BPD Signs and Symptoms

 

When I was 13, and displaying symptoms that would currently be labled as "BPD," I had no idea that my first years of life had created behaviors and signs that others could spot in me.  I didn't know that the way I reacted to the adventist principal was behavior that could be seen by others as different, as me doing things that less or non-sexualized children didn't do or say.  I had no awareness of how my inner world was making my outer physical self do things that let predators know exactly what they could get away with doing to me.  Adult predators will say, publicly, to this very day, that a sexualized child "knows exactly what they are doing."  No.  They do not.  A sexualized child is unaware of outward signs they exhibit.  Let me try to elaborate.  (Yes, this means I'm going to "ramble," "zig-zag," appear to go "off-topic," etc.  Don't like that I do this?  Don't read this.)

When my dog wants to go outside, his ears perk up, and he goes to stand beneath the hook where his leash is hanging.  He has no idea that there are other dogs who will ask to go outside by sitting in front of, or pawing at, a door.  He has no idea some dogs simply slip through a rubber or plastic flap in a "doggie door" made for just that purpose.  My dog has been conditioned to go out on a leash.  That's where his awareness ends.

Children learn what they are taught, and are unaware that there is anything different going on elsewhere in the world. Over time, the human mind is usually capable of discovering there are as many differing ways to experience and react to life, as their are people living it. Those discoveries only come with time. Lots of time. Hearing others tell stories, watching other families interact, visiting other neighborhoods, regions, countries, reading books and watching TV shows or movies, entering classrooms and interacting with peers, studying subjects that open up their minds to experiences outside of their own. It takes decades of living to fully begin to understand all of the ways humans are behaving. Children have no idea why they are doing anything. A shoeless 12 yr-old, laying on their belly lifting their feet up and crossing them, reading a book on the floor or on their bed, or looking at a rock or a bug in the grass, has no way of knowing that there are grown ass men who find that common childhood pose to be a turn-on, and when a child is displaying such behavior, there are men who say, publicly, "Look at the way she is laying there, she knows exactly what she is doing, she is just asking for it." That child knows nothing. That grown ass man knows he can say such a thing, and other adults may choose to place a sexualized adult filter in front of that child, tinting a normal childhood behavior with intentions that child will not know anything about until they are much older. Even a sexualized child will not understand why certain adults respond sexually to that common child pose. They may know it makes an uncle or a neighbor or a teacher happy when they are displaying this childhood behavior, but that child does not at all understand any of the sick things going on in adult predators' minds. They are just doing things the way adults around them are conditioning them to do. That same child may rinse out their cereal bowl and place it in a dishwasher every morning. This child has no way of knowing other children might leave the bowl on a coffee table, or set the bowl in a sink without rinsing out the soggy flakes, or not use a bowl at all for the kinds of foods other children see as normal food to ingest as the sun comes up. Children do what they do because of conditioning. Understanding, intentions, a grasp of bigger concepts, all of that is not part of childhood. Those concepts only come with time, age, expanding experiences. 

The sda principal saw the way I moved, the responses I gave when he had me sit next to him, the way I was unable to easily engage with my peers. Combine that with my bitten fingernails, and that teacher knew exactly what he could get away with doing to me. (Yes, I know damn well bitten nails are not exclusive to those experiencing childhood sexual exploitation. But when combined with other signs of sexualized conditioning, those gnawed nails are a glaring red flag.)

A child gains no wisdom the day their first wisdom tooth erupts. A child gains no knowledge the day they measure above 5 feet tall. Menstruation, new hair growth, changing physical development, nowhere in any of this is a single ounce of wisdom or understanding being added to a child's mind. Adults around them are the ones that child first starts to gain knowledge and understanding from, and a sexualized child who keeps being drawn in and re-exploited by predators will never have a chance to gain the wisdom they truly need to escape that awful cycle, if no decent adults will step in and stop the cycle of sexual re-exploitation. Sexualized children tend to make decent adults uncomfortable. It seems to me it must be easier for such adults to say to themselves, "Hey, that child was just born acting promiscuous. Their choice to be that way. Not my problem." That is a form of blaming the victim, and it means sexualized children like I was, almost never receive help.  

Five of Marc Maron's victims who have been used by him since the fall of 2020, speak of having BPD, behave with obvious signs of sexualized conditioning and trauma, and have those godawful gnawed nails that immediately grip my heart in a painful vise. I know what these broken girls are going thru. I can't silently know this shit anymore.  

Unless, until, those like me who know what is really happening start to speak up and defend these young broken humans, afab children will continue being sexualized from toddler-hood on, and misused by predators who will be marketed to them as safe and will publicly misuse them with no repercussions. These children will self-harm and kill themselves in greater and greater numbers each year, because they are as imprisoned by their surroundings as the afab children who are forced to cover themselves head to foot in other countries, where blame and agency is being horrendously mislaced onto them.