Trying not to spiral and lose control
I’ve been living with BPD for most of my life, and even though I’ve worked hard to keep it under control, I feel like my life completely fell apart this week. I’m currently 29, and after a long time in therapy and being consistent with my medication, I finally started living a more stable life about three years ago. But this weekend, I had a crisis after more than a year without having one, and I ended up losing the person I was dating because I split on her really badly. I sent her a pretty harsh message out of rage, and even though I later tried to apologize and explain that the message didn’t reflect what I actually think about her, and that I was in the middle of a crisis and reacted badly after feeling attacked by her first, she decided to cut me out of her life.
I didn’t get the chance to tell her about my BPD before the crisis because we had mainly been talking through text, and I was planning to tell her once we met in person. The problem is that she postponed the date for over two months, and well… shit happened.
I was already feeling devastated about that, but then today I received even worse news: I failed the last exam I needed in order to graduate from college. This was the second time I took it, and even though I truly believe I prepared more than enough for the exam, I still don’t know what went wrong. I spoke to my professor, and he told me that my responses were not deep enough.
And you might ask, “It’s just an exam, why can’t you take it again?” The problem is that this was the last opportunity I had to pass it. My university is pretty strict with students enrolled in double degree programs (like me) and doesn’t allow us to fail a course if we want to obtain the second degree. I only got this second opportunity after fighting for it with lawyers and formal appeals because I’ve always been a top student, but now I feel like I completely ruined a process that took over four years of my life. What makes it even more frustrating is that I’m already 98% done with my degree, and this was the final step I needed to reach 100%.
I come from a pretty shitty family where I feel valued only because of my academic success, and I don’t even know how to tell them that I’m not graduating. I’m really scared of the amount of shame they’re going to direct at me, and I feel like I’m quickly spiraling into another crisis again.
Thank you so much for reading! I really needed to get this off my chest.