BPD Isn’t the End of the World Except for When It Is
Navigating the polarised good v evil binary dystopian hellscape of 2020 isn’t easy when you have Borderline Personality Disorder. Then again, nothing is easy when you have Borderline Personality Disorder. The world must be either good or bad, right? It can’t be both, at least not simultaneously.
When the COVID pandemic hit and the world went into lockdown, a part of me felt vindicated. At last, my paranoid apocalyptic predictions of the 21st Century no longer seemed so farfetched, hysterical and pessimistic. The world had finally, irrevocably proven itself to be bad, right? As if that wasn’t proof enough, we now had a whole new band of assholes to hate, with the Anti-Mask and Anti-Lockdown crew serving as yet more proof (not that I needed it) that western civilisation had become so self-interested and self-destructive that it had finally reached critical mass and all it would take was a global crisis to make the whole thing explode. My worst predictions had finally come true, proving that I wasn’t the paranoid and pessimistic one, but rather everybody else was blind and naïve. I had been proven right. Right?
Maybe so. At least, that’s certainly how I interpret things sometimes. Usually on the days when I don’t get enough sleep and decide that a balanced breakfast consists of three consecutive cups of coffee, two beta blockers and nothing else. On other days, I can look at the world and decide that things aren’t so bad after all. Maybe I do look good in that selfie I posted. Maybe I am a decent writer. Maybe that boy will text me back. Maybe I won’t die alone, and maybe the world isn’t such a hopeless, joyless pit of existential terror. Or maybe it is.
BPD is an ugly illness. It makes you see the bad in everything that you saw the good in just a moment ago. Your perception of friends, family, yourself and the entire world can flip in an instant, just when you thought you had found stable footing and caught your breath. It threatens friendships, relationships and your own physical health, and there isn’t a medication regimen that can ‘treat’ it as such, although antidepressants and other medication can help treat the symptoms of depression and anxiety that almost always accompany the disorder.
I was diagnosed with BPD two and a half years ago, and I wish I could say that the last quarter of a decade has led me to truly understand the ins and outs of my illness, but that would be a lie. I have read books and articles. I have spoken to psychiatrists, psychologists and random people on the street. It pains me to say it, but most of the time I feel as though I am no closer to truly understanding how my silly little brain works.
However, if this pandemic has allowed for one thing, it’s a crapload of introspection. I have ‘found myself’ about twelve times in the last eight months and lost myself even more times than that. I have gotten to know my brain in the way I would get to know another person, never truly being able to predict how it will behave but learning to recognise its quirks and habits. I have learnt to cherish the intense feelings of love and compassion that I feel when I care deeply about someone and detach myself somewhat from the obsessive fear that they will abandon me at any moment. I have learnt to feel exhilarated rather than exasperated by the way my thoughts race at a billion miles per hour whenever I am trying to write an article, poem, novel or essay, translating wonderfully coherent, erudite musings into mindless word vomit in the blink of an eye.
Maybe the world is dying. Maybe mankind is ultimately bad. Maybe I overthink and give too much merit to my pessimistic assessments of the world. When it comes to BPD, the only certainty is uncertainty. As my mental health journey continues I know that this rollercoaster will probably have a few more sharp drops ahead, and maybe it will even threaten to derail at some point. It’s 2020, and the best way to cope with it all is to hang on tight, scream (into a pillow or into open air, either works) and hug your friends (current social distancing measures permitting). And if all else fails, Microsoft Word is always ready to receive a new bucketful of word vomit.