#psych diagnosis

[going-to-ikea-for-the-fries]

Home. (ALT ENDING) || cbf!Simon "Ghost" Riley

Rating: M Words: 3K (this one got away from me, sorry) Pairing: cbf!Simonxafab!reader / teen!Simonxteen!Reader Summary: Teen Simon and his best friend often spend their nights away from their respective houses because they found a home in each other… CW: mentions of psychological issues, mentions of self-harm, mentions of therapy Tags: you/your pronouns, hurt/comfort, ANGST, forgiveness, catharsis. a/n: not proofread. THIS IS THE HAPPY ENDING. I'M STILL NOT HAPPY WITH IT, BUT IT IS WHAT IT IS.

[FIC MASTERLIST] || [MY MASTERLIST]

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Anyone would say that Simon Riley is good. 

Good company for going out drinking.

A good partner for duos in training.

A good shot.

A good soldier.

A good candidate.

A good recruit.

A good lad.

But Simon would say he’s a bad, bad man.

Even before he took this job.

Destined to rot from the inside out.

To become the things he’s promised himself to not ever become.

Finding a way out of home, out of the trauma, only works if some of it is not already inside of you.

Slowly eating you up.

Ever-lasting.

All-consuming.

That’s what Simon figured out in the last 15 years.

Grief.

Depression.

Rage.

Antisocial tendencies.

Psychopathy.

PTSD.

Compartmentalization of emotions and trauma.

Tendencies for self-harm and self-sabotage.

Fear of vulnerability.

Trust issues.

An inclination for isolation.

A past muddled by juvenile delinquency and early drug and alcohol use.

An avoidant attachment style in any relationships he attempts to form due to an inability to truly connect with others.

An identity crisis stemming from low self-worth and a disturbed self-image.

The list goes on.

Simon would say he’s got it all under control.

But any Army-appointed psychiatrist would disagree.

And he’s too valuable of an asset to let go of…

Just the ‘depression’ diagnosis would land the average soldier on a watchlist and the ‘tendencies to self-harm’ would get anyone a medical discharge and interned into a psych ward.

Thank God Simon’s not the average soldier.

Price has been pulling strings to keep him around, calling in favors to people for his sake and getting people to turn a blind eye to the fact Simon Riley has not gone to a single routine psych check in the better part of a decade.

In exchange, however, that forced Simon to take a deal with Price and instead see an off-site psych expert. A friend of Price’s, a retired psychiatrist who has no way of getting him discharged.

As such, every time he goes on leave he drives some 4 or so hours from Hereford to a small village in Cumbria up north to see her. He always spends the first week of his leave there, in a chalet right smack in the middle of the Lake District National Park…  It’s peaceful and nice. Over those 5 to 7 days, he talks about anything and everything. 

At first he hated it, but with time, it did bring him clarity on a lot of his issues without any sort of danger or judgement. In her words, Dr. Armstrong had been dealing with John’s shit for “far too long”, and nothing Simon would tell her would make a dent on the appalling things she’s heard… And true to her word, Simon hadn’t spotted any shock or discomfort in her, even as he spoke of some utterly vile things.

She made him feel heard, understood, welcome… alive, even if more often than not he didn’t quite feel human. He always came in the door like the ghost of his moniker, a shadow, with steps too hard, body too stiff, breathing too tense, eyes too sharp… And left with an ease and lightness uncharacteristic to someone like him… Dr. Armstrong unraveled all the damage during those 5 to 7 grueling days… Only for him return to base and begin the process of hardening himself once again.

He’s thirty-three, you’re thirty-two today.

He dragged himself out of the comfortable bed in the guest house nearby to the chalet, and threw on a hoodie and some slides before he ventured out to the main house across the stepping stone walkway and into the house through the sliding glass doors.

Dr. Armstrong was already at the breakfast nook in the kitchen when he came in. She’s not quite gone gray, but she’s getting there. Her face is steadily getting more wrinkled compared to 10 years ago when this started. She’s wearing a light blue robe and a set of warm pajamas. Her hair cut into a pixie à la Judi Dench. “Good morning, Simon.”

Simon, meanwhile, is all disheveled, hair sticking up from having just woken up, face peppered with a 5 o’clock shadow, eyes still crusty and face unwashed. “Mornin’.” He grumbled as he poured himself a cup of tea and popped two slices of bread into the toaster.

“How did you sleep?” She asked him as she regarded him over her green-frame reading glasses, which adorned the tip of her nose. She took a sip of a black mug with a cat’s whiskers drawn in it in white.

“Same as usual…” He replied as he stirred some milk into his tea. He grabbed the plain toasted bread and plopped it into a plate and began to turn to join her at the table when she set down her tea mug and leaned her elbows on the table, giving him a pointed look with a cocked brow.

Holding back a groan akin to a moody teenage boy’s, he set down the plate and cuppa, and grabbed some butter and a knife, spreading it over the toasted bread. He was thankful that Dr. Armstrong forced him to take care of himself, he was… But it doesn’t mean he was happy about it. “How did you sleep?” He returned.

“Slept well, thank you.” She replied and kept a stern watch over him as he reached the fridge and grabbed a yogurt and a small box of raspberries. He poured the yogurt into a bowl, topped it with the fruit and a drizzle of honey from the bowl in the corner of the counter, and then took his slightly more nutritious meal to the table. 

She watched him closely as he began to eat his buttered toast, letting him have a moment of stewing in the ‘forced’ meal. She took off her glasses, folding them shut, and set them aside, along with her tablet, and stared at him.

In a way, Simon was more of a son than a patient to her, after so many years helping undo the damage the military and his childhood wracked on his head. He looked forward to the routine, needed it, so much that if he didn’t have these moments with her as often as he had grown accustomed to, he’d start acting a bit erratic. A bit more prone to violence, a bit harder to contain, a bit harder for John to keep a handle on. “What’s on your mind this morning?” She asked him with a cocked brow.

He finished his toasted and wiped his mouth. Then he started toying with the spoon resting on the edge of his yogurt bowl. “That it’s a bad week to be here.” He told her.

“And why is it a bad week, Simon?” She asked him as she leaned her head on her palm.

“There was this girl,” He began to say before he spooned some yogurt into his mouth. He had long stopped wearing a mask while staying over at Dr. Armstrong’s house. His scars were always on display for her to see. “who I grew up with. Her birthday is this week.”

The older woman nodded her head as she watched him closely. “I see. And… this ‘girl’... Was she a friend? A girlfriend?”

“I guess.” Simon said as he ate another spoon of yogurt, brown eyes lowered and focused on the red raspberries suspended atop the fatty yogurt. “We were like…” He trailed off. “She was… erm…” He stopped again and exhaled through his nose.

“I see.” The doctor said as she kept watching him. He kept eating quietly. “And… I assume you don’t talk to her anymore?” She asked.

“No.” Simon replied. “After I joined the Army, she moved away from Manchester and we lost contact.” He said softly.

“Do you still think about it?” She asked him. “About her?”

“Sometimes.” He admitted as he stirred his spoon in his bowl before sighing again and eating another spoonful. “A few times a year… Around her birthday, and mine. And Christmas… And the anniversary of the day we met…” He listed.

“And how does it feel…? Nice? Sad? Bittersweet?” She trailed off, knowing sometimes Simon needed help verbalizing his emotions.

“Sad.” He replied bluntly and ate a couple of spoonfuls of yogurt in a row before pushing the now empty bowl aside with the spoon resting inside of it. 

“And cruel.” The woman watched as he rolled his shoulders, a bit tense, and raised his irises to look at her, eyes softened. “It’s been 15 years since she left Manc, left me and I-” He trailed off. 

Looking away, he kept talking, and talking. “I still think about her. I think I’m okay, I think I’m doing good, doing better, and then those dates come and I’m reminded that she exists, that she’s out there, that she… that she went off and found herself a place and I’m here, and have nothing to show for it, just some stupid fucking medals pinned to the breast of my suit and blood on my hands that doesn’t wash off in the fucking sink.” He hissed bitterly, his eyes unfocused as he poured it all out.

“She was like me. We did everything together, were basically attached at the hip. She was my partner in crime, like a home away from home. Sure, dad beat me and mum, and scared us all and I’m much better now and I’ve grown up, but nothing feels okay. Nothing feels normal or good. It’s all just… just bullshit!” He hissed, his breathing beginning to grow faster. “I go through the motions but I don’t feel okay, I don’t feel safe.” He turned his head away from Doctor Armstrong.

“The last time I felt safe I was in her arms, looking into her eyes and telling her that I loved her for the first time and making all these promises for a future that didn’t happen. A future I stole from the two of us.” He grumbled. “And the worst part is that I used to blame her for leaving, for seeking out a better life, a better place! Maybe I still blame her… But it’s not her fault. It’s really not.” Simon’s eyes began to water in a way they never have before. 

“It’s all my fault. There’s no one to blame but me. The last conversation we had was a stupid fucking argument where I looked her in the eyes, the girl I loved, and told her to stop relying on me… She was looking to me for help, to get her out, to get us both somewhere safe…” He stopped and pressed his lips together to contain a sob. His eyes squeezed shut as tears rolled down his cheeks. 

“I was going to marry her.” He confessed and groaned. “I came back from Aghanistan and bought a ring, because while I was out there, with bullets whizzing past me and watching my brothers in arms fall like flies, all I wanted was to do was go back to her… And I was completely expecting her to be there… To be waiting for me…” He trailed off. “After I broke her heart and told her to leave… I… I somehow expected her to have been weak… to have stayed. And she was strong enough to leave.” He nodded as he pondered on it.

“And the worst part is that I want to know what happened to her. I want…” He trailed off. “I know it’s been so long and she probably doesn’t think about me and even if she did, she wouldn’t want to ever step foot anywhere near her and it’s not like I want to see her, or to meet with her or to… I don’t know, pick up where we left off?” He ranted more and more. “I just… I want to know she’s okay, I want to know she’s alive. I pray every year that she didn’t turn to hard drugs and die of an overdose on a street corner somewhere… I…” He trailed off. “I need her to be alive and healthy and safe and… happy.”

Doctor Armstrong’s eyes softened as a lightbulb went off in her head. She had finally found the genesis to most of Simon’s issues. The grief of the past, the depression, the antisocial tendencies, his propenture for isolation, his fear of vulnerability, his trust issues, his inability to truly connect with others, the avoidant attachment style to any relationships he does attempt to have…

It was because he was attached to her, whoever this girl he spoke of was. He grieved her, he missed her, he couldn’t pursue a meaningful relationship when he had lost such a deep one… A relationship, an attachment, formed through trauma, unhealthy, sure, but one that resulted in a bond. Any attempts of his to ‘move on’ felt wrong and soured quickly. And until now she couldn’t figure out why that was… thinking he just kept unhealthily self-sabotaging… until now.

That morning was a first in many ways. Simon was speaking unprompted, Simon was voicing his emotions, Simon was confronting his past, Simon was admitting to his mistakes, Simon was expressing his wants. He was not just opening up, but he was actively prioritizing his wants, his feelings… It was huge for someone whose sense of self was as skewed as Simon’s.

It only took ten years… But they were making progress.

-

‘You just have to write her a letter, Simon. Let her know you don’t mean to impose on her life, but that you simple hope she’s doing well, thank her for having been part of your life. Keep it simple, concise. You can do that.’

Dr. Armstrong severely underestimated Simon’s ability to follow her request. Granted, most of the time he follows them no problem… But when it comes to you? Yikes.

‘Simple, concise’ became 38 and a half pages. None of it proofread. He felt like he passed out and when he woke up he had 38 pages of straight up gibberish, half-baked thoughts and equally half-baked pages. He doesn’t even remember what the fuck he wrote (probably because he was drunk and high, his first time smoking in 15 years).

Trying to read it gave him a headache, so he just transfered it into a Word document, the only file in an all-black slide-out USB drive, and stuffed the USB and a note saying ‘From Simon Riley’ into an envelope. He didn’t even dare send it himself. He simply dropped it off in the mail-out box at base and and called it a day.

That was 3 months ago. 

As he lays in bed after dinner, he silently hopes to God that you’re ignoring him and tossed out the USB drive without even reading the mess of text in it… Or even that the address Laswell’s analysts found for you in Scotland was wrong. 

But he also can’t bear to imagine  someone else opening the envelope, checking the USB drive and finding that letter and-

A buzzing awakes him from his thoughts and he looks across the room to his phone which is charging on his desk in the corner. He moves across the room swiftly, finding a number he doesn’t recognize has sent him a text. 

It has to be you. He’s careful with his number, he doesn’t give it out willy-nilly. Only Price, Laswell and Nik have it. And you, since he included it in the document.

Taking a deep breath, he clicks the text on the screen, his brown eyes screwing shut as if it was about to explode. Or maybe it was just his heart racing that made him feel that.

He was afraid.

Simon Riley was afraid.

The Ghost wouldn’t protect him now.

Not from you.

Or, rather, not for the way Simon might react when it comes to you.

Deep breaths, Simon told himself. 

Deep breaths.

In…

… and out.

Throwing open his eyes, he looked at the screen, finding one tiny little paragraph in the bright green chat bubble:

hi riley… read your letter a bunch of times… truth be told i didnt know how to answer it, been trying to find what to say for weeks on weeks now and coming up short. if ur free anytime soon can we just have a call over the phone? might be easier. if not then im glad to hear ur fine and that u found success x

Simon reads and rereads your text over and over and over…

And then something in him snaps. He clicks the phone button next to your unsaved contact and then stares at the screen, eyes wide and frantic, not even considering that you might not be ready, that you might be busy, that you asked for ‘one of these days’ and not ‘right now’...

The call connects.

Simon holds his breath.

And so do you, he can hear your little gasp.

The counter at the top of the screen ticks by.

00:01

00:02

00:03

00:04

00:05

00:06

00:07

00:08

00:09

00:10

00:11

00:12

00:13

00:14

00:15

Simon’s eyes begin to well up with tears, he can hear your breath on the other side, but he’s too much of a coward to say anything.

00:16

00:17

00:18

00:19

00:20

00:21

00:22

00:23

Thank God that you’re not.

You’ve always been stronger than him.

“Riley?” You whisper his name.

Taking a deep breath, he opens his mouth to speak… But all that escapes him is a stupid little “Hm?”

You pause again, your breath catching in your throat again… before you say it:

“I forgive you.”

His world nearly collapses at that moment and a sob escapes him, a sound so pathetic and weak that he wants to beat himself over it before Dr. Armstrong’s words ring in his head:

‘You can’t keep suppressing your emotions, it’s okay to cry.’

And so he does. He sobs, audibly so, big fat tears running down his face as he lets his back hit the wall and slide down it until he’s sat on the floor.

“Riley…” You whimper, and it sounds like you’re on the verge of crying as well.

He doesn’t want to make you cry. He really doesn’t… 

But he can’t stop…

For the first time in forever, he feels exactly the one thing Dr. Armstrong has told him he deserves to feel:

At peace.

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[FIC MASTERLIST] || [MY MASTERLIST]

TAGGING ANYONE WHO READ/COMMENTED THE FIC (there's only like... 10 of you total, I'm so sorry)

taglist: @iite-cool , @spicyspicyliving , @lyralein , @heavenlyrivers , @depressed-but-make-it-cute , @myhomeworksnotdone , @captainquake42 , @waiting-so-long , @erensonly , @pieckyghost

Thank you so much for reading this fic, to the people who've read it here and on AO3! Your support mean the world to me!

[actuallyverynormalbtw]

i dont like to talk about self-diagnosis because i dont enjoy people making assumptions about me, my illnesses, and my diagnostic status. but i will say:

i have self diagnosed and gone on to be medically validated with an official diagnosis. multiple times actually. i was never wrong about my self-diagnoses.

however, i have been misdiagnosed by professionals FIVE TIMES. and let me tell you, a professional diagnosis being wrong is far more harmful than a self-diagnosis being wrong.

if your self diagnosis is wrong, maybe you used the wrong language or put yourself in a box or now feel invalid and whatnot. but if your professional diagnosis is wrong, it can lead to abuse, medical trauma, panic attacks, issues with medication, even suicide.

i was misdiagnosed with BPD when i was 15 by a psychologist that i spoke to for hardly even 10 minutes. this diagnosis was based on my parent's description of my reactions to abuse, and the diagnosis was used to validate and excuse their abuse.

i was misdiagnosed with MDD when i was 12 and put through several different types of anti-depressants. we never found anything that worked, because it was actually ADHD and dissociation, but i did end up with panic attacks and insomnia all throughout middle/highschool!

when i self-diagnosed with autism however, it saved my life. it took me out of active suicidality because i was able to finally able to accept myself after years of feeling like i am just "being a person wrong". i had the knowledge to accomodate for myself and the language to advocate for myself. this was life changing. even if i was wrong, which i wasnt, i dont see how it couldve caused any harm.

my opinions on self-diagnoses arent black and white, and im not entirely settled on them either, but i do think this is important to understand. doctors and psychologists are not all knowing. we live in a time where we can access thousands of dollars worth of university level education on the internet, even the same exact resources medical students use. plenty of people are capable of interpreting themselves and that information to come to a conclusion about what they are experiencing and what might help.

sure, self-diagnosis might be biased. but a professional is most likely going to be just as biased, and possibly less aware of it. its just silly to use bias as a primary argument when it is an inescapable feature of human psychology. there is a reason ADHD is underdiagnosed in women. there is a reason anxiety disorders are underdiagnosed in men.

an incorrect self-diagnosis wont take away resources or your space in your comminities. but professional misdiagnosis can cause real damage.

(i am not trying to fear-monger about professional diagnosis, moreso responding to the fear-mongering surrounding self-diagnosis)

[protosstar]

having lyrics addressing how mental health is just completely dismissed coupled with all that religious imagery in the staging hits incredibly hard when the cultural mindset in serbia is one of "mental illness isnt real you just need to go to church"

[clowniconography]

i walked past someone watching something on their laptop at the dining hall and almost instantly recognized a.) that they were watching an episode of Psych and b.) which specific episode they were watching including the title. and neither Shawn nor Gus were onscreen in the .2 seconds i looked. just thought everyone should know that

[mylittleredgirl]

they recently had us switch to a new organization and calendar system at work (including some new software but mostly “this is how you should organize your entire life and you will know peace and never miss a task again!!”). at least half of the system is just a digital version of what i was already doing, and other parts of it are better, so i have no idea why it took me out at the knees. i had been riding a long sweet wave of low anxiety and now i'm trapped in a byzantine maze of highly doable tasks and shaking like a shelter dog in a crate—the exact opposite of what the system is supposed to do.

and the craziest part is that somehow... i can't seem to go back to my old system anymore either?? it's only been a few weeks! i used that for five years!! it’s like i have forgotten how to do the most basic parts of my job or make decisions. my brain turned into a stack of marbles and now they’re all over the floor.

like damn, apparently those crayola markers and glitter stickers were a load-bearing structural element of my professional competence. how do i explain that to regular people.

[fishyyyyy99]

I totally agree that the psychiatric community is very gatekeep-y, and that self-diagnosis is valid. But I also can't help but feel annoyed when people watch reels or whatever and say things like, "I'm so OCD", in an attempt to feel cool or quirky. Except you can't know for sure if they're just doing it to seem cool or quirky (because some people definitely do do that). And then there's the conflicting feelings of not wanting to gatekeep something but also feeling annoyance at your condition being made light of. IDK, I don't mean this in a bad faith way, but does anyone else have thoughts on this?

[barksbog]

Ya’ll have healthcare bills in Austria?? Wow I thought it was free in Europe

you pay for healthcare it´s just universal and cheaper than in the US. for employed people it´s usually automatically taken out of their payment. Since i´m selfemployed i get a 160€ bill every month+ additionally cover 20% of all my doctors bills+ prescription fees for my meds + covering the full cost of my therapy since healthcare doesn´t cover that but i need it for transitioning.

i end up easily spending 300€+/month on healthcare stuff and it´s pretty rough

(this is in austria, even within the EU there is a huge variation in accesibility, cost and coverage of healthcare)

[avpdpossum]

“your self-diagnosis will never be as good as a professional diagnosis” yeah, my self-dx isn’t “as good” as a pro-dx would be, it’s better!

most psychs have spent maybe a few days maximum learning about the absolute basics of my diagnoses, while i’ve spent years taking in every bit of information i can find, including lots of information from the same sources they’d be using and more — chances are i know more about my diagnoses than the average psych ever will

psychs who do have more knowledge got that knowledge from deeply stigmatizing sources, and most have never bothered to learn from the people who actually live the experiences they claim to be experts in (ex. “npd experts” who actually just specialize in “evil abuser disease” or people like martin kantor)

a psych will never be able to know what’s going on in my head the way i can because they can’t read my mind, so even if i was able to articulate my internal experiences really well (which i’m not — i’m a semiverbal avoidant with often disorganized thoughts/speech; explaining something like that is hard if not impossible for me), hearing it secondhand can’t compare to the 20 years i’ve spent living it

the vast majority of psychs operate based on sanism and profit motive — they’re more than willing to take obscene amounts of my money, only to deny me a diagnosis based on not meeting some shitty stereotypes or say there’s no point in giving me a diagnosis if i don’t want a cure or give me the diagnosis and then have me put in a psych ward because my diagnoses make me one of those ~scary mentally ill people~ that none of them want to deal with

a misdiagnosis from a psych could potentially lead to me being put through intensive therapies or put on medication for the wrong thing, which can have very bad results, and the label might stay on my medical record even after being proven wrong; if my personal assessment is wrong, nothing happens — no one gets hurt, i just go “oops, nevermind”, keep whatever useful things i learned from it in my “toolbox”, stop using the label itself, and move on with life

coming to my own understanding of how my brain works and using the labels that actually make sense to me means i actually get to have some autonomy for once — i get a community of people who understand my experiences and a better understanding of how to manage my symptoms and accommodate myself, without having to fear things like forced treatment or intensified discrimination

the idea that my neurotype makes me incapable of self-awareness and introspection is ridiculous — some people might feel that way about their own situations and need to rely on outside assessment as a result, but that experience is not universal

my understanding of my own mind is NOT second-rate compared to a psych’s, and i don’t need to put myself at risk just for a stranger to tell me what i already know

[faeriekit]

This is more mental health but my people pleasing tendencies are so severe that I accidentally started pretending I was getting less anxious and solving interpersonal conflicts in order to make my therapist feel like he was having a positive effect on me. I didn't want him to feel bad. Once I saw how happy he was about my "progress" I couldn't bear to correct him and eventually started strategizing how I'd answer when he asked how I'd been.

Unrelated, but a different therapist once described me as "sensitive" and not only had this never occurred to me as a possible description of myself, it shocked me and hurt my feelings so severely that I cried about it. Which sort of felt like proving her right, if I'm honest about it.

TMI but me before I got on meds for my rampant RSD 💀jhghvhbjnlkg I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry for your poor therapist. If it helps, they definitely didn't say it to be mean, although it's not as helpful of a declaration as, like, something treatable or something easier to research. High Sensitivity is, like...a in informal trait marker for a couple of different possibly atypical neurotypes. It's just sort of floating around in the collective psych professional hivemind at the moment.

[flimsy-roost]

ADHD screening test:

How frequently do you struggle with task A (that everyone insists is due to willful laziness)?

How frequently do you struggle with task B (that everyone insists is due to willful laziness)?

How frequently do you struggle with task C (that everyone insists is due to willful laziness)?

How frequently do you struggle with task D (that everyone insis-

[realbeefman]

for as much as house says “everybody lies” he does. believe patients about their symptoms far more frequently than any irl doctor would

[trans-axolotl]

for anon asking about NPD/ASPD resources

For context, anon sent in an ask searching for nonstigmatizing resources for support with PD diagnoses and other stigmatized diagnoses.

And this is such a good ask--it is so fucking frustrating and dehumanizing to try to search for support when half the stuff that pops up is using really cruel language or just directed towards family and friends. The community definitely deserves better, both when it comes to the way psych professionals perpetuate stigma and in regards to the prejudice and sanism that shows up in other communities in our lives. Unfortunately, I don't have a ton of resources on hand, although I do know one good support group. The rest of the resources I know of are kind of mediocre or not PD specific, so if other people could add on I would really, really appreciate it!

Neuromancers runs a discord and a Cluster B peer support group that I've heard really good things about. I haven't been myself, so I can't 100 % vouch, but they're a group with abolitionist and mad pride values.

This might not be exactly what you're looking for, but it's an article exploring cultural bias in PD diagnosis that links to a lot of sources that talk about how psychiatry contributes to stigma around personality disorders. I clicked through some of the studies that it links to and it does use a lot of medicalized language, but I thought I would link the article anyway in case it's ever helpful to have academic sources to show to other people.

Also not exactly what you're looking for, but another article debunking some of the common talking points about NPD in pop psychology (Content warning that it is discussing some very ableist myths in the context of challenging them)

Last sort of general resources for peer support that I have some trust that they are PD friendly are the Wildflower Alliance and Hearing Voices Network Groups. Wildflower alliance groups offer a lot of different general peer support and I have one friend with NPD who has spoken positively of those spaces. Hearing Voices Network groups can vary a lot depending on location, so defintely plan to email ahead, but I've been to a few groups that welcome people who generally identify as psych survivors/mad/ex patients who want to share community spaces around those values. Also want to share is the neurodivergent friendly workbook of DBT skills (the link is to buy it directly from the creator but if anyone who is interested can't afford it rn, dm me and I'll send you a pdf.) Again, I know this is really not super relevant to what you asked for but is one of the less stigmatizing, less medicalizing workbooks I can find for accessing info about coping skills and this is one of my general favorite support resources.

Overall I'm really sorry that I don't have better resources to offer you, and I think that really should be a sign to the mad pride/psych abolition/peer support community that we need to do a lot better job in making sure that our spaces are explicitly welcome to people with stigmatized PD diagnoses. The work shouldn't have to be on you to try to navigate these spaces and figure out whether or not you're welcome, and any spaces that offer peer support, are aligned with mad pride and psych abolition, really should be doing the work to make sure lateral violence and sanism aren't being perpetuated.

followers, esp followers with lived experience, please add on!

[xerospaced]

I think we need to start putting Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD/EUPD) under the microscope

I think it's high time we really get into it

Let's stop faffing about and get real

Like why do men get diagnosed with C-PTSD but women with the same experiences and symptoms get BPD

Or, hmm, I dunno, maybe why women who are undiagnosed neurodivergent are continually misdiagnosed with BPD without a moments consideration that it could be something else at play

Or how the diagnosis is given so quickly on assumption

It's almost like...

I dunno man

Anyone remember that period in the history of psychology where women who were dealing with trauma from abuse and/or sexual assault and the like were said to have "hysteria"

Ykno how they'd have one conversation with a psych and the psych would be like, "hmm, female, emotionally unstable, difficulties communicating, fragile sense of self. Oh yes yes, hysterical"

RING ANY BELLS!? ANYONE!?

As someone who was misdiagnosed with EUPD/BPD at 21 after one conversation with zero investigation. Who also later discovered they have adhd (diagnosed at 26) and autism (undiagnosed/dismissed due to adhd etc.). I find it pretty fucken sus that all these women are given this bullshit catch all diagnosis that labels them a problem and places the blame entirely on the flaw within themselves and then just... left to it.

I've been a part of BPD groups. I've seen those women. I've seen how the diagnosis has NOT helped them. I've seen how their symptoms have worsened. How hopeless they feel. How they try and try to do or be better but can't seem to get the hang of it.

And I've seen how many of them really need help dealing with their trauma, their symptoms of C-PTSD. I've seen how so many of them have had difficulties with parents friends and partners, always being misunderstood and the problem, almost like... hmm I don't fucken know - neurodivergent people maybe!

Honestly, to anyone who has been given the diagnosis of borderline. I urge you to investigate. Dig deeper. Do your own research. Look into the stats on misdiagnosis (I promise you, they are staggering!) Look at what conditions/disorders are often mistaken for borderline. Just do yourself a favour and question this label. Investigate.

[neuroticboyfriend]

sometimes i think maybe MH self diagnosis isn't that deep. and i don't mean that as in it doesn't matter or isn't significant. i mean psychiatric diagnoses are heavily biased towards ableism and disorder labels are really just a collection of experiences. it's not like they're diseases with a defined pathology. the causes and origins of the experiences are different for everyone.

so. if you've learned you share a lot of experiences with people with a certain diagnosis, and the resources and support given to people with that label help you... go ahead and use whatever language you want to describe your experiences. cause that's really all it is at the end of the day. even for professionally diagnosed people, their dx might not fit them 100%. so. who's to say it has to for you, too.

you don't even have to self diagnose yourself with something definitive. you can use symptom labels. you can just be neurodivergent or mentally ill and not specify further. whatever helps. it's your life, your brain. as long as you're not hurting yourself or anyone else, you're fine. and if you realize the words you're using didn't fit as well as you thought.. oh well. try again. understanding yourself is trial and error. it's nbd.

what matters is that you're supported and doing better. that's all.

[gracegrove]

not super on topic, but because of some of the things going on in posts lately and talking with a mutual it really got me thinking about how some users on here will cling onto psych degrees and use it to preemptively categorize and diagnose billy hargrove and then in turn come after those who like him.

and it made me realize

they are seeing mental health diagnoses like this:

as stand-alone categories with clearly distinguishable borders.

above are all diagnoses that i believe billy would meet criteria for on at least a superficial level.

when in reality diagnosing looks more like this:

in which there are no borders, symptoms can and will overlap across many diagnoses, and it takes time, skill, and listening to your client and understanding their history and needs to look at those blurry overlapping spaces particularly.

billy's anxiety symptoms could truly be just symptoms of anxiety. but they could be symptoms of hypervigilance and overall heightened arousal and reactivity due to living in an abusive environment, which would speak more to PTSD. they could also be representative of BPD symptoms in terms of relationship instability as well as the stress and upheaval he has just gone through moving to hawkins.

billy could experience periods of low mood this could be Major Depressive Disorder but could also be Dysthymia, Bipolar II, so on. billy's difficulties with emotion regulation and (possibly) implied swings in mood could be indicative of BPD, but are also symptom markers of Bipolar and Cyclothymic disorders, and are also noted as disruptive behaviors in ADHD.

I think there's a lot to be said about how nuanced diagnosis can be, it's definitely not as simple as cracking the DSM, thumbing to the right section, and just checking off a few boxes. Because sooooo many symptoms can cross into other disorders and not even stay within the same classification. they can easily jump from trauma disorders to psychotic disorders to mood disorders to personality disorders. why? because these symptoms are common and symptoms aren't the only thing that make a diagnosis.

you must consider all these: symptoms, onset (when did it start), duration (how long has it been happening), and severity (what level of impairment/are there a little vs a lot of symptoms)

if i eyeballed billy hargrove without a diagnostic interview i might've said Oppositional Defiant Disorder.... and guess who'd be wrong? Me. because you can't just blatantly categorize, eyeball, or sum up a person. it ain't that simple.

learn to consider that all lines are blurred and that those blurs are where all the information is.

[disabledunitypunk]

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