“Living a life without an identity, sense of self, or anything real to ground into is empty and lonely.”

I am diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder and Antisocial Personality Disorder.

I experience all the symptoms; impulsivity, fear of abandonment, paranoia, splitting, lack of guilt and remorse, and so on. When I began treatment I was having hallucinations as well – not anymore though. I manage them a lot better with professional help. I still go through a lot of rage, anhedonia, irritability and sensation seeking, and I still have bad thoughts sometimes.

It’s honestly challenging for me day to day, still feeling parasitic and sometimes pretty unworthy and shameful- like I’m not a human and don’t belong here, just watching life pass me by. People irritate me a lot- the little things- so being around them is a challenge. I also struggle with it because I know all my flaws and pick myself apart in my head.

The ASPD is always on- like a way of thinking (first channel of thought) and I don’t act on it much. I’ve spent some good time developing my own morals and values. I prefer the ASPD sometimes- BPD is just so painful. I’m currently doing EMDR an DBT. I use mushrooms on my own time and that’s also helped me to feel new feelings.

My partner has NPD and I would say I knew long before disclosure and dating. I knew him a few years prior to dating.  He has is pretty under control with (I would say) mild splitting, projection, and fantasies. He’s been to therapy and coaching for these behaviours.

I disclosed pretty early on and him shortly after. We entered the relationship pretty consciously with intentions of awareness and working through our ‘stuff’ in efforts to ‘save the world’. We’re both pretty spiritual, so believe that evolving our mind, body, and soul will help the collective and those that interact with us – the ripple effect.

I was splitting on him pretty frequently out of fear he was going to be like every other guy I’ve dated and abandon me. He allows me to spin out -most of the time without his own ego reaction- and tries to validate and co regulate with me. Then we dissect the shame together. The work we do together around our trauma and wounding is something I’ve never experienced before. It’s been honestly more helpful than therapy.

He doesn’t deal with as much dysregulation as I do, but I am able to step into his stuff too and help him see grey areas and rewrite the stories that are playing; where he’s guarding his shame, etc.

I would say our own struggles are the main struggles, alongside projecting them or externalizing the negative emotions onto each other or the space we share. We ‘check in’ frequently with each other though, and that’s been pretty helpful to catching perceived threats and dysregulation before it gets too far and explodes.

My bigger challenge has been trust and vulnerability. I think if I were to ask him, he would say his is to hear and feel first, instead of immediately fixing or using pure logic. It leaves me feeling unheard and unseen when someone moves straight into helping or fixing my stuff. I just need to know I’m human and not alone in it (validation) then I can feel safe and de-escalate pretty quickly. Boundaries were a little difficult in the beginning as well for both of us- I’d also slip into self-abandonment in efforts to keep them ‘happy’.

Only the people closest to me are aware of my diagnosis, I try to be as ‘mask-off’ as I can with those people. They never label me as anything, but try to hear how I feel and respect what I need, ie a boundary, release of emotions, reassurance, those things. I think the people in my life are pretty aware that these thought distortions, behaviours, etc stem from complex trauma. In fact, I may have over educated them.

I do think that as far as assumptions from outsiders or even close friends about narcissism and sociopathy go, I can see where their own story is becoming projected onto mine from their past or current partners, via the associations they have with the terms and their own insecurity or fear, if that makes sense. I just have to detach my story from theirs. I’ve never dated anyone neurotypical to my knowledge- just lots of other Cluster Bs, and co-dependents.

There are so many things I wish people knew. My disorders come from dysregulation, shame, survival, insecurity and fragmentation from attachment trauma. It’s not the person themselves who is to blame. Narcissists aren’t evil. ASPD isn’t evil. None of it- or us- are all bad or inherently evil. Just frozen in time, survival and dysregulation.

We are all worthy and deserving of love, and if we all looked inward instead of blaming others, we’d get further into healthy relationships with ourselves and others. If people didn’t take behaviours personally and practiced healthy boundaries, reflection, and created an emotionally safe environment and/or community, we could all heal so much quicker and more effectively.

Living a life without an identity, sense of self, or anything real to ground into is empty and lonely. It feels hopeless and overwhelming. It’s painful emotionally and physically. There are so many emotions and trauma stored that feel impossible to release and reprocess – especially considering we don’t have the tools to do so. We don’t have self compassion, vulnerability or even often the ability to feel safe in our own body.

We want what other people have; to be secure emotionally, physically and financially. We want to be purposeful and loved. We want connection. We need safety.