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*Welcome to* “Take Off The Mask with CasieCasem (TOTM),” *the podcast where we strip away the filters and dig deep into the heart of mental health. I’m your host, Casie Casem, and here, nothing is off-limits. We talk about the things that matter—raw, real stories from people who’ve been there, insights from experts who know the field, and conversations that challenge how we think about mental well-being.*
This isn't just another mental health podcast. It's a community. A place where you're seen, heard, and understood, no matter what you’re going through. Whether you’re here to find support, gain understanding, or simply listen to meaningful discussions —whatever brought you here, you’re in the right place. our goal is to create a space where you feel heard and valued. Remember, you’re not alone on this journey. *Together, we're breaking down walls and opening up honest conversations that need to be had. *Together we can Change the Face of Depression Join us as we take off the mask and face mental health together.
*Before we dive in, a quick note: today's episode may cover sensitive topics related to mental health. If you feel overwhelmed at any point, please reach out to a professional or someone you trust. We’re all in this together, and there’s always help and hope.*
*Ready to take off the mask? Let’s get started.
Check out our website at www.CTFOD.com or www.changethefaceofdepression.com
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I am thrilled to welcome 2 incredible guests. From Nea Bpd's lived Experience Committee.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: who bring a wealth of perspective, insight, and heart to this conversation.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: First, st we have Sadia Ali
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: co-chair of the lived Experience Committee and a newly appointed member of Nea Bpd's Board of Directors.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Sadia's life perspectives in the forefront of her Bpd advocacy
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: are really her lived experience, and her work is instrumental in bringing all of this perspective to the forefront. She is the only current board member with lived experience, and she's here today to share her experience and her journey with us.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thank you so much for being here, Sadia, we really appreciate you joining us.
Saadia: Thank you. I'm happy to be here.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thank you so much. And joining Sadia today is Amber Joy Pastechi. She's also a member of the Lived Experience Committee and a dedicated advocate for individuals navigating the challenges of Bpd.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Amber's commitment to this work stems from her personal journey, and she brings a unique voice to today's discussion. Amber, we're so happy to have you here.
Amber Joy Kostecki: I'm happy to be here. Thank you.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Absolutely.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Let's start with the basics for our audience.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Borderline personality disorder is a condition that's often misunderstood and surrounded by stereotypes.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: With such a wide range of possible symptoms.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: 256 unique combinations.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: It's no wonder people struggle to understand it.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Sadia, let's start with you. Would you explain Bpd to someone who's hearing about it for the 1st time.
Saadia: Definitely. According to the Dsm. A person can be diagnosed with borderline personality disorder if they have 5 or more of the following 9 symptoms.
Saadia: efforts to avoid abandonment, unstable and intense relationships.
Saadia: unstable self-image, self-injurious behaviors, like cutting
Saadia: impulsivity in 2 or more areas, like spending money or gambling substance, abuse reckless, driving.
Saadia: unstable mood, feelings of emptiness, intense anger, and paranoia, or disassociation.
Saadia: So I can't do the math for you here on the spot. But given the diagnostic parameters. There are 256 combinations of these symptoms that can all be diagnosed as Bpd.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: That's incredible.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Amber. What is it that you think are some of the key characteristics or traits that stand out in Bpd? Or have they shown up in your life.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Yeah. Well, one of the
Amber Joy Kostecki: one of the things about it is that it's a
Amber Joy Kostecki: disorder that has to do with other people, and not a lot of people describe it this way. But
Amber Joy Kostecki: it has to do with other people and our relationships with them. So it does get really complicated. And yeah, I've dealt with in my own life, for sure.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Absolutely.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I myself have been diagnosed with borderline, and I feel like this is an excellent opportunity for us to have great conversations about.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: You know how fascinating this is because, as someone who's been diagnosed, I can relate so much of what you've said, that fear of abandonment.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: It's such a core part of my own experience. I remember moments where even small changes in relationships felt like the end of the world.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: It's something I'm still learning to navigate.
Saadia: Fear of abandonment is definitely a common thread with people experiencing Bpd. And sometimes people confuse that with a disorganized attachment style which I happen to have, but you can have Bpd. And an anxious attachment style and avoidant attachment style. I'm not sure you can have it with the secure attachment style, but these are separate things it is. It is a good
Saadia: thing to know about your attachment style. If you're trying to kind of work through your symptoms so like the crash course on that
Saadia: is anxious attachment. This is an oversimplification, but it happens when you're enmeshed with your primary caregiver when you're young, and it shows up essentially with you, being super clingy. So people with Bpd. Who have anxious attachment, their attempts to avoid abandonment might be a little more straightforward, such as saying things like, Don't leave me. Do you still love me?
Saadia: Are you mad at me, or things like that?
Saadia: Avoidant attachment, on the other hand, arises usually when you are neglected by your primary caregiver.
Saadia: and it shows up in adulthood as you, not really wanting to form attachments at all. So with the fear of abandonment, can can arise with Bpd. With someone who has avoid an attachment by cutting people off really quickly and really easily sort of in a you can't fire me. I quit type of way. So that's another way that you can see it and disorganized attachment. It's
Saadia: somewhere in between the 2. It has some elements of both. And it it happens when you.
Saadia: when you really want to be connected to someone. But you're afraid of that person, and it arises when you had an unpredictable primary caregiver.
Saadia: and you got mixed messages from them, and it leads to you sending mixed messages in in your adult relationships and fear of abandonment you can very quickly go from. Don't leave me to
Saadia: as like an anxious attachment person would do to
Saadia: you know I'm cutting you off. I'm never gonna talk to you again as someone with avoidant attachment would do so.
Saadia: So the attachment style and the fear of abandonment and Bpd are totally separate paradigms, but they do kind of interact and overlap in an interesting way.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Oh, my goodness, that is incredible! That's so much to unpack here.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: So I personally can find myself relating to absolutely doing that. The idolation of the you know I can't live without you. Please stay like
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: there's no life beyond this point. Type thing
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: to, you know. Also having those moments almost
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: right next to each other. I I feel like I can say of I don't need you, you know. Get out of here like you're nothing, you know all those things like I'm not gonna let you have this hold on me. All of those things. I can absolutely
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: really reflect on those.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I have some questions that are a little off script, but you brought up some great points that I feel like are possibilities for talking points. And so I wanted to go into your use of main caregiver.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: So when I was 1st diagnosed with Bpd.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: there was such a taboo about it. Now. This was
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: 1510, 15 years ago. I have been living with it for that long.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: So my question is, nature versus nurture.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: There was a I guess they needed more research they needed to do more research on, if it was like the nature, or if it was the nurture like, if it was the at home childhood, the raising, the disruption of, you know.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: safety in the childhood, or something traumatic happening that would rattle somebody to have that type of a
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I'm going to use the word mental illness. It's a personality disorder. And so that makes us
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: more susceptible because of the the
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: underlying issues at home or nature versus like what they are learned behavior, things that they have, you know, from school interactions from, you know, friends or boyfriends, girlfriends
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: try to make. I guess this
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: warped personality disorder. How would you say someone can
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: like, how how do you even go about saying you have this disorder? How do you go about getting diagnosed.
Saadia: Nature versus versus nurture is definitely a big debate, not just with Bpd. And and
Saadia: mental illness, but in in all sorts of
Saadia: all sorts of different places, I will say for Bpd. When some people are so there's no agreement on it, just like there's no agreement in general about nature and nurture. And what percentage is dominant but with with
Saadia: people who have Bpd are oftentimes more perceptive and more sensitive. So if you've ever heard of a microexpression
Saadia: when you know people with Bpd can pick up on those things and feel, you know, you know they they feel they have a reaction to it, whereas some other people
Saadia: might not be tuned into that. And that's fine. That's a different kind of person. But what that means is that someone with the predisposition towards Bpd could be traumatized by something that is not traumatic for someone who
Saadia: isn't emotionally in tune with the people around them. So, for example, a parent seeming to reject them by not being interested in their report card or their art project, or something else to a very sensitive little kid. They could experience that, as you know, a lowercase t trauma.
Saadia: and that could put them on a path, because once you get traumatized it's easier to be traumatized again, because when you're a kid and you get rejected by your parents, it feels like it feels very scary, whereas another kid might hand over their report card and the parent might not have a reaction, or they might win their sports game, and the parent might not have a reaction, and the kid might not even notice.
Saadia: So I think that's really important to be aware of when you're thinking about the origins of Bpd is that we're generally more sensitive people. And that means that when we're young we can be a lot more affected by the same things that neurotypical people
Saadia: aren't phased by.
Amber Joy Kostecki: I can talk a little bit about that, too, actually.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Sure please.
Amber Joy Kostecki: So I believe I got my borderline because of trauma. But I have 3 daughters and my middle daughter. She's 19. She also has borderline, but she got it through genetics.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Yeah, it makes it.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: That was actually going to be my next question. If you felt there was any statistics at all, if it was hereditary, or if it was, you know, based on and like a disruption in the livelihood.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Is there any statistics, you, or any information at all that we have on that like? Is it.
Amber Joy Kostecki: I don't know. I don't know at the moment I might have seen it before, but I don't remember.
Saadia: Still out on that one.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Perfect. Yeah, let's some very good information, because
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I'm curious about that one. I do wonder if
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: it is genetic, you know. Like, if if we got it from
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: our parents, you know, just for say, and then, if there was a traumatic
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: something that happened at the home because of the parents having. Bpd, you know that just
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: distilled it into the children.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Happen. But also we tend to, or people with borderline tend to have one parent that is like narcissistic.
Amber Joy Kostecki: That's how my mom was. So.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I can absolutely understand that. Yeah. My childhood was very tumultuous. I am.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: My mother was murdered when I was a year old.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: The story says that I was there, and
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: it was in front of me.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: And then, you know, that was
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: this year actually next week, December the 28th is going to be her 37 year anniversary
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: of her death day. And so, after you know.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: my mom was killed that way, it was considered a passion crime. She was beat to death for disclosure. So that was, you know, what they considered somebody very close.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and it's
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: unsolved still, to this day. So with all of that chaos of not having that nurturing parent
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: also the way that she was taken, all of the things that happened with that, you know. My family was
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: very back and forth with each other, my mom's side against my dad's side.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: It was really hard until I was about 12,
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and then, you know, even more things happened that took me away from my mom's side of the family, and
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I didn't see them for years and years, and then
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: You know my my home bringing was not
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: awful, but it definitely. You know, there could have been better things about it for sure.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Maybe a little bit more empathy and grace, of course, for sure, some therapy. But I do think that all of that
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: has 100% to do with. You know all of the things that I've been diagnosed with.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: But I do believe that that's that fear of abandonment is understanding that you know
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: the least permeates in life. And just you, you get that one little grain of.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I guess, empathy, or what you think is kindness and love
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and then it turns out to
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: maybe not be that way. And then it's like, Oh, my God! I can't live without it, even if it's not what I think it is like. I just want to live with the idea of it. I don't want to be alone.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: That was something that I really had to deal with was the the getting out of that mind frame of. There's no life beyond this point.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: So I think that I'd like to talk about
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: the sheer number of myths and stereotypes that surround Bpd.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: So idea in your advocacy work. What are some of the most harmful stereotypes that you've encountered.
Saadia: Well, 1st of all, I'm really sorry to hear about your mom. That is terrible, and
Saadia: there are really no no words for it.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thank you. That's that's my a little bit of my testimony. Why, we started change the face of depression. You know, understanding what depression can do, and grief and all of those things. And I wanted to
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: make an impact in a better way than the world impacted me.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: And so I realized that I could either be absolutely down in life and really
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: feel the heaviness of this conversation, or
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I could see what a destruction this heaviness is, and how it has affected everybody close to me and my family.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and do better.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: And so
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: that's why we are having a conversation like this today. Thank you very much for your empathy. I appreciate that.
Saadia: Yeah, I I also identify as a cycle breaker.
Saadia: And we need more people like that. So good for you. Keep up.
Saadia: Keep on keeping on on the journey.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thank you. Well, I love you and your advocacy, like you are also diagnosed with Bpd, and you're going to be on the board. So you know what are some of those things that you find your own self having to, I guess, combat, you know, and and like, get a grasp on what those stereotypes are, I know just one talking point is therapy.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I went to several different therapists for years, and you know, given
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: the fact that I have. Bpd, and what those
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: side effects or characteristics look like. I had a lot of
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: just flat out therapists that refuse to work with me, and so with your work and your advocacy, especially what you do with the
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Nea Bpd. And all of their resources. How is this?
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: A a great light for us like, how can you help dispel some of those stereotypes.
Saadia: Well, the the 1st one that I would like to focus on is the stereotype of people with Bpd. As
Saadia: externalizing their emotions, so yelling at people or making a scene in some other way, and this has very much not been the case in my life. I mean most of the time everyone has their their moments, but for me, when I got upset I would almost always internalize my feelings and appear calm on the outside, but be shut down and
Saadia: stop talking, and on the inside I would ruminate until I was alone, and I would have really, really intense feelings. That wouldn't be, you know, visible just from looking at me, and when I when I when I was alone, that's when I would kind of act on my feelings, and I would usually hurt myself by cutting myself or scratching myself, or
Saadia: you know, other other techniques. And so it it sucks to be stereotyped as someone
Saadia: who makes their feelings other people's problem
Saadia: when I dealt with so much of it alone for so long, and I endured so much, emotionally and physically from trying not to make my feelings someone else's problem.
Saadia: I'm sure you can find an ex-boyfriend here or there who would disagree with this, but I can only speak my truth, and I know a lot of other people who have what some people call quiet Bpd. And they internalize their their feelings, but they're just as strong, and and they deal with it alone. And the
Saadia: this type of person with quiet Bpd actually has a higher
Saadia: suicide rate, because no one knows that they're suffering, and no one knows how much they're suffering.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, that's incredible that you bring that up.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I absolutely resonate with that I to
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: feel like I maybe even did a combination of the both. I think it was
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: when showing emotion. Maybe it was so much built up that had finally combust that that emotion was rage, and it was a lot
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: very loud, very exaggerated, because well, not even I'm not going to word. No, it wasn't exaggerated. It just came to a head.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and maybe the reaction wasn't warranted to be that
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: loud, but the combination of all of it combusting turned out to be that loud
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and then, you know, I would go into a shame
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: embarrassment, you know, and then, of course, having to grovel for you know, apologizing for my actions and the way that I handled things.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and then either doing it silently, like you were speaking of of internalizing it.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: And then also, you know, a combination of both doing it out loud and internalizing it while also cutting.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I never cut to kill.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I always cut to feel or just try to
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: get my mind off of it to what is that word distract?
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah. How about you, Amber?
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Do you have any stereotypes that you've had to confront? Or how did you push a back back against any of those.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Well, I don't think there's any stereotypes. But
Amber Joy Kostecki: wait! What did you ask, Sadia, before? Sorry.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: No, that's.
Saadia: The same thing.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Oh, okay.
Amber Joy Kostecki: well, for me, I don't have quiet. Bpd, I've never been. That's the one symptom I've never
Amber Joy Kostecki: dealt with was self harm.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Besides, in like other ways, like self-sabotage and stuff like that.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Indeed.
Amber Joy Kostecki: In relationships and jobs and stuff like that. But yeah, so I've never really had the self-harm. And I've always.
Amber Joy Kostecki: I think I think I feel like there's a combination of you know.
Amber Joy Kostecki: alone, and feeling like crap by myself and being loud with people, you know, when I needed, when I felt like I needed to.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Absolutely.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Well, another thing, I'd love to get your thoughts on. So I was doing some research about Bpd
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: for my own self, just to educate my my own self. I really love to hear what people say.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: as far as therapists and medical. You know, educators anything like that, because
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: when I was 1st diagnosed. I was institutionalized.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I was in the inpatient for 12 days.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and I was very angry at my diagnosis. It made sense.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: It it made total sense. I could accept it. I could
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: like the all the chat I was like, yeah, I got all, all of them. I got everyone
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and I was mad because I felt like it wasn't fair. I felt like I have a right to feel this way like like look at me like, look at my life like I am angry. And this is, you know what it's called, basically. And I just wanted to be.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I don't want to use the word accepted. But I I just wanted to feel heard. I wanted to have somebody say, Okay, well, that makes sense.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: you know, like one and one equals 2, and I have had.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: you know, not great conversations with
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: therapist about it. It's almost it's a
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: it's a taboo. It's 1 of those fearful
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: stamps. I feel like you get put on.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: And for the 1st time in
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: 1415 years of having this diagnosis, I came across a Youtube channel.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: And this guy's name is Healthy Gamer Gg. Which is a great tag, and he is.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I believe, a licensed therapist like I should have done even more research on this, but he was talking about borderline like he went into it very, very detailed. It was a lot to to take in, and I I really enjoyed that conversation. He said, that we can go into remission, and within 10 years, with the right support, people can
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: fully recover from Bpd and have a what you would consider normal, healthy life
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: not anywhere close to to what it used to be, and you can almost see yourself as a new person right now, reflecting on when you were really Bpd.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and be able to see that difference. How how do you feel on that? Do you feel like that's accurate? Or do you have any idea of remission? Is that something you've seen in your journey, or the stories of others?
Amber Joy Kostecki: Yeah, I can talk about this one. Yeah, I feel like I'm in remission right now.
Amber Joy Kostecki: because I was diagnosed in 2016 when I was 36 years old, and I had never heard of borderline before that.
Amber Joy Kostecki: And so I've done. I've been doing constant research, you know, since then. But yeah, it can go into remission. But
Amber Joy Kostecki: but what people forget is that it can come back at any moment, no matter what, even if it's 10 years you've been in remission. It can come back right away without you even realizing it.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, like a trigger.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Well, just it could be. It could be an external thing, and it could be an internal thing. It's always like different.
Saadia: It's cortisol. So I'm no scientist. But what happens is the flood of cortisol into the brain, for again, it could be an external event, or it could be, you know, internal rise in anxiety, and nothing externally actually happened that triggers, the the Bpd. Symptoms so.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I think it's mental, even like maturity, maybe mental and emotional maturity, like
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: regulating your emotions or learning how to regulate your emotions.
Saadia: So there! There are statistics that at 25, which is when your prefrontal cortex finishes, developing
Saadia: certain risks like dying by suicide, reduce majorly. For people with Bpd and a lot of people experience significant changes in their quality of life around that time. Again, this is just a general statistic. Some people don't even get their diagnosis by that point. But some people who have a really difficult time when they're younger things, and then, you know, things sometimes
Saadia: change drastically around that time when your your brain finishes cooking.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. And a lot of life is hopefully lived. By then you're able to.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I guess.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Navigate things better.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Both of you are incredible advocates, and your work on the Lived Experience Committee is proof of the power of personal stories.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: So, yeah, what is the only you're the only current any a Bpd board member with lived experience. That's right.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: What does that role mean to you? And how do you hope to create a change.
Saadia: It means that I need to speak up, because if I don't, then
Saadia: the lived experience perspective won't come from anywhere, and it won't be heard and incorporated.
Saadia: It means trusting myself and speaking my truth, regardless of whether I feel validated or invalidated, because I maintain that it's pretty much impossible for a person without Bpd to understand what the experience is like. So you know, there's a high likelihood that I might
Saadia: say some things that don't really land with a group of people who don't have lived experience. And I have to be okay with that, you know. And along those lines it's also about taking care of myself, because there's a lot of emotional labor involved in bringing my lived experience, which has been really really difficult to the table and to use it to make what is at
Saadia: at bottom line a business decision.
Saadia: What I love about this position
Saadia: is that I can contribute something unique
Saadia: to to myself and my experience. You know I could have been on a different nonprofit board, and I chose this one because I
Saadia: I can I my my voice, my voice matters here and my voice there aren't a lot of people who are engaged in this space and able to
Saadia: to contribute in this way. You know you, you're you're super lucky to have Amber here. She's an amazing advocate in this space, and she'll tell you in a second about all the amazing programs that she runs. But you know I didn't meet anyone with this condition until I joined the Lived Experience Committee at Neabpd. So
Saadia: you know, that's that's been a really.
Saadia: it's been a really huge thing, for my development is meeting other people with this condition and seeing how they experience it and how they get through life without spiraling, and they take care of themselves. So if you're listening to this and you have Bpd, I would recommend finding friends finding a community and applying to join the lived Experience Committee, because it it really makes a difference
Saadia: to be able to speak your truth around other people who can actually relate.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, that is fantastic.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: That is absolutely fantastic. I'm so happy that you
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: actually have the diagnosis, and you are out there advocating for us to be able to talk to. Well, frankly, people that don't understand and try to
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: advocate for us and let them know what it's like, how we would actually reply or respond, and how it does benefit somebody with this type of a personality disorder.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: amber. How is sharing your story through advocacy, impacted your journey.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Well, it it completely has impacted my journey, because
Amber Joy Kostecki: so I got diagnosed in 2016, and when I was looking for support there wasn't anything I couldn't find anything. So I decided to start my own nonprofit
Amber Joy Kostecki: organization and dedicated to borderline and to helping people with borderline. And I started running support group meetings right away weekly for people, and a lot of people came as in person then. But it's on zoom now. But yeah, the the meetings help a lot of people, and I advocate for people on a personal level as well.
Amber Joy Kostecki: For many people that call me, and they need help, or they need something researched. I'll do that for them. I'll just do whatever I can to help them at all, and plus I'm also in school.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Right now to get my bachelor's and master's in social work, so I can get licensed and become a therapist and specialize in borderline.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Amber. That is fantastic. My next segment was to talk to you guys about resources and thank you for bringing up your support group. I really wanted to ask you, what can you give us an idea of? Of what does a support group look like, for instance, if we were to just log on to something that you were doing. What? What does somebody expect to kind of happen.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Yeah, definitely. Well, so now I've been running them on zoom every week since January.
Amber Joy Kostecki: And so I have like a core group of people that that come. And then there's new people that come. But if somebody were to just log in, you don't have to have your camera on, you don't have to have your your sound on. You don't have to say anything, you know. Maybe just listen. The 1st time or 2. Some people do that
Amber Joy Kostecki: some people just come on and they're they're on but yeah, we'll be talking about either a topic or somebody will be talking about what they're going through recently. And
Amber Joy Kostecki: when you have borderline, it's awesome to talk to other people with borderline, because we all understand what's going on, you know. So that's a really huge plus about support groups. Is that aspect right? There.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Oh, yeah, I'm having a blast talking to the 2 of you. Just I feel like you get me.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I don't know. I have such a peace. Having this conversation, I I don't think in the 7 years that I've had change the face of depression. Have I ever opened up about this. And I'm so happy that you guys.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: you know, we kind of have something really precious in common.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: What other resources are there? So for anyone listening who might have just been diagnosed with Bpd. Or for a loved one that's just trying to understand it. What would you recommend.
Saadia: Yeah. So I have to use this. I have to plug Neabpd. They do have the largest resource library anywhere in the world of resources for people with lived experience and their families so definitely go to their website, it's neabpd.org. And you'll have access to everything. All the programs are free family connections is
Saadia: Nea Bpd's signature program, and that is for people loved ones. So people who have family members or people that they love who have. Bpd, and
Saadia: it's it's a wonderful program, it it makes a huge difference. There is a huge wait list. So I would say definitely, get on the wait list. But my hot tip for for your listeners is that there's another program called Mstr. Managing Suicidality and trauma Recovery. That doesn't have a wait list. And it's about 75% of the same content as family connections. So if you need resources now
Saadia: and your loved one, I would say.
Saadia: sign up for Mstr. Get on the wait list for family connections. One of those 2 things, if you have lived experience, I'm so happy to be able to share some resources with you, because, as Amber mentioned, when I was looking for this sort of stuff, there wasn't anything, and the Lived Experience Committee, which was founded almost 3 years ago. Now I was a founding member has created a couple things. So our first, st
Saadia: your 1st project around 2023 was
Saadia: or 2022 was to create a resource list. So what we did was we went through podcasts, books, websites, workbooks, Youtube channels, even nonprofits, blogs, websites.
Saadia: I think apps. I think we did apps as well to figure out which ones were effective and non stigmatizing was a really big idea. I really big
Saadia: part, and we. We consolidated them into a list, and they're available on Nea's website.
Saadia: And I'll I'll send the link to you so you can put it in the show notes. It's under recovery resources. So there's that
Saadia: those are a little more clinical which are definitely valuable, and our 2024 project has been to have a blog. We've posted about weekly. It's called this borderline life, and there's a link to it. If you just go to neappd.org, and those are voices of people with lived experience. Talking about, you know, different topics, relationships, family.
Saadia: you know, target behaviors.
Saadia: Dbt skills, things of that nature. And you know I would suggest. Go, go, read some of them, and see if you resonate with any of them. There's a a wide range of
Saadia: of topics and styles. So those are. Those are the things that exist now. And in 2025 we're excited to host panel discussions every couple of months. I think we're calling it Chat Bpd, which I find hilarious. So join us. I think the 1st one is at the end of January. So follow any Abpd on social media. We have Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin.
Saadia: and we will post the event flyers there. So.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: That is fantastic.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Oh, my goodness, yeah, you guys, when I was diagnosed
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: decade ago, they did not have any any support like this at all. I'm so grateful to be having this conversation with you guys. I am so happy to learn about the lived Experience committee as well. I think I might even try to join.
Saadia: Oh, please! Do!
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: What type of
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: like? What can I expect? Will you? Will you give me an insight on like? What? What, what, what does it entail like, what all do you guys get together weekly? Do we have, you know, conversations? What type of of atmosphere is it like.
Saadia: We get together once a month and we are working on projects. So it's very structured.
Saadia: It's not a social club, although we do you know? Get to know each other and
Saadia: some people make friendships.
Saadia: And if you're if you're interested in getting involved, you can email me. My email address is Saad, that's my 1st name@neabpd.org. So if you're interested in producing some of the resources and working with other people who have lived experience. Please please join us.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Beautiful. What type of projects are you working on.
Saadia: So I mentioned the resource list. We also did a social media campaign for the month of May, where we posted something every day on Nea's social media, and then we have the blog, and our coming project is the panels.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: That's so exciting. Alright, yeah, I'll definitely be getting in touch with you guys. This is something I'd love to hear more about.
Saadia: Great.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Amber. I'd love to talk to you a little bit about your advocacy. What are some areas of hope that you could leave with us. Do you have anything you'd maybe love to speak on and and share some experiences that you've seen like just evolve and get better from the resources.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Yeah, for sure. So
Amber Joy Kostecki: the way I've been healing, I have my own things that I do, besides therapy and meds and all that stuff. But I think that one thing that really does work really really works is volunteering.
Amber Joy Kostecki: volunteering will help the other person. It will help you. It helps everybody. It makes the world a better place, you know. So volunteering, doing something you're passionate about is really important, and then
Amber Joy Kostecki: figuring out. And you will figure it out eventually. Your purpose in life. And that's that's hopeful, too. So there is always hope definitely.
Amber Joy Kostecki: But yeah, people can do all sorts of traditional non-traditional. I would suggest doing trying whatever you can, you know, like Dbt and Cbt and everything. So just try stuff until you find what works best for you.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thank you.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Sadia. Can you go back over the attachment styles that we talked about earlier? I meant to ask you, how can one find out what type of attachment, style they have.
Saadia: There are quizzes online. There's a famous book called Attached, and I think that's kind of the seminal work in this space. But there are some pretty easy quizzes. You can take online. I would start there. And just I mean, see if it resonates like Amber said, Try everything. But take what serves you and leave the rest. You have to differentiate between what helps you and what helps
Saadia: someone else, or even most people. You know, you're an individual, and the only thing that matters is what works for you. So start with a quiz, maybe. And then if if you find this really insightful, you know. Get the book, get it from your library, and
Saadia: and you know, see, see if that helps.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Okay, that's fantastic.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I do have a couple of questions. If you're up for it.
Saadia: Of course.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I'd love to ask both of you, what type of advice would you give to your younger self when you 1st started navigating Bpd. As to where you are now in your journey.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: What would you say to your younger self?
Saadia: You're not crazy, and everything will eventually make sense. In every disproportionate emotional reaction there is a kernel of justified emotion. So find that kernel and validate it.
Saadia: and it's way easier to let the rest go.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Oh, my God! Sadia! That was fantastic! Holy cow! Thank you. I feel so heard. Thank you. Oh, my goodness! There is a colonel
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: of justified feelings.
Saadia: Oh, my God!
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Goodness, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Amber. Do you have anything that you'd love to say to your 1st diagnosed Bpd self?
Amber Joy Kostecki: no, it probably would be about the same like I would tell my younger self to go. Go. Do research, do as much research as you can, and there, and that there's hope, because hope is a huge thing for sure.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah. And self-compassion. That's a huge role in managing your Bpd, I can speak for myself on that. I could definitely grow with some self-compassion.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Right.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: What's a common misconception about Bpd. That either one of you would like to correct.
Amber Joy Kostecki: I can say one that bothers me. I guess is so. People will see this study that was done. Well, the person somebody saw a study that was done, and they miss
Amber Joy Kostecki: spoke on what the statistic was.
Amber Joy Kostecki: They said that people with borderline they're going to all die by the age of 27. Right? But what the study actually said was the mean age of the participants was 27.
Amber Joy Kostecki: So somebody misquoted that. And now lots of people think that that's true. Lots of people. I've had people come to my support group and say that they're scared of that. And I'm like, well, I'm 44. And this girl is also 44. So we're telling you, it's not true.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Yeah, she was really hard to convince. Actually.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, I can stand right here and tell you, I believe I've actually heard something along those lines as well, just thinking that we had basically an expiration date that the the illness was, you know, gonna lead to
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: self extinguishment. And that's I thank you so much for saying that because yeah, I am 38, and
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I am almost, you know, definitely past that. And I do myself feel like I am in remission.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: So that is definitely my my light of hope that I want to leave.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: What was your turning point in your journey that led you to advocacy.
Amber Joy Kostecki: For me. I just started doing it right away, too. When I started the nonprofit. I started the advocacy immediately, without even knowing. Really I had to do a lot of research on how to do the whole thing. But yeah, I started advocating for people that came to my group in person with anything I could help with, because I'll help anybody with anything if I can do it for sure.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah. So you got diagnosed and then felt such a fire by wanting to have resignation like, There, there's people that understand you, and letting people know that they're not alone, that you understand them, that you basically just immediately put into action and and wanted to let other people know that they weren't crazy.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Yeah.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: That's awesome. What are some actionable steps that families and loved ones can take to support someone with Bpd like, in addition to researching their resources, and, you know, getting in touch with the Nea Bpd.
Saadia: Help them find that little kernel of truth.
Saadia: It's really easy. I'm glad you resonated with it so much when I said that, because that was a conclusion that it took me a really long time to come to, and I would oscillate between
Saadia: feeling, you know, extremely righteous, and then feeling like, Oh, God! Like I'm crazy like I can't trust anything I think or feel, and actually none neither of those are correct. And and you know, people, if you let them. There are a lot of people who will make you feel that as a person with Bpd, you just can't trust your feelings at all, and that is too too extreme of a statement. In my opinion I strongly believe that
Saadia: people with Bpd are hypersensitive, and so yes, it's disproportionate. But the the real.
Saadia: the the the thing that sparked it still happened, even if it was a micro expression, even if it was
Saadia: a pause, you know, in a comment, you know, like, you know, why did you pause? Even if it's really really small, it's it's still. It's still something that happened and made you feel a certain way, and
Saadia: you know my my partner. Now, God bless, is really really good at letting me tell him what I'm upset about without taking it personally or thinking that I'm attacking him because he understands that
Saadia: I feel things really deeply, and I need to be able to put those things out there in order either for us to address them or
Saadia: for me to just feel seen and heard, the way that you know people should be able to feel in a relationship. And so that's the advice that I would give.
Saadia: Anybody who loves someone with Bpd is help them find that kernel of truth and
Saadia: help them let go of, and that will help them. You can't help them. Let go of the rest. I know that the instinct is to tell them to calm down. But if you find that kernel of truth, it will help them. Let go of the rest.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, that's beautiful.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thank you so much. I have a resignation with that as well. I am in the most healthiest relationship that I have ever been in, and also the longest.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: We just celebrated our 5 year married anniversary.
Saadia: Yeah.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thank you. That's a big, it's it's a big deal for for Casey.
Saadia: And.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: But I had a personal milestone like I received an update that you know.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: the website got more traction that it than it normally did.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and I was so excited I could not wait to tell my husband about it, because he, you know, sees me work on this tirelessly. This is my passion. This is my passion project, and to see it go up, you know, was a milestone for Casey, and I woke up before he did. It was a Saturday morning. It's not abnormal at all for me to be, you know, a little manic. I get up. I'm all excited about my day. I've been in, you know, 2 or 3 h before he woke up.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and the moment he woke up and he walked into the kitchen I was like, did you see the text message that I sent you? You know, I'd screenshot the email and sent it over to him. And his reaction was, Yeah, I saw it.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and instead of me understanding like Hey Laney, you've been up for like 3 h. Let him get his feet on the ground. Let him have a sip of coffee, and then, you know, listen to his response. I immediately took it personally, because I wanted him to be way more excited about it than I felt like he was.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and I was that was it. That was it. It went from, you know, my knight in shining armor, my best friend.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: the man I'm gonna spend the rest of my life with to you know.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: How dare you hurt me this bad? You don't care about me at all. Nothing I say is important, like you know it, it just completely. 180 just went up to extreme pushed off the mountain.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and I just shut down.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and he realized that I shut down, which made him also shut down because he didn't
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: understand the struggle that I was going in mentally, internally.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and it took us sitting down to have the conversation for me to understand that Number one. If he would have done me that way, I would have not
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: acted. You know, the way that I wanted him to, I would have also added, acted the same way like Bro. I haven't had my coffee yet. I just got here.
Saadia: Give me a second.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: You know. And then I realized that I was seeking external validation for a personal milestone, and that
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: level of emotional like maturity is what saved my day from being ruined.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Because I was able to have that conversation with him and say, Oh, wow! I just realized that's what I was doing, and I blamed it on you. It was 100. Gonna be your fault. So
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: thanks for walking through me, you know, walking through that with me.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: But yeah, I mean, it takes patience. It takes communication, and it absolutely takes self-compassion, and and that right support.
Amber Joy Kostecki: I wanted to say something about that, too, like for loved ones and people with borderline
Amber Joy Kostecki: so I'm in a lot of
Amber Joy Kostecki: obviously Facebook borderline groups. But I'm also in groups where it's parents of kids with borderline because my daughter has borderline. So I'm looking at what these people are saying.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Oh, yeah, of the people with borderline. They talk very. It's very stigmatizing.
Amber Joy Kostecki: If the I'm sure if their their child heard while they were talking about them it wouldn't be okay. So they just need to be careful about how they say things and what they say, and that it's not stigmatizing, you know.
Amber Joy Kostecki: anytime. They're talking to the person or anybody else, you know.
Amber Joy Kostecki: in every situation they need to be careful about what they say and how they say it.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah.
Saadia: Yeah, I wrote a blog post on this which
Saadia: we can link it in the show notes. But if I so Bpd is.
Saadia: you know it's hard to measure this objectively. But if you Google, most painful mental illness, all sources point to borderline, and
Saadia: I feel like parents. And you know, partners don't
Saadia: know this and and that's why I feel like people who don't have the condition themselves cannot
Saadia: understand what it is like. You know, we have the highest
Saadia: suicide rate of any mental illness. It's it's 1 in 10, unfortunately, and 7 in 10 attempt at some point in in their lives.
Saadia: Which is why people are out here believing that the life expectancy for Bpd is 27, which it absolutely is not as we debunked earlier. But you know. I wish loved ones understood how painful it is. I've tried to explain it in many ways, but something that one of our fellow committee members said
Saadia: on a panel that we had last year really stuck with me, and she said, You know, if I could cut off one of my limbs to get rid of my borderline. I would do it in a second, and I have goosebumps even now, saying that because I knew exactly what she meant, I never thought about it in that way. But you know, imagine
Saadia: the way I've tried to explain it, you know, to people is, imagine when you feel good, it feels like your wedding day or your graduation day, or you're having your 1st child, or you've gotten a promotion that you've been working for your whole life, or you just got elected President of the United States. Okay, that's how I feel when I feel good. And then when you feel bad, it's like your best friend died. It's like your your spouse died. It's like you got fired. It's like.
Saadia: you know, you found out you have. Well, okay, I won't
Saadia: appropriate anyone else's illnesses. But but that's how it feels, and that's how intense it is, and
Saadia: you know remission is possible. But, like loved ones.
Saadia: I wish they understood that. At the same time I'm not saying that people with Bpd have a past to act. However, they want because they absolutely don't, and what I would want them to know was that was that one people. Other people do not understand your emotional experience. They they do not understand. You know your your husband.
Saadia: He! He! He! He doesn't understand why you feel the way you feel, because he doesn't have Bpd. And and so, you know, giving people that, Grace.
Saadia: It's very easy to want to be like he like he must know he hurt me on purpose, and of course he knows how I feel, but they really don't. They don't know how you feel. And so it's your job to communicate that. So
Saadia: I would want that. That's what I would say. People.
Saadia: you know, loved ones. Kind of, yeah, does that help.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yes, yes, it does, and it brings me to actually a talking point. So one of the things that I personally would like to dispel is the word
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: manipulation.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: So I have seen that word a whole lot when it comes to Bpd. And it being tied to being one of the I guess
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: characteristics of it.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and I would like to say out loud, I don't like that word. I hate that word so much. I don't feel at all that it
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: represents me, except for now, in this conversation, when we're having internalized like our loved ones don't understand what we're going through. But you know we think they must. I think that's internal and mental.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: like self manipulation, like I feel like. I manipulated myself
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: to believe that he didn't care about me, and he didn't care about my accomplishments, or you know, things like that. That's
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: maybe where that came from.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Does that sound right?
Saadia: I think the source of the manipulation is the degree of pain, and the fact that people without the condition can't understand that. And so they don't understand why a person with Bpd would be acting in such a
Saadia: because, you know, manipulation is trying to influence something, someone to do what you want. And so, you know, people with Bpd. It feels so painful for things not to go the way that they want that they may engage in some behaviors that can be seen as manipulation, and I believe that the root of the root of that is, that
Saadia: is, that the loved ones don't understand really the the
Saadia: the tight spot that the person with with Bpd is in, and the person with Bpd. Doesn't understand that the thing that their lives won't end. You know the world won't end if this thing doesn't go their way because it it really feels like it will.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: It feels like it will. Yeah.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Oh, yeah.
Saadia: Feels like a whale, and I wrote this down. But this is the damaging effect. It can have to be accused of manipulation, you know repeatedly. And
Saadia: you know I wrote this a few years ago, and I just found it a few weeks ago, and I took a picture of it because
Saadia: it it really it really you know, hurt my heart to to read and and think that this was how I was feeling, and so the prompt was an assignment from my therapist, and it said.
Saadia: You know, what are you afraid will happen if you talk about your personal needs with your therapist? And I said this, if I talk about my personal needs with my therapist, then I will either get them met and feel manipulative, slash, guilty and selfish, and anxious that they will be revoked once the manipulation is discovered
Saadia: or not, get them met and feel misunderstood, and thus emotionally isolated, confused, guilty, like I have attempted to manipulate him, and failed, and thus exposed, for not only for my shameful, sneaky, bad behavior, but also for my weaknesses, read, needs.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Wow, wow.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: yeah, that's good
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: and grief.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: How do we get past that.
Saadia: Oh, Amber, do you have any ideas?
Amber Joy Kostecki: How to get past the manipulate like being called manipulative or.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Or having. How do we get past
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: a rock and a hard spot? How do we get past
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: being willing to be able to talk to somebody and having that openness to have that conversation without that
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: in the background, thinking, oh, you know, if this works out for me, they're gonna take it right back away.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: or like, you know, a love given, and then a love taken like the carpet being pulled out from underneath you.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: or you just continue to self hard, like
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: avalanche, you know, like into self destruction, because
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: you don't feel like that's gonna be
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: a conversation. There's no way that it's gonna be fixed type thing. So you just continue to go downhill. How can you? How can you get past these
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: 2 options.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Yeah, I guess. Well, one thing you could do is mindfulness.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Which is part of Gbt and can be very helpful.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Otherwise, I mean, that's a hard one. Yeah, because, hmm.
Amber Joy Kostecki: yeah, I guess it just takes experience like living it like lived experience. You will hopefully get out of that.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: And word manipulation. Yeah.
Amber Joy Kostecki: It takes many years to heal and get to remission. Yeah, it's not not easy.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, takes years to navigate it and figure out even. I have a wrench to throw at you.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Have you either of you.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Before or after, or in addition to been diagnosed with
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: bipolar disorder because of the extreme highs and the extreme lows.
Amber Joy Kostecki: I am diagnosed with bipolar. I was diagnosed with bipolar, like 3 years after I was diagnosed with borderline
Amber Joy Kostecki: so at 1st it was bipolar 2, and then they changed it to bipolar one. But I don't. I only get the high highs I get like I get
Amber Joy Kostecki: it for like 3 days, and then I could just go back to being regular order line. I don't get those lows, which is good.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah.
Saadia: Yeah, I was misdiagnosed with bipolar 2 when I was a teenager, and I I self diagnosed with Bpd. When I was
Saadia: in 2020. So when I was 21 I was on Reddit, and it was Covid, and I had very little to do, so I went down a Reddit Rabbit hole. And I, I
Saadia: decided to Google the list of symptoms because I kept seeing Bpd. Bpd. Bpd. And reading the list of symptoms was such a turning point in my life because I had never felt seen before. I had been in the mental health system for years and years and years, almost a decade at that point, and I had always felt like there was something specially wrong with me, because
Saadia: depression didn't cover it. Anxiety didn't cover it. Ptsd bipolar. None of this stuff really got the deep emotional
Saadia: anguish that I I was in like many times a day. And then all of a sudden, I wasn't, you know. So
Saadia: you know, I took the diagnosis to my primary care physician, and and she diagnosed me and
Saadia: it was very clearly
Saadia: I think, because I was quiet. Bpd, it was a little harder to diagnose, but I told my therapist who I'd been seeing since I was 15, that I had Bpd. And he just said, I know
Saadia: I knew that.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Oh, my goodness!
Saadia: And I was like, why didn't you tell me? And he basically said that it was so stigmatized that he didn't.
Saadia: Well, and I was so furious. I never saw him again after that. I haven't seen him since.
Saadia: and I mean he I mean this man charged like
Saadia: $400 for 45 min sessions, and he didn't tell me I had Bpd, I mean, I I just like
Saadia: you know, I'm an attorney, and that would be considered malpractice in my field. I know things are a little different in the in the and he's not. He's not a psychiatrist. He doesn't have a medical degree. But
Saadia: you know, knowing that I had Bpd for years, and not telling me 1st of all, it perpetuates the stigma because it it goes along with this idea that your diagnosis is so bad
Saadia: that we can't even tell it to you. Okay, yeah.
Saadia: Okay.
Saadia: Second of all, if you don't have the diagnosis. You can't treat it, you know. Bpd, there's no medicine for it. It's a collection of symptoms, and you have to be really cognizant of the symptoms, and they're written down in a list for you, you know. So when you get the diagnosis, you can really focus on. Okay, I need to stop these impulsive behaviors. Okay, I have an unstable self image. You know. I need to start journaling and reflecting on my identity. You know I have unstable relationships. You know, how can I get them more stable and this sort of stuff? So
Saadia: I don't even know what the question was. Oh, yes, so yeah. I have a lot of beef with the, with the mental health system and a lot of the providers, because.
Saadia: you know, it's a really new field, and I had, you know, some
Saadia: some less than competent providers, and
Saadia: that you know it kind of. I feel like it took away years of my life, you know. If I had been diagnosed properly at the time. Then
Saadia: maybe I could have gotten better a little faster, and enjoyed a little more of my life.
Saadia: Another myth. In addition to the idea that Bpd is a life sentence is
Saadia: that Bpd. And any personality disorder cannot be given as a diagnosis to someone under 18. This is no longer best. Practice.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thank you for letting us know that
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I absolutely love that story because that is a key prime example. Just how difficult Bpd is like you're absolutely right. It was quote, unquote, so bad that they didn't even want to tell you because of this stigma attached to it.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: That's incredible.
Saadia: After 6 years and tens of thousands of dollars. I mean, I was pissed. Okay.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I bet. What did you so what did you think the like? The whole time you thought that it was
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: bipolar only.
Saadia: I thought that it was no, I I thought that it was Ptsd.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Oh, wow!
Saadia: Yeah.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Well, I can understand how that
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: how you felt that way, though, too, you know, like with borderline, I can absolutely understand why you would think it was Ptsd related. Because, yeah, it is
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I. I relate to that.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Well, wrapping her up, what message of hope would you like to leave with our audience.
Amber Joy Kostecki: I would say.
Amber Joy Kostecki: I would say, to be hopeful, just to stay hopeful, because you never know what's going to happen, and everything happens for a reason, and you need to look at your life and accept things. Acceptance is really key, because if you don't accept something you can't change it. So you 1st have to accept it, and accepting your whole past is hard to do. But it it can happen. It does happen, and it helps once you do.
Saadia: Yeah, I 100% agree with amber, what? I would.
Saadia: what? I would like to share is that bpd is 100% treatable. It is out an outdated idea that it's
Saadia: it's
Saadia: not treatable, and it's actually more treatable than substance. Use disorder. So an 8 week course of Dbt is is.
Saadia: will help a person with Bpd. More than it will help a person with substance use disorder, so if you have it, if you think you have it. Don't be afraid of it. Dive right in it's it's
Saadia: It's treatable.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: For our audience. Can you just let us know what is Dbt.
Saadia: Dialectical behavioral therapy. It was founded by Marshall Linehan for people who were
Saadia: very suicidal, and it has since been expanded to be used for people with depression, anxiety, pretty much all of of the
Saadia: you know, most common mental health challenges. And it's essentially a collection of skills. You know, there's a distress tolerance unit. There's an interpersonal effectiveness unit. There are tons of free resources online that that you can access. There's a workbook by Kiki failing FEHL, ING, which I've done, that I found pretty pretty useful, so if you can't afford
Saadia: a provider that's like a low cost way to
Saadia: to get some of the benefits of it.
Saadia: Dbt is kind of a lot of people consider it the gold standard, but a lot of people also have other
Saadia: perspectives, and I know amber has some alternative.
Saadia: Has alternatives that maybe she would like to share.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Yeah, you're saying like the the things I've used or tried to instill in people to do like volunteering. Number one volunteering.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Think of what you're passionate about, because
Amber Joy Kostecki: it's not nothing. You got to be passionate about something and use that to feel out where you want to volunteer at, or with or online or in person. Either way, it's just a good thing to do
Amber Joy Kostecki: and then
Amber Joy Kostecki: acceptance, like I said, you have to accept everything from your past completely and fully in order to change it. So that's really important. And then self-awareness is also really important. I have my own theories and stuff about borderline. But what I feel is there? It's on levels, not a spectrum, but levels.
Amber Joy Kostecki: And the more self-aware you become, the higher the level you become.
Saadia: Hmm.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, I like that.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Can you give us? Maybe just a little bit more on that.
Amber Joy Kostecki: On like the levels and the well.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Sure.
Amber Joy Kostecki: So when you become self-aware.
Amber Joy Kostecki: you start to have realizations about things like, I started to have realizations like deep realizations, real huge things. And then you accept those realizations because you might fight it and not want to accept those either. But it's a it's you have to do that. So
Amber Joy Kostecki: yeah, I mean, that's pretty much it. It just takes a long time to do.
Amber Joy Kostecki: but it's it's worth it. And it works.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yeah, yeah, I I had a realization that you know, once I had my own children.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: That my caregivers just
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: they didn't know how to love me properly because they didn't have the love that they needed either.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: I think that's a
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: a step of a level is being able to understand like you don't know how to do better if you don't know how to do better.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Right? Exactly. Yeah.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Well, thank you so much for joining us today, ladies, I want to give the message that all of our audience, if you are with Bpd. You are not alone, you are not broken, and Bpd. Is just one part of your story. With support you can write the rest of it on your terms.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Recovery is possible even on those hardest of days. Just know that you're worthy of love, support, and understanding.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thank you so much, Ida, and amber for sharing your stories and insights. Today you've brought so much hope and humanity to this conversation. You guys, I've really enjoyed talking to you.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: to our listeners.
Saadia: Thank you.
Amber Joy Kostecki: That's correct.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Yes, thank you. Thank you.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: To our listeners. If you want to learn more, check out www.ne. abpd.org.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Thanks for turning in to tune on. Thank you for turning in to take off the mask, and we'll see you next time.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Bye, ladies.
Amber Joy Kostecki: Bye.
Saadia: Bye.
Take off the Mask with CasieCasem: Alright. Thank you, Seida. Have a great day.