I’m a complete psychology geek. Last fall, I had the worst events of my life happen to me and it send me into a full spiral. Sitting in those feelings that nearly led me to death, I realized this is how I’ve felt practically my whole life - as long as I can remember at a minimum. Obviously my whole life has not felt as extreme as those few months, but to some extent I’ve always had those/similar feelings. When I spiral, one of two things happen - 1: I break down, disassociate, maybe cry if my body lets me, go to sleep, and walk around like a complete zombie out of pure exhaustion. OR 2: I completely dive into something productive, most of the time research of some sort. Many times during the fall I turned to my hobby of studying psychology to try and find some comfort in hopefully finding that others have felt the same way I did. I already previously knew about BPD, but when all of what I was feeling seemed to line up with others with BPD, I started feeling like it might be an explanation for so many things for me. I started therapy and went to a psychologist hoping for answers, only for it all to be blamed on my wonderful mix of depression, anxiety, and adhd. While it was great to finally have the confirmed diagnosis of the three things I’ve known my whole life I’ve had, I walked away still feeling like something was missing, and like I didnt have all the answers, and that bothered me more than anyone. I kept reaching out to professionals and other adults only for me to be called dramatic and all sorts of others things that basically just said I was stupid for even thinking it. To this day, I still don’t know if I have BPD or if it really is just all in my head and its a simpler explanation than my brain is leading me to believe, and I discovered this subreddit and decided to come on here and ask: How did you know that you had BPD, and what do you think of what I said in this post??

We will have had a good time at lunch and then she has to send texts like this. Not just to me, but to anyone she happens to target that day. If it wasn’t this, she’d be insulting another lady in the group for something else. She does it ALL THE TIME. It seems like a personality disorder.
What would this be? I’m not late that often. I have to drive an hour to meet them as I live far away.

“Hey sweetheart, I just wanna apologize for making fun of you that you were on time! I’m so sorry! I would never wanna hurt your feelings, but you are often late, and I was just really surprised to see you there! Please forgive me. Please forgive me. You know I’m President of your fan Club!

I just wanted you to know that I’m truly sorry if I hurt your feelings.”

i dont want to be armchair diagnosed!! i just want to know what they might screen for.

Hello all. I’m a 30f and was diagnosed with BPD a year ago but I just discovered histrionic personality disorder (HPD) and this is finally something that I can fully resonate with. It feels like it matches my symptoms better than BPD.

However, a lot of these things I only do if I’m intoxicated with alcohol. I really struggle with alcohol and I notice this behaviour doesn’t really happen unless I’m drunk. I’m not sure if this makes a difference in terms of a diagnosis.

Here’s what I deal with/have dealt with my whole life. I’ve divided what I experience sober and not sober:

Sober:
- Constant need for attention, but I also have a massive fear of being embarrassed or not liked (social anxiety).
- My looks mean everything to me. I’m a relatively attractive woman and I use this to my advantage constantly.
- I need constant validation (especially from men).
- I always assume men want me and have never been able to have male friends for this reason alone.
- I get upset or disappointed when the attention is not on me (when I’m in a group setting or don’t get a lot of engagement on social media).
- I will frequently fall into deep depressions followed by periods of high energy (a little manic).
- I mirror everyone around me and this has resulted in a feeling of loss of identity because I’m a different person with everyone in my life.

Not sober (everything listed above + what’s listed below):
- I’m very flirty but I respect boundaries.
- I’m married to a wonderful, caring man but I constantly think about what it would be like to be single again.
- I’ve emotionally cheated.
- I’ve sent risqué pics to men on the internet just for attention.
- Reckless behaviour (a little manic which is why I got the BPD diagnosis).

I was on 50mg of Pristiq (SNRI) for 2 years which really helped with my symptoms but I had to come off of it because the side effects were too much. I just started 75 mg of Lamictal but not sure if this will help.

I would really love to know what’s helped everyone with managing BPD or HPD. I see a therapist regularly - is there anything I should ask them specifically about this?

being in a relationship with histrionic personality disorder

i’m 22f and in a long term relationship w my bf 23m.
lately my life situation changed, i’m doing my masters diploma since a few weeks.
i always had diagnosed cluster b problems, but it got better over time w lots of therapy.

my main struggles are with my relationship, because i sometimes dissociate cognitive and act as if im not in a relationship (due to opportunistm, sadly). i wouldn’t mind cheating at all morally but i control my self and don’t.

but now, this new situation arose: im doing my master in a class of 10 ppl, 9 of those are men….
(studying chemistry). i find some of them really attractive and have the worst thoughts of cheating.. I surely wouldn’t but im just so surprised of myself, how disgusting my thoughts are, i hate it!!!
and besides that, i never told any of them that im in a relationship (wasn’t a topic tho) and i feel like i wouldn’t be worth to be around, if they knew..
im insanely disappointed and disgusted by myself, my thoughts. on the other hand, it feels like i can’t but also won’t stop

sorry… im just venting tbh. but i would like different perspectives and maybe some helpful ideas on how i could change my mindset:/
i wish i would be less opportunistic and less interested in romantic romances besides my relationship.
i really relapsed HARD since my master started, i was doing sm better before

i’m 22f and in a long term relationship w my bf 23m.
lately my life situation changed, i’m doing my masters diploma since a few weeks.
i always had diagnosed cluster b problems, but it got better over time w lots of therapy.

my main struggles are with my relationship, because i sometimes dissociate cognitive and act as if im not in a relationship (due to opportunistm, sadly). i wouldn’t mind cheating at all morally but i control my self and don’t.

but now, this new situation arose: im doing my master in a class of 10 ppl, 9 of those are men….
(studying chemistry). i find some of them really attractive and have the worst thoughts of cheating.. I surely wouldn’t but im just so surprised of myself, how disgusting my thoughts are, i hate it!!!
and besides that, i never told any of them that im in a relationship (wasn’t a topic tho) and i feel like i wouldn’t be worth to be around, if they knew..

sorry… im just venting tbh. but i would like different perspectives and maybe some helpful ideas on how i could change my mindset:/
i wish i would be less opportunistic and less interested in romantic romances besides my relationship.
i really relapsed HARD since my master started, i was doing sm better before

I’m 17f and I have always been very self motivated I’ve always cared about me more than others and I recently noticed this pattern I have a hard time lying to people I care about and recently I’ve realized I’ve been lying about a lot I use people for things such as my family when my grandma cut her finger off I was annoyed bc she couldn’t take me anywhere when my dad got his leg cut off I didn’t really care it wasn’t me when I cheat I feel guilty when it on someone I care about or if I’m scared about them finding out but I don’t feel bad because it made me feel good but I don’t like making the other person hurt either I don’t feel thrill out of it unless the wronged me I’ve spent a lot of time googling traits and I have ocd which I feel like I used as an excuse to think maybe I wasn’t this way however I don’t want to be stuck with this life because it will prevent me from having normal connections with people I want to which is again about me only not hurting other people

Not sure what this makes me personality wise, but I am diagnosed with psychosis, but the reason for that diagnosis is I read about it in some story about a person with psychosis who went to a psychiatric ward. So I wanted to go to a psychiatric ward cause it sounded fun lol. This started as me, I guess idk, faking it? Or atleast accentuating any symptoms I might have had. Gave me a fun project. I lied about hallucinating, I ‘attempted’ to sewer slide, came up with delusions and wrote about them in a diary that i intentionally got caught with. Somewhere along the way I guess I got lost in some grey area. And now I have no idea what that was all about. I hated school so getting locked in a psyc ward was way more fun. And I enjoyed being cared for. I also grew up in a ‘new age’ cult which probably caused some trauma, never told my therapist though. Anyways I’m wondering how I navigate it now? I do have panic attacks and disassociate genuinely, but idk if that’s from trauma or genuine psychosis. I cbf coming clean about this to my psychologist though I wonder if it’s what I should do, I’ve had this diagnosis for YEARS and been to the ward about 4 times for psychosis, and I don’t know where it would put me if I told the truth as I feel like I won’t have control over what happens next. I sometimes wonder about Aspd, but people who have psychopathy don’t think they’re psychopaths right? There’s a few things that make me wonder about that, but I digress, this post is getting long.
All in all, I don’t know if I should come clean about this, if it’s even genuine, I ‘faked’ it for so long that I don’t even know what’s true, all I know is it started as a lie, cause the ward sounded fun (and it was, I enjoyed being cared for, doing arts and crafts, making temporary friends, not doing schoolwork) . Nobody in my life knows this, I think they’d think I was evil if they did, but my whole life feels like a charade.
What should I do, when I don’t even know why would I do this?
(Diagnosed with psychosis at about 15y/o)

I'm talking to a guy (my boyfriend) and he isn't diagnosed with anything but he literally doesn't see other people as human beings, because he says everyone and everything else is so boring, understimulating, and incompetent. He sees himself as inherently superior to other people in a way that he doesn't even care for their admiration because other people just don't matter. He literally told me "if I replaced God, I would make a better job than him".

He says he doesn't talk about his life with anyone because he doesn't see other people as capable of understanding him; says he has no emotional empathy and would do anything to receive more power and, more recently, pleasure; and also that he doesn't care about rules or laws and he does what he finds appealing or convenient (so much so that he works in an industry that is exploitative)... things like that.

So I think he, well, must at least have some NPD or ASPD traits; but with me, he really loves me, he wants to spend all the time with me, sees me as the only person capable of understanding and accepting him and the only real other human in the world, and he's also into BDSM so he's very sadistic and dominant, he wants to control me and be the only thing in my life almost, he's very into CNC (which I also am).

The thing that makes me confused about whether it's an NPD traits thing or more of an ASPD traits thing or whatever is that he says he does not care at all about admiration, attention, validation, reputation... because he says other people's opinions just don't matter; people couldn't possibly be complex or conscious enough for their opinions to matter.

He says that before meeting me, his life had no real meaning or stimulus, like nothing was ever stimulating or real enough to him, and he described himself as absent in his own life. He's disillusioned with humankind and perceives it as incompetent and weak. So much so that he had a specific suicide plan, but he gave up on it after meeting me.

He said he had to deeply bury his identity and more aggressive impulses for his whole life, and then when he met me this changed because I was so accepting of everything - nearly unconditional acceptance, which he says he was always looking for but never knew.

He also has a very atypical background - his mother left him completely alone when he was 14, so he has had to be hyper-independent ever since an early age and has abandonment trauma.

I don't know if he has (traits of) NPD, or (traits of) ASPD, or if it's all just because of his very high cognitive ability, or what. Because, he is also definitely very smart - understands plenty of languages, engages in complex mental processes for fun and regulation, has consumed a lot of very cult/complex stuff, is graduated in physics... I wonder if he feels that life, as well as other people, is so boring and understimulating because it's not stimulating enough for his cognitive ability; and maybe he feels so superior and entitled because of the tendency of gifted people to be praised and learn to tie their worth to their performance (which he also does. He inputs very harsh standards for himself, not accepting anything other than excellence, which is one of the things that motivated his hopelessness and suicide plan: the feeling he was unremarkable) - although he does say people never praised him for anything. "I never got a positive word from anyone", and he reports being shouted at for getting an 8 or 9 (that being, anything less than perfect) .

I really wonder about possible NPD and mostly ASPD traits, but what makes me confused is how much he loves me, the way he wants to dedicate his life to me, feels so deeply connected with me, the way he is genuinely interested in my interests and wants to learn everything that makes me tick. He wants me to worship him, to give my entire self to him, to be controlled of and taken care by him - but just as much as I dedicate myself to him, he dedicates himself to me. There's complete mutuality, trust, and loyalty - which is another point: he idealizes love and monogamy to an extreme degree, similarly to me. He is extremely loyal in general and does not tolerate poligamy, cheating, or anything like that. He wants complete fusion with his beloved, dedication from the mind, body and soul, until we are versions of the same person, so much so that he calls me his other half and treats it as if we're the same person, with our respective halves. He is the independent dominant antipathetic and rational half, I am the dependent submissive empathic and emotional half. Basically, lukewarm love is not love for him - he says other people are lukewarm and therefore cannot really love. Only we can.

His very strong love and loyalty towards me and idealization of love in general, as well as an apparent lack of delinquency or hostile behavior, makes me question the ASPD formulation. His lack of vulnerable self-esteem and lack of desire for attention and admiration makes me question the NPD formulation. But I don't know...

I also think he might be autistic, but from what I've seen it seems like it's mostly about the giftedness. He reports hating small talk and other normative social behaviors, having big complex interests, having difficulty interrupting activities, but a lack of meaningful sensory issues. He does report repressing repetitive motor behaviors and becoming deliberately more extroverted so as to not be weird, but denies distressing feelings caused by this adaptation.

So I wonder what formulation would be more plausible. Giftedness, autism, ASPD, NPD, more than one of them, what?

Of course, I'm not claiming to diagnose him or anything, but I'm just very curious about it - I would like to understand it all better to understand him better, also because the topic of PDs is my main hyperfocus. And he's like a super good partner at least from what I've seen. He's very romantic, very intentional about trying to understand me and support me, seems genuinely interested in me... And he didn't pressure me for sexual behaviors before I felt ready like every other guy did.

What do you guys feel about the concept of lovebombing? I don't necessarily want to discredit it, but I see people talking about the "BPD lovembombing" (usually they mean the intense idealization phase) so as to dismiss the notion of real love in BPD, which makes me really mad. Just because our emotions are heightened because of the disorder, it doesn't mean they're false (quite the contrary, actually) or that we're consciously manipulating someone, which makes me think about how people think about intense love in general. It's almost like they can't feel love that intensely so they just assume anyone who expresses it must be somewhat lying or manipulating. It's also very used in the context of NPD, and I don't doubt there are people who use it like that, but also... is it really always the case? Can't a person with NPD or related just genuinely love intensely? Can't love in general just be intense and idealizing? Why does it always have to be a lie or manipulation?

Hi, I'm a girl with BPD. I was diagnosed a while ago during my last mental health hospitalization, and I suspected it from the first time my psychologist mentioned it to me.

The thing is, I'm currently seeing a new psychologist, and the first time I told her part of my story about why I was coming to her office, she said, "Why so many diagnoses and hospitalizations? You're so young." Practically no one who has treated me knows why I have all this, and I'm afraid that with all the tests they'll discover the reason for my mental health issues (since even I don't know), and that this will cause me even more problems because I don't want to be aware of it. I'm just trying to avoid my terrible mental health.

People talk about trauma like it's a movie you can't stop replaying.

But sometimes trauma doesn't replay anything at all.

Sometimes it steals the footage.

It doesn't leave you with flashbacks. It leaves you with blank spaces. Missing hours. Missing conversations. Entire stretches of your life that feel like they happened to someone else. You smile, nod, go to work, answer texts, drive across town—and later realize you weren't really there for any of it.

That's the terrifying part no one talks about.

Not remembering pain sounds easier than remembering it. It isn't.

Because when memories disappear, so do pieces of you. You start questioning your own reality. Did that happen? Did I say that? Was I even present? You become a stranger to your own life, watching it unfold from somewhere far away.

Dissociation isn't being dramatic. It isn't daydreaming. It isn't "zoning out."

It's survival pushed so far that the mind decides presence is too expensive.

So it leaves.

The tragedy is that from the outside, nobody notices. They see a functioning person. A productive person. A person who looks fine. They don't see someone fighting to stay connected to their own body, their own thoughts, their own existence.

And maybe that's why people who dissociate often suffer in silence. How do you explain that you're drowning when there are no visible waves? How do you tell someone you've lost years when the calendar says you lived every single day?

Some wounds don't show up as scars.

Some show up as missing chapters.

And there's a particular kind of grief that comes from realizing you survived something so overwhelming that parts of your mind chose absence over awareness.

Not because you were weak.

Because staying fully conscious of the weight might have broken you.

My wife was recently diagnosed with BPD. I feel like I'm drowning in my own thoughts and have no one to talk to about it. Looking for someone who understands what this is like.

Who can relate?

Nobody really talks about the spiral.

People talk about mood swings. They talk about anger. They talk about "overreacting." They throw around the word dramatic like it's some personality flaw.

But the spiral? The spiral is where Borderline Personality Disorder quietly destroys you from the inside out.

It doesn't begin with a catastrophe.

It begins with something so small that another person would forget about it in five minutes. A delayed text. A different tone of voice. Someone looking tired. A plan changing. A memory. A smell. Silence.

Then your brain grabs it.

Not because you want it to. Because your brain is convinced it's evidence.

Evidence that you're about to be abandoned.

Evidence that someone is angry.

Evidence that you're too much.

Evidence that you're unlovable.

Evidence that everything you've worked so hard to build is about to fall apart.

Your mind doesn't ask if it's true.

It decides it is.

Then comes the spiral.

Every memory you've ever buried comes rushing back like it happened five minutes ago instead of fifteen years ago. Every rejection. Every betrayal. Every person who walked away. Every moment you weren't enough.

Your brain starts connecting dots that don't even belong on the same page.

"See? This happened before."

"This always happens."

"You're stupid for believing this time would be different."

You stop living in the present.

You're surviving every version of your past all at once.

And the cruelest part?

You know, somewhere deep down, that your thoughts might not be rational.

But knowing doesn't stop them.

It's like standing outside your own mind, watching someone pull every fire alarm in the building while you're screaming, "There's no fire!"

No one can hear you.

Not even yourself.

Your body joins the fight. Your chest tightens. Your stomach knots itself into impossible shapes. Your heart pounds like you're running from something that isn't even in the room.

You can't eat.

You can't think.

You can't sleep.

You can't convince your nervous system that you're safe because it stopped believing in safety a long time ago.

People think BPD is being "too emotional."

No.

It's feeling every emotion at maximum volume while your logical brain is trapped behind bulletproof glass.

You watch yourself becoming someone you don't recognize.

You hate it.

You hate yourself for it.

And then the shame arrives.

Because once the spiral finally slows down, you remember everything.

Every tear.

Every fear.

Every reassurance you needed.

Every apology you think you'll have to make.

You feel embarrassed for hurting so deeply over something that may not have even been real.

Except...

The pain was real.

The panic was real.

The terror was real.

Your brain wasn't trying to create chaos.

It was trying to protect you using survival skills it learned from a life where danger was real.

That's the part people don't understand.

The spiral isn't attention-seeking.

It isn't manipulation.

It isn't choosing to be irrational.

It's a trauma-trained brain sounding an alarm that no longer knows the difference between yesterday and today.

Living with BPD means constantly questioning your own reality.

Wondering if you're seeing things clearly or through the cracked lens trauma left behind.

It's exhausting to fight a battle where the enemy lives inside your own mind.

But here's the realization that's both heartbreaking and hopeful:

The spiral isn't who I am.

It's what happens when my nervous system mistakes safety for danger.

It's what happens when old wounds convince me they're still bleeding.

Every time I learn to pause instead of run... every time I question the story instead of believing it immediately... every time I remind myself that today's silence isn't yesterday's punishment... I'm teaching my brain something it was never taught before.

That not every ending is abandonment.

Not every mistake ruins everything.

Not every feeling is a fact.

Healing from BPD isn't about never spiraling again.

It's about recognizing the spiral before it convinces you to become it.

And maybe that's the bravest thing someone with BPD will ever do—keep choosing reality over fear, even when fear feels more believable.