Introducing myself? Well here I go.

I’ve never been good at introductions, but here I go.

was diagnosed with autism when I was 11. Oh christ the stigma! Went through a couple of traumatic events growing up, but like - we never spoke about it. Mental health was always a hushed subject.

I’ll always remember when I was 16, I started trying to harm myself as I just felt so full of emotions and needed some way to release them. My mum spotted them and went on about “people will think somethings wrong”

well, no shit. Something was wrong with my life and I had no one around to talk to about it.

got diagnosed with depression and anxiety when I was 20. Saw a couple of psychologists throughout the years, tried multiple antidepressants and it felt like I was kind of surviving, but only just?

flash forward to 2020, when I was 30.

now, covid didn’t really make any difference for me, fortunately. So that wasn’t a trigger. However, life got bad and I ended up seeking hospital admission for my mental health. Trying to explain to my parents why I did so was one of the hardest discussions I’ve had in my life.

When I was there, for three long months, they diagnosed me with Dysthymia - chronic depression. When they later told me it would be lifelong, I felt like it was a life sentence, I’m stuck with this shit for life.

End of last year, I just felt that something wasn’t right. I’d have weeks where I’d feel on top of the world and made weird decisions (I woke up one morning and decided I wanted a tattoo right there and then! It’s not an awful one, but that’s not like me!). I ended up getting linked with a community mental health program, and got on the wait list to see a private psychiatrist, as turns out the public mental health services? They weren’t taking on anymore patients - that’s what they said anyway. Like seriously, what the fuck do they expect people to do. ACT Health - do better!!

And then whilst I was dealing with all these new changes, my GP practice closed down, so I had to find a new GP - thankfully the whole practice has a focus on both mental health and chronic health conditions, so I personally take that as a good thing.

Ok, so a few months go past, and I have my appointment with a psychiatrist. He asked me a few questions, and then “it sounds like it’s possibly bipolar 2”

and then after talking a lot more, it was confirmed bipolar 2.

I’m surprised how well I took that news. My mental health worker and I spent some time looking up information, which helped me understand it much better (and spoke about these forums, but I wasn’t too sure about it at the time!) and I felt kind of ok, still had my depressive cycles pretty badly but I got through it.

Then last month, my depression got awfully bad. My psychiatrist and I had previously had the conversation of if I felt like I was in danger, present to the emergency department etc. It was a Sunday night, and I really didn’t want to inconvenience anyone by getting them to drive me there, and I finally asked my mum. She cried, I cried, eventually got to ED, and admitted to the hospital yet again.

felt like a bit of a failure as here I was once again needing psychiatric care.

The day after I was admitted, they called my mum in to have a “family meeting”. The two of us were talking about how my sister (AMAB/MtF) has both autism, and borderline personality disorder.

The doctor turned to my mother and said “actually, that’s what we believe PixieSolstice has”

Excuse me, what? They had barely talked to me beforehand and they’ve gone and gave me a new diagnosis behind my back? And this is how I find out?

Spent the next few days crying a lot over it. I knew BPD had a lot of stigma around it, and I’ve seen what my sister has been like, growing up. I know no two people are the same, but it just didn’t add up! This can’t be me. I started doing some research on my own about it (not the greatest idea when you are an emotional wreck, just saying 😉) and noticed a lot of the symptoms overlapped with autistic traits in females.

The doctors didn’t see me for the rest of my week’s stay, so I tried explaining all of this to the psychologist in the ward. She still tried telling me that I must have BPD. Which then made me upset again. Not a good week!

Both my mental health worker, and my psychologist seemed suspicious of the BPD diagnosis as well, and didn’t believe it. Which brought me hope.

Went to see my psychiatrist the other week, and mentioned all of that. He understood where I was coming from, however wants to talk a lot more about growing up and my sister etc next session and I have this suspicion he might suspect a dual diagnosis of BP2 and BPD or even just BPD. On the good side - he’s so knowledgeable and easy to get along with!

So yeah. There’s what’s turned into my life story. Questioning all my mental health issues currently. It’s a weird ride called life right about now.