I got the sweetest compliment today that the way I communicated my needs was excellent! That’s new for me because I’m usually indirect. This time, I was clear, direct, and HONEST about what I needed in the moment. And it felt good. Especially because I communicated it without caring about what the response or reaction would be. Slowly and surely I am improving 💜

So I applied for this role in April. I’ve done 3 interviews. My last interview was one month ago today. It is now August. I did my background check and references on the 3rd of August. The department confirmed they want to hire me, and they are waiting on HR to “release the position.”

I spoke with an HR rep on Friday and he said I should hear something by the middle of this week. What could possibly be taking so long? What the fffffffff I am losing my mind. I don’t want to over communicate with them but I feel like I’m being strung along. What does release the position mean?!

I have been sitting with myself a lot lately, and reflecting on the ways I have hurt my partner. I know isn’t easy dating someone with BPD, and I really empathize with the frustration my gf must feel. I know she loves me more than anything and she wants to stay with me, but I know that if I don’t seriously get to the bottom of some of these wounds, I will lose her. And I just can’t mess up someone loving me so deeply.

So I’ve been finding new ways to care for HER nervous system since she’s always tending to mine in some way shape or form. Maybe this will help someone. It’s not our fault that we have BPD. However, if we choose the same patterns over and over, and sabotage ourselves over and over, then yes we are to blame for that. And the people who love us now do not deserve to suffer for what the people who “gave” us BPD did.

Here are some things I’ve been doing:

1. I’ve been going in really heavy with affirmations. The mind is powerful. Speaking to your mind really helps. My affirmations sound like this:

“____ is her own person. She has the right to have relationships, opinions, experiences, etc. outside of me.”

“Ownership is not love. Control is not love.”

“I can depend on myself for my needs.”

“I am loved and I deserve love. I am not an intruder in this beautiful space. I deserve to be here.”

“I deserve a calm love”

“She loves me. She would not do anything intentionally hurtful. I can give her the benefit of the doubt.”

2. I’ve been mindful of the way I bring things up to my partner. A lot of times it isn’t what I’m asking her, but the WAY I may be asking it or even the TIME I ask it. I no longer ask her questions right before work or when I know she may not be in the space. My feelings do not need to always take center stage.

3. I realized that my partner is not an unlimited emotional resource. I trust myself to journal, reflect, or talk to my therapist or loved ones about feelings. I don’t need to bring everything up to my partner. And a lot of times after reflection, I realize that I was worried about nothing and there’s no need to talk about it with her at all.

4. When she disagrees with me, I work within myself to not take it personal. As long as my feelings are being heard, validated, and understood, that should be enough. She does not need to agree with me all the time. We are two different people and it’s okay to disagree on things. It’s healthy

5. I make it a point to ask her if there’s anything she may want to talk about. We (pwBPD) hear our loved ones talking about how they feel they need to walk on eggshells around us. I don’t want her feeling like that. I want her to feel safe in sharing her feelings. I ask questions like:

-How did that make you feel?
-What aren’t you saying right now that you need to say with no filter?
-Do you feel seen in this moment?
-Can you help me understand how you’re feeling?
-What happened from your point of view?
-Is there anything I could have done/said differently?
-What part of this is bothering you the most?
-What do you need right now? To vent, or for us to look for solutions?

And then I make it a point to affirm her feelings:
-I see where you are coming from
-I can see why you feel that way
-Thank you for trusting me with your feelings and experience

6. I’ve made it a point to really get to know her people. Her family and friends are important. They support her in ways that I’m not always able to (one person can’t be your everything!). I make sure to push her to spend time with them as much as possible too

7. I try to remember that she is MY girlfriend too. And she wants a healthy, fun, well-rounded person as her partner. So I am pouring into my individuality more. My hobbies, making new friends, really loving on myself. And it’s made our relationship so sexy and free.

•••

I know these may sound simple but they’ve made a world of a difference in my relationship and maybe they can help yours too. It’s not easy. I have hard days where I don’t communicate well, where I’m moody or where I’m easily frustrated. But the more I work on myself, the more those days a few and far in between. As long as I am accountable and do better, everything is okay.

I’ve been so sad and angry. The lynchings, the murders, the discrimination, the racist comments I’ve been seeing lately. Most days im usually able to be positive as possible and have the strength to fight. But lately I’ve been feeling so defeated and just angry.

And then there’s also the guilt of when I have good days. Like why do I deserve a good day when so many of us are suffering?

I’ve been thinking about the horrific reality of being lynched or hunted. How scared those people must have been. How much evil they experienced first hand. What were the last things they heard? Felt? Saw?

I’m just so angry all the time now. It’s so heavy. I don’t know how we’re supposed to manage or cope with what our world is becoming? Like what do we actually do? I need advice because most days I can’t even get out of bed.

I haven’t eaten or slept in 3 days. It’s like my body will not relax enough to sleep. My heart just feels like a boulder in my chest. I love her so much. Any tips to manage the pain? I’ve smoked, I tried mindlessly scrolling for hours to distract myself, I’ve tried talking to loved ones. I’m just devastated that it didn’t work with her.

I just wanted to post something on the positive side. I have come such a long way. I used to be shattered at the thought of someone leaving me, of someone not liking me, of failing at something. This past year was really the straw that broke the camels back and I decided I needed HELP.

I really appreciate my psychiatrist for listening to me and making sure I have what I need. I had gone unmedicated for my whole life and now at 29 I decided okay, maybe I need some extra help. And my medication has saved my relationship with my girlfriend, my relationship with myself, my family, and even my work life. I say this to say, please do not be afraid of medication like I was for so many years. Imagine how much I could have accomplished much earlier!

I am also in DBT, but to be honest majority of my work has been self work and shadow work. I was on the verge of losing everything, and it really shook something up in me. I decided I wanted to be healthy and balanced more than anything, and I did not give up on myself. And now I understand that even if my gf was to leave me, cheat on me, whatever, I will not only survive, but I will thrive on my own. Why? Because the truth is, I am the love of my life! It took me all this time to realize it is ME. I think I have become my own FP. I am obsessed with being better, I want a better body, I want better skin, I want to be a better human.

I wish I could write a big letter to all the people I dated before and genuinely apologize for anything I said or did to hurt them. Dating someone with BPD is not easy, and I can see now the things that people did to love me despite me struggling mentally. I think people always knew I had something going on with me but no one knew what it was, and for a while I thought it was bipolar.

I am NOT PERFECT by any means and I still have hard days and moments. But now my attitude is different because I know I am NOT my traumas. I can be whoever I want to be.

I’m so grateful for my journey and for the first time I am excited about what is to come.

I just saw a post where a guy was excited about the fact that a woman spoke to him at work and they had a brief conversation. He then says that he spoke to her on the way out and she was nonchalant, which made him feel like she was saying "yeah, yeah, sure buddy. Dude, Im tired, fuck off" as if she owed him some kind of grandiose farewell.

And whats crazy is, its a younger man who made this post. Seriously, some of yall are serverely lacking in social skills, social cues, community, friendships, etc. Some people just enjoy small talk. That doesn’t mean they’re now your friend or interested in you. I need some of yall to get a grip because this is how people end up hurting innocent people because of their “feelings”.

Therapy may be needed to navigate your feelings if you often feel attacked by others‘ actions regardless of how minor they are.

Do not let this place swallow you up mentally. Please use the mental health resources, join some social clubs, seek therapy so you can be the best you can be. Your mental health matters, please take care of yourself.

Genuine question. I see pick managers writing up stowers more than stow managers. They’re more invested in stow than pick. And the attitudes are always nasty. I’m not usually one to generalize but this is my experience in multiple buildings.

One thing I’ve really been working on is making sure I am caring for my partner’s nervous system. It is already hard enough dating someone that has BPD (me), and I want to make sure I’m caring for her as well.

The beginning of our relationship was HARD. She almost left me. She would always say things like “you don’t hear my perspective” or “I feel like I’m walking on eggshells and I can’t tell you how I really feel.”

I didn’t want to lose her because I couldn’t control MY emotions. She is the most beautiful woman, and I am so grateful she loves me through everything. She deserves care too. My goal is to make her feel loved, seen, and held.

When we’re having a difficult conversation, I’ve been being mindful of how I listen to her. When she is saying her piece, I am silent. I let her talk. I remove the emotions from the forefront. I try to genuinely put myself into her shoes. I remind myself that while what I am feeling may be strong, that does not mean that I am right about happened or what I am feeling happened.

I ask her questions about her perspective:
-How did this make you feel?
-What happened from your point of view?
-What was the intention behind this decision? What was your thought process?
-Is there anything I could have done/said differently?
-What part of this is bothering you the most?
-What do you need right now? To vent, or for us to look for solutions?

Then, I make sure to validate her feelings so she doesn’t feel like her feelings don’t matter to me:
-I see how you could feel that way. I understand where you are coming from.
-Your feelings are valid. I’m gonna hold this for a minute, can we come back to this conversation after reflection?

I repeat back to her what I heard, and ask to make sure I heard correctly and I am understanding what she is ACTUALLY SAYING instead of what I FEEL she is saying.

My relationship has been flourishing. After we have hard conversations, because she feels validated and heard, and I feel validated and heard, we often cuddle after. We laugh. We’re US.

Maybe this can help someone. I don’t want us to lose the people we care most about because of this debilitating thing. We can defeat it.

Sending love and support ♥️

Okay so I have been with my girlfriend for 2 years. She is 29, I am 27. There is this friend that she has that she has been intimate with before we met, they dated shortly. Now they are just friends.

I’m feeling extremely insecure about this dynamic, and probably just need to be snapped out of it. Honestly, my gf was upfront about everything from the beginning. She offered to introduce us but it just hasn’t happened yet. The girl from what I see is cool…but right before we started dating they were still flirtatious. I guess I’m thinking how can she just unsee this woman’s body or unfeel the feelings? Especially knowing how deeply my gf feels things. I feel insecure and the thought of them spending time 1:1 makes me nauseous.

One day we were in an argument because I was asking questions about the dynamic. It got heated and my gf said “for all this, I should have just fucked her.” She later apologized and said she didn’t mean it, she just felt like she was being interrogated, but I’d be lying if it wasn’t playing in my head.

It doesn’t help that the girl is gorgeous and I love a beautiful woman. If they didn’t have history, I wouldn’t care about them being friends. But the fact that she used to fuck this girl is driving me crazy.

I feel like I’m being childish, but at the same time I keep feeling nauseous about this.

Soo my girlfriend’s childhood best friend seems kind of shady to me the more I learn about her. To the point that I get annoyed hearing about her.

She has a girlfriend as well, but is constantly lowkey talking ish about her. And how she wishes she could have a man instead. She has also cheated on her with a man in a one night stand.

But the comment she made the other day really topped the cake. She says that she wonders if being with her girlfriend will result in her going to hell, so she’s on the fence about keeping her. She treats her girlfriend like a yoyo. Just pulling her in and pushing her away. Extremely avoidant. I feel so bad for her gf because she ADORES her. And she just treats her like she’s disposable.

And she’s judgmental. My gf and I smoke weed, and she made a comment one day that she’s glad she isn’t “strung out on drugs”.

She just irritates me the more I get to know her and it’s hard for me to mask when I don’t really like someone. But off the strength of my gf, I’m kind and polite.

My gf is an extremely loyal person. If you are her friend, she will love you to the END. But the things her friend says are just so odd.

Anyone experienced something similar?

Since I can’t share screenshots or pictures on here, I had to add the text from the text messages.

I sent this to my closest friend today. Nothing happened, I just was feeling so much gratitude for her:

“I am so deeply sorry for the way that any of my actions or words have impacted you over the years.
I can't tell you enough how much I love you and appreciate you for seeing me and loving me. Though the impulsivity, scatteredness, just not being present or being overly insecure.
It is only within the past year I was able to see much damage going all those years undiagnosed did to me, my relationships, my life.
Because I haven't been working in corporate, so I didn't have anything distracting me anymore. I spent a lot of days just reflecting.”

And this is what she said back! I felt so loved, so seen, so held in her response:

“You don't have to be sorry. I don't have BPD (that I know of) I can only imagine the influx of emotions coming all in at the same time. I think it's also worth it to recognize that you deal with a lot of PTSD and you were so young dealing with so much trauma. I know that's overwhelming for you oa. You're definitely forgiven but no apology is needed. I'm not innocent either & I apologize for any times I could've done better too.”

I am 29 and I have BPD. I really need to meet others who also are working towards remission. BPD is such a distinct disorder that I feel only someone else dealing with it can understand my feelings sometimes. Looking for someone to connect with to be able to chat, vent, talk about our journeys together. Community is so important and I want to make a good effort to try to find others who may be feeling similarly to me.

I had a conversation with my partner today about boundaries. I have BPD, and we have been navigating our relationship with both of us in therapy and with me on mood stabilizer medication. This morning, I asked what things are okay to share about our relationship to friends or family because my partner vents about our relationship when she is upset and has said really messed up things about me to these people. Things that were not even TRUE, but she was just upset. These are people that I am expected to be around and build relationships with. I don’t feel comfortable building these relationships without understanding what the boundaries are on what is shared or said.

To be clear, I want my partner to be able to talk about her feelings. I need to know if it is wrong for me to want to have clarity on what things are sacred to our relationship vs what things people should know.

This is a follow up conversation to an argument we had over a year ago about her disclosing my mood disorder to her friends. She shared it without my knowledge. This made me uncomfortable because of the stigma surrounding it, navigating for me is already difficult.

Please lmk your thoughts

As a result of having BPD, I have become an extremely avoidant person. I don’t form new relationships because I don’t want people to get close to me. I push people away when they feel like they “know” me. I almost get offended when they do that. Because I don’t feel that anyone will ever truly understand the depths of the pain. They won’t understand it, they’ll judge it. So when people take a liking to me, I push them away, lie to them, or just full on block them. I know it’s not healthy, I’m just being honest.

I realized how bad it was because my partner loves people. She talks to EVERYONE! 😭 I love that about her and I wish I could be that way.

Recently a person came into her life that she knew before but they were hurtful to her. They sent her a message apologizing and wanting to reconnect. I split on her because I genuinely didn’t understand why she feels the need to respond. Then I realized that “normal” people don’t just cut people off and forget they exist.

I hate that I’m like this. I want real friendship. I understand that life is hard, people have conflict and resolve it and move forward. But for me, conflict and disrespect signals the end of a relationship. I just feel so deeply hurt that I either punish them by guilting them (like my mommm!!! 🥰), or I abandon them completely with no explanation. I don’t even know that I miss those people because of how strongly I feel they’ve hurt me. But to a normal person, they could be cool with them again. I’ve lost so many friendships. I’m starting to believe it just isn’t meant for me.