Crazy, forever.
“I think we’re done here. I don’t think we need to schedule another appointment for the moment. It really feels like you’ve got it under control. I’m truly impressed by your progress. Call me if you need me, but I feel like you’re doing just fine.”
When these words came out of my therapist’s mouth, I was elated. I had been seeing this man for years, ever since I started university. He knows my life story better than anyone else. I’ve cried and cried on his couch so many times while recalling painful events from my life—him listening quietly, nodding, and then offering clarity on my actions and feelings. Hearing him say that to me almost felt better than finding out I’d graduated university after failing a few classes.
The usual post-session snack run and walk home felt like a breath of the freshest air. This is it, I’m turning the page.
Obviously, it’s not that easy. It never is.
I’ve had a few more sessions with him ever since then but much less frequently. To be honest I should go way more but I am clinging onto the fact that I already figured it out, he told me. Clinging on to the crazy-free future I imagined for myself where I’d be at peace for eternity, freed from my own brain. Going back to him now, is a reminder that it’s not going to happen and life will continue to raw dog me and that the way my brain is wired makes it more difficult to process.
Like what the f*ck do you mean? I did the work, I deserve to waltz through life as a proud alumna with acquired skills and no longer be a sleep-deprived miserable student struggling to make it out.
Unfortunately, it’s easier to remember that omnichannels are essential to a marketing strategy than to remember that the reason I keep running back to the something-something-aholics is because I’m apparently hellbent on proving I’m special enough to be someone’s reason to change because some fuck shit happened to me as a child. It’s fucking boring and repetitive. Yet, here I am needing to sit my ass down on that velvet couch on the verge of tears as he explains to me that I must use my mental tools to overcome whatever it is I am going through.
“Remember the tools.”
As a borderline personality disorder girly, I rely on these tools. All I ever wish for is going through life without having to meticulously analyse why is it I feel things intensely and then having to take a moment to deescalate if it’s not too late— and if it is, having to fix it and apologise for my impulsivity. Or having to consciously remember that people don’t just become evil because they didn’t react the way I wanted them to. That no I am not actually in love with that man I saw twice.
It’s like watching everyone ride through life in a smooth automatic vehicle as I am having to figure out how to change the gears of a beat up 1995 Toyota Camry, hoping to God that it doesn’t stall.
I am so tired, I could cry.
Struggling with mental health isn’t something to be ashamed of but it can lead you to say or do things that are. My reality gets so warped sometimes that whatever I feel like saying in the moment seems valid, even insightful, until I come to and realise it wasn’t. By then, the tools and coping strategies show up too late, and I’m left looking at something I said that now feels wildly off. It’s terrifying, this moment when I realise I wasn’t thinking straight, that I’d convinced myself of things that aren’t even close to true. And I wonder: how did I get there? How was I able to take it that far? It makes me feel unhinged, like someone who should be locked away. Honestly, if anyone even remotely interested in being with me saw the inside of my mind, they’d probably run for the hills. And I wouldn’t blame them. There are days I want to run from myself too.
Still, I can acknowledge that my immediate impulses aren’t inherently dangerous—if I’m able to stop myself from acting on them. Like I often have the impulse to stalk people who’ve rejected me however I’ve very rarely acted on it and if I did it was always a healthy amount, stalking in a charming way, if you will. But reining my impulses in when my emotions are dialled up to a hundred takes an exhausting amount of energy. It often feels like I’m one body housing two people: one, a stubborn, impulsive child; the other, a calm, patient caretaker. They’re in constant, maddening dialogue. Honestly, sometimes I just want them both to shut the fuck up or, at the very least, have Scarlett Johansson’s voice from Her narrate whatever the hell I’m doing instead.
But Scarlett’s voice will never be my reality. That’s a fat fucking pill to swallow, and I’m choking on it.
I may have been embarrassed many times from the ways I have acted however I do take great pride for trying to strengthen my coping skills without any crutches. I love being independent and always strive to be that way in every aspect. So I did stop taking my pills and believed that I could better myself. BPD has no cure so I’m better off figuring it out. And I must say I am seeing results and I do feel stronger.
However, sometimes I do think about that one time my psychiatrist offered me to go to this “retreat” a couple of years back. I mean I know it was probably a psych ward but I won’t pretend I haven’t fantasised about it, even though the thought also terrifies me.
It actually sounded kind of nice. He described it as “rest time,” somewhere on the outskirts of Paris, with lots of trees and a big garden. A place where someone would tell me when to take my pills, when to eat, when to sleep. When I could go outside and feel the sun, and when I had to go back in. I wouldn’t have to think for myself anymore, and I’d be pleasantly numbed by medication. Maybe I’d even make a friend, someone I could sit and read with during outside time.
Maybe what I really needed then was rest. Maybe it was time to surrender a little, to let myself be tucked into bed by someone else, to give up—just a bit.
When I had meningitis and was hospitalised for ten days, I didn’t feel like I had to suck it up or push through. I was overworked, I was tired, I knew I needed rest. And weirdly, I had a great time. I wore sunglasses in my hospital bed because I was sensitive to light, and hot medical students would pop in to ask how I was doing. My biggest concerns were which YouTube video to watch next, and whether the food tray would come with yogurt. Not once did I feel like I had to be strong.
I wish I could give myself some grace sometimes when it comes to my mental health. To trust myself enough that I will be back on my feet faster than I used to, and that I won’t be rotting in bed for 3 weeks at a time anymore. Trust in the work I’ve put in, the tools I’ve come up with to guide me through everything. That it is okay to not always be the most emotionally intelligent, to not be the bigger person, to say the right things. If sane people make mistakes and get depressed sometimes, I’m sure it’s okay for me to go through similar things too. It’s okay to feel tired and weak and sure as hell is okay to go back to therapy when needed. I am learning to accept that not everything is a straight line.
Anyway, yeah I’ll probably be crazy forever and everyday will continue to be a fight to be more stable and there will be days I’ll be tired and will have to go back to my therapist. And then he’ll tell me again that I am doing well and I probably will be—before, of course, I come back to him again. I’m doing my best to surrender.
Sizy always says my “condition” makes me special, that it’s not a flaw, but a gift. It means I ache for depth, crave connection, and feel everything in vivid, unrelenting colour.
There is a wild, aching beauty in this way of being. I can never quite capture it with words—how gratitude swells in me until it spills over, how joy with my friends burns so brightly it feels like the sun itself lives in me. Heartbreak doesn’t just sting; it devastates. But even in its ruin, there’s a strange sort of grace. It reminds me I’m alive, that I’m still capable of love, of longing.
And when I fall for someone, it’s not subtle. The butterflies eating me inside out. My breath catches. A velvet warmth floods through me, soft and all-consuming.
Maybe she is right and that it just means that I am a constantly living life at its fullest, that I feel very much alive every single second. Not a single moment wasted.
V.B, Bali, April 2025
