Hey retro_chic,

Yes, I have those too. I think this comes from early attachment issues, as you are experiencing your early relational feelings and schemas with your therapist now. A lot of times, this represents the inability to 'process' anger. You experience being angry with your therapist from a child's perspective, but it gets absorbed back into you like the original projections of your mother. People often refer to this as "turning anger against yourself".

My therapist acted like yours when I asked him questions about my diagnosis. I ended up letting it go, but I did want to hear his perspective about it...However, I've been searching for answers for most of my life, and I have come to the conclusion that it doesn't matter much what your diagnosis is. A personality disorder just means you had developmental trauma. Not too many people fit into the exact boxes of those diagnoses, as they largely point to specific behavioral expressions of inner states. We're just so different in how we express ourselves.

Diagnosis isn't that important for psychiatry either as you'll be treated for symptoms--sleep, depression, anxiety regardless of your 'official' diagnosis. People take stimulants, antipsychotics, and mood stabilizers for depression; whatever works. I know there are psychiatry manuals that recommend certain medications for certain conditions, but since one person can get 5 different diagnosis from 5 different psychiatrists, and everyone reacts differently to medications regardless of diagnosis, it still ends up being trail and error. And for example, say you have borderline, which is sure to cause anxiety. Anxiety leads to insomnia, lack of sleep leads to 'biological depression'. Being in a state of anxiety all the time leads to hormone imbalance, health problems, which leads again to 'biological depression'. Or take for example, someone with a grief depression. Having temporary depression leads to lower self-confidence, which can spiral to affecting sense of self, thus becoming 'emotional depression'. They are overlapping, not binary. Many people experience temporary depression from grief, then they are put on medications for depression when they would have been better off waiting it out. That's different...but largely, there is not much science behind it. I think it's silly to categorize biological vs emotional. I've had long talks with a psychiatrist about this, and they just can't be distinguished like people would like to think.

It can be interesting reading about all the diagnoses, for sure, but that's about the extent to which I think they are useful. From a psychoanalytic perspective, they are are treated just about the same anyway.

I think it will be all good. You're young enough to be able to shape your future. Even if you feel anxious and depressed, being in this therapy will provide the opportunity for you to set the path of your life rather than being driven by unconscious motives, influences, or drives. You'll be able to make decisions that are non-destructive. Making your unconscious conscious prevents self-sabotage and lets you choose relationships for the right reasons rather than for the wrong reasons. Or for the avoidant, lets you choose to be in one to begin with. I know for sure that I'd have a much, much better life had I done therapy sooner. Of course people who do therapy young won't really know what choices they would have made; how their life would have ended up had they not been in therapy.

Feeling your feelings makes a big difference in managing behaviors. You'll likely get to the point where you feel safer with relationships and more content with yourself. All these things lead to a better life, which has an effect on depression and anxiety.

Sometimes it helps to lower your expectations. Therapy isn't a cure by far. Also, I don't think resolving depression necessarily leads to doing and feeling better. I actually think it's the other way around-doing leads to feeling better which leads to depression remission. Therapy can help you with the doing part, which will ultimately help with depression. It's the tiny, marginal changes that add up over time. It takes a lot of patience, too.