Things have gotten better

The other day, my wife told me that I should write about how I have progressed over the years. She is right, as she usually is. As far as I know, no one really knows the cause of Avoidant Persoanlity. Im guessing its genetic, past down from the parents to their children. But in my life, there are events that I can point to that have made the condition much much worse. I am speaking of my time in the military. I will write about that next time.

When I go out of the military, I was a mess. I remember going to the mall. It was such a horrible experience. I felt like my mind was being split to everyone in the mall. It is like my mind was trying to evaluate everyone around me for threat levels. Anyone that was considered in my mind as a threat, which was most of them, would have to be avoided.

I would get so paranoid and overwhelmed with all this that I would have to leave after a pretty short time. When my wife and I 1st got married, we would fight a lot. Just about non-stop. Its a wonder that we survived at all.

We have been married for 9 year now. Its been almost 20 years since I left the military.
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Now I can go to the mall like normal people. Well almost. After about an hour or so, I will start to feel overwhelmed, but not as bad as before. I know when its time to go. But I do still have this very annoying thing. When I am on the 2nd floor of the mall, I have this small nagging thing in my mind that says to jump over the rail to the bottom floor. Its very annoying but of course is not gong to happen. But I do wonder as I get older if it will become a problem. When people get older, they tend to lose a bit of their mind control and sometimes do weird things. Especially if they go into Dementia or even full on Alzheimers.

I can meet people, but I still avoid large crowds. The larger the crowd, the more reserved I am. But its far better than it once was. I still think about trying to get help. If I knew of someone that I thought could help, I would try it. I have tried going to shrinks, but they seem to be of little if any help. I don't want to go to someone that has learned what an Avoidant is from a book and thinks they know how to treat it. I want to go to someone that is, or has been, an Avoidant.

Unless someone has lived being an Avoidant, I don't think they could help. They would not know what its really like to live with the disorder so I don't think they could possibly understand how to deal with it. So if I can find someone like this, I will certainly seek them out. But until then, I think God is my best choice. He is of course the best choice anyway, but God gives the ability to heal to docs and such.

I wished that I had contact with all Avoidants or as many as possible. But I don't know if this is possible. The very nature of being an avoid ant is to avoid things. Many Avoidants might not even bother being on-line. Many more probably don't actively search for help. Many more don't even know that they are an avoidant.

What I would like to know from other Avoidants is what they think caused their condition, if they have days that are better than others, and if anything seems to help.

For example, for me, I have found that certain vitamins help a lot. In fact, my wife calls them my "Happy Pills". They are from Advocare and are called MSN Max E. They are a bit expensive, but they are the only thing I have ever found that really helps. When I take these vitamins, I feel better. Some days I feel almost normal. (Though I am not sure what being normal actually feels like)

These are not magic pills. They don't magically take away the fear, the anxiety, the social awkwardness etc..., but they do take the edge off and on some days even more.

I have a poor diet. I don't eat veggies and very little fruit. So I would love to know if a poor diet is something that others Avoidants have. If that is the case that having a poor diet is a cause or contributing factor for this problem, then simply improving ones diet or taking good quality vitamins like Advocare might solve, or at least help.


If anyone out that knows how to contact more Avoidants and get the word out about this, I would appreciate it.





This is my log of my day to day issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also srtuggling with this disorder or another like it.http://www.AvoidantPersonality.com

What is an Avoidant Personality??

Since I have put my condition out there for everyone to see, I thought it might be a good idea to post on what an Avoidant Personality is.

There is lots of info on there on what it is to be an Avoidant. All you have to do is Google it. Here is a pretty good web site on it.

But what you won't find on most of these web sites is what it means to be one. What is it like to live, eat, and breathe as an Avoidant.

Basically, an Avoidant Personality is one that avoids relationships because because they don't know how to deal with them. The small things that most of you take for grantite are completely foreign to an Avoidant. Things like:

How to start a conversation
How to stop a conversation
How to approach someone to be friends
How to approach someone to ask for a date
What to do with your hands while you are talking
and on and on it goes

The funny thing is, that on my good days, you might never know I am an Avoidant. Even on my bad days, I can fool ya. I have gotten very good at hiding my condition. I can even fool professionals. I am really that good.

Its a bit like being 2 different people. On my good days, when I feel halfway normal, I am the good Christian Pastor. On my bad days, when the Avoidant is in full swing, I am so far gone, I am barely here.

I have had days when i felt completely disconnected. On these days, Its like watching a movie. There is someone else carrying out my life and all I can do is watch them. I am floating off in the distance somewhere,

I have lived this way for so long, that I really have no idea what its like to be "Normal". People scare me. Everyone frightens me including my wife. I fear all authority figures. When I am with people I cower, I don't look at them in the eye. I feel like everyone is superior to me. I feel like everyone is out to get me. Even kids are better than me.

I was diagnosed with this when I was in the Military. I went to a shrink and she diagnosed me with this disorder. I do have good days, which you will also read in my blog.I do have a few days when I feel almost good. Days when I can talk and relate to people. But the vast majority of days and ones that I can't function as a normal member of society. My life is filled with things that don't make sense.

I was told in the military that I would never meet a woman much less get married. Well, I got married, but being an Avoidant is a high challenge. When we fight, as all couples do, I just give in, I cower and won't speak up or fight back like a normal person would.

I just go to my corner and pout.

My job is to talk on the phones all day. Something that I hate with a passion. I don't like talking to people at all and really hate talking on the phone.

But in all of this, God gives me the straight to go on and even do good. I am a Pastor, which is beyond weird. I don't even like people, but yet I do like people, and this is what being a Pastor is all about.

So back to what it is to be an Avoidant. They should rename this disorder to Life Avoiders. Because that is really what it is. I avoid life and all costs.

Its an extreme form of social anxiety. its an extreme form of depression. Some days, its an extreme form of multiple personalities, Its just extreme!








This is my log of my day to day issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also srtuggling with this disorder or another like it.http://www.AvoidantPersonality.com

Coming out of the closet??

I bet that got your attention!

I wil be 51 years old this year. I am an Avoidant Personality. I am told that it was likely genetic, which means that I was probably born with it. There are things that happened in my life that made it worse. But I won't go into those things here.

I have always hidden my problem. I have feared to make it known to anyone other than my wife. I have feared that if people that knew me knew about this, I would be shunned, ostricized and judged.

To make these even worse, I am a Christian Pastor. How can I possibly be infected with a mental disorder? Luckily, I don't pastor anywhere right now. I just attend Church.

What if my friends knew?
What if my family knew?
What about the Church members?
What about people that I work with?
Would they look at me differently, or at all?
Would I ever be called on to Pastor anywhere again?

Well, these are questions that I have had no answer for all these years. I still don't know how people will react. I have lived in fear of this al my life. Well, I finally decided to come out of the closet. I will put this out there for anyone and everyone to know. Im not going to advertise it, but neither will I hide it anymore.

Paul had some sort of issue that God refused to remove from his body. We don't really know what it was. Most people think that it was a physical deformity of some sort. But what if he was an Avoidant or he had some other sort of mental issue?

Throughout the Bible, God didn't have any desire to use folks that had it all together. He never looked to use those that were perfect, had perfect diction, a perfect body, or even had anything at all going for them.

God used those that were, in the worlds eyes, defective. I think he did that on purpose.

So maybe there is hope for me. Maybe shedding light on my being an Avoidant is a good thing. I hope so.

So for better or worse, here i come!!!






This is my log of my day to day issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also srtuggling with this disorder or another like it.http://www.AvoidantPersonality.com