My AuDHD Was Misdiagnosed as a Personality Disorder

Why this so often happens to people who are already marginalized

Photo by Taylor Deas-Melesh on Unsplash

In January of 2010, I was labelled “Borderline”.

After two years of battling serious health issues, I had finally received a diagnosis of Celiac disease. This was good news. After many specialist appointments, we finally had an answer, and the treatment was strict adherence to a gluten-free diet. Maybe not super easy at first, but certainly not the worst of the possibilities we had been exploring.

Once I was no longer able to focus all my attention and mental energy on various medical appointments and diagnostic tests, the anxiety and emotional weight of the previous two years finally came crashing down on me. How ironic: my physical health was finally improving while my mental health began its steep decline.

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The previous two years had been horrible.

I had to stop attending my University courses because I was too unwell. I was forced to demote myself at work because I couldn’t keep up with the demand. I had my driver’s license suspended for one year due to the seizures, removing some degree of freedom I had enjoyed for a short time. I had purchased my first car in 2007, only to put it up on proverbial blocks in 2008.

I had been too sick, and was spending too much time in doctors’ offices, to process all of this while it was happening. When I finally stopped moving forward, the pain caught up with me. I became severely depressed, spending entire days in bed. I often wouldn’t get up until my (newlywed) husband arrived home from work, and many times that was simply to move to the couch with a glass of wine in hand.

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It gets worse before it gets better.