Borderline Personality Disorder…. where do I even start? If I were alone at these times and didn’t have my partner of 5 years and my new companion Jersey, I’d be hooped.
The thing about BPD is that you often feel more than you think. It’s as though you have a gaping hole in your heart and it takes a very special connection with a person and/or animal to fill it. It feels like nobody could possibly understand the level of loneliness and uncertainty you feel each day. I often say; I can feed off of everyone’s energy around me and it can make or break my mood, but my emptiness came from my belief that nobody I loved could possibly understand or reciprocate my feelings.
I am very lucky to have such a strong support system in my life because when I don’t, I want to die. It doesn’t come from a place of wanting anything from anyone but from a place of abandonment and neglect. In these moments I feel like anyone who loves me is absent and especially when I’m misunderstood, I feel like they’re just going to leave me and never turn back. The difference between most other personality disorders and mine is that I have a crippling fear of abandonment as well as an intense uncertainty of who I am and what my purpose is. It feels selfish to have these feelings but because of my childhood trauma, I have little trust left to give anyone. Not even myself.
If you’re reading this and my words resonate with you, please remember to get up and do something. Anything. The more time you spend alone or on social media, the less you’ll know about yourself. Pick up a book, or a pen or ball. Take your passions and interests seriously and distract yourself with those things each time your mania begins. You are loved but you’ll only feel that love if you love yourself first.
