• 💖 [Donate To Keep MyPTSD Online] 💖 Every contribution, no matter how small, fuels our mission and helps us continue to provide peer-to-peer services. Your generosity keeps us independent and available freely to the world. MyPTSD closes if we can't reach our annual goal.

BPD Border line personality

Status
Not open for further replies.

trying2movefwd

MyPTSD Pro
I've been officially dx'd with BPD,G.A.D,PTSD,MDD severe recurrent. They say this is very common among trauma servivors. Anyone else relate? I think the BPD is the biggest challenge.
 
I've been officially dx'd with BPD,G.A.D,PTSD,MDD severe recurrent. They say this is very common...

I'm not a psychologist, I do have some aquaintances from work that are. That means I get to hear them talk normally about people, without all the professional editing they do with clients.

BPD is a particularly depressing diagnosis to get in my opinion, just because of the way the description of it makes you feel about yourself.

I think they should take the personality disorder part off of it when its a result of trauma, and not just a personality disorder.

People with reactive disorders due to PTSD can recover and out grow some of these things with time and counseling.
 
If I look back my personality issues (caused by trauma) were one of the biggest things keeping me from healing. All the things you mention are treatable and I hope the diagnoses turn out to be helpful for you. Shining a light on what needs healing. Remember too that personality disorder diagnoses are merely a shorthand descriptions of problems we have when relating to others or ourselves.
 
Yeah! I started with Bipolar, added anxiety, ptsd, borderline traits, did, hell, even type 2 narcissism. The list was endless.

Now that I have a better grip on my issues, complex ptsd does a pretty good job of covering the bulk of it.

BPD hurts. But it's complex trauma stuff. Very hard to come through childhood trauma and go on to develop complex ptsd without having some Borderline traits, if not BPD.

The thing about "complex ptsd", rather than the shopping list of diagnoses, is that for me, it explains what caused all this stuff and how it's all related. The anxiety and the depression and the borderline issues are all related to what happened to us as kids, so looking at them as one big inter-related situation is helpful (for me). They didn't develop in isolation to each other, and I can't treat them independently of each other
 
Yeah! I started with Bipolar, added anxiety, ptsd, borderline traits, did, hell, even type 2 na...

It's starting to make more sense to me how different diagnosis/ symptoms are all interrelated. May I ask what your therapy consists of that addresses all at the same time? It seems I would have to find a highly qualified professional .. at the moment cannot afford an expensive one. I mean, I'm sure it was a gradual approach .. I'm still hesitant at the idea of going on medication if that is recommended, but I feel I should be open to it.
 
t seems I would have to find a highly qualified professiona
You know what? Not so much. I've had a bit of a hit and miss mess over the last 7 years, but the truth is that even the ones that weren't trauma-niche experts had something to offer. I'm glad I've done your standard CBT, DBT, mindfulness, ACT...pick your acronym, I've probably tried it. All of that stuff was mostly directed at other mental illnesses, but they've all helped a lot. Medication was unavoidable. And there's been a lot of hospital time for me personally.

Getting help with all those symptoms and thought patterns and the physiology stuff was essential for me. The key is to keep in mind that (for me anyways) all of these issues are coming from a deeper set of issues that need addressing at some point, which is where the trauma-focused therapy steps in.

I think a lot of people would agree that learning to cope with the trauma therapy is as important as the trauma therapy itself, and all those other approaches help you cope. We tend to want to charge in with all guns blazing in a "Let's get this over with" approach, but it too often just doesn't work like that.

If I were to do it all again from scratch, sure, I'd be more active about trying to find a trauma specialist earlier on. But I've pretty much taken whatever therapy has been available to me at the time, and I don't think any of that has been a waste.
 
Great book Living In The Borderlands helped me deal with the diagnosis. It's meant for practitioners but with my kindle's dictionary I did okay.
 
I think BPD has a bad rap that it doesn't deserve and which doesn't reflect that it is usually traumagenic.

I also agree with @Ragdoll Circus that it is impossible at times to separate out the issues at play. Depression, PTSD, in my case dissociation as well, etc all are interrelated. But, solving parts of one help the others, so general therapists can be helpful. Just be careful that they aren't completely ignorant of trauma - I've had some really bad therapy in my day, which makes me nervous to suggest just trusting anyone. That could, however, be my own issues cropping up.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top