Extremely paranoid(VERY long). Help please?
April 1, 2015 2:59 PM Subscribe
**DISCLAIMER: This is very long, tediously written, incoherent, etc., so I don’t expect you to read all of it. I have listed my main problems in numbers 1., 2. and 3., and I don’t care how much you have read, as long as I get as many opinions as possible. The therapy section is in number two, just in case you were going to suggest that. I need some advice on what to do now, not what to tell my therapist**
OK, here goes: I think I might be extremely paranoid. I used to just blame my own behavior on my social anxiety and my upbringing, but after talking with a girl who actually had paranoid personality disorder, I’m starting to doubt myself. I resonated with everything she said and had never in my life thought of it as unusual.
It intrigued me a lot, so I went home and started reading about the disorder(this all happened yesterday, so this is not meant to be some kind of self-diagnosis). I started to re-evaluate past ‘betrayals and attacks’ from other people and had sort of an epiphany.
There are three major problems, and I would really appreciate it if you gave an opinion on some of these. What I want the most is - obviously - to be able to let people in. I want to be able to receive therapy, I want to have friends, possibly even a boyfriend, and I want to be able to walk in public without getting majorly depressed afterwards. I want to feel safe. As it is now, I am never relaxed. I am always surrounded by people who could/am trying to hurt me.
1) Complete strangers
I suffer from maladaptive daydreaming, meaning I daydream constantly without being able to control it – this leads to a lot of social anxiety-inducing traits such as tics, making facial expressions, talking with myself, and just generally acting detached. These tics will eventually lead to me being bullied by people in public transportation, by my neighbors, people in my class, and people on the street. I have quite a lot of in-your-face ‘proof’ of this, namely friends remarking “I think your neighbors were talking about you…”, people imitating me on the street, people throwing stuff at my windows, and people leaving trash at my door. I have lived in three places with one or more of these incidents happening.
When it finally dawns upon me that people are making fun of me, I start to get really weird. I believe that everyone who is laughing is laughing at me – and unless I get absolute proof of the opposite, I will never be able to convince myself to calm down. I cannot walk the streets without using ear plugs, lest I feel extremely stressed because I constantly scan people for signs that they are making fun of me. I cannot take the bus in the morning, and when I thought that some people from class were making fun of me I stopped going to school at all. The panic attacks are too much to bear.
I once thought I had caught my neighbor in badmouthing me with a big group of friends. When I angrily confronted him, I realized that he didn’t speak my language at all. Still, whenever I hear his friends talk, I assume that it is about me.
Are people talking about me? Yes. Am I completely sane? I don’t think so. I think I sometimes hear what I fear the most. I think I twist words.
2) Therapy
I have had many incidents with psychiatrists and psychologists. I seem so tense, distant and awkward, that they usually think I have some kind of a developmental disorder. Thus, I never get therapy for very long - they always refer me to someone else before the 6th session or so. They talk about this 'wall' that I have, that they can't reach into me, which somehow translates into me having some kind of brain damage(the only ones who have been able to reach me even a tiny bit, have been those that never believed there was anything wrong with my brain to begin with). They never agree on what is acutally wrong with me, though, so I have many different diagnoses that only certain people who have experienced me in certain situations agree with. I have recently been to group therapy for social anxiety, which worked only as long as it lasted. I do have social anxiety for sure.
I usually despise anyone trying to treat me. I believe they are holding back information, that they are trying to cheat me out of treatment due to a lack of budget, and that they find me boring and are trying to cut corners, preferring to work their magic on someone more interesting and cooperative.
We have excellent health care in my country, so I can get any kind of free treatment should they deem it necessary. I am also regarded as intelligent and self-sufficient, if only way too moody, distant and mildly socially awkward – this it usually translates into ‘not needing therapy’.
I’m having a meeting with these people again on Wednesday. They will try to evaluate what kind of help I need and how urgent.
Oh, and I can’t just buy a therapist. I don’t have any money, so any help I can get will be for free
3) Relationships
Friendships can start out great but they tend to always end the same way – we meet a couple of times, I start to relax a bit, then something suspicious happens, I obsess over it and try to covertly confront the person(somehow). This always ends badly and unresolved. Then, I usually stop writing to this person, or they cut contact with me. When they stop contacting me, I always assume that they were trying to use me in some way, and it didn’t work out, so they gave up and moved on.
If I try to continue the friendship for once, these paranoid thoughts will continue for a long, long time – and I will feel weak for succumbing to my need of having friends when they are ‘obviously’ all making fun of me behind my back.
I get over this anxiety if people don’t trigger me for a while, but the longer the friendships last, the longer the ‘list’ in my head of betrayals will be the next time they treat me badly(or is giving me telltale signs about it… Or making a distasteful joke… Or avoiding me for some time… Or not answering my text messages). No matter how much I like a person, I will eventually be too stressed out, hurt and offended to continue a close relationship with anyone.
One example of this is when I had a major fight with girlfriend A about how she had cancelled our date for the fifth time in a row(I’m a straight 23 year old woman, btw). We didn’t talk for a while, and when we did, girlfriend A and girlfriend B had obviously engaged in trash talking about me, and they now both believed that I was a liar about random things – they gave away very clear signs of this without actually saying it out loud. When they openly stated that they didn’t believe one of my(true) stories, I was mortified and didn’t speak to them for nine months. They didn’t contact me either.
Girlfriend A eventually contacted me, and we went to this party together. At the party, I mentioned the only good news that I had: I had met a guy, sort of a friends-with-benefits. There was nothing but enthusiasm about my voice, nothing that could be interpreted as lying, yet they both got that same weird look on their faces and proceeded to flat-out ignore my statement. I didn’t consider them my friends for another year after that. When I did see them in this timespan, I had a couple of sudden angry outbursts and did a lot of brooding because I couldn’t stand the tension, and their lack of respect.
- This is not so much about weather I am right about my suspicions or not, as my reactions to them. I will never, ever forget these incidents and is hyperaware of anything girlfriend A does or says to and about me. How ‘high’ she ranks me on her list of friends, and how ‘safe’ it will then be for me to continue seeing her. I am frequently angry with her and rarely experience gratitude for our friendship despite this being two years ago. We have been friends since I was four years old, so dumping her is not an option I would like to consider. I experience situations like this all the time if I try to get close to someone, and it is unbearable.
I obviously am not good with boyfriends either. I have only had one boyfriend – it lasted two months. The rest of my(vast) experiences with boys have been friends-with-benefits and one night stands.
My family I do fairly good with, but I was dramatically scapegoated as a child – the differential treatment was obvious to people outside the family, but the family itself kept stating that it was all in my head. Everyone accepted this – my cousins, parents, grandparents, etc. They all told me I was crazy, and when I entered my teenage years, I really did get delusional about it. Today we are all friends, which make my very clear and traumatic memories all the more disturbing. I hate that I am close to forgiving them, as I fear they will continue to damage me somehow(they don’t).
- Emotionally, I am the most lonely person I know. I have a host of other problems, but thought I doubt how much of it would really matter once my paranoia is gone. I cannot describe the hurt and deprivation that I have experienced as a result of my self-limiting behavior, or from past experiences. I never get used to feeling as bad as I do, but despite daily efforts and constant plotting on how to 'break out', nothing ever works. It just gets better in the same painfully slow way all by itself no matter what I do, but I will be too old before 'good enough' happens. I don't want to waste another year of my life, or day for that matter.
Does anyone have any kind of advice/opinion whatsoever, that is not therapy?
OK, here goes: I think I might be extremely paranoid. I used to just blame my own behavior on my social anxiety and my upbringing, but after talking with a girl who actually had paranoid personality disorder, I’m starting to doubt myself. I resonated with everything she said and had never in my life thought of it as unusual.
It intrigued me a lot, so I went home and started reading about the disorder(this all happened yesterday, so this is not meant to be some kind of self-diagnosis). I started to re-evaluate past ‘betrayals and attacks’ from other people and had sort of an epiphany.
There are three major problems, and I would really appreciate it if you gave an opinion on some of these. What I want the most is - obviously - to be able to let people in. I want to be able to receive therapy, I want to have friends, possibly even a boyfriend, and I want to be able to walk in public without getting majorly depressed afterwards. I want to feel safe. As it is now, I am never relaxed. I am always surrounded by people who could/am trying to hurt me.
1) Complete strangers
I suffer from maladaptive daydreaming, meaning I daydream constantly without being able to control it – this leads to a lot of social anxiety-inducing traits such as tics, making facial expressions, talking with myself, and just generally acting detached. These tics will eventually lead to me being bullied by people in public transportation, by my neighbors, people in my class, and people on the street. I have quite a lot of in-your-face ‘proof’ of this, namely friends remarking “I think your neighbors were talking about you…”, people imitating me on the street, people throwing stuff at my windows, and people leaving trash at my door. I have lived in three places with one or more of these incidents happening.
When it finally dawns upon me that people are making fun of me, I start to get really weird. I believe that everyone who is laughing is laughing at me – and unless I get absolute proof of the opposite, I will never be able to convince myself to calm down. I cannot walk the streets without using ear plugs, lest I feel extremely stressed because I constantly scan people for signs that they are making fun of me. I cannot take the bus in the morning, and when I thought that some people from class were making fun of me I stopped going to school at all. The panic attacks are too much to bear.
I once thought I had caught my neighbor in badmouthing me with a big group of friends. When I angrily confronted him, I realized that he didn’t speak my language at all. Still, whenever I hear his friends talk, I assume that it is about me.
Are people talking about me? Yes. Am I completely sane? I don’t think so. I think I sometimes hear what I fear the most. I think I twist words.
2) Therapy
I have had many incidents with psychiatrists and psychologists. I seem so tense, distant and awkward, that they usually think I have some kind of a developmental disorder. Thus, I never get therapy for very long - they always refer me to someone else before the 6th session or so. They talk about this 'wall' that I have, that they can't reach into me, which somehow translates into me having some kind of brain damage(the only ones who have been able to reach me even a tiny bit, have been those that never believed there was anything wrong with my brain to begin with). They never agree on what is acutally wrong with me, though, so I have many different diagnoses that only certain people who have experienced me in certain situations agree with. I have recently been to group therapy for social anxiety, which worked only as long as it lasted. I do have social anxiety for sure.
I usually despise anyone trying to treat me. I believe they are holding back information, that they are trying to cheat me out of treatment due to a lack of budget, and that they find me boring and are trying to cut corners, preferring to work their magic on someone more interesting and cooperative.
We have excellent health care in my country, so I can get any kind of free treatment should they deem it necessary. I am also regarded as intelligent and self-sufficient, if only way too moody, distant and mildly socially awkward – this it usually translates into ‘not needing therapy’.
I’m having a meeting with these people again on Wednesday. They will try to evaluate what kind of help I need and how urgent.
Oh, and I can’t just buy a therapist. I don’t have any money, so any help I can get will be for free
3) Relationships
Friendships can start out great but they tend to always end the same way – we meet a couple of times, I start to relax a bit, then something suspicious happens, I obsess over it and try to covertly confront the person(somehow). This always ends badly and unresolved. Then, I usually stop writing to this person, or they cut contact with me. When they stop contacting me, I always assume that they were trying to use me in some way, and it didn’t work out, so they gave up and moved on.
If I try to continue the friendship for once, these paranoid thoughts will continue for a long, long time – and I will feel weak for succumbing to my need of having friends when they are ‘obviously’ all making fun of me behind my back.
I get over this anxiety if people don’t trigger me for a while, but the longer the friendships last, the longer the ‘list’ in my head of betrayals will be the next time they treat me badly(or is giving me telltale signs about it… Or making a distasteful joke… Or avoiding me for some time… Or not answering my text messages). No matter how much I like a person, I will eventually be too stressed out, hurt and offended to continue a close relationship with anyone.
One example of this is when I had a major fight with girlfriend A about how she had cancelled our date for the fifth time in a row(I’m a straight 23 year old woman, btw). We didn’t talk for a while, and when we did, girlfriend A and girlfriend B had obviously engaged in trash talking about me, and they now both believed that I was a liar about random things – they gave away very clear signs of this without actually saying it out loud. When they openly stated that they didn’t believe one of my(true) stories, I was mortified and didn’t speak to them for nine months. They didn’t contact me either.
Girlfriend A eventually contacted me, and we went to this party together. At the party, I mentioned the only good news that I had: I had met a guy, sort of a friends-with-benefits. There was nothing but enthusiasm about my voice, nothing that could be interpreted as lying, yet they both got that same weird look on their faces and proceeded to flat-out ignore my statement. I didn’t consider them my friends for another year after that. When I did see them in this timespan, I had a couple of sudden angry outbursts and did a lot of brooding because I couldn’t stand the tension, and their lack of respect.
- This is not so much about weather I am right about my suspicions or not, as my reactions to them. I will never, ever forget these incidents and is hyperaware of anything girlfriend A does or says to and about me. How ‘high’ she ranks me on her list of friends, and how ‘safe’ it will then be for me to continue seeing her. I am frequently angry with her and rarely experience gratitude for our friendship despite this being two years ago. We have been friends since I was four years old, so dumping her is not an option I would like to consider. I experience situations like this all the time if I try to get close to someone, and it is unbearable.
I obviously am not good with boyfriends either. I have only had one boyfriend – it lasted two months. The rest of my(vast) experiences with boys have been friends-with-benefits and one night stands.
My family I do fairly good with, but I was dramatically scapegoated as a child – the differential treatment was obvious to people outside the family, but the family itself kept stating that it was all in my head. Everyone accepted this – my cousins, parents, grandparents, etc. They all told me I was crazy, and when I entered my teenage years, I really did get delusional about it. Today we are all friends, which make my very clear and traumatic memories all the more disturbing. I hate that I am close to forgiving them, as I fear they will continue to damage me somehow(they don’t).
- Emotionally, I am the most lonely person I know. I have a host of other problems, but thought I doubt how much of it would really matter once my paranoia is gone. I cannot describe the hurt and deprivation that I have experienced as a result of my self-limiting behavior, or from past experiences. I never get used to feeling as bad as I do, but despite daily efforts and constant plotting on how to 'break out', nothing ever works. It just gets better in the same painfully slow way all by itself no matter what I do, but I will be too old before 'good enough' happens. I don't want to waste another year of my life, or day for that matter.
Does anyone have any kind of advice/opinion whatsoever, that is not therapy?
Is seeing a psychiatrist for an evaluation an option? Not therapy, but an evaluation for medications, if appropriate, and recommendations for further treatment?
posted by jaguar at 3:15 PM on April 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by jaguar at 3:15 PM on April 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
I am not a therapist or a psychiatrist, or any kind of mental health professional at all. I am speaking from a lay person's perspective in this answer.
Your question does sound to me like you're dealing with some kind of atypical thought patterns -- I feel like you're assigning some causality that doesn't really seem to me to exist, and perseverating on it past the point where it's useful or adaptive. (I'm happy to provide specific examples if you want, either here or in memail.) In my experience with other friends who have dealt with these kinds of thought patterns, they've gained great relief not from therapy but by seeing a psychiatrist who was able to prescribe medications to help nudge their cognition back to a more useful place. If you haven't already been evaluated by a psychiatrist, I'd recommend you go there next.
Good luck. You sound very unhappy and stressed, and I don't blame you at all. This sounds like a very frightening and upsetting way to live.
posted by KathrynT at 3:18 PM on April 1, 2015 [27 favorites]
Your question does sound to me like you're dealing with some kind of atypical thought patterns -- I feel like you're assigning some causality that doesn't really seem to me to exist, and perseverating on it past the point where it's useful or adaptive. (I'm happy to provide specific examples if you want, either here or in memail.) In my experience with other friends who have dealt with these kinds of thought patterns, they've gained great relief not from therapy but by seeing a psychiatrist who was able to prescribe medications to help nudge their cognition back to a more useful place. If you haven't already been evaluated by a psychiatrist, I'd recommend you go there next.
Good luck. You sound very unhappy and stressed, and I don't blame you at all. This sounds like a very frightening and upsetting way to live.
posted by KathrynT at 3:18 PM on April 1, 2015 [27 favorites]
I’m having a meeting with these people again on Wednesday. They will try to evaluate what kind of help I need and how urgent.
Can you share with them the description of your experiences that you've written here? I think it might be helpful to them to read your explanation of your situation in your own words, and without any barriers based on their perception of your interpersonal style.
posted by ocherdraco at 3:32 PM on April 1, 2015 [19 favorites]
Can you share with them the description of your experiences that you've written here? I think it might be helpful to them to read your explanation of your situation in your own words, and without any barriers based on their perception of your interpersonal style.
posted by ocherdraco at 3:32 PM on April 1, 2015 [19 favorites]
Print this out and take it to your therapist appointment, hand it to them to read.
posted by erst at 3:48 PM on April 1, 2015 [11 favorites]
posted by erst at 3:48 PM on April 1, 2015 [11 favorites]
Response by poster: Kathryn, I would love some specific examples. You can just write them here - I know how I appear, so don't be afraid to offend me. I'm feeling safe here behind my computer screen.
ocherdraco, I will show the psychiatrists this thread, but don't be too hopeful. I'm too angry/scared to be completely honest in therapy/psychiatry, so I have previosly suggested to psychologists that they read parts of my diary, but they were not interested in that. I just read erst's advice - I will do that.
I will follow people's advice on taking medication, butI think you all should know this: I have EXTENSIVE experiences with psychiatrists and psychologists. And medication has always had disastrous effects on me.
I have tried medications for anxiety, medications for ADHD,(despite not having problems with concentration) and anti-depressives, as well as medications to help me sleep. They either made me feel worse or completely numb, no matter how low the dose. If a therapist told me that this was the only thing they could do for me, I would probably kill myself. I know this sounds crude, but I have had much more succes with my previous self medication of alcohol and weed, than with any of their drugs, to be honest
I knew a girl in high school who was a paranoid schizophrenic - the anti-psychotics made her not see or hear things anymore, but she is a zombie now. The same with my chronically depressed mom. She is 'better' but not 'there'. I lost a big part of her when she started taking medication when I was 14. I have experienced this state on myself before due to medication, and I don't want to live like this. I am afraid that I will get even more trapped inside myself than I already am.
What I was really hoping for is some practical advice on what to do now. Anything!
People have gotten better from medication and therapy but these approaches alone are simply too passive for me. They will also be long-winded, and probably not work.
I know there is not a whole lot of paranoids/severealy socially phobic on MetaFilter to give me weirdly specific advice, but I have read various questions posted here on MetaFilter, and a lot of them had some creative answers or different perspectives. I know how very mentally ill I am, and that this is not as simple as 'What to do about my love for emotionally unavailable men?' or 'I am in love with my father in law, help?' or something, but please...? Anything without the help of professionals?
posted by ParanoidAndroid at 3:58 PM on April 1, 2015
ocherdraco, I will show the psychiatrists this thread, but don't be too hopeful. I'm too angry/scared to be completely honest in therapy/psychiatry, so I have previosly suggested to psychologists that they read parts of my diary, but they were not interested in that. I just read erst's advice - I will do that.
I will follow people's advice on taking medication, butI think you all should know this: I have EXTENSIVE experiences with psychiatrists and psychologists. And medication has always had disastrous effects on me.
I have tried medications for anxiety, medications for ADHD,(despite not having problems with concentration) and anti-depressives, as well as medications to help me sleep. They either made me feel worse or completely numb, no matter how low the dose. If a therapist told me that this was the only thing they could do for me, I would probably kill myself. I know this sounds crude, but I have had much more succes with my previous self medication of alcohol and weed, than with any of their drugs, to be honest
I knew a girl in high school who was a paranoid schizophrenic - the anti-psychotics made her not see or hear things anymore, but she is a zombie now. The same with my chronically depressed mom. She is 'better' but not 'there'. I lost a big part of her when she started taking medication when I was 14. I have experienced this state on myself before due to medication, and I don't want to live like this. I am afraid that I will get even more trapped inside myself than I already am.
What I was really hoping for is some practical advice on what to do now. Anything!
People have gotten better from medication and therapy but these approaches alone are simply too passive for me. They will also be long-winded, and probably not work.
I know there is not a whole lot of paranoids/severealy socially phobic on MetaFilter to give me weirdly specific advice, but I have read various questions posted here on MetaFilter, and a lot of them had some creative answers or different perspectives. I know how very mentally ill I am, and that this is not as simple as 'What to do about my love for emotionally unavailable men?' or 'I am in love with my father in law, help?' or something, but please...? Anything without the help of professionals?
posted by ParanoidAndroid at 3:58 PM on April 1, 2015
I have a milder form of what you're describing - quite a few things you wrote resonated with me. The stuff about being paranoid that when anybody laughs it's at you until proven otherwise, and about freaking out and having weird social reactions when you're feeling insecure, that's me to a T.
So, what's it all about? For me, I was friendless and bullied until I entered college, so I have a ton of childhood memories where they really were laughing at me, or where people would pretend to be my friend and then use it to bully me later. I know this isn't really what you want to hear, but the thing that helped me the most was therapy with a great therapist. I was able to learn about why I was reacting the way I was, and deal with those emotions so they didn't have the same grip on me anymore. Your quick dismissal of therapy is concerning because it's the tried and true way of dealing with anxieties.
That said, the first thing that came to mind for me, other than therapy, was mindfulness meditation. When I'm dealing with serious anxiety, I'm always living in the past, obsessing over what has gone wrong or future, worrying about what will go wrong, and never in the present. Meditation helped me get in touch with the present moment. There's a great free guide to vipassana meditation out there, google it.
Also, there are a few points where I think challenging yourself, or having a therapist challenge you, might be a good thing. For example, you say "We didn’t talk for a while, and when we did, girlfriend A and girlfriend B had obviously engaged in trash talking about me, and they now both believed that I was a liar about random things – they gave away very clear signs of this without actually saying it out loud.". How, specifically, did they communicate this? Are you 100% sure this is what they were communicating? How do you know? Are the signs they gave you always signs of distrust, or is there some ambiguity in the situation? I don't know the answers, but if you are truly being paranoid it is quite possible you have misunderstood something.
The same thing with this - "At the party, I mentioned the only good news that I had: I had met a guy, sort of a friends-with-benefits. There was nothing but enthusiasm about my voice, nothing that could be interpreted as lying, yet they both got that same weird look on their faces and proceeded to flat-out ignore my statement." - how do you know this was about you lying? If you really think you're being paranoid socially, challenge those times where you assert something you don't really have proof over. Again, a good therapist will help with this.
posted by zug at 4:13 PM on April 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
So, what's it all about? For me, I was friendless and bullied until I entered college, so I have a ton of childhood memories where they really were laughing at me, or where people would pretend to be my friend and then use it to bully me later. I know this isn't really what you want to hear, but the thing that helped me the most was therapy with a great therapist. I was able to learn about why I was reacting the way I was, and deal with those emotions so they didn't have the same grip on me anymore. Your quick dismissal of therapy is concerning because it's the tried and true way of dealing with anxieties.
That said, the first thing that came to mind for me, other than therapy, was mindfulness meditation. When I'm dealing with serious anxiety, I'm always living in the past, obsessing over what has gone wrong or future, worrying about what will go wrong, and never in the present. Meditation helped me get in touch with the present moment. There's a great free guide to vipassana meditation out there, google it.
Also, there are a few points where I think challenging yourself, or having a therapist challenge you, might be a good thing. For example, you say "We didn’t talk for a while, and when we did, girlfriend A and girlfriend B had obviously engaged in trash talking about me, and they now both believed that I was a liar about random things – they gave away very clear signs of this without actually saying it out loud.". How, specifically, did they communicate this? Are you 100% sure this is what they were communicating? How do you know? Are the signs they gave you always signs of distrust, or is there some ambiguity in the situation? I don't know the answers, but if you are truly being paranoid it is quite possible you have misunderstood something.
The same thing with this - "At the party, I mentioned the only good news that I had: I had met a guy, sort of a friends-with-benefits. There was nothing but enthusiasm about my voice, nothing that could be interpreted as lying, yet they both got that same weird look on their faces and proceeded to flat-out ignore my statement." - how do you know this was about you lying? If you really think you're being paranoid socially, challenge those times where you assert something you don't really have proof over. Again, a good therapist will help with this.
posted by zug at 4:13 PM on April 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
I also think that if you can't verbally communicate stuff to therapists, continuing to write stuff up for them to read might be a good way to get over the initial hump. I also think it's very interesting you mentioned that you were feeling anger about the idea of therapists. What's that about?
posted by zug at 4:14 PM on April 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by zug at 4:14 PM on April 1, 2015 [3 favorites]
You're at an age when a lot of various mental health issues can start to emerge, and it's extremely common -- and extremely frustrating, I realize -- to bounce around with different diagnoses for several years as symptoms emerge and change and everyone tries to figure out what's going on. Sometimes professionals don't want to or can't (because of diagnostic criteria) assign diagnoses for serious mental illnesses for clients or patients without a longer history of symptoms. It may look like they don't know what they're doing (and, of course, there are cases where the professionals don't know what they're doing), but often they may be trying to assign the least-serious and most-treatable diagnosis that covers the symptoms until it doesn't fit.
You mentioned paranoid personality disorder. It is probably worth bringing up your concern that you have a personality disorder with your treatment team. There can be times that treating professionals do hide a personality disorder diagnosis from clients (for both good and bad reasons), but they may be more open about it if you bring up the possibility first.
posted by jaguar at 4:17 PM on April 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
You mentioned paranoid personality disorder. It is probably worth bringing up your concern that you have a personality disorder with your treatment team. There can be times that treating professionals do hide a personality disorder diagnosis from clients (for both good and bad reasons), but they may be more open about it if you bring up the possibility first.
posted by jaguar at 4:17 PM on April 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
What I was really hoping for is some practical advice on what to do now. Anything!
Buy and work through the Anxiety and Phobia Workbook. It isn't therapy -- for good or for ill!! -- but it will very much help you to develop tools as to how to reasonably evaluate the chances of your worries being real or likely. I can't promise it will be useful, though it has helped several friends of mine overcome some really crippling anxieties, but it is very, very unlikely to be harmful.
posted by KathrynT at 4:39 PM on April 1, 2015 [5 favorites]
Buy and work through the Anxiety and Phobia Workbook. It isn't therapy -- for good or for ill!! -- but it will very much help you to develop tools as to how to reasonably evaluate the chances of your worries being real or likely. I can't promise it will be useful, though it has helped several friends of mine overcome some really crippling anxieties, but it is very, very unlikely to be harmful.
posted by KathrynT at 4:39 PM on April 1, 2015 [5 favorites]
I was bullied quite a bit as a child by neighbors who were expected to be friends. I found it hard to take people at face value.
I short circuited the issue by approaching friendships as a one way street. I would try and spend time with someone, because I liked to spend time with someone. If they didn't like spending time with me, that was on them. And if they continually avoided my invitations, I would eventually get bored of trying to plan things with them. It wasn't taking a hint that they disliked me because that was giving into a negative paranoid voice of mine that often lied. It was simply orienting my life in a way that let me focus on the people who make me feel less lonely.
This means making peace with the idea that some folks you run into don't like you. But you already have enough experience with that to know it's true. And if you step back, you realize it's normally not about you. So be gracious and let them be petty gossips to help their self esteem. Not because they deserve it, but because it will allow you to stop carrying that weight.
[Ed note: this is not the healthiest way to deal with it. But it's how I got through middle school and high school before I felt capable of doing real work on myself. It's a defensive strategy, not to be confused for real wisdom.]
posted by politikitty at 4:47 PM on April 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
I short circuited the issue by approaching friendships as a one way street. I would try and spend time with someone, because I liked to spend time with someone. If they didn't like spending time with me, that was on them. And if they continually avoided my invitations, I would eventually get bored of trying to plan things with them. It wasn't taking a hint that they disliked me because that was giving into a negative paranoid voice of mine that often lied. It was simply orienting my life in a way that let me focus on the people who make me feel less lonely.
This means making peace with the idea that some folks you run into don't like you. But you already have enough experience with that to know it's true. And if you step back, you realize it's normally not about you. So be gracious and let them be petty gossips to help their self esteem. Not because they deserve it, but because it will allow you to stop carrying that weight.
[Ed note: this is not the healthiest way to deal with it. But it's how I got through middle school and high school before I felt capable of doing real work on myself. It's a defensive strategy, not to be confused for real wisdom.]
posted by politikitty at 4:47 PM on April 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
"Emotionally, I am the most lonely person I know."
I promise you a zillion times that you don't know who has a great poker face, and who is really suffering behind their mask. I actually LOL'd when I read that.
On a practical level, you don't seem to know of the concept that perspective is 99% of impression and opinion. Some of that comes with age and experience. You can learn the skill in therapy, too.
posted by jbenben at 4:55 PM on April 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
I promise you a zillion times that you don't know who has a great poker face, and who is really suffering behind their mask. I actually LOL'd when I read that.
On a practical level, you don't seem to know of the concept that perspective is 99% of impression and opinion. Some of that comes with age and experience. You can learn the skill in therapy, too.
posted by jbenben at 4:55 PM on April 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
The pot smoking may very well be contributing to your paranoia. Using may help you feel better in the immediate term, but overall it could be having the opposite effect.
If you aren't willing to try therapy again it would be worth taking a hiatus from the drugs and alcohol. If abstaining from substances doesn't seem doable, then please consider talking to a counselor about possible issues with substance abuse.
posted by TheCavorter at 5:04 PM on April 1, 2015 [12 favorites]
If you aren't willing to try therapy again it would be worth taking a hiatus from the drugs and alcohol. If abstaining from substances doesn't seem doable, then please consider talking to a counselor about possible issues with substance abuse.
posted by TheCavorter at 5:04 PM on April 1, 2015 [12 favorites]
Kathryn, I would love some specific examples. You can just write them here - I know how I appear, so don't be afraid to offend me. I'm feeling safe here behind my computer screen.
:-) Thanks for the disclaimer, I really appreciate it. I want to stress that this is just my impression as a lay person who has known friends who have had similar issues; I'm not you and I wasn't there. But I do hold this impression pretty strongly.
Again, I am not a mental health professional of any kind. I just have a handful of long-term friends who have had issues with selectively reinforcing certain kinds of experiences into a worldview which was intensely painful for them, but which had very little to do with objective reality, and the similarities were strong enough that I felt compelled to call them out.
posted by KathrynT at 5:23 PM on April 1, 2015 [11 favorites]
:-) Thanks for the disclaimer, I really appreciate it. I want to stress that this is just my impression as a lay person who has known friends who have had similar issues; I'm not you and I wasn't there. But I do hold this impression pretty strongly.
I have quite a lot of in-your-face ‘proof’ of this[. . .] I believe that everyone who is laughing is laughing at me – and unless I get absolute proof of the opposite, I will never be able to convince myself to calm down.This was the first thing that leaped out at me. I just quoted this part because it's not really relevant to my impression whether I think the things you describe are likely or unlikely; what raised my curiosity was the emphasis you placed on having objective, incontrovertible support for your experiences. That's not SO uncommon, but in my experience, it often goes along with having some distorted cognition.
then something suspicious happens, I obsess over it and try to covertly confront the person(somehow). [. . .] When they stop contacting me, I always assume that they were trying to use me in some way, and it didn’t work out, so they gave up and moved on. [. . .] I will feel weak for succumbing to my need of having friends when they are ‘obviously’ all making fun of me behind my back.This is a really good (and pretty freaking self-aware) example of the perseveration thing I mentioned. A suspicion turns into an obsession, the obsession turns into a justification for isolation and self-blame. Your thought processes seem from your description to always ratchet towards more intense and more universal, and never loop back to "what if I misinterpreted this? what if I give this person the benefit of the doubt? What's the worst that could happen?" Whether or not your suspicions have a rational basis, this is exhausting and stressful and it would probably help you to be able to break that pattern.
girlfriend A and girlfriend B had obviously engaged in trash talking about me, and they now both believed that I was a liar about random things – they gave away very clear signs of this without actually saying it out loud.This is the sort of thing I mean about "assigning causality where none may exist." These women did say they didn't believe you about one specific thing, but you don't actually know that they engaged in trash talking or that they believe you are a liar overall. That's an impression you've formed from subtle signs and signals, and which you clearly believe to be incontrovertibly true and correct, to the point where you ended the friendship. However, it's totally possible for that sort of thing to happen as the result of over-zealous pattern matching from an anxious mind, where your brain assigns outsize influence and importance to inconsequential or random events. If that "pattern" matches previous experiences, then it gets filed away not just as fact but as reinforcement for the previous events, which makes you even more likely to draw these same conclusions next time. The whole thing can get very unpleasantly self-reinforcing.
Again, I am not a mental health professional of any kind. I just have a handful of long-term friends who have had issues with selectively reinforcing certain kinds of experiences into a worldview which was intensely painful for them, but which had very little to do with objective reality, and the similarities were strong enough that I felt compelled to call them out.
posted by KathrynT at 5:23 PM on April 1, 2015 [11 favorites]
I will suggest you work on eating better and taking care of your physical health. "A sound mind in a sound body."
I suffer from maladaptive daydreaming, meaning I daydream constantly without being able to control it – this leads to a lot of social anxiety-inducing traits such as tics, making facial expressions, talking with myself, and just generally acting detached.
This description sounds a bit like when I was extremely ill and mostly bedridden and the second I would close my eyes, I would start hallucinating conversations with The Grim Reaper and things like that. I would enter this really vivid, bizarre landscape of a sort I had only read about in various works of fiction and it seemed very real in some sense. As I got physically healthier, I stopped doing that. My brain was permanently changed by going through that and I have more visual stuff that goes on in my head than before my medical crisis, but I no longer have this just runaway train of an internal world now that I am physically healthier.
One of the things I did while working to get healthier is I took supplements known to be important for brain health, such as B vitamins. So I would say do some research, keep a journal of what you eat and of whatever symptoms or events seem pertinent to you, and try some supplements.
You can memail me if you want off the cuff speculation about what types of supplements you might try, what are some "best practices" for trying stuff and seeing what works, and where you might look online for more info.
I will also suggest that if you are functional enough to attend college or get a job elsewhere, you consider moving away from your home town. A lot of people who grow up with mental health issues do get just downright abusive responses from people around them and then that sets up negative patterns that become impossible to fully resolve no matter how much therapy you do because no matter how much YOUR behavior changes, the behavior of other people persists in these patterns. Most people are terrible about not being very helpful when you want to really change. (They usually aren't trying to be difficult. They usually just don't really know any better, basically.)
So you might find it a whole lot easier to change your behaviors and thought patterns by following the advice common in addiction treatment of "change your people, your places and your things." Though that assumes you have the wherewithal to arrange a big move, which is challenging in its own right. Maybe you aren't in a good space for making that happen.
Best of luck.
posted by Michele in California at 6:03 PM on April 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
I suffer from maladaptive daydreaming, meaning I daydream constantly without being able to control it – this leads to a lot of social anxiety-inducing traits such as tics, making facial expressions, talking with myself, and just generally acting detached.
This description sounds a bit like when I was extremely ill and mostly bedridden and the second I would close my eyes, I would start hallucinating conversations with The Grim Reaper and things like that. I would enter this really vivid, bizarre landscape of a sort I had only read about in various works of fiction and it seemed very real in some sense. As I got physically healthier, I stopped doing that. My brain was permanently changed by going through that and I have more visual stuff that goes on in my head than before my medical crisis, but I no longer have this just runaway train of an internal world now that I am physically healthier.
One of the things I did while working to get healthier is I took supplements known to be important for brain health, such as B vitamins. So I would say do some research, keep a journal of what you eat and of whatever symptoms or events seem pertinent to you, and try some supplements.
You can memail me if you want off the cuff speculation about what types of supplements you might try, what are some "best practices" for trying stuff and seeing what works, and where you might look online for more info.
I will also suggest that if you are functional enough to attend college or get a job elsewhere, you consider moving away from your home town. A lot of people who grow up with mental health issues do get just downright abusive responses from people around them and then that sets up negative patterns that become impossible to fully resolve no matter how much therapy you do because no matter how much YOUR behavior changes, the behavior of other people persists in these patterns. Most people are terrible about not being very helpful when you want to really change. (They usually aren't trying to be difficult. They usually just don't really know any better, basically.)
So you might find it a whole lot easier to change your behaviors and thought patterns by following the advice common in addiction treatment of "change your people, your places and your things." Though that assumes you have the wherewithal to arrange a big move, which is challenging in its own right. Maybe you aren't in a good space for making that happen.
Best of luck.
posted by Michele in California at 6:03 PM on April 1, 2015 [2 favorites]
I'm sorry you're going through this, I know it must be very difficult. I'm not sure if this will be helpful, but one thing that resonated with me was that you are believing everything you think. I used to do this a lot, and I feel like it was a negative thought pattern or habit of thinking that made me lonely, self-conscious and socially anxious.
What helped me was working on the negative thought patterns with a therapist, who I think was somewhere in between CBT with a hefty dose of mindfullness. Basically I (if memory serves) started to break the habit by recognizing that the story I told myself was just that. So taking an example from your post:
I have to go, so I'll try and give some concrete things:
- be aware that just because you think something, it doesn't make it true (some phrases that help me: don't believe everything you think, my brain is telling me stories,
- Check out the book "Loving what is", it's cheesy (IMO) but it helped give me some concrete tools for question some of my negative thought patterns and beliefs
- Mindfulness and buddhism, as much as you want, maybe "Punk rock zen" if the more theological or mystic buddhism isn't your thing. For me it's a practical philosophy that helped me understand how my negative thought patterns contributed to my suffering, amongst other things.
I hope something here is helpful, I hope you keep trying to find a therapist/psychiatrist who can help you.
[I have to go, but if you have any questions I'll be back online tonight or tomorrow]
posted by pennypiper at 6:06 PM on April 1, 2015 [4 favorites]
What helped me was working on the negative thought patterns with a therapist, who I think was somewhere in between CBT with a hefty dose of mindfullness. Basically I (if memory serves) started to break the habit by recognizing that the story I told myself was just that. So taking an example from your post:
girlfriend A and girlfriend B had obviously engaged in trash talking about me, and they now both believed that I was a liar about random things – they gave away very clear signs of this without actually saying it out loud.I think this is actually a story you told yourself based on actions or body language- maybe they looked at each other, or one rolled their eyes, or one seemed distant. The thing is, every one of those actions could be the result of a very different story. This is very related to what KathrynT described as "assigning causality where none may exist."
I have to go, so I'll try and give some concrete things:
- be aware that just because you think something, it doesn't make it true (some phrases that help me: don't believe everything you think, my brain is telling me stories,
- Check out the book "Loving what is", it's cheesy (IMO) but it helped give me some concrete tools for question some of my negative thought patterns and beliefs
- Mindfulness and buddhism, as much as you want, maybe "Punk rock zen" if the more theological or mystic buddhism isn't your thing. For me it's a practical philosophy that helped me understand how my negative thought patterns contributed to my suffering, amongst other things.
I hope something here is helpful, I hope you keep trying to find a therapist/psychiatrist who can help you.
[I have to go, but if you have any questions I'll be back online tonight or tomorrow]
posted by pennypiper at 6:06 PM on April 1, 2015 [4 favorites]
Response by poster: politikitty, I love that approach, so creative . I tend to be way too nice/brooding/passive, and have this extreme fear of people taking advantage of me, kindof a self-fulfilling prophecy. Your perspective could make everything a little less stressful for me.
zug, I believe that meditation is a wonderful tool, but I can't do that stuff without getting a severe tension headache for days afterwards. I just think I am too dissociated and distant for it to work, ironically.
I think challenging myself would be a great idea, though. Verbally assaulting my neighbour was the incident that made me realize that I was delusional, and I think I need all the clarity I can get.
I have a hard time explaining how a person who looks at you in 'disbelief' looks like, and how my experience is in any way trustworthy. Let's just say that I have seen this girl react similarly to minor incidents from other people, and I know her quite well. She is very passive aggressive and this time her 'faces'(because she wouldn't dare communicate in actual words) were very demonstrative.
I am angry with my previous therapists because I think they are too quick to look for solutions to outer problems without knowing about my inner life. They think I need help in understanding social cues or how to clean my house or whatever, not therapy. I have wanted therapy for 10 years! I know fully well how I appear(if they'd just ask I could tell them, you know?) and I can read social cues except for those related to being overly paranoid - I'm usually great at parties and from people who has met me there, I am known as this very social, communicative and entertaining person. But therapy, doctors, people on the street or people in class, activate this kind of fight-or-flight thing in my head. I cannot appear natural to save my life and I am always hyperfocused on my social incompetence. The anger against others, I think, is some kind of hidden lashing-out for making me feel this way.
Kathryn, I have distorted cognition for sure. But I have been bullied by complete strangers, and it has been confirmed by relatives. A guy I used to sleep with told me that a friend said I was the 'village' idiot due to my tics and that their friends laughed at me once on the bus... I just don't want people to invalidate my experiences as pure psychosis
I also know that I am very distorted when it comes to friendships! You are completely right that it spirals out of control. The only reason I know that I am wrong is that I have had so many friends that it would be impossible for them to all conspire against me. So I know I am wrong about some people, but I can never point out who.
You may not be a therapist but you sound smarter than most of them.
Michele in California, I'm currently working on this. I feel so much better with excercise and a great diet! It is hard to change habits when being so detached from the world, but it is slowly getting easier for me. I have moved 6 from city to city 6 times for the last 7 years. My tics will quickly make me quite a celebrity if there is only bus to town, though.
pennypiper, I know that I think this way for the most part. My problem is my inabliity to stop obsessing about it, my overreactions, and that I cannot tell what is in my head and what is real. The worst part is not my thoughts, but my involuntary emotional reactions. Even if I think nothing, the stress of feeling persecuted will be there
posted by ParanoidAndroid at 6:15 PM on April 1, 2015
zug, I believe that meditation is a wonderful tool, but I can't do that stuff without getting a severe tension headache for days afterwards. I just think I am too dissociated and distant for it to work, ironically.
I think challenging myself would be a great idea, though. Verbally assaulting my neighbour was the incident that made me realize that I was delusional, and I think I need all the clarity I can get.
I have a hard time explaining how a person who looks at you in 'disbelief' looks like, and how my experience is in any way trustworthy. Let's just say that I have seen this girl react similarly to minor incidents from other people, and I know her quite well. She is very passive aggressive and this time her 'faces'(because she wouldn't dare communicate in actual words) were very demonstrative.
I am angry with my previous therapists because I think they are too quick to look for solutions to outer problems without knowing about my inner life. They think I need help in understanding social cues or how to clean my house or whatever, not therapy. I have wanted therapy for 10 years! I know fully well how I appear(if they'd just ask I could tell them, you know?) and I can read social cues except for those related to being overly paranoid - I'm usually great at parties and from people who has met me there, I am known as this very social, communicative and entertaining person. But therapy, doctors, people on the street or people in class, activate this kind of fight-or-flight thing in my head. I cannot appear natural to save my life and I am always hyperfocused on my social incompetence. The anger against others, I think, is some kind of hidden lashing-out for making me feel this way.
Kathryn, I have distorted cognition for sure. But I have been bullied by complete strangers, and it has been confirmed by relatives. A guy I used to sleep with told me that a friend said I was the 'village' idiot due to my tics and that their friends laughed at me once on the bus... I just don't want people to invalidate my experiences as pure psychosis
I also know that I am very distorted when it comes to friendships! You are completely right that it spirals out of control. The only reason I know that I am wrong is that I have had so many friends that it would be impossible for them to all conspire against me. So I know I am wrong about some people, but I can never point out who.
You may not be a therapist but you sound smarter than most of them.
Michele in California, I'm currently working on this. I feel so much better with excercise and a great diet! It is hard to change habits when being so detached from the world, but it is slowly getting easier for me. I have moved 6 from city to city 6 times for the last 7 years. My tics will quickly make me quite a celebrity if there is only bus to town, though.
pennypiper, I know that I think this way for the most part. My problem is my inabliity to stop obsessing about it, my overreactions, and that I cannot tell what is in my head and what is real. The worst part is not my thoughts, but my involuntary emotional reactions. Even if I think nothing, the stress of feeling persecuted will be there
posted by ParanoidAndroid at 6:15 PM on April 1, 2015
My problem is my inabliity to stop obsessing
FWIW, my youngest son gets kind of OCD when he has fungal issues and/or vitamin deficiencies. For a time, we bought Disney Princess Gummi Vitamins and he took those by the handful and it would keep his OCD tendencies under control enough to not make him and everyone around him crazy. As we learned about the fungal issues, we cleaned up hidden mold in the apartment and things like that and eventually left that mold-infested hell hole and now he is usually not obsessive and no longer needs the vitamins.
posted by Michele in California at 6:19 PM on April 1, 2015
FWIW, my youngest son gets kind of OCD when he has fungal issues and/or vitamin deficiencies. For a time, we bought Disney Princess Gummi Vitamins and he took those by the handful and it would keep his OCD tendencies under control enough to not make him and everyone around him crazy. As we learned about the fungal issues, we cleaned up hidden mold in the apartment and things like that and eventually left that mold-infested hell hole and now he is usually not obsessive and no longer needs the vitamins.
posted by Michele in California at 6:19 PM on April 1, 2015
But I have been bullied by complete strangers, and it has been confirmed by relatives.
I'm really with you on a lot of this, and I'm with you on this. I understand. I truly do. But is it possible that this bullying that you first, sometimes genuinely experience, and secondly, sometimes may be misinterpreting, is actually common?
I'm asking you this because I had two experiences yesterday that felt like true 'bullying' to me -- I was hurt -- why were these people so mean? and in retrospect, I think that 'coming across assholes being jerks to you' isn't a super uncommon experience.
One of my experiences was with a flight attendant. The other was with a manager in a store. Today I overheard a repellent conversation between my husband and an admin in a doctor's office--where she really was, for lack of a better term, being a dick to him.
I'm saying: one, there are cases where per KathrynT, you're possibly wrong and also two, cases where--the world is sometimes hurtful and others are having kind of a crap day and for those of us who are sensitive and prone to repeated obsessive not-super-productive thoughts, those tiny moments can turn into a Great Personal Narrative when really we're talking about the natural course of human existence and while I don't think that's the conclusive answer to your question it might be a useful preliminary step toward fitting these realities into an authentic narrative that isn't paranoid or bullshitty but is genuinely truthful about yourself and the world.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 6:44 PM on April 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
I'm really with you on a lot of this, and I'm with you on this. I understand. I truly do. But is it possible that this bullying that you first, sometimes genuinely experience, and secondly, sometimes may be misinterpreting, is actually common?
I'm asking you this because I had two experiences yesterday that felt like true 'bullying' to me -- I was hurt -- why were these people so mean? and in retrospect, I think that 'coming across assholes being jerks to you' isn't a super uncommon experience.
One of my experiences was with a flight attendant. The other was with a manager in a store. Today I overheard a repellent conversation between my husband and an admin in a doctor's office--where she really was, for lack of a better term, being a dick to him.
I'm saying: one, there are cases where per KathrynT, you're possibly wrong and also two, cases where--the world is sometimes hurtful and others are having kind of a crap day and for those of us who are sensitive and prone to repeated obsessive not-super-productive thoughts, those tiny moments can turn into a Great Personal Narrative when really we're talking about the natural course of human existence and while I don't think that's the conclusive answer to your question it might be a useful preliminary step toward fitting these realities into an authentic narrative that isn't paranoid or bullshitty but is genuinely truthful about yourself and the world.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 6:44 PM on April 1, 2015 [6 favorites]
I don't think anything wrong with you physiologically is at the root of your problems, ParanoidAndroid; I think they are part of a pattern of adaptation to the way your family has treated you and is treating you.
You are aware of what they did to you -- which is a huge step many people with similar backgrounds have not taken in an entire lifetime -- but knowing such a thing and being able to really take it in and deal with it on an emotional level are two very different things because of the enormous costs of really coming to grips with it.
You're paranoid about everybody, and suspicious, and rejecting, and do whatever it takes to sabotage relationships because if you were ever to allow anybody else in enough to have a real friendship or love affair, the elaborate fantasy you've constructed that lets you believe your family loves you despite how they treated you would collapse like a castle of tempered glass struck by a hammer, just from the force of the contrast.
In short, you have to find ways to make everybody else as bad as or worse than your famiy in order to continue to hold onto the fantasy of being loved and valued -- and in the case of your family, that evidently takes some doing!
I believe you will need to give your family up, possibly for years, in order to overcome this paranoia, and that you will probably end up hating them during the process, all while you are feeling more lonely, isolated and vulnerable than you can ever remember.
It will be an extremely difficult passage, in other words, but I am convinced genuinely loving relationships await you on the other side.
(P.S. I see your attraction to the idea you have Paranoid Personality Disorder as part of your strategy to blame yourself rather than your family for the way they treat you.)
posted by jamjam at 8:08 PM on April 1, 2015 [7 favorites]
You are aware of what they did to you -- which is a huge step many people with similar backgrounds have not taken in an entire lifetime -- but knowing such a thing and being able to really take it in and deal with it on an emotional level are two very different things because of the enormous costs of really coming to grips with it.
You're paranoid about everybody, and suspicious, and rejecting, and do whatever it takes to sabotage relationships because if you were ever to allow anybody else in enough to have a real friendship or love affair, the elaborate fantasy you've constructed that lets you believe your family loves you despite how they treated you would collapse like a castle of tempered glass struck by a hammer, just from the force of the contrast.
In short, you have to find ways to make everybody else as bad as or worse than your famiy in order to continue to hold onto the fantasy of being loved and valued -- and in the case of your family, that evidently takes some doing!
I believe you will need to give your family up, possibly for years, in order to overcome this paranoia, and that you will probably end up hating them during the process, all while you are feeling more lonely, isolated and vulnerable than you can ever remember.
It will be an extremely difficult passage, in other words, but I am convinced genuinely loving relationships await you on the other side.
(P.S. I see your attraction to the idea you have Paranoid Personality Disorder as part of your strategy to blame yourself rather than your family for the way they treat you.)
posted by jamjam at 8:08 PM on April 1, 2015 [7 favorites]
I would second (third?) the recommendation for Cognitive Behavior Therapy. Since mindfulness (note: NOT meditation, per se) is appealing to you, I would encourage you to look at Dialectic Behavior Therapy, which has that as a component. They both tend to be "toolbox" approaches, where they provide you with tools to try to address the issues you're having, but they definitely require you to do work, to figure out what works for you. Do some googling, maybe, and see if it might be a good fit?
Also, your therapist only knows as much as you communicate to him/her. It's not really fair to say "they don't know about X." and "I'd tell them if they'd ask." If it's important to you, then communicate it to them, but CBT and DBT aren't the sort of approaches where you're necessarily/probably going to have deep conversations about childhood trauma on a regular basis. If you want to dig into that kind of thing, then, yeah, maybe group therapy (not a support group) or a more psychoanalytic approach would be the way to go. But I'm not really getting the feeling that that's gonna be the best way for you.
So, when you go in, if you do want to try a DBT or CBT approach, in addition to printing out what you typed in this post and handing it to them, say, "I would like to try" You say you're good at putting up a front, which means that you're going to have to self-advocate to get what you need.
posted by DebetEsse at 12:48 AM on April 2, 2015
Also, your therapist only knows as much as you communicate to him/her. It's not really fair to say "they don't know about X." and "I'd tell them if they'd ask." If it's important to you, then communicate it to them, but CBT and DBT aren't the sort of approaches where you're necessarily/probably going to have deep conversations about childhood trauma on a regular basis. If you want to dig into that kind of thing, then, yeah, maybe group therapy (not a support group) or a more psychoanalytic approach would be the way to go. But I'm not really getting the feeling that that's gonna be the best way for you.
So, when you go in, if you do want to try a DBT or CBT approach, in addition to printing out what you typed in this post and handing it to them, say, "I would like to try
posted by DebetEsse at 12:48 AM on April 2, 2015
I think the only responsible advice we can possible give OP here is that she needs the help of competent medical professionals. All this stuff about vitamins and so on... I don't know, I don't think it's helpful. OP needs to be evaluated by a doctor or psychiatrist and given the help she needs.
We're not doctors or shrinks and we shouldn't try to play one on TV.
posted by Justinian at 12:55 AM on April 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
We're not doctors or shrinks and we shouldn't try to play one on TV.
posted by Justinian at 12:55 AM on April 2, 2015 [8 favorites]
My brother has a disorder that includes paranoia. It's excruciatingly difficult for him. Many of the things you've said resonate with me. In particular, that people don't believe you or your perceptions.
As for what you can do right now, I'm going to address your desires one at a time:
"What I want the most is - obviously - to be able to let people in."
This demonstrates extreme self-awareness. You've already taken the most difficult step toward change, so some kudos are in order here. This is, I'm sure you'll agree, a long-term goal. That is, there are things you can do today to keep moving toward this goal, but there is no quick win on this one. You have to get there incrementally.
"I want to be able to receive therapy..."
This is a mid-term goal. You can take immediate steps today on this one--and start building up incremental steps toward your long-term goal. Developing a trusting relationship with a therapist can take a long time. You go through people who aren't a good fit. Then there are those who don't get you at all, or whose style is grating. Or who just want to give you pills without listening. I've been there.
Is there any therapist you've ever clicked with in any way? If so, I'm going to suggest this as a short-term step: Call up that therapist today, right now, even if you don't live in that city anymore. Ask him/her for a referral. Tell them you'd like a productive therapy relationship with someone where you are now. If they can't give one, for whatever reason, ask them who can. Don't stop, don't give up. This helps get you to long-term goal of letting people in. Tell them there are issues interfering with your daily life, so it's a pressing need, not some kind of optional "nice to have."
If there's no therapist or other person you trust to help you find a referral, use a referral service. If you're in the US, go to the Anerican Psychological Association's locator service at http://locator.apa.org to search for someone nearby.
"I want to have friends, possibly even a boyfriend..."
This is a long-term goal, but totally doable. I think you see that you'll need to get into a good therapeutic relationship to be able to recognize and develop healthy friendships and romantic attachments first. There's nothing wrong with having this need, by the way. Tons of people who walk around with no paranoia also need therapeutic help to understand their own thoughts and behaviors so they can form long-lasting healthy relationships.
"I want to be able to walk in public without getting majorly depressed afterwards. I want to feel safe."
This is either a mid- or long-term goal, depending on the causes of your depression and fear. I know you said you hate some types of medication because they make you feel dead. I'm here to suggest maybe a different medication--one that doesn't make you feel that way--can help chemically disrupt some of your anxiety in an immediate short-term way so you can at least begin to feel some ease walking around and being in public. I think this is a pretty important step you can take almost immediately (as soon as you can get to a doctor and outline your severe anxiety, anyway) toward achieving your long-term goals listed above.
Chemically tamping down the social anxiety so you can just get somewhere without feeling unsafe or overwhelmed seems like a really doable step in achieving some of your long-term goals. Do you have a medical doctor you go to? Patient First and other doc-in-a-box places will sometimes treat social anxiety in acute cases, but it would be better if you went to your primary doc, or even your gynecologist for help. The important thing is that a doctor helps treat your anxiety so you have enough social stamina to start executing on your goals.
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 1:37 AM on April 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
As for what you can do right now, I'm going to address your desires one at a time:
"What I want the most is - obviously - to be able to let people in."
This demonstrates extreme self-awareness. You've already taken the most difficult step toward change, so some kudos are in order here. This is, I'm sure you'll agree, a long-term goal. That is, there are things you can do today to keep moving toward this goal, but there is no quick win on this one. You have to get there incrementally.
"I want to be able to receive therapy..."
This is a mid-term goal. You can take immediate steps today on this one--and start building up incremental steps toward your long-term goal. Developing a trusting relationship with a therapist can take a long time. You go through people who aren't a good fit. Then there are those who don't get you at all, or whose style is grating. Or who just want to give you pills without listening. I've been there.
Is there any therapist you've ever clicked with in any way? If so, I'm going to suggest this as a short-term step: Call up that therapist today, right now, even if you don't live in that city anymore. Ask him/her for a referral. Tell them you'd like a productive therapy relationship with someone where you are now. If they can't give one, for whatever reason, ask them who can. Don't stop, don't give up. This helps get you to long-term goal of letting people in. Tell them there are issues interfering with your daily life, so it's a pressing need, not some kind of optional "nice to have."
If there's no therapist or other person you trust to help you find a referral, use a referral service. If you're in the US, go to the Anerican Psychological Association's locator service at http://locator.apa.org to search for someone nearby.
"I want to have friends, possibly even a boyfriend..."
This is a long-term goal, but totally doable. I think you see that you'll need to get into a good therapeutic relationship to be able to recognize and develop healthy friendships and romantic attachments first. There's nothing wrong with having this need, by the way. Tons of people who walk around with no paranoia also need therapeutic help to understand their own thoughts and behaviors so they can form long-lasting healthy relationships.
"I want to be able to walk in public without getting majorly depressed afterwards. I want to feel safe."
This is either a mid- or long-term goal, depending on the causes of your depression and fear. I know you said you hate some types of medication because they make you feel dead. I'm here to suggest maybe a different medication--one that doesn't make you feel that way--can help chemically disrupt some of your anxiety in an immediate short-term way so you can at least begin to feel some ease walking around and being in public. I think this is a pretty important step you can take almost immediately (as soon as you can get to a doctor and outline your severe anxiety, anyway) toward achieving your long-term goals listed above.
Chemically tamping down the social anxiety so you can just get somewhere without feeling unsafe or overwhelmed seems like a really doable step in achieving some of your long-term goals. Do you have a medical doctor you go to? Patient First and other doc-in-a-box places will sometimes treat social anxiety in acute cases, but it would be better if you went to your primary doc, or even your gynecologist for help. The important thing is that a doctor helps treat your anxiety so you have enough social stamina to start executing on your goals.
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 1:37 AM on April 2, 2015 [3 favorites]
My husband had/has many similar issues and the only way I could get psychiatrists and psychologists to actually treat him was to attend appointments with him. With me either validating or discussing my impression of events he talked about, and the professionals seeing how his distorted cognition would show up while talking to me (not obvious in a one-on-one meeting where everything he said was accepted at face value) they finally recognised they had misdiagnosed him and adjusted his treatment accordingly. The proper medication made a huge difference. Do you have anyone in your life that can come with you as an advocate to some appointments? Not all professionals are willing to be challenged in this way; it is hard on the advocate as well, but it may be a path to getting treatment targeted to your needs.
posted by saucysault at 4:28 AM on April 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by saucysault at 4:28 AM on April 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
I gave a list of ways to reframe negative/semi-paranoid thoughts in another thread in a slightly different context (the asker was certain that everyone who met her thought she was boring), but I think some of them could still be helpful in your situation:
"Whenever people do not speak to you, or talk to you briefly and then walk away, or seem uncomfortable around you (according to your instincts, that is), work on thinking thoughts like the following:
-this person just remembered that she promised to send an email to her boss and she forgot
-this person thinks that he is boring ME, and looks uncomfortable because he can't believe he is still so awkward at parties
-that person just realized she needs to change her tampon
-that person just saw his ex walk in the room and he is desperate to be somewhere else
-that person had to stay up late three nights in a row working on his dissertation, and the way he drifts into conversation and then out of it again is a result of his sleep deprivation
-that person spent the day crying because her cat is sick and she saw something that reminded her that her cat is sick and she is leaving before she starts crying in front of strangers
-that person just got a text (phone on silent, buzzed in his pocket) and he is hoping it is from his crush so he wants to go read it in private
-that person is still obsessing over something one of his coworkers said to him today and he is worried that he’s going to have to deal with the fallout Monday
-that person has social anxiety and had to bail
-that person has to blow his nose"
Add to this older list the idea that whenever you see people laughing, they are laughing at
-the stupid thing one of them just said to a barista
-the comment a mutual friend just made on Facebook that they read together
-a puppy that you can't see
-the pun-based name of a business that is on a sign behind you
-an email one of them got inviting them to an Amway party
It is true that sometimes people are jerks who point and laugh. But you seem persuaded that every laugh, every sigh, and every eyeblink is about you, and that they are all messages for you to decode. It just isn't possible for that to be true, because the majority of people are self-absorbed and thinking more about themselves than you. By training yourself to believe that people are reacting to things other than you (up until the point when someone specifically and explicitly says "I, right now, am making fun of you personally"), you get away from the toxic thought patterns that are currently causing you so much pain.
If I see a random person in public, then lean over to my friend and say something and we both burst out laughing, I can basically guarantee that there is a zero percent chance it had anything to do with that stranger I just looked at. Maybe they are wearing a scarf that makes me say "remember the scarf [our college friend] loaned to me during that snowstorm?" and then we both burst into laughter about the shared memory, which means our laughter was technically INSPIRED by the stranger we saw, but that it has nothing to do with that person at all.
You are creating suffering for yourself by believing that the majority of the people around you are invested in you to the point that they would find it worthwhile to plot against you, even in minor social ways. I know one person in the world who tries to live her life like that, and every single one of our mutual acquaintances thinks it is sad that she thinks that way, and they feel sorry for her for thinking that trying to hurt other people is a good way to live her life. They do not go along with her attempts to recruit other people to participate, because it is gross.
Oh, and if you have friends who continue to care about you and hang out with you even though you sometimes fall off the map and/or accuse of them of conspiring against you, then they are most likely people who love you and actively overlook your accusations because they know you are in pain. You should dwell on their determination to remain friends with you, not long-past slights against you that were likely accidental or even nonexistent. They could avoid you forever if they wanted to, and the fact that they continue to seek you out means they want you in their life. That is a huge, huge compliment.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 7:11 AM on April 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
"Whenever people do not speak to you, or talk to you briefly and then walk away, or seem uncomfortable around you (according to your instincts, that is), work on thinking thoughts like the following:
-this person just remembered that she promised to send an email to her boss and she forgot
-this person thinks that he is boring ME, and looks uncomfortable because he can't believe he is still so awkward at parties
-that person just realized she needs to change her tampon
-that person just saw his ex walk in the room and he is desperate to be somewhere else
-that person had to stay up late three nights in a row working on his dissertation, and the way he drifts into conversation and then out of it again is a result of his sleep deprivation
-that person spent the day crying because her cat is sick and she saw something that reminded her that her cat is sick and she is leaving before she starts crying in front of strangers
-that person just got a text (phone on silent, buzzed in his pocket) and he is hoping it is from his crush so he wants to go read it in private
-that person is still obsessing over something one of his coworkers said to him today and he is worried that he’s going to have to deal with the fallout Monday
-that person has social anxiety and had to bail
-that person has to blow his nose"
Add to this older list the idea that whenever you see people laughing, they are laughing at
-the stupid thing one of them just said to a barista
-the comment a mutual friend just made on Facebook that they read together
-a puppy that you can't see
-the pun-based name of a business that is on a sign behind you
-an email one of them got inviting them to an Amway party
It is true that sometimes people are jerks who point and laugh. But you seem persuaded that every laugh, every sigh, and every eyeblink is about you, and that they are all messages for you to decode. It just isn't possible for that to be true, because the majority of people are self-absorbed and thinking more about themselves than you. By training yourself to believe that people are reacting to things other than you (up until the point when someone specifically and explicitly says "I, right now, am making fun of you personally"), you get away from the toxic thought patterns that are currently causing you so much pain.
If I see a random person in public, then lean over to my friend and say something and we both burst out laughing, I can basically guarantee that there is a zero percent chance it had anything to do with that stranger I just looked at. Maybe they are wearing a scarf that makes me say "remember the scarf [our college friend] loaned to me during that snowstorm?" and then we both burst into laughter about the shared memory, which means our laughter was technically INSPIRED by the stranger we saw, but that it has nothing to do with that person at all.
You are creating suffering for yourself by believing that the majority of the people around you are invested in you to the point that they would find it worthwhile to plot against you, even in minor social ways. I know one person in the world who tries to live her life like that, and every single one of our mutual acquaintances thinks it is sad that she thinks that way, and they feel sorry for her for thinking that trying to hurt other people is a good way to live her life. They do not go along with her attempts to recruit other people to participate, because it is gross.
Oh, and if you have friends who continue to care about you and hang out with you even though you sometimes fall off the map and/or accuse of them of conspiring against you, then they are most likely people who love you and actively overlook your accusations because they know you are in pain. You should dwell on their determination to remain friends with you, not long-past slights against you that were likely accidental or even nonexistent. They could avoid you forever if they wanted to, and the fact that they continue to seek you out means they want you in their life. That is a huge, huge compliment.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 7:11 AM on April 2, 2015 [4 favorites]
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posted by I EAT TAPAS at 3:13 PM on April 1, 2015 [2 favorites]