Personality disorders stigma?

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It's really astonishing how horrible some people can be.

Schizoid PD-Extreme Introversion. Well okay, not sure why that's a PD, but apparently it is. Damn extroverts.
Borderline PD-Mostly caused by past child abuse. Is child abuse now somebodies fault?
Avoidant PD-Pretty much extreme social anxiety...
Obsessive-Compulsive PD-Extreme OCD

A lot of these people are unwell, that's the thing. It's not a mental illness as such, but it's still a problem that's nobodies fault. And why Schixoid is a PD is beyond me.

Doesn't change the fact that many people with certain PDs damage people around them. Nobody really chooses to be who/what they are anyway.

I know you have a right to post what you want to and you shouldn't have to change for me. I'm not asking for that. I just think I might have some kind of personality disorder if every post you make about your disorders makes me feel envy. Every time I meet or hear about someone who is somewhere on the schizophrenia spectrum I feel jealous. I've gotten over my obsession enough that I don't need to try and induce symptoms that mimic psychosis but I still can't bear to hear that other people have psychotic disorders when I don't.

I was going to send a PM to avoid hijacking this thread but a PM sounds even more personal and could come across as an attack. I don't know how to safely say what I've just said.

I think a lot of people who get diagnosed with Borderline PD shouldn't be diagnosed with it, especially with the stigma attached. They have another disorder which hasn't been defined yet, imho.

Extreme extroversion in the form of Histrionic PD is pathologised as well.

Everyone is crazy.

But the same can be said of Psychosis/mania. Nobody asked for that either. There are some people with personality disorders and mental illnesses that are dangerous. A person with Antisocial PD is probably pretty dangerous. The same can be said of a person with Schizophrenia who is convinced that the FBI are tracking them through the fillings in his teeth and thinks that random people on the street are government assassins hired to hunt him down and kill him. You're less likely to get someone blaming somebody for having Schizophrenia than blaming someone for having Antisocial PD. If someone is dangerous, whether it's because of a mental illness or a personality disorder, then it is right that end up in a secure hospital somewhere. If anything, for there own protection.

Crazy...I don't know, what is Crazy? I tell somebody I have bipolar disorder and most people consider me crazy. But am I crazy when my medication is working properly and I'm stable, just because I have an illness that means I have to take these pills on a daily basis? Certainly, when I'm in a pretty bad mood swing, I'd consider myself to be crazy. But just because I have a diagnosis doesn't automatically make me crazy.

I know about Histronic PD. Not as much as I know about the other personality disorders, but I've heard of it. I've even come across someone who claims to have comorbid Schizoid-Histronic, however that's possible.

I'm not referring to you, but some posts on these threads are beginning to bug me. How many people want nothing more than there own issues to be understood, and then lump personality disorders in with "dangerous". Some are, yes. But does that make everyone with a personality disorder dangerous? No, I don't think so.

I was referring to the fact that psychological problems and deviations from the norm are so common, it's almost like everyone has a touch of mental illness - but some more than others.

Ah, okay. I've once heard someone saying that anyone could look in the DSM and find "there disorder", especially with the changes in DSM-V. If anything though, I only ever consider something to be a psychological problem if it is 1)Bothering the person who suffers from it or 2)Making the person a danger to society. There doesn't seem to be a "normal person" though. If there is...then come on, they've gotta be pretty boring.

Seriously though, I get what you're saying. Everyone has a bit of that "crazyness".

I think the fact that like half of all people in jail have antisocial PD, clouds the view of others regarding that. Borderline is overrepresented too (a lot more common in females in prison).

Schizoid PD, OCPD, Avoidant, Schizotypal and whatnot seem to be around the same amount in prison as outside of such (or close enough. Say 2% compared to 1%). The same with mental disorders such as ASDs and Schizophrenia.

The latter group of disorders above do have representations of criminal acts (even high profile ones), but the incidence is far less than antisocial and borderline PD.

Maybe the stigma is wrong and not the diagnosis on those cases?

Just thinking.

No, I notice a lot of people who get diagnosed with BPD only have a few traits and are missing the manipulative aspect. I do think it's sometimes used as a way of describing complex psychological problems, due to a lack of a better label and the list of traits doesn't fit a lot of sufferers that well.

Some people have most of the traits and the diagnosis fits, but for quite a lot I'd say it's used to explain something doctors don't understand yet.

I absolutely agree. This shoudln´t be a PD. Stupid "experts".


Yes, I agree. But nazis are a danger to society too, yet no one says they are mentally ill or have a PD.

Well, but that's what I'm talking about. To be manipulative is not a diagnostical "have to be". At least not in the DSM-IV and ICD-10. I'm not sure about the DSM-5, but so far I remember not even there. Marsha Linehan also doesn't thinks that Borderliners are necesseraly good manipulators, but that it's an emotion disregulation disorder.

But that there are some disorders out there, that haven't been defined yet is highly possible.

First of all Schizoid PD is not even in the DSM-5 anymore and second of all originally SPD was a construct to explain mild (especially) negative symptoms from the schizophrenic spectrum some people experience without having schizophrenia themself. Later on it lost a bit it's original meaning and it just mostly ment a person who want's to be for her- or himself. That the originally meaning of SPD changed up to some degree has a lot to do with the fact that schizotypal PD was added. In the ICD-10 you still have the diagnostic criteria of a high level of phantasy, what still kept a bit more the original meaning of SPD.

The newer deffinition of SPD how it was described in the DSM-IV is also a lot more than introversion, it means more that a person is mostly totally isolated and also doesn't care much for human contact. When you like to stay in your room in the evenings, but still like to talk to your siblings for example, than you are propably not schizoid, but just an introvert.

I didn't mean everyone who is a danger to society is mentally ill, and to be honest, I call BS on a lot of the theories that violence is somehow genetic...or something. As far as I'm concerned, everyone somewhat has a choice. Of course, if someone was seeing monsters on the street, wasn't bothered by it, and yet was attacking people who he/she thought was monsters, then that would be a problem. Or somebody who's manic and refuses to accept that there's anything wrong with them, yet is exploding in an angry rage everytime someone talks to them.