Hi asp1079, welcome to Psych Central!
Quote:
Originally Posted by asp1079
As a result of my depression and BPD I more often than not have to 'pre-plan' my emotional reactions... I feel more and more like my displays out emotions and my reactions to things are dull. Flat, lifeless... my smile isn't vibrant enough, my laugh seems too forced, I never laugh at the right time, I can't bring myself to care as much about the little things that make other people react easily - e.g., a funny joke or video. I just stare sometimes at these kinds of things and people become uncomfortable when I don't react in a positive way to something I SHOULD react positively to. Now I'm almost always paranoid people know I'm really empty inside.
Another example: at holidays and at gatherings where you have to socialize, I'll have to literally psych myself up for how I'll react in a 'good' and normal way to giving/receiving gifts and meeting people, since I fear they'll think I'll dull, sad, etc. I really don't know what the fix for this is. I feel very guilty about it.
|
It sounds to me like you're describing strategies that you've come up with for pretending to be "OK" or "normal" or whatever you want to call it. Your strategies do seem to be getting in your way, too, but your real problem seems to be that
- You think you're not OK the way you are, and...
- You think that if you didn't keep pretending to be OK, other people would notice you weren't (and hold it against you). However...
- You also get to worry that if your pretense isn't quite convincing, people will catch on that you're pretending -- and hold that against you, too.
R.D. Laing discusses this sort of thing in
Self and Others. One thing he points out is that it's quite possible to work your way around from being yourself, to pretending to be different from how you really are... to
pretending to be yourself. Pretending to be yourself, it turns out, presents all the same problems as pretending to be anyone else, with none of the benefits of being yourself.
--> If the shoe doesn't fit, please don't wear it. <--
In my experience, the way to get away from pretending is by cultivating mindfulness. By the way DBT, which was first developed as a treatment for BPD, emphasizes mindfulness a lot.