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Do you know why?

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Do you know why?

Postby nprkntlny » Wed Dec 10, 2014 1:43 am

Do you know why you are schizoid? What precisely triggered it? (i.e. trauma, sensitivity, environmental influence, media, etc.).

Me: I'm almost certain it was due to pervasive, severe depression and dysphoria from childhood, ages 5-20 at least, though I believe the groundwork was set by age 12.
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Re: Do you know why?

Postby Comp_Lex » Wed Dec 10, 2014 2:10 am

nprkntlny wrote:Do you know why you are schizoid? What precisely triggered it? (i.e. trauma, sensitivity, environmental influence, media, etc.).

Me: I'm almost certain it was due to pervasive, severe depression and dysphoria from childhood, ages 5-20 at least, though I believe the groundwork was set by age 12.

For me it is the same. The "trauma, sensitivity, etc." thing is also correct. I have been raised in an environment that was consciously or subconsciously hostile towards me. So I had uncaring- and strict "you should always work and have no fun" parents, I was the loser of my school, the loser of my sportsclub, etc. That is how everyone saw me and they also acted on that idea of me. I guess I always have been different, even as a small child.
I believe my parents triggered my disorder and the "People in majorities tend to assume that their own psychology is normative and to equate difference with inferiority" thing amplified the symptoms.
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Re: Do you know why?

Postby Acinorev » Wed Dec 10, 2014 2:40 am

Not really, no. But I do know my parents are angry and volatile people. I would not approach them for pretty much anything if they were acting or being certain way. (I also know my own anger is pretty high and I have always had a bad temper.) There was a lot of yelling and anger growing up.

I also know that from a young age I would specifically act different ways in different company so as to fit in properly, and none of those things were representations of myself when I was alone. I could only do this by not having innate emotional reactions. I would often quell emotions that would immediately surface so that I could act appropriately. I would be fine to play by myself often enough. I think I lagged behind peers in school socially, although I did have friends I suppose.

I think my innate emotional reactions, if I'm going to have them, are often too strong for me control my reactions appropriately. Also angry unapproachable parents.
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Re: Do you know why?

Postby roscid » Wed Dec 10, 2014 8:04 am

"Know" is a strong word, but I have suspicions.

  1. Compensation for a fundamentally sensitive psychology. In order to avoid feeling frequent emotional pain (and the subsequent embarrassment for outbursts), I learned to distance myself from my emotions. This response eventually became automatic.

  2. A history of having my feelings invalidated or ignored. Expressions of sincere emotion were met with ridicule or dismissal, so I stopped sharing them.

  3. General feelings of estrangement. When trying to connect with others, I get the feeling that we operate on different frequencies. Being unable to relate my experience of the world in common terms puts a huge barrier between myself and others, exasperating my already solitary nature.
So, pretty standard psychoanalytic stuff.
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Re: Do you know why?

Postby Dezzi » Wed Dec 10, 2014 8:57 am

I suspect several factors also:

- absent father & depressed, overstrained mother during childhood who felt left alone by my father and was very overprotective of me, yet preoccupied with herself and her loneliness. I suppose I was very sensitive, but she didn't have the capacity to notice this due to her emotional overload.

- after their divorce, verbally abusive stepfather & even more depressed mother, crying all the time. I suppose there wasn't much room for my emotions to fit in between his aggressiveness and her depression. Plus, I wasn't the kind to share much in the first place.

- own depression when I was around 13. That's when I consciously noticed, that I'm a little different and that I am not very interested in my peers, as well as their topics of conversation. But I still looked like a child, so adults wouldn't talk to me about their topics. I started to withdraw then. And with time I lost focus/recognition of my own emotions (though in retrospect I don't think I felt them like others did in the first place) and became detached from others.
I sometimes wonder what is worse: the triviality of human interaction or the fact that no one notices.
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Re: Do you know why?

Postby ZonedOut » Wed Dec 10, 2014 10:08 am

A wide range of both constitutional and environmental factors have likely resulted in me being schizoid today, but I think the most noteworthy aspect responsible for the ultimate development of my schizoid defense is...
Dezzi wrote:(...) overstrained mother during childhood who felt left alone (...) and was very overprotective of me, yet preoccupied with herself and her loneliness. I suppose I was very sensitive, but she didn't have the capacity to notice this due to her emotional overload.

...this, resulting in being trapped in a continuous cycle of alternating intrusion and abandonment up to today. My mother has no single notion of the existence of interpersonal boundaries. Since I was born, she parasitizes on me (in an attempt to fill her unfillable void) by clinging heavily to me and by carelessly intruding my personal space without any regard of my personal well-being, followed by rejecting me and abandoning me when I turn out again not to be able to meet her unrealistic emotional needs. I think this alternating pattern of idealization and devaluation resulted in an early arrest in my development of an adequate sense of self and in the belief that relationships are threatening to my existence. I think the relationship with my mother is one of the most important things that ultimately drove me schizoid.
Dx - Schizoid Personality Disorder // Attention Deficit Disorder
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Re: Do you know why?

Postby Lucinda » Wed Dec 10, 2014 7:24 pm

Started at 8yrs of age for me.
At 15yrs i developed an eating disorder . After a couple of years I felt I was dying . I then made a conscious and overnight choice to live.
In a strange way, this experience caused me to reinvent myself. I became social; discovered I was attractive and could hold my alcohol.
Years later at a party I found a bed, crawled into it and wept for 12hrs much to everyone's concern. After that i didnt party or drink much and started retreating inwards again.

At this stage I only feel comfortable with ' off beat' people, with whom I can be as distant as i like with. I dont seek company but somehow life throws certain people my way.
I have given up work at my usual professional as I can no longer handle the role conflict or having to endure people I cannot relate to.

Why ?
I guess the answers lie in parents ,childhood trauma, environmental stress and a couple of delinquent genes. I am sure most of us here could write volumes regarding all that ...
''Life is not a task. There is absolutely nothing to attain except the realisation that there is absolutely nothing to attain.''
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Re: Do you know why?

Postby Ashlar » Wed Dec 10, 2014 8:37 pm

I don't know why.

My mother's family was odd. My grandfather on that side was at least a little mean at times, supposedly was a dick as a farmboy kid. He went military, married a shy girl when he got out. My grandmother was never very odd, worked hard as far as I know, was moderately intelligent given education at the time. She reads books and they were catholic. They kept seperate beds. It's possibly my grandfather had almost no friends socially. He had two pensions and he was really easy to talk into a "deal" like an insurance policy or warrantee that did nothing. He worked and kept busy around the house all days every day. He was a little aggressive and bossy at times, and my mother implies he was mean and abusive but I'm still not clear on what that actually meant. It could be anything from horrible to her just being pissed he was such a dickbag when she was a kid stoner. My aunt on that side is very invested in fake social status, so I never got along with her as a kid. The aunt married into a relatively well off family.

My father's family was very angry and rage-filled when my dad was growing up. There's a lot of violence and drugs from his generation. Lots of involvement with the sketchiest people. Lots of football #######4, my grandfather was a coach. My grandmother on that side was always very nice to me, we got along great. She tried to hide from him for months at a time on vacation, because he was so angry. My uncle on that side developed huge drug problems and a narcisistic complex. It's also interesting that my female cousin (closest in age to me, just a year or two younger) gets talked down to by my grandfather. I only learned that recently. It's just sexist #######4, but it's there. That family always exagerates their stories, I think.

My mother and father met in highschool. Two year age gap. Her parents disapproved. Sent her away to college. He followed. Pregnant at 20. Married during the pregnancy I think? Divorced when I was 11. I know I was scared of my dad a lot. He used anger and threats. I met a lot of drug dealers and junkies as a kid. I was never comfortable around them, always suspicious. I don't think I was ever super abused, but it was a $#%^ life.

I was obviously "weird" as soon as I was in kindergarten. I had no interest in other kids. I got in trouble all the time for being violent and not doing my work. I couldn't eat anything but "plain" foods. Bologna and hot dogs. Vanilla ice cream. Ketchup bothered me. Kinda normal, but it was odd enough that my teachers had specific issues with just me. I got kicked out of school. Had some kind of wednesday night classes for problem kids. I was the quiet one there. I violently rejected some girl named sarah. They thought I was mentally challenged.

First grade I learned how to read and write. I was highly proficient and fast at it. That reminds me that I'm still successful at writing even now. Anyway, teacher was nicer to me. Grades improved. Still got in trouble (always always got in trouble).

Second grade I get put in the "advanced" class. 146 or something IQ. Whatever that was worth. Family is running a pizza restaurant that collapses under some drama.

Not to go into my life story, but I know I was late to discover anything sexual relatively speaking. 8th grade at the earliest. I kinda put myself in a weird place where I had decided to reject all interest in sex years ago, so I held myself to that through high school and college in spite of opportunities and interest to the contrary.

My best guess is that it's partially hereditary (brother with schizophrenia, family on both sides has issues, history of suicide I think) and partially to do with my weird/#######5/crazy home life. I may have felt rejected by my mom. That's one of those theories that seems plausible. I never had affection for my mother like children do.
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Re: Do you know why?

Postby smirks » Wed Dec 10, 2014 11:42 pm

I don't know why...I can make some guesses.

I don't think I experienced attachment as an infant. From descriptions of my infancy, I apparently didn't cry if left on my own. I also don't ever remember a closeness with my mother. She has her own bag of mental issues though. I don't think she's a schiz. She's too emotional. Maybe an avoidant or a soc. anxiety. But there is no warmth there between us, and there is a possibility I was neglected. You know, or maybe there was no bonding to be had with me for innate reasons.

But there is a pretty pervasive pattern of not venturing forth and finding friends, from infancy. They would find me, but looking back there is little to no effort on my part, no inviting people over, much secrecy, little communication.
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Re: Do you know why?

Postby Alligator9 » Thu Dec 11, 2014 1:43 pm

I don't know, I never had a very close friendship with anyone not even my mother and my best friends were cats so I learned that you don't have to show emotions or make friends with others
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