Thats an interesting question. And I could answer it in so many different ways.
Its been a long time since I have defined myself as a borderline, an adoptee, an anything really. For a while now, I have sorta just accepted some semblance of me and described myself as that. But there are parts of me I suppose that may never really go away.
I read about Borderline Personality Disorder and realize that even if per say, I don’t qualify for the diagnosis, what it feels like to be a borderline will never be far from my mind. I will never forget what it felt like for me. Hell still feels sometimes. (although I feel like I need to put a side note here, that I have recovered from having to feel a lot of these things anymore, I am a lucky one)
It feels like being lost.
It feels like not belonging in your own body, in your own skin. Sometimes its even hard to feel like you really do exist, that this body you live in exists, and that it is somehow connected to you and to the actions that you put it through.
It feels like sometimes pain is the only way to make you FEEL like you exsist again. Of course I am not talking mental pain, no that is something that is felt on such a deep level, you have to close it off just to remain somewhat functional. No physical pain, physical pain is the connection to the reality of everything. Without it, sometimes you can get compleatly lost in the non-reality of the disconnection you feel.
It feels like your mind is disconnected from everything sometimes, like you can’t quite get a grip on anything because there is just no way to grasp it, instead it just slips through your fingers just when you think you might get ahold of it.
It feels as though other people don’t really exsist once they are gone. As soon as they walk out the door, or hell even just go to bed in another room, it feels like they don’t exist anymore. Of course somewhere in that rational mind you know they still exist! But you can’t feel them any more. Like a light switch that just gets shut off, every feeling you have, every feeling they give you, dissapears as soon as they do. As if every essance of there very being is gone until you see them again. And when its that one person, the one that is the center of your world at that moment, Sometimes the pain of just missing someone is so unbelievable, its like the inner parts of your soul will just come apart until you can just know that they exsist once again. So sometimes you pretend they are there, just so you won’t have to feel what it feels like when they aren’t. And of course, there is that rational brain telling you that you are nuts… and just deal with it. But the longing is still there, no matter how many times you try to rationalize your way through it, the longing is still there. The missing is still there.
It feels like lonelyness… because once you are alone, you are ALONE. You can’t feel those who love you, you can’t feel their love towards you. After they are gone, its like they don’t love you anymore. After all, if they are gone, how can their love remain. Lonelyness is so central, so inside the core, it feels as though you practically are the only person who exsists in the world, and yet that existance is so fragile, so unreal, that the lonelyness becomes your exsistance, and soon it feels as if the whole world has gone. And without others, your own exsistance fades, hence herein comes the physical pain, as said before, physical pain can become the only tie you have to actual exsistance.
It feels like dark… dark dark dark. Like all the light in the world was just somehow sucked out. All the energy and all the hope, just gone, sucked away to destinations unknown. Only sometimes then there is light, LIGHT! So damn bright it almost blinds you. Your eyes… your body are unaccustomed to so much light and it practiacally blinds you. Happy is just as stong an emotion as sad, only even more scary. Because I never quite knew what to do with that light… and before you know it, snap, its gone.
It feels like being compleatly out of control. Anger, rage, at NOTHING sometimes. But there is no hope in controlling that anger, none at all. Let it out, and it is distructive, violent, dangerous. Keep it in and it makes the darkness even darker, until finally everything just goes black…
or RED
And watch out for red… because when RED comes there is no help. When there is red, there is no rational, only rage, uncontrollable, uncomprehensible, inexplainable, rage.
It feels like death, like death of your soul, death of your mind. And you can’t get death OUT of your mind. Can’t walk by a window without wondering what would happen if you jumped out. Can’t look at your own wrists without knowing how simple it should be. Can’t stop obsessing about how or when or if it would work. Cant look at a bottle of pills without seeing death first.
It feels like black and white, and nothing in between… well except maybe red. But everything, everyone, every place good or bad. And every moment the black and white changes. Good self, bad self, good mother, bad mother. And somehow the ability to keep the good and the bad compleatly separate. You can love someone you hate, and hate someone you love. But never at the same time. You either love them, or hate them. But that can change in an instant. Borderlines can love someone abusive… and be okay with it.
It feels like confusion, like never knowing the answer to a question. Even one as simple as whats your favorite color? What IS my favorite color? Is it black, I’m wearing black today I think I like black. But Purple is nice too, but wait maybe I like blue… do I like blue?
It feels like insanity, because through it all Borderlines are just intelligent normal people… with some kind of messed up brain sequence. We know we are messed up, but don’t know how to make it stop. Don’t know how to just BE NORMAL. Don’t know how to just be ourselves. Have no off button… have no on button. Have no button that turns the black and white into gray. Have no button that makes it easier when someone walks away. Have nothing like that. But do have an intense need to be loved… which proves difficult for others to do. Which in turn makes our lives more difficult too. It feels like insanity because you just can’t understand what the hell is wrong with you. Why you can’t make sense of anything or anyone. Why people look at you funny and ask you what the hell is wrong with you. It feels like a complete lack of understanding and place in the world.
Because it feels like being able to function completely normally while no one around you has a clue.
No one around you knows the war you fight within.
I totally get what you mean about not knowing people exist once they leave the room (or the house) –I completely experience that, especially with close family members. Its scary to step back and realize it and admit it, but its true.
Yeah it is NOT a nice feeling.
I am lucky, very lucky, through a good therapist I have recovered from having to deal with a lot of the feelings I describe above. I don’t feel that way anymore, but the memory of what it felt like is never far from my mind.
Jessie,
I’m wondering, has the way you feel when you are alone changed since your therapeutic work? In other words, your identity at times when you are alone….
Nicole
Yes, my feelings when alone have changed a lot since I have been in Therapy. My identity when alone has changed as well, I don’t feel LOST anymore, like I need other people just to define who I am. I still have a sense of self, even when I am not with other people.
Therapy helped this, as well as meeting my bio parents. Particularly my Bdad. When I first met him, I saw him only on weekends (still the case now, even tho we live together, he’s a truck driver) and I literally felt like a piece of myself was torn out every time I had to leave. Or later, every time he would leave for the week. It was really hard, and I HATED how much I MISSED him. I knew it wasn’t healthy. I don’t know how, I guess just because despite the fact that he left, and despite that fact that we fought sometimes, his love NEVER changed. I had never really experienced that before. Even with my aparents, they would get mad and my mother would say she didn’t want to look at me, or she didn’t like me right now. With my Bdad, that never changed, he always loved me, he always liked me. And he was always the same when he came back. So eventually I just learned how to deal I suppose, and those feelings faded, and I learned how to feel his love even when he was gone.
Thanks Jessie, its good to hear about your progress.
I’m working on this now in my own life.
Hi Jessie,
Thanks for this post & I am glad that you have recovered from most of borderline symptoms. I am a self dignosed borderline. and though the feelings suck, I still feel better when I can define and lable all this mess that I feel deep inside. Sometimes I wonder, if I will ever recover! for the past few years, I have been supressing my feelings and I was living my life pretending that everything is ok and all is well. Then suddenly out of nowhere, I went through a very difficult situation where all my fears and pain from the past were triggired, only then I realised that I did not recover, I was simply trying to push the bad memories and pretend that it never happened. I can say that it was a bad choice. But I didn’t know what else I was able to do. Now I am back to one, starting from scratch and it feels like hell, seriously.
Moreover, I wonder if you have ever experienced the out of sight out of mind? in every relationship, even if it is not that intimate, I experience the out of sight out of mind. After a month or three months maximum of not seeing that particular person or not visiting that particular place, the memories related to the place and people vanish from my mind. and if by any chance I see that person again or he/she was mentioned, I feel sick. I feel that knot in my stomach even of that person did not do anything to hurt me. For example, I used to work in a place for one year before I decided to leave. no issues came up I just found a better opportunity. Later on, I just cut contact with my ex-coworkers, although my relationship with them until I left was great. They tried to call me but I just kept ignoring their calls and emails. every memory related to that place makes me feel very sick. deep inside the thought of losing their respect crosses my mind every now and then. I feel that although I was nice to them and they to me, I could have still avoided getting very close to them. I feel that I got too close that I am not respected enough and they discovered a lot of my weankesses. one of the co-workers, who was the closest to me and we were very good friends called me one day. I was very rude to him and talked in a very formal manner. I felt that I had to rebuild the respect which I thought I have lost…I know it might not make sense, and I apologize for the very long post, but I am new to interacting with people who feel what I am feeling or who have been through what I am going through and it feels great to know that I finally belong, for the first time in my life….
Hollow soul,
I feel aweful that I didn’t post a response to this sooner. Its been a long time since I have blogged regularly and I sorta go away from it sometimes. I hope you are able to read this.
I am glad that my words can help though. I remember one of the greatest tools of my recovery was a friend of mine who was also a borderline. We could talk about all the ‘crazy’ things and it helped so much just knowing I WASNT the only one. You aren’t either.
I have issues staying in contact with people period, I am only now just getting better at it. But even at that, I have a hard time. I understand what you are saying because even if I run into someone in the grocery store that I know, I avoid them at all costs, simply because I just DONT want to talk to them or have to start a conversation, or even worse, try to remember things when they are someone I only know vaugly.
I have spent so long avoiding getting close to anyone for fear that once they get to know me at all, they will just run for the hills! And memories for me are a joke. You talk about things practically vanishing from your mind. I have done that a lot, although I like to think I am getting better. But before, just an example, a friend of mine and I were close, and I went to his grandfathers house with him several times. He left for four years when he joined the army. He came back, and went to his grandfathers house with his new wife, and he brought me back a fern and handed it to me. I knew it meant something because he told me he had something special for me. And I could tell he was anticipating a reaction when he handed it to me. But I couldn’t, for the life of me, understand why he was giving it to me.
He must have been able to tell by the look on my face, because he said, remember when we went to my grandpas, and you wanted something to remember it by, so you took home a fern, but in the car ride home it spilled over and the dirt got everywhere and made a huge mess in your car, and then it died and you were so upset, well I brought you another one.
I didn’t remember. It was one of the sweetest gestures anyone had done for me. He remembered that for four years and thought enough to go get me one, and I didn’t remember at all.
So yeah, pain… out of site, out of mind, I get that.
I read through all that and smiled to myself at last some one has put it in words, I have been called self obsessed selfish a lier anything that has happened in my life I can’t relate to people as I am not even convinced myself it happened to me, even though it did.
I have no idea who I am, I am now 48 in fact 49 this year I found my Birth mother but she does not remember my birth fathers name so that piece of the puzzle may never be solved all I know is his first name and his profession at the time.
I battle inside each day, I question my motives I cant communicate with people on a normal level, one thing I do is talk to much I am way to honest, I went through some years ago self harm as I was diagnosed with mental illness and was treated as such with heavy medication ignoring the one reason I was unwell wich was a large lump growing inside me that lead to an operation that nearly killed me, so I got off the medication and noticed I was free, my birth parents have left me with a bone disorder two in fact one is known as in my spine being out of shape, the other unknown where the rest of my bones are gradually changing shape, I cant say anything to my doctor as they wont listen, why because I cant relate it correctly, so life is do what I can do when I can do it and that could be gardening, that leaves tiredness via the pain it causes, but in my mind it is living, and I have to live.
When I do relate people think I am looking for sympathy, when I get sympathy I recoil, I just want understanding sympathy is not a useful reaction it helps no one.
I could go on for a long time telling everyone how I life each day with different emotions changing sometimes by the second, but I can see you all know that, one thing I am lucky about is I have a patient and understanding friend who lives with me So I don’t live alone, but I know I cant be easy to live with.
Only 2 days ago after a online bully episode aimed at me that near destroyed me, did I sit back and start asking why people can’t see the real me, I answered that before I came here, because I cant find the real me and I dont think I ever will.
I just want to be able to accept and then to control some behaviour, one thing I dont beleave in is wasting my life, and now I am wasting it.
wow, thanks for writing and having the courage to write. i’m sitting here for the first of my life realizing and accepting that i have BPD. i just got sober after over 20 yrs of drug and alcohol abuse. that was nine months ago and many memories have come rushing back, feelings of joy, and sadness for wasting so much time trying to hide my true emotions. but after being sober for a few months and having a nice time being that way, the feelings of fear, abandonment, paranoia, loneliness, and anger have returned. i’ve always been convinced substance abuse is my biggest and only real problem, but tonight i’m coming to terms with some truth that’s overwhelming and strangely comforting at the same time. i am borderline… there i said it. i was adopted in 1970 and have always known i was suffering from some sort of abandonment issue, but all the reading i’ve done today about bpd makes it very clear that it’s been a part of my life forever. everything i read fit, not just a few but all! it’s a relief to be aware. i’ve always had erratic behavior and was the ‘craziest dude around’ and the most intense and most drunk and sometimes fun???’, but after a while that badge tends to wear thin and all i’m left with is feeling crazy and alone. i’ve never had a successful relationship in my life, which is sad because i’m married to a great lady who loves me alot, but i’m just not able to get over all my tendancies and issues to return the love. i wish all of you the very best, and remember-it’s not our fault and we are not alone.
I completely relate. I’ve been diagnosed with borderline and bipolar, but I believe I am only borderline. I feel out of place all the time , stuck between worlds, confused with my ever shifting views on the world, one extreme to the next. It’s tough to deal with; very isolating. I like the analogy of the light switches , it’s very accurate
I am the mother of a borderline. I am so lost as to how to help. I know she is borderline and so does her ex husband. She has been hospitalized for eating disorder a couple of times. Her father, sister, and new husband all think she is just fine. She has hurt herself for years overexercising and being bulimic. She has bad bones and is way below her weight norm. I knew even as a baby she was not happy in her own skin. It was so apparent to me that she had deep needs. I was told it was my imagination and I needed to do more as a mother. I wanted to do more, but my concerns were diminished and demeaned. Now she is 40 and has 2 great kids that she has emotionally abused and raged at for years. She will not speak to me as I did not support her reckless approach to her divorce. The other family members saw her as a victim and she was allowed to do unthinkable things to destroy her immediate family. I feel she has gotten way to much power in her disorder and that the real her is buried so deep that she just can’t come up out of a pit that I believe others pushed her into for their own ego needs to help and totally ignored her needs as a person with borderline. She has gone to several therapists since college, but when they mention “borderline” she is out of the door after giving them a tongue lashing they will never forget. I want to have hope that someday she will be free of this pain and suffering. She sees me as the enemy and I am totally shut out of her live. Any thoughts??