Ask the Therapist
BPD and Self-diagnosis
I am 15 years old and I want to know if I have a borderline personality disorder. I did have a very bad childhood, and I do suffer from a lot of the
symptoms that are related with BPD. I don't know if I feel that way because I just read a book about someone who had it (Girl, Interrupted) and am a hypochondriac, or if I really do have it. Please help!
I can't responsible diagnosis you in this forum. I suspect you might, as you say, be over-identifying with the character in the book you just read. But, just to be sure, why not tell me why _you_ feel like you might be borderline. And how is it you've come to describe yourself as a hypochondriac?
The reason I think I might be Borderline is because I did have a traumatic childhood growing up, I have severe feelings of
emptiness and boredom, I have severe mood swings, I'm afraid of being abandoned, i have intense and unstable relationships, and I just stopped wrist scratching, but do have thoughts of suicide. I have been told by my parents and other people that I'm a
hypochondriac because I'm always worried that I might be sick, or have something seriously wrong with me.
Well, it certainly sounds like something's going on. It's always best to get the opinion of a professional. Unfortunately, I can't provide you with anything more concrete than what I've already said. The thing about BPD is that a lot of other things look like it or have characteristics of it. Are you in treatment? If you aren't, then maybe you could talk to someone at school (like the school psychologist or social worker) who could give you some perspective.
The symptoms you describe certainly sound "borderline-ee", but they also sound a great deal like plain old adolescence. I don't want to sound like I'm minimizing what you are feeling, but it's more likely that you are showing some borderline symptoms as the result of something else - what a colleague of mine calls "syndromey"...looks like something, but it's not quite that.
