Does diagnosis help?

I'm presently undergoing diagnosis. I'm sort of a self diagnosed BPD at the moment I suppose.

The past couple of months have been the most significant in all my 62 years in the area of me dealing with my issues and not going off into destructive rage. I try to rationalise exactly why. I overthink everything. There is a therapeutic 'saying' that I've always liked. It seems to me that the deep hole is BPD and seeing this has made a difference that years of therapy haven't. It's early days of course.

Here it is. Some of you may be familiar with it but I thought I'd share in case you aren't:

“I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I fall in.
I am lost... I am helpless.
It isn't my fault.
It takes forever to find a way out.

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don't see it.
I fall in again.
I can't believe I am in the same place.
But, it isn't my fault.
It still takes me a long time to get out.

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it is there.
I still fall in. It's a habit.
My eyes are open.
I know where I am.
It is my fault. I get out immediately.

walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.

I walk down another street.”

Hi,
When you ask if diagnosis helps, I for myself am unsure, in one way yes, in the other no, for me...
Having diagnosis helped me to start searching for informations about why I act the way I do and I discovered alot of very interesting stuff to understand my behaviour. Understanding why I behave in a specific way gives me better opportunities to act in a preventing manner ( e.g. self harm).
On the other side, I discovered how much of my behaviour has its roots in my disorder, letting me sometimes with the feeling that I am my disorder, like I am borderline not like I have borderline. This sometimes triggers the thinking that there is no real self in me, making me feel completly worthless.
I would love to hear anybodies opinion on that and how they deal with it.
It is always a struggle between a soul that has a disease and having no soul just disorderd brain functioning, just ****.

That sounds to me like making meaning out of life, and as such is a part of life with or without BPD.

BPD is a man made classification. It is used to aid putting people into boxes for treatment. No 2 BPDers are the same and you are just you. As a human being you are different, just as some are disabled or different in many other ways.

I can't help you with finding meaning in your life but I do know that regardless of BPD it can be done. What is good for you? What do you find therapeutic? Pursue it.

a (correct) diagnosis is helpful if for no other reason than knowing the appropriate treatment options. and for some it's very validating, to understand where your feelings and behaviours are coming from. it can also provide a sense of community if you know others struggling with the same disorder(s). support groups are really great for that.

I agree with @TwinkleStar. Before my diagnosis I was extremely confused about why I was feeling and behaving the way I was. This is turn created the rapid cycle of disruptive behaviour and put me in a hole that I fell back into as I was almost getting out.

In truth, the diagnosis upset me greatly because I knew nothing about it at the time and had a doctor say 'Borderline Personality Disorder' to me and I thought to myself, 'I must be flawed in the way I behave'. The connotations from the name of the illness I found upsetting.

BUT

By knowing what I had I was able to explore treatment options. I participated in a group therapy called STEPPS with about 12 other people. The therapy allowed everyone to see how the illness affects people differently and that was key for me because all the criteria for it I didn't feel related all that much to me and when I read up about it online I just could not accept that I had an illness with symptoms and characteristics that just weren't me. I think the group therapy gave me the opportunity to accept.

It gave me access to DBT and resources to help me understand wtf was going on with me, so yes, in my case, a diagnosis helped.