I agree with you to an extent. I was diagnosed with BPD and no one even bothered to tell me. I was in a mandatory 24 hour hold after an episode and the Dr who saw me wrote on my report that he was diagnosing me with BPD (after speaking with me for only 30 or so minutes) and sent the report with me without discussing it. I was adopted and had neglectful adoptive parents as well as having been molested by a family member as a child. A lot of trauma to work through.

After leaving there I began seeing a psychiatrist and he (as well as my therapist at the time) felt that women especially are commonly over diagnosed with BPD and they felt it was Complex-PTSD.

To be honest, I don't even know what it is, if it's one or the other. Like you, the idea of really having BPD scares me. I could deal with the C-PTSD diagnosis but with BPD (when my now ex and I both realized it was a possibility) turned into an excuse for me to act a certain way. After some EMDR and DBT things got better (until somewhat recently) and now all the old symptoms have returned including panic attacks.

I really like what you said about a bad year not being BPD. I have a feeling different forms of PTSD is often misdiagnosed as BPD - the symptoms are very similar and more often than not it sounds like people have dealt with some serious trauma.