One of the hardest things I've had problems with is understanding if I'm relating to a situation in a normal or a not-normal way and it's so difficult to understand at times. Like I know when I'm being completely irrational sometimes, like when I get jealous that my friend is spending time with her boyfriend when I wanted to talk to her and then not calling me back (she's obviously busy with him and doesn't realise that I feel like she's not being a good friend when she's being a fine-friend who is just busy) so I keep my cool. But what if your boyfriend and you go to a party, come home together and he tells you that he never realised how beautiful a mutual friend is before. That happened, I felt sad and jealous, but I still kept my chill and agreed with him. Is that normal for a boyfriend to do though...and what would a normal person feel? Fine? Or what if you've been practically ignored at a party by everyone and it feels like every time you try to spark a conversation with someone, they don't really want to talk to you and move on and you get so sad and feel pathetic, that's normal I would think? Or what if your boyfriend insists on still talking to the girl he dated during your break because she's 'vulnerable' and is 'new in the country' and that 'it wasn't her fault and he feels bad for hurting her' and that 'you're not allowed to say who he can and cannot talk to' well how would a normal person react to that? I reacted by shouting and crying and kicking a wall a few times in front of him and then I was made feel that that was my BPD and 'not normal'. But normal people do react emotionally too, they don't just pleasantly sit by or calmly say they're not ok with something that hurts them badly and then calmly go home. Or what if they were broken up with suddenly after spending the night at their boyfriend's and thinking it was all fine, how do 'normal' people react? A few tears, a little sobbing then catch the bus home and never talk to that guy again? Is that it? I reacted by crying, shouting at him, begging him to stay, and I may have kicked something too and refused to leave for a little while. Not everything I do is 'normal' but I also don't react all the time to things that normal people might, like I don't mind my boyfriend smoking weed or getting drunk from time to time and I don't tell my boyfriend his friends are stupid or his hobbies are immature or criticize him for anything. I'm not domineering and self-righteous, and plenty of 'normal' people are. I hate the way that I have really bad impulse control at times and kicking things on the street out of anger is not something I like doing but I just can't always figure out in a situation what it is normal people would do to show emotion. I'm also terrible at silent treatment, I tried it once, I can't do it. I'm also terrible at cursing, I can't curse my boyfriend out or attack his insecurities, I just explode in tears and anger and then self destruct a little and act out a little in public places which is the worst because I hate grabbing attention in public but I can't help when and where it happens that the thing is that triggers me off. And what do normal people do when their boyfriends are shouting at them or giving them the silent treatment? Do they just walk away? I can never walk away, it's against every bone in my body because to me I feel that if I were to walk away from an argument, then the person would never come back and I'd basically be ending the relationship. I'm definitely Mrs. Fix it. Anyway, I've definitely done things that aren't 'normal' but I think I've also felt and done a lot of things that are normal too but because they're all mixed together, people just see it all as me being 'crazy' and my 'issues'. It's annoying because just because we have a mental health problem doesn't mean that we're always wrong, we can be in the right a lot too and the 'normal' partner could actually really be in the wrong and we're not over -reacting. The amount of times I've seen drunk crying girls at clubs at the end of the night or 'normal' girls shouting at their boyfriends over something and I know if I did those things, people would just think it's all my 'issues'. Sometimes I feel like I'm not allowed to feel or be emotional towards anyone ever now because I'll just get the 'she has mental problems' card thrown in my face instead of people actually just trying to relate to me in that moment. Also, the amount of people who keep their emotions inside and wrapped up is ridiculous, like who get hurt by people and just try and bottle it up and let it slide and never say anything too, well that's not good either. Of course, for people with BPD we have the hard part of feeling things very intensely and also the added part of depression that can occur without an outside stimulus at times too so we are different, but I really don't think that when it comes to how we feel in relationships that we're so totally different to normal people. Like normal people can also be insecure, needy, afraid of being left, a little obsessive. There are times when normal people even feel feelings of dislike towards their partner too and normal people have fights over small things too that can blow up. I just don't like this idea that people with BPD are totally crazy and no one should date them because I really don't think that's true at all and a lot of the boyfriends I've had have even wanted me back after break ups so it's not like they had a totally terrible time and I've never been consistently horrible to a boyfriend. I just think that it's not good to think that we're so totally different and 'crazy' all the time because it just makes us feel bad about ourselves and the internet is really mean towards BPD people when at the end of the day, there are really horrible 'normal' people out there too and really lovely BPD people