|
|
|
Symptoms/consequenses
|
|
Below follows a review of the consequences of the three separate disorders within borderline disorder and combinations of these disorders. As far as I can see, there are no consequences that are solely based on attachment disorder. | ||||||||
|
1 |
|||||||||
|
A |
|||||||||
|
2 |
|||||||||
|
A |
|||||||||
|
B |
|||||||||
|
C |
|||||||||
|
D |
|||||||||
|
E |
|||||||||
|
F |
|||||||||
|
G |
|||||||||
|
H |
|||||||||
|
I |
|||||||||
|
3 |
|||||||||
|
A |
|||||||||
|
B |
|||||||||
|
C |
|||||||||
|
D |
|||||||||
|
4 |
Arrest of the development + unfaniliararity with your own self | ||||||||
|
A |
|||||||||
|
B |
|||||||||
|
5 |
Arrest of the development + attachment disorder + unfaniliararity with your own self | ||||||||
|
A |
I don't understand how to handle other people, whom I like and why | ||||||||
|
B |
|||||||||
|
C |
if the other person doesn't give me any clues, I don't know what to talk about | ||||||||
|
6 |
|||||||||
|
A |
|||||||||
|
B |
|||||||||
|
C |
|||||||||
|
D |
|||||||||
|
E |
|||||||||
|
F |
|||||||||
|
7 |
|||||||||
|
Unfamiliarity with your own self | |||||||||
|
feeling empty Because I didn't learn to look inside, I don't know who I am. I can't link my own behaviour to my feelings within, that's only possible when I am able to acknowledge my feelings: 'I feel something', separate them from eachother: 'what I am feeling now is different from that other feeling' and when I can put a name to it: 'o, this is sadness I am feeling'. A long time ago I never came to step one: the acknowledgement of my feelings. Later I could do this, but then I couldn't take the second step. For me my feelings form one big heap of indistinguishable things and I can't find my way around in them. So that's why something that's happening outside can't be linked to a feeling within. And my own behaviour also remains very incomprehensible. I've never understood why things didn't work out. I tried, didn't I? I wasn't able to explain my own behaviour, to understand that what I did influenced others people's behaviour towards me. Incomprehensible why that friendship ended, baffling why I was bullied at school, and then not even to mention the very clear intelligence and on the other hand all failures on EVERY area of intellectual challenges: despite my intelligence I only finished (with ALL the things I started) preliminary school! I wasn't able to see what I did wrong. Other people reacted in ways that were really puzzling to me. Most of the times I was convinced that they were acting funny because I couldn't find the fault in myself, from other people I hear that they thought it was all their fault, but for us all goes that we didn't have any clue as to the reasons. | |||||||||
|
Arrest of the development | |||||||||
|
black-and-white thinking Since splitting doesn't stop, this black and white view on the world remains intact too. Something is black or something is white, I do something with all my might and perfect or I won't do it at all, something is absolutely fantastic or it's utterly disgusting, everything in my life is categorised this neatly. I have bosom friends but when people can't be bosom friends I can't call it a friendship. So of course I don't have acquaintances, because someone you only see once every three months, that's nothing really. But even bosom friends aren't safe: one small mistake, one tiny beauty mark and they tumble down from their pedestal and they have to try REALLY hard to get back on it again. And since most people don't want to try as hard as I deem necessary, I've lost many many friends. I can't accept less than perfection, not of other people but in many cases also of myself. | |||||||||
|
not being able to postpone things I want to have/do/buy As a little girl I am driven by my needs and desires. And since I don't have any control over my little girl, I feel so overwhelmed that I can't do anything else then go with it. And since I even didn't know what was going on I couldn't resist it. In some way it just HAD to happen. In the standard view on borderline this is looked upon as too much impulsivity. But with the idea of the arrest of the development, of my little girl inside, it's NOT so strange that I am so impulsive, because which child of two years old isn't? And who blames a child so young for being impulsive? | |||||||||
|
feeling irresponsible for myself and my environment I don't see any internal reasons to clean up my house, physical care isn't self-evident. Cleaning up the house costs a lot of energy and is against my own will. This also very understandable: that's the job of mum and dad, not mine. So if it isn't done, well alright, I will do it, but don't you think I am going to like it! Physical care also falls under this treatment, when you should brush your teeth or taking a shower is being arranged by mum or dad, as a two-year-old you don't have to occupy yourself with this. | |||||||||
|
sense of time This is also very understandable: a two year old child doesn't have a sense of time, so neither do I. Sometimes I can't remember what I did 5 minutes ago, people I met three days ago I can't remember, I forget appointments and I ALWAYS come late. In short: the short term memory of an average two year old! What also plays a role in coming late is the responsibility: if I have to leave at 11, I'll leave at 11. But then all the things I have to take with me still have to be packed, because that's not my responsibility really (but my moms or dads) so I didn't do it. Because they obviously didn't do it (as in many many other cases where they should have) I have to do it myself. Consequence: I'll be late. Also the time I need to travel isn't considered, possible delays, waits for public transport, not even how and in what way I want to go somewhere. And if I decide to go by bus, instead of with my bike, I have to look up which bus and where I have to get of. Always late. And looking inside for an answer to the question 'why' is no use, we know that now after point 1A, so I've always had to take the explanation others gave: 'you didn't want to come'. 'no, it's not that', but since I couldn't explain what it really was, they seldom believed me of course. Some other people tell me they aren't having troubles with time. I don't know if they really don't have problems or that they worked very very hard to find ways of overcoming this without a real inner change. | |||||||||
|
lack of concentration Sitting still for a long time and really do something, like a study or something, is almost impossible, I'm much too impatient for that. Ever seen a child of two years old sitting still? Longer than half an hour? Where where where :-) I think for the rest it is self-evident. | |||||||||
|
reacting too emotionally Children very often react much more vehement then you would have done as an adult, self control isn't really necessary in a two year old! Self-evident too I think. Also see under 4A. | |||||||||
|
dissociative phenomena Reality and fantasy aren't parallel: I am here but in my mind I am not: the automatic pilot answers. Little children do this too: sometimes they tell about something that happened but on inquiry with an adult it turns out that it happened differently: fantasy and reality are difficult to separate. Also things that happened on different times are combined. I now realise that this also has to do with the sense of time, that's also the cause that so many events are mingled together. | |||||||||
|
hallucinations Seeing things that aren't really there. This also happens with little children: they see a monster under the bed and they aren't there. An adult would say 'they aren't there', but for the child they are real. That's how this works too: a hallucination isn't indistinguishable from reality, for as long as it's happening anyhow. I always sat upright in bed screaming. I usually saw spiders and other scary creeps, most of the time monstrously big. Then the light had to come on, to look for myself it really wasn't there. Since I now where it comes from it has happened less and I am not so afraid of it anymore. Now I don't have them very often anymore and the hallucinations aren't this frightening, a bit weird at the most. | |||||||||
|
not interested in what other people do, unless it's something that relates to me or could relate to me The selfish child. I remember from years ago that we celebrated Sinterklaas (like Christmas, only in the beginning of December and without a tree), with family with two young nieces. I was terribly irritated with those nieces, they were not interested in what others got and they were hardly able to wait for their turn. That's how little children do it: their own world is the most important thing. What daddy does when he goes to work, no little child is interested in that. What mummy is doing when she has to leave for a little time, that doesn't occupy their minds for one second. It occupies them THAT they are gone, but why, no. But because for some part I DID grow up and I've learned certain things on the outside, I know that people don't like it when you don't ask 'how was work', so I ask it (but don't ask me to tell about it afterwards, because many times I find out half way through a story of someone that I have been sitting there mumbling hmm without really hearing what it was all about!). Being 'interested' in what Pieter does during the times he's not with me, isn't directly connected to me, but it does indirectly: when I ask after his day he likes that and he will still like me. Actually I hardly know what people I am seeing regularly seeing are like. I know what they mean for me, but what their hobbies are, what they like to eat or what kind of movies they like to see, I don't know THESE things, because they aren't directly connected to me. So I very often forget names of husbands, children, never know what to give someone for his birthday (if I have remembered the birthday in the first place!), those kind of embarrassing things. | |||||||||
|
Attachment disorder + unfamiliarity with your own self | |||||||||
|
feeling alone I always feel locked out, lonely, a spectator and an outsider. I am there, but I've never got the feeling that I fit in and I am never certain that another time I'll be as welcome. I imagine the following: I live in a castle, a beautiful old one. But I live there all alone. The castle is all empty. There is no furniture, there's nothing on the floors, the walls are bare. There are some built-in closets but the doors are ajar and the closets are empty. There are innumerable floors and rooms and everything is empty. Around the castle there's a castle-moat and of course there's a drawbridge and a heavy gate. Far away from the castle is a fence. On the other side of the fence are people. They are having a great time because I see them laughing and talking. But I can't understand what they are laughing and talking about. I can't go out and they can't come in. I'd like to belong with them. But I am an outsider. I am there but also I am not. So that's how it feels for me when I am in company of others, like they know something I don't, like they are talking about things I can't hear and if they are laughing it could be about a joke but just as well about me. That's no basis to trust you belong with people, now does it! And it sure doesn't give me the trust that I always will belong, also the next time. | |||||||||
|
only negative things can come in All positive things that are happening with me make no difference to how I am feeling. It's not coming in, it's falling into one big nothing and I don't know where it goes. Negative events confirm what I already know: I am worth nothing. So this is absorbed very eagerly, as again a proof that my parents were right. Positive things can't come in. Of course I can hear them but that doesn't mean I also believe them. Sometimes I do believe something but that's only for as long as it's happening. Sometimes when I feel comfortable around someone it's over as soon as I've left, I can't even remember how it felt at the moment it happened and it sure doesn't diminish my eternal doubts about the feelings of that other person for me. Like Pieter who stayed with me for over ten years, but I've never been able to pull any security out of this, I'm as afraid he'll leave me as I was in the beginning. And if we have a nice evening together it still doesn't mean anything. I've built myself a wall against positive things, or rather to that what I don't know. I don't know love, so that's filtered automatically, that can't come in. The negative things I DO know. They hurt and I'd rather not feel it, but this seems the only acknowledgement of the fact that I exist. So this can come in. | |||||||||
|
determine my own boundaries? Which own boundaries? I am NOT allowed to determine my own boundaries, what I would or would not want doesn't matter at all. I admit what others tell me to admit, because that's what I learned: if you know what to do, look at mummy and daddy, it's THEIR boundaries you've got to keep an eye on. To deviate from this golden rule means to lose a chance of their love, an unacceptable risk. So here follows automatically that I've never dared to explore my own boundaries. So even if I DID want to break the golden rule, I still wouldn't haven any idea how to determine my own boundaries. | |||||||||
|
on my own account I can't like something or make a plan To like something I need consent and/or approval. If other people disapprove I'm hardly able to like it. A plan is only plan when I've told it to others. A good thought, a great idea, a beautiful book can only be really good when I've told others about it, after which I can get consent (all in my mind though) after which I am able to carry the plan out or tell even more other people that a certain book is such a beautiful one. | |||||||||
|
Arrest of the development + unfamiliarity with your own self | |||||||||
|
reacting too emotionally I don't know what the appropriate reactions are to different situations, so I create my own reaction. But to show others that I am certain of it I overdo it. Everybody has opinions don't they? Well, so have I! Here, here's one of my opinions, see I've got one, see I'm normal, I have opinions! That's about the way this goes about in my head. A great deal of these opinions are based on what I rally find deep deep inside (although I wasn't able to make this connection before a long time: I've always thought: if I get better I'll be a completely different person!), but the way I was handling those opinions always was very spasmodically and too pointedly. Yes indeed, like I tried to prove something. But if you would have spoken with me about this in the period I was still doing this I wouldn't have known what you were talking about. Also see below 2F. | |||||||||
|
not being able to ask or accept help Either you do something or you don't, asking for help is cheating. So if something doesn't work out, I'll hand it over to someone else, I'll give over the problem and don't occupy myself with it any longer. Given help can't come in either: I can execute the given solution but I can't make it my own, it's not internalised. And of course the given solution never fulfils my subconscious expectation that when I ask for help I'll get exactly that solution I've been waiting for all my life, and the consequence is that I just execute the given advice or don't finish it at all, remaining unsatisfied in both cases. | |||||||||
|
Arrest of the development + attachment disorder + unfamiliarity with your own self | |||||||||
|
I don't understand how to handle other people, whom I like and why Manners aren't mastered as well. To determine whom I like would require that I could feel that inside, which I can't. So everybody is a bosom friend or an enemy. Acquaintances? That's a theoretical idea: or I am friends with someone or I am not. Someone I only see twice a year, I can't give a name to that, that's nothing. This is again the black and white thinking. And with that also comes that it's not up to me to give an opinion about whether or not someone is nice. If someone likes me, who am I to say 'this might be but I don't like you'. I'm nothing and nobody, I can't judge other people now can I? | |||||||||
|
not being able to contract/maintain a friendship To contract a friendship, I'll have to have an idea what I think is important in a friendship. If it went wrong (I or the other person broke contact in a more or less abrupt way) I couldn't find out why this was. My own part remained clouded. To be able to see what went wrong I should have had insight in what I do and what I find of what others are doing and this insight I don't have. Children are only starting to learn this when they are about three or four years old. | |||||||||
|
if the other person doesn't give me any clues, I don't know what to talk about Inside of me it's empty. So when it's left to me I can't find any subjects to talk about because I don't find anything important, because imagine that the other person thinks it's all nonsense! so as soon as another person gives me a clue I can talk about that, but my own subject......brrrrr NO! The fear for rejection is so deep that I don't even dare to develop own ideas. Clues for a conversation can be divers: only the proximity of someone can be enough, but it can be direct questions, or his appearance, or his clothing. Telephone conversations are very difficult because of this! | |||||||||
|
defensemechanisms: having control and being controllable | |||||||||
|
rehearsing I'm continually busy with preparing for conversations (in my head) for all kinds of situations I could encounter, so I won't be tongue-tied at the moment itself (although most of the time I don't use it the moment I need it). This is a defence against having to face a situation unprepared. The loss of control over a situation has to be prevented at any time. So I try to examine as thorough as I can how a situation could develop and what my input could be. Input here is still very passive: taking care that a situation isn't working out negative for me. | |||||||||
|
talking out loud Always being controllable: telling out loud what I am doing if for instance I am going to the kitchen and halfway there I find that I forgot to bring my cup with me: first I realise it, then I'll say out loud 'o, forgot my cup' and only THEN I am allowed to turn around and go back, because it looks silly if you go somewhere and suddenly turn around, even when nobody's there. This last part explains a lot: I have to make sure that people can't think I am strange or that others understand what I am doing. | |||||||||
|
apologising I am excusing myself continually (in my head) to everyone who could find fault with me or could be angry with me. The reason is self-evident: I am used to having to explain myself to everyone I know but also to everyone who expects someone of me. For instance, there once was an advertisement about a group of girls in a dressing room and they were brushing their teeth with the taps wide open, water flowing freely. Then one girl comes in and starts screaming NO NO NO while turning of those taps. Now every time I am brushing my teeth and the tap is flowing when I am rinsing my mouth I am apologising 'yes the tap is open and the water is flowing but that's because I am rinsing my mouth and I'll close the tap as soon as I'm done'. I always owe an explanation, complete and unasked. | |||||||||
|
not being able to lie, not even a white lie, or lying very easily I can't lie, because others always have the right to know what I do or what I find, for the full 100 %, no matter how negative this can work out for me. The same reasoning makes it very understandable for me that the opposite thing happens: lying very easily: because you don't want others to thing negatively about you you'll tell a lie that makes you look better. | |||||||||
|
anger that's out of proportion The world is so threatening for me that I always have to on guard. Rather hitting someone else than him having hit me! The cause of this anger is fear, in capitals. I am afraid to lose love so I'll have to take care that other people love me. But when I feel I can't influence this, when I feel that the other person is mad at me and that there's nothing I can do to make him love me again, well, there's only one thing to do really: lashing out, chasing him off, don't let him see that I am hurt, don't let him see that I am vulnerable. See also my extensive article on anger. | |||||||||
|
(thoughts about) suicide There's no better defence against pain and fear..... | |||||||||
|
Automutilation | |||||||||
|
This is a thing by itself. I know a lot of borderliners who do this, I also know some who don't. I myself haven't done this so I can't really place it from within myself. Some theories:
| |||||||||
|
|
|||||||
