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by **Nick1992** » Thu Apr 10, 2008 6:48 pm

no

It could be AvPD. Doctors won't know too much about it, so you better find a good psychologist.

I understand a lot of what you are going through. The thoughts that people may attack you - I have had those. For me it came from being in school where people would bully me. It has taken many many years for that reflex to go away. I still get wary sometimes though. The low self worth, the panic in social situations, the relationship problems are all familiar to me.

I do not understand the thoughts about killing when you look at children or old people. I don't recall having anything like that.

by **trents** » Fri Apr 11, 2008 5:14 am

Hey, welcome. If your doctor is a general practitioner, he probably doesn't know much about AvPD. Mention it to your counsellor/therapist.

I can relate somewhat to some of the things you are talking about, apart from the homicidal thoughts (if I understand you correctly re: "unwanted thoughts about killing and other horrible things when I look at people"). That is probably something that you might want to consider telling your counsellor - it may be a symptom of something that can be treated... I dunno.

I have had times in my life when I feel especially sensitive to paranoid thoughts - even riding the bus, simple things, even when trying to sleep - feeling terrified that someone was going to kill me. I'd say for most of my life I've always felt like my life was going to be cut short somehow. Well, it hasn't, yet. For me, that is a symptom of PTSD, which I also suffer from, from being bullied as a kid and feeling unsafe as a child in my own home.

Did you experience any traumatic events growing up? Were you fearful as a child? These are things that will help your counsellor treat you.

I'm glad your faith has been a help to you.

by **Portilloizay** » Fri Apr 11, 2008 5:26 am

Use paragraphs too.

by **Peptron** » Fri Apr 11, 2008 11:12 am

Parador wrote:It could be AvPD. Doctors won't know too much about it, so you better find a good psychologist.

I understand a lot of what you are going through. The thoughts that people may attack you - I have had those. For me it came from being in school where people would bully me. It has taken many many years for that reflex to go away. I still get wary sometimes though. The low self worth, the panic in social situations, the relationship problems are all familiar to me.

I do not understand the thoughts about killing when you look at children or old people. I don't recall having anything like that.

The thoughts of killing when you look at children or old people or such agressive thoughts are part of schizotypal personality disorder. A lot of what mikey1988 said seems to point more to schizotypal than avoidant, for example the ideas of reference and the intrusive thoughts and the feeling of evil or being evil. Of course I cannot really judge with only this little information, but that would be interesting if mikey1988 checked into schizotypal PD. And it's also quite possible to be somewhere between StPD and AvPD.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schizotypa ... y_disorder

Eventually, the individual learns (unconsciously) to see people as harmful and the source of humiliation and ostracization. This leads to the development of "ideas of reference," in which the schizotypal individual believes that events are of special relevance to them or that benign events are somehow related to them (e.g., sees two people laughing and believes that the people are laughing at them). The individual may realize that their ideas of reference are irrational, but maintains them nonetheless. This exacerbates the individual's social anxiety, causing them to skew away from society and withdraw into their own world.

ICD-10 criteria of schizotypal personality disorder:

* Inappropriate or constricted affect (the individual appears cold and aloof).
* Behaviour or appearance that is odd, eccentric, or peculiar.
* Poor rapport with others and a tendency to social withdrawal.
* Odd beliefs or magical thinking, influencing behaviour and inconsistent with subcultural norms.
* Suspiciousness or paranoid ideas.
* Obsessive ruminations without inner resistance, often with dysmorphophobic, sexual or aggressive contents.
* Unusual perceptual experiences including somatosensory (bodily) or other illusions, depersonalization or derealization.
* Vague, circumstantial, metaphorical, overelaborate, or stereotyped thinking, manifested by odd speech or in other ways, without gross incoherence.
* Occasional transient quasi-psychotic episodes with intense illusions, auditory or other hallucinations, and delusion-like ideas, usually occurring without external provocation.

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