Nessa Barrett: My Journey with Borderline Personality Disorder (FBF) [VIDEO]

Natha Barrett, welcome to Call Her Daddy.

So can you give us, like your elevator pitch, of like, who you are?

And I ended up getting like around like eight concussions. I had suffered from like pretty bad brain injuries and I had to completely stop sports like altogether. And I was like a pretty like athletic person growing up, and soccer was my life. Like when I would get punished, like my parents would like ground me from going to practice like it was, and I'd freak out. And so as soon as I stopped doing that, I had to find something else.

And I started posting on social media. And then I'm here. Here we are.

It was a really good feeling.

And then I, just my notifications were like, insane. I like, blew up, like during school, and everyone thought it was so cool at first. But then, when it got to a certain degree, it was like, I was like an outcast because of it. And I would like walk into class and like, they would take pictures of me from Google and make them like all of, like the home screens on, like the computer. And then teachers would, you know, use like, my name and like my salary as like anecdotes for like, math problems.

And like it was, Yeah, it was like a weird stuff. And like having, like freshmen, like kids like, come up to me and ask for pictures. It's like, it was a lot. And I just remember like, I hate school, I hated school. And the only way I was going to college was for soccer.

And when that was out of the picture, I was like, no, I'm going to college. And then, when this happened, it was like, I begged and cried to just be homeschooled.

But it, it was just really weird for me, because I, like the year before that, too, like I was like, I felt like I was already became an outcast in my school. And like, in high school, like I was new, I was a new kid, as a freshman, like no one's ever seen me before, I moved to a different town. And I left my previous school because I, you know, I felt like I didn't belong there. And I was kind of, like, you know, alone and like, outcast. And so I moved to a different high school.

And I was like, everyone, like loves, like the new kids, you know, at first. And then I, yeah, sophomore year is like, downhill.

And I would leave at 11, go right to the airport, fly to LA, and then come back Sunday or Monday, and then do school the rest of the week. And I couldn't stay locked in my house in New Jersey, not doing anything that I, you know, created already and started. And, and like school was just, you know, online anyway. So I bought a plane ticket when I was 17 at 1am. That was I had to leave for at 4am.

And my parents knew that I was going to run away. So they took all of my suitcases. And I packed everything up in, like, old school bags and my old soccer bags and like duffel bags that I had, and got an Uber and left.

And I'm thinking, Oh, I got away with it. I land on my connecting flight and I phone, blown up. Where am I all this stuff? Like they're tracking my flight. They know where I am.

Like cops are coming to get me, like they're not gonna. And I'm like, what the heck. So I'm just like, like playing like, I don't know. I was like trying to be like undercover, like at like the airport, like freaking out. My anxiety was so bad.

And yeah, I just hopped on the next flight. And I just kept going.

And so, like, I knew, like a few people there. And I had a place. And in my, my mindset at the time was like, anything other than being home is better for me. You know, it's like I would have done anything to get out of that situation.

So you were dating Josh Richards, who is also a TikTok star. What was your relationship like?

For like, it was too serious for how young we were. And I mean, like, he was a part of sway at the time, too. And I mean, like those boys, like they were blowing up. Like that was like their prime when we started dating. So it, you know, like, them, being like 17,, 18, you know, blowing up living in LA, like in a house of their own, was like a frat house of like social media.

And, um, you know, it's hard to, you know, resist some things. And I wouldn't say that this is the truth. But how I felt at the time was that a lot of the good parts of our relationship was simply for views and content and that stuff. And it got like really hard for me to process, because I'm, you know, I fall for people like heavy and I get very attached. And so seeing things a certain way was kind of just like, I couldn't understand it.

I, it was just, yeah.

And like, it was, it was just not me. And then, over time, I, just like, kind of like, allowed myself to be like, that person that, like, everyone, could like, make fun of.

and that's when, like everyone's like, oh my god, like they started like falling for each other when they did Lottie Dye. and I'm like, no, you know, like that, it wasn't like, that's not like what happened. it was like after, like the song was already made and everything was already done. it was like after. but, yeah, we were struggling with in our relationships separately and there was a lot of tension in the house too, because, you know, certain people didn't really get along.

and Josh at the time, like before, we broke up. he was just so busy with work and I was like, heavily like starting my music career. and so there was just a point we decided to break up because I was struggling a lot mentally and I just realized that, like, hey, like, we started dating when we were really young and we're both just not the same people as when we started, and I just felt like we had a lot of different interests, you know, and it got to a point where sometimes you just realize that you're more comfortable than you know in love at the moment, I don't know. we broke up and then stuff just started happening and it wasn't like anything like sneaky really. I felt like I just let my heart kind of just like take control and I knew that it was like really bad timing and like not the best situation, and I just know how it looks and it should look that way because I didn't make a decision.

but like I don't regret anything and also to like, which I don't want to use any like it's it's. I don't want to sound like I'm like making up excuses for myself, but like with my, like mental health stuff and with BPD, there's a thing called favorite person and like. we can get into that like more in depth. but your brain basically like unwillingly attaches itself to someone and when that happens, like that's all you can think about and you'll do anything to make that person happy and they become your life and identity at that point and it turns romantic because it's so hard to identify the difference between that. you know, when you, when you're so in love with someone, it's like they become your favorite person, but with BPD it's like different.

and I think, because me and Jaden were spending so much time with each other, with music and all that stuff and we're really close friends and I, you know, wasn't with Josh anymore, and even when I was, it's like he was gone most of the time. we didn't really spend that much time together. my brain attached itself to Jaden in that way, and so that's when I was like I'd do anything at that moment to make it make it work. but then, you know, social media gone to play and then the whole drama started and it created it, something that it probably wasn't going to be like. we started dating like ah, like it became serious and an actual thing, like after everything broke out on the internet, because it we felt like we had to.

the night that everything kind of like broke out was the day that our performance we performed on Ellen. it was like a headline that like, oh, we announced that we're dating like we made it official and I was like what the heck I you know like I'm not gonna lie, like I was being like very selfish and I obviously felt a certain way, but I feel like everyone could say at certain points that, like what people say online is not gonna affect them. but, and even if you don't want it to and you don't let it subconsciously, it's gonna be in your head, you know, and it's gonna do something. and I'm just very thankful that I got to deal with that situation with someone by my side, because it, you know, I've dealt with a scandal similar to that and I was completely alone dealing with it. so it was different and I felt like a blessing and a curse to you know, go through it with Jaden, but it was really hard.

I just didn't want to really talk about the situation because I was one kind of embarrassed, but two also like very angry at the way that everything played out, and it was just something that, like, made me really upset, because at the time I just thought that I was doing something that would make me happy, but then I had the whole world, you know, calling me a slut and telling me that I'm a backstabbing bitch and like all this stuff, and I'm like a homie hopper and like a homewrecker and all this stuff, and it was just very frustrating to me because I was like there's so many aspects of the entire thing that no one knows about.

I think it.

and during our relationship too, like we both really struggled mentally and we also were kind of like because of how it started, I felt like we always felt like we were outcasted from, like everyone, you know, and it was just kind of like an us against the world type thing, and that got hard when we both were struggling so much personally, and there's just a lot of things that we, I felt like we both needed to work on before jumping into another relationship, which we did way too fast and it got really tricky and our mental health just got the both of us and it, you know, we just had a lot of growing to do and I felt like there was also the pressure of us, like all the drama, like we felt like we had to make it last. there is speculation that he.

and when I was 14, which was like I was yeah, I was a sophomore in high school I had it was shortly after I got my last concussion I spiraled and I guess the trauma that my brain had just exacerbated all of my mental health and everything just went terrible. I developed really bad ADHD and I couldn't go to school because I couldn't read like more than two sentences without vomiting. I had to go to, like ocular and vestibular therapy, to learn how to, like you know, run or like balance on one foot and like you know catch balls and like how to track my eyes, because they were. so it was like really bad and because of my ADHD, you know getting really bad because of my brain injury, I struggled a lot mentally and that's when I had my first actual suicide attempt and I was hospitalized for it. so it was like pretty rough.

did your family find you, or how did they find out?

yeah, I overdosed on a medication that I was prescribed to aid my concussion, you know, and like the pain that came with it and my migraines and all that stuff. and I was at my dad's house at the time and I think he was like making dinner and I was upstairs in my room and he kept calling me down for dinner and I guess I wasn't answering and I don't remember much. all I remember was going in the bathroom and I had like an old, like glass cup that was like empty in my room and I was just like. you know what like fuck it like. I'm gonna do it now.

I was very impulsive, very impulsive because of my ADHD, and I was so deeply depressed and I've always dealt with, like you know, having such intense and like deep, like feelings where I would just like I was so depressed and like I would like cry and I couldn't stop crying, I'd get like so mad and angry and like mean and I didn't know what was wrong with me. and when it got worse because of my concussions, like I felt like I was insane and that there was no getting better and I was done and I felt like I was a burden like to my family and you know I caused like so much pain because of how I was mentally, and so I went to bathroom and filled it up with sink water and I just, yeah, I overdosed. and I just remember, while it was like kicking and I sat down and I wrote everyone notes, and I think I just like passed out on the floor and my dad found me and just like carried my limp body and called 9-1-1. and I just remember he, like there was a hospital that was like so close to the house and I was like like in and out of, like consciousness and like I just remember his voice echoing. you know, I didn't really know what was going on.

and he was like on the phone with ambulance, like freaking out and like asking how fast that they could come and all this stuff. and he was like, you know, I'm just gonna drive, I'm just gonna put her in my car and just like drive to the nearest hospital. and they were like telling him not to do it. and so he was like trying to drive to meet them closer because they wouldn't come. and I just remember them like dragging me out of his car just to put me in the backseat.

and then I remember, vividly. remember, like my mom, like yelling at me while the ambulance doors was closing, while I'm on like the stretcher, and I just like woke up in the hospital. but I think the scariest and like most traumatizing thing for me was my little brother witnessing it and him, just like you know, crying, and I felt like I just like scarred him for life, almost seeing that, and him just being like sissy, okay, like what's wrong with sissy, like freaking out and yeah.

and then I thought that, like once I got better, I could go home and I was all I wanted was to go home. So did you end up having to go away? Yeah, they put me on a stretcher, I think like three days later, when a bed opened up out of place and I arrived at a psych ward. I was obviously in the pediatric, you know, because I was 14. so it was like you know kids around my age, and I was very shy and timid and scared and embarrassed, and I don't want to talk to anyone like.

I don't want to like open up to anyone like when they would have group. it's like no way I'm sharing like my story or like why I'm here, anything like that. and then I learned that there is a point system and you have to in order to get out, and I was on level one and you gotta be on level four to even get considered to leave. and yeah, and that was scary too, because my parents also placed me on phone protocol. so you don't have phones and phone protocol is when you can't even use the payphone to call anyone, you don't get calls, you can't.

so I was completely like isolated and alone, like in that spot, and it was. it was traumatizing. but then, as soon as I got comfortable in there and like started making friends, like it was, it was like fun. and then you start feeling like you know, I felt like I belonged. you know for the first time if you could like say something to that 14 year old girl now where you're at like, what would you say to yourself?

oh, my god, thank god she was in there because I mean I wouldn't be where I am now. um yeah, and I just, I just felt so like hopeless at that point, because I couldn't really see like a future after getting out of there.

so all I feel is sad and all I can ever feel is sadness and that there's no escaping it and it's like you. just it hurts like it. it's like you're. it's so painful mentally that it starts to physically hurt and you you can't really control anything. um, and that's why what I struggle the most, because it makes you act out in ways that you know, isn't you?

and you really have to learn how to become very self-aware in order to help yourself.

I got, you know, trauma from, you know people that weren't just like in my family, like when it came to, like boys and like I feel like almost every girl now deals with, like sexual trauma, because people fucking suck, um. but I just went through a lot of fucking shit, um that I don't know. if I'm I'll ever be like comfortable opening up about it, um.

because, like right now, I'm trying to, especially in therapy. I'm trying to learn how to detach myself from it and learn that it doesn't really you know me, it's not a part of me and it doesn't make me who I am. um, and I'm also trying to learn how to forgive, so um yeah.

I just have a problem, and you know my team suggests it all the time, and even like my friends, and I know it's best for me. but I feel like sometimes I'll freak out more if I don't know what's being said about me. so it's just. it's a hard thing. In June of this year, you lost your.

you know, I feel like I don't really um, I don't really have like close family. I'm not that close with my family and I I'm just like alone out here and like all I really had was Cooper, and he was like a brother to me and my um, my best friend ever, like a twin flame, like I believe that you have like multiple soulmates in your life and I feel like he was like my platonic soulmate, like 100% like me. um, as you know, a boy and um, I never had anyone understand me the way that he did. so this kid struggled, you know, just as much as I did, maybe even more, and I knew that, and I felt like, as long as I knew him, it was an ongoing battle to keep him here, um, and to make sure that he was safe. and, uh, drug addiction is just something that's so scary.

um, you know, I felt like everyone just did as much as they could, but I never thought that this day would, um, that day would ever come. and I was, you know, it just sucked, because I just like, remember, like waking up, like from a text from him that day, and um, I didn't want to believe it, like I couldn't. I, I, I lost myself like I it. I lost myself, um, completely like I. I was destroyed, um, because there was never a thought in my brain that I would ever have to live a single day without him.

you know, I never thought that there would be a day where I didn't even text him. you know or not see him, um. and up until that point too, like we were spending every day with each other, like so um. and then I think, like you know, it just got really hard and it was just like very big, like tragic thing for everyone, very unexpected. I think, you know, we all knew he was struggling a lot more than before, but I didn't ever think that he would, you know, leave, I really, I told anyone this, um.

but like we openly talked about, you know how much we struggled here on this earth, in our mental health, so much you know, we both like when we were, you know, suicidal or, you know, struggled with anything like that. it was like each other, that, like we would like, you know, have to like, make us like, feel, like we need to be here, and we were like this. and so it's like if one of us was going out, like we were going out together. that's just like.

that's how it was in my head, and so when he was gone, I don't know how I could like live. um, it's very hard.

um, grieving is such a crazy thing, and I, you know I dealt with the, you know, losing people in my life, but never the closest or the only person that I had. um, and it's just something that you can't really fathom until you're in it. and I didn't know what I was doing, and I was struggling so much already, because I just went through like a breakup, and so it was just like it was really weird for me. it felt like my entire life, just like flipped upside down, and I was just like I was just like falling apart. um, and I just was.

I was grieving and trying to deal with all my emotions, um alone, because that's the only way I knew how to, and I didn't really want to talk about it with anyone, because it made it more real to me. um, and it was just like really hard for me to like just open up about. so I was dealing with it alone and same time too, like my best friend Sabrina, I was just trying to be strong for her and strong for you, know his family and, like everyone, that I was just dealing with everything by myself and it ate me alive, and that's why, yeah, I ended up getting admitted, actually into mental hospital, and the first one since I've um.

been in like since, like when I was 14. so it's pretty scary. Did you go into the treatment center because of everything? and that happened with Cooper? Yeah, um, I, um, I just broke and lost control fully, um, and um, I had, um, a suicide attempt.

I was taking Xanax for my anxiety and to like, lie and all that stuff. so I was on that. and um, when you take an excessive amount of that which I never had before, um, it, it just like turns you into someone that you're not. and uh, I just I, I just like, went into my car, I think, and um, I don't remember anything, but from what I was told, I was planning on driving off of a cliff while I overdosed. and um, I think, as soon as I started backing out, Bri and Sabrina, just like, pulled up, like like right by my car, and they got me to get out and all that stuff.

and uh, and yeah, like the next day, I, uh, just like, I think, opened up and was like, kind of like vulnerable and honest for the first time. and I, just like, cried and I was like, I'm so scared. and um, we just called the ambulance and um, I got help. And thank God you're here.

there's no way that, like, I'm just not gone yet. so I, you know, I have to do something and I just also realized that, like, I just have such strong sympathy for everyone that struggles mentally and goes through hard times that, like, I don't want to leave at all because I want to be here in order to, like make an impact for those struggling. and I feel like, um, I still have just like so much to do and I don't want to live for Cooper and um, you know, I just see life so differently now and I feel like now and the first time in forever I've been open to like taking getting help seriously and in I've just like gone through waves where I, you know, I hit rock bottom and then I get help and then as soon as I start feeling good again, like I stop because I think I'm fine. um, but it's like not true. and I just realized it's all about like maintenance and like they'll keep and not like.

I just have to continue going. and so yeah, and I've also been like so anti-med, that like now I'm like on a mood stabilizer which is like I feel like it's working. that's like another thing.

and now, like you know, it's just like, really weird and I like, wrote die first, um, about there's such such a special song for me. and at the time it was like about. um, my mom and Cooper, um, but I never out like, like I never like, publicly said that it was about Cooper because I didn't want to think about it, but the people closest around me knew.

um me as like Nessa. you know, like from Nessa and it I, I don't know. I'm just like I get so overwhelmed with the amount of love and support. but also it's like I. it's like I couldn't really care less if, like you know, one person listens to my song, or like one million, you know.

so it's like as long as like there's one person out there that relates, um, but it's just so in unreal to think about. and I'm just like really excited because it's like my dream. you know, I can't thank.