thegrinningdog

[thegrinningdog]

Heather Nesheim  -  https://www.etsy.com/es/people/heddarsketch  -  https://twitter.com/heddarsketch

[thegrinningdog]

I feel empty and exhausted from all day creating these personalities, turning them on and off and remembering to practise that smile and get that chuckle right. I can't afford to lose all the sleep I've been missing, my array of façades will suffer a price I can't even save up for if I tried and tried and tried not to cry this time, tried not to show how upset I was with the mere thought of rejection and dissatisfaction that I avoided the situation all together and now I have all this shame and regret on my doorstep wondering what happened, something must have happened, you don't just get this upset for no reason, reason, everything needs a reason and I used all mine up to buy one last look at what life could have been like had I not pulled the short straw from the darkness that closes in on me every time I think this time it could be it. This time. I could be happy.

[thegrinningdog]

What do i fear.

I am my disorders.

My head will always be a cage.

Balance will always be out of reach.

You will see right through me.

I will be alone because I deserve to be alone.

The only comfort I will ever truly have will be this darkness I have pulled around me like a down comforter, lost in the folds of clouds and sadness.

[thegrinningdog]

but I can’t, I can’t, I can’t (C.B) (9.19.17)

[thegrinningdog]

dog teeth #114

[thegrinningdog]

you know that feeling when you’re so fucking sad it physically hurts and you just can’t explain how horrible it is and nobody understands because you can’t figure out how to tell them it feels like your chest is caving in and your hands don’t feel like yours anymore so you just kinda sit there and try to remember how to be okay?

yeah.

[thegrinningdog]

A selection of BPD moods

This week I’m being a bit lazy, I found a great post on here but couldn’t find the original source, which sucks. EDIT - I have since been sent the original post which is here - http://bpdbot.tumblr.com/post/170807814429/a-selection-of-bpd-moods.  I’ve really wanted to try and sum up some of the random and shifting moods that I have as someone with BPD and this post will try to explain that a bit further than rather than just stating the obvious emotions and moods that you could just read on Wikipedia! 

The post I found on here….

“a selection of bpd moods

- nothing is real nothing is real nothing is real nothing is real

- depression but emptier

- anger but emptier

- hey wanna see a cool trick? *dissociates*

- setting 3782634 reminders to do things but ignoring them anyways

- I Cannot Physically Move My Body Fast Enough To Handle This Energy Right Now So I’m Just Going To Sit Here And Hope I Spontaneously Combust

- when ur dryer is off balance and it goes ThunkThunkThunkThunkThunk except that’s ur brain

- everything is GREAT and AMAZING when ur with friends and then you go to the bathroom and cry for ten minutes for absolutely no reason

- The Mirror Staredown

- very small ᵒʰ when u realize someone hasn’t answered the clingy text u forgot u sent six hours ago and suddenly Everything Is Terrible And You’re Gonna Die

- LOVE ME LOVE ME LOVE ME LOVE ME!!!!!!!!

- i’m a god and everyone that doesn’t like me can burn in hell

- my skin does not fit right and i am not equipped to handle this feeling

- everything u touch feels WRONG and u don’t know WHY but u want to SCREAM”

I’m going to add a few more I’ve thought of myself that I think are quite fitting…

- I have to clean everything around me or I won’t be able to concentrate on anything else 

- WHY would you say that to ME

- Please stop staring at me. Please stop staring at me. Please stop staring at me.

- Who is that person that did all those things? Oh wait, me

- DO NOT OVERREACT AT ME OVERREACTING

- feeling so agitated by the tiniest little things like someone not wiping the sugar they left on the side after making a coffee to the point that you want to kill them

- oh hey, I don’t fit in with anyone

- what’s it like to not ever have to rely on medication to function

- sleeping for 20 hours or sleeping for 2 hours and having a mental breakdown either way

- the constant battle of having to explain to people that you’re not able to cope 

- it’s okay I’m in control I’m only eating 500 calories a day

- it’s not okay I’m eating 6000 calories a day to fill the void of despair 

- I’m FINE

Thanks again for reading, Joanna xo

[thegrinningdog]

Having BPD is like having a goblin in your head spin a wheel to choose how you’ll emotionally react to literally everything, and half the options on the wheel are just “SELF DESTRUCT”

[thegrinningdog]

That feeling when you know you told someone too much.

[thegrinningdog]

just remembered that tomorrow is another day I have to wake up and do things

[thegrinningdog]

Love Unencumbered by Co-Dependency

In order to grow and make progress with my mental health and with my personal relationships, I find myself looking back at my past and do the best I can to not dwell in the overwhelming shame I feel, but instead try and learn from my behavior, so that I don’t make the same mistakes twice- By the way, this is a lot easier said than done, but still something I try to actively incorporate in my decision-making process, especially when it comes to romantic relationships.

My entire life, I’ve loved to be in love. Whether it be romantic love, platonic love, or familial love- I felt and welcomed the all-consuming intensity of my emotions. I look back and realize I was developing obsessive compulsions with each favorite person I had growing up. At the time, it felt so natural and instinctual to lose my sense of self; become dependent on the individual that made me feel the most euphoric highs and absolutely devastating lows. I was addicted to the passion. I would argue, “this is how love is SUPPOSED to feel”.

It wasn’t until my first real long-term relationship that this obsession, this co-dependency, this excruciating fear of the other person leaving, began to slowly kill me- but I didn’t care. I saw it happening and I allowed it to manifest into what it eventually became.

What started off as a passionate, “the kind of love you read about in fairytales” relationship, gradually turned into obsessive, controlling, and frantic behaviors on my part in attempts to avoid being abandoned by my sole reason for being- I was no longer me- I was who he needed me to be. I had to preserve and protect this love. I was no longer an independent entity from my relationship. This love consumed my individuality and eventually became the sole source of my happiness- consuming my every thought.  

No matter what he did, no matter how much he hurt me, I didn’t care- I was his.

It took him throwing me against a wall and breaking up with me- despite my begging, despite my sobbing, despite my physical and emotional breakdown, for me to finally even attempt to find myself again.

It took me one year. One year of crying every night. One year of reckless, dangerous, and hateful self-destructive behavior. One year of dreaming of the different ways I could kill myself before I could finally detach myself from the pain his absence had conceived.

I eventually found myself in love once again- to my current partner- but this time it had to be different. I wouldn’t allow myself to relinquish that much power and control over my happiness to another human being, ever again.

I still find myself feeling certain pings of jealousy or compulsive urges for control in order to avoid potentially losing him; however, I force myself to not act on these thoughts. I cry and shake out of fear, but I refuse to fall victim to my borderline tendencies once again.

I even find myself missing the intensity of that kind of love- but I remind myself that this longing is only the manifestation of the self-destructive tendencies I had made a home out of. I had learned to feel comfortable destroying myself.

These tendencies, though not the sole cause behind the breakup, were nonetheless instrumental to its demise.

I will not allow my instinctual need for co-dependency- for panicked control- to destroy what I recognize now to be a loving relationship founded on mutual respect, friendship, honesty, and independence.

I have not, and will not, allow my happiness- my sense of self- to be dictated by anyone other than me. I’ve already made the mistake of having once assigned that much power to someone else- and regardless of how well I’ve been able to reconstruct and mend my independence: a part of me will always belong to the man I foolishly surrendered my identity to. I allowed a part of myself to be stolen from me- and because of that, I will never be capable of loving the same way, ever again.

But you know what?

That’s okay. I never want to endure a love like that ever again because that was not love. That relationship was cancerous- gradually metastasizing my identity. That identity, I now realize, has so much to offer independently.

I will not give someone else the authority to shatter me.

I’m no longer a slave to my fear and fragile self-esteem. I’m learning my worth so that my partner can inherently understand the value I add to his life- without frantically attempting to prove it to him- because I’ve learned to realize I’m worth loving.

I’m a kinder, stronger creature thanks to the man who broke my heart, so for that reason, I want to say thank you for breaking me, so that I could learn how to rebuild myself.

[thegrinningdog]

Little is known about the origins of this practice, although there is some unfounded speculation that it is loosely derived from or perhaps inspired by ancient Aegean notions about bees’ ability to bridge the natural world with the afterlife.

[thegrinningdog]

I honestly always find the term ‘spinster’ as referring to an elderly, never-married woman as funny because you know what?

Wool was a huge industry in Europe in the middle ages. It was hugely in demand, particularly broadcloth, and was a valuable trade good. A great deal of wool was owned by monasteries and landed gentry who owned the land. 

And, well, the only way to spin wool into yarn to make broadcloth was by hand. 

This was viewed as a feminine occupation, and below the dignity of the monks and male gentry that largely ran the trade. 

So what did they do?

They hired women to spin it. And, turns out, this was a stable job that paid very well. Well enough that it was one of the few viable economic options considered ‘respectable’ outside of marriage for a woman. A spinster could earn quite a tidy salary for her art, and maintain full control over her own money, no husband required. 

So, naturally, women who had little interest in marriage or men? Grabbed this opportunity with both hands and ran with it. Of course, most people didn’t get this, because All Women Want Is Husbands, Right?

So when people say ‘spinster’ as in ‘spinster aunt’, they are TRYING to conjure up an image of a little old lady who is lonely and bitter. 

But what I HEAR are the smiles and laughter of a million women as they earned their own money in their own homes and controlled their own fortunes and lived life on their own terms, and damn what society expected of them. 

[thegrinningdog]

Excerpt from Rudy Francisco’s poem “Ouch”, featured in his poetry collection Helium

[thegrinningdog]

Day 6.

[thegrinningdog]

The day after surgery.

[thegrinningdog]

The Cycle.  TBT