# Officially diagnosed with BPD, my life is a mess



## Louise McCann (Jul 23, 2017)

I spent 2 weeks in the mental hospital for trying to kill myself after OD-ing on 20-30 pills of different types of prescription meds, with a bottle of wine. It's been a month since I was discharged. 

I am lucky to be alive. Yet so unlucky to be alive.

I am perpetually unhappy and never satisfied with anything. I spend all day at home trying to interact and play with my daughter and the whole night studying or googling random crap. It's 7am here and I can't sleep. My anxiety is back, I worry non-stop about others judging me or how my life is in shambles.

I am a failure. My STBX husband left me 3 weeks after giving birth, I have zero contact with him and no idea where he is. I receive zero child support and have no money for a lawyer. Child support agency is doing nothing about it! 

I am broke, jobless, a single mother to a 9 month old yet still have 2 years to graduate from my pharmacy degree. I might now have to take another year off to focus on my child who is developing slowly and to receive the treatment I need. I feel so pathetic...

I worry about meaningless crap incessantly and always suffer. All I want to do is get high, I miss it. Cannabis, XTC, coke...all of it. But I can't, I am a mum. 

I go back and forth with what I want to do in life. I almost invested all of my savings on Bitcoin, posted an ad for paid sex so I could get rich (never went along with it), toyed with the idea of quitting university to become a make-up artist. Somehow I am still here and haven't done anything stupid. Though I spend my nights awake, crying and anxious.


I am honestly mentally deranged. But I do need to finish this last semester of university before I can take a break. 4 months...I don't know how I'll cope. 

This post was pointless but I did need to vent. I often feel so incredibly lonely so pouring all my feelings and thoughts out does feel therapeutic, albeit anonymously online to a bunch of strangers. Oh well


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## WildMustang (Nov 7, 2017)

Hey Lady,

I don't know much about BPD and I am not qualified to advise you on that, but I can say I am so glad to know you are alive and did not succeed in taking your life. 

I hear what you are saying that you feel unlucky to be alive. But I would have to disagree because life is a precious gift. 

You are not a failure. You are not pathetic. Just because you have those thoughts, doesn't make those thoughts true.

Do you have contact with any of the doctors or counselors from the mental hospital in your area?

Where are you located? I am asking so I can research some resources in your area such as mental health resources, 24/7 suicide hotlines, etc.

You are not all alone in this universe, even though it may feel like it at times.

Hang tough while I try to find qualified help for you.

I will PM you very soon.

Please stay on TAM and let us know how you are doing. 

Lots of people have BPD and go on to live productive lives. Some of them are even on TAM.

There is hope.


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## WildMustang (Nov 7, 2017)

Where are you located - city state and country?

Do you have any family members in your area?

Do you have any friends in your area?

Do you have a church in your area? Even if you don't attend church, most of them are happy to help and/or can direct you to resources that can help your precious daughter and you if they can't (free counseling, food banks, help with bills, help with childcare, etc).

I just now PM you. Please PM me back when you can.

I also sent a PM to fellow TAM member known as "Uptown" to see if he can help as he has a lot of knowledge about BPD and he may be able to advise you better than I can.

Take Care. Know that you have value!

While you may feel lonely, you are not alone!


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## WildMustang (Nov 7, 2017)

@Louise McCann, please post soon to give us info so we can help you.

You are not alone.

Thank you!


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## Uptown (Mar 27, 2010)

Louise McCann said:


> Officially diagnosed with BPD


Louise, I'm sorry to hear that you've been in such terrible emotional pain. Was your diagnosis performed by a psychologist there in Scotland?



> My anxiety is back.


That's not surprising. A recent American study found that 81% of women suffering from full-blown BPD also suffer from a co-occurring anxiety disorder.



> I am a failure.


No, you are a survivor! As @*WildMustang* explains above, feeling like "a failure" does not mean it is true. It is only a feeling. Moreover, if you exhibit full-blown BPD symptoms, you have an amazing level of self awareness. Simply amazing! I've had the good fortune to communicate with nearly a hundred self aware BPDers on several forums. They are so rare, however, that I've never knowingly met one in my private life even though I do know a number of BPDers. 

I mention this to explain why, if you are a BPDer, your chances of doing well in therapy are _dramatically improved_ by your remarkable level of self awareness. The main reason that BPD treatment has such a dismal success rate among high functioning BPDers is that it is rare for any of them to have sufficient self awareness to take advantage of the treatment programs. Nearly all of them (i.e., the 95%) refuse to attend therapy. A HF BPDer is filled with so much self loathing that the last thing she wants to find is one more item to add to the long list of things she hates about herself. 

Further, even when these BPDers attend therapy at the insistence of a spouse, they typically will play mind games with the therapists (as my exW did with six different psychologists in weekly visits for 15 years). It therefore is very very encouraging that you have already overcome what is the biggest impediment to a successful treatment.

You are not out of the woods yet, however. In addition to the self awareness, you also must have the ego strength required to be willing to work hard in therapy for several years (at least) of weekly sessions. If you have strong BPD traits, it is important to find a therapist who is very experienced in treating it (with programs such as DBT and CBT). It is likely that most major cities in the U.K. offer such programs that are targeted to helping BPDers.



> I am honestly mentally deranged.


No, being "deranged" (i.e., "insane") would mean that you've lost touch with _physical_ reality (e.g., believing that the TV news reporter is personally speaking to you). BPDers, however, see _physical _reality just fine. What is distorted is your perception of other peoples' intentions and motivations. 

The human condition -- for all of us -- is that our perception of other people's intentions becomes distorted whenever we experience very intense feelings (e.g., love or hate). Well, BPDers are like this too. But, because they are not very skilled at regulating their own emotions, they experience these intense feelings far more frequently. Hence, BPDers differ from other folks in degree, not in kind.

This means that BPD is not something -- like chickenpox -- that a person either "has" or "doesn't have." Instead, it is a "spectrum" disorder, which means every adult on the planet occasionally exhibits all BPD traits to some degree (albeit at a low level if the person is healthy). At issue, then, is not whether you exhibit BPD traits. Of course you do. We all do. Rather, at issue is whether you exhibit those traits at a strong and persistent level (i.e., your behavior is on the upper end of the BPD spectrum). 

The current theory is that, if you exhibit full-blown BPD behaviors, a combination of heredity and early childhood trauma (real or imagined) caused your emotional development to freeze at the level of a young child. This means that, to be able to better regulate your emotions, it is important to seek therapy to acquire the emotional skills that you had no opportunity to learn in childhood. 

You need to learn, for example, how to do self soothing, how to better regulate all emotions, how to avoid black-white thinking by tolerating strong mixed feelings, how to trust, how to intellectually challenge intense feelings instead of accepting them as self-evident "facts," and how to stay aware of the present instead of escaping through daydreams into the past and future. Absent those skills, you must continue to rely on the primitive ego defenses used by young children: projection, denial, temper tantrums, magical thinking, and black-white thinking. This, at least, is my understanding, Louise.



> This post was pointless but I did need to vent.


Venting can be very helpful. That's why a substantial share of TAM members come here to do exactly that. If you would like to read the shared experiences of some other BPDer TAM members, I suggest you take a look at the thread, *I Mentally Abuse My Husband*. It was posted two years ago by a young woman who, like you, lives in the U.K. She suspected BPD but was undiagnosed. 

Moreover, @*Soulpotato* and @*EllaSuaveterre* share some of their experiences at TAM's *BPD Support Group*. And they share many more experiences in the threads they have started or participated in. If those threads raise any questions, I would be glad to join *WildMustang* in discussing them with you. Take care, Louise.


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## EllaSuaveterre (Oct 2, 2016)

Hello sweets. I don't have much to say that hasn't already been covered. The other posters are right; for rock bottom you're still very self-aware and that's a very good sign that your BPD will respond well to treatment. Have you looked into distress tolerance?


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## Louise McCann (Jul 23, 2017)

I just want to thank everyone for your responses. After starting that thread and writing what I had written, I immediately regretted what I had done for fear of being judged and put down by the folks here. How silly of me, afraid when nobody even knows who I am. 

I feel like the only person who is anxious and has their life in shambles. As though everyone else is perfect and perfectly content. Feeling inferior has become the norm for me. 

It's comforting knowing that there is hope but it is hard to believe it. It's like I am convinced that I will fall under the small minority of people whose symptoms don't improve with treatment. But I know these are just feelings as one of you said, and I won't know unless I try. Gotta have a little faith. 

Gonna check out that BPD thread so that I don't feel all alone. I found out too that my soon to be ex mother-in-law contacted my father a month ago wanting to send my daughter a christmas present, which she never did. The exchange between them didn't really go well. I felt anxious again as she tried to justify my STBX's actions and it made me feel like crap...so without thinking twice I texted her a long essay reminding him of what he did and challenging everything she said. No response.

Silence hurts more than a defensive argument. She doesn't even care about my daughter, she is just pretending. A caring grandmother who hasn't seen her grandchild once ever nor asked about her until recently... sigh. Why do I even care. I am just so hurt by their complete disregard for my daughter.


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## Louise McCann (Jul 23, 2017)

Also that link for the support group didn't work...anyone mind guiding me towards it? I am quite the tech noob not gonna lie xD


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## Louise McCann (Jul 23, 2017)

Here is some background info about me which would help others gain some insight...

I am currently based in Asia but study at university in Scotland. I have already been diagnosed here and can start DBT when I am ready but I am due to continue my 2nd semester in Scotland next month. 

I have not received the appropriate help while I was there, having been suicidal, very anxious and immersed in drugs and yet my pleas for help were not exactly entertained. One nurse failed to follow up, another doctor recommended I read up some online manual and the last doctor prescribed me anti-depressants which did not work. 

My family support me financially and help to look after my daughter. My friends are very young and are themselves struggling with mental health issues and drug use. They possess very strong borderline traits. I do have a couple who are normal whom I see once a while to distract me from my problems.

However, I can only begin DBT when I am able to commit long-term after deferring my studies once I have completed my second semester. I do need to find a way to cope with my intense emotions for the 4 months that I will be overseas so that I do not slip back into the unhealthy pattern of drug use, reckless sex and suicidal thoughts... my ex is in the same city where my university is located so that will trigger some unpleasant feelings as well. 

Any advice or coping mechanisms to help me deal with or be able to control my irrational thoughts and emotions?


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## WildMustang (Nov 7, 2017)

Thank you for updating us!

If it were me, I would begin DBT therapy and any other therapy recommended by professionals helping you, and strongly commit to therapy long term.

When you feel better, you can always resume school.

You would not be quitting school. You would be postponing school. 

It's important for you to take care of YOU so you can take care of that sweet little girl of yours and also yourself.

As far as irrational thoughts, and we all have them, what works for me is to *immediately* question if the thought is true and consider evidence that supports the opposite of those thoughts.

Say for example, you think, "I am a failure." Immediately question that thought: "Wait...is that even true?" and consider, "I am reaching out for help, that's not failing...I am and have been in school trying to better myself, that's not failing...I am doing my best as a Mom, that's not failing...I am in therapy for BPD, that's not failing...etc"

If you can learn how to do this, it will greatly help your negative thoughts turn to positive thoughts and then translate into more positive feelings.

I wish you luck!

Please continue to post on this thread and let us know how you are doing. 

Have you tried PM one of the moderators to help you with the link for the support group that does not work? Righht off the top of my head, 2 mods are @EleGirl and @MattMatt .

Take care, Lady!


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## Uptown (Mar 27, 2010)

Louise McCann said:


> Also that link for the support group didn't work...anyone mind guiding me towards it?


Sorry about that, Louise. Because the link works for me, I suspect that the section *Social Groups* may be restricted to members who have more than 30 posts or have been here for several weeks. 

If it is not restricted to established members, there is another path to it. Follow these links at top of the page: * Tools* / *User CP*. Then click on *Social Groups* on left side of page. Then click on *View All Groups*.


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## Uptown (Mar 27, 2010)

Louise McCann said:


> Any advice or coping mechanisms to help me deal with or be able to control my irrational thoughts and emotions?


Louise, I suggest you read the book, _Borderline Personality Disorder Demystified: An Essential Guide for Understanding and Living with BPD. _It is targeted to folks suffering from BPD. It is the most popular BPD book with the group of BPDers I have communicated with.

Please keep in mind that the fears and thought distortions that you have to deal with are basic conditions that everyone has to deal with occasionally. Your added burden is having to deal with them more frequently and at more intense levels. Dissociation, for example, is something that we all do many times every day to some degree. At a strong and persistent level, it can become a real pain -- as you must know all too well. 

Yet, the DBT program that you mention would be an excellent way to learn how to tame the dissociation. Indeed, "mindfulness" is one of the very first skills taught. It is one of several emotional skills that you had no opportunity to learn in childhood. But you can learn those skills now as soon as you obtain professional guidance on acquiring them. On your own, you can make some progress by simply reading about DBT and CBT techniques. You likely will not get very far, however. Professional guidance is essential when learning many new emotional skills during adulthood.

As I noted earlier, it is _common_ for BPDers to be very smart and to excel in very demanding professions. What is _uncommon_ is for a BPDer -- no matter how smart she is -- to have the high level of self awareness you are exhibiting here. Having that self awareness -- while also having a condition that nearly always makes self awareness impossible for others -- goes far beyond "smart." Indeed, it is so far beyond that nobody yet understands how a tiny portion of BPDers are able to accomplish it. If anyone understood how you're able to pull it off, they would be making a fortune teaching other BPDers how to do it.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

Louise McCann said:


> Also that link for the support group didn't work...anyone mind guiding me towards it? I am quite the tech noob not gonna lie xD


The link works fine. But it's probably not clear what you are looking at when you go to the webpage. TAM allows our users to create their own forums, or social group that someone crated BPD. However it's not even an active group. There are only 4 posts on it and the lasts ones are from 2013 and 2016.


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