Lines and Colours

In my mind, I am normal. This is because I live with me twenty-four seven (OK, not always twenty-four seven because some of those hours I am asleep).

I have BPD. In the past, I never realised that I feel emotions more easily, more deeply, and for longer than others do. I thought the intensity of my emotions was normal. Turns out, it’s not. I read somewhere that in non-BPD people an emotion typically fires for 12 seconds. In BPD’ers it can last up to 20 percent longer. BPD’ers emotions also repeatedly re-fire, or re-live, or recur, however you want to say it, so emotional reactions occur for even longer. I do. I go over and over and over the emotions, pinging from one to another like a steel ball in a pinball machine.

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Blog For Mental Health 2013

Here we are, still within the first month of 2013.  A few days into it, but it is never too late to get something like this rolling.

Last year’s badge

Something like what?  Why, it’s time to unveil the Blog for Mental Health 2013 Badge!  Lulu started this amazing campaign last year, and it caught on like wildfire with mental health bloggers everywhere.  They proudly took the pledge, spread the word to other bloggers, and displayed the badge prominently on their blogs.  You’ve seen it in our sidebar, I’ve seen it on nearly every mental health site I visit.  It has truly been an unprecedented show of solidarity.

Helping to Break Stigma

When I received the job offer a few weeks ago I thought it over for a few days before excitedly accepting. My new manager arranged that she would send me some paperwork to fill out, and the next week we would meet so I could have a look around one of the branch practices I would be working in.

When I’d quit my previous job a few weeks ago I never expected to land on my feet. My parents were terrified that I had no long term prospects and I was just going to be a temp nurse.

Disorder and the Internet : The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

Internet.

It’s a word that has become synonymous with “life”.  How many hours a day can we say that we are “online”?  For some, like smartphone users, we are never truly offline.  The internet has become a deeply embedded part of our lives.  With all of the information available, social networks active and potential people to meet oceans and countries away, the entire world is at our fingertips.  How could this ever be considered a bad thing?

When I Realised What I Do is Good

There are some things you may already vaguely know about me.  My real name is Carrie and I have an alternate personality whom I call Charlotte (not to mention the poor guy, Jack, in the back ground who hardly gets a say in anything).  I live in the UK near London, by the sea.  I am almost 30 years old.  I suffer from depression, I have recently been diagnosed with Emotional Dysregulation Disorder (the new name for BPD) and have lived with a host of psychiatric conditions since I was a child. 

I am also a Veterinary Nurse.

Canvas’ One Year Magically Fantastic Extravaganza Post

Onwards & Upwards

As a person with more than her fair share of mental health problems, I find it really difficult to maintain relationships, mainly friendships (I don’t trust people enough for any other kind!).

I always put this down to perhaps I’m a horrible person. I seem to go through friends like nobodies business and always blame myself when the friendship falls apart.

Since my diagnosis with Borderline Personality Disorder (or Emotional Dysregulation Disorder, whatever you want to call it), researching the illness and the way other sufferers perceive the world has helped me realise that I’m not entirely to blame and it is my point of view of things that is askew.

The Blogging Community

The more I regularly blog, the more grateful I am for the mental health blogging community.

Some of the issues I deal with have become more bearable now that I blog about them. On my blog, I’ve mentioned before that I used to visit a depression forum. I think the forum visits helped me endure through the big break. After a while, though, the forum jumped the shark for me, or I jumped the shark for the forum. I popped into the forum occasionally for a bit. I thought that I should help people out as much as I’d been helped there.