newbie from sydney

emiliakc · Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 8:48 am Post subject: newbie from sydney

Hey guys,

Just want to say hi! Im usually loitering about the www.avoidantpersonality.com chatroom and one of the guys there mentioned this site so i thought id check it out.
Im not professionally diagnosed but, like alot of the people ive talked to who have avpd, i stumbled upon it. Before it, i used to shrug my anxieties under the rug as depression and/or laziness. I was never one for diagnoses and such, i believe we all have some sort of personality disorder or other and i didnt really care to know what or which i had. But coming by it has seemed to clear up some of the fog a great deal, answering for alot of confusion ive had about myself. Not to plug, but the avpd chatroom has been a great way for me to interact with people who are dealing with similar things. I certainly feel alot less alone in this and less isolated now that ive become a bit more aquainted with hrm.. "my kind" lol.
After much tottering around it im finally going to see a therapist for the first time tomorrow. I mean, i have the option, why not right ? For all i know my diagnosis isn't even going to be avpd at all, but it should be interesting to see what "category" they happen to put me under at very least. Im feeling a little bit defiant and apprehensive about it but i know its something i have to do, i have to at least give it a chance eh ?

Hopefully get to talking with some of you soon,

Take care!

Emilia

SilentStranger · Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 11:30 am Post subject:

Hi Emilia,

Its good that you are getting the help. Let us know how you went. Thats is if you feel comfortable talking about it.

I am not from Sydney, but there are few Aussies here including some from Sydney, but most of them seem to have quietened down. Anyway welcome to the site!

-SS

Diluted_Acid · Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 2:30 pm Post subject: Re: newbie from sydney

Hello and welcome emiliakc, avp has always been a disorder i've never understood that well. However your post has refreshed in my head what it really is i guess, and yeah, often people with SA do experience it you'll find. I know its especially happening to me as of now, as i deep down prioritise studies, my job and other things over the few friends i have. Best of luck overcoming it though, if anything i'm feeling better than i used to and i hope we all can fend off all these disorders (in relation to sp) made known on this site.

emiliakc · Posted: Thu Sep 18, 2008 5:50 am Post subject: ..8 months past..

Its been a whiiile.. At the start of therapy which started shortly after i wrote my first post above, my therapist asked me to write down a page of things i had to do this year.. The main things included in that list of 50 were .. seeing my friends and family who i'd alienated 2-3yrs prior, to go back to school and to get a job. As someone with SA(and the like) you could prolly understand how daunting those thing's can be. I had no intention of completing any of those "tasks" and kind of just looked at my therapist like she was the 'crazy person'. But now that i've pretty much completed that list, it is sort of surreal. I should feel a sense of accomplishment but i don't.
I knew in the back of my mind that starting this road to "recovery" was really just that- starting. The real work would start afterwards- during the maintenance, the keeping afloat of the ice that i'd broken. It just seems like a new level of challenges which only seem to get harder as i go along. I'm at that place again where if you told me that i could do this, i would just look at you like you were the crazy person. I'm on a downward slip, alienating everyone again and not sure if i want to continue getting better. It..just..seems..endless..It really is damn hardwork not giving in to the apathy and numbness. I definitely have a renewed appreciation for ppl with mental disorders still trying to make it work. It just seems like a very fine rope to tread. It always feels like you're on survival mode and at any moment you could fall one way or another if you're not paying attention. A huge kudos to the ppl pushing through it every day continuing to make it hurdle after hurdle.

I actually havent seen my therapist for about two months because silly me cancelled all the appointments. I still dont like the idea of being reliant on someone to keep my head screwed on half straight and $140 a pop at that. I dont like the idea it has set in the ppl around me when i am having a bad day and their immediate response is to send me off to the therapist like a quick fix to the stepford wives house. And it's just a worry to me that i seem remotely functional to myself only when i'm regularly seeing my therapist. But for all the lack of enlightenment of those sessions something must have been going right..so here is to credit where credit is due........hrmm? I see my therapist again soon, i'm not sure how great it'll go from here on in. You can't really help a person who doesn't really want to be helped anymore. Or can you ? I don't know.

Thanks for getting this far....lol..

Take care and goodluck!

Emilia

PS. Official diagnosis - Extreme SA + Depression. Yay, chuck me in with the majority Wink

Happy to have joined the club! *cough