HAPPY BPD MONTH: Recovering From Invalidation

HAPPY BPD MONTH: Recovering From Invalidation

What happens when the person who’s meant to validate you leaves you feeling completely unseen? This mini episode of Bold Beautiful Borderline takes that gut-punch of invalidation and turns it into a practical DBT roadmap. Host and clinician Sara Amundson walks through the DBT skill of “recovering from invalidation” using a recent rupture with her own long-term therapist.

She doesn’t share the exact comment, but she’s blunt about the impact: she hung up mid-session, refused to log back in, and then had to deal with follow-up safety checks from both her therapist and psychiatrist. For anyone who’s ever thought, “I’m too much” after reacting strongly, this will feel very familiar. Sara breaks the skill into clear, honest steps.

You’ll hear her talk through checking the facts (“the fact is that to them, my mental health is the number one most important thing”), challenging harsh self-talk, recognising that past trauma with her ex-wife made the invalidation sting even more, and leaning hard on self-compassion tools like journalling, crying, and sensory-based skills such as ice and grounding exercises.

She also normalises setting boundaries in the moment – like ending the call – while later respecting her own behaviour: she believes leaving the session may have been the safest choice she had. From there, she moves into self-validation, reminding herself, “We’re not overreacting. We’re not too sensitive. We’re not broken,” and finishes with her least favourite DBT move: radical acceptance.

That includes accepting that her clinician was likely doing her best and that repair might still be possible, just not immediately. This short, raw, slightly sweary episode speaks directly to people with BPD, anyone recovering from chronic invalidation, and loved ones trying to understand it. If you’ve ever wanted to cut someone off forever after feeling dismissed, this might help you pause and ask: is there another way through?