. The patterns are there. You can touch them and feel them. The disorder is only an abstraction.

The other problem is that when you find a disorder and start reading about it, you can easily convince yourself you have symptoms that you don't actually have, in order to remain consistent with the diagnosis. That leads to lots of confusion.

In sum, look at yourself. Look and see what patterns are already there, and address those. Don't bother trying to diagnose yourself because it's a waste of time.

I pretty much agree -- but I don't think it's a waste of time to use a label. Sure, you have to remember that the label is just an approximation of a set of traits (that may or may not fit the prototype). But it may be helpful to compare yourself to others that the label also applies to, and even more importantly, it's important to see the realistic treatment options out there. Not saying you have to buy into it, but you don't have to reinvent the wheel either.
 

ThatsWhatHeSaid

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I pretty much agree -- but I don't think it's a waste of time to use a label. Sure, you have to remember that the label is just an approximation of a set of traits (that may or may not fit the prototype). But it may be helpful to compare yourself to others that the label also applies to, and even more importantly, it's important to see the realistic treatment options out there. Not saying you have to buy into it, but you don't have to reinvent the wheel either.

Yeah, I agree with that.

I was going to update my post to clarify, but I didn't have time. My basic complaint of diagnoses is that they carry the same dangers as types, in that people can get confused about what a diagnosis really is.

For example, I post on a few sites where people are constantly wondering which disorder they have. They sift through different ones, trying to see which one fits best, but get confused when they find some factors of one and some factors of another. They they make the mistake of twisting their history and self-concept to match the disorder, like they're trying on an uncomfortable outfit and adjusting to make it fit. They think this thing -- narcissistic personality, ENFP, Republican -- is this thing out there, as if people are born in discrete flavors of personality. It's very confusing. If they focused on the components instead -- their behavioral responses, cognitive patterns, and political ideas -- and didn't worry about the classification, there wouldn't be any confusion that arises from trying to classify. They would just be what they are, and then they can choose to modify that or accept it.

I agree, though, that knowing what to look for and how things work together (triggers and responses) can be helpful. But you do have to be clear about what you actually have (symptoms, not a label) in order to benefit from it. Otherwise it can be really dangerous.
 

FDG

pathwise dependent
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The fact that you even want to manage it is HUGE. A lot of people with borderline personality disorder are impossible to treat because they want to say everything is everyone else's problem.

Yeah. I would go as far as saying that if you can understand that you have BPD, then you only have a very mild form of BPD, which should be manageable with some effort.
 

LadyJaye

Scream down the boulevard
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Nov 6, 2007
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The suggestion of contacting NAMI is an excellent place to start. They have a whole arsenal of resources to get you going in the right direction. Also, there's the United Way. I spoke with both organizations when my BP parent needed serious intervention, and they were both very helpful and compassionate.
 

disregard

mrs
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Apr 23, 2007
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It takes a lot of positive self-conditioning to break the negative thought cycle associated with BPD. It took me several years to turn myself around. I began with physically not allowing myself to do the things I used to, for example breaking a relationship off completely, walking out on a job. As sticking around became more habitual, I began to work on the psychological aspect. I would constantly remind myself in my head why I value the relationship so much, why I love my job so much (or at least, what my job represents -- independence, stability, socialisation).

You have to start somewhere, so start with what you can control. At first, you won't be able to control your irrational thoughts and feelings, but you can put the phone down/walk away from the computer/reach out your hand and hold theirs when you're in a fight. That last one really helps me. I know that if I can just overcome my pride and hold my boyfriend's hand when I'm giving him the cold shoulder for whatever ridiculous reason, everything will be okay, because that always breaks the ice and we can laugh about my tizzy fit.
 
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