Over the past few days I’ve sat and looked at my blog, both loathing its emptiness and my inability to stimulate anything new into it. Prior to the years coming, I’ve never had the same levels of trouble posting meaningful things as I now find within myself. Therapy always taught (blindly I often regard) that writing in journals can cause some level of emotional relief.
However, how does one with a disorder like Schizoid Personality Disorder (hereon out termed SPD) really find the emotion to drive words into paper? or even keyboard strokes onto a open blog editor? I’ve been sitting for days, as events unfold around my life, trying to generate some level of stimuli in my mind to deliver something to paper/pen or keyboard/editor. Finally, I think its come to me. A way to psychologically break down everything around me and in-depth relieve some of the emotional turmoil that resides deep inside myself.
For the sake of the reader, I would like to refer people to this Wiki page, which I feel contains the most comprehensive and well-composed facts about a disorder that is suffered by less than 1% of the human population.
The Diagnosis and the Beginning of the End
As anyone who has read the above linked articles will learn, SPD is suggested to begin in early childhood. It’s believed that detachment from emotional situations, as well as possible forms of abuse may contribute to the condition. The condition is believed to begin in steady waves of revaluation, where some people exhibit only some symptoms and others may exhibit many or all. Moreover, the condition also is believed to have “Overt” and “Covert” behavioral elements, which describe how a Schizoid will respond to certain types of stimulation. There are no defined guidelines to the “Overt/Covert” system, and I believe that as a Schizoid, I exhibit traits in both categories depending on several factors.
So with the above stated, I feel I can openly expose a dark secret that is likely the underlying platforms to the conditions. Within my mothers second marriage lied a pathway of darkness shrouded by abuse. Both emotional and physical abuses took place over a course of five to six years, as well as much of a mental neglect for the needs of a developing child. I felt subjected to loneliness as I often blamed myself for many of the things that happened to me. This personal accountability led to a certain level of self-loathing for myself, feeling that I could of done more to prevent the things that happened to me. To this day, I often find that I accuse myself for many of the abuses that I endured, even despite furthered education and the wisdom of growing that would correct such thought paths in the normal mind.
I spent a relatively half-normal teen life after the divorce of my mother and stepfather, Fred. However, the time that should of been spent rekindling the love and emotional lacking with my mother were cut short on September 11th, 2001. The terrorist attacks of 9-11 had caused a full-fledged military panic, and my mother as an active Navy Reservist was activated to duty. By September 25th, 2001, my mother was boarding a flight to Florida and off for a year tour she went, suddenly and silently. Custody over me was transferred via power of attorney to my Grandmother, whom is a loving and kind woman.
By definition, my grandmother would fit the word Angel; however, she was also very disconnected with the emotional needs of a child in my situation. I was entering my teen years which would prove to unroll a complexity beyond my best imagination. Mixed with her inability to quite cope with and understand the unique condition that was beginning to develop and dwell within me like a plague, a battle for wits and understanding unfolded over the coming year. I found myself spending the better part of my days and evenings alone in a two-story home, as my grandmother labored endlessly to help meet the ends needed in a now war-separated family. When she wasn’t at work she spent a good amount of free time with my best friends mother, venturing to Casino’s and letting us to the house alone.
It was during this time that I begun to develop a deep and serious passion for the Internet and fantasy reality both online and in my head. I found myself drifting in and out of reality and fantasy many times when I was idle, and I also discovered a new-found passion for annoyance. I found that many of my emotions would become hyper-sensitive due to over stimulation and peer pressures and agitations. I found that school-based teasing would trigger major emotional cues into panics and anger spells… Things that previously never plagued me, even during years of abuse.
It would eventually come to pass that as my mother returned, I had developed a major detachment from her. What once stood as a dying urge for her approval and love was replaced by pure inability to care for her or even find the time and manors to rationalize conversation with her. I often found myself avoiding her or mocking her behind her back, simply trying to both emotionally and physically shut her out. I replaced emotion with food and physical stimuli with video games and fantasy production. The early stages of SPD were laying the foundations to something that would, eventually, become the undertones of my life.
My mother eventually left the Police Department and pursued new ventures, meeting her now third husband, Dennis. Along the way I found myself reacting very negatively to Dennis, despite his pure attempts to bond. I wanted no part of another male in my life and I met him with vengeful hate and dislike in the early months of our encounters. During this time, I was withdrawn from public school and put into an internet-based homeschooling programme as it was regarded that over stimulation was harming my productivity in class. I coped negatively to the withdrawal from what was common to me, and began to seclude further. It was no longer than 3 months after this that it was announced that we’d be moving. The home I’d come to love of 4 years was gone, and the city in which I spent my entire life was going to be in the past. I attempted a futile refutes against this move and was shortly conquered and my bags were packed and moved… to Arizona.
A year passed and I had actually shown signs of improvement, although still lacking in communication. I finished school early and lost 130 pounds. I was preparing for bootcamp and shortly, I was shipped off to the Navy… Here, I met with one of the most difficult roadblocks of my life. It didn’t take long before SPD raged up from over stimulation and all the progress of a year was shot short in an eventual emotional snap. The off switch was hit, the mental retractions and the regressions began… I showed signs of shutoff and discontent, as well as agitation and anger. It was enough to eventually prompt an evaluation into my mental health.
Three days past of continual evaluations and questions, pressure put on me that I’d never felt before to express or expose emotions I’ve felt I long since lost. I was questioned about anything and everything, ranging from childhoods darkest secrets to the most recent love affairs I’d had (if any). The probing questions eventually generated enough data for me to be ran into MMPI-2. The end result was a diagnosis that affects less than 1% of the population of humans, Schizoid Personality Disorder. This set the wheels in motion for my medical erroneous entry discharge, and after a short lived and failed rebuttal to stay in, I was on my way home with less confidence than ever before.
The Move to Tucson
My initial move to Tucson happened in September of 2007, but was short lived as I leased my apartment but then left to work down where my parents lived. So, alas, living at home but still paying for an apartment with 3 roommates I absolutely hated, I kept myself productive in receiving my CNA (nursing assistant) license. At the time of pursuing this license, I was still learning the full extent of what SPD meant in my life. It was more-or-less in progression and not a full-blown problem yet; as I functioned immune to most of the stimuli-triggers that had seemingly triggered on and off in school and in the military.
I started my first job as a CNA and developed a deep passion for care of the elderly. I was quickly attached and swooped up into the love and compassion I found in providing the bare essentials I take for granted every day. Working on the Physical Therapy rehab unit, I quickly bonded close and long-term friendships with patients who would come and ultimately go home. Many found me to be mature for my age and capable of absorbing their insight, as well as providing true heartfelt care.
However, it didn’t take long for external relationships with other people to quickly cause problems. I had gotten involved in my first relationship since prior to service in the military, and I was met with the force of an ugly human being. A person who felt that three years age difference somehow entitled wisdom above me and their (self proclaimed) intelligence produced more of an understanding of my condition than the medical doctors who spent months working with me to develop skills and coping tactics to merge into normal life.
To say the least, it didn’t take this relationship long to cause regression into stimuli-based SPD response and lockouts began, as well as problems continuing my job in Sierra Vista… So, shortly after, I transferred to a Tucson facility…
Monica Traw: A test to commitment and love
On my second day after transferring to the new facility and being free from the grip of a negative relationship, I laid my eyes on a young woman when being toured the facility. At moments glance, I couldn’t keep my eyes from her and I felt a continued draw to her. Some people would call it the fairytale beginning to a noval style relationship, with days progressing into me finally feeling able to talk to her… And after the first date, the wheels were set in motion that would define the next seven months of my life…
After only 2 weeks she stayed over nightly, making it the fastest progressing relationship in my life. It became a test to my mental maturity and my ability to sustain and develop. The standard coping mechanisms with reality I was used to soon began to fade out of grasp as the realization of commitment sunk into me with raw fangs. I was in a committed relationship with someone that I was quickly falling in love with, and I had to begin to structure my life around it.
It didn’t take long for SPD to generate some levels of complication in the relationship, especially the secretiveness of my personality and my drive for privacy. It often lead to inquiries to what I had been doing, or if I had been doing something questionable… Often, situations that put me on edge and left me unable to respond coherently. The standard rules toward which SPD had let me run my life were quickly needing revamping, in order to save a relationship I otherwise loved deeply.
Months progressed and we eventually moved in together as I began to go through several fast career shifts. The stimuli of what has now become 3 months of changes and shifts has left my personality somewhat in a matter of ruins. The side effects that SPD generates when stimulation comes full force with my emotional shut offs kicked in… and so began a struggle for both relationships and careers.
I went into lock down mode over the past 3 months, which included lack of verbal communication, lack of external exposure, stress-related migraines, and an inability to express any emotions positive or negative. The pressure mounted upon Monica and she felt that at some point, something was being hidden from her. In the logic of a “Normal” person, I guess the reaction would be to try and probe or figure out whats going on with a person they love… Especially if suspicion is part of the problem.
In response to even more stimulation mounted upon that added by a career shift that was taking a negative turn, my mind and body simply began to go into a stress-induced panic mode. Headaches have become almost a normal factor tied into chronic insomnia and relatively frequent panic attacks associated with hostility in communication and persona. All things accounted for, I’ve nearly become a text book example of what SPD is.
Despite the diagnosis and the recent upturn of events, however, I’ve tried to keep a positive outlook on where I’ll be in the near future. Monica and I have since become engaged and we are working past what will define the “Dark age” of our relationship… Something that proper commitment and love will prove we can prevail through. It’s been a steady road lately of ups and downs filled with communication improvements and some emotional presentation that was previously withdrawn.
Lately…
So, I guess to conclude a long and insightful blog mostly to vent internal tensions, I guess the best way I can look at this is that it’s been a steady learning experience. The diagnosis of SPD has proven to effect me more at certain times than others, but proves that it is a life-long condition that, although sometimes may appear dormant, can arise in full force if triggered.
In recent times I’ve come to learn that maybe even my career path might need adjustment. It seems that in my current career path, I have ended up being forced among a group of peers that nearly enjoy knowing that the improper stimulation will cause problems and conflict. Being on the inside looking out, its sometimes hard to tell whose a friend and whose a person of opportunity who is truly miserable when they have nothing to be miserable over.
As SPD has continued to increase as a major player in my life, I’ve learned that it enables me to be highly victimized because I lack the ability to stand up for myself. I’ve learned that opposed to years prior, I’ve let people tread on me in ways that are even legally questionable and subjective to legal retaliations that could cripple people… And yet, I find myself unable to actually stand up and take any action against it.
So as the weeks unfold and I begin to transition into newer and different fields, I guess I will have to see where this blog takes me, if I can even find it in me to continue posting to it…
Thanks for reading!
