"very severe" social phobia vs. avoidant personality

What exactly is the difference between these two? I'm confused because it doesn't seem like my doctor asked all that many questions he just said to take clonazepam for the anxiety. Anybody know?

Ps- thanks to everyone who supported me while I was trying to reveal my problems to my doctor!

I'm not really aware of the difference between the two disorders. have you tried googling them both, or checking the descriptions on this site? The treatments for both may be similar, but I don't know.

I hope you doctor is helping you work through avoidant behaviour, and not just expecting the medication to be a cure-all and away you go. I always thought that medication alone doesn't work as well as medication + therapy (and vice versa).

I've been wondering about that ever since I learned about AvPD and I've tried to find out. Between the sources I've read, there seems to be no consensus on whether or not the two are even different. But Wikipedia says so:

Research suggests that people with avoidant personality disorder, in common with social phobics, excessively monitor their own internal reactions when they are involved in social interaction. However, unlike social phobics they also excessively monitor the reactions of the people with whom they are interacting.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avoidant_personality_disorder#Link_with_other_mental_disorders

So, apparently, the monitoring of others is what makes AvPD unique. I'm not even sure I have AvPD then, because I'm not aware of paying close attention to the reactions of others. I'm monitoring myself all the time, that much I've noticed. It seems like a minor distinction to me, so I think severe general Social Phobia and AvPD are practically the same.

Hmm, I think I definitely not only keep myself on guard but also watch for the response of other people. Hence my not talking at all... who knows though. I think y'all are right, the line between very severe social phobia and avoidant personality isn't really all that big. So I'll just keep posting here

ciaolavida wrote:What exactly is the difference between these two? -- referring to social phobia versus avoidant disorder

One site I read distinguished them as follows. AvPD people fear intimacy, not necessarily particular social circumstances. AvPDs have a lack of close relationships. Social phobics do not necessarily avoid close relationships. Their fear is of certain social circumstances (such as public speaking or attending large parties) because they have low confidence in their social skills. Social phobics avoid those particular circumstances that they fear.

Here's a link where I see someone else replied to such a question elsewhere:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.supp ... ffcdfa2f74

In that case, I have both. I don't have friends, I don't have relationships. And people in general just scare me to death. Oh well.

I think the 2 can be related quite closely. You (and all of us here) don't have many friends or relationships because we're scared of people getting close to us then getting rejected by them, then in turn, we're scared of people and social situations because we don't have friends to build up our social skills. Vicious circle unfortunately...

I've also seen day-dreaming and fantasizing recorded as a very common thing for AvPD people, while I haven't seen much mention of it in context with SAD.

Just off-topic slightly, I don't have many problems with speaking to groups of people at work, if it's about work, EG I am training a group of people. But as soon as the training finishes, I am out of there to avoid talking socially to other people.

Daydreaming is a part of AvPD?? That explains so much. I am such a daydreamer/fantasizer. I can have a crush on a guy, and while I'll never talk about him or to him, plan our entire beautiful life together.

Hehe, yep, I do the exact same thing if I there's a girl I have a crush on for instance, I never even thought it could be related until someone bought it up in a thread recently.

http://psychforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=9496

I have also seen it mentioned on a webpage that discussed all aspects of AvPD, although unfortunately I can't find the link any more