Aibu not telling new partner about diagnosis

[Bpdqueen]

Iv been seeing a new guy for about 3 months now and things have been going great and I'm worried that if I tell him I have bpd he will leave. Aibu to keep this secret from him.

I haven't had a bad episode for about 4 months Iv had smaller episodes while with him but nothing he has seen. He hasn't seen that side of me at all

Walking into traffic or on train tracks is not just dangerous to herself. It's dangerous for other traffic participants. She could have caused a fatal accident.

Let's not minimise, ok?

Sooner or later he will. And when it happens, the fact you kept the diagnosis from him will only compound his negative reaction.

OP could you ‘test the water’? Eg Discuss a mutual friend or someone in the news with MH issues and see how he speaks about it.

If he is ‘psychologically minded’, great. If not, then you could start to try and protect yourself emotionally a bit before telling him and expect the ‘worst’.

OP, honestly, how would you react do you think if this relationship ended now?

Nobody even knows what the circumstances leading up to the car smashing incident even were so how they can judge this woman as violent is beyond me. As with all things, there would have been a reason for why she did that, such as having to put up with years of emotional or physical abuse.

All people have done is connect that with her bpd and used it to justify their own deeply held prejudices.

I'd kill myself

The strongest relationships are built on trust and mutual respect. Having secrets about something so important isn’t a great idea now you’ve been together for a few months and know it’s a relationship you want to continue.

Please start the conversation but break yourself in gently if you need.

You absolutely have to tell him. People who are involved with one another deserve to know the full picture. It's lying by omission.

I agree with the advice to start preparing the ground. Tell him that you have had some mental health issues. If you have ever been in hospital tell him that, let him get to know you and gradually tell him what some of the issues have been. I wouldn’t start by coming straight out with a diagnosis or label.

This is the worry. You need to speak to your team asap. The intensity of your feelings is a real risk.

Agreed

Violence is violence. Just because it can be explained by something, doesn't make it any less dangerous. Learning that your attacker has an illness doesn't lessen your trauma or the impact on you in any way.

If I saw someone smashing up a car in the street I would be really frightened. If I knew someone whose ex had smashed up their stuff, I would be worried for their safety.

I watched one of my brothers in a relationship with someone with BPD. It was really difficult to grasp just how 'in' to him she was very, very quickly. That's not to say my brother isn't lovely/lovable, he very much is. Rather, it was the rapidity of him being, in her mind, basically the best man to have ever walked the earth

My ex got into a similar situation with a FB "friend", Trez, except this one wasn't a romantic thing (at least not on his part) and he was genuinely trying to help

It then turned out that her condition had brought about numerous accusations of rape - paramedics, delivery drivers, care workers, you name it - which was when he asked me to accompany him as an obvious safeguard, only to find it didn't go down at all well

Obviously I'm not suggesting for an instant that OP would go down this route; I'm simply empathising with your experience of hyper-focus

Absolutely this.

You need to tell him, if you really like him he should know. I would want to know, so that I could support my OH.

Is BPD Bipolar disorder or borderline personality disorder? I've seen both mentioned on the thread.

@XenoBitch and @Puzzledandpissedoff

thanks for supporting the simple fact there is another side to BPD and who it affects/harms beyond the diagnosed person.

And, with the OP's most recent statement, I'm out of here.

Borderline personality disorder

Sorry, but that suggests you are not ready for a relationship right now.

The only relationship you should be concentrating on right now is the one with your MH team...no one has a CPN, psychologist and psychiatrist when they are well.

I say that from a place of kindness and someone with BPD.

There will a point in your recovery journey that you can deal with a life stressor like a break up, without automatically thinking of suicide. Now is not that time.

You have to tell him.

I'd 100% leave a partner who didn't tell me about such an important thing. You should have told him at the outset.

And just the fact you say you'd kill yourself if he left you shows how much you're affected by this illness. You're a very long way from being well imo.

Oh OP this 100% means you are not in the right head space to be in a relationship right now. It is completely and utterly unfair to make another person your only reason to live. This is not in any way healthy or functional or something that resembles 'love'. This is compete and utter emotional dependence which is a totally different thing.

You are far too ill right now to be in a relationship - or to recognise or understand what love is.

You need to give him a fair chance to decide for himself without emotional manipul of 'I will kill myself'. Not everyone can handle a partner with a serious life long MH issue.

Telling someone that you have BPD - probably doesn't explain anything to them but it does sound frightening.

As you get to know someone well, it wouldn't be good to hide that you have mental health difficulites that result in X Y Z behaviours sometimes... but the name of the condition is probably not helpful in this case.

Hello OP, we are really sorry to hear you are feeling this way.

We hope you don't mind, but when these threads are flagged up to us we usually add a link to our www.mumsnet.com/webguide/mental-health Mental Health resources]]. You can also go to the www.samaritans.org/ Samaritans website]] or email them on [email protected].

Support from other Mumsnetters is great and we really hope you will be able to take some comfort from your fellow posters, but as other MNers will tell you, it's really a good idea to seek RL help and support as well.

We are going to move this thread to the Mental Health section shortly.

theconversation.com/we-need-to-treat-borderline-personality-disorder-for-what-it-really-is-a-response-to-trauma-115549