Grey Area

I guess the easiest way to tell my story is to split it into two sections: Before Therapy and After/During Therapy. It would make the most sense to go from beginning to end, but I think splitting it is the easiest for me. It made sense while I was taking a shower so I'm going to make it make sense here. This post is mostly the grey area/transition between the two.

Therapy was never an option I had for myself. Suicide was my option. Therapy was something suggested/told to me by a friend who I had met just a month before, this past new years. In my family, or at least in my mind of what my family is like, doctors and medicine and therapy and all of that is never something that's immediately thought of. It's never, "Oh, I feel really sick and I have a pain in my stomach, I should call a doctor and get it checked." Instead, it's more like, "Oh, I feel really sick and I have a pain in my stomach, but mom will get upset if I stay home from school and I probably just need to take a short nap or something and eat soup. I'll be back up and running in no time!" So naturally to me, it took him some persuading to get me into therapy.

In fact, the police were even involved in the process. One night, I just went "alright, I'm done here." I texted everyone I cared about and just said something close to, "Thank you for being a part of my life, goodbye." Then I tried to strangle myself with a belt (which by the way, won't work, it'll only make you sort of dizzy and have all the blood in your head feel like it's pushing out toward your skin). Anyway, the friend called the cops and he told me he was going to, so I ran out and got in my car and drove to a lake I used to live by. I walked all the way down a sidewalk that you can't get to with a car and sat in a park that was in the direct middle of the lake. It was around 9:30 at night so no one else was there and it was dark and cold. By that time everyone was calling or texting me and I guess they had some bonding moments with each other trying to get my address or something. Long story short, I went home because my dad was mad at me since the cops wouldn't leave until I got back.

Now this next part might piss you off or cause you to lose faith in America's police department proceedures, but try to think of it on their terms. They came up to me when I arrived and asked how I was. I told them I was fine because in all honesty I had alread changed my mind about dying, at least for that night. They asked if I needed any phone numbers to call, (which by the way, the national suicide prevention help hotline or whatever is  1-800-273-8255) and I told them yes I had that number. Also, at that moment, my mom pulled up and came rushing over acting all freaked out or something. (My parents are divorced and I live with my dad) Then I reassured the police I was okay, and they left.

My mom gave me a hug and whatever and I pushed her away and just said something like, "I have this under control. I'm going to see a therapist give me the insurance info. Go home."

Mostly after that night it's a blur. It did take me a couple weeks to find a therapist I was happy with, and one that would take my insurance. And I did give up on it plenty of times feeling either falsely content or just fed up with the process and the time it was taking.

But here I am now. My first therapy visit led me to almost immediately being diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder. She asked if I knew what it was and I said I had heard of it. She asked my opinion on it, and I told her I didn't have one. She gave me some obscure description that was like a metaphor or some incripted message or something. I actually learned about it by going home that day and reading the entire wikipedia article. It was scary. I actually felt scared, and that's pretty abnormal for me.

It wasn't a wake up call or anything, since I knew something was obviously wrong with me if everything in my house was a weapon to use against myself, but it was definitely a "wow". I don't know how to describe it simply. Basically for me, I went home and got on the computer and typed in what she'd said, Borderline Personality Disorder. The wikipedia page was the first hit on Google, so I clicked there. It probably took me five minutes to read the whole thing, and I mean I READ it, I did not skim it. I guess it could maybe be compared to finding someone in the world that is exactly like you, and you're stuck in amazement, because I understood everything that article says, and still says (I often read it to try to understand my feelings and rationalize them). It was like I was reading a description of MYSELF. My COMPLETE self. (Aside from excessive drug and alcohol usage, I will clarify now)

I didn't like it. I was upset. That told me basically everything was wrong with me. I texted some people, asked what they thought about it. They either didn't know and I had to explain it, which I butchered and just ended up saying nevermind about, or they just thought it was a common thing. That got me thinking it was like one of those disorders that's just considered...an excuse? How people don't take ADD/ADHD seriously in children because children are "naturally" like that.

I didn't want an excuse. I'm not the type of person to use excuses for ANYTHING. I don't even want to draw any real attention to myself. But this was nuts. This disorder wasn't anything serious, nooo this was just one of those weird ones that everyone has the symptoms for.

While maybe it's true that the symptoms seem common, it's to the extent that they are occuring or even the strength in which they are occuring that draws the urgency to the disorder. This is not an excuse. This is making my life hell. Life is unnecessarily and unfairly hard, and it doesn't have to be that way.

There's one thing I would just like to say before I move on in my other posts to my personal experiences and my opinions and etc. It's that, out of pretty much I guess all the personality disorders (I forget where I read/heard this from), this is the only curable one.

You can get past this.

(Even for me, this is still unbelievable because I still feel like shit, but hey, "facts" are "facts".)

Late Beginnings

Hey, what's up. Call me Bear. I should probably explain myself first off. I'm a young person. I don't have a degree or any formal teachings of this or any disorder, or even of any counseling or therapy or psychological services. I took a Psych 101 class once in High School, and I have access to the internet, myself, and my therapist. All my opinions, views, "advice", and descriptions are based on my knowledge from these places. Take what I write with a grain of salt because it's not going to always be 100% accurate or even anything good to say, and it may or may not relate to your personal situations, or other people's situations that you are trying to understand.

With saying that, while I don't have a copy of the DSM IV, I've read the descriptions of Borderline Personality Disorder from it on the internet, and it almost fits me to a T. Interpretations and experiences will be what makes the difference there, please understand.

Also, I only started therapy like what, two months ago maybe? And before that time I had no idea that anything was really even wrong with me. So I guess even though I'm experienced in the fact that I have had the symptoms for a long time, I am still learning about it and myself. This won't be a solution or a manual about how to live with it and move on, because I'm still neck deep in the shit that is BPD and I'm just beginning to climb back out. See this as a journey or something cliche.

This post is just a disclaimer and an introduction, for now. I'll try to write weekly posts but who knows, it may not stay that way. I'll likely end up posting whenever I feel up to it.

If you have BPD or even Bipolar Disorder, which is similar but not the same, feel free to contact me and we can talk over email or Skype or something. Something I have been told and am still even in the process of fathoming is that I am not alone. And if I'm not alone, neither are you.