[Happy Camper]

I have an appointment soon and I was wondering how I should bring this up with my pdoc.

I've been hospitalized a few times, though I think the people that suggested that I stay in inpatient got the wrong impression. The 2nd inpatient admission a counselor I had only seen once thought I was manic and sent me to the ER, but no one there saw mania in me. I was admitted anyways because I couldn't guarantee them I wouldn't self harm. I had been under severe stress for a number of weeks and internalized all of it, which lead to some severe roller coaster mood swings and dissociation. I described them as highs and lows and explained to the hospital psychiatrist that they changed very rapidly, in minutes or seconds. I was alternating between dysphoria and intense sadness, followed by a kind of "neurotic enthusiasm" and elation, though I can hardly believe it met the criteria for mania. Still, this doctor refined an earlier bp nos diagnosis into bipolar 1 and said that I was having a mixed episode. From a diagnostic stand point this made zero sense.

At the time I was probably too agreeable, but I was just happy to have an explanation for a lifetime of inconsistency and feeling broken. A history of major depression probably aided the diagnosis.
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Mood swings have never been my primary problem--I have almost no ability to cope with stress and have a tendency to self loath and cling to despair. I've felt a hollowness all of my life, but it's only gotten worse as I get older (19 now).

When I was younger I didn't really know how to describe or make sense of any of it, but I didn't feel that the depression was a random chemical imbalance and didn't see medication as appropriate. The moment I mention suicide everyone assumes I'm severely depressed and need SSRIs, and so I'm used to disappointment everytime I seek treatment because put simply, they just don't get it. They don't seem to understand the underlying issues or that they're chronic, and so they only see the depression or interpret it as a mood disorder. The anti psychotics and mood stabilizers had no effect on me; I still got triggered by things daily and would still fluctuate in and out of suicidal ideation. They also gave me tardive dyskinesia but it went away.

Borderline PD has caught my attention before, but I always overlooked it because the first thing you hear about it is that it's a female problem and places a lot of emphasis on abandonment fears. I've never been in a relationship (lack of interest and confidence) so it's hard to even say if it's relevant to me, but beyond that I fit a a majority of the criteria for this personality disorder. I relate much more to borderlines than I do bipolars (but was scared to admit this to myself for a long time).

With my current pdoc I've mentioned my personality problems but he doesn't seem to register it and brushes me off. I really want to get serious about psychotherapy but I have serious doubts about continuing the trend of miscommunication, incompetence, or possibly even getting stuck with someone who's gender biased or can't overlook the bipolar diagnosis. I've been medicated and counseled since the age of 12 and I really believe that it's only been damaging to me so far. I just hate getting put on edge everyday and not feeling like a person.

What can I do?

[Atypical_Disaster]

I was misdiagnosed with bipolar because of my borderline PD related mood swings. It's gotten sorted out now, but I can really relate to this frustration with being misdiagnosed. I don't have much advice, but I'm sorry you're going through this and I hope you can get it sorted out soon. It's hard to find pdocs that are willing to discuss personality disorders, most of them just don't want to deal with it... borderlines in particular are very challenging to treat and a lot of professionals refuse to see it because they don't want to have to treat someone for that, or alternatively they aren't competent enough to treat borderlines.

I hope you can get the right diagnosis, and the right treatment. You deserve real help.