Caring Enough

The suicide rate of people with BPD is around 10-11% according to most people willing to venture a guess. Since BPD is underreported and undiagnosed often, it’s hard to say if these numbers are meaningful in any significant way.

Of additional interest, the suicide rate among families of those with the disorder was 8 times higher than that of the general population in a study of about six years ago..

Years back, when I was working a psychiatric unit, if person was admitted numerous times with suicide ideation, had not apparent other stressors and had a ’wonderful, supportive spouse’ that the patient ’thought was their soul mate’ we automatically started assessing the spouse for personality disorders!

The damage done to Non’s by caring about someone who has the disorder is insidious.. it is soul destroying.. the disorder targets us (the Non) at our most vulnerable and sensitive areas.. and chips away.. uses sleep deprivation, (how many of us had rages that went on at us for days?, or got woke up the middle of the night?), uses projection, blaming, shaming, black and white thinking, accusations of everything from ’you’re so controlling’ to ’I know you’re messing around on me!’, to ’if you don’t do x,y,z you’ll be responsible for what happens to me(suicide, and emotional black mail).

To take responsibility for our own part of the bpd/nonbpd dynamic is hard.. but we all own a piece of it.. whether it’s poor or non existent boundaries, caring TOO much, enabling the disorder or it’s affects, believing that if we (non) love them (the person with the disorder) enough, they can recover.. or believing that ’it’s all our fault, that if we (the Non) could just ’get it right’ the relationship would prosper.

Taking responsibility for our own part, our own issues, and learning to value our own mental wellness enough to get professional help, to get information, to find support (in real life and in cyber space), to begin to protect our children, our selves, takes courage. It takes patience. It takes stubbornness. It takes picking ourselves up and crawling out of the black hole of despair that the disorder pushes us into.

If anyone on our lists is thinking about harming yourself, even passively, like failing to protect yourself from someone who is physically violent, please contact a local suicide hot line. Contact myself via email or icq, get help NOW.

You are all valuable and unique people..with many wonderful characteristics.. see our page at www.bpd411.org on characteristics of nons.. Keep sharing your story till someone believes you..till someone listens.. till you find the help you need to begin to heal..or continue to heal..

respectfully

Deedee

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Disclaimer: The information on this site (http://www.bpd411.org) is based on personal experiences of the authors and members of our e-mail mailing list. It is NOT meant to replace professional advice or take the place of counseling, therapy or additional personal research.