If you google BPD or personality disorders, you will find plenty of research on facts and figures, statistics and dictionary definitions but not how it affects people individually and the effects that it can have on day to day life. Of course, at the end of the day its personal, its how it personally makes people feel, how it impacts your life and how you feel because of it!
Some wonderful people have come forward to explain how it impacts them so please take a look!
*Susanna:
“How it affects me? Constantly fearing that ill be abandoned is a huge pain…if someone went an entire day without smiling at me, i’d be in agony thinking why they hate me…and of course I can’t ask them if they hate me bcuz then…they’d hate me more!
So then its just waiting for them to show me some kind of love…and waiting is hard…I won’t be able to function and go about my day.”
*Nicole-Eloise:
“Borderline Personality Disorder has the capability to ruin every aspect of my life. Because I used to be so impulsive, I ended up having a drinking problem. I’ve lost so many friends, and almost every relationship I have been in has been unhealthy. Due to me being aware of all of this, over the last year I have isolated myself- I rarely see my friends, and I refuse to even consider forming any kind of intimate relationship. Hopefully, BPD won’t cause me to be alone for my whole life.”
*Unlunacy:
“BPD mainly affects me in my interpersonal relationships with people – things like having abandonment anxiety, lots of mood changes throughout the day, causing strain in my relationships, ‘splitting’ on people (I go from loving them to hating them within a minute if they do something minor). It’s also just difficult to believe in yourself, since BPD is considered a severe mental illness and a lifelong condition, sometimes it seems like there’s no way out. As for daily, I find it difficult to see a grey area in anything. If something mildly bad happens to me, I completely overreact and think it’s the end of the world. Likewise if something good happens, I’ll downplay it in my brain until it seems worthless. It causes me to dissociate because my brain won’t let me stop thinking about trauma and everything bad, so it shuts down completely instead. I have a lot of panic attacks because of my future and my anxiety surrounding my friends and boyfriend leaving me. It makes me paranoid and scared that people hate me or think I’m crazy. It’s really tough to try and fight against stigma of an illness which is causing stigma for itself naturally. Society isn’t ready to accept illnesses which are ‘scary’ or cause ‘un-natural behaviour’ and there’s a long way to go for people to be convinced that it’s the persons brain that is like that, not the person. There’s nothing wrong with my personality. Everyone has a good and bad side to their personality, i just find it more difficult than most to control my ‘bad’ side. Then again, I guess you could argue that it’s not a bad side in some aspects, and that people are just too sensitive to different types of personalities and people in general”
*Kimberley:
“I guess the biggest thing since being diagnosed is being aware of it. So now it’s almost like every decision I make I have to second guess to make sure it’s my true self and not BPD. But I also have anxiety and Depression. I sort through multiple thoughts at a time that don’t feel like my own essentially.”
*@meandmymhmatters:
“BPD effects me in many ways but it is the constant second guessing of whether I am overreacting or not to a situation that I find the worst. It also makes me constantly analyse myself and my relationships with others as I worry whether I am being a burden to them.”
*@originalmuse1 :
“Bpd makes me not trust my own feelings. I never know what im really feeling. I obsess over people or things. I have huge gaps in my memory which upsets me.”
*@ALTP2018:
“Yep, I have BPD. I find the worst thing is the mood swings. Never knowing if you’ll be up tomorrow or down or how you’ll feel in a few hours. The TINIEST thing can send me down or the opposite & make me manic. It’s really exhausting & I can be up and down several times in 1 day.That and the constant fear of abandonment both consciously & unconsciously. Being little miss perfect in every way but then collapsing because it’s impossible to please everyone. Underlying anxiety about this has also caused obsessive & compulsive behaviors & lack of identity.”
*Malan:
“Borderline Personality Disorder. It’s the fine line between succeeding or failing, or even both. It’s that impulsive urge to live in the moment, don’t mind the consequences. It makes total sense at any given moment. It’s instructive yet destructive. The colours of the spectrum disappear. Life is Black and White. It’s the only only thing I’ll ever know.”
strongertogether 