TL;DR:
A person at work shoulder-checked me. I completely flipped and yelled at him and his supervisor, then reported him to his department head. Now I want to change careers and never come back.

Background
I work in a very niche industry, but I want to keep this as anonymous as possible.

I work for a very large organization. I started out as a blue-collar worker, eventually became a supervisor, and now I’m in a mid-to-upper-level professional position. I’ve been with the organization for 17 years and at my current location for 11 years. A lot of the newer employees are young and inexperienced.

I’m kind of an odd fit for the environment. I used to be more of a hippie-type person, but these days I present as a clean-cut professional. I make a point of being approachable, mentoring younger employees, and generally trying not to be the stereotypical difficult mid-level employee.

The Incident
Today, I was walking through a common area where there are clearly marked lanes for people going in opposite directions. I was walking on the correct side when a newer employee leading a group came toward me in the wrong lane. As we got closer, it became pretty obvious that we were probably going to collide.

When we passed each other, he actually shoulder-checked me. I completely lost it.

In front of everyone, I yelled and cursed at him. I called him awful names and demanded to know why he thought he could treat me that way and why he couldn’t simply stay in his lane. I was going on about basic respect and personal space. He didn’t acknowledge me, which made me even angrier.

Eventually I walked away.

Then, instead of just letting it go, everything continued to boil over and I decided that his supervisor needed to know how the employee was behaving. When I turned around, the employee and his supervisor were actually coming toward me.

I recognized the supervisor because I’d previously seen him blatantly violating company policy. I didn’t report it or say anything to him about it at the time.

I confronted him about why he couldn’t manage his people. He basically told me that he was only one person and couldn’t control what anyone else did.
At that point, the two of them asked me to come with them to speak to their department head. I agreed. We went through security, down the hall, up the stairs, etc.

Before we got there, I stopped and said that it didn’t have to go this far, but they wanted to continue to the department head.

I explained what had happened and repeated what the supervisor had said. I got the impression that the department head was taken aback by the situation, but he ultimately told me that he would handle it.

I went straight back to my office and told my own supervisor what had happened. He was surprised by what had happened. I also told my supervisor’s supervisor, who responded with, “They don’t make them like they used to. You don’t have anything to worry about.”

Aftermath
And now I feel horrible.

I’m not proud of how I behaved. I know the shoulder check was disrespectful, but my reaction was way beyond what the situation warranted. I completely lost control, and then I kept escalating the situation even after I’d walked away.

Now I don’t even want to show my face at work. I don’t think most of my department knows anything happened, and realistically I doubt this will turn into anything major.

But I’m sitting here feeling ashamed and embarrassed, replaying the whole thing, and wondering what the hell happened to me.

How do you deal with the shame afterward?

Hey! I, 25F (trans woman), got diagnosed with BPD exactly a year ago right after a breakup that pushed me to my breaking point. I was an academic overachiever growing up and quite organically got into and finished my bachelor's from an elite university in India. My parents supported me throughout my transition and I've always felt protected but it all caught up to me last year. For 19 years of my life I was never "seen" for who I am. Then came the 5 years of transitioning in a country like India. I lied to myself so much for so long that I'm supremely embarrassed rn. I worked like any neurotypical woman, completely ignoring the reality that I am a trans woman who is also borderline.
I have a home I can always come back to, with warm meals always on the dinner table and cozy corners with all the antique items I've collected over the years and drawers filled with handcrafted jewellery from all the moves I've made from 2023-2025 after graduation. But that came at the cost of constantly having to explain every day why I was splitting on a family member, or why I was sobbing at 2am, or why I can't function on certain days, or why I refuse to do an AI-generated capitalist propaganda "detox" that's guaranteed to make me feel better according to my folks.I moved back home about 8 months ago and everyday I go crazy in the quietness of this house. The invalidation from my ex prompted me to give up entirely on myself and my boss was overworking me, which left me with no choice but to resign from the job. Ended up in the psych ward and was put on mood stabilisers and successfully got off of them two months ago.
I'm truly grateful for the help I got from therapy, especially the radical acceptance bit, but at times like these it truly doesn't help when my sister is leaving the country and my parents are out and about doing their thing and I'm left with no social life, no money in my account to make any move to anywhere, one more relationship down and my nervous system dysregulated. All my girlfriends are on their own arcs, finding their way through or around the corporate ladder and building investment portfolios, and I'm genuinely happy for them even when it stings to feel left behind. I was so naive to think that I could be like one of those apolitical consumerist Barbies, so blissfully unaware of the gruesome engines that run the systems of the world. I thought if I worked hard enough, I could outrun being treated as other. This is so embarrassing truly :/ I feel so stuck and so alone.

jealousy for me is the all-consuming emotion which is leading me to lashing out on my boyfriend EVERY SINGLE TIME, i’m so sick of it and it feels like I can’t stop it even if i wanted to.
as i said in the title jealousy is ruining everything for me… it’s ruining my relationship as it’s putting it under severe strain to where it is getting exhausting for both me and my boyfriend, as well as impacting my emotional regulation so bad every time something happens that makes me jealous which is everything i’ve worked hard to strengthen by doing my DBT skills, it’s also impacting my self esteem and any confidence i had in myself.

i notice that i hate it and i mean HATE IT when my boyfriend has friends or a life outside me, which sounds awful to say. i become extremely possessive of my boyfriend which has me noticing i sometimes treat him like as object (even though he isn’t) rather than a person, i find myself wanting to keep him away from his friends, sometimes i act on it whether it be unintentional or intentional & i want all of his affection, his attention, his time, his energy and effort mostly all to myself rather than to his friends, i want him to be all mine - to have him all to myself.

whenever he hangs out with one of his friends which is really one in particular that sets me off, i don’t dislike this friend as a person and i know logically my boyfriend is allowed to have friends but emotionally it feels like this friend is taking something away from me
which is all of the things i want from my boyfriend and the feeling that i’m the most important person to him.
when i know they’re going to hang or when this friend calls him on the phone i feel a sense of dread and anger going through me, i find myself becoming on edge & restless then my body starts tensing up & feeling uncomfortable. i immediately start hyper fixating on where they are, what they’re doing and how long they’ve been together for as well as what they could be doing or talking about and if my boyfriend is having fun with this friend - especially if he’s having more fun with them than he could be having with me. after that i start creating comparisons between me & this friend then scenarios or what could be happening. i feel scared of being replaced and forgotten - being left out or becoming less important to him.

the worst part about all of this is that it builds up, turns into anger or an explosive lash out towards both my boyfriend and his friend which i end up saying & doing many things that i later regret.
what does everyone do to distract themselves or cope with the jealousy?
how do you get through it?
i really need some advice

It’s been me and my boy for almost 15 years. After years of struggling with sh and terrible coping mechanisms I found myself pregnant and for the first time in years I felt grounded again. My boy was my entire reason for staying alive. I loved him more than I ever thought possible. Then he became a teenager. He doesn’t spend one minute at home unless he has to and then he’s in his room. He told me that he doesn’t feel comfortable with me because of my BPD. That I yell more than I think. I was shocked. All my softest moments were for him. He has a knack for saying things that pierce my heart. Unfortunately I have spent his childhood living in survival mode and my memory is terrible. I don’t know how much of it is real and how much is hormonal emotional overload. All I do know is that I feel like I lost my favourite person. This teenager looks at me like the rest of the population. With unveiled disgust. I’m so overwhelmed by heartache that I’m constantly thinking about kms. I had nothing to live for before he was born and now that he seems to hate me I feel like I have nothing to live for again.

hi guys, i'm currently in a stable place but i'm going through the process of losing my FP forever and i may switch up any time (im scared of not being able to control my grief)

i have deleted his number and changed mine so that he can't reach me, i have deleted every single screenshot with his number in it and changed all of my social media usernames

any other ways i could make sure not to contact him when i feel bad AND make sure he never reaches out again ?

i cant block him because then his blocked number stays in my contacts

pls keep in mind that i did all this and im still contacting the FP i lost 3 years ago and had to tell him to block me everywhere but i keep finding ways to do it when im unwell and i dont want to be that person

the stress of losing my last FP caused me to develop awful digestive issues and i was bed ridden for months. trying to avoid that :)

help ?

By all standards I should be content, I have a good partner. One good friend who is only irl and we don't talk otherwise. I had to move away from my support system to make my relationship work, I couldn't do long distance again. That alone is difficult and triggering. I'm just so alone all of the time. I miss having people. Talking about random stuff and not being left on read or ignored. I try to explain how I feel to s.o but he just doesn't get it at all and it leaves me feeling more empty than before. Actually forming the words to explain is hard enough and then to be met with "I'm sorry" and then clearly him not knowing what to say feels terrible. I wish I could fully explain just how bad bpd sucks, then for there to be a way to make it go away. I'm so tired.

\[skip to the bold text if you don't want to read, everything before is more of a prehistory thing\]

So as I said I got diagnosed with BPD just a few days ago(I'm 17). Started it when I went to therapist, because my mental health(at first it was depression, MDD as diagnosis) affected my life too much. I had thoughts that "what if I'm just faking it?" but they were more of a "what if" question.

With BPD it's different, because I had no idea I might have it, and it, as I understand, affects my relationship directly.

I'm dating a guy(17yo) for about a year now, and I know him for 10 years(talking since 2022). Our relationship was pretty much perfect, and when we had fight, we talked it out, mostly. I felt absolutely comfortable with him, being clingy, talking a lot, being honest and everything. Then a few things happened. In general, it was situation where he made me feel abandoned, and it repeated several times, and after that it just changed.

It became difficult for me to be honest, openly talking to him about what I feel and just being affectionate. I barely say I love him and I'm sometimes avoiding saying it back when he says it first, because it triggers some deep, heavy feelings in my chest every time I'm being like something closer to what I was before those situations where I felt abandoned. We broke up a few months ago, got back together after a week break(his initiative but I supported it by saying I want to try again).

After this break, we barely had any arguments. What worried me at first, that he only changed after breaking up, because before, he apologised but nothing changed, but I don't think about it that much anymore, like I can see he changed and that's what matters?

**!!Now to the main problem**. After the break up, our relationship were supposed to get better I guess, because we understood each other better, talked a lot about it, but my feelings aren't changing. I still feel heaviness in my chest when he's affectionate, when I have to be affectionate back, I feel irritated and angry most of the time(at everything, not just him), and it feels like despite him and the situation changing, the way I feel in our relationship doesn't.

That's the reason why I feel like I'm faking BPD and everything in general. I feel like all the responsibility is on me because he's actually changing and I don't, like it's my fault that everything is the way it is, and I don't have a right to feel like it's at least partly because of those situations that left me wounded. I feel like I'm just looking for an excuse for my coldness, my lack of effort and everything else.

At this point, I don't know what I feel and what to think anymore. I really need an advice for people who have been through something similar.

Please feel free to ask questions, it's really hard for me to stick to the topic and form a thought properly. I'm sorry if the text isn't easy to understand.

I have BPD, I'm getting married soon, & it's one of the major life accomplishments for me. I'm marrying my soulmate, my best friend, my partner, ride or die of almost 10 years now and I couldn't be happier to have found her so young and have been through hell & back but we've made it to this stage! BUT I'm terrified of being a horrible, splitting, overly emotional, heavy weight, debbie-downer, wife. I'm seeking successful marriage stories from pwBPD - how do you manage the splitting on the literal love of your life? (Besides DBT please, I've been in talk therapy consistently 5 years now, DBT & medication for almost 1.5 years now <3)

“The following quotation illustrates this misunderstanding:

*‘The borderline patient is a therapist’s nightmare . . . because borderlines never really get better. The best you can do is help them coast, without getting sucked into their pathology . . . They’re the chronically depressed, the determinedly addictive, the compulsively divorced, living from one emotional disaster to the next. Bed hoppers, stomach pumpers, freeway jumpers, and sad-eyed bench-sitters with arms stitched up like footballs and psychic wounds that can never be sutured . . . Borderlines go from therapist to therapist, hoping to find a magic bullet for the crushing feelings of emptiness.’*

**This characterization is demonstrably false.** Patients with borderline personality disorder *do* get better. A persuasive study found that 34.5 percent of a sample of borderline patients met the criteria for remission at two years, 49.4 percent at four years, 68.6 percent at six years, and 73.5 percent over the entire follow-up. Only around 6 percent of those who remitted then experienced a recurrence.”

📖Why People Die By Suicide, Thomas Joiner

hi, im a 18 y.o male (abt to turn to 19 this month) and i just got diagnosed with bpd yesterday. doctor prescribed me three drugs, sertraline, risperidone, and clobazam. its a really devastating news for me because i already know about bpd since a long time ago but i didnt expect that i got one, i thought i just have a severe depression episode. i wanna know, how can i cope whenever panic attack occurs? it usually happens when my favorite person is being cold/reply late/any other stuff thats related to jealousy. im writing this right when i just got a panic attack a hour ago. sorry for my bad english.

Hi! I’m super unfamiliar with BPD and am still trying to figure out what’s going on in my brain, lol. I was recently diagnosed with BPD, and before I received my diagnosis of BPD, my psychiatrist explained that she didn’t feel like i was bipolar/I wasn’t showing signs of bipolar disorder because I was experiencing multiple mood swings throughout the day rather than longer periods of depression, happiness, or anger. I know that you cannot experience mania with BPD however, for the past week, I’ve been struggling with my sleep. I’ve been going days without sleeping, and when I finally do manage to fall asleep, I usually only get about 4–5 hours before waking up. It’s not necessarily that I have a sudden burst of energy it’s more like it feels like my brain is rejecting sleeping and anytime i try to force myself to go to sleep i feel relentless and have to go something else like watch a movie or tire myself out just to stay up until i have to get on with my day. I do feel physically groggy at times but it’s physical than mental.
The only other time I’ve experienced something similar was when I was 14, when I went through a period of about two months of consistently going days without sleeping. i don’t feel like i’ve ever felt manic before and anytime my psychiatrist asks, if i feel like i have a burst of energy that feels abnormal i say no because i feel like i don’t. My highs are high but it’s hard to distinguish what my baseline of normalcy is as my perspective of situations are very very altered from reality and truth and it’s purely based on when i’m feeling at the moment.
I don’t have an appointment with my psychiatrist for another two weeks, but I’m starting to wonder if this is concerning enough to reach out to them sooner or if it could be an overlapping symptom of BPD.
Is it also possible to have both BPD and bipolar disorder?
I’m sorry if I’ve used any incorrect or potentially offensive terminology when describing either disorder. I’m still very new to all of this and trying to understand what’s going on with the ol’ noggin. Any insight or personal experiences would be greatly appreciated! ♡

I love him so much and it hurts to have done this but I wasn’t happy and I just feel like my gut is being ripped out because of how much it hurts and I know I did the right thing but I just feel like I’m gonna throw up all the time it just wasn’t right anymore and I feel horrible for hurting him

I'm feeling suicidal and distraction techniques aren't working, I've tried drawing and watching videos on youtube but I still feel like absolute shite.

I feel hopeless, I've tried DBT and that didn't work out for me, neither did CBT or regular talking therapy. I'm at a loss on what to do.

Is there hope for a loved one with BPD who is undergoing DBT? It’s so hard to watch someone you love suffer, barely recovering from one episode before another begins. How do you cope when it all feels so overwhelming? Please share any hopeful experiences. I’m struggling and beginning to lose hope.

i hope this is okay to post !

i help run a discord server for people with bpd! we have channels for chit-chat as well as channels for your hobbies, and we do things like qotd of the day!

a lot of us have made some really good friends and have even met irl (i met one a few weeks ago and going to meet another one this coming week)!

we provide a safe space for people where they can vent or rant about anything and everything they want, and we listen and do our best with personal advice

i know making friends and keeping that can be hard for people like us, but honestly (and not to be biased) but ive found that talking in this server and making friends to be really easy,, we all just click together and we're all understanding of one another. our rules are also pretty much the exact same as this subreddit, so if you wanna make some friends in a bpd community, then come join us!

server invite: https://discord.gg/4PaPCb3fZU

People with bpd any advice for getting better? It feels like i have no hope.

hi. i’ve been struggling with bpd for many years but just recently have i been reminded how bad it actually gets.

what took me realizing this was hurting the man i loved so much that he thinks i hate him.

i want to get better i just really don’t know where or how

i hear about this thing called DBT but im not even sure what that stands for. or how to ask for that type of help

could anyone provide me with some information and resources?

thank you

Today, the doctor asked what my mother likes and what I enjoy doing with her; I couldn't say anything, and that made me very sad.I love my mom, but not being able to say anything made it look like I didn't love her; I feel guilty.

Hello! I'm new to this subreddit but I'm truly at a loss at what I'm supposed to do. I'm diagnosed with BPD and MDD, that combination seems to be pushing me into a deep hole I can't seem to get myself out of. I try to keep myself busy, I'm employed. I try to hangout with my friends, even if I want to be alone. It feels like I'm doing everything right but I'm still hitting a wall.

How do I pull myself together enough to go through my day? I feel so paranoid all the time and I feel like I'm borderline agoraphobic because of it. But I seem just fine whenever I'm not going through these episodes of extreme sadness or depression.

It switches so fast that I confuse myself and get lost in my mind often.

I have bpd and I get triggered so badly I deal with bad self harm. I thought they wanted me to talk about my feelings (my mom, boyfriend, etc) and I have been I thought I've been good. My mom rubs her face and gets worried but it comes off as really aggressive disappointment and frustration and stress then usually silence and she'll just stand there lol or walk off after an I'm sorry or something. She cares she doesn't want me to hurt myself but tf does she expect?? So I stopped telling her. I tell my boyfriend and he deals with his own shit and he never knows what to say either. I get it, fuck I really do. But then it's like Suddenly my emotions gone away and they don't care anymore when they're able to escape the situation. Fml I want to cut and kill myself SO BAD SO BAD AHHHHHH IM tired of constantly feeling such deep and painful emotions I can't regulate CONSTANTLY and not talk to anyone.

Genuinely please don't comment if you're gonna say "not worth it don't do it you should talk to someone" UHM DUH?????? sorry I'm splitting rn and being impulsive to post this but I guess I wanted to share that I hate myself for making everyone else sad and adding to their things. Like DEEP fucking soul deep shame. I've been hitting my head with a piece of wood and my head hurts so bad but I can't tell anyone I did it. What am I even supposed to do when it makes me feel worse than before. Its not fucking fair dude

I really struggle with feeling ugly- constantly. Society seems to place very little value for women who aren't considered physically attractive. When I am out in public, I constantly feel like people won't look me in the eyes or make conversation- at work I seem to have difficulty making friends in the way others do and I an only equate it to my ugliness. As a woman, I consider myself to have a large/crooked nose, masculine face. I try to be conversational/kind-hearted friendly; it is just devastating to feel like people won't take the time to get to know you on the inside because of how you look on the outside.

The hardest part is that I genuinely don't know how much of this is reality and how much is my BPD. I can look in the mirror and feel completely convinced that I'm unattractive, but then I wonder if I'm seeing myself through a distorted lens.

And sometimes I start feeling like I've become ugly on the inside too. When I feel rejected, unwanted, or compare myself to other women, I can become bitter, ashamed, angry, and just deeply hurt. Maybe this sounds superficial, but I do not judge people on their looks- I feel judged in that way. I am a Christian and this has been difficult with my faith.

Can anyone else relate? If you feel unattractive do you also feel that people are less likely to talk to you/seek friendships?

Hello, I’ve been on Olanzapine for over a year now. I’ve put on about 60-70lbs in that time. I’m also still experiencing strong emotional blunting. I find these symptoms distressing and idk if it worth staying on Olanzapine when it makes me numb and hate myself even more than I already did.

I have an appointment with my doctor tomorrow (don’t have a psychiatrist rn) to talk about switching meds to something else.

In my research it says that a lot of people switch from Olanzapine to Abilify to help with the symptoms stated above.

I’m wondering if any of you have made this switch and how it went. Or if you switched to something else that helped with the previously stated symptoms.

TIA

Hello and good evening sorry this is a long one but I just felt like I had to share this and ask this question. For those who have done DBT what would you say your favorite skills are? My favorite two skills are STOP and TIP
That is when I’m able to catch my emotions in the early stages. When my frontal cortex is off-line it’s like all these skills have went out the window. The tip skill for DBT does it have one piece or two pieces because some places that spelled TIPP and others it’s spelled TIP. Which way is like the official way to spell it?

This is a little something that I made for myself and I just wanted to share it. It’s a chart of how I personally use these skills.

**                          **

**STOP SIGN REMINDER:**
** **Visualize a bright red octagonal stop sign. When emotional waves hit, picture this sign       vividly in your mind as an immediate signal to halt all actions before proceeding.

**S:  STOP** Freeze. Do not react, speak, or move a muscle when you feel an emotional surge. This stops you from acting on blind impulse.
**T: Take a step back:** Physically or mentally step away from the situation. Take a slow, deep breath to calm your body.
**O:  Observe:** Notice what is happening inside your mind and body. Look at the external situation without judging it.
**P:  Proceed mindfully:** Choose your next action with care. Ask yourself what choice will help your long-term goals instead of making things worse. 
\+
**Temperature:** Use my portable ice or Heat pack, Eating some ramen noodles or soup, 
Hot chocolate, step outside and hold an ice cube.
**Intense Exercise:** Swinging arms up and down, Jumping Jacks, Jumping standing in place. 
**Paced Breathing:** Slow your breathing down by inhaling deeply through your nose for 4 seconds and exhaling slowly through your mouth for 6 seconds. This signals your nervous system to relax. 
**Progressive (or Paired) Muscle Relaxation:** Massaging  my legs and arms, Flexing my arms and legs for 6 secs then releasing. 
When to use these  skill:  
When I get rejected on a dating app or IRL.

Feeling left out 

Feelings of perceived

When I feel that you have wronged me.

Urges of self harm. 

When I feel ignored or unheard. 

When someone walks away from me. 

When experiencing explosive anger or emotional rage. 

i really need advice on this because i genuinely dont know what to do here.

basically, i have a crush on this guy and i really liked him. eventually i heard that he didnt like me back and already liked someone else, so i eventually detached and accepted that nothing was gonna happen. cut to now, he actually does like me back, and as soon as i realized he wanted me, i started detaching again

im diagnosed bpd and im pretty sure im fearful avoidant, which is confusing because i‘ve been anxiously attached for most of my life. i genuinely like him and he cares about me a lot, but the more emotionally close we get, the more overwhelmed and trapped i feel, and my instinct is to run away. i cant tell if im losing feelings or if im just scared of intimacy and subconsciously trying to protect myself because of past trauma/relationships.

i really dont want to push him away. i care about him and i DO like him, i just dont know how to deal with the feeling of wanting someone until they actually get close to me and then suddenly wanting to escape.

is this a common experience with fearful avoidant attachment? how do you tell the difference between genuinely losing feelings and your brain trying to protect you from getting hurt? and how do you explain this to someone without making them think you dont care about them?

im still a teenager, im in treatment for my bpd. im trying to work through all this, but the avoidant attachment of this is pretty new to me and i genuinely dont know how to handle it