avoidant or sa?

Before leaving my house i will check the area to assure no nieghbors are outside.If they are i will not leave the house,sometimes wating up to an hour or more till "the coast is clear".At stores or picking up take-out,same deal,i will sit in my car for absurd lengths of time until the fewest number of people are around.Does this sound like sa or apd,and what's the difference anyway?

Sounds to me you got SA. I am not qualified to tell you the difference between the two. But I think you most likely have SA. But SA is severe shyness and a fear of social situations and stuff. Are you like that all the time? At school, work, how do you function?

That's the problem,i don't function.But there are times(very few)that i am actually a confident,relaxed person.The thing that frustrates me the most is that i can't always be that way.

That's the problem,i don't function.But there are times(very few)that i am actually a confident,relaxed person.The thing that frustrates me the most is that i can't always be that way.

I believe that the line between SAD and avoidant is a very thin one if indeed one exists at all.

Incidently, SA is not extreme shyness. You can have it and not be shy at all. Conversely you can be extremely shy and not have SA. Its true that most SAers are shy but the two should not be confused.

there are generally three types of SA. ihaveissues may have aviodant personality disorder which is the most severe in SAD's. i do agree that aviodant and SA is very thin. there is another disorder thats called non-generalized personality disorder which affects people when they are doing something infront of others, like doing a presentation.

Well, If I had to guess, i'd say you have social anxiety, but I don't know if you may not have avPd. The difference is Social phobics want to be social, but ppl with Avoidant personality disorder have NO desire to change, and will only form a relationship if they feel they aren't going to be rejected.

mobster said:

Well, If I had to guess, i'd say you have social anxiety, but I don't know if you may not have avPd. The difference is Social phobics want to be social, but ppl with Avoidant personality disorder have NO desire to change, and will only form a relationship if they feel they aren't going to be rejected.

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Not true. According to the internet articles I've read, AvPD sufferers long for social contacts and relationships just as SAD sufferers do. I've yet to find one thing about AvPD that sets it apart from SAD. The whole thing confuses me.

Not true. According to the internet articles I've read, AvPD sufferers long for social contacts and relationships just as SAD sufferers do. I've yet to find one thing about AvPD that sets it apart from SAD. The whole thing confuses me.[/quote]

That's pretty much it as I understand it, AvPD sufferers do want to change, and are the only type of personality disorder patients who generally do.

I'm beginning to feel that although most AvPDs are generally Social Anxious and fit the diagnostic criteria for gSAD not all do. It looks to me that far more important to AvPD is an extremely low self opinion which is very hard to improve because you do not see value in anything you do.

I dont see how you can be avoidant without first having SA? ... I always thought that of the people that have SA, some people manage to still go out and face their fears and gets jobs etc ... whereas in more severe cases people would become totally avoidant or partially avoidant. I havent read up on it, but surely avoidance is just another severe symptom of SA that is present in a lot of cases but not all?

this will help

ok, first hi, im nicola im a psychology student, and i come here just to have a look, and see if i can offer any help, if it makes u guys feel easier me being here, i am not a sufferer, but once was, well it was more depressionwith avpd tendancies.
ok well, social phobia is defined as a irational fear of social situation,
a personality disorder is where a characteristic of your personality effects your functioning, eg an extreme personality trait.

SA criterea: paitent shows irational fear of social situations, usualy because they fear citicism by others, usualy fear is in showing anxiety syptoms to others ( SA is an anxiety disorder) so it is also a physical conition. even tho paitent fears soical interaction they are usualy aware of this irationality, and wish for social pleasure.

Avpd critera: (really hard to explain with it sounding like SA) but, avpd is more.... the persons fear of how others will judge them, avpd do not show physical syptoms with anxiety attacks. Avpd people are also more sensative to criticism than SA people.

Ok you could say, SA is an axiety condition triggered by social situations, Avpd is an actaly fear of being seen by another person is a negative light, also overlaps with schitzoid personality disorder and dependant personality disorder.
also Avpd paitents do NOT lack interest in socialising, thats schitzoid personalities, (not schitzophrenia btw) they do infact disire affection.

Pravelence rates are higher in Avpd paitents than SA paitnets, and is harder to treat.
Hope this helped people who wanted to know the difference!

I think Nicola's distinction that SA is characterized by feelings of anxiety that manifest as physical symptoms, whereas AvPD is more about how a person feels internally about him or herself is accurate - if I've understood her properly. Though I would say I have SA, I don't really have physical symptoms - I never have serious anxiety attacks where I shake and sweat, and I only blush occasionally. But I definitely have AvPD. The detailed description of it at http://www.toad.net/~arcturus/dd/avoid.htm was extremely close to home. The biggest problem is my self-image: I constantly berate myself and feel tremendous shame and self-contempt. Thing is that I've only developed AvPD in the last few years. When I was younger, though I enjoyed my own company I had a social life and girlfriends. I was even married for a couple of years. Now I have no social life and I haven't been on a date for 5 years. I desperately want a girlfriend, but I'm so afraid to go out and meet people. If I join some kind of social group, I always quit after a few weeks because I feel so uncomfortable. The prognosis for AvPD is supposedly not good. But Nicola, you say that you used to be a sufferer, so I'm wondering, how did you get over it?

This thread has led me to read up on avoidant personality disorder and I truely believe that is what I have.

From Wikipedia:

"Avoidant personality disorder (sometimes abbreviated APD or AvPD), or anxious personality disorder, is a personality disorder characterised by a pervasive pattern of social inhibition, feelings of inadequacy, and extreme sensitivity to negative evaluation. People with avoidant personality disorder often consider themselves to be socially inept or personally unappealing, and avoid social interaction for fear of being ridiculed, humiliated or disliked. They typically present themselves as loners and report feeling a sense of alienation from society."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avoidant_personality_disorder

Does anyone know if this disorder has any physical symptoms? I always thought I had SA because I have the symptoms of SA, but the description of AVD sounds more like me but says no physical symptoms... I don't know anymore what I have. They are all so similar...

hi

yeh that is exactly what i ment, lol. how did i come through it? honestly? well i realised my behaviour was irrational, and it was all in my head ( a habbit of living and thinking) when ever something negative poped in my head, i said the opiste like 'no one likes u!' id say to myself, ok nicola prove it, right now!..and i couldnt, so i belittled my thinking. which slowly...became a habbit too, gave me more confidence. once i gtot hat, i forced myself to get out there, id se a situation that i was scared of, and forced myself to face it. which built more confidence. then i meditated, and found my self as a person, and just learned to except that person. this is, once u prove to yurself ur thinking is wrong, u dont listen to it anymore, i worked on all this for bout a year n abit, so it wasnt over night. just dont give up!!!

cloaked said:

Does anyone know if this disorder has any physical symptoms? I always thought I had SA because I have the symptoms of SA, but the description of AVD sounds more like me but says no physical symptoms... I don't know anymore what I have. They are all so similar...

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Well you can and a lot of people do have both AvPD and SA/SP. If you have physical symptoms but are closer to the AvPD then you likely have both. I have AvPD and have no physical symptoms other then normal.

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Yup ... I do the neighbor checking thing too.

gg said:

:arrow: Avoidant personality disorder is characterized by extreme social anxiety. People with this disorder often feel inadequate, avoid social situations, and seek out jobs with little contact with others. Avoidants are fearful of being rejected and worry about embarassing themselves in front of others. They exaggerate the potential difficulties of new situations to rationalize avoiding them. Often, they will create fantasy worlds to substitute for the real one. Unlike schizoid personality disorder, avoidants yearn for social relations yet feel they are unable to obtain them. They are frequently depressed and have low self-confidence.

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This description fits me to a T. To begin with i thought i was shizoid but i yearn for close friends and a girlfriend. I get jealous of ''normal'' people.