Do you know someone who seems rather shy and awkward socially? Do they avoid situations where they have to be close to people? Do they have chronically low self-esteem and a tendency to focus intently on their own shortcomings, as well as a huge fear of embarrassing or shaming themselves? This person may have avoidant personality disorder.
The aforementioned traits might be familiar to a lot of people, and demonstrating one or all of them will not automatically link the person to an avoidant personality disorder. However, if these behaviours are intense, extreme and ongoing, and are significantly affecting the person’s functioning in everyday life, it is wise for them to seek support from a mental health professional.
In this blog, we’ll be taking a look at personality disorders in more detail, specifically avoidant personality disorder. We will look briefly at how avoidant personality disorder relates to social anxiety disorder and how people with avoidant personality disorder symptoms can seek treatment and support.
Understanding Personality Disorders
There are a number of different types of personality disorder, and it’s important to know that symptoms across these disorders can vary. In the majority of cases, symptoms will involve difficulties with social interactions or controlling emotions. People may also struggle to form relationships, or become suddenly aggressive during interactions with others. People with personality disorders may also find that they struggle with social anxiety, substance abuse and other mental health disorders such as depression.
Personality disorders differ from other mental health issues in that they do not come and go. Unfortunately, there is no cure or treatment that will make a personality disorder go away. Instead, treatment is focused on managing the personality disorder.
During diagnosis, symptoms will always be compared to the criteria listed in the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5).
- Some of the most common personality disorders are:
- Avoidant personality disorder
- Antisocial personality disorder (ASPD)
- Borderline personality disorder (BPD)
- Obsessive compulsive personality disorder (OCPD)
- Schizoid personality disorder
If you think that you or a loved one might be struggling with a personality disorder, a trained mental health professional will be able to support you in receiving the correct diagnosis and treatment. Contact TAC directly for more personalised support.
Getting Avoidant Personality Disorder Diagnosed
Like all psychiatric conditions, a personality disorder needs to be diagnosed by a psychiatrist according to behaviours and symptoms listed in the diagnostic and statistical manual (DSM-5). Unlike some other personality disorders, the criteria for avoidant personality disorder includes significant impairments in both self-functioning and interpersonal functioning. Below, we explore this in more detail:
Self-functioning impairments
- Identity: This involves feelings of low self-esteem and an individual believing themselves to be socially inept, personally unappealing or feeling inferior to others. They may also experience excessive feelings of shame or inadequacy.
- Self-direction: They may have unrealistic standards for behaviour related to their reluctance to pursue goals, take personal risks, or engage in new activities involving interpersonal contact.
Interpersonal functioning impairments
- Empathy: They can become preoccupied with, and sensitive to, criticism or rejection, and they normally infer other people’s perspectives of them to be negative.
- Intimacy: They can be reluctant to become involved with people unless they’re certain of being liked. They find intimate relationships incredibly difficult because of their fear of being shamed or ridiculed.
To be diagnosed with avoidant personality disorder specifically, the following pathological personality traits need to be present. Most are in relation to detachment, which is characterised by:
- Withdrawal, including reticence in social situations, avoiding social contact and activity, and lack of initiating social contact.
- Avoiding intimacy in close or romantic relationships, interpersonal attachments, and intimate sexual relationships.
- Anhedonia, which is a lack of enjoyment from, engagement in, or energy for life’s experiences; there’s an inability to feel pleasure or take interest in things.
- Negative affectivity, characterised by anxiousness: intense feelings of nervousness, tenseness, or panic, often in reaction to social situations; worrying about the negative effects of past unpleasant experiences and future negative possibilities; feeling fearful, apprehensive, or threatened by uncertainty; and fears of embarrassment.
To be diagnosed, the impairments in personality functioning and personality traits have to be relatively stable across time and consistent across situations; they are not ‘normal’ for the person’s life developmental stage or environment; and they’re not due to the effects of a substance or medication.
At The Awareness Centre, our professionals have vast experience across all manner of mental disorders and personality disorders. We’ll help to diagnose avoidant personality disorder and provide support with the coping strategies required to manage the symptoms. Talk to a trained mental health professional today if you are worried that a friend or loved one is showing signs of avoidant personality disorder.
Spotting Someone with Avoidant Personality Disorder and Providing Support
To support someone with avoidant personality disorder, it may help to understand what the symptoms are and to know that environmental factors may have had an impact on the progression of these symptoms. For example, the person may have developed these behaviours and traits to help them survive a childhood where their needs weren’t met. Many people with avoidant personality disorder display avoidant behaviour due to having a long-standing fear of rejection or feelings of inadequacy, which in many cases has shown to have been initiated in an early childhood environment.
If you know someone with avoidant personality disorder, try to be sensitive to their fear of criticism. As many will also display signs of social anxiety, you must be careful not to expose them to social situations that could potentially be frightening, overwhelming or shaming. Instead, allow them to decide for themselves if they want to come along. It’s also important not to take their behaviour personally if they come across as awkward or rejecting.
Of course, if the person’s life is becoming unmanageable due to their symptoms, you may want to encourage them to seek professional mental health support. Seeing their GP or talking to a personality disorder specialist or therapist is a good place to start. They may be able to offer treatment options including talk therapy and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT).
If you or someone you know feels ready to seek support for avoidant personality disorder or general avoidant behaviour, do not hesitate to get in touch with us at The Awareness Centre. We have a fantastic team of counsellors, psychotherapists and psychologists offering sessions seven days a week from our centres in Clapham and Tooting as well as our private practice in Wimpole Street. Email us on [email protected] or call 020 8673 4545 for more information about treating personality disorders.
2 Comments. Leave new
Hmmm… I wonder if treatment is always possible. I think it’s a matter of whether the condition is caused by the persons misinterpreting the words and actions of their peers… or if there’s something inherent in the person that actually DOES cause them to be ostracized. In the latter case, it’s a defense mechanism. And perhaps one that’s important for their survival.
True… by keeping people at arms length they’re missing out on the occasional possitive that might come from an interpersonal relationship… but people are cruel, and to continue to subject yourself to legitimate ridicule is just plain stupid.
Example: I grew up a well-adjusted child of a divorced couple, and in the custody of my grandparents. But when I was 8 years old, my grandmother died only a few months before a certain incident made national headlines only a few miles from where I lived. That is, Lorena Bobbitt cut off John Bobbitt’s penis.
Unfortunatly… my name is, also, John Bobbitt. Before 8th grade is come home with something like 17 broken bones, I had zero friends that lasted longer than 3 days (theyd be bullied until they’d come to me in tears and say they couldn’t be around me anymore), I had ONE girlfriend growing up and since then all attempts at dating went well… until they either learned my full name or that I was a Virgin (last week a girl threw a plate of food at me and broke my nose on our second date when she found out I was a Virgin), I wasn’t allowed to walk with my graduating class because the admin feared it might cause a “disturbance” When my name was called, I’ve actually been arrested several time for for “supplying False Information” and “hindering an Investigation” because I refused to answer if I was “the guy who got his d*** chopped off” when cops asked (charges dropped, but home was burglarised and I was left homeless during the week I was incarcerated).
On and on and on. Just this morning I opened my front door and found a butcher knife stuck in it. Lorena put out a new movie recently… so this is the fallout. I’ll just toss it in the box with the others.
Avoidant personality disorder keeps me alive; and while it’s very lonely, and I beg god for the courage to take my own life… i see no other option. Even psychiatrists…I’ve had two follow me around for a few days to experience my daily life. One refered me elsewhere, and went home in tears, saying only “I’m so sorry…”. And the other recommended that I change my name before any treatment was attempted (I’ve tried twice and was denied both times- to the tune of $600 each time)… but commented that it may be too little too late as far as my personality was concerned. After all, no women will date a 36 year old virgin. Period. It’s an established fact, I’m sorry to say (people argue the point, but in the end, I’ve got the record to prove it- and the scars).
My point is… not always is it treatable, short of changing the mentality of the population and it’s treatment of each other. That, we can’t control. And god knows…. people are very cruel.
Hello John. Thanks for letting us have your comments on our avoidant personality post. There can be many factors that lead a person to receive this diagnosis. We agree that we can’t change what other people say and do. The only thing we can change is how we respond to them. You mention that you have seen psychiatrists. We wonder if you have considered entering therapy to explore and process the many things that have happened to you?