I feel like my issues are too complex to recover from

[Deleted member 39476]

I may have missed it, but I haven't read anything in this thread about attachment issues. Does your T...

You don't even have to have a background in attachment theory to understand what went on there, I kind of realized what happened before I even went into therapy when I was filling out the background information. I remember there was a page with very basic questions: "Do you have any siblings, how is your relationship with them? What were your mom and dad like growing up?" etc. The original reason I went in was because I could not for the life of me stop thinking about my ex girlfriend, I remember writing down in the "what were your mom and dad like growing up" something like "My dad was neglectful and didn't pay attention to me or anything else, my mother was crazy, abusive, and left when I was 4" and immediately I drew the connection of exactly why I had so much trouble with this relationship, the cause and effect is incredibly clear there.

I've spent the last year working on internal attachment issues and internal parts in general.

 

[Deleted member 39476]

You've come a LONG ways in the time you've been here. :)

In the beginning, it was very MUCH "exposure...

If I wasn't so out of it all the time I would absolutely do shit like that. I feel the urge to totally lash out at people in real life all the time, I've always either just tried to shut it down or at least be toxic in a non-violent way. Come to think of it I actually have done a lot of really insane things in my past, having extreme overreactions to absolutely non-threatening situations. I only developed self awareness in the last 3 years, before that I was not aware at all that I was overreacting, to me they were just normal reactions to awful situations. If that isn't textbook borderline I don't know what is.

 

[scout86]

Like I said, I'm not in a position to give you a diagnosis. You asked why I said what I did, and the reason is that you seem more stable and more consistent, to me, that what I've come to expect from someone with a Borderline diagnosis. Having "overreactions" to "normal" situations can be part of PTSD too, because it sets you up to perceive a threat faster than is actually necessary. Fear and anger are related, so it makes sense that you'd feel anger. It's just that, to ME, there's a slightly different flavor to the reactions. That's NOT anywhere near as significant as how you score on a diagnostic test, or what are trained therapist comes up with.

 

[mumstheword]

You know I really think you'd benefit from looking at relationship and sexual attraction psychology. It seems to me that your loneliness and craving for female company, attention and care is instrumental in your sense of despair, self esteem, lack of social confidence and self worth which in turn is fuelling your depression, lack of direction, motivation and belief in your own personal power and will.

Labels aside, you are a person, a person who has had significant nurturing needs unmet.

You had a taste of what that nurturing felt like in your relationship and when it ended you were plunged into an emotional flashback of abandonment by your significant female.

I don't care what anyone says I know that abandonment by your primary care-giver at that age, could feel life-threatening and could cause ptsd, which, if untreated in a child, can develop into complex-ptsd.

Damn, back to labels.

I left my 4.5 year old for some months when my long-term abusive relationship drove me out into winter homelessness and a episode of acute stress disorder on top of my c-ptsd.

He doesn't have ptsd but has suffered depression, loads of suicidal ideation, self harm, social withdrawal, panic attacks, tells me "Mum, if it wasn't for you, I'd be a sociopath coz I don't feel empathy". He does display empathy, but I think what he's talking about is dissociation and a sense of emotional isolation and distance. Now I would no way be looking for a BPD diagnosis for my son, but the emotional neglect, vicarious abuse, separation anxiety and sense of abandonment he suffered from that time has definitely affected him adversely for the nearly 8 years since. He also witnessed and was used as a tool of abuse towards me by his father as a small child. He also stays up in his room, on his computer and other devices, with no desire to do anything or see anyone and is in freeze/dissociation mode A LOT.
Please don't minimize the affect of maternal abuse and abandonment on your very young mind or take on anyone else's minimizing of that or making it about some personality defect of yours. It's only a personality disorder if you refuse to own it, refuse to be honest with yourself and others, refuse to examine your cognitive distortions and project your issues on to others. People who can't and won't address their issues develop personality disorders, because they sure as hell weren't born with them.

 

[scout86]

People who can't and won't address their issues develop personality disorders, because they sure as hell weren't born with them.

I think there's some evidence that there IS a genetic component to at least SOME personality disorders, but that doesn't mean it doesn't pay to work on stuff.

 

[mumstheword]

Yes, I agree with that. My ex may be on the Autism spectrum and is dislexic, but it's the childhood neglect, dysfunctional childhood and most importantly choice to be chronically dishonest and unaccountable that got him his disordered personality.

I wonder if IQ plays a part?

Sociopaths and psychopaths are wired differently and are born without empathy or emotional depth, so that's a factor in some personality disorders.

My son has always displayed some traits that could have developed into sociopathy, had I not devoted a huge amount of time and energy addressing his tendencies to manipulate, be physically aggressive, be dishonest and be emotionally cold and distant.

He is his father's son. I have showered him (with the help of my new man) with years of loving boundaries, insistence on honesty, security, respect for him as a person, and massive love, play, communication and ethical frameworks and expectations.

He says to me "Mum I could be a sociopath because I like hurting people and I think about doing it a lot" even as a tiny child he was very aggressive and often violent towards me, but he follows it with "but, I have ethics, my ethics are - don't be a dick, and don't hurt animals or anyone weaker that you."

So even people wired in a way that could be sociopathic can be conditioned to not do bad things to people and to behave ethically and even neurotypical people can be conditioned to develop personality disorders. Either way, catch it early enough, it's treatable.

 

[Deleted member 39476]

You know I really think you'd benefit from looking at relationship and sexual attraction psychology...

I understand how serious it is, in a lot of ways there isn't a lot worse that can happen to a person next to having your relationship with your mother destroyed as a very young child. The line between PTSD and borderline gets super blurry in this kind of context because you can absolutely interpret being extremely sensitive to perceived abandonment as a ptsd response or a borderline response, I think its kind of both. I used to get extremely upset at even the slightest sign that a female didn't like me, overreacting always. Now I don't overreact externally but it still hurts if I even pick up on a hint that someone who is female doesn't like me.

 

[mumstheword]

I understand how serious it is, in a lot of ways there isn't a lot worse that can happen to a person ne...

I think that's absolutely understandable. Even for guys with healthy, long term relationships with their mother suffer rejection fear, and huge hurt and vulnerability when women spurn them or treat them with contempt. I can imagine the risk factor for someone in your shoes, is even further exacerbated to an extreme degree. Without the development of some genuine self-compassion, it's unlikely that you will have the emotional resilience to get out there and meet women and risk that rejection. It will feel life threatening all over again. I really feel for you, I do see your double bind.
On one hand your loneliness and need for female nurturing is just so huge and desperately painful but taking that step to get those needs met feels life threatening.

 

[Deleted member 39476]

I think that's absolutely understandable. Even for guys with healthy, long term relationships with...

It's more than that, if I were to actually get a girlfriend right now it would immediately become a codependent relationship which is not something I want. The internal effect it horrible though in the same way, my need for love in general is so bad, but I am so afraid, I can't show myself love.

 

[joeylittle]

I feel the urge to totally lash out at people in real life all the time, I've always either just tried to shut it down or at least be toxic in a non-violent way. Come to think of it I actually have done a lot of really insane things in my past, having extreme overreactions to absolutely non-threatening situations. I only developed self awareness in the last 3 years, before that I was not aware at all that I was overreacting, to me they were just normal reactions to awful situations. If that isn't textbook borderline I don't know what is.

So, when you were a teenager you didn't have the ability to regulate your emotional response.

Now that you've developed self awareness, you feel the feelings, but you understand that you need to shut them down - at least try and shut them down, somehow. And you are successful in re-directing them, often.

That's the textbook definition of not-meeting-PD criteria.

Remember, everyone has a personality, and sometimes, major aspects of those personalities are problems for the individual, or for the people around them. A personality disorder needs to demonstrate an enduring pattern, over time. That pattern needs to be markedly different from cultural norms and expectations. It needs to be pervasive and inflexible. Finally, it needs to lead to distress or impairment.

You barely have the 'over time', when we take into account the frame of having really poor impulse control as a teenage male. A few years after that, you developed what you call self-awareness (makes sense to me). It's exactly that self-awareness that demonstrates you are attempting - and succeeding - at conforming to cultural norms. All by itself, that is a real big one, and is probably why you'd not really profile correctly for a personality disorder.

We can also add, re: BPD specifically, that your emotional dysregulation is not pervasive and inflexible; you have, in fact, gone to great lengths to describe how you regulate yourself.

You are experiencing distress.

The qualities of a personality disorder - the pattern that is demonstrated, listed above: those qualities are all essential to a contemporary diagnosis of a personality disorder. You are likely only looking at the other area, where there are two of four criteria.

Self-diagnosis. Doesn't work. It's not a checklist. There are paradigms, fundamentals that lie underneath the criteria - and those are the things that take more years of study and/or experience.

Now, your therapist knows you. And they are (I'm assuming) qualified to diagnose (as in, have the proper amount of training, right license, experience, etc). So if your therapist tells you you have a PD, then they are right, and I am wrong. I might think your therapist is wrong, based on what you've said here.

Your assumption that you are textbook borderline is certainly wrong. You show more potential as an emerging narcissist, but only time would tell. Thing is, you've tempered your responses here with acknowledgements that you are reading and listening, even if you are disagreeing. So while your attitudes may be inflexible, your behavior still demonstrates some attempt to flex.

Just my observations.

 

[Sideways]

If I wasn't so out of it all the time

And this? Right here? Is a classic example of fitting your situation to a symptom or diagnosis. It should be happening the other way round.

A key aspect to BPD is that emotional explosions are met with dysregulated behaviour. That’s a central part of BPD.

Dysregulated emotions? Seem to be the exact opposite of the pathology you’ve described about yourself, which is far more at the ‘complete inertia’ end of the spectrum, well well away from emotional dysregulation.

Everyone can snap pushed far enough. The fact that you often feel like you ‘snap’ internally? Is nothing like the presentation of BPD.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

I explode internally really badly, I'm just too disorganized to explode externally to a significant extent unless I am in an actual danger situation.

That's not BPD at all. BPD is, basically, disregulated emotions. So it is all emptions felt at their most extreme possible. It is not possible to not have external explosions when not regulated. It just isn't. Those emotions come out whether you like it or not usually at the most minor things. Like being told it's raining outside. When the tv is a tad too loud. When someone says something that just slightly annoys you. The PTSD stress cup explanation is good here too as all of those emotions are in that cup (and for me, as is PTSD) and one slight change in that streas and bam. It is insanity. Also, manipulation comes along with it. I have been known to cut, take pictures of my cuts, and text them to people saying "look what you made me do". PTSD and BPD also compund each other. Making the other worse. For me anyway.

DBT is the therapy for BPD (and for me medication) but my point is that it is a good therapy for just the adverage joe that needs a bit of help. It is a good therapy so I would recommend going through it anyway and I am not about dignosing or non-dignosing people but that isn't BPD at all. If you have not had a formal dignosis then stop now and stop trying to self dignosis. I get you want answers but you can be barking up the wrong tree and spend a ton of time going in the wrong direction. DBT is part of CBT but CBT is more about challenging and changing distorted thinking and this thread is full of distorted thinking so in my humble non-therapist opinion, you should spend time with CBT.

(I'm pretty sure @lostforgottensoul will forgive me for saying this, but if you go back and read some of her posts when she first joined the forum, I think you'll see what I mean.)

LOL! No forgiving necessary! I call myself a crazed lunitic back then as well!