BPDRecovery.com: Forums

Hi - I am a social worker in the mental health field - I have worked Child Protective Services and Foster Care Services during my career -- and I am BPD - self diagnoised.
I was going along pretty ok in life for the first 4 years - lived with my divorced bio mom -very connected to my grandmother and great-grandparents - very normal - very loved and cared for -
then my mom died and to make this long story short I went to live with an uncle and aunt who were struggling with problems of their own -- they looked like the perfect family - which is why I was sent to them. My grandparents thought it would be best - they were younger, had kids near my age, good people. They could be good but they were also - cold, emotionally abusive, and their marriaage was rife with infidelity and trauma. My aunt would up and run away like a teenager and threatening suicide. My uncle was forever threatening to leave - they were never physically abusive - because good people wouldn't do that.
They prefered things hidden in the home - my aunt especially liked shaming as a child rearing method. Needless to say - at the tender young age of 4 - following the death of my mother - this had a horrid effect on me.
I have never had self-harming behaviors - unless you call closing myself off and sabotauging every relationship I have ever had self-harming which it is probably the worst sort of self harm. But I have had - irrationale fear of abandoment - to the point I would cause it with my pushing away behaviors and anger. After I got married at 22 I would be very mean to our pet cat while my husband was away - couldn't understand even why I did it -- but like the house I grew up in following my moms death - all of my inner misery was kept tightly hidden behind my own closed doors - even from my first husband. But things like that can't stay in can they - I ended up divorced and floundering around in relationships for the past 15 years. I realized finally that I had to try against everything that I normally did or fight against everything that I normally felt in relationships to make one work. I had to admit that I had no idea what normal felt like. What it felt like to feel normal relationship feelings and it has been hard and counter to everything I knew before this BUT I have worked at it like an alcoholic working at recovery.
That is how I found this web site. I typed in BPD recovery. In my field we often say Borderlines don't or can't recover- BUT I am here to say we can. It takes work - hard work - It often times goes against everything we think and have learned to believe so it often is uncomfortable - but if you work it like an alcoholic in recovery -- you can do it. I would never have believed it. It is not taught to us in Mental Health BUT I am living it - so I am very glad to find this site.

And we're glad you found us!

Amen, sister.
Welcome aboard!

That is AWESOME to hear! I too was troubled when I was reading about BPD and how it's believed you cannot recover from it. And I didn't want to take that answer as a given. So I am fighting to overcome and live a healthy, happy life too. I am so happy to hear you are achieving it!!

Welcome Bellaluna! While your story is sad, your attitude is the kind that people who recover have. I hope you'll find BPDR to be of excellent help.

Peace,
jim

Thank-you Jim, Shadow Chaser, Minx and Ash - thank-you for making me feel welcome and validated.
I hope to join this fight to show and get the word out -- BPD is something that with help - you CAN recover from -- and learn to live above. And Shadow Chaser -- I don't feel I'm totally there yet, I'm much farther than I was before and everyday I hope to be a bit closer -- somedays I go backwards -- but I am learning to catch myself now -- more often than not these days.
And thank-you too Jim for the sentiments. I appreciate the validation.
you guys are all very kind and welcoming -- BPD's recover quite nicely don't they.

Like I wrote in a post chronicling my progress- every day is a new victory.