Firstly, I want to congratulate you on finding this website, because it is an indication that you want to get better. If you didn’t want to you wouldn’t have searched the net for information. I applaud you for taking that step. But this is only the beginning, and I am not going to lie to you, this is going to be the hardest thing you have ever done in your life. Conquering BPD is unfortunately something only you can do, although family and friends can assist in this. I will explain their role later. But for now you need to know that you are alone, which are probably the words you never wanted to hear in your life. No one can fix this except you. And there is no magical cure. You can not take any medication to make it go away, and there are hardly any support groups to help you through. At this point you are probably thinking you don’t have a chance of beating it, but I am here to tell you different. You can beat it, and if you put in enough work, you will beat it.
Your first step to beating BPD is to go away and really think about whether you want to. Whether you are ready to. On the surface every sufferer wants to, because that is the answer they are expected to give. But have you actually thought about what it means to not be ruled by BPD? It means you will no longer have an excuse for being irrational, you can’t run away from your problems, you can’t hurt yourself or anyone else anymore, and you can no longer exclude yourself from the real world. You will have to rejoin it, own up to your mistakes and short comings, and be a functioning member of society. Which is what we all want isn’t it?
BPD sufferers act the way they do because they have never learnt how to control or regulate their emotions. This is what you must now learn to do. Normally we learn these things as a child, but for some reason borderlines don’t. Now this inability to regulate emotions can take different forms in different people, but the underlying condition is the same. Scientists so far do not know if the cause of BPD is genetic, environmental, or a combination of both, but really the reason you have it is of no concern. You have it. Now you have to learn to live with it.
The first thing you must do if you want to achieve recovery, is stop lying to yourself and admit you have a problem that is emotional, and you are not in control. A lot of sufferers do not want to admit this. It does not mean you are weak, or any less of a person than anyone else, it just means that for some reason you did not learn how to control your emotions and your emotional responses. Or it may even be that you are embarrassed by your diagnosis, and wish you had one of the other more accepted mental illnesses. I know for me I wished I had something else, because I didn’t want to admit that my problems came down to emotions. Why couldn’t it be biological or chemical like one of the others. There is not the same stigma in the mental health community with them, as then it is out of your control. But maybe you should be thankful that it is not one of those, because your recovery is in your hands, and you can get better. To some extent, they can not.
From now on you need to get used to questioning yourself at every turn, every decision, every response. Constantly ask yourself, “is this an appropriate response to what is happening”. You need to do this because as a borderline you can’t always trust what you feel, and if you can’t trust what you feel, how can you trust what you think about that feeling?
One thing that you should know, is that you didn’t develop BPD as a teen or in your twenties in response to something, but that you always had it. I know for me this took a while to get my head around, because I thought I was coping ok (not fantastic but not badly) until I had a breakdown when I was 22. Up until this point I was in a relationship, studying, working, and very out going. I broke up with my first partner, and I actually coped with this ok. It wasn’t until I broke up with my second partner not long after this that things went downhill. My breakdown, as I refer to it, signalled the beginning of many hospital stays and suicide attempts that, thankfully, were not successful. I got to the point that I could get myself well for a while, but it always seemed that every two years, no matter what, my medication stopped working and I would end up having another breakdown. I have come to realise that this analysis is not correct, but I will walk you through that later.
I am going to explain things that have happened in my life so that you have practical examples of what I am talking about. I know your life may be completely different to mine, but please read it anyway. You may find that even though the example is not relevant to you, the things I have taken from them could be.
In order to stop BPD from ruling your life, you will need to examine the following areas of your life:
- Your Thinking Pattern - You need to identify the fact that your brain does not think rationally all of the time, and that sometimes it may even seem out of control. I know for me, I could think about a subject for hours at a time, becomming worked up and emotional about it, before I realise I am even thinking about it. You need to be more aware of what your brain is doing, and there are times when you need to tell it to stop. When I catch myself over analysing situations, inside my head I will yell at myself to STOP just so that I can get myself out of that thinking pattern for a minute and have a breather. Then I make the conscious decision to think about something else, listen to some music, or talk to someone, just so that I can distract myself and get some space. Then I can go back and think about what it is I need to analyse, and whether I am over reacting or not, and whether I am being rational.
- Anger and Violence - You need to make the decision now, right this instance, that you will no longer be violent. This doesn't mean that you won't have the thoughts, but it does mean that you will no longer act on those thoughts. You do not have the right to hurt anyone else just because you can't control your emotions. And it does you just as much damage as it does them as you then feel guilty and over analyse and get yourself into a pattern where it will probably occur again because it is all you expect from yourself. Demand more of yourself. Don't use any excuses. You do not hurt the people you love no matter what illness you do or do not have. Take back your own power to control yourself. Only you can do that.
- Spirituality - It is important for the BPD sufferer to work out what their place is in this world and how they feel about it or they will feel they have no reason to live. Spirituality is a vital aspect in finding a reason to live and get better, as we begin to take the focus off ourselves. BPD sufferers are great at making everything about themselves, like children do, but this needs to stop in order to recover. The whole world does not revolve around you, and you can not go through life hurting other people without recourse. I personally have no interest in organised religion, so for me it was more of defining what it is I do believe in. I sort of take a bit from different religions and mould it into what I call “Universalism”, as it places the emphasis on the universe (instead of a God) and our place in it. I believe in karma and being a good person at all times. And probably the most important thing of all, I believe that sometimes bad things just happen, not because I am a bad person, but because random things happen that are out of my control. In fact, I think it is a good thing when bad things happen as they are designed to clear my previous bad karma, and teach me things I still need to learn.
So if you suffer from BPD and you have no spiritual basis, then maybe you should think about getting one. I am not advocating for any sort of religion specifically, but I am advocating that you should figure out what you think about this world. If you are someone who thinks there is no God and no purpose to life, and we are just here to suffer and then we die, then you may struggle with your recovery. We all need something to focus on, something to guide us and take the focus off ourselves. If I am of the opinion that there is nothing after this life, or no reason to it, then am I really going to care about what I do or how I act while I am in it? If finding a spiritual side is something you definitely can’t do, then maybe you should think about the type of person you want to be in this life, and whether you are living up to it.
For me, I grew up with an interest in spirituality, but knew that I didn’t believe in the Christian religion that my family was involved in. I could not reconcile religion with my scientific mind, and so it was something that I always struggled with. I think I felt quite empty without a belief in anything, and I always wondered what the purpose of life was. It wasn’t until I had my first stint in hospital and a friend told me about Buddhism that I started to revisit the idea of spirituality. It has taken me many years to form my own ideas and feel very comfortable with my spiritual self, and I implore others to start on this journey. I think in this world, with the pressures that go with it, it is necessary to know that we are only a small part in a big picture, and there is more than what we see.
My recovery only started when I accepted my place in the world and began to seek out the answers to my spiritual questions. It is only now that I can find inner peace in the fact that I am not alone, that this life is designed to aid in my learning, that I am only given enough tests that the universe thinks I can handle, and that even if I did succeed in suicide, I would have to come back and do it all over again until I learnt my lessons. As I said before, I have come to my own conclusions when it comes to spirituality, and you may not agree with them, but you need to find your own. That is the only way you will begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel
- Self Sabotage - BPD sufferers are great at causing their own downfall, a lot of the time without them even realising they are doing it. Do you constantly argue or accuse your partner of things, and then wonder why they leave? Do you call in sick a lot for work and then wonder why you didn’t get the promotion or might have got the sack? Do you have no money because you don’t have a job, but to be honest you don’t really look hard to find one? Do you keep taking jobs you know you won’t enjoy and then wonder why they never work out for you and why you aren’t as successful as others you know? Do you keep trying different therapists but can’t find one that you "click" with? Have you allowed yourself to develop addictions to drink, drugs or gambling and then complain that there is nothing you can do to stop or no one is helping you? These are all signs that you are using self-sabotage to keep you in the situation you are in.
To stop the behavior that you have been displaying up until this point, you must first recognize that you are doing it. Take the time to honestly look at your life and the different areas in it: your career, your family, your personal relationship, your finances. What areas do you do well in, and where do you do badly? What role do you play in the areas you do badly?
I will use myself as an example here for you. I always complained that I had no money, and that I wasn’t as successful as I thought I would be money-wise or career-wise. When I look at my behavior objectively though, I realize that every time I attempt University (I have had 4 attempts) I sabotage myself by not getting into a routine with my study, so that at the end of the semester I have 10 assignments to hand in and no time to do it in. When I am aware that I am about to fail, instead of fixing it or asking for help I tell myself that it is just a sign that I am not meant to be doing this course so I change my focus to a different career area and convince myself that that is what I am meant to be doing instead. It is something I put myself through all of the time, and then I whine that I am 30 with no long term career. The reality is I have no actual career that I am proud of because I sabotage myself when it comes to completing the necessary study. This isn’t because the study is overly hard – it is more because I am scared of what goes along with having a qualification. If I am successful I will then have no excuse for not being a contributing member of society. People will expect certain things of me, and I will have responsibilities. And that scares the hell out of me.
So what is it that scares you? Why are you sabotaging yourself? Figure out what it is and then you can change it. This will take a long time, but at least you will have a starting point. If you can only think of one thing at the moment, start with that. Once you start fixing that one thing, you will be surprised how it leads to another. Up until this point you have kept yourself in the dark about what it is you are doing that keeps you in this illness. Take back your life by owning up to your own actions.
- Fear of abandonment - this is a dominating issue in the life of a BPD sufferer and can manifest in many different ways. It could be that you are so scared of getting close to someone in case they leave that you avoid relationships with everyone. Or it could be that you are so scared of being alone you go from one relationship to another without taking the time to grieve each relationship in its own right. Or you may be in one relationship, but it varies between love and hate at the smallest thing because you can’t get your head around the fact that your partner loves you and is not going anywhere. How can you trust them to stay when other people in your life haven't? These are all issues you will need to deal with, and you will not be able to have a successful relationship until you do. Remember, you can't judge everyone by one person's actions. Not everyone will leave you if you treat them with the love and respect they deserve.
*I will expand on these over time when I have more time to explain what I mean. If you have any other things to add please feel free to discuss them on the message board.
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