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Discovering BPD has seriously explained so many things for me. Thankful I've found something that explains the relentless emotional trauma I experience all the fucking time.

#bpd #bpd problems

quietborderlineinfo

Explaining BPD to loved ones.

Well what a difficult subject. And kudos to anyone who is trying or wanting to try to teach their loved ones about BPD. And even more complex quiet BPD. I have always just tried to hide mine and push it under the rug so good for you for not being afraid. Explaing something as complex as Borderline Personality Disorder is not an easy feat. There is so much negative things in the media and posted around the interent. And to make maters worse even the health care system treats people with BPD poorly. However there is a woman and thank God for her who gets it. Her name is Marsha Linehan and she is the founder of DBT. To make this even more comforting she has BPD. She has lots of content around the internet talking about what BPD really is and how to treat it. We need compassion and understanding from our loved ones, not judgement and ridicule!

Quiet borderline is a sub type of BPD that some of us suffer from. Instead of acting out and being loud and destructive like most borderlines are protrayed to be. They tend to keep their emotions and thoughts to themselves. There are many different kinds of BPD and this is just one of them. When trying to explain this to someone it is important to remain patient and calm and if you feel like you are becoming emotionally dis regulated then take a breather and come back to it. People with quiet bpd act inwards instead of outwards. This can be alot harder to notice as well no one knows what’s going on till we tell them. Our emotions are directed inward instead of outwards. In this situation is it our objective, relationship or self respect we want to keep? Its probably achieving our objective while keeping out relationship and self respect. Be gentle and use an easy manner when explaining your symptoms, how they effect you and what it means for your relationship. Setting boundaries is so important. Since you aren’t able to outwardly express how you feel it would be easy for people to not take you serious or be used. You must learn to communicate effectively. Interpersonal Effectiveness can help. Talk about how you aren’t able to share your thoughts and feelings easily and how it feels just to clam up. It’s going to be difficult so make sure you are patient with yourself. Be clear and concise. Perhaps sit the person down and say that you want to talk to them but it will be a big struggle for you so they need to be patient. Start at the beginning describing how you feel and think and how they are able to help you with that. Wether its to ask you if you are really okay even when you appear fine or set up a time of day where you can talk to them about anything on your mind. I know it’s so hard, I struggle with it too but over time it gets easier and you start to feel like you want to share more.

if I can do anything else to help let me know -Ninja

tequilamockingbird2015

Thoughts on Quiet BPD

When asked about BPD, most people who know about this disorder immediately think of the “classic” symptoms: impulsive behaviors and episodes of rage. The same holds true for even mental health professionals.

But rage and impulsivity are only two out of the nine criteria in determining whether someone has BPD. Some people with BPD—myself included—meet the criteria for a diagnosis but do not use these “acting out behaviors.”

So what does it mean to have quiet BPD?

You probably still suffer from extreme mood swings and emotional reactivity, self-harm and suicidal ideation, chronic feelings of emptiness, paranoid ideation, dissociation, a lack of identity, and the intense fear of abandonment we love so very much (disclaimer: we hate it.).

And it may well be that your relationships are stormy as well—even if the other person has no freaking idea how distressing said friendship is to you.

How is that possible? Well, we feel the same things other people with BPD feel: we idealize you and become deeply emotionally attached to you, then suddenly we become emotionally cold and distant toward you over just a minor disappointment, we’re kept awake at night by paranoia that you secretly hate us because you didn’t text us back immediately, we spiral into crushing depression over the littlest things you say and do.

But the difference lies in how we express it.

With “classic” BPD you may tell the other person what you’re feeling. You may accuse the person of lying to you, avoiding you, abandoning you, etc. You may display anger toward the other person or get into arguments. The other person becomes aware of what you’re thinking and feeling. Not so with quiet BPD.

I almost never tell my friends what’s going through my mind unless they ask. I’m too terrified of being a burden to them. I internalize this tempest of dysphoria, letting it fester for weeks and months. I will drop off your radar, distancing myself from you without you even noticing. Unless you reach out to me, you’ll never hear from me again. I’ll isolate myself, forever convinced you hate me and that you’re better off not dealing with my burdensome self… even if there’s no evidence to suggest this. Even if we’ve literally been best friends for years.

You may not notice this shift at all, simply because I don’t express it. The friendship may not be distressing for you, but it’s sure as hell distressing for me. I’ve cycled through so many friendships in this way, in near constant agony as a result—and the vast majority of my friends had no idea.

I’m obsessed over this idea that I’m a burden. That my very existence is an annoyance to everyone, and so I very frequently deny myself the very emotion so often associated with BPD: anger.

I loathe myself so much I feel I don’t have the right to be angry for myself.

Sure, I can feel anger all right. If you slight a friend or family member of mine, I cannot begin to describe the rage that wells up inside me.

But if you insult me? I’ll sink to depression and probably agree with you (this has happened multiple times).

People with different types of BPD respond differently to the same triggers. For some, if they feel you’re going to abandon them or that you don’t care about them, they respond with anger. Others act impulsively in hopes of relieving some of their pain. But I respond by turning inward. I justify these “signs” that everyone in my life hates me—the same signs recognized by people with “classic” BPD—by deciding that if I’m going to be abandoned, well, it’s because I deserve to be. If you do hate me, it’s because I am, in fact, absolute scum. My BPD takes these signs and twists them into reinforcement of my extreme self-loathing. If anything, I’ll be angry with myself.

This translates into “acting in” behaviors that aren’t as obvious as impulsive behaviors. I self-harm and don’t tell a soul about it, I lock myself in my room and cry for hours, I become so emotionally numb I just stare at the wall all day, I’ll sleep for an entire weekend to escape my pain, I’ll even deny myself food because what’s the point of extending my lifespan, especially if I don’t deserve it?

Any kind of BPD sucks, quiet or otherwise. But raising awareness about quiet BPD is crucial: professionals may not realize we have BPD because we don’t fit the “classic” model, and thus we end up spending years misdiagnosed or in treatment that doesn’t address what’s actually going on with us. We could be spared YEARS of additional suffering by getting the correct treatment as soon as possible. So let’s raise awareness, shall we?

theemotionmachine

designing-my-life

How to be happy for others (even if you are a jealous fuck... as I was)

So, that classmate of yours established her business already, and that person younger than you is winning acting prizes, and that barely teen guy is destroying older folks in the sport discipline you admire so much and would do anything to take his place, and 80% of your high school class is somehow getting married, and these people are getting the corporate positions for those amazing brands you wanted to work for yourself. That sucks, right? No.

Get the fuck over yourself and read on!

Why is it good to be happy for others (even if you feel completely jealous)?

1) It’s healthy

Thinking in the way “He has that and I don’t - that sucks!” gets you into a loop, in which you have a few options:

To feel sorry for yourself

To dislike or even hate this person

To feel depressed

All of the above

Etc.

In short, it is not only unproductive, but it also raises your stress levels. Negative comparisons leave us the option to save our face somehow in front of ourselves - we make excuses, we say why we could not do this, we make up external reasons why this person succeeded and we did not, etc.

Thinking positively is healthy thinking. It does not stress us out and it has amazing benefits of pushing us forward and being more productive!

2) It makes you more likeable

I remember time when my old classmate from school told me that he did not think I was happy for another person’s success - that I did not wish them the best. And he was right!

I was belittling the success! It was done discreetly, but it showed.

That was the moment I decided to force myself to be happy for the success of others. Not because of what he said but because his natural excitement for the other person’s success made me like him and respect him very much.

I want to be like that.

After all, we want to be around those that support us. But those people are usually active doers themselves. You have to support them back. Or they will tell you to fuck off and go chill with other happy doers.

3) It opens doors for you!

If you share with others their excitement, their happiness and their success, and genuinely support them, they do not forget that.

Imagine if this person with their initial success ended up turning that little startup into a huge thing, meeting influencers and opinion leaders daily. Do you think they might help you to connect with such people, too, when you are an ass to them in the beginning? Nah, not really.

There is this friend of mine, whom I met after he established his coffee shop. Since I met him, I have been aggressively supporting him. I reached out to a manager of Yelp in my country and try to get her to the shop and bring her yelpers with her. I believe in my friend, his business and future. And I will be there when he succeeds big time, clapping my hands with a look of complete admiration.

4) It makes you a better fucking person and, after all, you live with yourself most of the time…

…so don’t live with a dick, live with someone you would like to meet.

…

To be continued?

This is a part 1 of the article. Tell me if you are interested in my tips and tricks for how to turn this thinking around, and I will write part 2!