Personality. "You have a great personality".
"One thing you don't lack is personality."
And as I am Irish an oft expression would be "Ah Neil is great craic", "Sure Foxy is a good skin."
Not to make out that I have no detractors, critics or those who might struggle to say a nice word about me, but I am pretty sure nobody would have ever thought I had a personality condition that was harming my life and affecting not just me but those close to me too.
Fond of a drink at times. He has his demons. Searching soul. Let's things get on top of him. Deep. But a gas character when he is himself....
But personality disorder...nah!
"You know about personality traits?" My psychiatrist asks me after a lengthy session.
I had been watching England beat Morocco in the first half of one of their games in the waiting area. Assuming an ordinary session was on the cards just as I assumed a win was England's too. I was right on the latter at least. Caught on the hop on the former. My boyfriend said afterwards, and probably rightly so "Just as well you didn't know what was coming..."
For decades I have had depression, at times severe and even profound, always there at best moderate. It is normally manageable, with some major flare ups but it's with me so long that I probably felt as I entered the psychiatrist's office in the hospital, that I knew what type questions and chat we would have. I knew I would be given the same prescription for the depression. I'd let him know about the progress in the last couple of months, about the weekly talk therapy I have committed to and the like.
I always feel the need to stress some positive in sessions as it can otherwise seem like a moan fest or drain me and I often think, probably wrongly, them also if I just focus solely on what's worsening, not improving or causing me problems, the chaos, the pain, the fears, the desperation of a mind at war with itself. I class myself as an eternal optimist, odd I know given my mind can be so negative and self destructive. But in the chair I think it is important to give some positive, and the good thing is I can always pluck some positives out without resorting to polly-anna syndrome or lies.
We would map out a little plan perhaps building on what's helping and looking at what isn't. We would discuss the suicidal end of things, something I always dread. It always makes me anxious as it's so hard to know what way to phrase things that will ensure I won't have Gardai coming running! It is something nobody says, but discussing being suicidal is a real tough one. We are told by every mental health campaign out there to tell someone but it puts an onus on them to report it, its a tricky area most of us don't fully understand and the notion that my thoughts need the attention of police just seems absurd to me. I will say yes I am still having suicidal thoughts regularly but not as bad as a few months ago. But aside from that, I am always an open book so I was not pre-empting what I would be saying to him.
An appointment with a psychiatrist is never something I see as just routine, no matter how relaxed I may be about needing to be under their care. However, I was not in the least worried about it. I was glad of the support and the profession which is unfairly maligned in my opinion.
Borderline Personality Disorder. I am glad he didn't use abbreviations, BPD seemed too casual, too glib for what was like a time bomb going off....
It has been 12 days now since the conversation. The consultation. Session.
On the tenth day I opted to press post on X, but until that moment I was in honesty shell-shocked and bewildered. Somehow, putting it out into the world is easier than telling people individually. That might sound ridiculous perhaps it is. I had just told two friends and Robert before that. It is weird as obviously it is something old not new, as in I have had the symptoms and issues for decades, but the idea of it being an actual disorder, a named condition just somehow floored me.
I sat in the park staring out at the trees.
It was a shock because it hits the nail on the head. It fits. It fits in a way nothing else ever has.
Today I walked the beach nearest me, glorious Tramore. I have walked it many times in many states of mind.
The psychiatrist printed off some information for me to read at leisure. Weirdly I did just that, I am a fast reader and avid scribbler on pages normally, always taking notes and drawing analogies. But these pages I held in my hands the other week sat on a bench in The People's Park, I read slowly, very slowly.
At least there is a cool song that keeps coming to my mind these last days as I digest the news that I have borderline personality disorder.
"Borderline feels like I'm going to lose my mind
You just keep on pushing my love over the borderline"
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