Being one of those people who can be highly sensitive to perceived insults, it would make sense to take it personally when a professional diagnosed me with a personality disorder. Heck, the whole point I’ve been trying to make to the world since puberty is that I am an inadequate ratbag of a girl with no personality worthy of love, acceptance or respect.
But on the contrary, it opened up a box of understanding and as I learnt more about Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) I came to feel relief to have some explanation behind my emotional instability. That’s actually the explanation, in a nut shell – having BPD basically means you are emotionally retarded. A social retard (sotard) is defined as someone who has no idea how to act or communicate with others appropriately, but does not get embarrassed because they are unaware of their own deficiencies. An emotional retard (emotard) is just a similar deal, different issue: an emotard is defined by yours truly as someone who has no idea how to handle their emotions or control destructive thought processes which cause such emotions, but does not recognise a problem with the way they cope or think because, having only experienced their own mind, they are unaware of their own deficiencies.
That is, until someone points them out and sticks a label on them, then hands you a list of symptoms and possible causes which all seem to be in accordance to everything in your mind and life.
Here are some symptoms which I have found match my characteristics and behaviour:
Deep feelings of insecurity
· Difficulty coping with fear of abandonment or loss and frantic efforts to avoid such things.
Nothing scares me more than losing someone I love, or someone deciding they don’t want to know me. My ‘frantic efforts’ mean I will pretty much do anything to make you not leave me. Yes, I am el-desperado.
· Continually seeking reassurance, even for small things.
I get super-dooper worried if you look at me like you hate me, even if maybe you were just frowning cos the sun was in your eyes. Especially in relationships. E.g. I’ve been called a ‘bitch’ [apparently] ‘jokingly’ but have ended up in tears over the comment.
· Expressing inappropriate anger towards others who I consider responsible for how I feel.
I kind of disagree with this, because while I do get fuckin agro and extremely catty when someone double crosses me, I believe it is well in order.
· A fragile sense of oneself in the world.
Why is my name Laura which means ‘victory’? Why have I become an only child due to an unforeseen road accident? Why was it her and not me? Does everyone love me or does everyone hate me, or are they just fascinated? Or do they even think twice about me and all my fuckedupness at all? If I have no family around me, what is the point in being on this earth?
Persistent impulsiveness
· Abusing alcohol and other drugs.
Why the hell not? I have BPD.
· Binge eating.
Yes, I am aware that I am 5’3 and weigh 47kg. But I LOVE food, as long as it’s not my parent’s cooking. And I will eat as much of it as I can. I haven’t mentioned that chronic feelings of emptiness is another trait of BPD, but this will cover it. Maybe I eat so much to acquire some kind of fullness. I’m just lucky that I have a fast metabolism. Maybe I could even compare it to an evolutionary or adaptational type of thing, like how plants cleverly develop those extra features so they can survive in arid conditions and stuff like that.
· Spending.
In worse off times when it was Monday and payday wasn’t until Thursday and I’d have $10 left on my card, I would have rather purchased the pink tab-top curtains on sale than staple food to ration out to myself for the next 3 days, just because I might use them one day.
Unstable and intense relationships
· Idealisation of potential friends at the first or second meeting.
If you’re nice to me, I tend to think the sun shines out of your ass even though I don’t even know what kind of dickhead two-faced biatch you may be. Further description of this trait usually points out that a BPD sufferer will demand spending a lot of time with you and/or share extremely intimate details with you early in the relationship. I would like to:
a) disagree; and
b) agree with both points respectively as:
a) I’m not a sotard; and
b) I’m sharing intimate details of my mental condition with possible strangers right now.
· Switching quickly from idealising people to devaluing them.
Once you do something which I perceive as ‘dogg’; you’re in the bad books immediately. I do apologise. It just goes back to the bullet point ‘Difficulty coping with abandonment’. I’m terrified that you don’t care, and start to believe that you don’t.
If there are people so emotarded, it has to be for a reason. But that is another story, for another post, best left to another day as it currently be that time of evening where I am alone on a Friday night and chose not to be ‘mindful’ (mindfulness is part of the object of the Dialectical Behavioural Therapy I am currently undergoing; but that too is another story for yet another post on BPD), and partook of some prescribed negative-emotion-numbing drugs. In other words, I need bed or something to eat.
Friday, August 7, 2009
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
To Inflate One's Ego By Diminishing That Of Another
23 July 2009
I shall refer to him as Mop, because that is what I would like to use his head as. However, it might be a bit difficult getting the corners. What a useless Mop head.
Some of the things Mop said to me today:
“Do you think about me when you’re together? Hahaha, I bet you’s do!!”
“Do your parents know what a piece of shit their daughter is?”
“You just need to get over your sister's death. I have mates who have lost everything and they still get on with their lives.”
“I don’t know what it is, if it’s something you’ve done or cos of your ex; I dunno. But your name is tarnished. Fuckin tarnished. No one has anything good to say about you.”
“You need to be with some Aussie c*nt like a public servant or something.”
“You’re a fuckin dumb c*nt, dude.”
“You’ve always been depressed. I never knew if you were gonna neck yourself one day; I couldn’t deal with that shit, man.”
“No one gives a fuck about you. I cared about you more than anyone else did.”
“You have completely disrespected me, you little bitch.”
“I guarantee one hour with me and you’ll have you whole life straightened out.”
“It’s not that I want you, Laura. Trust me, if I wanted you I WOULD have you, believe me. I can have ANY bitch I want.”
“Why do you live in a fantasy land thinking your life’s OK when it’s shit?”
“That’s not very nice, to hang up on me.”
“You’re a twisted bitch. You always were.”
“You have been raised with no culture, no morals, no family. You have nothing like I do.”
“Your life’s a fuckin mess and you’re never gonna fix it.”
“Don’t you understand? Every c*nt respects me. I walk into a club packed with heavy c*nts and they bow down to me. And I have a bitch disrespect me like this?”
“If you hang up on me again I’ll come to your house, kick down your door and burn it down with you in it until you fuckin die.”
"I've worked so hard for my image, and now you've ruined my image."
“God created us to know the difference between right and wrong. You’re fuckin retarded.”
“I’ll fuckin kill you, you twisted c*nt.”
“I’m sorry Laura, I didn’t call you to make you cry. Honestly, dude. Don’t cry.”
Fuckhead.
I shall refer to him as Mop, because that is what I would like to use his head as. However, it might be a bit difficult getting the corners. What a useless Mop head.
Some of the things Mop said to me today:
“Do you think about me when you’re together? Hahaha, I bet you’s do!!”
“Do your parents know what a piece of shit their daughter is?”
“You just need to get over your sister's death. I have mates who have lost everything and they still get on with their lives.”
“I don’t know what it is, if it’s something you’ve done or cos of your ex; I dunno. But your name is tarnished. Fuckin tarnished. No one has anything good to say about you.”
“You need to be with some Aussie c*nt like a public servant or something.”
“You’re a fuckin dumb c*nt, dude.”
“You’ve always been depressed. I never knew if you were gonna neck yourself one day; I couldn’t deal with that shit, man.”
“No one gives a fuck about you. I cared about you more than anyone else did.”
“You have completely disrespected me, you little bitch.”
“I guarantee one hour with me and you’ll have you whole life straightened out.”
“It’s not that I want you, Laura. Trust me, if I wanted you I WOULD have you, believe me. I can have ANY bitch I want.”
“Why do you live in a fantasy land thinking your life’s OK when it’s shit?”
“That’s not very nice, to hang up on me.”
“You’re a twisted bitch. You always were.”
“You have been raised with no culture, no morals, no family. You have nothing like I do.”
“Your life’s a fuckin mess and you’re never gonna fix it.”
“Don’t you understand? Every c*nt respects me. I walk into a club packed with heavy c*nts and they bow down to me. And I have a bitch disrespect me like this?”
“If you hang up on me again I’ll come to your house, kick down your door and burn it down with you in it until you fuckin die.”
"I've worked so hard for my image, and now you've ruined my image."
“God created us to know the difference between right and wrong. You’re fuckin retarded.”
“I’ll fuckin kill you, you twisted c*nt.”
“I’m sorry Laura, I didn’t call you to make you cry. Honestly, dude. Don’t cry.”
Fuckhead.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Fire Fighting in 2009
Irony. I fucking love it. Love it like having my mouth burned by pizza cheese or tripping over in public when I’m by myself. It causes pain and finds a perfect, poetic way to humiliate me.
The thing is, I wrote ‘Poodles on Leashes and the Lack of Firemen’ long before the most browbeaten version of myself graced the lower part of this country; rather than after a triumphant survival of bullshit and deplorable treatment. Trapped in thinking I was with the person who would love me enough to rescue me from a burning room, little would I think that he actually would more likely ask me to throw his belongings and my money to him over the flames, grab a Lipton Ice Tea from the fridge and then say before departing, “It turns out you’re not actually that important to me anymore. Sorry. Really.”
So I got burnt, and the wounds have barely turned into scars. I also played with fire after that, trying to tell myself there was no way I’d get burnt again; this was the imbecile version of myself.
I thought of investing in a [metaphorical] fire-proof jumpsuit with cold-hearted seams and tough exterior. But I decided it just might be more practical, from now on, to not be too afraid to evacuate if there is ever that first sign of smoke.
The thing is, I wrote ‘Poodles on Leashes and the Lack of Firemen’ long before the most browbeaten version of myself graced the lower part of this country; rather than after a triumphant survival of bullshit and deplorable treatment. Trapped in thinking I was with the person who would love me enough to rescue me from a burning room, little would I think that he actually would more likely ask me to throw his belongings and my money to him over the flames, grab a Lipton Ice Tea from the fridge and then say before departing, “It turns out you’re not actually that important to me anymore. Sorry. Really.”
So I got burnt, and the wounds have barely turned into scars. I also played with fire after that, trying to tell myself there was no way I’d get burnt again; this was the imbecile version of myself.
I thought of investing in a [metaphorical] fire-proof jumpsuit with cold-hearted seams and tough exterior. But I decided it just might be more practical, from now on, to not be too afraid to evacuate if there is ever that first sign of smoke.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Poodles on Leashes and the Lack of Firemen
February 2008
There is a girl perched upon a bed in a cold room, alone and worried about how her hair might appear to others having not been styled correctly due to lack of tools; and what may the opinions of those others be towards her misplaced fringe.
“Who the fuck are you getting ready for?” he booms, and it is hard for her to tell whether he is joking or if he is actually angry that she is primping.
With hope in favour of him joking, she aims a cheeky “You, babe!” at him, but he just walks out of the room and slams the door.
With an eyelash curler and removal of smudged eyeliner, it is barely apparent that she is wearing last night’s makeup. Fakely fresh-faced, she pursues the door in order to join everyone else who is wearing last night’s makeup in the living room.
But he opens the door instead of her. “Stay the fuck in here. I don’t give a fuck if there’s a fire in here, you don’t leave this room.”
With thanks to a testosterone-fuelled display of violence in the living room, this is where it occurs to her.He finds her attractive enough to protect her delicate eyeballs from a violent exhibition of manhood, but cares not enough to save her from a burning bedroom.
There are some males out there who parade their female companions around. There are some girls out there who fail to distinguish between being a poodle on a leash and being someone’s partner.These men think that receiving respect comes without needing to give it. They don’t respect the girls they cheat on their girlfriends with, nor, needless to say, do they respect their girlfriends. Yet they demand to be respected and honoured like a golden knight, and far too often are given that respect of which they are unworthy.
These women try to fit the mould that their “masters” cast for them and are given a patronising “Good girl!” when they come straight home from work – that is, she is at home, not elsewhere nor with anyone questionable – cooks a scrumptious dinner for everyone and spends her spare time waxing unwanted hair from her upper lip or applying beauty-promising chemicals to her skin to make her even more attractive than she already is. After, of course, bleaching the shower and toilet bowl and scrubbing the dried food scraps off the inside of the oven, like all good little women do. She is to be rarely seen and never heard, unless chatting amongst the other women about the best way to remove lime build-up from underneath the vanity, how much they love their beloved or all the loving gestures they’ve given to their beloved lately.
It is these men and women who have their brains washed with the issue of gender inequality as being nothing out of the ordinary. It is usual for women to mature long before men, but in these cases, the women’s ability to use their own mind is stunted by routine emotional abuse and belittling, and the men completely fail to ever grow up.That is, however, unless the woman happens to wake up to herself and realise men who actually have the potential to get past the “woman as my servant” thing, do exist in the world.
The girl who sits upon the cold bed realises this is a glimpse into an abusive life. That is, it will be if she doesn’t get up and leave. Not right now, but when the risk of getting shot in the kneecaps dies down, she’ll be gone.
She believes there is a male specimen out there who would not have anything bad to hide from her delicate eyeballs, and would indeed rescue her from a fire.
There is a girl perched upon a bed in a cold room, alone and worried about how her hair might appear to others having not been styled correctly due to lack of tools; and what may the opinions of those others be towards her misplaced fringe.
“Who the fuck are you getting ready for?” he booms, and it is hard for her to tell whether he is joking or if he is actually angry that she is primping.
With hope in favour of him joking, she aims a cheeky “You, babe!” at him, but he just walks out of the room and slams the door.
With an eyelash curler and removal of smudged eyeliner, it is barely apparent that she is wearing last night’s makeup. Fakely fresh-faced, she pursues the door in order to join everyone else who is wearing last night’s makeup in the living room.
But he opens the door instead of her. “Stay the fuck in here. I don’t give a fuck if there’s a fire in here, you don’t leave this room.”
With thanks to a testosterone-fuelled display of violence in the living room, this is where it occurs to her.He finds her attractive enough to protect her delicate eyeballs from a violent exhibition of manhood, but cares not enough to save her from a burning bedroom.
There are some males out there who parade their female companions around. There are some girls out there who fail to distinguish between being a poodle on a leash and being someone’s partner.These men think that receiving respect comes without needing to give it. They don’t respect the girls they cheat on their girlfriends with, nor, needless to say, do they respect their girlfriends. Yet they demand to be respected and honoured like a golden knight, and far too often are given that respect of which they are unworthy.
These women try to fit the mould that their “masters” cast for them and are given a patronising “Good girl!” when they come straight home from work – that is, she is at home, not elsewhere nor with anyone questionable – cooks a scrumptious dinner for everyone and spends her spare time waxing unwanted hair from her upper lip or applying beauty-promising chemicals to her skin to make her even more attractive than she already is. After, of course, bleaching the shower and toilet bowl and scrubbing the dried food scraps off the inside of the oven, like all good little women do. She is to be rarely seen and never heard, unless chatting amongst the other women about the best way to remove lime build-up from underneath the vanity, how much they love their beloved or all the loving gestures they’ve given to their beloved lately.
It is these men and women who have their brains washed with the issue of gender inequality as being nothing out of the ordinary. It is usual for women to mature long before men, but in these cases, the women’s ability to use their own mind is stunted by routine emotional abuse and belittling, and the men completely fail to ever grow up.That is, however, unless the woman happens to wake up to herself and realise men who actually have the potential to get past the “woman as my servant” thing, do exist in the world.
The girl who sits upon the cold bed realises this is a glimpse into an abusive life. That is, it will be if she doesn’t get up and leave. Not right now, but when the risk of getting shot in the kneecaps dies down, she’ll be gone.
She believes there is a male specimen out there who would not have anything bad to hide from her delicate eyeballs, and would indeed rescue her from a fire.
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