BPD and a huge list of comorbidities

Hi @GayBPDmale,

It sucks that you are struggling so much at the moment. I am a 39 year old woman with BPD and I have been tangled up in the mental health system for 20 years. I really wish you could find the support you are looking for. I know first-hand what a profound difference good support can make. I don't have any "family and friends" but I have a great GP and I have just connected with an awesome psychologist (after a horrendous year of eight failed attempts!).

I truly believe that the help you seek exists, but I know how very VERY difficult it can be to find it. I have had so many awful experiences with various mental health professionals and the cost puts a lot of the potentially good ones out of reach. I wish I had an answer for you. Sadly I don't, but I want you to know that you are not alone in your struggle to find good support.

Personally, I have found that reading up on my various diagnoses and their treatment has been really helpful. For example, I have never formally done DBT, but I bought the DBT treatment manual and read through it myself. DBT is a very skills-based therapy for BPD and the skills are explained very clearly in the manual. For me, I found this just as useful as spending thousands of dollars going to a group just to have a psychologist teach exactly what is in the manual. I know that that approach wouldn't be for everyone, but it worked for me.

I think we are very blessed to have a wealth of knowledge at our fingertips with the internet. The reason I see a psychologist is primarily for social support and advocacy. We both know that she isn't going to teach me some radically new emotion regulation skill that I don't already know. I think it's important to see mental health professionals as just one tool in the tool kit. An important tool - especially if you are socially isolated, but only one tool nonetheless. I only started posting on this forum a week ago, and I'm adding it to my tool kit as an avenue for social support. I hope you are able to feel supported here too

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@Former-Member Hi,

Wow, your story sounds a lot like mine. As I mentioned in my other post I don't have the "family and friends" thing either. I had no meaningful connection with my family of origin, and I have neither a partner nor children. I found your comment about therapy/medication only being effective if one has family support really interesting. I asked my psychologist just the other week what "getting better" actually looks like, and whether I can really ever create a life worth living without close relationships. I accept that I am simply unlikeable and I have a remarkable talent for hurting people such that they walk out of my world. I no longer have any expectations of having the family and friends thing. My goal in therapy is to be able to gain and sustain employment (I've had two major workplace incidents). My hope is that if I can achieve this, then the human interaction I may get through employment will be sufficient to meet my relatively low need for connection. I'm not sure if it will though, or whether one really does need some deeper relationships to feel ok.

I do find it depressing that everywhere I turn, the message seems to be that the support of friends and family is key to living well with mental health issues. Still, I do feel a bit better having FINALLY found a good psychologist and also having a GP who "gets" me. I know they are both acutely aware of how socially isolated I am, and they are both working hard to make up for my notable lack of friends and family. So...even though it sucks being so alone, I actually have a little glimmer of hope that I may yet create a life worth living.

I could also relate to your comment about therapists regarding you as a curiosity due to the complexity of your situation. I have had some horrendous experiences, especially in the past year. I have developed a theory that the more a therapist tells me how experienced they are and how confident they are that they can help me, the quicker it all goes arse-up!!! They start off thinking they have all the answers, and then as my story unfolds they really start to shift until we get to the "I'm sorry, I don't think I'm the right person for you" spiel. I am SO relieved to have finally found a good match in a relatively young and inexperienced psychologist who knows she doesn't know it all and thus is committed to putting the effort into knowing more! We have now had four sessions and I feel much better than I did a month ago. I only wish that everybody could find that good match.

Maybe I'll see you around the forums @Former-Member

Thanks for the honest responses. I have spent a lot of time educating myself and also researching DBT and other therapies. I like the fact that you guys are at least real about it. I don't think a lot of people understand the reality of having serious mental health issues and not the money or support network to back it up. Unfortunately I suspect that there are many of us and we aren't well advocated for, we are the dregs that fell through the net, mind you that net is loose and the gaps are huge and I also think we represent some form of shame to the industry itself, god forbid we don't fit into their framework of recovery.

@GayBPDmale I think you are right that many people with BPD fall through the gaps. Happily, this is changing at least a bit compared to what it was like when I was diagnosed 20 years ago. Are you aware of the Australian BPD foundation? There are at least some people out there who "get" it and who are working hard to break down the stigma around BPD.

I agree that cost is a MAJOR barrier to being able to get good support. I am extremely fortunate in that due to the nature of some of my history, I am able to access funded sessions through a program run by the NSW government for victims of crime. That is the only reason I was able to keep therapist shopping through this past gruelling year. Otherwise I would have given up for sure.

I hope that just knowing you aren't alone, will help you to feel at least a tiny bit better.

I'm hoping that being on here and I guess chatting to you guys and knowing im not alone will help.

In terms of not having friends I would say that I have just been very fortunate to have the ones I have, they are a couple and they are amazing, they aren't your run of the mill people, they are very special so in that respect I have been exceptionally lucky. I would say to anyone who thinks they are unlikeable or unloveable unfortunately most people just want 'things' from you, so if your perceived to have nothing to offer except heart ache and hardwork most people see you as worthless, pointless or just 'too hard'. I see this as a failing of human nature and particularly western society and not a failure of yours. Unfortunately it doesn't make it easier but I will say there are a handful of people and Im talking a tiny handful, less than what will self promote that will still choose to stick around and still see you for who you are behind it all, finding them however is probably like striking gold and I have been very lucky. I would also say Australia is absolutely terrible and very far behind in treating BPD. I have had contact with Australian BDP Foundation, to be honest I was disspointed with my interaction with them, I won't go into the details but I felt like it was a very 'backyard' organisation, although I have seen at least they finally have improved their website. I know they are run by volunteers so I guess expecting anything is unreasonable but yeah I was underwhelmed by them.

I'm hoping that being on here and I guess chatting to you guys and knowing im not alone will help.

In terms of not having friends I would say that I have just been very fortunate to have the ones I have, they are a couple and they are amazing, they aren't your run of the mill people, they are very special so in that respect I have been exceptionally lucky. I would say to anyone who thinks they are unlikeable or unloveable unfortunately most people just want 'things' from you, so if your perceived to have nothing to offer except heart ache and hardwork most people see you as worthless, pointless or just 'too hard'. I see this as a failing of human nature and particularly western society and not a failure of yours. Unfortunately it doesn't make it easier but I will say there are a handful of people and Im talking a tiny handful, less than what will self promote that will still choose to stick around and still see you for who you are behind it all, finding them however is probably like striking gold and I have been very lucky.

I would also say Australia is absolutely terrible and very far behind in treating BPD. I have had contact with Australian BDP Foundation, to be honest I was disspointed with my interaction with them, I won't go into the details but I felt like it was a very 'backyard' organisation, although I have seen at least they finally improved their website. I know they are run by volunteers so I guess expecting anything is unreasonable but yeah I was underwhelmed by them.

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I can't see a psychiatrist it just isn't going to happen (down to dollars). I have maybe 6-7 appointments left with my psychologist for the year and I don't doubt her skills but I think even she is starting to understand that everything we do is something i'm already doing or have done before. I think she is really good for basic 'managment' and nice company, she has at least made efforts to link in with my GP and has also tried to assist in referrals so she is much better in those respects than what I have experienced previously.

I too have had some work/education on the otherside of MH and I too have heard both professionals and educators saying the most horrific things about borderlines. Although when I worked in the UK in a resi-rehab unit they were far more compassionate and educated and would discuss the borderline patients in ways that were no different to the other patients. So I do think Australia is particularly bad in terms of stigma within the industry and it's severley perpetuarted by the educators here.

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