Have you ever been on a
roller coaster? That's pretty much how a person with BPD feels most of
the time. I mean... not literally.
Okay, let me explain
myself. When you suffer BPD, one of its main characteristics is the
mood swings.
You may feel happy right
now. And then something may happen, something that may be a little
upsetting but that other people wouldn't consider 'a big deal', and
BAM! suddenly you're sad, you feel like nothing is worth it or even
suicidal. What happened? That little event, or there wasn't that
little event. Any small trigger or small events can make your mood go
from 0 to 10. The same way, someone may tell you that you were late
and suddenly you're rage is so high that you feel like screaming at
that person or even getting physically violent (or so mad that you
feel like interiorising the pain with yourself).
Right, right. I'm not
saying that ANYTHING would trigger a BPD person's emotions. But BPD
is also referred to as an mood instability disorder, and that's
because people who suffer it have a lot of trouble keeping their
emotions in line and controlling them. Their feelings generally
surpass them.
It doesn't mean that if
they feel mad they will automatically get violent, do not get me
wrong. But if something makes them mad, it will probably infuriate
them. If something hurts them, it may make them sink so down that
they may feel hopeless.
These feelings may not
last longer than hours, because something else will probably happen
and their mood will swing towards something else.
In the same day you can go
from feeling happy, to feeling absolutely hopeless, fury and rage and
then happy again. I remember when I was 18 it was when I became
really self-conscious of these mood-swings and how brutal they were.
Maybe one day I was feeling suicidal and then a few hours later I was
extremely happy and excited about many different things.
I remember telling my
psychiatrist that I thought I was bipolar. I had never heard about
borderline personality disorder at this point. And bipolar was what
sounded the closest to what I felt. She immediately ruled it out when
she asked me what was the longest I was depressed for and I said a
day.
But interesting fact:
Guess what? Many years ago they used to think that BPD was a milder
form of bipolar disorder.
One of the main issues
with this roller coaster is that: you are very unstable and therefore
as a consequence so are your relationships with people. Besides
idealization and devaluation, this emotional instability is one of
the major reasons why BPD people have such a hard time building
long-lasting stable friendships and romantic relationships. A later post will talk about this more in detail.
But it is possible to
become more stable. In my case, medication has helped me get my
emotions more stable. I never thought that I'd aspire to be 'stable',
but since last year that's all I want to be. Lately my emotions have
been all over the place so I guess I need to visit the
psychiatrist...
If you are worried about your mood swings, visit a therapist.
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