Okay, super long post incoming. Warning for discussion of emotional abuse, self-harm, and suicidal ideation. First off, my actual diagnoses. Aside from autism, I'm diagnosed with ADHD, generalized anxiety disorder, and, most glaringly, rapid-cycling bipolar II. The thing is, I'm starting to wonder if maybe some of those diagnoses were inaccurate. Specifically, I've been wondering if I might have borderline personality disorder. Worth noting is that I do have a history of emotional abuse (at the hands of teachers, particularly my first grade teacher, and arguably some now-former friends--more on the latter group later). I also check off a majority of the diagnostic criteria for BPD. Let's go down the list. Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment: Yes. VERY yes. This may have been sparked partially by an incident when I was 17 or so, when the girl I'd considered my best friend began to spread rumors about me and broke off our friendship with no warning at all, but I've always had some fear of abandonment. A pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by alternating between extremes of idealization and devaluation: Not quite. I do have a lot of trouble with unstable interpersonal relationships, but I don't do the splitty thing, usually. Identity disturbance, such as a significant and persistent unstable self-image or sense of self: Eeyup. I frequently find myself wondering if I'm even a real person, and often feel the intense need to reinvent myself entirely. Impulsivity in at least two areas that are potentially self-damaging (e.g., spending, sex, substance abuse, reckless driving, binge eating): Spending and binge eating. The latter might just be a tendency to overeat when emotional, though. Worth noting is that I have pretty severe impulse control issues in general, in all sorts of areas, but not all are necessarily self-damaging in and of themselves. Recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, or threats, or self-mutilating behavior: YES. I frequently self-harm, more as a sort of punishment than anything else--essentially, "I am a bad person and deserve to hurt." I've also struggled with frequent thoughts of suicide, and have threatened it on many occasions. Emotional instability due to significant reactivity of mood (e.g., intense episodic dysphoria, irritability, or anxiety usually lasting a few hours and only rarely more than a few days): To the extreme. I flip between intense anger and crippling depression and incredible joy at the drop of a hat, and it's rare for an episode to last longer than a few days--I don't think I've ever had one last more than a week. Chronic feelings of emptiness: Not sure. I do frequently feel worthless and like my existence is totally pointless, like I'm just a waste of oxygen, but I'm not sure that is what they mean. Inappropriate, intense anger or difficulty controlling anger (e.g., frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights): YES, so much. Transient, stress-related paranoid thoughts or severe dissociative symptoms: Yes on the paranoid thoughts, quite frequently. Dissociation is rare, but happens occasionally. I check off seven of the symptoms for sure, as you can see. Diagnostic criteria requires at least five, IIRC. And it'd explain a lot of my problems. The thing is...my psychologist is utterly convinced I don't have it. Granted, she's a psychologist rather than a psychiatrist, but still. Her perception of the disorder seems somewhat confused, since she seems to think it's entirely about manipulation--and while I can be manipulative, it's not my default state. I'm definitely gonna ask my psychiatrist about it, but...yeah. So what say you, Kintsugi? What is up with me, in your opinions?
Definitely check with your psychiatrist. What if you brought in the DSM entry for your psychologist, with all of your above comments & additions? (Also, this is the first time I've read this entry, and depending on interpretation of points...I definitely account for five, and might account for seven of these points. ...fuck.) I can see how your psych is confused, though, since rapid-cycling bipolar seems closish to some of the points for BPD Does anyone know if there's a comorbidity for ADHD and BPD?
That's a good idea, actually. I think I'll do that. My understanding is that bipolar disorder and BPD are often comorbid themselves, so that might complicate things. There's also a marked comorbidity with ADHD (a full quarter of borderline patients also meet the criteria for ADHD, apparently) and anxiety disorders.
Sounds pretty BPDish to me. And psychologists can be really bad about it, because they're afraid of it, because they don't know that treatment for it is now a thing.
Sounds like BPD to me as well. I'm diagnosed with that, severe anxiety, bipolar disorder and a variety of other things. I understand the confusion though, because so many of these things have similar symptoms, and depending on the shrink they might have different interpretations.
