"My Story"
Personal Stories

No new stories will be added to this section. However if you would like to make a contribution to the Sanctuary, you can send in your story to to be included in my new book about the borderline personality disorder.

Please be advised that some of these letters can be a trigger.

Story #46

When I was in my twenties, I went into therapy because I was having horrible memories of being sexually abused as a child, and I didn't know what to make of them. I found a very good therapist and worked on my issues. Years later, while reading a book about trauma and treatment, I realized that my therapist had been treating me for Borderline Personality Disorder. I had every symptom: fear of abandonment, fear of being alone, black and white thinking, dysphoria, high risk behavior, unstable relationships, suicidal thoughts. The only thing I didn't have was mutilation. I never cut myself.

For five years, I went to therapy. God, my therapist was patient. She tactfully and carefully brought to my attention all the aspects of my disorder and helped me lift them from my personality. Instead of dating men who were in trouble with the law, I decided not to date at all. I decided to be alone-- dateless, for the first time in my life. I started building life-long friendships. I stopped having meaningless sex. I started thinking about what kind of life I wanted.


A year later, I met my husband. We fell in love and got engaged one year later. I decided to take the plunge and move where I'd always wanted to live -- near the ocean. We got married a year later and moved to the place of our dreams. It was hard to leave my therapist. She was so helpful. I knew my therapy wasn't over. I knew I had to continue, because I knew I still had residue of borderline personality.


It took a long time to find a therapist in my new home. Three years! But I have found one who specializes in trauma, and I am dealing with the more painful aspects of the sexual abuse now. One thing that I also have is somatic disorder-- I have actual physical pain which cannot be medically diagnosed -- it is psychosomatic. I have learned that I have it to repress my rage. As I express my anger safely in therapy, the pain becomes less.


Here's the thing. I saw a show on PBS today about Borderline Personality Disorder. I recognized myself so much. But I realized that I have gotten beyond so many of the aspects of it. I now have stable relationships. The dysphoria is cut down by about 80%. I am having a stable marriage. I enjoy spending large amounts of time alone. I haven't had a suicidal thought in years. I'm not perfectly cured. But I've made a life for myself. It's not a perfect one. But it's a good one, and it's a whole lot more than I had before.

I don't know what the clinical outlook on this is, but I really feel that this thing is not a life sentence. I think it's something that happens to us, but it's not who we are. I think there's hope after all.

Story #47

My story begins a long time ago, when i was only 3 years old. That was my introduction to abandonment. My father left us, and since that time, i can count the times i have seen him on one hand. 

My mother remarried, and she picked another winner. This one liked 'em young, and taught his son the same. At night, my stepfather would come into my bedroom and force me into oral sex. During the day, my stepbrother would make me do all kinds of disgusting, inhuman things. Once, he surprised me in a place i made as my own little "sanctuary" - we had a little wooded area behind our house, and i created a kind of fort with some old wood. i would go there to read. i remember it was raining that day, and he showed up there. he forced me onto the ground, pushed up my dress, and put small rocks inside me. He stuck his hand inside until i started bleeding. That's just one example of the sick things he would do.

This continued from the age of 6 until i was 12 years old, when my stepfather left us. i can only guess that he left because i got too old for him. i remember that i started drinking when i was 12 years old, after he left. i would hide whiskey in my dresser drawers, without worry that my mother would ever find it. She was so self-absorbed, i knew she'd never even look there! 

At that point, i was practically self-sufficient, except for having a job. i would make my own meals, do my own laundry, i got up for school and left the house before anyone else was even awake. i got very good at hiding what i was doing. One day, i found a razor blade. i have no idea what prompted me to decide to do it, but i barricaded myself in my room and threatened to kill myself. i guess my mother didn't want to get too involved, so she sent her boyfriend upstairs to stop me. He knocked my door down, took the razor blade away, and that was that. My mother didn't do anything about it, never talked to me about it. i continued to drink, and within a year or two, i started cutting. The first cut i ever did, was kind of atypical. i made a huge cut on my face. When people asked about it, i told them a cat scratched me. We didn't even have a cat! My mother finally asked what happened, and i told her it was a friend's cat, and she chose to believe that. 

i continued to cut myself, although not quite so conspicuously, until i graduated high school. i was involved with several guys in high school who were not exactly the best choices for me. When i was 15, i was dating a 23 year old guy i met at a fast-food restaurant. i just thought it was cool that he was going out with me at all! He thought it was great that he had a little kid to control. He raped me.

i went to college at the age of 17. (See, like many borderlines, i'm actually pretty smart!) i chose a college 1500 miles away from home, because i thought by doing so, i could re-create myself and run away from my problems. It worked for a little while. About 3 days, to be exact. My third day there, i went to a party, got completely wasted, and was raped.

i decided to focus on my studies and "show them" - my multiple abusers - that i was not a loser. By the time my junior year rolled around, i had a 4.0 GPA at one of the best colleges in the country. But then i crashed. Right before Thanksgiving of my junior year, i had a total breakdown. 

My roommate was really concerned about my drinking, i was crying all the time, she didn't know what to do. She insisted that i go see a counselor. i told her i would not go unless she went with me. She came, we all talked, and within a week, i was in a psychiatric hospital as an inpatient. i stayed in the hospital for 3 1/2 months. i was in and out of their intensive care unit. i would try to escape. 

i lost 40 pounds in 2 months. i used anything and everything i could find to SI. When my friends brought me Chinese food, i kept the chopsticks, and when i got back to my room, i broke them so i'd have something i could use to cut myself. i would drink the facial astringent for the alcohol. 

They decided that i was a good candidate for ECT. That was an absolutely awful experience which should be relegated back to the dark ages along with lobotomies, where it belongs. All it did was give me even more memory gaps than i already had (don't remember much of my childhood, and now there are big chunks missing from my 19th year of life), and did little to aid in my "depression". You see, they still hadn't figured out what was wrong yet. All kinds of diagnoses were floating around - Major Depression, Treatment Resistant; Schizo-Affective Disorder; Bipolar II; PTSD; some kind of psychosis.... and they couldn't figure out what drugs to put me on either. You name a drug, i've probably been on it - i'm not exaggerating.

That was my first hospital experience. When i finally got out, i thought i'd go back to school. HA! i could barely function, let alone think on a higher plane of reasoning. That year, i had three serious suicide attempts. Each time, i ended up in the intensive care unit at the hospital, hooked up to life support that i intensely despised. i remember that very first time, especially - i woke up, hooked up to all kinds of tubes, so very angry that i was alive, and i just couldn't believe it. i couldn't even kill myself right! i told them i would go right out and do it again, so my wonderful mother committed me to the state hospital. It's not as if she couldn't afford to put me in a private hospital - she had married again, this time to a rich man, but no way would she waste that good money on me! So off into the state system i went for 3 weeks. By this time, i had learned what the doctors wanted to hear, and told it to them, so i was released. And i tried to kill myself again, failed again, ended up in the hospital again, but this time, i didn't make the mistake of telling anyone that i would try again. I went into a day treatment program. 

This was when i first started to hear about the possibility of BPD in my case. I was still engaging in the SI - never gave it up. I had large bruises on my thighs, long scars on my leg from cutting, and broken fingers. 

While in the hospital, i had met a guy. We met up again around this time. i got pregnant, thought i was in love, and we got married. The relationship was always terrible, although while i was in it, i would have told you he walked on water. He was very controlling. i stayed home with my daughter because he didn't want me to work. i didn't have a car, even though we lived out in the country - if i wanted to go anywhere, i had to go with him. i had no money of my own - he would give me the money to go shopping with. When i finally did get my own car, i was only allowed to keep under 1/2 tank of gas so i couldn't go too far, couldn't run away. i had to ask for gas money. 

When i started having more problems with BPD and needed more intensive treatment, he went behind my back and cancelled my health insurance. i found out from the treatment program i was in that i would have to pay for my meds. (The only reason i could stay in the program is because my grandfather had agreed to pay for it.) i insisted there had to be a mistake, because i was on my husband's insurance. When i got a hold of the insurance company, they told me that my husband and the kids were covered, but that he had called and cancelled me, saying that we were getting a divorce. i confronted him, and he said that he was worried the insurance would cancel all of us if i used up these benefits. i told him that was a bunch of bull, but what could i do at that point? Nothing, and he knew it.

When i got home from the program, i found out that he had closed out our bank account. i had no access to any money. i tried to get him to go to counseling, but he kept insisting that i was the one with the problem, not him, and i needed help, not him.

The stress was extreme. i was smoking two packs of cigarettes a day, and i found out that burning myself with cigarettes was better than the cutting! i would burn myself several times a day. It got to the point where i couldn't smoke a cigarette without burning myself.

He finally snapped. One day, he told me he was taking our two small daughters to Dairy Queen. This was unusual, as he rarely did anything with them alone. My mother's intuition kicked in, and i decided to follow the truck. i followed that truck for over 30 miles, until he finally rammed the truck into my car. i got out of the car and went over to the truck to find out what he was planning on doing. At that point, he closed the window on my hands and dragged me down the highway. He ended up running over my foot, and i couldn't walk for a month after that. All this time, our two girls were in his truck, screaming and crying. 

Obviously, i couldn't go back to him. And my mother wasn't willing to take me in. He took off with the girls for two weeks. Fortunately, the courts were smart enough to award me custody pending the final divorce decree. We ended up in a transitional program for homeless mothers and children, and stayed there for almost a year.

Strangely enough, during that year, i did not do any kind of SI behaviors. i even quit smoking. i think i was too busy trying to survive for my children. I got a job, and an apartment. And here i am. Everyone is so proud of me. How far i've come, how well i'm doing. 

The sad part is, i'm not doing well at all. Yes, i've been able to stop myself from SI for 22 months. But it is such a struggle. i hate the world. And i think that there is not one person who truly knows me. i don't even know who i am. i've never completed anything important that i started. i have no sense of identity. i feel as though if i died, the world would certainly be no worse off, and would probably be a better place. Now, there are those who say i am letting my abusers win. But i say, maybe they saw something inside me that i am refusing to see in myself. i mean, how can that many people be wrong about me? From everything that has happened to me, i can only surmise that i have some kind of internal flaw that i was born with, that i will never be able to overcome. the sooner i accept that, the better for all of those concerned. 

So i wait. When will i accept the fact that i am fatally flawed, and accept the fate bestowed upon me so long ago by my abusers? That is what remains to be seen. But for now, i refuse to trust any longer, i will no longer place myself at risk to be hurt by others, i will stay isolated, as i have learned is the safest way to be.

Story #48

I'm 25, female, and very lost. I want to die so much all the time because it's been nothing but pain. The only thing that prevents me from it is how much I know it would hurt my dad. 

My mother hated me and viciously verbally abused me. In front of me she would tell my younger siblings not to end up like me, that I would never be loved and never be able to marry. She talked to them endlessly about sports and dates but me being non-athletic and not very social somehow made me less than everyone else. My father was wonderful and still is in many ways but after a while he gave up and just took her side.

For many years I emotionally shut myself off and couldn't even feel good things. Then when I was about 22(?) my roommate told me she wanted me to move out because she "needed to grow and live by herself." I am bisexual and  was very much in love with her even though she was straight and that night I had a "good cry" for the first time in over 10 years. 

Gradually my depression sank in. . . I would cry and be in something very cold and dark and lost and I know I don't really need to explain more because people with BPD know EXACTLY what I'm talking about. After I moved out my Borderline Personality that was perhaps lurking within me all this time began to shine. I'd get panic attacks if I thought anyone I loved was going to leave me. I still blame myself whenever someone goes away.. . .after my best friend and I graduated from college he joined the Army to pay off his student loans and I haven't heard from him since and of course, it's my fault. Like it was my fault Sarah wanted me to leave and has barely spoken to me since. Everyone leaves and I always feel so alone. 

The intense rage I don't have or at least I don't think I do .. . I've learned to cry but not to scream .. . my rage is so deep it scares the living hell out of me. I turned into a robot when I was about 12 so I just stood there while my mother hurled insults at me. . . I'd be like this sponge and had trained myself to not feel it getting wet. 

From 11-13 I was suicidal and had a serious binging disorder, I started smoking at 17 and playing with knives on my legs at 24. In college I went through a period where I didn't bathe and had to have my friend Stacey talk to me about it. Suicidal feelings always plague me and I do everything to prevent people from leaving me, even when it's not healthy for me to stay with them. I battle depression and panic constantly. 

I had to share this because I've been in back and forth denial of BPD for about a year and writing helps me accept it more. Hopefully some will be able to relate in the meantime take it one second, one minute, one hour at a time until you can take it a day at a time. And try to find someone with BPD to talk to. . . others have no idea and usually don't want to. 

Story #49

On Halloween (trick or treat?) of 1978, I was born to a middle income family with one brother 21 months to my senior. It all went downhill from there. My mother never wanted me, and she would tell me that every day. Not necessarily in those words , but she would say that she "never wanted to have a girl", and that I was " no good and fat and lazy." I can remember these words in some of my earliest memories, at an age when any child is too innocent and naive to live up to the expectations of a tyrant. Since she started me young, though, she set me up for her years of anarchy. My parents weren't as physically abusive, although they did hit me at times. They didn't need to be, all they had to do was look at me wrong and it would kill me. Every day of my existence, though, they made sure that I knew that I was fat and ugly and that I would never be as good as them or as my brother, whom, it was made clear, was my mothers favorite. I was daddy's little girl, but he was afraid of my mother in a way. He would never stand up for me and, in fact, he would join in with the fat jokes and name calling that I endured from the rest of my family for every lousy day of my childhood. 

I was fat. I was depressed. The only thing that I had control over was what went into my body. I would wait until I got home from school. My brother would be outside and my parents would still be at work, and I would go through all the cupboards and eat as much food as I could possibly shove down. Then, the rest of the family would come home and make comments like, "why don't you chase your sister around the house to see if she can lose some weight", and "at least if we ran out of food, we know that YOU'D live." And, of course, I was hitting my teenage years. Anyone who has ever been in a public school system knows how cruel children can be. No one even noticed when I tried to kill myself. I couldn't believe that my parents didn't even notice half a bottle of their precious pills gone. During my adolescence, I probably tried to kill myself a total of 5 times and no one noticed, not once. My parents did not even notice their 11-year-old daughter intoxicated for days at a time with alcohol from their own liquor cabinet.

It probably didn't help that both of my parents were into drugs and alcohol. I used to have to take care of my mother when she came home drunk. She be crying and saying that she was going to die, and I wanted her to. I think that is where most of my anger comes from. I would be so mad at her the next day, not for getting drunk, but for saying that she was going to die and not following through. They could never understand why I "threw temper-tantrums," just as I could never understand why the people who were supposed to love me the most hated me so much. I was lucky that my grandmother came to visit every summer. No matter how bad it got in school, it was nothing as compared to staying home with my family, but my grandmother was different. She was the first person who ever made me feel loved and it only took four words "you're my favorite grandchild." I've never been anyone's favorite anything. We were pretty much inseparable all summer every summer. Without her I would probably not be alive. We would go fishing, pick flowers, pick berries, make jelly, bake, make stuff, things that I had never done or wanted to do with my mother. She left every winter though, and again, I was alone.
 
I have been alone all my life, I am lonely a lot, but I am always alone. I moved out of my parents house when I was seventeen. I was still in high school and I actually graduated (after summer school.) It's not that I wasn't smart, I scored high on my SAT's, but my emotional problems interfered with homework and with my relationships with anyone in authority. My parents forced me to move back home right before I turned 18, so right after I turned 18, I moved over 200 miles away. Did not tell them that I was leaving, never mind where I was going. I didn't know where I was going. All I had was my car and some clothes. I ended up in New Hampshire, with hopes of trying to sort out this mess that is my life. I had a boyfriend who was married when I met him and old enough to be my father, but I stayed with him for almost two years because my mother told me that it wouldn't last a month. I was alright for that period of time, I have always been an emotional person, but there were no breakdowns until I ended it. He was an alcoholic and in the end I could not deal with it, so I left him and was single for eight months. I was in a band singing and drinking and doing a lot of drugs as well, but I was the happiest I had ever been.

That's when I met Cliff. He is the first and only man I have ever truly loved, which , for me, is torture. I am so emotionally volatile and moody that I have a hard time putting someone I love through this kind of hell. It seems like something goes wrong every single day now. My health is deteriorating, my PAP tests have been coming back abnormal for the past year and a half now, but I have not been to see a doctor in over a year for it. I can't afford to and I guess I'm hoping I'll just die. During my last "temper -tantrum" I actually burned to word die into my stomach. I always cut my stomach so that no one else can see. I am so embarrassed by the fact that I can't control my own actions. As I am writing this, I am experiencing my second miscarriage, which, after burning the word die in my stomach, is really freaking me out. This is my second miscarriage and not that I was ever trying to get pregnant, but to be pregnant and full of life one minute and have it die the next (especially after burning the word into my stomach)..........it's my own fault. I've already killed two of my babies. Maybe not intentionally, but just because of who I am. No fetus is ever going to be able to survive my stressed body, I don't even know how I do it. I suppose it was a blessing for both of them not to be condemned to a life with me as their mother. Cliff was the father of both, though and to think that my body is not capable of producing anything out of love..........I don't want to think about it anymore. 

Last January, the other singer in my band, and my very good friend, died in a car accident. I stopped working for a couple of months. In May I had my miscarriage. In June, I was fired for working too hard, kicked out of my house, and broke up with Cliff (busy month.) I got another job that lasted only a month because I hated my boss and wanted to stab him through the heart with a letter opener. I started hanging out in bars a lot, conning men out of drinks and money. I got another part-time job that lasted a month. Then, again, went back to conning men out of money. I have been working for about a month right now, but am ready to quit for fear that I will seriously injure one of my coworkers. I am a hard worker, I just can't deal with people. But, since I am such a hard worker, I am very strong plus I workout on a punching bag to relieve some aggression. When I get mad, though, I get afraid that I might hurt someone seriously. And I generally seem more interested in fighting men than women. One night as I was going to a bar by myself, I saw a couple arguing as I was getting out of my car. He hit her, so I spoke up and he threatened me. I walked back to my car, started it, put a pair of gloves on then went back and screamed "hey" as I was right behind him. As he spun around, I smashed him in the face, first with the right, then the left. I knocked him off balance, and as soon as he hit the ground, I started kicking him with my pointed high heel boots. His girlfriend ran into the bar so I kicked him in the face a couple of times, then took off. This is the first time I have shared this with anyone, I told myself to forget about it. I went back to one of my regular bars and got trashed.

I don't know how to deal with my life. I started going to therapy a few months ago, and they diagnosed me with BPD and major depression. They put me on medication, which seems to have reduced the feelings of self pity and sadness, but those were the only things that have been keeping my anger in check. I'm not sure how I'm going to deal with it, but I just try to take each day as it comes. Maybe if I won the lottery, I could have everything I want and live by myself.......alone-not lonely.

Story #50

I'm a 43 year old female diagnosed BPD 16 years ago. Having read several letters by other BPD's I feel compelled to tell at least part of my story. I went through the childhood sexual and emotional trauma of many BPD's. Though never having had an official diagnosis (to my knowledge) prior to 16 yrs ago, I had been in and out of treatment much of my adult life to no avail. For me the diagnosis was liberating. I had a name for all the craziness. 

I've been fortunate, an excellent therapist who has seen me through the years of abusive and destructive behaviors. A husband of 21 years, whose co-dependency actually ended up being helpful, and kept us together until we could both grow and change. The scars from cutting are faded and white and most people don't even notice them. I haven't OD'd or been hospitalized in almost 10 years, though for a while if felt like I lived in the hospital and visited home. I have 5 beautiful children. The older ones have recovered from the abuse I heaved on them as small children. They know that they have to be wary of their mental health because I have a strong incidence of mental illness and suicide in my family. But they know how to feel and express it. Something I had to wait to adulthood to learn.

I still take medication. I'm still in therapy 2-3 times/ week. It's expensive with the limitations of insurance (a whole different form of abuse), but we made the decision to sacrifice many things so that I could stay alive. I reached a crisis point where that was the ultimate decision. Stay alive and work to get better, or give in to the urge to end it. Staying alive and not changing wasn't an option, it was no longer bearable. When I made that decision, things changed. It's been incredibly difficult, and I'm not symptomless. I just have learned to live with my limitations and to respect them. I have abandoned religion, a great source of my self deprecation. I have learned to trust my instincts (not my impulses). If there's a god, I'll deal with it when I have to. Till then, there's life to be dealt with, not afterlife.

I'm learning so much, I feel like a child in many respects, a healthy child that I parent myself. In other ways I've never been more adult. I feel a sensuality and an appreciation for my body that I never thought possible. I have the body of a 43 year old woman who has had 5 children, and it doesn't look like my 18 yr old's, and yet I'm learning to see and appreciate the beauty of it. I still rely heavily on therapy and the routine of it and the feedback, and the grounding influence it has on my life, but I have learned to work there. I have learned to cut through the crap. I've learned to be honest about what's happening and what I feel and not to hold back important information. I've learned to accept criticism without feeling totally devastated by it. I've learned to trust. I've learned that understanding is important. That if I have a deep understanding about what's happening, change happens automatically, I don't have to DO anything, just be aware and the choices I make based on my understanding lead me in the right direction.

All I'm saying, I guess, is this: Borderline's seem to be intelligent people. Our minds have the healing elements inside. There is hope. It requires diligence, but if you are ready for the change, the resources will come to you. There are no quick fixes. It will be your job the rest of your life to be healthy. But, as with any job, the longer you do it the easier it becomes. You become familiar with what is required. Good luck on your journey, the rewards are in the traveling well, not the final destination.

Story #51

I guess you can say my pitiful story begins before I was even born as my mother took castor oil while she was pregnant with me so..god forbid!..I wasn't born on her birthday. How I wondered what I could of done wrong or why she must not of loved me as I recall from at least 3-4 years of age, all of us girls being pushed out the backdoor of our house early in the mornings after our father had left for work. "Get outside! I don't want to see you! Don't you even knock on the door." I remember having to go to the bathroom and knocking on the door for it to remain unanswered. (what the hell is she doing in there anyways??) and then the complete and utter humiliation as I relieved myself in some huge pine trees and a large group of school kids laughed and pointed. 

I spent a lot of my childhood alone...just wandering .which left me open to be taken advantage of. twice I was almost raped by some boys who were friends of my sisters and then finally the molestation by some girl who was one of my sisters friends. (oh how i wish my sisters would look out for me and let me follow them on their rampages of fun but I was not welcome) This little "relationship" lasted for quite sometime until finally we moved to the other side of town into a brand new house. Oh how this devastated my sisters who relied on all their little friends for entertainment. So, they turned to me. The oldest took great pleasure in torturing me throughout the day while my mother remained locked away in her room. I remember pleading for her help as my sisters beat on me and there was never a reply except maybe.."leave me alone!" 

I never quite understood why my oldest sister hated me so much. But because of it, I spent my days wandering the woods outside and then finally "guarding" my room the entire day so they wouldn't trash and steal my things no more. I guess my mother could see the fall in her ranks and she began to try to regain her position as ruler by chasing us with knives up the stairs and laughing hysterically like it was some great joke. I'd nearly pee myself and feel my heart constricting in pain as I tried to lock the bathroom door to escape from her. She was a weird one. My mother also took great pleasure in making up stories to our father for when he came home, so she could smile evilly as she heard one of us being belted when he got home. 

How we feared our father's wrath because it was always coupled with alcohol and high stress from his day at work. At around 13, I think I had a nervous breakdown. I couldn't go to school no more. I missed an entire year and was in and out with different shrinks. My entire family was against me. They would stay up and talk about what a liar I was and that I was just faking the entire thing. 

By next school semester, I was fine. I think when I was around 15 they split up and I actually was so happy I couldn't hide it. But she took everything we had so for a time while I was the only child in the house, I took care of my dad as he fell into some sort of depression. But he started dating someone he has known for many years and she soon moved in. Suddenly there were rules and more rules. 

At 18, I moved in with my boyfriend who I knew soon off was not right for me but I was too stubborn and proud to crawl back to my dad's house. I ended up pregnant and we got married. He had to be the most abusive of all my relationships. He liked to choke me while having sex that progressed to the point where he wanted to choke me to death just so he can revive me. He used to scream in my ear until my ears would ring and he would hit me while we were in the car. But still I stayed until I met someone new at work and left him for this guy. I knew soon after we moved in together that this was a bad idea. He was a spoiled child. I was getting the strength to leave him when I found out I was pregnant. For at least 6 months I slept on the couch and we didn't talk while I began an affair with my ex husband. 

I was suicidal and began abusing myself and the baby I wish would die by not eating and doing as much physical things as possible. But then it all lifted and I really tried to make the relationship work. He was too into his tough love crap. Making me cry and breaking all my things and then saying it was all to teach me a lesson. After about 3 years, he left me for someone else and I had to live with his parents. I got really bad here.

Soon after, a good friend killed himself and I tried the same. For a year there was me not eating, drinking like a fish, on a first name basis with half the police force, and trying to kill myself everyday. I was in and out of the hospital 4 times in that year. This is where I was diagnosed with BPD. Was I so angry with this label. Ok, at first I was happy it was called SOMETHING..but all the stigma attached to it, made me angry. I didn't want this! I felt like a freak, especially when I went to the emergency room once just for a migraine and they treated me like a mental patient. They had guards on my door and talked to me in that motherly voice. I'm a person here! 

During this year I met the guy I'm still with. I put him through hell. But he got me back. So, all in all. We are about even these days. He fucked everyone in town and so didn't I. I knew this was a problem when I sat down at a table and realized that I had fucked every single one of them.

I was ready for change. I found God the year after and it really changed me around. I went off meds, no therapy, I held a job, I could pay my bills..I felt cured. But 2 months ago, things all fell apart and it triggered it all back. But this time I willing to change and work on myself. I'm with a guy who cares and loves me and wants to see me through all this and I'm sick of how this illness rules me. I want to feel normal. I want to know what the hell that feels like! I'm sick of all the crazy mood swings, and how when I do something wrong I have to punish myself with out even thinking..BAM! You're bad!

I like to slap myself or cut my wrists just to feel the pain. (this is real, I think as I feel a new pain) my crazy thoughts that I so believe and cause me to lash out at others, how I can't seem to like anyone..I have to put them down, I think I hate everything..is that possible? how I hate myself so much..how I don't feel worthy or good enough..how I cant trust or relax...how damn dependent I am..how sometimes I don't even know what I want just what someone else wants..how I don't know myself no more. Me or my feelings..are they real? Is it me or this illness?? I don't want to be a walking illness no more..I don't want to lick everyone's boots anymore so they wont leave me..or lose myself because I did something bad and I'm trying to always make up for it...Who am I anyways? What is real and what is just this damn illness??? Am I even there underneath it all? If it was taken away, would a person be there? Just an empty shell? or maybe just a little girl? I don't know anymore. All I know is I'm sick of it ruling me and ruining everything and everyone around me. I'm 28 years old and I want it all to end. I want to be normal. Can I be?

Story # 52

My mother couldn't get pregnant they said, and the five times she tried, she failed.  The sixth time, she didn't fail I still wonder why sometimes...

It was a hard pregnancy, she was in a hospital for six months.  When I was three years old, my parents divorced.  My father with a nervous break down, throwing himself in his work, and my mom with the start of what turned out as anorexia nervosa.

After some years, my mother found a new love.  He was very tall and broad built.  Everything seemed okay at first, and they got married.  But within a year he started drinking, and he got very abusive (also sexually).  He started to beat my mother up, and at night I would fall asleep hearing her scream.

This went on until my 12th birthday. I began a court case against her, because I wanted to live with my father. It was hard, because she took it very personally, I just wanted out. The court case went on for one whole year, I did win eventually, and my mother lost custody over me, so I left to move in with my father.

After 3 months 'I must have been around thirteen by now' my father fell in love with a woman who also had two kids.  One girl was 3 yrs younger than me, the other was 1yr younger, but severely autistic.  Suddenly where there  was peace and space to come to peace with the past, there was a whole crowd, plus a child that needed more attention than me.  I never got along with them, and there where many vicious fights.  I guess I couldn't accept that I had to share my father with her and after 9 months I decided to run away from home.  Looking back on it, it was the most stupid thing I could have done.

I ran away at 13 living in several squats, but still remained in contact with my father.  I got into a youth helping program and after a while they placed me in a youth house in Denmark (Odense).  I had a great time there, I met other kids with the same anger and fear and I felt at home.  I also lived with one of those kids in a foster family there for some months, It was great!  But I had to go back to Holland as the regulations said, this was very painful.

Back home I started running away again, and met a Turkish busker called Orhan.  He was very nice and understanding to me, and I sat many night beside him.  His girlfriend and him decided to take me home, they contacted my father and somehow arranged for me to stay with them legally.  The woman Elly had a 6yr old daughter called Sora she really looked up to  me and I loved her, Elly and Orhan were great, and I  finally felt like I was living in a family and being wanted, I thought I finally found my place. (Somehow I started doing self injury for the first time.)  After approximately six months Orhan got into trouble, his Visa had expired, and he had to go back to Turkey.  Elly and Sora went with him, and so did I, but the government made a problem out of that, and I had to come back to Holland.

I moved in with my father and stepmother again.  I was really depressed for some time, and hung around a lot with a guy called Joost who really listened to me, and he made it all a little better somehow. We did a lot of self injury together.  At 16 after a bad fight with my stepmother, I called up Joost, and we decided to run away.

We were planning to go to Amsterdam, but while hitching decided to go London.  On the boat we met a Scottish busker called Dave, he was hitchhiking as well so we decided to hitchhike to London together.  When we were in London, we decided to go with him and we ended up in Scotland (Kelty).  We stayed at his house for a while, and played around with a lot of drugs, I don't really remember a lot from this period, we spent our days cutting on each others arms and taking every drug we could get hold of, drinking and sleeping.  All I can remember clearly was calling my dad to tell him I was OK,  because I felt guilty towards him, as he was the only person I cared for.

From Scotland we traveled with Dave to Belgium (Antwerp) he said he could make better money there, because the terraces were great this time of year, and we went with him. We met some punks and lived with them, it was a time full of breaking rules and anarchy.  In the late summer in Antwerp, I met a guy called James he was a 26yr old busker and I fell totally in love with him, I met him and the next day I moved into his place.

James was into very mysterious things and used a lot of drugs like LSD and XTC and Heroine.  We made the plan of traveling through Europe and went hitchhiking one day with two English dudes one of them called Jimmy and the others name I can’t remember right now.  I had totally forgotten about Joost, and didn't even tell him I was leaving. We ended up in Luxembourg were we met some street kids, and lived with them for a while.  When everything got to chaotic we went to France where we met a group of 14 Germans with 7 dogs who where traveling as well, we jumped trains, and even got evicted out of France; but managed to hitchhike back into France by hitchhiking in groups of two.  We said to meet each other in some town I forgot the name of, from there we hitchhiked in groups again to a place I remember being called Pavilion (but I'm not sure). There we met 4 other travelers under a bridge, their bus had broken down. One of them, was an English guy called Zed with a dog, who was called Spliff; the other English guy was a happy guy called Terrence (Terry) and the two others where a couple. The guy was German and the girl American, I don't remember their names.

We hitchhiked all to Pavilion Le Plage ( the sea-side) and we lived on the beach it was a great time, but after a while the police found out, and sent us away. The Germans decided to go home.   Zed, The Couple, Terry, and I went hitchhiking again. We ended up in Gruisan a little sea- place at the south of France, and I  remember this period clearer than the others, I don't know why.  We slept under bridges, and played music for money at night. Terry and I fell in love secretly, but we never did anything with it. After a while the stress in the group became too much, and James, Terry and I decided to go back to Antwerp.

In Antwerp, I realised I had not had a period and I got a test, I found out I was pregnant. I really wanted to see my dad then, and we all hitchhiked to Holland (Groningen). We stayed a month at my fathers home (the three of us); where we decided to move to Ireland, and so we did. My son Chavez was born two days after my own birthday, 14-02-96, in Mullingar. It was hard for me, because I didn't know what to feel, or how to be a good mom.  I started to freak out a lot, my moods began to show very clearly and in reaction to that James started to use a lot of drugs. Terry and I began to grow very close at that time, and James realised this. There were a lot of fights, physical ones also, between him and me.

At the beginning of 1997 I decided I had enough, and I went back home. I stayed with my father, and he helped me to get a house here.  James followed, but things only got worse,  and I missed Terry.  The relationship completely ended by march of that year, and James went back to Ireland. Around the end of April, being 19 yrs old  I went back to Ireland again,  because I started to miss him.  The stress of it all was too much, and I almost ended up dead.  With blue marks on my throat I returned to Holland.

On my own, in Holland, it was pretty hard, many lonely nights full of crying and questions. Questions I've never got an answer to. I started to fall back into the punk scene somehow, and I met a guy called Jasper.  We fell in love and I think he was the first person I trusted (besides my  father). Somehow I began to long for a steady life, but then something happened.  Chavez went to James for one month, and I went to Antwerp to clear my head.  I worked 12 hrs a day, and I began to drink again.  Jasper visited me there.

After a month James called me, and told me I would never see Chavez again.  The owner of the Irish-pub in Antwerp felt so sorry for me;  he bought two tickets and I flew to Ireland (Dublin) the next day.  He would join me a week later.

In Ireland, I found a chaos and a pain, I would've never imagined to feel.  I was told that I had sexually abused Chavez and beaten him up as well, (this hurt so much).  I never had laid a finger upon him.  I had always been afraid that I would end like my mom.  This was my worst nightmare, the court case that followed lasted seven months.  In that seven months, I started drinking so much that once I actually overdosed on whiskey and ended up in hospital. No one from home came to help me; not my mom, not Jasper, and not even my dad.  I do not remember ever feeling that alone. Jasper eventually broke up with me over the phone.  Which somehow made me feeling less again.  I somehow won the case, and went back home with Chavez.

Arriving at the airport, my father and Jasper and mother etc. were there.  Jasper held a rose in his hands, and hugged and kissed me, telling me he missed me.  Everyone acted as if they had given up the world for me, but the truth wouldn't leave my head.  Jasper and I tried to build up something for a while, but it didn't work out.

After that, I don't think, I've been able to 100% trust a man again in a relationship.  I guess there's just been too much pain.  I've had some relationships after him; some short and some lasting a little while, but every time they end because I start getting into moods and push them away.

I'm 23 yrs old now, and I know I have bpd.  My life has become easier since I found out.   I'm learning a lot about myself, and I'm starting to accept it.  I'm beginning to realise why my life has turned out this way, and why I did these things. I know I'm only on the first step of an enormous staircase, but I feel as if a whole new world is opening up to me.  One that I could learn to understand.