Borderline Personality Disorder Advice

So I have to say that I am new to the forum but it seems to be filled with delightful and intelligent people. I was wondering if there were any seasoned individuals with Borderline personality disorder that could point me to a good reference on dealing with co-dependency.

I currently find myself in a relationship that makes me unhappy. I know that this is complicated and enhanced by my borderline... Each therapist tells me this. No one tells me what I can do about it. I go through these black and white fits where I can either not tolerate being alone, or reverse and can't tolerate being around anyone. The relationship is leaving me very depressed and hurt and I can't even bring up the issues. It almost feels like I don't deserve to and I don't matter.

Now having borderline I recognize that my emotions at any time can be irrational. I just don't know how to decipher. I usually test myself by waiting a few days to see if I still feel the same...but couldn't irrational last more than 24 hours?

Anyone who has any advice or a great resource on BPD would be greatly appreciated.

SomeKindsCyan, I am not intelligent, nor delightful. But I have been in relationships for extended periods of time (to the young ones, this means multiple decades). Some of these were not or are not easily ended.

If you are unhappy and the relationship is easily ended; that would be one thing. If not, may I offer you this:

Relationships are not always about being happy. Sometimes they are about character development. If not abusive (I never advise staying in an abusive relationship), ask yourself: Am I a better person for being here"? If so, you have found a redemption of the relationship that may see you through. If not, and you can not see adopting this as a way to view the relationship -- I cannot help.

I am not a professional, and this is not my area of expertise.

Thx, thank you for your input, it is appreciated.

Decius: My borderline consists of nearly non-existent self esteem, paranoia regarding separations and abandonment, persistent depressed moods, Substance abuse, addictive personality, self injury, and suicidal ideation.

Of course it is nicely mixed with PTSD, Social anxiety disorder, Panic disorder, and severe depression since I was 8.

Something somewhere in the mix was done incorrectly in my brain. The self injury is a 14 year habit, the substance abuse stuff is about four years, risky behaviors about 10...

I've tried therapy or the last 14 years but nothing seems to be sticking.

You are the most open honest person I think I have met. In my experience, honesty is painful, but healing. I can only speak for myself. But if you are this transparent here, I can only assume that you are more so in the mirror.

That said, what I have seen is beautiful. Yes, this is just a forum. But things do come through. I would therefore a claim a notch up or two on the self esteem thing. At least one person is 'getting it.'

Thx,

You're too nice to be real. I am very self critical in the mirror unfortunately. I've convinced myself that I deserve being abused and hurt...even gone out of my way to find people who were borderline dangerous. I think that's the worst part of the Borderline thing....most people get it confused with Girl Interrupted. There are external Borderlines who manipulate and hurt people (Though in some cases unintentional) and internals like me who turn it all on ourselves.

I've been studying DBT and the illness itself but I'm always left with the thoughts that if I was prettier or more stable, or had more money....maybe I wouldn't have to be silent and spineless to get a guy to like me. Then I'll flip the mood swing to being done with relationships altogether that I'm better off alone.

I think the most frustrating thing is that I'm either way out in left field, or way out in right....there's no middle ground. No matter how many compliments people give me on my character or whatever...I can't even believe it.

It's a major pain in the backside...

Thank you for the conversation. Most people just label me nuts and move on.

Decius,

I do feel trapped in many different aspects. I am trapped at my residence because I live in a house with two families...no door, no privacy. I'm trapped at work where my bosses are allowed to treat us like crap and lie back and fourth to get us in trouble. I'm trapped in a car that's falling apart and illegal because I can't afford to get it replaced...

My whole life is a trap, and I don't see it ever getting better. Though I never made the connection between being trapped and depressed before. So thank you for the next thought doomed to roll around in my brain.

I used to be very creative....but I've lost any ability to write or draw. Finishing a project of any kind is almost unheard of...

I have no idea what I want at this point.

No to distract from the conversation, but:

I think everyone is trying to 'fix' themselves. I have not yet met someone that did not have a glitch in their software somewhere. I certainly do.

quote:

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I used to be very creative

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... That does not end.

I saw a shrink once that asked me what I wanted to be. I am working on sixty, and i still do not know. Perhaps just me.

No distraction at all. I think the notion that I can be 'fixed' is far fetched, or impossible depending on the day. I just want someone to accept my insanity, I will accept theirs, and we will be oblivious to reality.

Have you ever read the book Catch 22 ? Joseph Heller's book is on the surface is just an anti-war novel. But here is the real thing: The anti-hero, Captain John Yossarian, wants out. He can get out if he is insane. But he must apply for the release. But if he applies to get out, since war is insane -- he must be sane and therefore is denied. If he does not apply, he must be insane, and therefore he could get out. But then he can't, for he did not apply.

Anyone who thinks they are sane, probably are not. Those that say they are insane are probably not so much so.

Some Kinda Cyan, I empathize with your position, since my first manic epidode I have been to about ten plus mental hospitals, while studying psychology and philosophy.

Being in hospitals allowed me to play therapist to a gambit of people and I gained alot of knowledge about a wide variety of mental health issues and disorders as well as my divings into the depths of Mania which is like talking amphetimes and staying up for a week straight without any drugs and it continues to get more intense until you crash but allows you to feel euphoria and hear and see the world in a horrfyingly beautiful way in a psychotic high were I make connections and have thoughts that I am unable to make at my baseline level, I have felt suicidal depression and have failed at it two times.

I say all this because I want to be as honest as possible with you.

My theory on borderline personality disorder is that it is the result of errors in thinking on a massive scale so much so that it hasn an affect on how you feel and process emotions at a core level. The improper emotions are then excacerbated by the errant thought processes that caused this fundamental shift in your subconsious mind in the first place, what exacerbates this even more is that your a Woman, and studies show that not only do Women feel more emotionally then men during their period but also at a basic baseline level hardwired into your brain. Which makes it so crippling to deal with your emotions and processing them. Thats why most Borderline Personality patients are Women.

PTSD, social anxiety disorder etc. you sound much like my own sister who was raped, that was her trauma that she relives and causes the social anxiety and panic attacks. If you want me to be able to help you further than you need to discuss the trauma with me, I am not a licesned therapist but I have seen what works and what doesn't and people who confront their trauma and figure out all the reasons why it happened and be able to explain it as something that is a part of life and them tend to fair a alot better than those who ignore it, If you read on treatment of PTSD a major part of it is talking out the trauma which can take years of therapy, I learned this in books about PTSD in vetrans, my uncle being a PTSD vet and my neighbor of 21 years a vietnam Vet with PTSD. Its not something you should talk about with anyone who is not actively trying to work with you on your trauma as it causes you to relive it, so this is not something to talk about with a boyfriend that you haven't been in a commited relationship for at least a year, one that your actually content if not happy with. If it's not me then it has to be someone otherwise it will dominate your life and you won't even realize the extent of damage it's really doing.
To give you some perspective my own trauma involves intense bullying,
I was held back in first grade not because I was not making the grades but as stated in the letter to my parents that I was not making social connections with my peer group, I was in a home of a troubled marraige with two parents that deeply loved me but there was turmoil that I feel need not be described here. Later on in 5th grade I was sent to a child psych ward because I had a breakdown over my parents divorce and blammed myself deeply for it I was angry but mostly sad as it was turned inward. After a switched schools I felt like I didn't belong that I wasn't welcome I had no personel attatchment to these people and my teacher treated me different than the others from day one, at least that was my perspective, I felt this penetrating judgement from her that I didn't feel as intensly until 6th grade. Middle school is a shit time for alot of people and for me it was an absolute horror and a catalyst in my personal developement. I was bullied like any other school kid sure but I was able to handle it because you sorta needed to develope a tough skin living in a culdasack but we were apart of a community feuds and anomisity was always short lived even if I was bit of a Momma's boy, who has very protective of me at this point after everything that had happened to that point. But with middle school the bullying was different, these people at a basic level, those that bullied me didn't care about me at all and thats the sort of thing you expect from kids but I was already in a depressed state. There was one particular day that really pushed me too far, the class before the class im about to talk about was a math class in it I was being grilled on the holocaust by two other students ,something we were just learning about,and I was being accused of being facist or anti-semetic, which Blew My Mind because half my family on my dads side is jewish and I love my aunts uncles and cousins dearly that are and was friends or at least aquantences with many people who where jewish not related to me, I was deeply offended but I was not very articulate at that point in my life so I was angry at them for accusing me of such a thing. Then It was time for biology and I was on my way to biology class that was being taught my my substitute at the time who would later become my lax coach. On the way to that class five people in the hallway all older and bigger than me shoved me around pushed my books on the floor and one of them asked me "what the fuck I was going to do about it?" I was flustered and then all the sudden I felt angry towards them and back at myself. So I sat down in my seat and was muttering to myself, the last thing I remember saying was "if they want violence I will show them violence." I then proceeded to break my glasses in half and cut my right wrist with them, I still have a small scar from it this was the violence I wanted to show and express.
I was sent home and put into counciling the next week I was apparently going to kill everyone in the school and that I wanted to kill and rape all the jews. There was a Rumour started and it escalted and got out of control. The thing that was it's catalyste was that columbine was fresh in everyones mind and well you know middle school kids, 1 girl even said that I threatened her with a flame thrower I was barred from the school and put into intensive psychological testing and had to fight the school in order to be reinstated, I was obviously found mentally compitent. and was allowed to return to school.
This is where the trauma begins, everyone was out to get me from there on in, I was a fat kid and people would punch me in the stomach in the hallways as hard as they could and just walk away, they would beat me up outside of school and where always playing tricks on me. I had a cousin and his friends that saw through the bullshit and slowly gained acceptence back into the school but those three months until school was over were hell for me. I saw the opinon against school shooters and I learned about the Nazi's and facsism and was convinced that people would want me dead, my neighborhood was a safe haven but I rarely left it or the house that summer, eventually the thought of everyone wanting to kill me wanned but I never talked about what happened to anyone ashamed of wanting to hurt myself I just flat out denied the rumours. I started boxing and lifting at my therapists behest and started playing football, luckily for me I was a good athlete and could hit harder than anyone on the teams I played on, if you bullied me and you were on the team in highschool or pop warner you were getting laid out. People stopped physically harassing me and switched to verbal harassment, I wasn't really too sensitive at that point but anytime people would verbally harass me they would get to the point of calling me a psycho and I would break down on the spot, the stigma cut me very deep.
Fast forward to my first manic episode and I had achieved a 3.23 after moving away from the town and was going to go to nursing school, I was 500 miles away from the town. After my first mania I fell into a Massive suicidal depression and swallowed a bottle of ativan waking up three days later with my mother and uncle hovering over me. I was ashamed by the pain and concern I saw in my mothers eyes, I felt so selfish and hollow. I turned to weed heavily to numb myself for awhile.
One day I started seeing 666 everywhere and started to notice the color red, I was studying existential philosophy at the time and anytime I was in class I thought satan was trying to see through me and find my hypocrasies as the hypocrite is sent to some of the worst levels in hell according to the hierarchy portrayed in dantes inferno. It accelerated my destruction of other peoples hypocrisy as well as my own, but after awhile I started to associate everything with someone trying to kill me or frame me for murder or lure me to a party where they would kill me. I was told terrible stories in mental hospitals by drug dealers that no one should have stuck in their minds from there own murders to being hit on by people fresh out of prison who had turned prision bitch gay. It was horrifying, I started carrying a big flashlight in my bag as a club, I was still physically fit but I thought everyone was out to get me. I stopped going to school but as I slipped deeper into mania it fueled my psychosis and delusions and a became mildly agoraphobic and thought that satan was telling me thorough clues in the universe to either kill myself or someone would kill me, after not sleeping for three days I finally went to the hospital for the forth time in three years.
Satan is gone from my paranoia but now I am stuck with the idea that everyone is out to kill that I meet so when I do go out I make sure there is a street near by, that I am in a public place, and I never hang out personally with anyone that I didn't know before my first mania. My trauma causes me social anxiety and when I start slipping into mania and start making beutiful connections in thought and having ephanies that forever change my mind, I start thinking that every post on facebook or article or photo on stumble upon is someones attempt to kill me or lure, I sometimes fear attack of being attacked in my home.
This is all because of the comorbity of my trauma and my bipolar and I know I can't change it but I can cope with it. This took me two years to come to terms with.

Trauma can actually change your very DNA in a theory that is explained as epigenitics, along with the history of mental illness in my family and you get my mental deformity.
If anyone has read my rants on here it's usually because someone is either being a bully or making remarks and opinons that a bully would make, I see red sometimes and I am sorry for mucking up debate
when people avoid the trauma in their lives they don't analyze it and can't learn to cope with their own tendancies, aren't able to identify the signs of there stress quickly enough to explain them away and gain control of the situation as well as what they are thinking. Decius and Cyan think about exactly what goes through your mind during these anxiety attacks and write them down, do it the next time you have the anxiety attack during the attack, it may nmake it more intense BUT, this way when your in a calmer state of mind you will be able to analyze the real problem i thinking that your mind represses later. If you want help please post it
The reason why most therapists don't work is because they haven't studied the human mind like their life litteraly depended on it, I have and thats how I am able to relate and help people how I helped myself.

Alot of boderline personality disorder patients that I have met have crippling self esteem issues because they tend to value themselves on other peoples judgement and opinions.
This is a big reason for codependency issues beyond the scope of needing someone for economic support or drugs.
Don't feel bad or ashamed in any of this as you are a human being, stop thinking your insane, insanity is a bell curve and is completely subjective, alot of people would say I am insane, to me alot of other people are insane. I bought a copy of Catch 22 two months ago but have not started it, I am sure there is something flawed in that arguement because I only see myself insane in the eyes of society which on the whole is insane and many individuals in it I see as insane, at times I know when I am being insane and irrational by my definition and call it out everytime I start to have a delusion, but I call myself on it and stop it. I am not a violent person but a romantic one who is pulled very quickly into emotion and lately have been high energy.
You made the statement that you want a lover that makes you oblivious to reality, it sort of speaks to your want to escape, through drugs maybe sex (which overcomplicates a realationship when introduced too early) You say your depressed and feal trapped maybe thats why you want to escape to states where you lose your inhibitions.
What you need to do is create a list of people that unconditionally love you and that you would die for in return, those are the only opinons of other people that matter. My dad calls it making the short list. Think about yourself, aside from things of vanity, think about yourself as a person what don't you like, why don't you like it, what would you like it to be like? You need to create your ideal self and write it down, nothing that is vanity no looks or appearances, just core values of what you think it takes to be a good person. Are you lying to yourself in anyway, this isn't me trying to be mean at all this is totally legitimate, you don't have to tell anyone but yourself but alot of people in society will perpetuate there mental disability with lying to themselfs to try to protect themselfs just like avoidning confronting trauma, only this will confront your own thoughts, if you find yourself overthinking this then put the pen down ( write everything out it resonates and your mind more strongly then if you just typing it.) and go do something HEALTHY THAT YOU ENJOY, a slice of pie maybe go out in nature and do some photography work but make it something you don't have to think about and just focus on that moment, your mind will subconsciously ponder your problems without you needing to figure anything out actively.
Start a journal, this is sooooo key to mental health, you need to write a deep journal of everythought you have when you are thinking about issues that are making you feel depressed or "insane" and anxious, write it down as close to the moment as you can, this way you can deal with it better later when you go to review it. You need to focus on you and not how other people percieve you and maybe you have to write about how other people make you feel but after you do think about what right they even fucking have to make you feel that way in the first place, how that makes them a shallow asshole and why you should even care about that opinion, If this from someone on your short list then you need to take whatever they said seriously, decide if they still are on the short list after it but most importantly if you think they have a legitimate point then take only the parts of the arguement that make you want to be that better person and think about how you can become that person, how you can change your thinking but always bring it back to your idea of an ideal self and how it fits in.
You need to create your own philosophy on how you should be living life and try as hard as you can to live up to it.

I have so much more I want to say but I have already been working on this for four hours that is how much helping you and decius means to me, if you have any questions or comments on anything I have said please let me know but I need to sleep now haha
The One Thing Holding You Back - its a self help book on processing emotions and works better than DBT, if you really wanna learn DBT studdy buddhism, a cool book on Buddhism is Sit Down and Shut Up its written by a punk rock guy and is a badass read
have you also gone to NA or AA yet? Your substence abuse is a massive part of the problem, more than you may realize. I can elaborat in a later post as well as on self harming, because it would take alot more time to do the topic justice.