A Mentor Leveled Up

August 7, 2024 will be a day I remember for the rest of my life, this was the day she leveled up.

Everyone can probably think of an influential person in their own life. Someone that just simply made a difference, a lasting difference. My mentor came into my life the year I would turn 10 years old. For a brief timeline to help add more perspective to this post, I now have a 10 year old daughter of my own.

I heard of her passing only a few days after her death, while scrolling Facebook. An old classmate had posted her obituary and when I read it I couldn’t stop the tears or the thoughts and feelings that followed.

I had been working a fundraiser for my daughter’s softball team earlier that day and my daughter & I had just stopped for a drink and a snack at Sonic.

I read the post and the news of her passing it was too much for me at that moment so I cried, actually if I’m being honest, I ugly cried for a moment. My daughter, sitting beside me in the passenger seat, asked me if I was ok. I told her that I would be fine, but I had just learned that my favorite teacher of all time had passed away. She said with wide eyes, “mom she must have been an awesome teacher!” I said, “baby she was, but more than that she was just an amazing human being!” I cried a bit more before wiping my tears and driving home. I am so thankful I had the privilege of being one of her students.

The ol’ school building where she became a mentor.

It’s not like we had a common friendship or even said a word to each other in the last 24 years since graduating high school, but yet, she still somehow had this amazing impact. The impact she made happened at a time in my young life when the world I knew had begun to disintegrate around me. My parents had divorced and dealing with it wasn’t easy for me. Everything was changing & happening at such a rapid rate that I thought for sure there would be no way of ever finding my footing. I was sure my life would always be uncertain.

In general, as a child at this time, my life was uncertain & left it impossible for me to predict any of the chaos that would often occur … unless of course, I was with Mrs. Rains.

In her class, it wasn’t chaotic it was the opposite. There was a schedule to maintain, and we maintained it. I knew that her students were important to her. I knew this because of how she made me feel as her student. I always felt loved and recognized for working hard. I always had a task, a lesson, or a job. It wasn’t that I was her favorite, (😍 although I told myself I was!) she was the same way with all of her students. She had a magical way about her that students responded to. It wasn’t that she was the nicest teacher that would let a student get away with being mischievous or rude, she taught us that it was a better option to be a good person. She would keep class engaging and interesting.

I think of all the lessons and the many ways she helped her students. I wonder how many cups of coffee she would consume to get through the day? It makes me tired now realizing the amount of energy she must have given us on the daily.

She would have been the exact age that I am now, when she was my teacher. A 42 year old teacher doesn’t really sound like a person with an endless amount of energy, does it?

She was a source of good energy. She gave that good energy to all of her students.

Mrs. Rains was a member of the Muskogee Creek Nation and Yuchi Tribes. She had the most beautiful hair I had ever seen. Long and black as a starless night. She would wear beaded barrettes to hold half of her hair up. I would always compliment her on how much I loved her beaded barrettes & jewelry. I was a very shy child so for me to say anything to anyone was a big deal. As I didn’t start speaking to most people until around 5th grade. She noticed my interest and possibly considered my home life at the time & she took being my teacher one step further and decided she would teach me how to make my own jewelry.

She had a conference with my dad. My dad was a single-parent at the time. She asked him if she could keep me after school a couple days a week to teach me how to bead loom. He agreed, and this would be where I learned some of the most important lessons of my life & a little about jewelry making.

My dad and my daughter, May 2024… my dad had just turned 71 & my daughter had just turned 10. (Both May birthdays, days apart.)

Teaching someone is easy when you love to watch them learn.

Mistakes should occur when you are learning anything and it is good to remind your students they will be equipped with an eraser; because nothing is perfect, especially when learning something for the first time.

Laugh with your students, cry with your students, show them all the emotions. Life is emotional and they will be more successful if they know how to deal with the range of emotions. One emotion she always loved to share with us was joy. She had such an amazing laugh. I am thankful that I can still hear it.

Recognize accomplishments and set achievable goals. This is great for the classroom and the home. We all need to know that we are doing a good job when we are putting in the work.

Lastly, during the bead loom lessons, she taught me to appreciate the calm, to let the peace surround my heart and mind, and to remember to always place a mistake in my beading pattern intentionally. “Michelle, nothing man-made will ever be perfect, we will save that job for our creator.” I learned by intentionally placing flaws in patterns that our beauty or uniqueness can come from our imperfections, and sometimes the best placed imperfections will look like a work of art.

During an imperfect time in my life she was definitely an unexpected blessing. I must have been placed in her life as that imperfectly placed bead.

A student, although messy and shy, was one that stood out to her and in all of my awkwardness she somehow recognized my broken heart and began to stitch it back together, to help me feel whole again. My mentor taught me to focus on the peace instead of the mess happening around me. She let me know that perfect rarely ever occurs. I’m certain now that she was more than a mentor but an angel sent to help me find my purpose and peace in this messy place we call life.

The day of her funeral. My ❤️ a bit broken 💔.

I will always remember the lessons that she took the time to teach me. In knowing this I hope that maybe someday I can also be that unexpected blessing in someone else’s broken pattern of life and this thought makes me feel as comforted as one of her big hugs.

Mrs. Rains- I’ll never forget you!

If people with borderline personality disorder are such bad people…

I haven’t felt like posting or writing much. This inability to write actually started after I decided to coauthor a book with someone I consider a close friend. Her name is Sarah, she lives in North Yorkshire & she is brilliant. She has been on the podcast a few times & if you listen to the podcast you would know that she also battles borderline personality disorder. I quickly realized that she is a much more knowledgeable author and knowing this gave me the courage to try to do more with my writing… Then as life does, it suddenly became more difficult to write. Suddenly more was being required of me from work, from home and just many things keeping me from writing.

Since more of my time was being spent away from home, I just couldn’t get back into the swing of things. No productivity or creativity made me feel like I may not be the writer I had imagined I was.

I find myself battling these type of thoughts no matter what I do. Since realizing my issue with writing, or rather my lack of writing… I thought I would just post this response I answered to a question on Quora a few months back. Here is that response.

If people with borderline personality disorder are such bad people, what are they to do with the rest of their lives? Where are they supposed to go? When they’ve destroyed basically anything good and also self-destruct?

Individuals with borderline personality disorder are not bad people. We, in a way, remain children. We were the ones that were hurt, neglected, broken-hearted, beaten & abused, left to fend for ourselves after surviving traumatizing events.

As the saying goes, “hurt people, hurt people!” Sadly, for the PwBPD, it isn’t just the pain of childhood that helped create the various dysfunctions we consistently experience. This type of past treatment in combination with underdeveloped parts of the brain and what society can witness is even the nicest of people with borderline, can transform into emotionally charged nightmares, especially when it comes to relationships.

Meet Archer, my emotional support bestie!

We can easily discard and dissociate, think irrationally, become obsessed about being abandoned to the point of paranoia, and our emotions can become extremely hard to manage. This type of dysfunctional thinking leaves most borderlines relying heavily on coping mechanisms (mostly toxic mechanisms) to get through stressful events. Of course, these coping mechanisms will vary in levels of destruction, but the borderline is only seeking an effective method of painkiller and to avoid the perceived disappointment or rejection that might arise, even if, but for a moment. The route the borderline takes to stop the pain is not important. We EXPECT the rest of the world to understand that we are just doing our best to survive.

The borderline brain becomes a place similar to Neverland, where one remains a “lost-boy/girl”, never wanting to grow up, and also never feeling wanted. Like orphans, we rely heavily on reliable coping mechanisms and survival strategies, even the ones that lack manners. We live inside of our heads A LOT, as we don’t want to experience all of life as most of it is overwhelming and this creates a dissociative state. Shielding our fragile emotional state from being exposed. We don’t do this intentionally; it is a shift of modality in the brain. We can be in reality one second, and with little effort the next second we can shift to autopilot. We can go from the most generous of people, to hell bent on taking all that we can from others, just to feel alive and to validate our existence/importance.

PwBPD, aren’t all bad people, we can be very hospitable, some of the most generous and considerate of individuals. The problem is, no one notices the moments when we MUST have our needs met. This fact, most everyone else would consider for maybe a minute or two & shake it off, maybe even saying to themselves “I am just having a bad day.” To the borderline, this was the only missing piece required to start the internal chaos that leads to devasting outcomes in relationships.

We are good people, hell we can even be amazing at times. We were born different, experiencing early on in life that people cannot be trusted, aren’t reliable, or even lovable unless of course we meet certain conditions. We learn early how to meet our own needs and to use other people as “a means to an end”. The problem is we grew up never trusting anyone, because the people we were given as caretakers, left us to do it all by ourselves. (Some never become successful at taking charge of their own life, consistently relying on someone else to do it.) We learned how to suppress our immense sensitivity to others failing to meet our expectations. We look at people in terms of survival. Who has the thing we need to survive? If they can consistently meet one of our needs, we maintain that supply as long as they can deliver, we collect those kinds of people, and all others are seen as tools or temporary resources. We imitate others because our personality never had the chance to develop properly, out of necessity we adapted to live in survival mode.

People with BPD are not inherently bad, but rather the remnants of unpleasant childhood experiences and faulty neurological wiring. I would suggest that you live by being a manager of this disorder, manage your intentions by setting personal goals. Remind yourself that everyone is out here just trying to survive. Explain to those closest to you the things you need in order to feel better.

One relationship I’ll never end.
Coffee + me = 4ever

I have also concluded that some relationships may cause a Pw/BPD to suffer even more. I know it isn’t always easy, but those relationships aren’t healthy for a borderline, and you will not thrive in that type of environment. Start paying attention to your autopilot mode. A plane with a pilot has a much better chance at arriving at his/her desired destination. You must continue to tell yourself that no one can care for you better than you and maybe that will help eliminate the need for others to do it for you. I have been working very hard at becoming the parent I always wanted, for myself and my children. Beyond that, I really don’t know what to say other than, YOU CAN DO THIS! I’ll be cheering you on from Oklahoma. Even though this last picture was taken in Texas at The BIG Texan.

Season 3: Episode 3

Part II, Interview with Kim

I had a great conversation with a new friend that I met on Quora. She explains how (BPD) Borderline Personality Disorder presents itself in her life in a profound way. I find her explanations relatable as well as easy to understand. Take a listen to our chat.

Link to the interview below.

Interview with Kim

Have a blessed day!

Merry Christmas

Podcast returns next week!

Podcast/Blog will resume this month.

Next Episode: 29 September 2023

Season 2: Episode 7 – “The Borderline’s Garden”

PODCAST LINK: https://open.spotify.com/episode/0bCrBZ25jGURp36yykT0ut?si=rlLOoiMxRjSEIf-q5O1Xcw

    We have been dealing with a lot over in our neck of the woods, my absence is mostly related to my brief summer break from teaching and well that just translates into a break from routine.  During this break from “root-ine”, I started to realize just how frequently my mind is busy generating thoughts and how those thoughts quickly blossom into feelings. Those feelings then ultimately direct my actions. This realization made me aware of the negative thoughts I was allowing to grow, and well that is where "A Borderline's Garden" originated from. 
    Well, here we go, I am glad you are here to listen. Let me know what you think & please comment if you are inspired to share your thoughts with this Ol' gardener.

It always starts out so small, a tiny seed that gets planted in my grandiose garden of thoughts. The place where all thoughts are nurtured before blooming into actual real feelings & behaviors. My negative thoughts are the most durable of seeds. They also grow into the most stubborn of weeds. Each durable seed collected during childhood. Nurtured by every crisis event of my youth. Now as an adult, I can spot the full-grown mess of stubborn weeds. Monsters really, glaring at me from time to time. Taunting me with their incessant noises, consistently spewing reminders of my past failures and only encouraging my insecurities to blossom. Even though I can identify the root of my problems now, I’m often feel too vulnerable or too emotionally immature to handle the task, the job of removing the stubborn weeds that had been planted before I became aware of the delicate state of my overgrown thought garden.

I drifted off to sleep after working on this post. I’ve been working on this one post over the last few months. For whatever reason, this work let my pre-slumber positive mindset fall directly into a nightmare. I woke quickly around 4am, clammy, bothered & unable to fall back to sleep. This nightmare made me question a lot of things about myself. I laid there in silence, heart & mind racing, eyes unable to focus, mouth dry, covered by the cool darkness, my mind tossing about several conflicting thought seeds. Normally, I would have started crying and rolled over to ask my husband to provide some sort of comfort for me. This morning though, my reaction was a little different, I was able to calm myself without his help just by eliminating the terrible thoughts and focusing on the actual situation.

First, I began to question the origin of each feeling. I knew that everything I was feeling had just sprouted up from this bad dream. Could these thoughts have originated from my subconscious or were they from some darker place within my vast thought garden, a place I tend to visit too often, that place called paranoia? I knew I could test the validity of each thought. What are the test standards? – If it lowers my frequency or lessens my energy, the seed should not be planted. If it leads to truth and love, the seed can remain in my garden. I knew that a few specific bad seeds had already been planted, based solely on the developing insecurities the nightmare had encouraged. My insecurities are not founded in reality, rather based solely on my feelings. I can be in a loving relationship and still feel unloved and undesirable. I compare myself to other females nearly every day. If I am not as physically strong as them, then I feel weak. If I am not as pretty as them, then I feel disgusting. There is no middle ground for the mind of a borderline. It either is or isn’t. This black and white thinking is destructive and leaves very little room for grace. The battle of sticking to the truths of who I am remains most of where my struggles lie, and why this is such a serious disorder. Nothing is certain, and when everything is based on how I feel my entire concept of reality shifts from moment to moment. I should have thrown those seeds out long ago, but I didn’t know what I was doing. A novice thought gardener back then, those negative seeds grew into stubborn weeds, nothing good.

How could these small little thought seeds grow into such enormous monsters? They do at times confuse and scare me, but I don’t want them completely taking over my thought garden. The bad seeds feed on my fear like it’s some type of miracle grow. This fertilizer or “insecurity shit” it transforms the smallest of negative thoughts into these full-blown nightmares, only the type experienced in real life.

Photo by Meruyert Gonullu on Pexels.com OL^HBD

I know I’ve not been the best kind of thought gardener; I just toss out every kind of seed without identifying whether I want it planted in my garden or not. I am guilty of thinking too much! My thought garden now vast & just like in real gardens, there is a ton of work to do. The weeds (my negative thoughts) show up in my garden randomly and frequently. They require no help to go from destructive thoughts to insecure feelings, they just suddenly appear and then I suddenly feel “less than”. The moment I notice these monsters in my garden, they begin extracting unusual powers from my insecurities, As the weeds settle in and begin to establish roots, they also simultaneously begin to construct catastrophic stories that my negative thoughts affirm will be my future reality. This experience must happen for all bad thought gardeners… Giving into the weeds, because we didn’t know how to nurture the proper seeds.

I’ve been trying a peculiar method these days. Be the gardener with a green thumb, protect and nurture the good seeds the ones you are responsible for and throw the rest away. Armed now with the knowledge that you must only tend to the garden you decide to plant, have planted, and will plant. Be a wise gardener. Identify your seed, provide an environment where it will grow best, be aware of what you have already planted so you learn what you should plant each season. * Tip: If good things can’t grow in your environment, change what you can control of that environment.

This will not be some quick and easy fix for managing “The Borderline’s Garden” and each may still get caught up in the weeds. I know this fact personally, as I still have terribly low days, like the one I experienced just a few days ago… but being armed with this truth helps me dig my way back up towards the sunshine. I welcome the warmth of the sunshine and the embrace it brings to my soul.

For the individuals that live with BPD, we know the intensity of sorting through our numerous thoughts. Our minds busy generating various types of thought seeds all day! Our mind’s motivation for this overproduction of thoughts is our never-ending desire to satisfy our constant yearning of one thing, to “feel” loved. The mind offering only the familiar sad justifications, listing reasons why you will never be good enough & that you should never believe that anyone will stay. The stubborn weeds you have left unmanaged for so long, now great at reminding your psyche that everyone eventually abandons you. Remove those monsters, they will never produce anything good.

Listening to the utterances of these monsters repeatedly, leads to a certain type of thinking, “I am not good enough, I’m not fun enough, I’m not witty enough to maintain the attention I crave from anyone anymore… if I don’t have this desired attention, then I do not have love. If I do not have love then I will be left alone. Unloved & abandoned, two of my greatest fears married together to successfully tackle one objective… Destroy any & all joy.

The truth is each person ultimately gets to decide what will grow best in their grandiose gardens. You can either ignore the weeds until they take over or you can address each thought seed upon arrival, be diligent in protecting your precious garden of thoughts.

Announcements!!!! (Next Episode Info!)

All I have been seeking lately is some reassurance that I am enough.

Someone without knowledge of how BPD affects the individuals that battle it, would never know the seriousness of this disorder. They wouldn’t know the seriousness of mine, unless of course I bring them into my inner circle. There aren’t many people there, and I am probably overreaching by referring to it as a circle. I don’t even have enough people in it to make a circle, it’s my inner semi-circle. I mask it well, my loneliness. My deeply planted insecurities are pretty well hidden from the outside world. I know that I have the ability to hide it when I need to, but moments like last night make it impossible for me to keep those ugly monsters completely locked away. So instead of locking them up inside my thought garden, I have decided to do the hard job of cleaning up the mess of overgrown weeds and getting back to tending to my more positive thoughts. Tending to my thought garden.

I finished this blogpost and discovered a little bit more. The nightmare was sent to apparently convey a message. After thinking about the dream all day, realizing that I was constantly worried about being abandoned that I was on my way to securing that as my future. It was as if while sleeping I had been visited by the “Ghost of Christmas Future.” He drew the connections to the time I had lost my faith in love during my youth & what I had been seeking to replace that lost faith, maybe I was seeking a lust for romance and adoration. Understanding that connection led me to more questions… If God is love, had I lost my faith in God? Have I been actively rejecting love, choosing only to survive? Choosing list and romance and adoration over love. I know now that if I want to live, and not just remain in survival mode, I must learn to love myself & others, showing each and every individual grace, acceptance and understanding. By rejecting love to self, I had been earnestly working towards securing a future of loneliness. It is a reassuring thought that we are never alone, and I pray that no one is ever without love! God Bless!

For more information or useful strategies, listen to my previous podcast episodes or check out other blogs by individuals with BPD that understand it is a constant struggle, and wake up each day ready to continue the fight… Maybe you could even start writing your own blog.

After wrestling around with all the thoughts that it took for me to produce this piece, the Bible verse that came to me was (plfff!) 1 Corinthians 13:6. The actual verse that talks about love starts on 13:4

Love is patient. Love is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast. It is not proud. It does not dishonor others. It is not self-seeking. It is not easily angered. It keeps no record of wrongs…

Take a break you deserve it!
* Next episode I am hoping to have Sarah back on with me. We briefly discussed what we would like our chat to be about and I just love collaborating with her. Please check back next month for Season 2: Episode 8.