My Struggles with Self Therapy

Yesterday I posted about how I use self help therapy to help with the symptoms of my BPD. It's been a very long 2 year struggle and I'm guessing I have many years of the same to look forward to. This is literally the hardest thing I've ever done. But it's also one of the most rewarding. When I started this, I was on the verge of losing everything I loved. I was miserable and crazy and in turn, I was making every one around me miserable and crazy. But now I lead a semi-normal life. I have a semi-normal marriage. And I even feel semi-normal! For someone with BPD, that's a big achievement!

But it almost didn't happen. The problem with self therapy is the fact that I'm doing this alone. I have no one to support me when I'm struggling, encourage me when I feel like giving up, or celebrate when I hit a milestone. It's just me. The hardest part was getting started. Knowing what was ahead of me made me put it off. And once I finally did start, I ended up sabotaging myself and almost quit.

Like I said before, the book I chose was The Angry Heart by Joseph Santoro. When I got it, I spent two days reading it from cover to cover. As I read through it, I kept alternating between feelings of discouragement and encouragement. I mean, I could actually see myself following the book and getting better. But one of the things it stressed was the need to drag up old childhood memories and work through my feelings about them. To be quite honest, that scared the crap out of me. So I set it aside for a couple weeks.When I picked it up again, I read that I would need a notebook with different sections to use as a journal. So in an effort to put it off a little longer, I opted to make a journal from scratch instead of buying one. Although it really was just an attempt at procrastination, today I'm glad I made it myself. I look at it as a reflection of me. It contains my whole life inside and out.

It was hard at first. I don't know if it's my OCPD or the BPD, but one of them makes me a stickler for rules. I tried to do everything the book said word for word, but I kept worrying that I wasn't doing it right. Was I going too fast? Too slow? Was I doing the exercises correctly? How was I supposed to know when I was ready to move on? There were things I wanted to write in my journal, things in my early adult life that I thought were important, but each section was for specific thoughts or exercises and there wasn't a section for what I wanted to write. So I held it in. Plus I was scared that my husband would read it, so I refused to write the truly awful memories of my childhood (I did this for him. He has a good relationship with my family and I was afraid that would change if he knew the worst of it). I was making improvements, but they were tiny because my fear was holding me back. Then one day I decided there was no point in even trying if I couldn't give it my full effort. I knew I had to either do something to make it work or I had to quit. So I made it work.

I got a lock box to keep my journal private. I really don't think John would have read it, but I had to be sure.
I decided since it was my therapy, I would make the rules. On the front page of my journal I wrote:

"This is my journal. This is my story. I can write whatever I want in it. I'm not going to get into trouble. Nobody will be mad. I will take my time and work at my own pace. I will trust in myself to know when to move on. I can and will do whatever it takes to make myself better"

It may seem silly, but it worked. To me, writing that in my journal made it feel like a rule. It was a rule that gave me permission to do what I needed to do in order to keep going forward. And it was a lot easier once I stopped struggling against myself..

Although I'm proud of how far I've come, I still wish I could attend regular therapy. I wish I could go to group therapy and see with my own eyes that I'm not alone in this struggle. I wish I could go to one on one therapy and be able to open up to someone that could help me. I wish I could get some sort of medication to help regulate the ups and downs. For now that's not possible. But that might change when I move back home. Oh, I wish, I wish!

Personal Responsibility

I get annoyed with people that use BPD as an excuse for their behavior. I know it has a huge effect on our emotions and thoughts, but that doesn't mean we have to let BPD control our emotions and thoughts.

I lived for years using BPD as an excuse for my actions.
"It's not my fault."
"I can't help it."
"Don't blame me."
I let BPD rule my life. I let it make my decisions. I let it control my thoughts and emotions. I didn't even try to change because why should I have to change something that isn't my fault? I did whatever I wanted and then expected people to understand that it was the BPD, not me. Heck, I even expected people to feel sorry for me. And when I finally tried to get therapy and realized that there wasn't any in my area, I gave up. I used that lack of therapy as an excuse to keep acting out.

While writing this, the same words keep running through my mind: weak, irresponsible and selfish. Giving BPD so much control over my life made me weak. Using it as an excuse made me irresponsible. And giving up on finding treatment made me selfish. I never even thought about how this was affecting my husband and my family.

It was by pure chance that I found out about a therapy option most wouldn't even consider for treating borderline personality disorder. Self Help. My first reaction was ridicule. I mean, how the hell could a self help book treat something like BPD? From what I read, it takes years of intense therapy and even that doesn't work for everyone.

But then I took a look at my life. My marriage was a wreck. My arms still had scabs from my latest self harm episode. I had no friends because I drove them all away. I had almost been kicked out of the house because of my last suicide attempt. My emotions were raging out of control and because of that, my behavior was driving away everyone I cared about. I realized that if I didn't figure out a way to control my symptoms, I was going to lose everything. I realized that even though it wasn't my fault that I have BPD, it's still my responsibility to figure out a way to treat it. So even though I didn't put much stock in a self help book actually working, I decided I should at least try it. Besides, it couldn't possibly make my life any worse.


The book I chose was The Angry Heart by Joseph Santoro. After some initial troubles (which I'll write about in later post), I stopped holding myself back. I dug into my past, relived painful memories, and wrote it all down in a special journal. I took an honest look at my current life and implemented the changes needed to make it better. I started with the exercises and repeated them many many times. I worked at my own pace and it was slow-going. But it was working. My head didn't feel as crazy. My marriage was stronger than ever. I stopped self harming and attempting suicide. I even made a few friends. And all thanks to a ridiculous book I thought would be a waste of money.

I took responsibility over my life and my life got better. Although BPD still has a big impact on my thoughts and emotions, I no longer blame it for my behavior. Taking personal responsibility for my actions has made me work even harder at getting better.

This is something every borderline needs to do. Whether we use traditional therapy or self help, we still need to start accepting responsibility for our own actions.

Can a Borderline have a long distance relationship?

I have to leave, to go back home. My Dad is really sick and I'm pretty sure he won't live another year. My step-mom is treating him like crap. He said he fell down a couple times and she made him lay there for an hour each time before helping him up. And even though he has trouble moving, she won't help him with anything. So I need to go home and take care of him.

But home is 2000 miles away and my husband can't join me for 5 - 6 months. Can we survive that long? Can I survive that long?

I have so many fears about leaving. Will he cheat on me? Will he talk bad about me? Will he realize he's better off without me? Will he decide not to follow me? So many worries...

John's not happy about it anyways. But he says he doesn't have the right to ask me to stay because he would do the same thing for his parents. Heck! We did do the same thing for his parents. We were just supposed to visit his parents in North Carolina for a couple weeks and then move up to my hometown in South Dakota. But then John's Dad hurt his back. So we stayed to take care of him. Then John got walking pneumonia. Then he had to get 2 teeth pulled and by then we had no money to move. So we stayed here....for over 3 years.

Although I wanted to leave immediately when my Dad told me how bad it is, I've put off leaving until the beginning of September. We have a week-long vacation to Pigeon Forge planned for the end of August. I figure that will give us some one-on-one time before I leave.

I hate this, but I have to go.

I would hate to be normal!

I've had a bad couple of weeks. Actually, I've had a bad month. I've only been manic twice in the last month. And even then it was only for a couple days. I hate it. If I'm not manic, I'm just blah! I don't want to do anything but watch tv and overeat. I make plans and to-do lists and then cast them aside. I have no energy. No drive. Nothing!

So how do normal people do it? How do the mentally sound get through each day without feeling the intense drive that mania gives? How do they live life without that manic "I can do anything" feeling. Or do they have that same drive and that same feeling just in lower non-manic doses? I don't know. And I don't want to find out!

All I know is when I think about it, I feel sorry for my husband because he doesn't get to feel these intense happy feelings. But then I'm jealous that he doesn't have to feel the sad, mad, empty feelings that comes when the mania is gone.

I wish I could just be manic all the time.

Bad bad Mothers Day

I really thought I could handle Mothers Day this year. I was fine last year and the year before, so why would this year be any different? Well, last year and the year before that, I celebrated Mothers Day by planting flowers for each of my kids. To me it was sort of healing. My kids aren't here for me to protect and nurture, so I spend all summer protecting and nurturing the flowers I plant for them on Mothers Day.

This year it rained. It rained all day long.

I was fine when I woke up. I knew how the day was going to go. I planned on working on the computer for a bit. Then showering. Then I was going to plant my flowers. I had only been online for about 1/2 an hour when my husband came in the room with "that look" on his face. You know, the one that says "Please don't shoot the messenger". When he told me it was raining, I didn't react. I felt nothing. But then I went back online and when I saw the page for my support group, I broke down and started sobbing uncontrollably. The pain was unbelievable. I felt so broken.

I don't know how long I cried, it felt like forever. When I was done, I posted on my support group and then clicked out. I spent the rest of the day going through photos of my kids, pictures I never look at because it hurts so much. I literally beat myself up with memories, sort of an internal self harming. Throughout the day I tried to visit my support group online, but every time I did, it would trigger a sobbing session (I guess I know a little about triggers after all).

Monday was a little better, but I still wasn't "happy". Today I'm still a little down. I don't feel like talking to anyone, so I'm hiding out in my rooms. My normal daily activities hold no appeal. Facebook, Squidoo, Sidetick. I'm not really wanting to do any of it. I hope this feeling passes soon.

BPD, Self Harm and Triggering

Like most Borderlines, I self harmed in the form of cutting for a good chunk of my life. I'd say I probably started around the age of 12 or 13 and I didn't stop until I was 29. The first time I cut, I did it because it was cool. All my friends saw what I had done and I swear their view of me went up a notch after that. I continued to cut every once in a while, but not too often because it hurt like the dickens!

Then came the day when my horrible temper showed itself. Like always, I was out of control, screaming, throwing stuff, punching the wall. Even after all this time, I can still remember how mixed up I felt inside, how badly I needed to explode. I don't know what made me think of it, but I got out my razor and I started cutting. It was the first time I had ever cut without feeling pain. Instead, all I felt was exhausted relief. That day, and for the next 17 years, I would use cutting as a form of anger control. 

Now you're probably wondering why I took the time to tell all that. I did it to explain why I cut. I've seen so many instances where a Borderline reads or hears about someone cutting and that triggers them into doing the same thing. It's like they go crazy with the need to self harm. But I don't understand why. The only thing that's ever triggered a cutting episode for me is feeling that extreme anger and not wanting to explode. For me, it's never been about "feeling the pain" because I don't feel pain, just relief. I think if I actually felt the pain, I would have never cut again. So anyways, the whole point of this post was that I really don't understand triggers. So if someone wants to explain it to me, that would be awesome!

Online BPD Support Groups

In the three years I've been online, I've joined quite a few online support groups. Some were just for BPD and some were for a broader range of problems. I always ended up quitting because it seemed like I was never able to post about the things I needed to post about. For instance, if I was having a bad day and felt like cutting, I couldn't post anything asking for help because it might trigger someone else. How stupid is that? While I understand about not wanting to trigger anyone, what's the point in being part of a support group if I can't get support when I need it the most? 

Recently Facebook made it so that groups can be either closed or secret. With this change came the creation of two (that I know of) BPD support groups. I joined the first one and spent the next couple days in awe. Everyone was so open about everything. We were all asking questions and finding out that we all have pretty much the same symptoms. I found out that I'm seriously not alone in this. That support group quickly became my leaning post. 

But after a while, people started arguing. Feelings were getting hurt and people were leaving the group. To be honest, I expected this to happen. After all, you can't gather 200 emotionally unstable people in one room and expect everything to be fine. But after seeing this happen every single day, I finally couldn't take it anymore, so I joined the second group (who I heard was much calmer). Thankfully, they were. Everyone was super nice and supportive. I very quickly became close friends with a few. 

Then a couple of us started seeing a trend in the posts. Certain people were posting all day every day about wanting to hurt themselves or kill themselves. Now personally, I ignore those posts. I know that's not very supportive of me, but I wouldn't know how to help them anyways. Besides, it was getting really annoying (and triggering for some) to constantly see a steady stream on s/h posts. And when one of the group members voiced her concern about it, she got attacked. So now there's arguing in both groups. 

A little before that happened, a couple of us struck out and started our own group. There's only 8 or 9 of us, but we like it like that. This is a different type of support group. It's a place we can go and be around other Borderlines, but we don't really talk much about BPD. We mostly talk about other aspects of our life. It's so nice to be around other Borderlines, but not focus on BPD. This group has been a life saver for me.

In the past couple of days, both groups have calmed down again. For now things are peaceful and I plan on sticking with all three of them. If you have Borderline Personality Disorder and you would be interested in joining one of the Facebook groups (they're better than I make them sound. I promise), friend me on Facebook with a message about joining so I'll know to add you.