As someone with a personality disorder, I'm thankful you wrote this article. It really is a disability. I've been in therapy a few years and I'm working on healing, but when I have an episode, it's like some survival (more like anti-survival) instinct kicks in and overpowers me, like how OCD or panic attacks can overpower people with anxiety. I used to feel crippling shame because I thought I was "born evil" or "born broken." That shame didn't help me get better, it just made me suicidal. I finally started getting better when I viewed BPD as a disability I have, not who I am, and started therapy to learn how to live with it.

That's not to say it's not my responsibility. It is. It's not my fault I'm disabled, but it is my responsibility to heal for the sake of myself and those around me.

That being said, it is blatantly not true that we are not capable of love. I love the people in my life a lot. I have done bad things in my life (and I feel ashamed, believe me), but I did those things because I have an emotional disability that caused me excruciating emotional pain and didn't have healthy coping skills, not because I can't feel empathy or love. Excruciating pain + no coping skills = acting out, regardless of how much love one feels. I think more pwPDs would seek treatment if people knew this basic truth. Nobody is the sum of their disabilities, even emotional ones.

I could be wrong. Maybe there really are people out there who are incapable of love. But I've never met one.

Maybe this YT video will help others as it helped me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0LE2jug9D0&t=6

Thank you for taking the time to read my comment. Again, thank you for writing this article.