Quote:
Originally Posted by piano97
Hi. It does sound like you have some mixed features. I have some of that too. And cycle frequently. If I'm not particularly stable, I can have hypomanic, mild manic, and depressive symptoms all within a week. I've gotten to the point I can predict when it's coming on. And it sounds messed up but I look forward to the 'peak day' when I feel like I'm made of gold and my body has a different vibration. I can't think straight and within a day am thinking my phones probably tapped and the cia, might, be plotting against me, but some of that can be headed off with extra anti-psychotic PRNs and benzo PRNs. But anyway, if I could bottle and patent what that peak day feels like, I could be a millionaire. But I have learned that when I know I'm headed that way, I have to tell friends "in a couple days I'm totally going to stop meds and probably think they might be poison, so pretty much I need you to reality check me, until I say I'm taking them." I did that last time and only missed a couple doses, and had taken PRNs the couple days before so I didn't get as out of whack as I could have.
Anyhow, I did not get a borderline flair from your posts, at all. I know you mean by that, for awhile I kept telling the doctor I thought I might just be axis 2, therefore didn't need meds. He told me, at least 5 times lol, that 'everyone has a little bit of axis2, but I don't see that as being part of what's going on". Then another time he read the dsm to me, in full, on BP2. "If that's not you I really must have missed something, and please tell me".
I'm not really in the most stable place right now, I think it's a seasonal./time change induced thing, but I'm relatively functional compared to some other times in the last year and half. I take a mood stabilizer and antipsychotic (though I'm trying to get off that). I think that is the standard treatment and in general gets good results. Keep working with MD to find the right mix.
And keep talking to other people  |
Everyone has a bit of axis 2 because everyone has a personality.
Seriously, those axes are not mutually exclusive, quite the opposite: it is not at all unlikely that you have "something" on all axes. Any problems/challenges in functioning which aggravate your problems, for example, would have been on axis 4, your GAF score, also functioning, on axis 5, any purely somatic conditions on axis 3.
The DSM-5, however, has done away with these axes—because there is so much overlap between personality disorders and other mental disorders.
They keep the personality disorder categories, but they also provide a dimensional model. Basically, categories make even less sense for personality disorders than for other disorders.
That said, I have no idea whether the underlying causes for any possible personality problems (that's what counts) is like that of people that have mostly borderline traits. But the changes in demeanour (not being due to mania or depression), that wave, and confusion or ambivalence, boredom, might indicate some personality "problems" which could be described as borderline traits. Suppressing these can lead to instability.
But it could be something else altogether or indeed a very normal, very well-adjusted personality. It doesn't really matter much whether it is significant enough to diagnose, if it is a problem.
Having just BP doesn't mean that there are no other problems and if you take meds you're good. Might exist, but I think it's unlikely.
What counts is whether you can deal with it yourself or not.