I used to believe no one should get close to me.

Not because I didn’t want connection — I did. But because I thought I would keep hurting people and that they would keep hurting me.

If my emotional intensity hurt people, then withdrawing felt responsible. Ethical. And safe.

Toxic shame can convince you that you are the problem — not that something is happening to you.

DBT’s biosocial theory says emotional vulnerability has biological roots. Some nervous systems are simply more sensitive. Emotions hit harder. They last longer. Regulation is harder.

When I began researching what that biology might be, I found work suggesting that BPD may involve dysregulation of the endogenous opioid system — the system that helps regulate pain and attachment.

If baseline opioid tone is low, emotional pain isn’t just “big feelings.” It’s amplified.

Attachment doesn’t just feel important. It feels stabilizing.

Loss can feel like a life-or-death emergency.

When my nervous system stabilized with low-dose buprenorphine, I did not become a different person.

I became steady.

Connection felt possible and rejection felt survivable. I could leave something unhealthy without feeling like I would die from it.

I wasn’t a hazard.

I was dysregulated.

People with BPD are often labeled dramatic, manipulative, attention-seeking, medically expensive.

Up to 75% struggle with substance misuse — often trying to regulate unbearable internal states with whatever works.

Many standard psychiatric medications do not target the endogenous opioid system. That may be critical for relieving the intensity of these internal states.

Low-dose buprenorphine is not a first-line treatment. It is not well-studied for BPD. It will not work for everyone.

But ignoring biology while telling people to “try harder” is not enough.

You are not fundamentally broken.

Your behaviors make sense in the context of a dysregulated nervous system.

And dysregulation is treatable.