Avoidant Personality Disorder

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wow...i just wikied it...fits me to a T...

While many people with AS fit the symptoms of AvPD, much of it is due to a logical reaction to poor social treatment in the past (at least the social side of AvPD). The practical side of AvPD can manifest in some individuals with AS due to either: a) Bad experiences in the past or b) Consumption with routine and special interests

Some individuals with AS have strong avoidant tendencies in adolescence, but outgrow them when their NT classmates become more civil in late high school. Which is why a pre-mature diagnosis of AvPD might be short-sighted. People with genuine AvPD will never outgrow it.

it's already being determined. bilateral grey matter differences have been detected in subjects with antisocial personality disorder and they surmise that it causes a complete disconnect between the reasoning and compassion parts of the brain. pathological liars have an overabundance of white matter. those are neurological differences that seem to be connected to "psychological" problems. awaiting further research, however. there are most certainly psychological conditions rooted in experience rather than organic causes, but how much they in turn change neurology is also being researched.

It is definately "gray" and isn't completely understood when you're talking about the psychopath, sociopath, pathological liars and yes, I believe that is based in biology or neurology too as it appears. Personally, I'm not in that gray area, aside from the brain matter you're referring to, and that's all I want to talk about. For me there is a distinction between psychological and neurological, in my own personal case and no one is going to convince me otherwise. I am the best expert on me and you are the best expert on you and that's all that is really relevant here.

Do you have any evidence of any of this? Most recent research has been that schizophrenia and bipolar are primerally genetic. Twin studies and adoption studies, as well as genetic research all point to primerially biological origins. Some specific incident may be a trigger, but more often, those disorders become apparent sometime during puberty or early adulthood, and a "specific incident" could be a convenient scapegoat.
In addition, people with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder have multiple neurological differences. MRI and PET scans continuously show this, I honestly didn't know that there was any debate as to whether major mental disorders had a biological basis or not. Research for many years has been consistently showing biological and genetic links.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/51521.php
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/528669_3
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schizophrenia#Neural
http://psychcentral.com/lib/2006/what-c ... -disorder/

The neural differences that cause bipolar disorder and schizophrenia are more documented than those that cause AS! I'd love to see your evidence to the contrary..

The simplest way I've heard this explained is- Genetics load the gun/Experience pulls the trigger

If it were this black and white, there probably wouldn't be anything left of the human race.

How are you doing JohnnyD017?
I hope you're hanging in there with being here, and can see that you belong here as much as anyone.

If it helps any I know a girl I used to room with. She was sort of an outsider like me. I didnt know about AS then. She had been to psychs and got told Avoidant Personality, but something about her strikes me as aspie, in retrospect. She had coeliac disease, I dont know if that is relevant or not. Her issues were very different to mine though, I always tended more towards oblivion about what people are thinking. I dont see why she couldnt have been aspie though.

I remember she liked doing things by herself and would often run off to the movies by herself, in a bid to escape people.

I know... and im sorry if i offended at all or acted like i didnt want to be here because of the people. The fact is i get depressed whenever i come here. The message i get every time i look at anything here is "there's something wrong with me" and THAT thought itself is AvPD-ish. Its the reason why i take things so personally, cos my gut instinct is that im always wrong and everyones always out to get me.

The problem is i was diagnosed the wrong way. My mother was the one who gave the doctor all the info on my childhood and shes proved that she doesnt know me that well. I did have a diagnosis of AvPD before AS, but my mother thought it 'wasnt good enough' and kept digging. I think she was aware that someone with an emotionally cold mother (like her) was more likely to be avoidant and kept looking for alternate answers to keep suspicion off herself. With the diagnosis of As she almost seemed happy to be cleared of 'bad parenting' and went around telling everyone all about it, whether they needed to know or not. I still know many of these people or friends of these people she may have spoken to so i have no idea who 'knows'. So after all that, i felt embarrassed, ashamed and humiliated about having AS. I still do and it wont go away so its almost like i HAVE to disprove it or im gonna be dead before i get to 30. you're right. I dont know myself. Ive been living a disorder for the last 10 year cos it was implied to me that i couldnt have anything or be anyone. But, most people here seem to be comfortable with their diagnosis so avoidant personality makes more sense to me.

I can understand people with AS having more chance of being avoidant but i find it strange that i fit every single thing on the AvPD list yet the AS traits that dont overlap with it, i dont fit. and I suppose someone who has been avoidant from childhood would grow up to resemble AS. On the other side of the coin i hear many experts say that AS is over diagnosed. If the person doesnt have empathy issues or restricted behaviours or any of the other main things, should they be diagnosed with it? should we really be diagnosing it on social anxiety and minor traits?

by the way, avoidant personality isnt JUST about avoiding people. theres some other behaviours involved. this page has some good stuff:
http://www.realmentalhealth.com/persona ... sorder.asp

Hey Johnny, I get that way too. It's hard coming on a forum because every little thing someone says to you (or doesn't say) is thought out extensively. It sucks when your brain registers every human interaction you have as a shut down.

Avoiding persons topic

I do avoid others, and many AS members here do the same. It is a choice.

Some AS just do not have a clue about interacting with others. Neither do I , and I have decided to abstain (avoid other people, unless I choose to interact on rare occasions). Perhaps my avoiding interaction and people has to do with negative experiences. Whatever--to me the cause does not matter.

Last edited by sartresue on 25 Dec 2009, 10:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Sometimes it's really a hair trigger, though. Not every genetic disorder carries 100% heritability. We don't really know why sometimes you can have a gene for a trait and not develop it-- not all genes are expressed. You can't really figure it out, because environmental triggers can be anything. You can't know every chemical, sound, wavelength of light or radiation, etc, that you come across through your entire life. In order to actually study what causes certain genes to be expressed, you'd have to have huge numbers of people living in complete isolation in utterly controlled environments.. which would be totally abnormal in and of itself. Sometimes there are identical twins who are raised together, and one develops a disorder while the other doesn't.. I'm sure someday we'll know why.. but as far as I know, nobody currently really knows.


Now that, I can agree with!
Without any fuss, the stars would be going out..

there are structural brain differences in those with bipolar disorder that are remarkably similar to the structural difference they are finding relates to AS (i believe the amygdala is either smaller or irregular in some way). so where is the distinction there between physiological and psychological? how is a bipolar person more "crazy" than an aspie?

p.s. - i am diagnosed with both, and i agree with both diagnoses, and i think neither reflects negatively on me psychologically. i don't make value judgments on myself because of being bipolar that i wouldn't make with AS, that makes no sense to me. neither is reason to judge myself psychologically "faulty", if you will. my brain is structurally different than your average NT. i'm cool with that.

JohnnyD017,
I'm not sure if I'm reading it right but it sounds like there are some issues with your mom that are complicating matters for you. And my guess with AvPD is that many people who suffer with these sorts of problems were probably abused in one way or another and likely in many ways by many people. I know I was and it does have a profound impact on a person. Emotional abuse is equally damaging as any other form of abuse.

I don't have any doubt about my own diagnosis but I can understand how disconcerting it must be to not know. I don't feel proud or good about my developmental disability however. I have suffered all my life with it and gotten negative feedback from others in one way or another everywhere I go, so how can I possibly feel good or proud of it. Some people here get plenty of support, help and resources provided to them and likewise are rather sheltered that way and they lean on things like 'lack of empathy' to justify being rude, insensitive and/or obnoxious. I have empathy and always have, even more so as a small child, so I don't relate to that in the first place.

I hope you can seperate the issues with your mother and not let those negative feelings influence what you know to be true for yourself. And it doesn't matter what other people think. That's about them. People project stuff all the time. That's their stuff. Try to remember that when you're dealing with people. We are the only ones who can define who we are and when others try to define us, they are just being ignorant and arrogant. It's only their problem that they're seeing, not ours.

I wish you much peace and resolve for what you're dealing with.

Last edited by Meadow on 24 Dec 2009, 3:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I don't have any of the biology or neurologically based psychological disorders and that's why there is a clear distinction for me. Can that just be understood for what it is? I have numerous psychological problems but they are rooted in environmental causes. My neurological handicap strictly pertains to the autism and nothing more so it's easy for me to distinguish between the two.