Memoirs of a Borderline

Reading other memoirs of people with borderline personality disorder has brought me to a place where I want to tell my story about my struggles with mental illness. It is hard to bring myself to write this because I am discouraged by the fact that people don’t want to hear a sob story, and maybe this memoir seems I am begging for pity. That is not what I want. I only want to share my feelings about what it is like to live with the disorder, among other disorders.

I have an eating disorder which affects my life. I was diagnosed with an “unspecified eating disorder,” which is appropriate because I have tampered with anorexia, bulimia, and over-exercising. I still function and do the things I need to do, and I also still eat, unless I am going through a particular stage where I have become more obsessive. When this happens, I tend to restrict what I eat, exercise a lot, and sometimes, make myself throw up. I have a fear of eating in front of other people. I always worry about the 9-5 job, one of my first thoughts being the pressure of lunch while at work. I feel judged, awkward, and almost like I am not allowed to eat in public. Secrecy is the only place I feel like I can feed myself.

Around two years ago was the strongest I had ever been affected by my disorder. I dropped down to ninety-five pounds on my five foot four frame. I was doing fasted exercise every day. I wasn’t eating meat, grains, or dairy. I was eating in very small amounts. I will never forget what it felt like to be lying in bed unable to sleep because of the hunger pains in my stomach. I would get up and chug a glass of water to subside some of this feeling and get what sleep I could. My breasts were gone, my periods had stopped. When I looked into the mirror, I saw a different person. In an abnormal way, it felt good to feel myself starving. It was like I was pushing myself to a new limit. My pants were barely staying on me. I was exhausted and burnt out every day. The sad part of it was, I was doing it to myself. I felt unsafe where I lived and living alone, and feared being judged by people I worked with. In a way, I was starving to lock people out. I didn’t want people to want to be with me or want to spend time with me. I felt it was a justification for selfishly living alone. Maybe if I starve, people won’t want anything from me and I won’t be taken advantage of because I am not even taking care of myself. In a way, I was starving to lure someone in. I felt inadequate because I didn’t have a romantic partner, which I craved. I felt I would break my fast when I found someone to date or be with. Maybe if I am tiny and small, I will attract a guy or not be frowned upon by society. I wouldn’t have to deal with body shaming. Part of me also felt superior to other people. It was like I was better than them for being able to resist food. They were normal, everyday people, while I was something different than that. I was unique in the way I wanted to starve. In some way, I felt as if I was doing the right thing because there are people who are starving in the world due to poverty.

I was hungry all the time, so I was constantly thinking about food. When I came home one night, I had been thinking about a Big Mac and was wrestling with the idea of going to McDonald's. I decided not to do this, but instead, I started to trash dive. This was my first time ever doing this for food. When you are starving yourself, and your mind finally gives up, all hell breaks loose. The second trash can I got to, a man in a pickup truck obstructed my plan, offered me a half bag of trail mix and a dollar. I told him I wasn’t poor or homeless and that I didn’t need his offer. Eventually, he drove off. I continued eating out of the trash that night, went back inside, felt so excited by this new discovery, changed, and went back out to hunt for food in the trash for a couple of hours. I took a bag with me and was trash diving and coming across food and bagging it and taking it home with me. Half-eaten burgers, leftover takeout, I even found a dozen of cage-free eggs!

I know what you are thinking. What is wrong with this person? Trust me, telling you what happened in my life doesn’t make me the proudest person either. I told my dad who was there to be supportive about this and he just encouraged that I stop. I believe my mom said the same thing. I decided to move home, and I decided to gain back my weight. I started to eat. My views changed. I was hungry for what felt like so long, that I decided I didn’t want to feel the hunger anymore. All I cared about was eating. A lot. Enough. To the point where I was allowing myself to feel full all the time. I decided I wanted to be strong again. I would work out when I got home from school before going to my job. I was doing a lot of strength exercises, with the mentality that I would build myself into a physically and emotionally strong person. Even if it isn’t blatant, I feel as if people around me lost respect for me. I feel my eating disorder has affected the way my family views me. They have seen me act in socially unacceptable ways because of it, and do socially unacceptable things. I can still feel tension between my parents and me because of the way I behaved when it came to food. You cannot take back the past.

I also suffer from generalized anxiety disorder. This disorder distorts the reality of my life and makes me a constantly nervous person. If I do not have to, I do not want to leave the house. In my off days, I’m at home or go for long walks by myself, and hold myself back from making social plans, feeling there will always be a negative consequence. I am paranoid and worry a lot about what other people think. If I do leave the house, I still encounter problems such as not wanting to eat in public. Now that I am older, nothing feels like it used to. I can’t bring myself to go see a movie alone or to run an errand without dreading it. Going to work isn’t so bad because it is something I have to do and feels productive. When it is just me by myself, it is hard to bring myself to do anything out of fear of what is on the outside. I feel as if I am an outcast of society now. I do not have great self-care techniques. I have no social life and have trouble finding hope in people who seem like they may be willing to be my friend. I imagine my life differently. Sometimes I desire death over living the way I do. If my boyfriend and I fight, the first thought in my mind is suicide. If I am really down, I do not want to do much more than lay in bed. Sometimes I pray for death.

I feel like I have never really known who I am, deeply, and there is a disconnect from the part of myself that is supposed to find my purpose in life. From what I have learned, this feeling is the criteria for borderline personality disorder. I have not been diagnosed with this disorder to its full extent, but was diagnosed with “borderline features.” My dad is a strong believer that I do have the disorder. Unstable and intense interpersonal relationships is a tendency of borderline people. I tend to put people on a pedestal and idolize them. One second they are my favorite person, then the next, I am extremely upset with them. Everyone around me seems so perfect. Their lives seem so great and they seem normal. Once I get to know someone, sometimes I tend to categorize that person as someone I really look up to. I think everything about them is great, and I want to be like them for these reasons. They become these ideal people and what they say goes, until there is a reason I may be upset with them. My relationships are not steady. I fight with those who are close to me and get really upset about very small things. When I think back to reasons I fought with someone or was upset about something, it all stems back to me, and it was usually my fault the fight even started in the first place. I have attempted suicide which landed me in the hospital. I had a relapse about a week later and tried again, this time not to the extent where I needed medical attention. Suicidal thoughts are still prevalent to me. Luckily, deep down, I know what I would be missing out on if I were to die. When I look at myself I always feel like I am the one who will always be on the outside looking into something which I could never obtain, a normal life.

The reason I say “normal” life is because I do not feel like I am like everyone else because I am disordered. I am a happy person. There are people who will always be there to support me. My mom, my boyfriend, and my grandma are immediate people whom I have a close connection with still. My dad and I are distanced right now, which pains me. I know deep down he cares for me and I love and care for my father. There are other people whom I don’t talk to as often but have had a strong impact on my life, and I think about them often even if we are not in close contact. My boyfriend has stuck by my side through my ups and downs, and he does not want to give up when it comes to our relationship. If I threaten suicide, he is there for me. If I am in tears, he is there for me. If I am screaming and being horrible to him because I am in a borderline rage, he is there. My actions ricochet off of him like bullets and I'm faced with his hardened persona which only reflects back to me the reality of how ridiculous I may be acting in that moment. When I get upset and swing my fists to hit him, it is like I am hitting a brick wall. Mentally and physically. I guess it is because he is from Southside, Chicago, and not much I can do will scare him. Sometimes it’s upsetting and hard for me to bear while I am feeling the volcano of unjustified feelings erupting inside of me. But usually, by the next morning, I have forgotten why I was upset in the first place.

For anyone empathizing with my feelings, it is cliché, but you are not alone. There are many people who suffer from all of the disorders which I have discussed. It is tough to have these issues. You are a stronger person for bearing the burden. There is always hope. Borderline people usually recover after going through dialectical behavioral therapy, which is treatment designed for borderline patients. The percentage is ridiculously high of people who show no signs of the disorder after recovery. Depression and anxiety can also be maintained with medicine or therapy, along with eating disorders. Knowing your triggers is important. Having a support system is also crucial. Sometimes it feels there is nowhere to turn. Doctors, counselors, licensed therapists, these people even have a hard time dealing with borderline people! Some therapists will not work with the borderline community. They find them too difficult to work with. In other memoirs I have read of people with borderline, some therapists have been extremely unprofessional with the patient. It is hard when the place you have to turn to or the help you should receive isn’t given. I feel many borderline people probably go through this, I know it has happened with me. There are other people in the world who know exactly what you’re going through. There are also many people who will accept you for who you are, even help you with what you are going through. There are going to be lows, but how amazing are the highs? I hope this memoir leaves you with encouragement that you can overcome any obstacles which you are facing.