Speaker 1: The ZM podcast Network.
Speaker 2: I couldn't control my emotions, especially my anger, and it
Speaker 2: was just boiling over into every part of my life.
Speaker 2: Having that stigma where people have that misunderstanding of BPD
Speaker 2: that they instantly think, oh, this person has BPD, they're
Speaker 2: really unstable, and that's just not true.
Speaker 1: Hi, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, or whatever time
Speaker 1: soon or whatever time that you're listening to. This. This
Speaker 1: is Hope is Real the podcast. The podcast designed to
Speaker 1: help you feel a little less alone, a bit more inspired,
Speaker 1: and a lot more hopeful. Now, today's episode is one
Speaker 1: that I am really excited about. I know that I
Speaker 1: say that every single episode, but it's because it's true.
Speaker 1: But this person is someone that I recently actually just
Speaker 1: met when we were recording of Voices of Hope campaign.
Speaker 1: Her name is Breal and she's a counselor from Altedola,
Speaker 1: from New Zealand, and she lives with borderline personality disorder.
Speaker 1: She was diagnosed at thirty and her whole world kind
Speaker 1: of shifted. Brielle's story is one that is both heart
Speaker 1: wrenching but also so inspiring and touches on a whole
Speaker 1: lot of different things. The girl moved to Russia. When
Speaker 1: she was a child, she experienced a lot of bullying,
Speaker 1: and we kind of unpack what was it that led
Speaker 1: to her BPD diagnosis, how did she feel about it,
Speaker 1: how did her family react, kind of unpacking a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of stuff that happened along the way. And again,
Speaker 1: Brielle was someone that as I was interviewing her for
Speaker 1: the Voices of Hope Project, I was just like, man,
Speaker 1: I need to know more. I need to know more
Speaker 1: of her story. And this episode is filled with tangents
Speaker 1: and a whole lot of stuff that we just as
Speaker 1: we talk about we kind of we literally talk about
Speaker 1: everything and anything under the sun. But it's a beautiful episode.
Speaker 1: She's a beautiful person. And again, as always trigger warning
Speaker 1: for the kind of things that we do talk about.
Speaker 1: If you have BPD or you know someone with BPD,
Speaker 1: this is a great episode for you, but do take
Speaker 1: your time and know that at any point you can
Speaker 1: stop it. You can come back to it, talk to
Speaker 1: people if you need to. But Brielle's story is coming
Speaker 1: up right after this Brea. Welcome to Hope for is
Speaker 1: a real podcast. I'm really excited to have you on.
Speaker 1: I actually got to interview you recently for Voices of
Speaker 1: Hope project, and as I was talking to you, I
Speaker 1: was like, I need to know more. I need to
Speaker 1: sit down with you, I need to have you on here,
Speaker 1: and I'm super super excited. So for Federal, thank you
Speaker 1: for coming, Thank you for having me. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: Of course, when we were talking on the project that
Speaker 1: we were doing, I was just really captivated and amazed
Speaker 1: by the way that you were able to articulate a
Speaker 1: lot of things that specifically here in an ALTI but
Speaker 1: also around the world is so stigmatized. And I'm going
Speaker 1: to kind of just honestly dive straight in. You were
Speaker 1: diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, which for a lot of people,
Speaker 1: and especially I would say, in the healthcare system, and
Speaker 1: kind of just glow believe there's so much stigma and
Speaker 1: so much misunderstanding. But not only are you diagnosed with BPD,
Speaker 1: you're also a counselor, yes, which is like just phenomenal,
Speaker 1: and so I would love to know kind of I
Speaker 1: will kind of go back and forth a little bit.
Speaker 1: I want to know about you childhood and stuff soon.
Speaker 1: But when you got that diagnosis of BPD, can you
Speaker 1: tell me what happened? What was the lead up? What happened?
Speaker 1: How did you feel? So?
Speaker 2: Yeah, So the lead up to it was I was,
Speaker 2: I think mentally in a really really really rough place,
Speaker 2: and I think I'd reached a point where I just
Speaker 2: did not know who I was anymore.
Speaker 3: And I knew.
Speaker 2: That it had gotten to a point where, you know,
Speaker 2: I'd been struggling with depression my whole life, like that
Speaker 2: was just a given since definitely since I was seventeen,
Speaker 2: and at this point I was, I was thirty, you know,
Speaker 2: but this had just reached a point where.
Speaker 3: It was, you know, this wasn't it.
Speaker 1: And I was living in England at the.
Speaker 2: Time, and my GP was like, you know, we've tried
Speaker 2: all these different medications, you've tried all this. You know,
Speaker 2: you've tried therapy. I'm gonna refer you to a psychiatrist.
Speaker 2: I was angry all the time. I was emotional all
Speaker 2: the time. I couldn't control my emotions, could especially my
Speaker 2: anger over the most ridiculous things, and it was just
Speaker 2: becoming something that I just couldn't have any control over
Speaker 2: and it was just boiling over into every.
Speaker 1: Part of my life.
Speaker 2: And I went and saw the public psychiatrist within England,
Speaker 2: and it took a few times to go and see
Speaker 2: different psychiatrists because it was the public systems.
Speaker 1: You didn't see the same psychiatrist.
Speaker 2: Bumpy Road because obviously you don't get a straight answer.
Speaker 2: So initially they thought, obviously it might be bipolar, but
Speaker 2: eventually they diagnosed me with borderline personality disorder or emotional
Speaker 2: instability personality disorder. How do you feel about that title
Speaker 2: emotional instability? Yeah, it frustrates me. Yeah, it immensely frustrates
Speaker 2: me because that means that it's just emotional instability that
Speaker 2: encapsulates one part of what borderline personality is.
Speaker 1: I also think that that specific title is what also
Speaker 1: creates so much of the stigma, right, is like that
Speaker 1: it's you just can't, you can't control your emotions and
Speaker 1: it's just too like and obviously, like you said, that's
Speaker 1: a part of it. But then when you are deal
Speaker 1: with like physical health things and a physical health like
Speaker 1: setting and then they see you've got BBD, it's an
Speaker 1: immediate kind of switch in their brain of like what's
Speaker 1: actually going on. And that's because of all of these
Speaker 1: other bloody things that it's been kind of thrown around
Speaker 1: as how did you feel when you found out that
Speaker 1: you had that diagnosis.
Speaker 2: Peace, because well, a range of different emotions eventually peace,
Speaker 2: I should say, mainly peace, But I think initially terrified
Speaker 2: purely because they don't they don't really set you up
Speaker 2: to feel or to understand exactly what it is. They're
Speaker 2: sort of like, here's your diagnosis, bye bye. And they
Speaker 2: also they do like a check in sort of afterwards,
Speaker 2: and they don't really support you in that way because
Speaker 2: obviously they also said to me, you can also get
Speaker 2: over it by.
Speaker 1: Having a life event, So get married or have a baby. Huh. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you can get over it by having a life event.
Speaker 1: A life event. That's the cure, the cure, the cure.
Speaker 3: Yeah, what is going on?
Speaker 1: Yes, okay, that's.
Speaker 3: I have not heard that.
Speaker 1: You're obviously so you've got that's from a lens of
Speaker 1: someone who has been diagnosed with BBD. You also have
Speaker 1: this from a lens of someone who's a counselor on
Speaker 1: your counselor brain. What is your response to that?
Speaker 2: So I can look at it from multiple lenses, from
Speaker 2: a from a from a lens of a of a
Speaker 2: person who has borderline personality disorder? How do I say
Speaker 2: this diplomatically. That's just not true. That's just not true. Yeah,
Speaker 2: a life event is not a cure for mental health.
Speaker 1: I just need to know where this guy got his
Speaker 1: license from. That's just like, I'm sorry. If that was
Speaker 1: the cure, I think we'd all just go get married
Speaker 1: and pop a baby out.
Speaker 2: Like I mean, at the time, I was a teacher,
Speaker 2: so I wasn't a counselor. I mean, with my counselor
Speaker 2: had on, I would like, I'd want to slap him
Speaker 2: with his degree me to or his PhD or whatever
Speaker 2: the hell he had to get his doctorate or whatever,
Speaker 2: because even with my qualifications, a life event is not
Speaker 2: going to solve your problems, no at all, like not remotely.
Speaker 1: And also, BPD is something that you can't really get
Speaker 1: diagnosed with until is it, like after sixteen or eighteen.
Speaker 1: That's when they prefer.
Speaker 3: To give the diagnosis.
Speaker 1: Very much, So, yeah, very much, because it's like, obviously
Speaker 1: it's not that's not the same as a lot of
Speaker 1: other meant wellnesses. This one is often kind of deep
Speaker 1: rooted in some kind of childhood trauma that has retrained
Speaker 1: the brain, and so sometimes you don't see the effets
Speaker 1: of that. And also a lot of the times that
Speaker 1: can be misdiagnosed as different things. I know, for you,
Speaker 1: obviously they were looking at possibly bipolar. I know. For me,
Speaker 1: I had the diagnosis of BPD when I was nineteen,
Speaker 1: I think, and I remember I never got told. I
Speaker 1: just saw it on like a discharge thing. And then
Speaker 1: like many years later, I saw another psychiatrist and psychologists
Speaker 1: and they were like, no, you've got PTSD and ADHD
Speaker 1: and those combined have similar symptoms. Because I never never
Speaker 1: had a lot of the symptoms of BPD, but they
Speaker 1: slapped it on and then it affected every other time
Speaker 1: that I went in to seek medical care.
Speaker 2: This is the issue with clinical notes as well. Yeah,
Speaker 2: they don't tell you on your clinical notes, and you
Speaker 2: can request your clinical notes as well, and this is
Speaker 2: how you have to be, like, you have to be
Speaker 2: careful with clinical notes because people can request those, yeah,
Speaker 2: and that's.
Speaker 3: That's they can misdiagnose people.
Speaker 1: That's so bad, which then impacts But it should never
Speaker 1: impact anyway the way that someone is being viewed and
Speaker 1: treated in the healthcare system.
Speaker 3: Absolutely not.
Speaker 1: But it does. Oh because of the stigmas. I would
Speaker 1: love to know, you know, kind of speaking on this,
Speaker 1: and especially to the people who know someone with BPD,
Speaker 1: who are working with someone with BPD, all of those things.
Speaker 1: As someone who lives with it, what do you want
Speaker 1: these other people to know, Like, explain what it is
Speaker 1: to live with BPD. Explain what it is to experience that.
Speaker 1: But also I know that it's not doesn't define you,
Speaker 1: and you still have so many other things about you.
Speaker 1: Like sorry, that's a big, wide winded question.
Speaker 2: But I mean living with BPD is I mean, it's
Speaker 2: it's one hundred percent not linear, and I have.
Speaker 3: Really really good.
Speaker 2: Pockets of time and moments and days and months, and
Speaker 2: and then you know, then it can fall onto the
Speaker 2: back foot where I don't have.
Speaker 3: Good times.
Speaker 1: And I think.
Speaker 2: Having that stigma where people, you know, when people have
Speaker 2: that misunderstanding of BPD, that they instantly think, oh, this
Speaker 2: person has BPD, you know they're really unstable.
Speaker 3: And that's just not true.
Speaker 1: It's also the manipulative thing that I seely get strong
Speaker 1: around to a lot as well, is that they're just manipulative,
Speaker 1: and it's like, no, they're just terrified of losing you
Speaker 1: and they're terrified of abandonment, and so they're going to
Speaker 1: do everything they can to hold on to.
Speaker 2: That like it's yeah, sorry, oh no, absolutely absolutely, and
Speaker 2: you know it's it's I think having that that that attachment,
Speaker 2: you know, can be really really difficult, which is I
Speaker 2: think why I mean personally, I keep my circle very
Speaker 2: small because of that. I disappointment is very difficult for
Speaker 2: me to deal with. So like if we make plans,
Speaker 2: If we do make plans, I have to know what's happening.
Speaker 2: And if those plans change, I need enough time in
Speaker 2: advance to know when they're going to change, how they're
Speaker 2: going to change, and if they're changing, why are they changing.
Speaker 2: So there's like there's these things in advance that have
Speaker 2: to happen, and for some people that's too much for
Speaker 2: them to handle because it is a lot, it's a
Speaker 2: lot to take on. Because if those types of things
Speaker 2: don't happen and they fall apart, sometimes I can't cope
Speaker 2: with that and that's a bit too much and for
Speaker 2: some people, and that's totally understandable.
Speaker 3: If that's too much for Pete, that's fine. But that's
Speaker 3: why my.
Speaker 2: Circle is small, because the people that are in that
Speaker 2: circle can handle that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was talking to a phenomenal woman, doctor Courtney
Speaker 1: Tracy from the US who's a psychologist who also lives
Speaker 1: with BPD, and I was asking her a similar question
Speaker 1: around like what would you say to friends and family
Speaker 1: of those who have BPD? And I remember she just
Speaker 1: kind of sat there and paused and was just like,
Speaker 1: I'm so sorry, Like you have to understand, we don't
Speaker 1: want this as much as you don't want this, Like
Speaker 1: this is not something that we choose, This is not
Speaker 1: something that we want. We know how destructive it can be,
Speaker 1: we know how hard it can be, but give us grace.
Speaker 1: And I think that's so important for people to understand that,
Speaker 1: Like a lot of people living with BPD, like you know,
Speaker 1: and you're aware of the behavior and the actions, maybe
Speaker 1: not at the time and it's happening, but you know
Speaker 1: that it's a thing that you have, but it's not
Speaker 1: something you can control. Yeah, And I mean, what for
Speaker 1: you would you say to people who do have BPD
Speaker 1: in regards to like probably on with your counselor hair on,
Speaker 1: Like what are things that they people can do to
Speaker 1: be able to kind of help manage deal with understand
Speaker 1: the ebbs and flows of it.
Speaker 2: I think for people with BPD, I think everyone manages
Speaker 2: their BPD differently. I learned recently about myself that I
Speaker 2: internalize a lot of what I have going on, and
Speaker 2: that a lot of what I have going on people
Speaker 2: don't realize.
Speaker 3: Unless I vocalize it.
Speaker 2: So if you are wanting people to understand you more,
Speaker 2: you need to be able to communicate that to them.
Speaker 2: If they're important to you and you want them to
Speaker 2: be able to help you and understand you, they need
Speaker 2: to be able to understand what's going on in here,
Speaker 2: but they can't do that unless you talk to them.
Speaker 2: Everyone with BPD has different things that tick them over.
Speaker 2: For me, particularly anger is my tipping point, but I
Speaker 2: internalize it and so a lot of it is being
Speaker 2: able to communicate that so that people can understand why
Speaker 2: it is the way that is. And I think if
Speaker 2: you have loved ones that are wanting to support you
Speaker 2: with your BPD, it is helpful to be able to
Speaker 2: be able to communicate with them. I think if you're
Speaker 2: struggling and there's not the support that's around you, that
Speaker 2: can make it a bit more difficult, and that is
Speaker 2: that is a lot harder and I do, I definitely
Speaker 2: do empathize with that. When I lived in England, I
Speaker 2: didn't have my family around me, and I was still
Speaker 2: trying to navigate my BPD once I had the diagnosis
Speaker 2: and trying to figure that out. And I'd had friends
Speaker 2: who were really good, but bless them, they were they
Speaker 2: were taking the brunt of it, the poor things, and
Speaker 2: I will forever feel guilty for them having to take
Speaker 2: the brunt of that. And so I think a lot
Speaker 2: of your own self care and learning what self care
Speaker 2: is for you that works for me at that time,
Speaker 2: Borrowing into myself which was sleep, which was a healing
Speaker 2: process for me at that time, Creating a safe environment
Speaker 2: within myself, which was I think my room at the
Speaker 2: time that was keeping me safe because it was out
Speaker 2: like it kept what felt unsafe outside, and that meant
Speaker 2: that my.
Speaker 3: Triggers were outside of that space.
Speaker 1: That's really good. Been able to have those those kinds
Speaker 1: of things, I think is so important. And also the
Speaker 1: reason that I was so stoked that we had you
Speaker 1: on this first campaign and to have you here now
Speaker 1: is that I know so many young people who get
Speaker 1: the diagnosis of BPD and then think that their life
Speaker 1: is over and think that they're not going to be
Speaker 1: able to do anything, and they see the way that
Speaker 1: they're treated, and they see the way that they're responded to,
Speaker 1: and they think that they can't have any careers or
Speaker 1: they can't do these things. But you're sitting here, you're
Speaker 1: a counselor you live with BPD, like you've been a teacher,
Speaker 1: You've done all these things. And I think that's so
Speaker 1: inspirational for people that do have this diegnosis and living
Speaker 1: with this. And like we kind of said earlier, BPD
Speaker 1: something that develops in the brain from some kind of trauma.
Speaker 1: And I know that with yours, you went through a
Speaker 1: crazy amount of bullying when you were younger. Can you
Speaker 1: talk about that?
Speaker 2: Yeah, So mine was sort of from when I was
Speaker 2: seven and up until I was about seventeen, So it
Speaker 2: was sort of long winded bullying off and on, which.
Speaker 3: Is probably why.
Speaker 2: Where it sort of stemmed from, which is probably why
Speaker 2: when I got my diagnosis at thirty, it was eventually
Speaker 2: became peace because I could go, oh my god, at seven,
Speaker 2: this is where it started for me. When I was seven,
Speaker 2: my family and I, which was my mum and dad
Speaker 2: and my older sister, we moved to Russia for four years.
Speaker 1: That's so wild, I know, just in general, that's such
Speaker 1: a wild statement. We just moved to Russia.
Speaker 2: I know, my dad got a job over there. We
Speaker 2: were supposed to go for three years. We ended up
Speaker 2: going for four years, and.
Speaker 1: I hated it.
Speaker 3: I hated it.
Speaker 2: The rest of my family loved it, but it was
Speaker 2: not the best for me, purely because I did not
Speaker 2: have the best time socially. We went to Me and
Speaker 2: my sister went to an international American school while we
Speaker 2: were there, and I was sort of just like the
Speaker 2: social outcast. I had no friends. I was very much
Speaker 2: the I think there was in the total number of
Speaker 2: I can't remember how many students they were there, but
Speaker 2: of the hundred there was over there was hundreds of
Speaker 2: kids there, and most of them were American. But of them,
Speaker 2: I think there was like I remember there being like
Speaker 2: a groan of how many students like nationalities, and there
Speaker 2: was like six New Zealanders, so there was like obviously
Speaker 2: not very many, two of them obviously being me and
Speaker 2: my sister. And I just remember me, I had zero friends,
Speaker 2: and I just remember being very alienated, for I was
Speaker 2: very eccentric, very quirky, and very much that was very
Speaker 2: much like picked on for that just very much that's
Speaker 2: that's sort of just what sticks out in my head.
Speaker 2: And I just remember one particular girl very much, highlighting
Speaker 2: it every sort of twist and turn, how much how
Speaker 2: much I was not like, how different I was, and
Speaker 2: how much I was not like the rest and do
Speaker 2: you know, just those kind of things, And that was
Speaker 2: that was at that point. And then and obviously we
Speaker 2: came home when I was eleven.
Speaker 3: And then it was.
Speaker 2: And then I remember being an intermediate and.
Speaker 1: I remember.
Speaker 2: There being like a vote about whether I could be
Speaker 2: whether I would be a good enough friend in a group,
Speaker 2: like being like whether I would be allowed to be
Speaker 2: friends with like anyone the vote yeah, oh my god, yeah,
Speaker 2: and so like so there's like these kind of things,
Speaker 2: so and so what one of the idiosyncrasies. One of
Speaker 2: the things that is that attaches itself to me is
Speaker 2: I remember the negative things in my life more than
Speaker 2: I remember the positive things. That's what sticks with me
Speaker 2: I am. I think it's just part of who I am.
Speaker 1: That makes sense though, Like that something I know that
Speaker 1: even when, for example, like scrolling through social media and
Speaker 1: I would see hundreds of good comments and you see
Speaker 1: one bad comment and you're like and then you think
Speaker 1: about that for the next ten years. Yes, Like it's
Speaker 1: you know, I think the human brain for some reason
Speaker 1: just dwells so much on the negative stuff. But when
Speaker 1: it is so much that it almost blocks out all
Speaker 1: of the positive stuff, that's when you have you know,
Speaker 1: these big issues there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's all you can focus on. Yeah, And
Speaker 2: so the you go through life and like that's all
Speaker 2: you can remember. And then so you go from intermediate
Speaker 2: and to high school and that sort of sticks out.
Speaker 2: And that's sort of when my weight changed, and then
Speaker 2: my weight went up, and then that's you know, high
Speaker 2: school sucks. Yeah already, Yeah, you know, we all know.
Speaker 2: High school's you know, the worst place on earth. Correct,
Speaker 2: you want to send anyone to the worst place on earth?
Speaker 2: Send them to high school?
Speaker 1: Four teenagers?
Speaker 3: Oh, I know.
Speaker 2: But then it just sort of deteriorated a lot from there.
Speaker 2: And from there then were there were my mental health.
Speaker 2: And I remember the mind games, you know, and but
Speaker 2: and I remember the you know, the fat jokes. The
Speaker 2: I remember walking past someone and they would like as
Speaker 2: I was walking past them, they would make the sound
Speaker 2: like a giant like the boom boom boom sound like
Speaker 2: you were walking past someone and I actually subconsciously actually
Speaker 2: tried to walk lighter because I thought that that would
Speaker 2: make them stop like that kind of stuff. And you
Speaker 2: can just imagine those kind of things and then somehow
Speaker 2: like people having issues with you and you've never met
Speaker 2: them before and.
Speaker 3: They just came out.
Speaker 2: From you from left and right because you knew you
Speaker 2: were just easy pray.
Speaker 1: And I mean, I get to speak in schools all
Speaker 1: around the world now, and every time that I go
Speaker 1: into any school, we often talk about the fact that,
Speaker 1: you know, bullies often have a bigger bully in their
Speaker 1: lives that they believe that it's okay or they believe
Speaker 1: that it's normalized. And you see these kids and man,
Speaker 1: they can just say some real hurtful things without any
Speaker 1: cognitive understanding of the risk, like the how that's going
Speaker 1: to be perceived and how it's going to impact the
Speaker 1: person that they're saying it too. And I think now
Speaker 1: even more so with social media and they can hide
Speaker 1: behind a screen, and the bully and goes from school
Speaker 1: to then also being at home, and it's the impact
Speaker 1: and the toll that that has on someone and also
Speaker 1: on the beliefs that you have about yourself, right, because
Speaker 1: when you're so young, and your world is being shaped,
Speaker 1: and your identity is being shaped and your beliefs, and
Speaker 1: suddenly everyone around you that you're spending more time with
Speaker 1: at school than you are at home are telling you
Speaker 1: all these horrific things. Of course, your identity and who
Speaker 1: you believe you are is going to shift. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: which is do you ever look back at that and
Speaker 1: look at especially this diagnosis that you have, knowing that
Speaker 1: it's been trauma based, do you ever get resentful or
Speaker 1: angry at the fact that this has come from these
Speaker 1: years that you are being bullied, or think about the
Speaker 1: fact that, like, if you hadn't been bullied, would there
Speaker 1: still be something that you struggled with?
Speaker 3: You know? Do you know what I would?
Speaker 2: But I think, to be honest, jazz that would take energy, Yeah,
Speaker 2: and just don't think that they deserve that energy. And
Speaker 2: but I've you know, I've lived with this for a
Speaker 2: number of years now, and I think I've gotten to
Speaker 2: the point now where it's been and because it's also
Speaker 2: gone on for like we're talking like it from seven
Speaker 2: to seventeen, so we're talking ten years. Yeah, And you
Speaker 2: could also look at it from the other perspective of
Speaker 2: if I saw them on the street, I would probably.
Speaker 3: Turn and run the other way.
Speaker 2: So it's like a double edged sword. Yeah, so wouldn't
Speaker 2: want to give them the time of day. And also
Speaker 2: other triple edged sword would never ever go to my
Speaker 2: high school reunion.
Speaker 1: Oh neither.
Speaker 2: You couldn't pay me fifty million trillion absolutely dollars.
Speaker 3: No, yeah, not a chance.
Speaker 1: Yeah I feel your I feel And it's what I
Speaker 1: think is so interesting is I feel the same about
Speaker 1: like if I saw them in the street that I
Speaker 1: still run the other way. And it's so interesting because
Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm literally twenty nine and still I like
Speaker 1: I sometimes see them comming on things on social media
Speaker 1: and I'm like, this is so wild that like fifteen
Speaker 1: years later, you're still coming after me. But I feel
Speaker 1: like the same kid that I was back then, which
Speaker 1: is I think people need to understand it, especially all
Speaker 1: the young people that are listening to this. The impact
Speaker 1: of your words now can stick with someone for life,
Speaker 1: like it's oh, and people just don't understand that, Like
Speaker 1: they don't understand the impact of words. And I mean
Speaker 1: what I guess in both of our cases, at least
Speaker 1: it has been able to be turned into something that
Speaker 1: can help other people. And that's why I also really
Speaker 1: love the fact that you've become a counselor because I
Speaker 1: think that you know, having been in the mental health
Speaker 1: field and being in as a mental health patient myself,
Speaker 1: knowing that the best people working in those areas of
Speaker 1: people that have been through it, because you can tell
Speaker 1: when someone understands or if someone is just purely clinical.
Speaker 1: And obviously purely clinical is needed at times, but for
Speaker 1: someone who has got in the middle of it, to
Speaker 1: have someone who resonates and understands, it's just so different.
Speaker 1: What was it that made you quit teaching and go
Speaker 1: into counseling, because that's a big shift.
Speaker 2: You'll actually find a lot of the counselors that I'm
Speaker 2: training with at the moment used to be teachers. Wow wow,
Speaker 2: and a lot of them are actually becoming counselors in
Speaker 2: schools cool, which is really great. Also shows the need, right,
Speaker 2: Oh definitely, yeah, I don't want to do that. I
Speaker 2: definitely want to come completely out of schools. But that's
Speaker 2: because I think for me, my era of being a
Speaker 2: teacher is done. When I became a teacher, I came
Speaker 2: out of finishing high school.
Speaker 1: I didn't finish high school.
Speaker 2: I finished end of sixth form, very very depressed, seventeen
Speaker 2: year old, very you know, didn't want to be here anymore,
Speaker 2: and who shocked her parents very much because they had
Speaker 2: no idea obviously what was going on, because I didn't
Speaker 2: tell them that I was being bullied and that I
Speaker 2: didn't want to you know, I was also you know,
Speaker 2: I was self harming.
Speaker 3: They didn't know anything.
Speaker 2: My school counselor actually forced me to tell my parents
Speaker 2: because she had said, if you don't tell them, I will.
Speaker 1: How old were you first started self harming sixteen? Was
Speaker 1: it something that you had seen somewhere or was it
Speaker 1: just something that obviously with the emotions that had come up,
Speaker 1: Like what was it?
Speaker 2: It was that was just the emotions that had come
Speaker 2: up and they just got so overwhelming. It was it
Speaker 2: was sitting in my stomach and it just got to
Speaker 2: the point where I.
Speaker 1: Had just needed to let they needed to come out.
Speaker 1: The reason that I asked that is because I think
Speaker 1: that self harm is something that, alongside BPD, is just
Speaker 1: one of the most stigmatized in the way of like
Speaker 1: it's just attention seeking and no one, no one is
Speaker 1: doing that for like you've got it. You've got to
Speaker 1: be even if it is that you need someone to pay,
Speaker 1: but you need someone to pay attention. There's not a
Speaker 1: bad thing. Like if a baby is crying on the ground,
Speaker 1: you're not just going to ignore it, right, And I
Speaker 1: think if someone is hurting enough that they feel like
Speaker 1: that's something that they need to do for people to
Speaker 1: understand the hurt, which majority of the time isn't even
Speaker 1: the case, like it's just trying to deal with that pain.
Speaker 1: It's just so misunderstood one hundred percent. Yeah, sorry, I
Speaker 1: keep going off, but.
Speaker 2: That no, I totally agree with you. I totally agree
Speaker 2: with you. There's the huge stigma stigmatized test stigmatization against
Speaker 2: mental health, but against self harm, and I think there's
Speaker 2: a lot of misunderstanding against it. And I think you
Speaker 2: can attribute that a lot to the older generation as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my parents were just like, what the hell do
Speaker 2: we do with this? They had no idea. And I
Speaker 2: have good conversations with my parents about it, more so
Speaker 2: as we move on, but they had no idea what
Speaker 2: to do.
Speaker 1: Well, they were I guess what's interesting is I feel
Speaker 1: like they were just masking it in different ways, right,
Speaker 1: because the pain was still there for them. Obviously different
Speaker 1: different kinds of pain, but pain is something that universally
Speaker 1: we feel when people just respond to it in different ways.
Speaker 1: And I think it's really interesting because, like, for example,
Speaker 1: our suicide stats here as majority middle aged men, people
Speaker 1: who have never been able to deal with or understand
Speaker 1: emotions or how you know. And so I think it's
Speaker 1: interesting when you then look at a teenage girl who
Speaker 1: is self harming because of the pain and just trying
Speaker 1: to let it out and go, that's attention seeking. It's
Speaker 1: like they're just trying to deal with the stuff so
Speaker 1: that they don't end up you know. Yes, it's yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I've gone off topic completely, but it's just something I've
Speaker 1: seen a lot of on social media especially, and obviously
Speaker 1: there is a lot of conversations and concern around it
Speaker 1: becoming a trend among young people. But still someone's got
Speaker 1: to be hurting to do that.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but then you have half the problem with social
Speaker 2: media being half the problem.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because social media, you know, it reaches such a
Speaker 1: huge and it's huge. Aren't you so glad that you
Speaker 1: didn't have social media when you were going through this?
Speaker 3: Social media?
Speaker 2: This is going to make me sound like a like
Speaker 2: a really really old Pelican. But social media was like
Speaker 2: just sort of picking up when I was in high
Speaker 2: school Bebo, yes, yes, miss in missing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like I look now and there are kids that
Speaker 1: are posting in psych wards and that you know, I'm
Speaker 1: like me and my co founder Gin you know, we've
Speaker 1: often talked about the fact that we're so glad that
Speaker 1: we didn't have this instant social media connection back then
Speaker 1: because like, oh my gosh, that stuff is documented forever,
Speaker 1: like you can't get rid of it, and it's like
Speaker 1: it's wild. But anyway, you were a teacher and you
Speaker 1: became a counselor. I have so many tangents. Also, my
Speaker 1: little ADHD brain is like this and yeah, like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, but I get what you mean because like, yeah,
Speaker 2: on the TikTok, I WoT other TikTok on the TikTok
Speaker 2: showing my age because I watch and there is this
Speaker 2: watch ye.
Speaker 3: No anyway, yes, so and so when I left high.
Speaker 2: School, I think I worked for my parents for about
Speaker 2: a year and then I just I actually just decided
Speaker 2: to become an early childhood teacher.
Speaker 1: Randomly. I love that for you.
Speaker 2: I just randomly decided to become very but again, impulsively
Speaker 2: and impulsivity, it's just another one. And I am really
Speaker 2: really impulsively too.
Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, that's why they thought I had BPD
Speaker 1: for so long, because my impulsivity was through the roof,
Speaker 1: like through the roof, and now it's turned into like
Speaker 1: impulsivity buying and by impulsive buying is terrible, but that's
Speaker 1: that's again, that's the same thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like.
Speaker 2: Moneyw like with debt and stuff like that, that's just
Speaker 2: another thing because you just like I like if you
Speaker 2: like with mood changing, like mood switching can be very
Speaker 2: big thing as well, So your moods will switch and
Speaker 2: like being on a high, Like it's very rare for
Speaker 2: me to be very high, Like I can be happy,
Speaker 2: but it's very rare for me to be hyper.
Speaker 3: I'll be hyper very rarely.
Speaker 1: But if I'm hyper, it's not a good thing. It's
Speaker 1: not a good thing.
Speaker 2: But anyway, yeah, so I did EC and I did
Speaker 2: this is probably a good example of impulsivity.
Speaker 3: So I did.
Speaker 2: Distance learning for my diploma in early childhood and so
Speaker 2: I did that and then upgraded it to for a
Speaker 2: year to my degree in early childhood and in between
Speaker 2: that became did my full registration, which takes a couple
Speaker 2: of years to be fully registered as a teacher, and
Speaker 2: then did my postgraduate diploma in early childhood education, went
Speaker 2: over seas and taught in England and became an assistant
Speaker 2: principal in a primary school.
Speaker 1: Oh my god.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I loved that experience but burnt myself out
Speaker 2: doing it. Wouldn't change it for the world because it
Speaker 2: was a really great experience, met some amazing people, but
Speaker 2: my mental health took a toll. Got diagnosed with BPD.
Speaker 2: But I didn't get diagnosed with BPD because I went
Speaker 2: to England. I got diagnosed with BPD because.
Speaker 1: You went to Russia.
Speaker 3: I went to Russia.
Speaker 2: H So, like you know, I went to Russia and
Speaker 2: you know, you know all of this kind of stuff. So, like,
Speaker 2: you know, all of that happened.
Speaker 3: And so.
Speaker 2: I decided that I came home from England and I
Speaker 2: was a shell of a human. I also came home
Speaker 2: in the height of COVID, so shell of a human
Speaker 2: with BPD. So this is an interesting experience for someone
Speaker 2: who's you know, had a mental breakdown with BPD in
Speaker 2: the middle of COVID.
Speaker 1: Oh, you would have to gone to isolation. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: had to do that too.
Speaker 3: Oh it was very interesting.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So this was before you had to book, right, so
Speaker 2: they just put you in a hotel. So I was
Speaker 2: very lucky because this was also the point where I
Speaker 2: also like, I couldn't be I didn't like. I'm also
Speaker 2: quite sounds very strange. Most people think it's very strange
Speaker 2: because when I meet people people, because I'm quite an
Speaker 2: introverted person, but people are like, I don't get that
Speaker 2: vibe from you. I get quite an extroverted vibe, and
Speaker 2: I'm just like, I don't really like a lot of people.
Speaker 1: I'm I quite like my own little bubble.
Speaker 2: But I'm like, I'm quite a socially anxious kind of person,
Speaker 2: and so I don't like. At the time, being touched
Speaker 2: by anybody was quite a bit of an issue. I'm
Speaker 2: pretty good about it now, Yeah, I'm good.
Speaker 1: I'm quite good about it now.
Speaker 2: Hugging is fine now, but like back then, to touch anybody,
Speaker 2: I would be like this, wow, now absolutely fine, So
Speaker 2: absolutely fine. But so going into managed isolation, I was like,
Speaker 2: please dear God, don't fly me down to christ Church,
Speaker 2: because that's what they were doing. Yes, like you fly
Speaker 2: into Auckland and I just flew from England that if
Speaker 2: they needed to, they'd fly you down to christ Church.
Speaker 2: We need to talk about this experience for a moment,
Speaker 2: because I feel like I haven't seen anything about like
Speaker 2: when you land in the country when this was happening
Speaker 2: and you don't get to get your bags and you're
Speaker 2: greeted by like the Navy.
Speaker 1: Was this your experience.
Speaker 2: Yet, so they come and get you off the plane.
Speaker 2: So they come and because I had a layover in Singapore.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and so this is how much.
Speaker 2: My parents there's such little delights because they paid for
Speaker 2: me to go premium economy just to try and see
Speaker 2: if it would make my experience just a little bit
Speaker 2: if the airline would take care of me a little
Speaker 2: bit better, just for my mental health. And there were
Speaker 2: like four other people within premium economy, so it was
Speaker 2: quite nice because that was but it worked out even
Speaker 2: better because like there was like no one on the
Speaker 2: flight anyway. Yeah yeah, but they like come and get
Speaker 2: you off the flight, put you in an area, leave
Speaker 2: you there and then take your way again.
Speaker 1: But with like with the guards and with that, like
Speaker 1: it was I remember when I landed and just being like, oh,
Speaker 1: my gosh, I feel like I've done something wrong, or
Speaker 1: I'm like arriving in some crazy thing and then you
Speaker 1: get on a bus and you don't know where you're going, yes,
Speaker 1: and then you just arrive at a hotel. I hope
Speaker 1: I've answered your questions correctly.
Speaker 3: What if I've answered them wrong, where are you going
Speaker 3: to put me?
Speaker 1: I know, like I just oh, my gosh, and like
Speaker 1: I I mean, I managed to turn mine into quite
Speaker 1: I was unboxing all my food, which for some reason
Speaker 1: blew up on TikTok. People were so like millions and
Speaker 1: millions and millions of views of me unboxing my food
Speaker 1: three times a day, and just like people were so
Speaker 1: invested to the point that America, there was this news
Speaker 1: piece that went out from some I don't even know
Speaker 1: what it was claiming to be like getting the truth
Speaker 1: of the news, and it was saying that all of
Speaker 1: New Zealand was in a concentration camp, which, first of all,
Speaker 1: the audacity of you to ever compare anything to that. Secondly,
Speaker 1: oh my god, I'm sitting at a bed in a
Speaker 1: hotel getting food delivered to me three times a day.
Speaker 1: I can order a coffee, like.
Speaker 3: You know, I'm just chilling. How is it?
Speaker 1: How do you interesting comparison? But okay, I know, sorry,
Speaker 1: we're still not at the point where you became a colt.
Speaker 3: No, that's fine, that's fine.
Speaker 1: I'm fine with that.
Speaker 2: But like that was fine because like I had the
Speaker 2: exact same experience because they bust me to a hotel
Speaker 2: which was fine.
Speaker 3: Four points on sheriton.
Speaker 1: Ah, how's that sedema?
Speaker 3: Ah? Yeah?
Speaker 2: This hotel had had a little walk a little area
Speaker 2: where you could go downstairs once a day to walk around.
Speaker 1: Couldn't I couldn't do that because I couldn't leave my room. Wow.
Speaker 2: So I left my room to do the coup the
Speaker 2: two COVID tests yea horrible which I had to do,
Speaker 2: which surprisingly one nostril was fine, second nostril and I think, yeah,
Speaker 2: that was painful. I don't know why that was, but that, yeah,
Speaker 2: that was interesting. But I couldn't leave.
Speaker 3: But when I.
Speaker 2: Left, because I was so it was I had mental
Speaker 2: health nurses ringing me every other day to check up
Speaker 2: on me, as well as the nurse that was based
Speaker 2: at the hotel ringing me every day to check up
Speaker 2: on me. The mental health nurse was advising me whether
Speaker 2: I needed to take any additional medication to check up
Speaker 2: on me, and then I actually had one of the
Speaker 2: Navy women.
Speaker 3: She came up and escorted me.
Speaker 2: Down to leave because that day Auckland went back into lockdown.
Speaker 2: My parents don't live in Auckland. Who were coming to
Speaker 2: get me because obviously I've moved back from England, I
Speaker 2: don't have any way to live. I was going to
Speaker 2: live with my parents. They live outside of Auckland, like
Speaker 2: two hours outside of Auckland.
Speaker 1: Oh, and put the barrier up. Yeah, so a bus
Speaker 1: had to drive us outside to Mercer.
Speaker 2: So actually someone came up to get me to bring
Speaker 2: me down because I couldn't physically get myself down because
Speaker 2: I was so overwhelmed. She'd put me, she had to
Speaker 2: put me in a different elevator because COVID, but she
Speaker 2: took my bag, she got me sorted with, like she
Speaker 2: did all my paperwork. She'd take me around to the
Speaker 2: different places that I needed to go and got me
Speaker 2: on the bus because I couldn't do it.
Speaker 3: So it was just.
Speaker 2: Different experiences that supported me the way through. I don't
Speaker 2: know how we got onto this part of the story,
Speaker 2: but how you became a counselor.
Speaker 1: She was like I don't even know was it well,
Speaker 1: you know, because obviously you've had all these experiences and
Speaker 1: I think, I don't know if this is where you're
Speaker 1: going with that as well, But having all of those
Speaker 1: people that were helping you along the way, that was that. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So they supported me all the way through, even though
Speaker 2: I was a shell of a person.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I thought I didn't want to be a teacher anymore.
Speaker 2: I definitely set myself to the point where I had
Speaker 2: burnt myself out. It wasn't something I wanted to do.
Speaker 2: I think I just had set myself to that point.
Speaker 2: I just finished high school, just did it.
Speaker 1: And then became an assistant principle.
Speaker 2: So I just and then I really sat down and
Speaker 2: thought about it. It took me about six months to
Speaker 2: put myself back together again. Yeah, and I decided that
Speaker 2: being a counselor was something that I wanted to give back. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, I also wanted to highlight the fact that
Speaker 2: you can live with mental health, you can live with BPD,
Speaker 2: and you can do anything. You are going to have
Speaker 2: roadblocks because God forbid. You know, I have some physical
Speaker 2: health issues at the moment that are causing me some issues,
Speaker 2: and at the moment I have when I go into
Speaker 2: the hospital. I don't disclose my BPD at the moment
Speaker 2: until the very end when they asked me what my
Speaker 2: medications are, and then they asked me why I am
Speaker 2: on those medications.
Speaker 1: Then I tell them I.
Speaker 2: Have BPD, but they've already treated me medical for my
Speaker 2: physical attributes at tributes.
Speaker 1: That's so helpful that you were diagnosed overseas for that,
Speaker 1: because I know in New Zealand that a lot of
Speaker 1: the times it comes up on your hospital records they
Speaker 1: type your name.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, it already comes up on my hospital records
Speaker 2: now because I've been back for four years and because
Speaker 2: I've had so many like I'm very much into the
Speaker 2: system with psychiatrists and things like that, so it's very
Speaker 2: much intertwined with within the hospital systems. But I think
Speaker 2: definitely that it was yeah, yeah, diagnosed overseas lot.
Speaker 1: I think, Man, I'm so thankful that you've been willing
Speaker 1: to sit down with me twice and a short spent
Speaker 1: a time. We did the last ones if you nicey
Speaker 1: long ago. But like I said at the beginning, I
Speaker 1: just think you represent Hope so well and just the
Speaker 1: way that you've been able to go and create this
Speaker 1: career and to be able to do it, to be
Speaker 1: helping people and to show people that you can live
Speaker 1: a successful life. And I love what you just said
Speaker 1: before you can do anything, like you can absolutely do anything.
Speaker 1: And we've talked about their advice that you know you
Speaker 1: have people with BPD and the people around BPD. And
Speaker 1: there's one last question that I want to say before
Speaker 1: I let you go. I don't want to let you
Speaker 1: go because I could talk to you for hours, but
Speaker 1: also I'm going to get told off if I do that.
Speaker 1: But I want to know I asked this to every person.
Speaker 1: This podcast is called Hope is Real. What does the
Speaker 1: word hope mean to you?
Speaker 2: I think hope can encapsulate so many different things. But
Speaker 2: hope that life doesn't end when you think it does.
Speaker 2: Hope that you have got so much more life to live,
Speaker 2: and that just because you may have a diagnosis of BPD,
Speaker 2: you know there is still hope.
Speaker 1: I love that. I love that. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for coming on.
Speaker 3: The podcast, appreciate having me.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, let's do this again twelve more times.
Speaker 1: So much need to discuss.
Speaker 3: I could talk till the cows come on.
Speaker 1: That's the problem. No, Thank you so much for coming on.
Speaker 1: You're so welcome. Thank you for having me well that
Speaker 1: you have it, guys, thank you so much for staying
Speaker 1: and for listening to this episode. And like I've said
Speaker 1: at the beginning, and I always say, if anything in
Speaker 1: this episode that's been talked about has brought anything up
Speaker 1: for you, you feel like you need to talk to someone,
Speaker 1: then please remember and know that the bravest thing that
Speaker 1: you can do right now is to talk to someone,
Speaker 1: is to ask for help, whether that's from a friend,
Speaker 1: a family member, or if you don't know who to
Speaker 1: talk to, then if you live in Altiola here you
Speaker 1: can call or text one seven three seven at any
Speaker 1: time to talk to a trained counselor. Or if you
Speaker 1: live overseas, go to dubdubdub dot the Voices of Hope
Speaker 1: dot org for a list of international helplines. Remember that
Speaker 1: no matter what it is that you're facing, no matter
Speaker 1: what it is that you're going through, that in all things,
Speaker 1: hope is real and change is possible. I'll see you
Speaker 1: guys next week