One thing they never tell you about asserting yourself and giving trusting your judgement a try.....people don't always like it, and you have to actually use your OWN judgement to determine if they are wrong or not. Sometimes people are really confidently, assertively...wrong. And as a borderline, maybe you just gave in. You had such a low opinion of yourself that you figured they are probably right. Your version of reality is usually skewed anyway.

Except when you start getting to a certain point in recovery, you are probably not wrong as often anymore. Stuff you observe and your interpretations are sometimes right, and sometimes worth fighting for. You don't have to have backing down as your default reaction anymore.

I took on a task at work that has pushed me into a position where I am needing to defend my recommendations for something and put up with some really strong personalities, who know about my BPD and have been pretty used to me being mousey and insecure. They don't like it when I disagree with them, it turns out, and I am standing my ground. I think some of them still see me as less competent, because in the past that was probably true. But I don't think it is anymore. I'm going to have to kick and punch my way into this new role. I'm pretty confident that I'm right about what I'm recommending and for the first time, I don't give a fuck if they don't like it. I will keep fighting and standing up for myself.

A lifetime of being misinterpreted can make a person pretty angry. That's basically my MO - being misinterpreted. So I'm going to keep explaining myself and defending myself until these people get it. They are probably all just pissed that they couldn't solve this problem and now someone is actually making headway and it turns out it's the crazy chick. 

I hope this story gives someone some confidence out there. I'm on the tail end of three years of DBT therapy and a year into my PhD, which was my "life worth living goal". If you've been working hard and wondering why you still can't trust yourself, maybe what I've described will be a useful perspective.