So it’s mental health week on buzzfeed (even tho the official mental health week is in October) and I guess most of you don’t know that I suffer from one (I know hard to believe right? lol) With my bubbly personality and happy persona, no one ever guesses until I tell them and they’re always like “What! Really?! I never would have known…” Hey, you know what they say — the happiest people are the saddest ones.

But back in 2010 I was diagnosed with having Borderline Personality Disorder, ADHD and Anxiety. I think I’ve always kinda knew that something was wrong with me, with my tumultuous relationships, impulsiveness, depression, suicidal thoughts, amongst other issues, I was kinda like “yeah something ain’t right…” Remember those quizzes you would take back in the early 2000s? The ones you would post on your Livejournal or Myspace? lol Well I took one about mental health and the outcome of that was I had BPD and I just shrugged it off to “whatever this is just a stupid quiz anyways…” I guess for a while I was in denial of it even when I would cut in 8th grade, I still didn’t think there was anything wrong with me. But many of my friends were concerned and I was even put on suicide watch for 3 days because of it.

The people closest to me knew this “craziness” because they saw it first hand. My friends or coworkers never saw anything past the bubbly personality. I knew how to compartmentalize and differentiate groups of people with how I acted.

Having BPD is so hard some days. It’s similar to bi-polar disorder but it’s not so manic. I have “low” days and “good” days. On the “low” days it’s hard to deal with life, all I think about are the things that stress me out and everything that is going wrong. Some days I just cry, cry for no reason. Also, having BPD means that I’m more irritable, and can snap at the smallest things. Ex’s have put it “walking on eggshells” with me. The impulsiveness has put me in some tricky situations that I’m still trying to get myself out of. All these things have engulfed who I am. I thought everything I was experiencing was “normal” or atleast “my normal” and sometimes I was okay with it and other days I was so frustrated with myself. Although I have this disorder it doesn’t necessarily define who I am, and I’ve realized that.

Anxiety can be so paralyzing. It can make you crawl up into a ball or cry… but I feel like my anxiety isn’t as bad as others. I manage it pretty well, it typically lasts about a minute or two then dissipates for a little while until it comes back again, but I don’t think it persists like some people experience it. I just never knew the name of the feeling I was experiencing when it was happening.

Honestly, I was shocked about the ADHD but it made sense since I could never concentrate on my studies and could never completely finish books… However even with ADHD I managed to do well in school. Took AP classes, was the VP of my class, graduated with an advanced diploma, etc. So, even if you have that I feel like you can always overcome your adversities with the right mentality and not let it consume you or become an excuse for not doing well.

I’ve come to accept having this disorder now and have taken steps to help myself adjust to what “normal” should really be. Although there really is no such thing as normal, it’s more like adjusting myself to stability.

I have a therapist and a psychiatrist. Both who I see regularly. The therapist helps discuss all of my problems and the psychiatrist prescribes my medications. I’m on Lamictal for the BPD (as a mood stabilizer), Zyprexa for the depression, Adderall for the ADHD, and Xanax for my anxiety. I can relate to the video below so well. Because it took trial and error to get me on a regime that worked for me. I had to try out different pills and dosages.. It was costly and exhausting. But I honestly don’t know how to function now without it.

There are days when I take my medicine that I think to myself “man, if this is normal then this shit is boring!” I’m so used to racing thoughts and unrealistic fantasies that would take over my head that when the medication stabilized me it was such a hard reality to accept. But I have come to accept it and I’m happy with it now. I’m not saying that everyone needs to go through medication and that it’s the only solution to having a mental illness, there are other ways of going about it, such as therapy or self-help, but it’s what has worked for me thus far.

I hate how having a mental illness still has a stigma on society. Granted, it’s better than before and more people have realized that it’s not such a bad thing as it was once stigmatized as. Most people don’t even realize that they have a mental illness. But I just wish that people knew that you don’t have to be ashamed of it and that it’s okay to talk to someone about what you’re going through. Seeking help was the best thing I’ve ever done for myself.