Lived Experience Forum

[Daisydukes]

I’ve been thinking about the way my BPD is perceived by others without BPD, A LOT. I’ve come here straight from reading hateful & hurtful comments on an article in Facebook. Where better to vent my frustrations but a place where I am anonymous and am not being perceived as “attention seeking”

Let’s get to it.

My Symptoms of BPD are harsh yes, I live in a constant state of emotional highs and lows. When I am happy I am extremely happy, I LOVE that side of myself and I certainly wish I could stay in that state of living forever but when I am feeling low everything within me changes, my confidence, my self esteem, I look terrible, I feel terrible and when this happens (this is grieving, we are grieving some ridiculous mind switch that makes absolutely no sense to ourselves or anyone else for that matter) we act out (if we haven’t like myself had long term help) as a means to sooth ourselves, we want to be healthy stable people more than anything. I suppose I can only speak for myself in saying that when I am telling someone about how I feel I am not attention seeking! Imagine one of your parents dies, it’s a terrible emotional thing to happen and you’re not attention seeking when grieving their loss, you’re trying to feel better when talking about this death, we are only trying to feel better! The things I do when in a low state can be extremely self destructive and hurting myself does hurt other people, I take responsibility for this, I wear my wrong doings and I try to fix myself after all the stupid drunk horribleness that spirals out of control and my more recent OD, I do not do these things because I want people to feel sorry for me I do them because I can not cope with my damn personality and all the bloody chaos that comes with it! I am my own worst enemy and I want nothing more than to live life like a normal person, I am not trying to seek pity I am trying to seek someone to confide in and understand me. I just want to be understood, I just want compassion not pity!

Why are we catergorised like psychopaths? I care about other people and I will try to help other people. Just because we are largely misunderstood social freaks doesn’t mean we want to live this way. Others perceptions of something they could never truly understand is so damn hurtful. I am a loving, giving and numerous person with a pretty crappy diagnosis.

Compassion and understanding not hate please!

[Phoenix_Rising]

Hi @Daisydukes,

It is super nice to meet you. I am in a bit of a dark space right now and thus not able to respond properly. However, I wanted to let you know that I have BPD and I absolutely 100% relate to what you are saying. I was diagnosed in 1996 and there has been SOME improvement in attitudes towards the diagnosis since then, but there is still a loooooooong way to go. For example, I recently discovered that on the brand new Head-to-Health government website, it says that people with a personality disorder might find it helpful to change their attitude. Yep, stigma towards those of us with that particular diagnosis is well and truly alive and well in 2017!

Anyway, I will try and come back and say a proper hello to you tomorrow. Tonight my big feelings are just a bit too big for me to think clearly enough to write a decent response to you. However, I just really wanted you to know how much I hear you and there are many others here in Forum Land who I know can also relate to what you are saying.

@Sans911 @CheerBear @Faith-and-Hope

[CheerBear]

Hi @Daisydukes 🙂 It's nice to "meet" you.

I can relate to so much of what you've spoken of in your post and very much appreciated reading your thoughts and experiences. Seeking compassion and understanding but being met with uhelpful and unsupportive responses, is something I and many others here, have experienced too. And it really really sucks.

A few of us have been having a conversation recently about a bit of what you spoke of above (it's scattered throughout the pages of this thread here  you're interested). I think it's completely normal to seek understanding and support when we go through all kinds of things. BPD has, in my experience and from my understanding, some pretty damaging stigma and misunderstanding which makes the responses from people to those seeking understanding, often incredibly unhelpful. I'm sorry to hear that (it seems as if) you've experienced it too.

It's great to have you here where there is a lot of compassion and understanding. You're welcome to jump in wherever you'd like, and if you want to tag someone you can put the @ symbol in front of their name. Hope to see you around some more 🙂

[Faith-and-Hope]

Hi @Daisydukes and welcome to the forums ..... 😊👋

I was new to BPD when I arrived here ..... for a different reason ...., and met some beautiful BPD challenged people with Lived Experience to share, helping us all to understand more about what BPD is how to come to terms with the challenges it presents.

Everyone here is challenges with something, and the depth and variety of experiences are not really comparable ..... it's all different for different people, different circumstances, different reasons and different seasons.

What is common here is empathy and understanding ..... the preparedness to care and share, and help each other through ..... learn about each other's journeys and what we can all contribute and / or take away with us.

Lovely to meet you, and I can see you have met some others here already.

💐🌷🌿

[Sans911]

@Daisydukes- hey there lovely lady. Wow, your post could have been me writing that. Almost every word (except the alcohol) and could have been me. Unfortunately, until recently I also worked in the same health care environment that now judges me harshly, labels me attention & drug seeking (even for medical symptoms) and and bars me from working as I'm deemed unstable & incapable. I previously worked casually so if I felt unstable I would not go to work for those reasons. Work was my last salvation to give me purpose, and now I haven't worked in 4months,i can't find many reasons to keep living. Yes, I 100‰ agree that compassion & understanding is needed for I don't believe we are social freaks but more extremely highly sensitive souls that are truly empathetic, caring and have unique, special qualities. But it's not our fault that wired in with these qualities is a lack of social connectedness, poor social & behavioursl skills coupled with invalidation of same skills when we are trying to learn, is it any wonder we are the way we are? Yes, the diagnosis of BPD is both a blessing & a curse. Luckily, I hang onto the fact that there are such individuals who do understand us, as I have experienced first hand. And I'm fighting hard to stay alive because I will change the world, one brick at a time, to change those negative perceptions of us. Anytime you want to chat @Daisyduke, just tag me hun.

[Appleblossom]

Hi @Daisydukes

Sorry to hear that you have not recieved genuine appropriate responses to normal emotions given your circumstances.  Glad you could post here on the forum.  Hope it helps a tiny bit.  There are some great people floating around this space.

Regards Apple

[Daisydukes]

Thank you all so much for reading me and replying with understanding and your own stories too. I have read them all and feel happy that I’ve found somewhere with like minded people. I told my mother today I had found a forum for BPD and she warned me about listening to people who say “ohh my bpd” and gestured a hug to herself and said some of us use BPD as an excuse to do crappy things but I don’t see that it was appropriate to say because that’s a personality trait anyone could have using blame to shift the focus on themselves and it further stigmatised BPD. It really upset me, this is the exact sort of crap I am loathing over. How we are perceived so damn wrong and anything someone who has bpd does reflects badly on the lot of us because people won’t see us as individuals as I think stated above in a comment.
I wanted to cry as I think my mother is one of the people who I feel doesn’t understand me the most. I didn’t react though, I got a little bit defensive but I didn’t get angry. She apologised but ahh it’s just hurtful

@pheonix_rising @CheerBear @Faith-and-Hope @Sans911 @Appleblossom

[Daisydukes]

@sans11 stay focused on changing the world, I also want to change the world in some way. I want to help the world.

[CheerBear]

Hi @Daisydukes. I'm probably going to be heading out of the forum for the night very soon as I have not had a great day, but I wanted to say that I have read your post and completely agree that what your mother did and said was not ok and would have made me feel hurt and angry also. It sounds like you managed it really well. It's hard work having to manage stuff like that. It would be way easier if people stopped and showed a moment of respect or understanding :S

It's good to see you again and hope to see you around some more. Hope your night is ok for you.

[Faith-and-Hope]

Sending you a proper hug @Daisydukes ..... not for anything other than that the comment was out of line and it hurt you .....

🤗💐💕

Well done you, spitting it out here and then waking on past it ...... one of the great things about Forumland ...... !