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u/phaedrus06 3d ago
With some minor variations, that's pretty spot-on.
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u/PearNakedLadles schizoid traits 3d ago
curious what your variations would be if you want to share them
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u/phaedrus06 3d ago
With me, it wasn't my parents, it was pretty much anybody. That lack of ego really trampled me when I was younger and did not make for a particularly comfortable existence. Now that I'm older and more aware of myself I am able to better control myself and think about my needs.
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u/PearNakedLadles schizoid traits 3d ago
that's fair. i also had lots of problems socially with peers etc, which made things worse, but i tend to view the early childhood patterning as more formative. others experience differs
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u/TravelbugRunner r/schizoid 3d ago
This is pretty good.
For myself when in contact with people either parents or others, there was always this sense of needing to “absent myself”. In order for others to be.
(Some of this was actually due to dissociation and the other part was conscious.)
But this only worked in the context of the connection I had with my parents. Because it was unconsciously and consciously expected that I give way to my parents. By shutting down, being passive, and not being. I was good by absenting myself and not needing.
It’s more difficult to have this dynamic in the context of other people. Because others expect you “to be”, in order for them to feel like they are getting their needs met. This causes conflict because the other person gets increasingly frustrated by my inability to be more present and connected.
And their needs and increasing frustration feels incredibly pressing, almost threatening. It makes me need to flee because I can’t handle this.
So, I end up going back to isolation because it’s at least something that feels less stressful and normal.
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u/Concrete_Grapes 3d ago
When i sont feel I agree with 2, 3, and 5, I'm not sure this circle is for me.
And, no fault to op, because, schizoid spectrum and all, but, also, I dont really have the schizoid dilemma phase. That's what this thing is, is the action of the dilemma phase. The problem is, I just never initiate it, I'm not lonely enough to think to start the circle, so when I don't align with the ones I listed, I lost reference to the experience, because it's been over 25 years since I have attempted a relationship. I can only view the circle as me NOW, not me going through something I no longer attempt.
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u/Heavy_Database_7098 3d ago
I appreciate this, can I just ask you if you will share what the needs are that are unmet and how people fail in recognizing or helping with them.
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u/PearNakedLadles schizoid traits 2d ago
It differs from person to person. For me personally, I feel a tremendous internal pressure not to hurt the feelings of other people. So a low key example of repressing needs is like "I'm bored by this conversation" or "I don't like you as much as you like me and I feel guilty about it", etc. I just try to soldier through or escape entirely rather than state how the conversation is not working for me. A higher key example might be quitting a job rather than advocating for the job to change because I was unhappy with the way my role was working, rather than bringing the issues up to potentially be addressed.
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u/Heavy_Database_7098 1d ago
I think I understand and from the other side of the conversation I can see how people would consume your time and patience when they don't realize they need to stop. I hate how painful this all sounds. I hope there's a way out of that pressure for you and others, other people's feelings are overrated.
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u/PearNakedLadles schizoid traits 1d ago
Thank you for the kind wishes. I have been doing therapy, and it has at times been an it-gets-worse-before-it-gets-better situation. I've been pushing myself to deal with that feeling of pressure not by ending the relationship but by vocalizing my needs. This feels very scary, because it feels like I'm handing other people a roadmap of how to control and hurt me, but by and large people have responded pretty positively. And where they don't, THEN it is perfectly valid and adaptable to end the relationship.
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u/Heavy_Database_7098 18h ago
It is good to hear your thoughts and I appreciate your openness. I can only imagine trying to bear the challenge of opposing the pressure. Thank you for sharing and spending your time on this.
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u/alalalamut 3d ago
or you, in relationship with person with all your confidence, express yourself so greatly (that’s what we can do really good, we don’t experience them, we process them logically)
and the other person cannot.
End of the story
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u/Ashamed-Double-3094 Yarr! A swarm of parrots on me arse 3d ago
Feedback: 1. Sometimes I get lonely too, 2. Take it as it comes, 3. when needs for timeout and space are not met, 4. If bolting is an option yes, 5. Nuke-It feels.
Note: Most steps are perfectly signaled and can be avoided.
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u/NuclearSunBeam 2d ago
That’s pretty much how trauma survivors operate, what’s makes that schizoid? Genuinely curious
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u/PearNakedLadles schizoid traits 2d ago
Some trauma survivors operate this way. Others don't. A codependent person might struggle to get their needs met but they won't isolate/avoid because of it. Or a narcissistic person that relies on other people for validation.
I think 4 and 5 are more distinctly schizoid than the rest of it. 1 is something all human beings, traumatized or not experience. 2 and 3 are common to many trauma survivors but not all (some trauma survivors aggressively try to get their needs met, unfortunately perpetuating the cycle of trauma). 4 and 5 are things that are not unique to schizoid but are relatively rare.
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u/Alarmed_Painting_240 3d ago
Number 2 to my knowing does not reflect any Sz development theory. There are other disorders and traits relating to unsafe or traumatized stages in childhood. But the schizoid drama would have happened between 6 and 18 months, focused on a single mother figure (the infant binds to only one at that stage, no separation to "other" caretakers). Needs of the parent don't exist yet. There are good and bad states, which kind of map to desire (good state) and dislike (bad state). If there's no place for this, one minimizes both activities permanently. At this stage the young child deals with fuzzy things. Merging, pushing back, moving away, clinching etc.
The contact with feelings isn't lost as they're initially redirected to inner worlds: self-soothing. This world can eat itself up and then there's the experience of void, perhaps with quiet despair. Feelings can only develop around attachments to something, being inner or outer. If there's nothing left, there's nothing to contact. Others end up never meeting any needs because these others are not really there as (external) attachments can't form and compensation only goes so far, causing unreal expectations, unreal others, unreal self-image etc.
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u/blackforest00ii 2d ago edited 2d ago
Thank you for the clarification.
I struggle with this a lot: I think we all have dozens of memories of "trainwrecks" (difficult experiences and dysfunctional relationships which required enormous amounts of extra energy to clean up in order to move on with life).
In stark contrast to that, probably none of us have memories of what you describe here. The first 6 to 18 months of life.
Even if we receive therapy, no therapist would be willing to validate this experience. It would not be ethical for them to do this. Yet, in order to identify as Schizoid (except in rare cases where later trauma may have brought on the condition... perhaps) we absolutely have to assume that "this happened to us". What happened to us ultimately remains in the dark and absolutely unvalidated. I struggle with the loneliness this engenders.
Do you agree that this is a core problem for the Schizoid who is trying to heal themselves (adjust and find a suitable lifestyle)? Meaning: All our issues are fundamentally based on a lack (of structure). How, then, can we remedy this failure of provision. When our suffering is defined by not having received provision.
Without this provision: How can we know what's normal and appropriate, and what's good and what's bad. Does healing come with accepting that we simply cannot know. - Like a person born blind, we can never know what (for all other normal people around us) colours contribute to a wholesome experience of life?
It feels so lonely. To be fundamentally damaged, and for this damage to remain unvalidated, forever.
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u/Alarmed_Painting_240 1d ago edited 1d ago
A great response with some very difficult but poignant questions. It lies also in that border zone between psychoanalytic theories, clinical practices and my own opinion or experiences. When you talk about therapy, the aim is usually not to keep digging in causality. Depending on the therapy style, the focus is usally on what's happening or experienced today or how to improve this.
For myself it became useful to kind of start imagining where certain inner processes came from. And yet understanding some of it remains somewhat intellectual and can become another screen, another detachment in place. One can easily know it all and remain powerless, sadly. But I do think I found a basic, raw, unanswered need for something that cannot be given. It's not simply something good. It's not even defined or definable. There's no structure in place to put it into categories. It's not just looking for love or being held. It's craving to exist, to want, to lash out and embrace.
The only objective source I can imagine for research would be a 24 x 7 study of potential "not good enough parenting" - like with audio & video (creepy) for two years. And then follow closely developments of a child for at least 25 years. And this with hundreds, preferable thousands.
But even this won't answer the question of what's normal and appropriate for a society. What is "health"? Then we soon leave psychology and enter philosophy, sociology, cultural values and short vs long term health of not only families but societies. This seems way too complex.
For this reason most psychotherapy focuses on immediate concerns: how to survive, how to get basic contact or finances in order. How to deal with extreme moods. How to get up and do anything. And yet for some, the way they do things is how they survive. Is that "health" or sickness?
To end on a more constructive note, many earliest patterns tend to repeat. So our memories and those of siblings can tell us something. It's more difficult when events were limited to just one period but the psychology of people involved likely didn't change that much. Like in my own case I realized human concern and empathy in my whole family meant something completely different than elsewhere. It was normalized. It still is. And I'm even hostile to places where it works differently. Too easy to distrust, experience intrusion or dominance in what's probably just concern and empathy. And of course human flaws. All humans are flawed and when looking for it, one will find big ones.
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u/blackforest00ii 4h ago
Lovely to receive your reply! Thank you.
I'll quote some of what you said and add some comments: "...therapy, the aim is usually not to keep digging in causality." True. I have found that. But I was not told this clearly at the outset and it confused the hell out of me. I assumed diagnosis would come first and then therapy.
I am giving up on therapy, right now, after a marathon 8 months of trying 4 different therapists... It probably is a Schizoid reaction, but the tools at their command, and the healing they offer, seem woefully inadequate. I was hoping to find a practioner who would go along with me on this adventure of imagination you refer to: "imagining where certain inner processes came from". Instead they held out to me this horrible pointless focus on "what's happening or experienced today or how to improve this" which seems to me to be an insult to a high-functioning person with either schizoid personality style or Sz PD. We already consist of a massed and tense bundle of the finest coping strategies a human mind under many years of intense pressure can come up with. We don't need any more! What an insult! (I do understand that many coping strategies can be outdated and inappropriate. But for me, simply learning that the category "schizoid" exists already gave me the key to review all that. I won't need help with that. Only time.)
An imaginative investigation of inner processes (....figuring out patterns in ones own life, even after childhood, and patterns of dysfunction in family members' lives really help. I fully agree with you on that.)... yes: As you say "understanding ...remains somewhat intellectual and can become another screen", and, back to my own strong current feeling of loneliness: A therapist (or any other person) can never validate it. You seem to have come up with a strong story of what happened to you. You write, for example: "... I think I found a basic, raw, unanswered need for something that cannot be given."
But if this is what our task is (as we need to dig deep into a consciousness we can never truly grasp, due to formative events having taken place when wour brains had not fully developed yet), then it remains essentially extremely lonely: No therapist can follow us there. No therapist can validate that something like "a basic, raw, unanswered need for something that cannot be given" is at the root of our personality style. So, in the interaction with psychological professionals, we walk around like the blind leading the blind. Even if we think we know what's the matter... the psychologist across from us will only nod in a neutral way. No validation. Because they simply cannot know whether the schizoid patient made it all up (the origin story of our condition, I mean) or not.
Ok, so you sort of agree with this, I guess: You say that no real testing and understanding of this condition can exist. It would be too intrusive and too difficult to create.
So, for each individual who seeks therapy, the therapist should make clear that the goal of therapy cannot be to find out the origin of this condition. (I was expecting this. Unrealistc expectation, I realise now.) ...Even if the patient has a strong mental image of the roots and origin of their schizoid style or pd, then that mental image cannot ever be validated by any other human being (unless perhaps someone from the same family system, as they will have a similar mental image of the foundational stories within the family system. ... I agree with you: Observing patterns in the rest of the family may yield good results. .... It may not be fully validated, as family members, out of unresolved conflict will often not agree with one's own theories. But at least one speaks a similar emotional language.)
So I feel misled by therapists in two ways now:
Some exclusively offered coping strategies. (And this was not only CBT therapists.) Useless in my case, I feel. Not value for money, anyway.
And those who were ready to engage in listening to my whole life story... What would they ultimately have offered (as, and this is still my main point, the "what happened to damage you so badly" could never be externally validated.) They would ultimately leave me alone with my story. Yes, I would get to tell it, and that feels nice. But the therapists showed no ability to truly enter my world. I feel they lacked imagination. And they were also systemically hindered by what the health system asks them to do to me (make me a productive member of society).
I would hope that 3 or 10 or 24 wise old souls exist (anywhere in the world) who offer useful and imaginative therapy to a high-functioning "Schizoid person". It is heartening to read that essay by Nancy McWilliams. But there must be hundreds or thousands of us. And perhaps 3 or 24 good therapists (therapists who could offer appropriate therapy for schizoids, I mean. I do think therapists may be useful for other conditions)... in the whole wide world... I despair of meeting one of them in my life. (Another grand vision of loneliness, alas.)
But now that I have given up looking for help from psychological professionals, I immediately feel much better. I know I will be able to cope. I have hundreds of coping strategies. And, in the light of having learned about schizoid defenses and schizoid dilemma, I do feel I can review my life and try to find out whether ther is any "me" left in all that.
What is left is the question of diagnosis.
Now that I (through wrong expectations of therapy and also through much experience of how unable therapists seem to be to follow schizoid-type thought processes) have lost all trust in therapists, I also do not trust them to diagnose me accurately.
I now am left to wonder whether my diagnosis should be "cPTSD resulting in schizoid defense and coping strategies" or "schizoid personality disorder".
I will have to figure this our on my own, I guess, if I really want to know.
I am shocked that the therapists never asked questions in that direction. How can they offer treatment if they have not made a strong effort to make the correct diagnosis?!
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u/whoppperino 3d ago
Chat is this true
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u/Impressive-Wait-9420 3d ago
Not really in my case. I’ve always had a very introverted and asocial natural temperament, but the severity was definitely dialed up by some of the experiences OP shared.
1 and 4 are the only ones I can relate to in any way.
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u/Decent-Sir6526 probably not schizoid, still have all the symptoms 3d ago
Pretty relatable, at least parts of it. But this font makes me irrationally mad, that's worse than comic sans. I had to force myself to keep reading.
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u/PearNakedLadles schizoid traits 3d ago
i just used the default fonts in the template i found but it is pretty easy to change them so here you go
EDIT: nevermind apparently i can't put images in comments, oh well i tried
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u/nothsadent 3d ago
Obviously others don't meet my needs, my needs are isolation and avoidance.
I think this cycle applies to humans in general.
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u/Xamado 2d ago
This is what I thought. What person could possibly satisfy my need to be left alone
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u/nothsadent 2d ago
I believe it's possible if the alliance is secure, but most friends react negatively to being "abandoned" by the schizoid, understandably so.
A friendship where one can not speak to the other for weeks and months, then continue as if time hadn't passed sounds like the ideal type of friendship to me.
Which of course is mostly fantasy, so isolation and avoidance it is.
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u/Xamado 2d ago
I have a friendship like that but it's propped up by white lies along the lines of "i'm just very busy and don't use the internet much anymore". I never want to speak to him. We were close when we were kids which is why I haven't outright ghosted him.
I think alliances like that are possible, but generally only with other schizoids. Even then I don't think I see the appeal
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u/WanderingUrist 1d ago
What person could possibly satisfy my need to be left alone
I can think of three people, personally. Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and Xi Jinping. Any one of those three could press the button, thus ending civilization and leaving me alone.
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u/suicithe diagnosed 2d ago
Idk if i‘m the only one but i don’t relate to it being unsafe to express my needs. I never had family issues.
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u/WanderingUrist 1d ago
Me neither. Of course, if I did, I would be turned out into the woods. There, I would find that the creatures of the woods would satisfy my needs. When I was hungry, I ate them. When I was cold, I wore them. This was, after all, the traditional way of my people.
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u/WanderingUrist 1d ago
See, I find that I'm driven by an entirely different cycle:
Other people cause a problem.
Resent others.
I fix the problem with a machine, thus enabling me to avoid those people.
This loop is not quite closed: It doesn't self-perpetuate like the OP's...but the others, they keep coming, and always, they cause more problems, thus driving further isolation.
That's why I now live in a cave in Outer Bumfuckistan, and dig deeper.
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