A few weeks ago, I was talking with a hypnotherapist about a few things and he told me that all these parts of ourselves that are causing us problems are just unexpressed psychological traits.
“I AGREE!” is what I said to myself, in my head, and thought about the thing that I dealt with for many, many years.
I think it started back when I was 22 years old, when I realized that people are not who they claim they are. In short, some entrepreneur whom, for some reason, I had seen as ethical and honest, finally revealed their lies (probably unintentional). That wasn’t the only thing, but it was one of the many things that happened.
All of a sudden, I realized I was barely capable of getting out of bed and was crying almost every day. That was my emotional breakdown and it lasted for around 9 months.
After that, everything started to drift apart.
I couldn’t enjoy my time around people anymore, I couldn’t trust them, and I was barely functioning. My motivation vanished and the only thing I had left were my passions for writing and personal development, which felt painful to keep alive.
Little by little, every symptom in the book was activated.
I started feeling like I was abandoned by everyone, including my family, and felt like there was nothing left for me in this world.
I was having unstable relationships because I was switching uncontrollably from loving someone to hating the exact same person. One day I was loving them, the next day I was hating them. And the switch was because of what I was seeing in their behavior. But more on that later.
I struggled with identity and had a lot of problems figuring out what it was that I wanted to do and be. I was starting projects and leaving them as soon as they were finished because I wasn’t sure I was the person who was supposed to continue, taking them forward. I was a builder who was living in the shadows of my abandoned projects.
I was impulsive and experienced a lot of emotional instability. On top of that, I was also feeling a lot of anger. I couldn’t help myself and I insulted a lot of people.
And finally, I was suicidal. By the end of this awful experience, which lasted until April this year, I was having daily suicidal thoughts and I also tried a couple of times to end it all. But I’m not going to get into details.
I was so disconnected from it all that I couldn’t take it anymore.
But the 11th of April was the last day of what I call “Dealing with Borderline Personality Disorder”. On the 12th of April, I felt like I was a new person – a very strange feeling.
Until that moment, it felt like I was in the middle of a forest, trying to see a way out, without a chance of understanding which way was the right way. Because of the dense forest, I wasn’t able to see anything and, as soon as I tried to make a step in any direction, all the symptoms listed above were surfacing.
But on the 12th of April, there was no tree anymore. I was still in the middle of the forest but I was able to see. I could look left and right and see where the forest ended and where the mountain began.
That’s right! At this moment, I’m climbing the mountain of rebuilding my life because my life literally got destroyed. No friends, no relationships, no money – almost nothing left, almost everything gone.
In an odd way, I got what I asked for
One of my plans was to end my life this year in March.
I struggled so much on so many aspects of my life that I said to myself, “In case I end up with no money, I’ll end it all”.
It was the 11th of April, I was visiting my mother, and I felt something was happening. I don’t know what it was, but I felt my energy going down tremendously and I knew I had to leave and go back to my place.
30 minutes later, I left my mom’s place and, right after that, I felt like dying. That feeling of emptiness and shallowness lasted the whole day.
I literally felt like that was my last moment alive, without having any intention of getting there.
I don’t know what the fuck happened, but… in an odd way, I got what I asked for. Something in me died. And it was related to all my Borderline Personality Disorder symptoms.
Since then, everything has been going great.
I still struggle with a few things, one of them being the financial aspect of my life.
But I’m waaaaaaaaaaay better from almost every other point of view.
I feel amazing, I don’t doubt myself anymore, I know who I am and what I want, I know my strengths and weaknesses, I trust the path ahead, and I have started to make friends.
And the best part: I haven’t taken any medication to get here. I barely had a few sessions of therapy, the last one being in 2023.
The hypnotherapist I mentioned at the beginning of the conversation had no involvement in this and I met him last month.
If you’re dealing with Borderline Personality Disorder…
First of all, please don’t take any medication. All it does is to dampen your symptoms so you don’t feel them anymore. But the problem is still there. As soon as you stop medication, all the symptoms will resurface. From my point of view, it’s just a waste of money and time.
Second, explore spirituality and meditation.
I truly believe that a big part of my healing was all the exploration I did around spirituality in the past few years. Eventually, I got to a point where I understood who I am beyond my body and identity and that made a lot of difference.
I also got to a point where I can pray without feeling weird about it. And this is not a religious prayer. It’s a prayer connected to my soul, my divine, and my spirit. Give it a try.
And the most important thing that helped is knowing and understanding this:
Borderline Personality Disorder is very similar to Bipolar Disorder. The thing that makes the difference is their trigger. While anything can trigger Bipolar Disorder, only external information can trigger Borderline Personality Disorder.
From my point of view, that means we have to adjust how we look at the world around us, and the triggers are gone. Sure, easy to say, but with enough practice, you can do it.
If I did it, after almost 15 years of struggling with it, you can do it too!
With love and optimism,
David
Photo by Rapha Wilde on Unsplash
