on the borderline personality

In May of 2010, just after attempting to commit suicide, I was diagnosed as having borderline personality disorder.

Borderline Personality Disorder is a pervasive pattern of instability of interpersonal relationships, self-image and affects, and marked impulsivity beginning by early adulthood. According to the DSM IV-TR, diagnosis requires 5 or more of the following:

1. Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment. Note: Do not include suicidal or self-injuring behavior covered in Criterion 5
2. A pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by alternating between extremes of idealization and devaluation.
3. Identity disturbance: markedly and persistently unstable self-image or sense of self.
4. Impulsivity in at least two areas that are potentially self-damaging (e.g., promiscuous sex, eating disorders, binge eating, substance abuse, reckless driving). Note: Do not include suicidal or self-injuring behavior covered in Criterion 5
5. Recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, threats or self-injuring behavior such as cutting, interfering with the healing of scars (excoriation) or picking at oneself.
6. Affective instability due to a marked reactivity of mood (e.g., intense episodic dysphoria, irritability or anxiety usually lasting a few hours and only rarely more than a few days).
7. Chronic feelings of emptiness
8. Inappropriate anger or difficulty controlling anger (e.g., frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights).
9. Transient, stress-related paranoid ideation, delusions or severe dissociative symptoms

Let's see how I measure up to the criteria above:
- Criterion 1: I definitely have this. I can't stand feeling alone, and am always looking for the company of others. In fact, I've even resorted to pretending that my Cookie Monster and my Snoopy stuffed animals talk, so that I can avoid feeling alone (in clinical psychiatry, this is actually known as "the Teddy Bear Sign".
- Criterion 2: I've certainly had my share of romantic relationships that barely lasted a month. Somehow, they always ended with me blowing up and breaking up with the guy. And it's not only with past boyfriends, but with past friends as well: as soon as I feel offended by a person, though their action may or may not be directed toward me, I would completely write that person off.  As a result, I haven't been able to keep many lasting friendships; I only consider the guys I grew up with, my 'twin', and a few others as my friends.
- Criterion 3: I've definitely always struggled with my self-identity, to the point that I didn't know who I was anymore... hence one of the reasons for my first suicide attempt.
- Criterion 4: Promiscuous sex? been there, done that. Eating disorder? struggled with it. Gambling? at one point in my life, I was at the casino every weekend and at a local pub playing on the pokie machines every other night. Alcohol abuse? you know it.
- Criterion 5: Cutting? guilty. Recurrent suicidal behaviour? heck yea.
- Criterion 6: Oh hell yes. My moods tend to go on a rollercoaster ride all the time.
- Criterion 7: Always...
- Criterion 8: No (thank God!)
- Criterion 9: No

Although I haven't gone into full details, one can see that I fulfill seven out of the nine criteria for having this personality disorder. When I was first diagnosed as a "borderline", I can recall resenting my psychiatrist to the extreme--in my mind, having this diagnosis confirmed that there was definitely something wrong with me and that I am crazy. Then eventually, these feelings turned into self-pity because I could not understand why I had to have this personality disorder, and it further reiterated that something about me is not quite right. With time however, I have come to accept this diagnosis. Knowing that my personality is disordered in this way helped me understand why I am the way that I am.

The 1999 movie 'Girl, Interrupted' is actually about a girl diagnosed with borderline personality disorder shortly after being institutionalized following a suicide attempt. In the few times I have seen this movie, I can remember really identifying with the main character Susanna Kaysen (played by Winona Ryder); and this is because I really saw myself in Susanna, even though I didn't know at the time that I would later come to be given the same diagnosis as she did.

To this day, I really do still believe that I am a borderline. To my closest friends with whom I shared this diagnosis however, they just could not agree with it. And who can blame them? I admit that I am one of those people who tend to bottle things up within, all the while maintaining an agreeable persona. Little do people know that for me, what they see on the surface does not necessarily reflect what's going on deep down.

One simply just cannot "recover" from having this personality disorder--the key word here is 'personality'. In actuality, people can outgrow it once they reach their middle ages. And yet, despite having this disorder, I no longer feel at all disadvantaged or unlucky as I once felt, especially since my psychiatrist has reassured me many times that I am one of those "high-functioning borderlines".

In a way, I have come to see my borderline personality as another trait that makes me unique. Hardly ever do I worry now about what people may think of me upon discovering that I have this personality disorder, because the fact is, I understand myself more because of this diagnosis. What I do worry about now is how I perceive myself; one day, I do hope to finally achieve a more positive one.