BPDRecovery.com: Forums

Hi all. I am a 37 yr. old divorced female with 2 sons-12 and 13 who live with their father, due to my illness. I love them very much and miss them. I see them-at this point-maybe 3 or 4 times a yr. I can not hold down a job, I have a boyfriend of 6 yrs. who one day I think hung the moon and the next I believe he is abusive. He kicked me out due to losing my last job and I had to move in with my father whom I love, but we have a very rocky history(my childhood was a nightmare) and one day he is so wonderful and the next he is argumentative and I do the black and white defense thing with him as well.

I want to get better. For myself and my kids. I am ashamed of my life and the instability-esspecially when it comes to how my sons see me. I never have money for entertaining them, etc. I have really low self esteem right now and I know I have to help myself anyway I can-I can't afford therapy-I do not have health insurance. I am on a wait for a sliding scale counselor at the local University here.

I hope to learn as much as I can and make some strides.

Thanks for reading.

S.

From poster-Fashionista71_by the way guys...I forgot to say that I have been dx'ed for many yrs. now-but due to other practicioners dx'ing me bi-polar I never got help. It was always in the back of my mind that the Borderline dx was right-but I didn't want to face it.

I can relate to the push-pull undertones of your post. Being here on this board has helped me to recognize some of the twisted thinking behind my behaviors as well as ways to untwist those thoughts and emotions. There is a Tool box on the upper left side of your screen that I encourage you to explore; much useful information is there.

I'm glad to see you 'facing' your illness, that's a big part of recovery, IMO. I can relate to your low self-esteem feelings too. I am finding that area to get much healthier as an unexpected consequence of the recovery process in other areas or in general, for me.

Anyway, welcome. I hope you can have a good look around and feel comfortable here.

Dear fashionista,

you write that you feel ashamed over your life, your illness and yourself. I can relate to that. But I'm trying to change the way I'm thinking about myself.

I wish you didn't feel ashamed! Because it's not your fault that you're not well. I don't think anyone in this community chose BPD (who on earth would?:)). I also think that shame prevents change, because it makes you think you don't deserve any better.

We mess things up because that's what BPD does. And we can try our best to take responsibility for the consequences and working on getting better. But I sometimes forget to take responsibility for myself, not blaming and punishing myself for my illness. I try to think inversely - what would I think and do if it was my best friend having this problem? That helps me being kinder to myself.

So - many words for saying this: try not to be ashamed and don't forget to be kind to yourself, like you would be to a loved relative or friend. I do hope you're feeling better soon, and get the help you deserve! Take care!

(My mother-tongue is not English, but Swedish - oddest language ever invented except perhaps Finnish - so I apologise if I'm expressing myself in a clumsy way. But if my English is bad, I totally blame my dictionary!

Hi Fashionista

I'm new here and just read your post. I so relate to the 180 degree reversals in feeling you have for your partner. I ADORE my man much of the time, am annoyed with him lots, and too frequently hate him. It's horrible for me and even worse for him, but thankfully he's amazingly loving and forgiving and now deals with it by telling himself it's not me it's my condition that's talking.

On a side note - I feel very uncomfortable with how often I use the word "hate". I think it's a very BPD trait of mine to use it inappropriately. What I find strange though is that when I try to find a more appropriate word to describe what I'm feeling I can't find a word that I feel accurately describes my feeling. I think that's something I'm going to work on here too. It's such a reflection of my black and white/all or nothing thinking.

Mermaid - I loved how you expressed yourself and I can't believe English isn't your native language. I second everything you said to Fashionista about being gentle with herself.

Thanks for being here folks