There was a period for about 3 years where I tried to kill myself regularly and was hospitalized multiple times. A psychiatrist once told me he thought I was borderline, which was the first time I heard of the disorder.

I have read A LOT about BPD, and all these years later, I'm still not 100% sure I have it or not. Sometimes I think I do, other times not so much. I haven't tried to kill myself in over three years, and when I was, it was mostly a resistance to a major life change at a young age (death of a parent + rejection from my family for being depressed and smoking pot to cope).

These days, I have some symptoms of BPD, but I can't tell if they are just appropiate experiences/feelings for the context I'm in, or if I actually have a disorder. It depends on what's going on. But I don't have 'episodes' as frequently as I used to. Maybe once every couple of months I'll get really down for a few days, but not to the point where I think about killing myself anymore. It's just not an option these days.

Either way, I've gotten a lot better at managing my own emotions and finding healthier ways to cope, rather than try to end my life. Whether it's BPD or not doesn't matter to me anymore. I'm alive. And I never thought it would be possible that I would see this day in my life today.

*Interestingly, I lost the desire to kill myself once I stopped taking the medications that the psychiatrist who called me 'borderline' prescribed me. I also had a therapist at that time who was really ****ing rude and said I had A.D.D. Me, a top-performing college student, of all people. So I took a state IQ test and met with neurologists who said 'no, you don't have A.D.D.'. I fired him a week later, and stopped taking the pills from my psychiatrist, and have been a lot better since.