Borderline Personality Disorder — With each passing day as the mental health worsens the dreams wither.

Borderline Personality Disorder — With each passing day as the mental health worsens the dreams wither.

"Borderline Personality Disorder — With each passing day as the mental health worsens the dreams wither."

(Oil on Canvas)

The splash or chaotic colours in the painting actually represent the chaos going on in a Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) patient’s brain. The intensity in the eyes and the teardrops show the pain. The body posture basically shows how a person with BPD at times tries to hide the dreadful emotions he/she is going through. The rose signifies the dreams withering away as the mental health worsens. With BPD, my experience was that some doctors refused to take me as their patient. I feel it is because of the concept that no matter how much hard work the doctors put into such a patient, the patient always collapses and goes back to point zero, and even if a doctor does take a BPD patient they don’t get well till it’s too late. So all those dreams that a normal person has, like to achieve something in life, have a set of goals, to be a better person, etc., all these almost seem impossible to achieve because the roller coaster of emotions don’t let us focus on anything healthy. There is so much going on in our heads in the sense of our emotions that it gets hard to try achieving something constructive in life. The writing on the body of the girl in this painting are some of the thoughts that go through the mind of a BPD person on a daily basis.
Zahra Qaiser
Artist

About the Artist

My name is Zahra Qaiser. I was diagnosed with BPD when I was 16. I am 24 at the moment. With me the thing was even though I was diagnosed early, no doctor knew how to approach my illness in an effective way. I for a long time felt like an experimental case for some doctors, while others straight up refused to take me as their patient. Then at 18 I was told that I needed DBT (dialectical behavioral therapy). DBT isn’t available in Pakistan so I had to travel abroad. With DBT I did improve to some extent but not completely. I am a student of medicine and in my last year now. The first four years with this illness felt like I could never live a life where I could be anything but this disorder. I couldn’t do well in my studies, my social life was a mess, I was paranoid, and so many other things were happening. But my DBT therapist encouraged me to show my emotions through art and poetry. I started doing that, which helped me a lot with expressing myself. Each time I felt like no one was getting me, I made a painting. I am still doing that. Painting and writing helps me channel my emotions in a way that is both constructive and gives other people an idea of what I am going through. 

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