How does BPD effect your everyday life?
I just was hoping to hear other people's experiences with BPD and how it effects there everyday life? How does it feel to have BPD? What do you do to cope with the symptoms?
Thanks for sharing!
It's not as exceptionally hard for me as it used to be. I think I can discern when it's a rational thought now from when it's a wrong one, bt I do get the occational bout of intense anger crippling sadness. When that happens I kinda avoid people until I get better. So as not to hurt them.
I'll tell you what BPD does to me...BPD increases the intensity of all my emotions...BPD destroys my friendships and relationships...BPD makes me lonely...BPD will one minute bring me from thrilled and happy to depressed and suicidal, and its not like anything necessarily needs to happen, BPD will also make me explode on friends and family for saying something that someone might consider offensive. It makes me wanna stay away from people so I won't hurt their feelings when I yell at them, or make them feel at fault when I cry from absolutely nothing...BPD makes me look like the bad guy...and I hate to think, maybe I am.
Any advice for dealing with an s.o. with BPD?
Hmm.. just a little taste of my day-to-day BPD life:
from thinking everyone hates me and that I'm an awful person to feeling like I don't exist at all, wondering if I'm even real, just an empty shell floating around especially in high stress/anxiety situations when I dissociate which feels like you're in a dream, slightly above your body and you and your surroundings aren't real
Pushing everyone who you've ever known away from you because you think they're going to hurt you, or you'll hurt them, and switching between loving and hating them so many times they get sick of your rollercoaster ride
Not being able to answer an 'about me' section or questions about yourself because you don't even know who you are and need someone else to tell you.. Changing your religion/sexuality/morals/values/hair color/etc. frequently to 'find yourself'
Being so impulsive that it hurts you and the people around you - I feel bad so I'm going to get drunk and make bad decisions, or gamble/spend all of my money, or eat everything in the house, or take this drug or hurt myself or kill myself because all of these things will somehow make me feel better and more alive than I do right now - especially with the self harm and suicide ideation, thinking negatively about yourself plays a huge part along with the instability of emotions.. like extreme end of the world depression I will never feel better feelings, I'm an awful person who is a burden on everybody and should kill myself so they can have a better life, etc.
Crying uncontrollably and being super offended by everything you see/triggered easily, getting angry over every little thing, not knowing how to control or show your emotions, feeling like you're going to explode from emotion-overdrive and you can't handle the intensity
That's a little taste of what it's like for me, but BPD is sort of like a spectrum disorder so everyone has a different set of symptoms and different severity for each.. I seem to have all of the symptoms at a moderate to severe level.. I heard it gets better as you get older and I'm only (nearly) 21 so still young and still learning how to cope..
Thank you for your response I really appreciated it. I am 21 also and recently diagnosed as bipolar 2 with rapid cycling but I feel like this diagnosis doesn't completely fit with my symptoms my research lead me to BPD so I wanted to see if I could relate to anyone's experiences.
Thank you everyone who has shared so far!
I have Bpd and bipolar 2. They are often linked together so you could have both. Speak to your doctor about it. Good luck.
I relate to you so much it hurts. I am only 22, and most of what you had written applied to my life up to 21, but a lot of it still applies. You have just broken me and I can't write any more. I'll try again later. You're amazing <3 Please, if you ever need to talk, feel free to message me.
@sashurss , I completely understand what you are going through, I was recently diagnosed with BPD and I am fifteen years old and it is hell for me every single day, but I'm not alone. Me & my mother both have very close disorders, I have bpd and she has bipolar disorder I think the second one. But, It is hell every single day with my raging hormones and bpd it doesn't mix, also I take hormones for my diysphoria and all of that adding up is absolute hell. It's like I'm close with everyone one day then suddenly my mind switches to thinking everyone hates me and i'm not worth life or anything like that. It's like what you described an emotional roller coster but everytime my mood falls it feels like im riding in absolutely horrible hell. Sorry i'm not good at describing. But, I wish you the best of luck and I hope you can make it through it because It sucks. This disorder sucks. It is constant torture and all of that so good luck! :)
Well. I suffered bpd a few years ago, and I can tell that bpd affect you in your daily life, because you treat with a lot of people. And that can make that you get an attack of humor swings that can last the rest of the day, that happens to me, and I'm still trying to control it.
This is really great thread. BPD literally ruins my everyday life, especially that symptom "black and white thinking". For example, one person somewhere told something negative about me and I thought after that that everyone hates me. One girl, who's really rational person, told me that it's not everyone, it's only one person. Of course, when I thought that they hated me, I was suicidal and felt really bad, wanted to harm myself and completely isolate from world, my mood suddenly changed. But it's good that I have that one rational friend who's there for me to explain to me my mistakes in thinking. I absolutely adore her. So yeah, this is one example of how BPD affects my everyday life.
@alexlove
Thank you for highlighting an extremely important and harmful aspect of BPD. In Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, the treatment most recommended to BPD patients, one of the skills you learn after safety is established is recognizing dialectics: "Dialectical is a less common variant of the adjective dialectic, which relates to logical argumentation and contradictory forces." This basically states that two things, even opposing, can be true simultaneously thus preventing the behavioral repetition accompanied by extremes in general, and black and white thinking in particular. On the outset, perspective and practice can help a lot in this regard.
I can completely relate to your sharing. <3
I was recently non-diagnosed (the psychiatrist and previous psychiatrist were "pretty sure" but didn't want to commit to a diagnosis) with Borderline and to be honest,this condition sucks. I feel like I'm on an uncontrollable spiral. I feel like I'm unhinged. Everything is surreal. I trust no one, not even myself. I think that's the most crippling aspect of all.
@imaginativeWillow1834
You are not alone. 