On the morning I was born, my father left the hospital feeling drunk with happiness. Over 30 years later he says he still remembers the birds singing, can still feel the sting of the early morning sun on his skin and the absolute certitude that he was the happiest man on earth. He wanted to stop strangers in the street and tell them about me, who had already changed his life forever just by coming into the world. I have always loved this story, loved the way he tells it and knowing I once gave someone the best day of their life. I now wonder if it was already written then, that there would be something a little off about me. Or if some things happened that made my brain work differently. I have some clues. I stare at the man in the picture and he’s not at all like my 11 years old self remembers, and his name eludes me and I ask him, what did you do to me? I wonder if he’s the missing part of my story, then I wonder if it really matters right now.


Today’s doctor looks like most the professionals I have seen in the past months: well under 25 years old. Like every other time, like every doctor before him, he politely excuses himself after listening to my story and goes next door to ‘discuss it with his supervisor’. I have heard it so many times lately that I can’t help but wonder if there’s actually someone next door. I’m tempted to follow him just to check if there’s a wizard behind the curtain. Junior is gone for quite a while. I entertain myself imagining an old professor sitting in a dark office all day, waiting for Junior to come explain the case of yet another Borderline-In-Crisis, then tiredly shaking his head no, unspoken response to a vague request: help me. Junior comes back looking sorry and I forget to ask him about the wizard behind the curtain. His hands are tied, Junior says. There’s no room in therapy and he can’t take the responsibility to put me on medication, my GP should do that. My GP wants you to do it, I remind Junior. He shrugs apologetically, palms up, eyes down. I go home and I stare at the glass full of pills that has been sitting on my desk for weeks, like an invitation to end the pain. Sometimes I hide the glass in the kitchen cabinet. Sometimes I move it to my nightstand. I don’t take the pills and I know I never will. Not long ago I had projects, hopes and so many reasons to be happy despite the struggles and the walls I had carefully built around myself. I have to believe that I have it in me to find myself again.


For now, extreme emotional responses and anxiety attacks are threatening to strike at any moment. Old and new addictive behaviours sit heavily on my shoulders, tempting me every second of the day. Everything in my current behaviour screams borderline and I’m not quite used to it yet. I repeat the word over and over. I write it, I spit it, I sing it, I deny it, I live it, I can’t get past it. Depression has slowly taken over and I watch myself destroy every good thing there is about me and about my life. I push people away to avoid the pain I would go through if they abandoned me when my issues become too much too handle. The relief I felt when I was diagnosed six months ago is long gone. I was shocked then, and angry and filled with regrets, just out of a relationship I had hoped would last and that I had ruined with a constant push-and-pull I couldn’t help doing despite knowing the pattern all too well. Brokenhearted and unable to manage the intensity of my emotions, not quite understanding what borderline meant yet but suddenly hopeful and ready to fight. Relieved my behaviour had a name and a solution: schema therapy. Hopes for better relationships in the future and more balance in my life in general.


But it’s like Junior said: the system is broken. Here in the Netherlands, the waiting lists are so long that mental health patients have to wait several months before they can start therapy. GPs refuse to give antidepressants in the meantime, because they’re not therapists. Therapists refuse to give antidepressants because they can’t offer long-term follow-up. So I tried on my own. I don’t mean the antidepressants — although, like a friend pointed out, if you can hire a hitman on the Darknet you should be able to buy Zoloft. Ha. No, I mean the therapy part. I have always had an almost obsessive need to understand things so I did what I do best: I read all the books about Borderline Personality Disorder and completed all the therapy exercises I could get my hands on — those which help you identify emotional triggers and how to better handle your reaction to them.


It helps, of course, even though it doesn’t replace therapy. I can see myself progressing slowly but if something triggers an intense emotion that I fail to manage properly, I’m back to square one with some more damage to my self-image. I oscillate between despair and hope, never really knowing if I’m holding on or giving up. I try to hang on to the good things about me so I won’t forget about them in my darkest moments. I list the words and I read them out loud. Funny. Strong. Generous. Charismatic. Smart. Sensitive. Determined. In the middle of my mantra the other side shows up and tries to take over. Intense. Insecure. Manipulative. Needy. Unstable. Complicated. And then I don’t know anymore and I lose touch with who I am. I know I should be able to be all of this, I know it’s not all black and white but I’m lost all the same.


I don’t want bridges, I never have. I want oceans and currents and waves and to feel alive with the turbulence of it all. But I’m in the middle of it and I don’t feel alive. The only thing I long for is a bridge because the turbulences are just too strong. I know I will find my bridge though. Better still, I will build my own and it will be strong and colorful and both sides of it will lead to something beautiful.
