Awkwardness and my past

There seems to be a distinct difference in the agreed upon reality of what happens in the interactions I have and the way I perceive and react to them. Take, for example, my appointment today. As far as appointments for free services go, I’m fairly sure it was routine. The building smelled like a cleaner made from stomach acid, but the workers were kind and did not seem judgmental. Despite all of this, I felt unbelievable awkward. It wasn’t just because I was applying for free help and, in essence, admitting to be someone incapable of taking care of themselves, but involved every little detail. I felt as though I would do something wrong, say something wrong, laugh at the wrong time, share too much information, or somehow make an ass of myself in general. This is how most interactions with human beings over the age of 10 go for me.

You see, I come from a background that didn’t exactly endow me with many natural social skills. My dad, the wonderfully amazing man he is, happens to be shy and somewhat timid in group situations. This seems to be changing now, but it will always be how I remember him from childhood. If only I would have taken after the shy side of his character, I may not have inherited the timidity and developed it into almost constant awkwardness. No, let us look at the parent that I had ample time to watch and imitate…my mother.

My mother happens to suffer from Borderline Personality Disorder. If you don’t know what this is, you are an epically lucky person.  To describe BPD, I’ll just use this little blurb from Wikipedia about how it is diagnosed:

“The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders fourth edition, DSM IV-TR, a widely used manual for diagnosing mental disorders, defines borderline personality disorder (in Axis II Cluster B) as:[1][14]

A pervasive pattern of instability of interpersonal relationships, self-image and affects, as well as marked impulsivity, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following:

1.Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment. Note: Do not include suicidal or self-injuring behavior covered in Criterion 5

2.A pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by alternating between extremes of idealization and devaluation.

3.Identity disturbance: markedly and persistently unstable self-image or sense of self.

4.Impulsivity in at least two areas that are potentially self-damaging (e.g., promiscuous sex, eating disorders, binge eating, substance abuse, reckless driving). Note: Do not include suicidal or self-injuring behavior covered in Criterion 5

5.Recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, threats or self-injuring behavior such as cutting, interfering with the healing of scars (excoriation) or picking at oneself.

6.Affective instability due to a marked reactivity of mood (e.g., intense episodic dysphoria, irritability or anxiety usually lasting a few hours and only rarely more than a few days).

7.Chronic feelings of emptiness

8.Inappropriate anger or difficulty controlling anger (e.g., frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights).

9.Transient, stress-related paranoid ideation, delusions or severe dissociative symptoms

It is a requirement of DSM-IV that a diagnosis of any specific personality disorder also satisfies a set of general personality disorder criteria.”

My mom only needs 5 of those symptoms to be diagnosed, but seeing as she always did say “If you can’t do something all the way, don’t bother doing it at all,” she shows all that are listed. Her favorite one is sabotaging relationships around her by being convinced people don’t like her, then pushing them away by threatening and self-injurious behaviors. Her children were not immune from this. From about age 8 on, I was Mom’s “best friend”, and she would tell me anything she had done to ruin a relationship or hurt herself, beginning with telling me the specific reasons she cheated on my dad. This just escalated to showing me her self-harm wounds, asking me to hide razor blades from her, and yelling at me while depending on me to validate her emotions. I never knew what to say, and thought that any action I made could result in my mother hurting herself. Her shame became my guilt.

And it wasn’t only her interactions with me that made me so concerned about how others were affected by my actions. I also saw how she would tell anyone, anywhere, about the personal details of her life. I mean anyone. Many checkout ladies at the grocery store know the intimate details of my mother’s mental and physical ailments.

Now here I am, having inherited two or three of my mother's errors of perception. I do place some blame on my mother for the way I interact amongst others, but I don’t think that it is an excuse for making myself feel miserable or wallow in self-pity. My mother has not been able to overcome what she struggles with, and while I have felt anger towards her for not succeeding, I also feel thankful that I do not have her brain. I am capable of fighting the negative messages that I tell myself, and I know that I have been able to have successful relationships with people around me. Looking at the bad habits and ways of living that I was exposed to, I have to also be thankful that I was able to somehow come out but half-scathed. I also know that I have been able to see my awkward nature as humorous and cute. I hope to see it that way again.

So now it’s onward and upward from here. I will continue to learn more and more about the world around me, what my place in it is, how to look at myself in a way that allows me to make mistakes. Though today has been hard, and I have struggled to complete simple activities of daily living, I feel more hopeful. Let’s see what tomorrow brings.

Oh, by the way, here is the link for that Wikipedia blurb, lest I run the chance of seeming perjurious:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borderline_personality_disorder