An introduction. A wonderful life except. . .

Hi. I'm a 22 year old male. Though I recently signed up to the forums here, I have been lurking for the past several weeks on various forums within PsychForums. Mainly lurking on this AvPD board as I feel I can relate to this board the best.

Seems I have a lot of things going for me in life. Trying to be as impartial as possible, I have several decent talents, I was very smart in school, I have a good sense of humor, I am financially secure, physically in okay shape, and I have been told that I am good-looking. The main problem is my psychological state. This is my achille’s heel so to speak. Isn't it amazing how one ache in 1% of the body can cause so much distress though 99% of the rest of the body is okay? This is how my psychological state affects my whole being: mind, body, and soul.

I believe I have clinical depression, AvPD and SAD. I believe I might have DPD, GAD, Tourette's, Asperger's, Bipolar, and/or OCD.

I've always been shy. And this is the solution I've always heard: "Eh, you'll grow out of it."

Though it is hard to believe, and you don't have to believe this, but I didn't really begin to find out how human networking and relationships worked until I was 16. Up until that point, I pegged pretty much everyone as friends (now I realize they were acquaintances). Innocent friends. I got some invites to some social gatherings but didn't go.

I was glad back then that my parents didn't make me do organized sports or Boy Scouts, etc. but looking back maybe that was part of the problem. I should have been in there. Both of my parents are passive themselves and never really pushed me to do things and we always marveled at the fact I could entertain myself with finding my own activities alone using books, imagination, video games, etc.

If I must point the finger at something else as the cause of my condition today besides my parents and myself it would have to be the lunch situation when I was 11 to 13 years old. Though what I experienced probably wouldn’t be classified as bullying, it would classify as teasing. And looking back at how easy of a target I was I am thankful I didn’t get teased more or bullied. Here I thought these were my friends and they would make fun of me much of the time during lunch. Depressing and confusing.

My perspective began changing when I was 16. I had several girls approach me, interested in a romantic relationship. I wrote some of these off as an act of kindness or sympathy - in the end, I concluded they weren’t serious. Except this one girl I couldn’t get out of my head. She seemed genuinely interested. And thus for possibly the first time in my life I felt wanted. Though my parents and family are nice, I never felt actively wanted. Never feeling wanted before, I likely mistook the other situations throughout my life up to that point as the genuine wantedness (oh, come on, that’s not even a real word! ). How did I handle this potential romance? The same way I handle everything: inaction and/or avoidance.

It has been a learning experience since. How did I go through public school and such without realizing how human relationships worked? Heaven knows. Even today I feel like I’m socially 8 or something. Like I said before, I always have known that I was shy but I didn’t understand how that would affect me and it’s only really been bothering me these past few years, the lack of human contact. Knowing the world’s definition of friend now, I find out I never had one. I had lots of acquaintances but never knew how to advance the relationship past that point nor did I feel the need to. I’ve never told anyone my true inner thoughts and this post represents the most I have ever revealed on any type of public place albeit anonymously.

Nowadays, I stay in a basement much of the day, living with my father. I know now what to do in regards to friendship but am too much of a coward to do it. I had a few short stints working under my mother’s wings at various places. I’ve never had a real job. I buy and sell things online to make money and thus have avoided having to get a real job. I’ve been to a psychologist one time but it never amounted to much. My mother has been diagnosed with Bipolar. Psychological problems run in my mother’s side of the family. My father hasn’t ever visited a psychological doctor that I know of. My parents must be disappointed and worried about me, but they hesitate in confronting the situation. I wonder if they don’t have AvPD.

What I was looking to do was generally introduce myself as I plan on being a regular contributor to this AvPD forum, maybe even to other sub forums within PsychForums. If you have any thoughts, comments, or requests, please feel free to post.

Well I'm semi-new to this forum too, but welcome.

Can't really tell you about advice because I'm practically like you, no real sense of what friendship is like and all that 'good stuff'.

Hope you find your answers.

I like your post because you write well, and despite your self-confessed "passivity" you don't come accross as overly needy or desperate for reassurance. There is something cool about you. Maybe it is the sobering experience of depression that simplifies your point of view. I'm sorry about the depression btw.

The words "lunch situation" reminds me when I was in middleschool and caved in to the nastily specific fear of eating in public. I excused myself from the bunch of "aquaintances" that made up my breaktime circle, and go to the library to bury myself in a book. I didn't mind the aquaintances per se but maybe a couple of times was criticized based on my withdrawnness or selfconscious demeanor, and that stung, so I thought "They don't need me or want me to hang out with them, I'm mostly just tagging along on their coattails in order not to look like a loner"
Looking back it was probably the wrong decision to become a loner.

None of them were friends by that stage. I don't know what makes the magic change where someone enters the friend sphere. What do I have to offer anyone at that level?
Calling someone a friend would feel like an imposition and an over-familiarity. How much do they require from me to make the whole exchange a fair tradeoff... involvement is so hard to sustain, even when it is begun.
There is another way to look at it, just count my blessing whenever someone nice talks to me. But then I worry what the next step is. I am supposed to want something out of this too, but to be honest I'm just treading water.

clydedenver wrote:I believe I have clinical depression, AvPD and SAD. I believe I might have DPD, GAD, Tourette's, Asperger's, Bipolar, and/or OCD.

You're a greedy one, aren't you?

Bipolar runs in families so if your mom has it you could too. But I don't think someone can have all of those things.

Welcome to the forum.

I don't think I really had a friend until I was 18. Before that I had people I called friends, but I don't think they really were friendships. I had acquaintances, or people I would spend time with, but I really didn't start to open up at all until my last year of high school.

and we always marveled at the fact I could entertain myself with finding my own activities alone using books, imagination, video games, etc.

the exact same thing

Well I'm semi-new to this forum too, but welcome.

Can't really tell you about advice because I'm practically like you, no real sense of what friendship is like and all that 'good stuff'.

Hope you find your answers.

Finding answers or solutions is one thing; acting on them is another. I feel like I have many of the answers - I'm simply too cowardly to act.

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Thank you for the kind words, BlueMennym.

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clydedenver wrote:I believe I have clinical depression, AvPD and SAD. I believe I might have DPD, GAD, Tourette's, Asperger's, Bipolar, and/or OCD.

You're a greedy one, aren't you?

Haha, yes, I’m hogging all of these so no one else can have them. Gosh, I wish
I were really that nice.

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Bipolar runs in families so if your mom has it you could too. But I don't think someone can have all of those things.

Yup, I know about the hereditary issues. And my mother’s father has to have something. At least between my mother and I we think he has something. I think AvPD. It’s actually scary how much I can identify with grandfather, at least the knowledge I have about grandfather.

I may not have all of those disorders but I sure can identify with many of them.

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Welcome to the forum.

I don't think I really had a friend until I was 18. Before that I had people I called friends, but I don't think they really were friendships. I had acquaintances, or people I would spend time with, but I really didn't start to open up at all until my last year of high school.

Sounds like me except I still haven’t opened up to anyone. Thanks for the welcome!

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clydedenver wrote: and we always marveled at the fact I could entertain myself with finding my own activities alone using books, imagination, video games, etc."


stilltrapped wrote: "the exact same thing"

Yes, this extended isolation is a huge reason for why I am like this today. I wasn’t abused physically or mentally or psychologically by my parents. But it’s as if they were happy I could entertain myself so I felt I was doing the right thing. My parents just went to work and came home and entertained themselves in front of the television. So growing up, I never felt anything was off in that I went to school and came home and stayed home entertaining myself till bedtime. Not until beginning at age 16 did I realize how different I was. And in that revelation came also the revelation that my parents were much the same way - different and diffident.

And to this day my parents think I’m happy. In reality I was happy in my own world for many years, even after age 16 and realizing how different we were. It’s been these past few years that have grown tougher to deal with. It’s comparable to being asleep and everyone around you knows you’re asleep. You wake up, but pretend you’re still asleep so no one around you notices and so you don’t have to face the world.

I want to go back to 2006-2008 where I was the most isolated ever but was generally happy in that isolation.

Having read all of this thread i feel i can relate a lot to your thoughts and state of mind especially the 'social skills' side of things and having difficulty in forming meaningful and lasting friendships. I can only give my opinion on this because by definition an opinion is subjective. i feel it is not the lack of skills or abilities to form lasting relationships with people that you have it might be the fact that you have difficulty accepting that someone can accept you for who you are and this all stems from low self-esteem. Why wouldn't anybody want to be your friend? you have no more or less attributes than anyone else in fact if you examined it i am sure you would have a lot to offer. the problem resides inside (like myself) you find it difficult opening up to people and prefer the company and comfort of your own company. I have come to learn that there are just those of us who appear sociable and others who are not. hope you find some inner peace it's a an elusive little bugger!

AuroraWizard wrote:Having read all of this thread i feel i can relate a lot to your thoughts and state of mind especially the 'social skills' side of things and having difficulty in forming meaningful and lasting friendships. I can only give my opinion on this because by definition an opinion is subjective. i feel it is not the lack of skills or abilities to form lasting relationships with people that you have it might be the fact that you have difficulty accepting that someone can accept you for who you are and this all stems from low self-esteem. Why wouldn't anybody want to be your friend? you have no more or less attributes than anyone else in fact if you examined it i am sure you would have a lot to offer. the problem resides inside (like myself) you find it difficult opening up to people and prefer the company and comfort of your own company. I have come to learn that there are just those of us who appear sociable and others who are not. hope you find some inner peace it's a an elusive little bugger!

It really was the lack of social skills or, at least knowledge of, that held me back partially. Yes, most of it is the fact I cannot accept myself. Through my life I noticed people brought the best of times but people for the most part brought the worst of times.

While I always acknowledged some acquaintance relationships made me feel better, it didn't justify going through the trouble of pursuing them since that chance of pain was always imminent. Deep down, I figured it was drama I could do without. So I watched TV, ran long distance, played video games and got most of my jollies from that. But being 23 now, and being out of school for 4.5 years has had its effect. I am evaluating my situation with the world. What I want to do. Who I want to be. The first few years out of school were fine, actually pretty cool. I finally got the general isolation that I always secretly wanted. I thought I was the rare kind of person that could do without socialization. I was mistaken. Such people do exist, but are exceedingly rare. Being by yourself, you slowly consume yourself. Becomes harder to relate to people around you.

Now I admit I need other people to make it through. But these years of isolation have taken their toll. I can barely relate to humanity any more on many of the levels, never mind my cowardice to initiate.

The good news is, I am making progress learning the art of socialization. The courage to put it to use is another issue. But I do grant you that the simple learning of how networking works and how to go about socialization is a confidence booster in itself. I guess before since I feared the whole thing, I stayed in my own world, kept my head down, and never even learned the process.

Looking back, I can find multiple instances in school settings where I could have pursued something to a safe degree. I find myself longing for those school days when initiation was easier since you were already in an environment geared toward something other than just socialization. So easy to create small talk. “Hey, what was the homework?” “Wanna be my study buddy?” It can be done in a work environment later in life as well, but it is easiest in school.

If you suspect you are AvPD and are still in a school setting, please, please try to take care of this AvPD issue now whatever that entails. Try to self-cure or reach out for help. I just had no idea what I was up against back then, no idea what AvPD was and how all the defense mechanisms worked. . .