Something i’ve been looking at doing for a while is introducing guest posts onto my blog. Chaz got in contact with me and she decided to write a personal post in which she raises awareness and talks about her experience for personality disorders and I’m really glad i’ve got to share this with you! Before you read on, make sure you follow her Twitter and check out her wonderful blog!
I have a personality disorder, but my therapists refused to officially diagnose me. This is the kind of thing you’ll hear often from people who are trying to get treatment for any sort of personality disorder. Some of them are more easily diagnosed than others, and I think that’s stupid.
The one thing that made me recover from my other mental illnesses, anxiety, depression, dissociative disorder, was knowing what I had and being able to do my own learning and research on it. Never in a million years would I have gotten better without helping myself. The only reason I am so easily able to deal with my Borderline Personality Disorder today, is from googling it, extensive research at home, and teaching others around me about what I’ve found out.
They say they don’t want to give you a diagnosis because it’ll ruin your life. It’ll ruin opportunities, people won’t want to hire you, people will be scared of you. I get it, it’s a scary way of saying it, you start to think this person isn’t who they say they are because they clearly have problems with stabilising their personality. Why does that mean you should listen to the stereotypes inside of your head? Why does that mean we get treated differently, why does that mean we can’t get the treatment we need?
I was out right denied therapy for my disorder. I was told I could do ‘group therapy’ in DBT, but only that. For anyone that doesn’t know, BPD has a set therapy form called DBT (dialectical behavioural therapy), which usually consists of 1 hour with a 1-1 therapist and 2 hours in group therapy, with qualified therapists. The thing that helped me the most throughout my 13 year journey of therapy, is 1-1 sessions. I was denied those, because I didn’t have a diagnosis. Why is that stupid? Because they are the ones who didn’t give me the diagnosis to begin with.
So not only did I not have a diagnosis, the same people then denied me my therapy that would help me, and hardly gave me any extra information on what I supposedly had been told I had! Isn’t our therapy system amazing in the UK? Also, in case you were wondering, only over 18’s can be diagnosed with a personality disorder in the UK. That’s because it’s apparently ‘easier’ to distinguish the personality disorder symptoms from ‘normal’ growing up symptoms. Do you not think giving children the chance at therapy would benefit them, get them help before things get worse? Be proactive, instead of reactive?
As you can tell, I’m angry. This happened to me over a year ago and I’m still angry about it. It shouldn’t be this way, people like me shouldn’t have to go through this. Please, if you want to help someone, educate yourself about personality disorders. There’s 10 of them, and not all of them fit the stereotype you’re thinking of. It’s an interesting subject, and the people who are suffering just need support and friendship.
Not only that, but educate yourselves more on the statistics of personality disorders. 70% of people with BPD will attempt suicide at least once in their life. How shocking is that? There’s a lot more where that came from, and I promise they’re just as surprising. Educate yourselves on symptoms, how to be proactive about personality disorders in friends and family, and how to get help. Educate yourselves on the difficulty of being diagnosed, therapy treatments, the costs of private treatment, the stigma we face. Maybe if other people were angry too, we could accomplish something together.
*Content in this post was written by Chaz and all photos were taken by me*
Don’t forget my social media;
Reblogged this on Fantasy Books 411.
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An amazing guest post. I was diagnosed with BPD at aged 18 and some days are just awful. I feel what they’re saying about the medical profession. It was actually by chance that I got the diagnosis, so I guess I’m one of the lucky ones. I’ve shared this post and am so glad you hosted it on your blog. 🙂
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Thank you so much for sharing! I’m glad you got a diagnosis!
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Thank you. 🙂 I hope you’re having a good week. x
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Great post! The most important thing anyone can do is be an advocate for themselves.👍🏼 —https://emilyryannblogblog.wordpress.com/2018/04/29/a-z-of-emily-ryann/
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Great post! I think it’s important to learn and teach others about their mental health so we can learn and grow as individuals xxxx
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Great post and well done to Chaz for raising awareness on mental health 💖. It’s so important to educate ourselves to remove the stigma surrounding mental illness and it also enables us to help others who are struggling. Thank you for sharing Ellie 😘 xx
Bexa | http://www.hellobexa.com
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Thanks for reading, really glad i got to share this on my blog!x
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I had heard about BPD before but I never really knew what it actually meant before now. I think that it is so great that you are making awareness about the topic!
http://whatmakesmesmileblog.com/
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Thank you for reading! I feel it’s so important to raise awareness for topics that arent talked about so much!
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Those stats are absolutely shocking! I totally see why this is so frustrating x
Sophie
http://www.glowsteady.co.uk
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Love the idea of having guest posts on your blog! This was such an interesting and insightful post to read, such an important topic for everyone to understand! Xx
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Thanks for reading x
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I had no idea about these figures, that’s terrible. This post taught me so much and it’s so well written. Kudos to Chaz for raising awareness and to you for sharibg it, thank you x
Lisa | http://www.lisasnotebook.com
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As someone who understands the struggle of dealing with mental health problems and other people’s ignorance, I totally get you girl. You’re doing such a good thing opening up about it to raise awareness.
I write a lot over on my blog Life After Coffee about self care tips if you’d like to check them out, because you’re doing so well and you deserve to remind yourself that you’re great! If you’d like to collaborate on a post and/or guest post about mental health I’d totally be up for it x
Nati | http://www.lifeaftercoffeeblog.com | lifeaftercoffeeblog@gmail.com
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Great post! It is really important to raise awareness on mental health. xx
https://tiateilli.com
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Thank you for sharing such an interesting guest post, I’ve learnt a lot from this- https://sophiehearts.net x
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Having a guest post is such a good and interesting idea. Raising as much awareness into mental health is so important. Great post!
Carly xx // http://www.prettystyleofliving.wordpress.com
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Great guest post. I don’t have a personality disorder but I do have anxiety and when it came to a diagnosis… I was relieved when I was finally told what was wrong with me! I finally had something to work with.
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It is so important to be informed and educated about the different types of mental illnesses out there – especially with some therapists being so hard to work with. With all of the denials from therapy, I give you lots of props for pushing forward. People should be able to access the care they need.
exquisitely.me
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THIS POST IS SO IMPORTANT.
I have followed you!
my blog: https://thoughtsofablogginglesbian.wordpress.com x
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What an extremely open and honest post, I’m so sorry that you have had so many knock backs with regards to diagnosis. Thank you for sharing and raising awareness.
Melanie | http://www.frasersfunhouse.com
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This was so eye opening. didn’t know there were 10 types of personality disorders. Just another reminder to be kind to each other and don’t judge anyone, cuz you don’t know their stories!
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