shame - possible abuse triggers

this is my first thread in this area. in 1992 i saw my chart for a minute when i was in-hospital for depression after my mother's death. in the chart i was labeled Borderline Personality Disorder. i knew nothing about it. i also saw the words "very needy".

i saw this chart as labelling me in negative ways and my response was a deep feeling of shame and inadequacy. (i was suicidal at the time so i was not thinking straight) i had previous labels as PTSD and after this time was dx as mpd/did which has been something i've been working with for 14 years and it all gets lumped together as i work with my T. so, all that to say this:

i've avoided this one dx like the plague and also the words abandonment issues. i struggled with d.i.d. a lot before i accepted its reality in my life. but i do not want to believe i am BPD. for some reason that seems horrible, shameful-like it means i am a terrible and defective person. i do not even remember who put that dx in my chart, it was no one i worked with for long - i was in-hospital 2 1/2 weeks and miraculously cured (when insurance money ran out) ! there were 3 generations at least of

childhood issues of physical, emotional, sexual and satanic ritual abuse, neglect and just general bad luck all around on both sides of our family! i'm being a bit flippant because my history is so bleak if i write it seriously it feels like i'm doing an "oh poor me" pitch which embarrasses me. at 18, i could no longer cope, became suicidal and was helped for the first time in life by becoming a Christian. that has been the one thing in my life that has remained as beneficial,stablizing and life-affirming.

last night i began reading in this area of pc.com that i've always avoided. i am wondering if any of you who have this problem could steer me to online information or really good books on BPD and anything that i could perhaps get for my spouse. we've been married 28 years and it has been no picnic for either of us and i have a dream of us somehow healing and changing enough to enjoy our older years together in a way we have not been able to enjoy the first years. (when we married i believed i was a virgin with no sexual experience-i blocked completely some horrific things i went through from infancy on), i'll stop there, i dont wish to trigger anyone or offend) so we married idealistically and the day we married i was so scared it is astounding. blocked abuse began to stir more when i had my first baby and fear for her safety began to haunt me without me knowing what i feared, but it was fear she would somehow be accessed and abused like me.

though i've had a horrible bunch of trials i realize that it has made me hard to be married to, some early mistakes my spouse made were misinterpreted by me as him being untrustworthy and for years i did not trust him, which was exaggerated and unfair. so we stayed together and grew apart and we are both suffering and we do not want to be divorced.due to my years of depression, painpill addiction and erratic behavior i have little credibility with my husband, he also doesn't believe mpd/did exists and believes that if i would just get my problems solved it would all be better because he feels he is stable and ok and i am the real problem.

sorry to take so long to get things said. but if anyone has any ideas, suggestions for self-help or ways to talk to my T about factoring BPD in with all the other dx i am "blessed" with , i would appreciate it. i can write matter of factly about all of this, but inside i feel like a horrible failure in many essential areas of life in ways that hurt the people in my family. i do not want them to live forever walking on eggshells. thank you for listening and any responses that may be offered.

leslie

(((((((((((((((( multipixie ))))))))))))))))
Thinking of you

thank you for responding furry paws. i have got so many things going on in my mind and i do not know what to do and i wish someone would answer my post. it feels lonely when only one friend comes to respond to my post. it's been 3 weeks since i last saw T due to holidays and i am just about at the limit of my stability and wish to explode - or rather i may implode. sigh, i hurt. hugs,

I read your post earlier and wasn't in a position to reply, but I intended to. I'm rather scattered lately.

BPD is a scary label. I see it as being in the same class as PTSD and DID, though, because they all have similar origins, and some of the same symptoms. BPD is probably redundant with either of those other diagnoses. They are all a challenge to recover from. You seem to be well on your way, so you have a lot to be proud of.

It is brave to face anything that you have been avoiding. Lots of people avoid BPD because it has such an unpleasant stigma. Nobody has diagnosed me BPD, officially, but it is the dx that I relate to the most, because it really does describe me, even if I'm not the stereotypical BPD client. I think that understanding the symptoms and behaviors that are relevant can be helpful. And you don't have to have BPD to have some of the symptoms. One thing that I have found helpful, because it describes me so well, is a list of characteristics from Marsha Linehan:

1. Emotional vulnerability: A pattern of pervasive difficulties in regulating negative emotions, including high sensitivity to negative emotional stimuli, high emotional intensity, and slow return to emotional baseline, as well as awareness and experience of emotional vulnerability. May include a tendency to blame the social environment for unrealistic expectations and demands.
2. Self-invalidation: Tendency to invalidate or fail to recognize one’s own emotional responses, thoughts, beliefs, and behaviors. Unrealistically high standards and expectations for self. May include intense shame, self-hate, and self-directed anger.
3. Unrelenting crises: Pattern of frequent, stressful, negative environmental events, disruptions, and roadblocks - some caused by the individual’s dysfunctional lifestyle, others by an inadequate social milieu, and many by fate or chance.
4. Inhibited grieving: Tendency to inhibit and overcontrol negative emotional responses, especially those associated with grief and loss, including sadness, anger, guilt, shame, anxiety, and panic.
5. Active passivity: Tendency to passive interpersonal problem-solving style, involving failure to engage actively in solving of own life problems, often together with active attempts to solicit problem solving from others in the environment; learned helplessness, hopelessness.
6. Apparent competence: Tendency for the individual to appear deceptively more competent than she actually is; usually due to failure of competencies to generalize across expected moods, situations, and time, and to failure to display adequate nonverbal cues of emotional distress.

If a lot of these sound like you, then DBT therapy and skills training might be helpful.

Lost in the Mirror, 2nd Edition: An Inside Look at Borderline Personality Disorder by Richard Moskovitz is good book for getting a feel of what BPD is. You will find lots more books either on Amazon or at the public library.

Hi babe, I have lived with bpd for 16 years and I managed to avoid jail or getting killed. I was a really violent, nasty person with a heart of gold. I don't really know where to start with your situation as there are many factors involved but you sound like you need some spiritual time-out for you and your husband. Bpd can be a really nasty, unpredictable disorder, but aren't they all to some degree? It took me along time to find a little peace and I am still growing.

I was also a single mother, hospitalised many times and self-destructed. I was also dx with schizoeffective at that time and dx bipolar last year. Woah, that was a punch in the guts. I wonder if maybe you should explore this dx with more indepth exploration with a psychiatrist perhaps? It may be that things have changed since you were hospitalised and that dx does not stick. It sounds like you have enough to deal with.

I hope I have kind of helped and am willing to explore this with you in greater depth if you wish. Good luck! we are with you

Oh, and I wanted to tell you that I really appreciate it when you share about how spirituality has helped you. It is sad that this community hasn't been very open or encouraging about that, but for a lot of us, that is where we can find real healing.

leslie,

i can't answer your questions, because i have no idea myself. just wanted to show my support and also say that i understand the fear of being labelled BPD. i am scared of being interpreted that way also.

deli

Firstly, let me apologise for my delay in replying - I read your post yesterday but was having an off day and was really moved by your post. I just couldn't face replying at that point.

I am afraid that I have only recently been diagnosed with BPD, so it is all a bit new to me. However, the traits and difficulties associated I have been dealing with since childhood. As no doubt you have too.

The important thing is that you have made such wonderful progress against the other diagnoses that you have been dealt. This is very much to your credit and should give you confidence that if you are BPD you can deal with that too. And I would say that you must remember that you will have been borderline for a long time now, and have made such progress despite this.

I don't see a BPD diagnosis as a slight on your character. People almost seem to think that a personality disorder is almost a lifestyle choice - that the person is to blame for the position they are in. This is simply not true. It is no more voluntary than schizophrenia or DID. As such there is a stigma attached to persons with such a diagnosis. Furthermore people seem more willing to accept other diagnoses rather than be subject to this stigma.

With the very serious events in your life and the very serious repercussions you have had to face I would consider it almost a miracle if you had not developed a personality disorder. But I would try and focus on the fact that if you recognise there is an issue then you can go some way to address - by therapy (such as DBT), by research, or simply by sharing your feelings with the supportive members of this community. In my opinion, this has got to be the first step in trying to create a better life.

Since my diagnosis I have been able to read up a bit and this has better enabled me to recognise traits in myself. I never realised how volatile my mood swings were - it was just how I was. But now I see them I can try and adjust. Whilst this is difficult, indeed impossible with my current skills, I now know the kind of skills I need to develop and can discuss them with the psychiatry team.

I read 'I Hate You - Don't Leave Me' which is quite dated now. But I found it extremely useful. I went through and highlighted every sentence that I found particularly relevent to myself. Then simply looking at how much of the book is coloured in is a very good indicator of how representative the text is of you. I recommend the book highly.

I am sure others have read far more and will be able to point you in better directions. But I was very keen to show that you are not alone and that I, and others, have been deeply touched by your post.

Just try and focus on the fact that, if you are BPD, you have been dealing with it in one way or another for many years - accepting a diagnosis does not change you in the slightest, it merely prepares you to try and combat it.

My very best wishes.

Hear Hear to you babe!!!! You know yourself very well. Kudos to you for such a peaceful and knowledgeable approach to your situation.

thank you all for responding so kindly and generously to me.
((((fuzzybear)))) your hugs are so encouraging!
((((rapunzel))))) thanks for the clinical info. i will go back and re-read it, it sounds on target. like you, the spiritual has been there for me to lean on in many ways. i appreciate you!
((((micah))))thank you for sharing and good suggestions, at some time i may be able email with you - i am not even sure of what questions i have yet, but thanks! ps, i'm glad you managed to avoid those really bad possibilities!!
((((deliquesce)))thank you and hugs for support-it helps!!!
((((ubiquitous manninlev)))) i did order the book you mentioned from amazon and 3 others (can you say curious)! i sort of want to jump into exploration and see what this aspect of my situation may feed into my current work with my T. i want to re-read what you said and think about all of it. now that i have kind of gone over the first big hurdle of my shame/fear response to the idea of having BPD, i'd like to really learn and grow and see if i can deal with this because i really, really see how this aspect of me could be a major part of what is making my husband suffer and be so self-protective. i never was able to see and acknowledge how my bpd affects my family and causes them pain. i've had a lot of my own pain and i've been way focused and me and probably not nearly enough focused on what my issues cost my spouse and daughters.. thank you so much for you input! i would like to approach it as you have. you have been very open and generous in your support! hugs!

i don't like to be overly effusive in my responses but i just have to thank all of you again, really i am so grateful to all of you. your sharing has reassured me and shown me that i don't need to panic over this - just take the time i need and start the process of recovery from it. sincerely,

leslie and her pixies

Hi Leslie!

When I read the beginning of your post I remembered back to the end of my therapy (which lasted maybe a year) and I asked my therapist if I could see my file. I think I asked at a point just out of curiosity, and I laughed at it, mostly because I already pretty much knew before I set foot in her office what she had written down.

My therapy involved repressed memories as well. As I started sharing that with other people in my life that I trusted I came to realize just how common that is.

I see you are a Christian. Without going into the biblical faith aspect of it, you have nothing to be ashamed of. We are who we are..... or were. You can hardly be blamed for not wanting to be abandoned. As far as BPD is concerned, you don't know the inner life of other people, and I dare say that there are many people that have other issues that aren't apparent on the outside.

I recently diagnosed myself with BPD and I actually laughed (I like laughing) at it because it's me to a "T" as I said in another post. I just refuse to let it get me down. I am who I am neurosis and all. *hugs self*

Anyhoo, I probably wasn't any help whatsoever (sorry!), and I am praying for you sis in Christ.

(((((((((((((((( leslie and pixies )))))))))))))))))