Avoidant Personality
Monday, November 16, 2020
Updates on life & Avpd
It has been a long long time since I have written in here. I start off a lot of my blogs the same way Ive noticed. Today I got the idea to go back through everything I have written, which was weird. I did this because Im writing a book about living with Avoidant Personality.
I have been working on this book for a long long time. Many years in fact. I am actually reaching the end of the journey, sort of. Im almost done with the 1st draft. Once the draft is done, the editing process starts. I found a guy that is doing the editing for free.
He is a college professor that teaches english and writing, so I think the book is in good hands. Its been quite a journey with Avpd and this book, and life. Im offically retired now which is the best thing ever. I can write and work on these ideas and things all day long, every day.
Its hard sometimes to stay motivated when part of me wants to do nothing but sit in front of the TV. I know that is a bad thing though. Just because I can do that does not mean I should. If anyone is interesed in a copy of this book when its out, just let me know. Phillip@AvoidingLife.org
I changed the name to Avoiding Life, which is the name of my book as well.
The daughter is almmost 17 now, so she will be graduating soon. She has a boyfriend. A dads worst nightmare, but its part of life and I cant fight it. He seems like a nice kid though.
My Avpd battle is still ongoing. Not sure it will ever be fully won, at least not in my lifetime. I continue to work with others that have Avpd and I continue to try to get the word out about Avpd. Its a hard battle because no one has heard of Avpd except those that actually have it.
The wife and I are doing well. We have been back togther now for 2 years and its going well. The Avpd still rears its head at times and tries to take over, so its a constant battle to keep its head down. Well, thats probably about enough for now.
Phillip
Tuesday, May 12, 2020
The FaceMask blues
Got your attention, didn’t I? These are weird times, aren’t they? Covid 19 has made a mess of our society, and world. Who would have thought that we would see a time when we would have to stay 6 feet part and practice other social distancing measures?
I was just at the grocery store this morning. I wanted to get a box of cereal. When I tried to go into the cereal aisle, I was presented with a large red cone and a very rude sign that said; “One way only, do not enter”.
I don’t go downtown for this very reason. I hate one-way streets. One time when I was downtown, I did not see the sign and turned into, what was very soon, cars coming right at me. I could even see the faces of the drivers. They looked angry and like they would run me gladly over if I did not quickly find a way to get turned around.
It was terrifying!
Now I was facing this one-way sign at a super market of all places. As weird as this is, things like this have become the new normal. One of these “new normals” these days is that we have to wear Face Masks. We all hate wearing these, but in the light of Covid 19, its necessary. Facemasks make it hard to breathe and even harder to talk through.
For a normal person, these are inconveniences. But for someone that is suffering from a mental health issue, putting on a face mask can be very traumatic event.
As a normal person (A Normal is someone that does not suffer from a mental health issue), it can be very difficult to put yourself in the shoes of someone that is like this. I am not sure that I can help you imagine this, but I will try. Being severely depressed is like being trapped behind very thick glass. Not ordinary glass mind you, but that weird glass that you find in some bathrooms that you can see through, but everything is very distorted so the best you can see are fuzzy shapes and shadowy misshapen figures.
If you suffer from depression, you can see clearly enough to make out friends, family, and loved ones, but no matter how hard you try, or want to try, you can never reach them. No matter how hard you want these people to hear your cries, your pain, or know anything about you, they cant.
Nothing you, or they can do will ever matter. The glass is impenetrable. You can pound on it until your firsts are a mass of blood, and there is nothing left but bloody bone, but no matter how hard you try, you can never ever ever ever feel the loving embrace of your mom, your dad, or your daughter.
Nothing can get through. You are trapped behind this glass forever watching the world go by. Even your very own spouse, or significant other, if you fortunate enough to have one, is on the other side of this glass wall.
You can only watch as your relationship with that person crumbles because the person you are supposed to love cannot feel anything from you, they can’t get to know you, or even talk to you on any meaningful level. You want desperately to reach out to that person that you love, but you cannot get through the glass.
To make matters even worse, the people on the other side of this glass only see a person that is stoic, having no emotion at all, and seems to be completely uncaring. To them, you seem uncaring, stuck up, not wanting friends, or relationships. Your loved ones, your friends, and the world only see someone that is always mad, wants nothing at all to do with anyone and cares for no one.
This is what the severely depressed deal with every day of their lives. Day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, and on and on with no end and no hope of ever escaping.
It is like Mr Cellophane from the movie Chicago. Mr Cellophane feels like no one can even see him. Life goes on all around him, but does not affect him in any way because he is invisible to everyone. To the Severely Depressed though, this is a safe place. “If no one sees me, they can’t hurt me.”
Hopefully you now have an image in your mind of what its like for the severely depressed. Take that image and add to it a face mask.
When a person that is already suffering from this intense nothingness puts on a face mask, it is like the old adage of rubbing salt into a wound. Even before they had to put on this mask, they felt like no one loved them, no one could see them, or even cared anything about them. Now add to this insult the extra injury of a face mask.
Before they were “nothing”, but now they are “extra nothing”. Without the mask, there was a possibility, even though a very remote one that someone, anyone, might glance their way. Even though they have given up hope a long long time ago that someone might stop and say Hi, now with the mask, even that remote hope is gone.
With the face mask, they are marked. Before they were just depressed. They could hide depression, they could choke back the tears, they could disappear just like Mr Cellophane and blend into the crowd.
Now, they have to wear a face mask and die all over again.
I was just at the grocery store this morning. I wanted to get a box of cereal. When I tried to go into the cereal aisle, I was presented with a large red cone and a very rude sign that said; “One way only, do not enter”.
I don’t go downtown for this very reason. I hate one-way streets. One time when I was downtown, I did not see the sign and turned into, what was very soon, cars coming right at me. I could even see the faces of the drivers. They looked angry and like they would run me gladly over if I did not quickly find a way to get turned around.
It was terrifying!
Now I was facing this one-way sign at a super market of all places. As weird as this is, things like this have become the new normal. One of these “new normals” these days is that we have to wear Face Masks. We all hate wearing these, but in the light of Covid 19, its necessary. Facemasks make it hard to breathe and even harder to talk through.
For a normal person, these are inconveniences. But for someone that is suffering from a mental health issue, putting on a face mask can be very traumatic event.
As a normal person (A Normal is someone that does not suffer from a mental health issue), it can be very difficult to put yourself in the shoes of someone that is like this. I am not sure that I can help you imagine this, but I will try. Being severely depressed is like being trapped behind very thick glass. Not ordinary glass mind you, but that weird glass that you find in some bathrooms that you can see through, but everything is very distorted so the best you can see are fuzzy shapes and shadowy misshapen figures.
If you suffer from depression, you can see clearly enough to make out friends, family, and loved ones, but no matter how hard you try, or want to try, you can never reach them. No matter how hard you want these people to hear your cries, your pain, or know anything about you, they cant.
Nothing you, or they can do will ever matter. The glass is impenetrable. You can pound on it until your firsts are a mass of blood, and there is nothing left but bloody bone, but no matter how hard you try, you can never ever ever ever feel the loving embrace of your mom, your dad, or your daughter.
Nothing can get through. You are trapped behind this glass forever watching the world go by. Even your very own spouse, or significant other, if you fortunate enough to have one, is on the other side of this glass wall.
You can only watch as your relationship with that person crumbles because the person you are supposed to love cannot feel anything from you, they can’t get to know you, or even talk to you on any meaningful level. You want desperately to reach out to that person that you love, but you cannot get through the glass.
To make matters even worse, the people on the other side of this glass only see a person that is stoic, having no emotion at all, and seems to be completely uncaring. To them, you seem uncaring, stuck up, not wanting friends, or relationships. Your loved ones, your friends, and the world only see someone that is always mad, wants nothing at all to do with anyone and cares for no one.
This is what the severely depressed deal with every day of their lives. Day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, and on and on with no end and no hope of ever escaping.
It is like Mr Cellophane from the movie Chicago. Mr Cellophane feels like no one can even see him. Life goes on all around him, but does not affect him in any way because he is invisible to everyone. To the Severely Depressed though, this is a safe place. “If no one sees me, they can’t hurt me.”
Hopefully you now have an image in your mind of what its like for the severely depressed. Take that image and add to it a face mask.
When a person that is already suffering from this intense nothingness puts on a face mask, it is like the old adage of rubbing salt into a wound. Even before they had to put on this mask, they felt like no one loved them, no one could see them, or even cared anything about them. Now add to this insult the extra injury of a face mask.
Before they were “nothing”, but now they are “extra nothing”. Without the mask, there was a possibility, even though a very remote one that someone, anyone, might glance their way. Even though they have given up hope a long long time ago that someone might stop and say Hi, now with the mask, even that remote hope is gone.
With the face mask, they are marked. Before they were just depressed. They could hide depression, they could choke back the tears, they could disappear just like Mr Cellophane and blend into the crowd.
Now, they have to wear a face mask and die all over again.
Friday, February 23, 2018
Divorced life as one with Avoidance
It has been a while since I have written here. A lot happened in the last few months since I wrote. I am divorced now. Its something that I never thought would happen to me.
Why the divorce happen really has little to do with the Avoidance. Sure I made some mistakes and hurt my wife emotionally. But once I found healing from Avpd, most all of that was resolved.
We got divorced because we were just not compatible, which is really really weird. We married because we both loved God and we thought that was enough. Well, it turned out that it was not enough.
How we loved God and wanted to serve him is very very different. My wife is a church person. She grew up in the church and wants to stay in the church.
She wants to go to Church, raise her hands up in the air "like she just dont care", and just be in the local Church. For me, I am different, I see church as a hospital for sick people.
Once you get healing, you go out into the world and work. Work feeding the homeless, clothing the naked and all those other Sheep and the Goats things that God said we should be doing but most of us dont.
So even though we are both Christians, we are still unequally yoked. So we moved on. Moving on is the hardest thing I have ever done. Some days are bad and is very hard to cope. Other days are bearable.
After all, we were married for 15 years but now thats gone. I have moved out and I am alone. Thankfully i have my daughter a week on and a week off. Its not enough, but its as good as it can be.
Life goes on. At least I think it must. I dont do the podcast right now. Its hard to give others hope, when you can find very little for yourself. But in God there is hope. At least that is what I am told and what I hear. So hopefully it is true.
Well, that is enough for today. I will try to start writing in here more. Maybe it will help.
Phillip
This is my log of my issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also struggling with this disorder and others like it. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1tyKSgW-IeaK851gvIjjthije0kOwg3tZxVqKXSC1xXg/viewform I am trying to get more information on this disorder so that we can find commonalities. Perhaps if we can learn more about this, we can figure out how to combat it and get better lives for us all.
Why the divorce happen really has little to do with the Avoidance. Sure I made some mistakes and hurt my wife emotionally. But once I found healing from Avpd, most all of that was resolved.
We got divorced because we were just not compatible, which is really really weird. We married because we both loved God and we thought that was enough. Well, it turned out that it was not enough.
How we loved God and wanted to serve him is very very different. My wife is a church person. She grew up in the church and wants to stay in the church.
She wants to go to Church, raise her hands up in the air "like she just dont care", and just be in the local Church. For me, I am different, I see church as a hospital for sick people.
Once you get healing, you go out into the world and work. Work feeding the homeless, clothing the naked and all those other Sheep and the Goats things that God said we should be doing but most of us dont.
So even though we are both Christians, we are still unequally yoked. So we moved on. Moving on is the hardest thing I have ever done. Some days are bad and is very hard to cope. Other days are bearable.
After all, we were married for 15 years but now thats gone. I have moved out and I am alone. Thankfully i have my daughter a week on and a week off. Its not enough, but its as good as it can be.
Life goes on. At least I think it must. I dont do the podcast right now. Its hard to give others hope, when you can find very little for yourself. But in God there is hope. At least that is what I am told and what I hear. So hopefully it is true.
Well, that is enough for today. I will try to start writing in here more. Maybe it will help.
Phillip
This is my log of my issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also struggling with this disorder and others like it. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1tyKSgW-IeaK851gvIjjthije0kOwg3tZxVqKXSC1xXg/viewform I am trying to get more information on this disorder so that we can find commonalities. Perhaps if we can learn more about this, we can figure out how to combat it and get better lives for us all.
Thursday, November 2, 2017
Normals that are trying to be in a relationship with someone that has Avpd
Hi everyone,
A Normal is someone anyone that is not an Avoidant. If you fall into this category, there is help for you as well. My wife is a Normal and she has been married to someone that has Avpd for 15 years now.
She has a wealth of experience and wisdom to share with anyone that is on that same path. She will answer any and all questions either on the air, by email, or both. Just let us know which you prefer.
Our next podcast 11/12/17 will focus on Normals that are trying to be in a relationship with someone that has, or your suspect has, Avpd.
Sign up now!
Before the podcast, please take our short survey.
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2V9PP7K
Phillip Dacus
A Normal is someone anyone that is not an Avoidant. If you fall into this category, there is help for you as well. My wife is a Normal and she has been married to someone that has Avpd for 15 years now.
She has a wealth of experience and wisdom to share with anyone that is on that same path. She will answer any and all questions either on the air, by email, or both. Just let us know which you prefer.
Our next podcast 11/12/17 will focus on Normals that are trying to be in a relationship with someone that has, or your suspect has, Avpd.
Sign up now!
Before the podcast, please take our short survey.
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2V9PP7K
Phillip Dacus
Saturday, October 28, 2017
How to start on the journey to heaing your Avpd podcast
Hi everyone,
The next podcast will be tomorrow at noon MT 10/29/17.
I encourage everyone to make the class live so you can take advantage of our live chat room and calling in if you wish to do so. We respect your privacy, so you can also just hang out and listen. You can also send us an email with any questions that you have and request they be addressed on the air, or respond vie email.
Here is the call in number. (929) 477-3305
Here is the link to get to the podcast. http://tobtr.com/s/10360945
If you are not able to make it live, never fear. The podcast will be available on my web site a day or two after Sunday. Avoidants.org
As always, if you have any questions for me, you can email them to Phillip@Avoidants.org. Please let me know in your email if you want mt to answer your question live in the podcast.
Phillip Dacus
Organizer, host and teacher
This is my log of my issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also struggling with this disorder and others like it. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1tyKSgW-IeaK851gvIjjthije0kOwg3tZxVqKXSC1xXg/viewform I am trying to get more information on this disorder so that we can find commonalities. Perhaps if we can learn more about this, we can figure out how to combat it and get better lives for us all.
The next podcast will be tomorrow at noon MT 10/29/17.
I encourage everyone to make the class live so you can take advantage of our live chat room and calling in if you wish to do so. We respect your privacy, so you can also just hang out and listen. You can also send us an email with any questions that you have and request they be addressed on the air, or respond vie email.
Here is the call in number. (929) 477-3305
Here is the link to get to the podcast. http://tobtr.com/s/10360945
If you are not able to make it live, never fear. The podcast will be available on my web site a day or two after Sunday. Avoidants.org
As always, if you have any questions for me, you can email them to Phillip@Avoidants.org. Please let me know in your email if you want mt to answer your question live in the podcast.
Phillip Dacus
Organizer, host and teacher
This is my log of my issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also struggling with this disorder and others like it. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1tyKSgW-IeaK851gvIjjthije0kOwg3tZxVqKXSC1xXg/viewform I am trying to get more information on this disorder so that we can find commonalities. Perhaps if we can learn more about this, we can figure out how to combat it and get better lives for us all.
Tuesday, September 5, 2017
Avpd Lives matter too!
There has been a lot of news stories and such on Black Lives Matter. I even saw one that said, White Lives Matter. In fact, I think this started a trend of many others as well.
Well, this got me to thinking about, you guessed it, those with Avoidant Personality (Avpd). Avpd is my passion. That sounds a bit weird now that I hear myself say it.
I receive emails from people all over the world that have Avpd and from "Normals". Normals are what I call those that do not have Avpd. These Normals want to be in a relationship with someone that has Avpd. All of the stories and their questions are pretty much the same.
They have fallen in love with someone that has Avpd, the Normal pursued the one with Avpd, which caused the one with Avpd to run, or want to run away. You see, in a normal relationship, when you love someone, you tell them, right?
Well, if that someone has Avpd, you can't just blurt that out, or be aggressive in your pursuit of them. That will trigger the fight or flight response in the one that has Avpd.
When the one with Avpd backs away, the Normal thinks they did something wrong, or the person with Avpd does not love them back. Even if the one with Avpd spouted feelings of Love before.
Because the Normal now feels rejected, (Yes, even Normals feel rejection!), they decide to sever the relationship.
This is a very common scenario that I hear over and over and over. Now don't get me wrong. I am not complaining in the least. I love helping people. Especially those that have Avpd and Normals that love us.
People that have Avpd are like a computer with 2 opposing sets of instructions. 1 instructions tell them to love the Normal. The other tells them to hate the Normal, or at least avoid them because the Normal might hurt them. These 2 instructions are in direct conflict with each other. Its not possible for the computer to complete both instructions. It is just not possible to love someone and hate them at the very same time.
So what happens is that the computer develops a Psychosis like the computer Hal from 2001 the Space Odyssey. In the movie, Hal was given 2 order in direct conflict with each other. The result was that the computer malfunctioned and did some crazy things that resulted in it breaking down completely.
Those with Avpd can be seen in much the same way. On the one hand, this person wants to love the Normal. On the other, this person wants to hate the Normal because they fear they might hurt them. Its just not possible for them to do both, so the result is a breakdown and they end up running away in fear.
The trick is not to scare the one with Avpd. I know this makes those with Avpd sound like its not worth the bother. But think of someone with Avpd like they have Cancer or some other physical ailment. If this person you love had Cancer, what would you do?
If the answer to that is that you would run away, then you, and the person you love is probably better off that you do just that.
Or if they had Cancer, would you love him or her anyway and have compassion and understanding for them and walk on eggshells (Go Overboard) to not frighten them or hurt them. If you would do that for him if he, or she, had Cancer, then why not this?
There is no difference. Someone with Avpd deserves that very same love and understanding as someone that has Cancer, or any other physical ailment.
This is my log of my issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also struggling with this disorder and others like it. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1tyKSgW-IeaK851gvIjjthije0kOwg3tZxVqKXSC1xXg/viewform I am trying to get more information on this disorder so that we can find commonalities. Perhaps if we can learn more about this, we can figure out how to combat it and get better lives for us all.
Well, this got me to thinking about, you guessed it, those with Avoidant Personality (Avpd). Avpd is my passion. That sounds a bit weird now that I hear myself say it.
I receive emails from people all over the world that have Avpd and from "Normals". Normals are what I call those that do not have Avpd. These Normals want to be in a relationship with someone that has Avpd. All of the stories and their questions are pretty much the same.
They have fallen in love with someone that has Avpd, the Normal pursued the one with Avpd, which caused the one with Avpd to run, or want to run away. You see, in a normal relationship, when you love someone, you tell them, right?
Well, if that someone has Avpd, you can't just blurt that out, or be aggressive in your pursuit of them. That will trigger the fight or flight response in the one that has Avpd.
When the one with Avpd backs away, the Normal thinks they did something wrong, or the person with Avpd does not love them back. Even if the one with Avpd spouted feelings of Love before.
Because the Normal now feels rejected, (Yes, even Normals feel rejection!), they decide to sever the relationship.
This is a very common scenario that I hear over and over and over. Now don't get me wrong. I am not complaining in the least. I love helping people. Especially those that have Avpd and Normals that love us.
People that have Avpd are like a computer with 2 opposing sets of instructions. 1 instructions tell them to love the Normal. The other tells them to hate the Normal, or at least avoid them because the Normal might hurt them. These 2 instructions are in direct conflict with each other. Its not possible for the computer to complete both instructions. It is just not possible to love someone and hate them at the very same time.
So what happens is that the computer develops a Psychosis like the computer Hal from 2001 the Space Odyssey. In the movie, Hal was given 2 order in direct conflict with each other. The result was that the computer malfunctioned and did some crazy things that resulted in it breaking down completely.
Those with Avpd can be seen in much the same way. On the one hand, this person wants to love the Normal. On the other, this person wants to hate the Normal because they fear they might hurt them. Its just not possible for them to do both, so the result is a breakdown and they end up running away in fear.
The trick is not to scare the one with Avpd. I know this makes those with Avpd sound like its not worth the bother. But think of someone with Avpd like they have Cancer or some other physical ailment. If this person you love had Cancer, what would you do?
If the answer to that is that you would run away, then you, and the person you love is probably better off that you do just that.
Or if they had Cancer, would you love him or her anyway and have compassion and understanding for them and walk on eggshells (Go Overboard) to not frighten them or hurt them. If you would do that for him if he, or she, had Cancer, then why not this?
There is no difference. Someone with Avpd deserves that very same love and understanding as someone that has Cancer, or any other physical ailment.
This is my log of my issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also struggling with this disorder and others like it. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1tyKSgW-IeaK851gvIjjthije0kOwg3tZxVqKXSC1xXg/viewform I am trying to get more information on this disorder so that we can find commonalities. Perhaps if we can learn more about this, we can figure out how to combat it and get better lives for us all.
Friday, April 14, 2017
How I have been able to cope with Avpd
How I cope with Avoidant Personality (Avpd)
My name is Phillip Dacus. I was born with Avoidant Personality (Avpd), as everyone that suffers from it is. Avpd is a disease. Like physical diseases, it can lie dormant in the body for years. Typically, Avpd does not rear its ugly head until the late teens or early adulthood. Everyone is different though, so different people have different stories as to when and how it started. Click here to read about these differences.
I have been working with others that have Avpd and similar disorders for 10 years. I get emails from people all over the world. Mostly I am contacted by what I call Normals that are trying to be in a relationship with someone that they know, or suspect, has Avpd.
The most common question I get is how did I overcome Avpd.
Before I start, I need to tell you that there is just no way that I can post my entire story here. It would require a book to tell you everything that I have gone through over the course of the last 40 years. By the way, this is exactly what I am in the process of doing. I hope to soon have my book ready. I am also working on some on-line classes that you can take.
What I will give you here is an overview of my story. I will go into detail on all this in my classes and book.
Though I did not know it at the time, I was born with Avpd. It is funny how clear things become in hindsight. I probably got my Avpd from my mom, which is typical. Avpd is usually handed down genetically from a family member. I have 2 brothers. One of them, though not diagnosed with Avpd, almost surely has it too.
I had a pretty typical childhood, though I cant remember most of it. I had Epilepsy as a child, so it was probably the Epilepsy that resulted in the memory loss. The 1st time I noticed the start of my Avpd was in High School, which was my mid to late teens. As a male, I never liked the normal things a guy should like. I hated working on cars, I did not like girls (though in secret I did, they just scared me so I avoided them), and I did not like sports. So I was accused of being gay.
My way of dealing with this lie was to hide. I was a hermit in high school. A few years after getting out of school, I went into the Air Force. I got stationed in England, which is what I wanted. I was so terrified of girls that I would get physically ill when anywhere close to them. This led me to being a hermit in the military as well. While in the Air Force, I went to see a psychiatrist for help with my fears. They tested me and officially diagnosed me with Avpd.
There was a very traumatic event that happened while I was in the military that greatly exacerbated my Avpd. In fact, I would say that it put it into overdrive. I dont have the room to go into my story here, but will address this in detail in my book and in my classes.
To make a long story short, I struggled for many years after the military with my Avpd. God brought a lady (now my wife Rebecca) into my life. We met over the phone, which in my case, was the only way it could have worked. I lived in Texas at the time, which is where I was born. Rebecca and I hit it off, so she flew down to Texas to pick me up and we drove back together. We got married 15 years ago.
I treated my wife very badly for the 1st 13 years of our marriage. I will give you an example of just how much of a jerk I was. My wife was pregnant at the time. We were driving in the car and had a bad fight. I pulled over and made her get out of the car and walk home.
The only reason why my wife stayed is because God told her to. During these years, I did a lot of writing in a blog that I created. I found writing to be very good therapy. If you want to read my blog, here is the link to it.
There are a lot of other things that added up to my healing. Things like;
Admitting I had a problem
Understanding myself
My wife understanding me
Identifying traps
Exposure Therapy
Finding truth
Not giving up
Reading, taking classes and understanding how Avpd works
Nutrition
A great understanding and patient wife
Teaching others
Reading the Bible and letting God work on me through His word
Prayer
Admitting I had a problem
Just like with Alcoholics, Drug Addicts, or anything else like this, the 1st step in the healing process is to admit that you have a problem. I can be pretty stubborn at times. Just ask my wife. As humans, we dont like to admit that we are flawed and Avpd is a pretty huge flaw. Avpd is very tough because as someone with Avpd I already thought that I was horrible and worthless. For someone that is "Normal" to try to tell them that they have a problem is something they wont want to hear. In fact, if not done carefully, it will do a lot more harm than good.
Understanding
I had to understand myself 1st. I had swallowed the lies hook line and sinker. One of these lies is that I was the only defective person in the universe. I was all alone and therefore, not worth fixing because I was the only one like this.
My wife Understanding me
My wife needed to come to a place where she understood me and had empathy for me. When we 1st got married, my wife had no clue about Avpd. She would tell me all the time to "Just Get over it". Once she understood Avpd, she realized that this was not possible. She became very patient with me, kind and understanding.
Identifying Traps
There are many traps and behaviors that I had to identify. Key triggers that set off Avpd behaviors. These needed to be identified, and once identified, avoided.
Exposure therapy
One of the things that scared me was going to the mall. I felt overwhelmed and helpless. These fears needed to be faced and the anxiety dealt with.
Finding truth
One of the biggest issues that I faced with Avpd was undoing the lies that I had accepted as truth. For example, one of these lies is that you are all alone. The truth is that Avpd is a disorder that effects millions of people all over the world.
Never Giving Up
My journey with Avpd took me 50 years to complete. While it is very possible to complete the journey sooner and find that healing quicker, there is no magic pill for healing Avpd. Im not going to blow smoke by telling you that you can be free of Avpd tomorrow. It is possible, but more often than not it requires a lot of work over a long period of time. The key here is to be patient and never give up!
Reading..Taking Classes and Understanding How Avpd Works
I have read a lot about Avpd. I have taken a lot of classes on Avpd, depression and similar disorders.
Nutrition
This may seem like a small thing, but it is fact one of the biggeest. Getting proper nutrition is a key element to healing. Your body is just like a cars engine. Your cars engine requires oil, which is its lubrication. Without this lubrication, your car will quit running. Put in good quality oil and changing it on a regular basis will keep your car running smoothly and efficiently. The same with your body, mind, and Spirit. Proper nutrition is needed in order for them to work properly. Garbage in, garbage out.
If you eat nothing but junk, your body, mind and Spirit will suffer and may even quit on you.
A Great Understanding Partner
As I pointed out above, finding a partner that understands Avpd, or at least tries hard, is critical. I listed this twice because it is so very important. If you are a Normal in a relationship with someone that has Avpd, or you suspect has Avpd, you need to start right now working on learning as much as you can about Avpd and how to deal with your partner that has it.
Teaching Others
The old saying is that the best way to figure something out is to start teaching others. When I started helping others, I learned a lot about healing up the things in my life that still needed some attention.
Reading the Bible, and Letting God Work On Me Through His Word
Please make note here that I did not say anything about going to Church. Few, if any, Churches know how to deal with mental disorders. It is not there fault, it is just not something that Church leadership has not been taught. The Church does a great job at helping with healing physical things like Back issues, Cancer, and other ailments like this, but when it comes to the mind, the Church seems lost.
I put this toward the bottom of this list intentionally. In reality, it is the most important step, but I dont want anyone to not start the healing process because they do not believe in God.
Prayer
Again, I listed this one at the bottom of this list on purpose. Prayer is critical in the healing process. It would be like having a Ford Expedition, but refusing to talk to Ford about the malfunction in your car because you don't believe the Ford Motor Company exists.
Even someone that does not like Ford would take their Expedition to a place that works on Fords to get it fixed. Same with God. Even if you do not believe in God, let God help you. You are His child. He is not going to turn you away just because you don't believe in him, or even like him. This does not mean that you have to sign on the dotted line committing to going to Church every Sunday. Just talk to God and ask God for help.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. If you want to know more, you are going to have to wait until my classes or my book is done. But in the meantime, you are more than welcome to write to me with questions.
This is my log of my issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also struggling with this disorder and others like it. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1tyKSgW-IeaK851gvIjjthije0kOwg3tZxVqKXSC1xXg/viewform I am trying to get more information on this disorder so that we can find commonalities. Perhaps if we can learn more about this, we can figure out how to combat it and get better lives for us all.
My name is Phillip Dacus. I was born with Avoidant Personality (Avpd), as everyone that suffers from it is. Avpd is a disease. Like physical diseases, it can lie dormant in the body for years. Typically, Avpd does not rear its ugly head until the late teens or early adulthood. Everyone is different though, so different people have different stories as to when and how it started. Click here to read about these differences.
I have been working with others that have Avpd and similar disorders for 10 years. I get emails from people all over the world. Mostly I am contacted by what I call Normals that are trying to be in a relationship with someone that they know, or suspect, has Avpd.
The most common question I get is how did I overcome Avpd.
Before I start, I need to tell you that there is just no way that I can post my entire story here. It would require a book to tell you everything that I have gone through over the course of the last 40 years. By the way, this is exactly what I am in the process of doing. I hope to soon have my book ready. I am also working on some on-line classes that you can take.
What I will give you here is an overview of my story. I will go into detail on all this in my classes and book.
Though I did not know it at the time, I was born with Avpd. It is funny how clear things become in hindsight. I probably got my Avpd from my mom, which is typical. Avpd is usually handed down genetically from a family member. I have 2 brothers. One of them, though not diagnosed with Avpd, almost surely has it too.
I had a pretty typical childhood, though I cant remember most of it. I had Epilepsy as a child, so it was probably the Epilepsy that resulted in the memory loss. The 1st time I noticed the start of my Avpd was in High School, which was my mid to late teens. As a male, I never liked the normal things a guy should like. I hated working on cars, I did not like girls (though in secret I did, they just scared me so I avoided them), and I did not like sports. So I was accused of being gay.
My way of dealing with this lie was to hide. I was a hermit in high school. A few years after getting out of school, I went into the Air Force. I got stationed in England, which is what I wanted. I was so terrified of girls that I would get physically ill when anywhere close to them. This led me to being a hermit in the military as well. While in the Air Force, I went to see a psychiatrist for help with my fears. They tested me and officially diagnosed me with Avpd.
There was a very traumatic event that happened while I was in the military that greatly exacerbated my Avpd. In fact, I would say that it put it into overdrive. I dont have the room to go into my story here, but will address this in detail in my book and in my classes.
To make a long story short, I struggled for many years after the military with my Avpd. God brought a lady (now my wife Rebecca) into my life. We met over the phone, which in my case, was the only way it could have worked. I lived in Texas at the time, which is where I was born. Rebecca and I hit it off, so she flew down to Texas to pick me up and we drove back together. We got married 15 years ago.
I treated my wife very badly for the 1st 13 years of our marriage. I will give you an example of just how much of a jerk I was. My wife was pregnant at the time. We were driving in the car and had a bad fight. I pulled over and made her get out of the car and walk home.
The only reason why my wife stayed is because God told her to. During these years, I did a lot of writing in a blog that I created. I found writing to be very good therapy. If you want to read my blog, here is the link to it.
There are a lot of other things that added up to my healing. Things like;
Admitting I had a problem
Understanding myself
My wife understanding me
Identifying traps
Exposure Therapy
Finding truth
Not giving up
Reading, taking classes and understanding how Avpd works
Nutrition
A great understanding and patient wife
Teaching others
Reading the Bible and letting God work on me through His word
Prayer
Admitting I had a problem
Just like with Alcoholics, Drug Addicts, or anything else like this, the 1st step in the healing process is to admit that you have a problem. I can be pretty stubborn at times. Just ask my wife. As humans, we dont like to admit that we are flawed and Avpd is a pretty huge flaw. Avpd is very tough because as someone with Avpd I already thought that I was horrible and worthless. For someone that is "Normal" to try to tell them that they have a problem is something they wont want to hear. In fact, if not done carefully, it will do a lot more harm than good.
Understanding
I had to understand myself 1st. I had swallowed the lies hook line and sinker. One of these lies is that I was the only defective person in the universe. I was all alone and therefore, not worth fixing because I was the only one like this.
My wife Understanding me
My wife needed to come to a place where she understood me and had empathy for me. When we 1st got married, my wife had no clue about Avpd. She would tell me all the time to "Just Get over it". Once she understood Avpd, she realized that this was not possible. She became very patient with me, kind and understanding.
Identifying Traps
There are many traps and behaviors that I had to identify. Key triggers that set off Avpd behaviors. These needed to be identified, and once identified, avoided.
Exposure therapy
One of the things that scared me was going to the mall. I felt overwhelmed and helpless. These fears needed to be faced and the anxiety dealt with.
Finding truth
One of the biggest issues that I faced with Avpd was undoing the lies that I had accepted as truth. For example, one of these lies is that you are all alone. The truth is that Avpd is a disorder that effects millions of people all over the world.
Never Giving Up
My journey with Avpd took me 50 years to complete. While it is very possible to complete the journey sooner and find that healing quicker, there is no magic pill for healing Avpd. Im not going to blow smoke by telling you that you can be free of Avpd tomorrow. It is possible, but more often than not it requires a lot of work over a long period of time. The key here is to be patient and never give up!
Reading..Taking Classes and Understanding How Avpd Works
I have read a lot about Avpd. I have taken a lot of classes on Avpd, depression and similar disorders.
Nutrition
This may seem like a small thing, but it is fact one of the biggeest. Getting proper nutrition is a key element to healing. Your body is just like a cars engine. Your cars engine requires oil, which is its lubrication. Without this lubrication, your car will quit running. Put in good quality oil and changing it on a regular basis will keep your car running smoothly and efficiently. The same with your body, mind, and Spirit. Proper nutrition is needed in order for them to work properly. Garbage in, garbage out.
If you eat nothing but junk, your body, mind and Spirit will suffer and may even quit on you.
A Great Understanding Partner
As I pointed out above, finding a partner that understands Avpd, or at least tries hard, is critical. I listed this twice because it is so very important. If you are a Normal in a relationship with someone that has Avpd, or you suspect has Avpd, you need to start right now working on learning as much as you can about Avpd and how to deal with your partner that has it.
Teaching Others
The old saying is that the best way to figure something out is to start teaching others. When I started helping others, I learned a lot about healing up the things in my life that still needed some attention.
Reading the Bible, and Letting God Work On Me Through His Word
Please make note here that I did not say anything about going to Church. Few, if any, Churches know how to deal with mental disorders. It is not there fault, it is just not something that Church leadership has not been taught. The Church does a great job at helping with healing physical things like Back issues, Cancer, and other ailments like this, but when it comes to the mind, the Church seems lost.
I put this toward the bottom of this list intentionally. In reality, it is the most important step, but I dont want anyone to not start the healing process because they do not believe in God.
Prayer
Again, I listed this one at the bottom of this list on purpose. Prayer is critical in the healing process. It would be like having a Ford Expedition, but refusing to talk to Ford about the malfunction in your car because you don't believe the Ford Motor Company exists.
Even someone that does not like Ford would take their Expedition to a place that works on Fords to get it fixed. Same with God. Even if you do not believe in God, let God help you. You are His child. He is not going to turn you away just because you don't believe in him, or even like him. This does not mean that you have to sign on the dotted line committing to going to Church every Sunday. Just talk to God and ask God for help.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. If you want to know more, you are going to have to wait until my classes or my book is done. But in the meantime, you are more than welcome to write to me with questions.
This is my log of my issues with living to Avoidant Personality Disorder. My hope is that in writing this, it will help myself and perhaps others that are also struggling with this disorder and others like it. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1tyKSgW-IeaK851gvIjjthije0kOwg3tZxVqKXSC1xXg/viewform I am trying to get more information on this disorder so that we can find commonalities. Perhaps if we can learn more about this, we can figure out how to combat it and get better lives for us all.
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