Greetings

[hamstergirl]

:(

I'm hamstergirl.

I've been journalling here for about a month. If any of you have read it, it doesn't make for pleasant reading.

I've been officially diagnosed as BPD for one month, but I've had it unknowingly for many years. The psychiatrist who diagnosed me thought I'd be mad at her for doing so, but didn't want to hide the truth from me to make things easier.

Actually, the diagnosis makes a lot of sense, given how things have gone in my life. Unfortunately, it's the only thing that makes sense right now. Everything else is chaos, as those of you who may have read my journals already know. For those who haven't:

I have cerebral palsy and have had several surgeries as a result. I had behaviorial problems and was sent away at age 7 for "non-compliance" to a psychiatric institute that was little more than a dumping ground for defects. I lived there for one and a half years before they kicked me out for "refusing to be helped". Words in quotes are my parents' words for it. They're still angry about it and refuse to talk about it, as it's "all been done before." There was a lot of yelling in my house growing up. (My mother has depression, half my siblings have it, along with an uncle; my father is just plain screwed up. No one knows what's wrong with him because he won't admit to having any problems. He did most of the yelling.) Of course, I'm not supposed to say anything about this to anyone; private family matter.

Then things really got screwy when I turned twelve. They operated on me, messed that up big-time, then went in three times on my spine. It ruined me physically and left deep emotional wounds which I have buried for years, along with graphic memories and a fear of doctors.

After another operation seemed to go bad, I wheeled out on my parents because my father wanted instant pain relief from a surgery that removed an entire hip joint. Sorry, man, but one's body needs time to adapt to that sort of thing, even me. He didn't get it and got nice and mad. And I was supposed to stay quiet about it all. (He let me have it for talking to a nurse about how his anger was making me feel.) So I left. The controlling little Hitler tried to stop me but it didn't work and he's still mad at the man who encouraged me to move away...11 years later. My father need only look in the mirror for the reason his daughter's not living near him. I've been scared of him since I was nine. His yelling got so bad that I looked forward to being left alone in the house. I even enjoyed the hospital more than being with him. That's really pathetic, because they did terrible things down there to me to keep me going, stuff that left me emotionally scarred to this day.

I really need someone with me right now to cuddle, because my health has gone down the toilet. I need morphine to sit up, because it hurts so badly and I may need a surgical cathetar. For some bizzare reason, I want nothing to do with the medical profession. I wonder why?

I have lived in virtual isolation for 11 years. Only constant daydreaming kept me from the worst ravages of BPD and now that defense is gone. It kept all these awful thoughts away, like what a freak I am and how I deserve to be hit and yelled at and locked in small rooms. And of course, how lonely I am. How I want to die.

I've never had a real boyfriend. My parents flipped out at the first kid I had the nerve to call a boyfriend. I was 9 and the kid was very nice and came from a Christian family. We also happened to be patients together at the psychiatric institute. My parents wouldn't rest until I ended the friendship and I finally did, in part to get them to leave me alone and now I won't even consider a serious relationship, because I consider myself dangerously flawed, unfit to have a relationship. If I weren't physically AND psychiatrically disabled, it would be all right for me to have a boyfriend, a husband even.

So I'm reduced to tenderly kissing, cuddling and rocking a teddy bear I've had since I was 15. Kissing him over and over again, trying to ease the pain. I save the worst of it for when I'm out of sight, because anyone who saw me doing it would think I was sick.

Only two men at my church know just how much trouble I'm in: the parish priest and the man who sponsored me when I became a Catholic. The latter's name is Doug and I think very highly of him.

I see a pain clinic on Wednesday. I don't think they'll take me because I'm too screwed up mentally. So I'll be left in physical agony, alone. I'll be cowering in the back of the church for the rest of my life.

The more I read about BPD, the more scared I get. I'm stuck with this bloody disease forever, huh, just like everything else I'm stuck with. I've been alive for 18 years too long.

I'm so tired of everything. I just want to sleep.

Before you write back to me, know that it's just a matter of time before I isolate myself from this board too. I'm only writing here because Doug asked me to write every day and I need somewhere to write and someone who understands. (People say I'm bright and I'm a talented writer, as well as very loving.) This disease obviously cannot be cured.

DO NOT READ MY JOURNAL HERE IF YOU ARE EASILY TRIGGERED!!!!

[buoyantcat]

Hey hamstergirl. First, I'd like to welcome you to the forum/website. I'm glad you're here, and you shouldn't isolate yourself from here. There's nothing to be scared of here. So.......welcome aboard!

Now, I do have to strongly disagree with you saying that Borderline Personality Disorder is "this bloody disease" that you'll be stuck with forever. I also strongly disagree with your saying "this disease obviously cannot be cured".

I do not think of this so called BPD as a terminal illness because it most definitely is not! Now, I am a pessimistic person, mind you, but I do have hope! And you must have hope as well.

BPD is not a retched horrible lifelong incurable disease that makes me who I am, okay?? It is only a flaw in my personality and it negatively affects my social ability to cope. It most definitely is not who I am. I almost take personal offense to what you said, but not quite. Because I can understand and relate to some of what you are going through...though not all.

We all get in our nasty little ruts where we say negative things that we don't really mean....things that don't really express how we feel deep inside. So, I am assuming you are in one of those ruts.

Please take care, have hope, and keep writing and talking to your friend Doug.

Peace,

Christina