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The "causes" of BPD

Personality Disorders Support / by Sweetteaa

July 19th, 2016

...See more *Edited by @blithesun94 for font size at author's request* Hi everyone. I looked around and didn't see a post similar to this, so I hope it hasn't been done before. *Trigger warning for mentions of childhood abuse, violence and rape* I was thinking back to my own diagnosis of BPD and it got me thinking about the information packet I had been given that listed possible "causes" of the disorder. "Personality forms during childhood. it's shaped by both inherited tendencies and environmental factors, or your experiences during childhood. Some factors related to personality development can increase your risk of developing borderline personality disorder. These include: - Hereditary predisposition. You may be at a higher risk if a close family member - a mother, father or sibling - has the disorder. - Childhood abuse. Many people with the disorder report being sexually or physically abused during childhood. -Neglect. Some people with the disorder describe severe deprivation, neglect and abandonment during childhood. Although the causes of BPD is unknown, both environmental and genetic factors are thought to play a role in predisposing patients to BPD symptoms and traits. Studies show that many, but not all individuals with BPD report a history of abuse, neglect, or separation as young children. BPD may result from a combination of individual vulnerability to environmental stress, neglect or abuse as young children and a series of events that trigger the onset of the disorder as young adults. Adults with BPD are also considerably more likely to be the victim of violence, including rape and other crimes. This may result from harmful environments as well as impulsivity and poor judgment in choosing partners and lifestyles.". Personally, I see a lot of myself in this. I was sexually abused as a young child ( a detail I only came to remember around 15 years later during my first inpatient stay), as well as living in an unstable and abusive household until my preteens. My mother and her boyfriend were addicted to meth, causing most of my psychological and emotional needs to rarely be met. When I was between five and six years old, my moms mother passed away and she, in her own terms, "freaked out", dropped me and my siblings off at my grandfather and aunts house and left with her boyfriend to New Jersey while we were all at school, without so much as a note or a phone call for months. I had already struggled with how much my moms decisions had effected my life, learning that this disorder, a thing I struggle with daily, could be linked back to her behaviors, was hard for me to overcome. My mother is thankfully now ten years sober and one of my best friends and sources of support, a fact I am truly beyond words grateful for, but some days I can't help but think, while I know being an addict is never easy, she kind of got to "walk away" from that life so to speak, while I still carry the physical and emotional scars caused by my childhood daily. I would love to hear everyone's opinions on this, whether you relate, how you cope, or anything else you feel like sharing.

Minor meltdown

Personality Disorders Support / by Sweetteaa

June 5th, 2016

...See more Hi everybody. First I want to trigger warn this post for mentions of thoughts of self injury, I didn't act on it but the thoughts I had were extreme. I have two cats, one is six years old and the other just turned one. I never had any problems keeping the older one flea free, when it was just her. I woke up this morning and noticed some flea bites on my legs and I was like damn ok wake up call I'm going to have to pull some money from somewhere and get them to the vet or at least get some medication and collars in the meantime. I just feel so guilty for my babies because these few bites are so hard for me to deal with I can't imagine what it's like for them :( Earlier this evening I was sitting on my couch and all of sudden it was like I felt my entire body covered in fleas. I couldn't see any but I could feel it, it was like every inch of my skin was crawling. I jumped up and started taking off all the covers on my couch and my clothes and my slippers and turning my washer on hot and throwing it all in. While doing this I'm scratching every surface of my skin, I just can't shake that crawling feeling. I go back into my room and put on pajamas but I can't stop scratching my legs and I feel like I'm going to scratch them until they bleed and it feels like that would be a relief. I try to calm down and put some itch relief cream on my legs but that doesn't feel like enough so I also poured rubbing alcohol down them. I get into bed to try to do some breathing exercises but I could still feel them all over me, and my scalp felt like it was infested. I scratch my face and there was an actual flea on it so this starts a new round of panic. I strip my bed and then use more way toner on my face than I normally would. I pace my bathroom debating boiling water to pour on my scalp because that feels like that only solution. But when I went into the kitchen I got so far as to take out the pot before I put it back and instead took my nightly medication. I'll admit to you guys that I took more than I usually do because I really needed to calm down and try to sleep, I was shaking trying to open the pill bottles and all I could think was how nice it would be to get a razor and cut all of my skin off. I was able to sleep for a few hours and now that I'm awake I feel a lot more stable. I haven't lost control like that in a while, in a way that I wasn't able to bring myself back in before it got to that level. I still feel kind of creepy crawly and I'm fighting not to pick at my skin. But I just wanted to be able to tell some people about it that might actually understand. It was a pretty scary moment and has just really encouraged me to find a BPD specializing therapist. thanks for reading xx

Car accident

Trauma Support / by Sweetteaa

December 29th, 2015

...See more Hi all. So like most of us, I've been through a lot of different types of trauma in my life, but right now I want to focus on the thing that's weighing most heavy on me and affecting my life currently. Obviously that thing was a car accident but I need to give a little history about me and cars before I get into. Also apologies if this ends up being a longer post, writing is really therapeutic for me and I've been holding in these feelings for a few weeks at this point. I'm twenty-four (and a half) years old. I didn't get my drivers license until I was twenty-one, failing the written once and the behind the wheel twice. I have anxiety in most aspects of my life and had my first panic attack at sixteen. Being in a car was never something I enjoyed. I deal with intrusive thoughts and vehicle accidents seem to be at the top of that list as far as gruesome, unwanted imagery goes. I grew up in an abusive household and we always had unpredictable cars, being in a car (with no means of escape) was the scariest and maybe that's where this fear comes from. But anyways, I was 21 with my mom trying to teach me to drive and I remember having to pull over on streets I knew like the back of my hand and cry and have her drive home because I couldn't handle it. I even tried low doses of anxiety medication (at the approval of a doctor) and still couldn't manage to over come it. By some miracle I got my license but it was still another three years before I really felt confident driving. There has been so many times in the past three years that I got even slightly lost and had to pull over to cry and remember to breath, or times I had to drive in storms and broke down as soon as I got to my destination because it was too much. At the start of this year, I set up some goals for myself. I wanted to be able to drive to certain locations around me, without panic, without tears. I crossed off the last of these locations this past August when I was able to drive downtown, without even getting lost. I was so proud of myself I even posted a Facebook status about it. I had this car that I loved (I didn't even know it was possible to love a car), that I knew like the back of my hand, that had helped me overcome what had been a giant fear my entire life. Because of this anxiety, I was always a super cautious driver. I'm not going to sit here and say I never speed, or I never made a turn that I quickly realized put me in the wrong way of a one way lane. But I didn't do distracted driving, my speeding was five (ok maybe ten) miles over the limit, I didn't text and drive or talk on the phone, I didn't adjust the radio or the AC while in motion. I did everything "right". And then one night someone decided they had time to make a right turn in front of me, cutting across my lane. They didn't. I hit the other car, causing it to veer off into a ditch while I skidded to the side of the road. I had just enough time to call someone before the panic attack started. While the accident was cited as "minor" the physical pain I felt was not. As of writing this, I have been out of work on doctors orders for about three weeks and still have another four to go while I do physical therapy. The insurance totaled out my car, finding damage to the frame once it got to the shop. The insurance also valued my car at a few hundred under what I owed on it. I had only had it for a year. It was the first vehicle that was truly *mine*, that no one was supposed to be able to take away from me. Until someone did. I know that everything I did, overcoming the anxiety, that was all me, it was something I did that is still inside me, but like I said, who knew it was even so possible to be emotionally attached to a car? Even being passenger in a car, while also painful, causes me anxiety, every turn, every yellow light my heart beats faster. Because know I've learned it really doesn't matter if you do "everything right", someone else can come along and mess all that up. Maybe this doesn't even sound like trauma, but I cry pretty much every day. I missed all the holiday family fun I had been l had been looking forward to all year, I couldn't participate in some traditions and forgot trying to shop. Let alone being out of work all this time, I didn't exactly have the money for Christmas shopping. I feel like so much has been taken from me, I went from working full time and being a full time student (though luckily it's winter break) with a decent social life, to hardly being able to get out of bed. And speaking of being able to get out of bed, I've been struggling with not falling into a depression. I have bipolar disorder as well as BPD, and I can feel the emptiness of depression trying to ..creep up on me for lack of a better description. I'm trying to fight it, trying to find things to look forward to each day, reasons to get out of bed. But with another month before I can even think about returning to work, with no idea when I'll be able to afford a car again, or reassurance of being able to pay for all the medical bills in the mean time, while I really do try so hard to be positive (I'm alive!), sometimes it's harder than it "should be" or I guess than it would be if i wasn't already dealing with these mental illnesses. Anyways, if you read this much, thank you! tl;dr: I had really bad anxiety, got into car accident, life flipped sideways, fighting anxiety and depression. I would really love to talk to anyone who has been in a similar situation or I'm open to any advice. But just thank you for listening. I really needed to get that out there. xx

Questioning your emotions

Personality Disorders Support / by Sweetteaa

February 8th, 2016

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