Love, Rewritten

For as long as I can remember, love has felt like a fire alarm I couldn't shut off—loud, chaotic, urgent. That’s what Borderline Personality Disorder does to your sense of love. It turns every heartbeat into a question mark, every silence into a threat. I used to think love meant intensity. I thought it was supposed to hurt a little, to feel like obsession, to always be on the edge of either complete devotion or total destruction. The highs were euphoric, the lows were unbearable. I confused anxiety for passion. I mistook inconsistency for chemistry. And I thought needing someone to the point of losing myself was the same as being in love.

Enter Eric.

Our relationship doesn’t feel like a rollercoaster. It feels like standing still on solid ground. And for someone like me, that’s been terrifying. Because when your emotional baseline has been turbulence, calm can feel suspicious. Peace can feel like boredom. Stability can feel like abandonment in slow motion.

But Eric shows up. Not just when it's convenient or when I’m easy to love—but when I’m spiraling, when I’m shutting down, when I say things I don’t mean just to see if he’ll leave. He doesn’t. He stays. And not in a way that makes me feel trapped, but in a way that makes me feel seen. Safe.

I won’t lie—my BPD doesn’t magically vanish in his presence. I still question. I still get scared that love this steady will disappear the second I trust it. But I’m learning. With Eric, I’m learning that love isn’t supposed to burn. It’s supposed to hold.

I used to believe love had to be proven over and over again. That if someone wasn’t showing they loved me in dramatic ways, they didn’t mean it. But now, I’m noticing the quieter things. The way he texts to make sure I ate. The way he reaches for my hand in silence. The way he listens—not to fix me, but to understand.

This relationship is asking me to rewrite everything I thought I knew about love. It’s challenging the parts of me that believe I’m too much. It’s pushing back against the story that says I’m only worthy when I’m broken or apologizing. With Eric, I don’t feel like a burden. I feel like a person—messy, healing, lovable.

Loving with BPD is hard. It’s terrifying to trust, to soften, to stay. But I’m trying. We’re trying. And for the first time, I’m starting to believe that love isn’t something I have to fight for—it’s something I get to grow in.

One grounded, steady, beautifully boring day at a time.

- D