h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I got diagnosed with BPD after I decided I couldn't trust myself not commit suicide or at least try and commit suicide and end up dying slowly as my organs failed in great physical pain ontop of all the emotional sh!te and had myself put in the psych ward... That's when I found out that BPD existed and reading the bit about in the DSM-IV I agreed with diagnosis, because at the time all i was was a collection of all nine criteria [to varying degrees].

http://www.psychnet-uk.com/clinical_psychology/criteria_personality_borderline.htm

Turns out she wanted to see my dad to say that I'm a hopeless case and there's nothing they can do for me. It's great to be loved.

Is that an exact representation or perhaps a negative misinterpretation through your eyes?

I say that because I have sometimes seen things as X when they mean Y. But because I always look for the worst in situations I would immediately take a negative explanation about things.

Could it be that the school is saying they don't have the facilities to give you the help you need and so more specialised help is needed from an external source?

Doesn't stop you feeling that you are being rejected by them as they can't help though.

I actually don't know anymore. I'm probably misinterpreting it, but which ever way, they can't help me.

Sorry, that last post may have sounded patronising. If someone had said that to me 20 years ago I would want to hurt them or hurt myself!

It has taken many years of therapy for me to see the difference between someone saying 'they can't help me', and me translating it as 'I can't be helped'.

Don't worry about being patronising.

People keep asking me if I'm 11, now that is patronising.

I have found that, in the event of the ned to hurt myself, locking myself in my cupboard and taking five or six paracetamol sometimes calms me down. But sometimes it doesn't and then I go for the blade anyway.

You shouldn't take 5 or 6 paracetamol - in some cases as few as 10 can cause irreperable liver damage. (and that is not a nice way to go; before you say 'so what')

When I feel like that I take a sleeping pill and hope I fall asleep pretty darn fast (fortunately the ones I have are very strong).

When I was at work then I would go out for a fag and pace up and down with speed. By the time I had finished my fag then I would have walked off the initial urges and could then control the remaining anger/stress with more constructive things, like cleaning the lab or scrubbing the kennels out.

Different stuff works for different people, but finding something that you can do anytime to express the feelings you have really does help. I often say to myself that if I still feel like cutting after I have done X,Y or Z then so be it. But usually by that time that I have done X, Y or Z then that crisis feeling has passed.
X, Y, Z could be anything - you have to find what works for you.

Yeah, last night was bad. I cried, shut myself in my cupboard, punched something (can't remember what, I was in that detached mood) and then went for the blade. But I'm okay now.

I haven't cut myself for about a month, and I haven't gotten drunk or used drugs in about two weeks.

The reason? Well, partly this site, actually, but also partly because I have been 'seeing' a guy I like.

I don't mean seeing as having sex with, or even really going out with, but just meeting up to talk and go to the movies. That probably doesn't seem like much, but I don't really have any friends. I'm not particularly unpopular, I get along with everyone, I just never really wanted any friends, at least not in the last few years. I've been known to deliberately stop any friendships because I prefer to be by myself most of the time - but it is just nice to know that someone likes me and likes to spend time with me.

I just haven't felt the urge to reach for my knife lately.

Wow, hate to open up a dead thread again...I posted here before under a different UserName, just there's a few things I have to ask.

With left handed people do they tend to cut on the right hand side of their body, and vice versa?

Has anyone else found that the shame and self loathing induced when found out unintentionally triggered another cutting session?

I ask the second question because I was found out by an acquaintance of mine last month, and it triggered. I was in a play and had to be painted green to the elbow. When I was being painted green, the woman who was painting me noticed the first day, and looked at me without saying anything. I knew that she knew, but I also knew she wouldn't say anything. She didn't let anyone else paint my arms for the rest of the run of the play. On the last night of the play, someone asked if I'd got all the green off, and pushed up my sleeve before I could stop them. They then proceeded to make a huge fuss about it, telling everyone else that was in the room, thankfully only 2 people who I trusted not to say anything to anyone else. But this triggered a session because of the shame I felt at being discovered.

I just wondered. Thanks.

Doesn't sound terribly healthy; I agree.

I wonder if it's a distraction from emotional pain. The problem with this is that distracting yourself from your problems is both ineffective in itself and won't make them go away.

If it's a cry for help... well I hate the way that people mock one another so much that people feel the need to self lacerate in order to get attention.

I think it's less of a distraction; more of a release of built up tensions, perhaps.

Often, people say 'bottling up your emotions won't make them go away', but metaphors just describe; they do not prove or explain.

Self harm creates physical pain and damage - I can't see how this would get rid of mental pain. When I get upset, there is no way to release it; I just destroy it by destroying the source of misery. I don't go and self lacerate or go on rampages.