Your story sounds eerily similar to mine. I was depressed and suicidal as a young teenager (though I never ended up in the hospital). I began self harming around 17. I was given the depression diagnosis in my late teens. My fear of abandonment started to cause problems with relationships in my early 20's. Other BPD symptoms started becoming apparent. I ended up in the hospital last year because of suicidal ideation/intent, and I was given the BPD diagnosis.
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Originally Posted by Little Jay
I'd gone from feeling the lowest of suicidal, to questioning why I felt that way and feeling fine a day or so later. Which sounds ridiculous but it's true. I must think they all think I'm a liar because how can someone be so depressed and then feel fine a couple of days later, and the last couple of days I actually felt good (with a load of ups and downs in between).
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This is how I often felt/feel, too. I have a distinct memory of sitting in my bed a couple years ago thinking, "Wanting to commit suicide isn't normal, but these mood swings don't seem like depression... so what's wrong with me?"
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Originally Posted by Little Jay
Plus surely a depressed person should feel really depressed all the time?
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I wondered this, too. I think there can be variation within the depressive episode. You can have good days and you can have bad days, but overall, the trend is low mood or empty or whatever your other depression symptoms might be. Over the past year, I've learned to distinguish between my depression and my BPD symptoms as they come and go.
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Originally Posted by Little Jay
I started to question that I really was just depressed and started looking into it online. Nothing I found seemed to match up to me until I found a page mentioning BPD. It felt like I was just reading about myself!
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I did the same thing (when I was sitting in my bed questioning my mood swings a couple paragraphs above), but I ignored the similarities because the site I was looking at said borderlines are manipulative and I truly didn't see myself as such. When BPD was mentioned to me by the doctor last year, I looked it up in a book and I was astounded by the similarities. Just like you, it felt like much of the book has been written about me.
So, after all of my rambling, what's my point? In your post, I saw many things that could indicate BPD, and I also saw many things that pointed to depression at times. Our experiences are similar and I ended up with the BPD diagnosis, but it's always hard to tell from an internet post and I'm also no psychiatrist.
I would recommend bringing up your doubts to your doctor. I personally wouldn't mention that I had diagnosed myself, but it's certainly relevant to tell him that the meds aren't working and that you are experiencing all these other things that don't seem to fit or be caused by depression.