Intrusive Images That Scare You

[wordsmithy]

i been having trouble sleeping lately.

well, its not that i cant sleep, its more that i dont want to.

i sleep by myself, alone, and i have a vivd imagination.

i've convinced myself that ghosts exist, they have distorted, screaming faces, if i'm not in an angle where i can see the whole room, i'm in danger of these things, beings, images of things lurking.

why am i scared, the best they can do is scream and yell at me. i have nothing to fear.

but then i've started to dream and sentences about killing people in my family and dreams like images, flash, one after another, i cant tell what they are or why i'm dreaming so oddly. but its scary so i wake up, turn on the light and lie there until morning.

images are images, they have no power. but i think about them and judge how real they are? i cant cross out that the danger isnt there.

but why do i keep having them.

i've been having thoughts of suicide again, which is no news. but they images are not romantized like they used to be. i dont like them, there like pictures from a horror film, but saying no to suicide is not something i can do. i keep that one in mind every second of my life.

but the more i have the images of suicidal methods, the more i have ideas about gohsts and disorted screaming human beings.

is heres the question, in theory if i were to stop keeping suicide in the back of my mind would the other stuff that keeps me up at night disappear too?

another thing thats on the cards is that i get prescribed quetiapine (an antipsychotic) if i need it at a low dose, but if i take the drug, it will take away suicide as the crutch i'm leaning on, not only that if those images/thoughts arent real, valid, rational, actually there as real dangers, i'm just using the drugs to ignore my reality... that doesnt sound like a good thing, no?

anyway.

just some question to through at you, if me repeating "images are images" to myself doesnt make sleeping easier.

[wordsmithy]

ok, i've thought about the quetiapine.

at the day hospital i go to, sometimes, reluctantly... theres a prescribing psychiatrist, is this really one of those things that it should be ok, and useful to discuss with her? or should i just think this isnt really a medication thing and leave it until therapy, which considering my relationship with the therapists and patients isnt too good one, and i dont really know when i'll be going again.

is this medication issue or is this more of a thing i have to talk out?

i might call the day hospital later but like i said, things are a little uncomfortable with them lately.

or should i wait for this phase to pass, is it a phase?

[Jinxsta]

ok, i've thought about the quetiapine.

at the day hospital i go to, sometimes, reluctantly... theres a prescribing psychiatrist, is this really one of those things that it should be ok, and useful to discuss with her? or should i just think this isnt really a medication thing and leave it until therapy, which considering my relationship with the therapists and patients isnt too good one, and i dont really know when i'll be going again.

is this medication issue or is this more of a thing i have to talk out?

i might call the day hospital later but like i said, things are a little uncomfortable with them lately.

or should i wait for this phase to pass, is it a phase?

I know how bad it is with images luckily i haven't had it too badly latley, my advice would be...do whatever you need to do to get through, if that means taking meds or extra meds (obviously not too many) then so be it. Don't distort youself with thoughts of is there meaning for these images....just try not to get too sucked in....easier said then done i know.

x

[hummm_mabbe]

i been having trouble sleeping lately.

well, its not that i cant sleep, its more that i dont want to.

i sleep by myself, alone, and i have a vivd imagination.

i've convinced myself that ghosts exist, they have distorted, screaming faces, if i'm not in an angle where i can see the whole room, i'm in danger of these things, beings, images of things lurking.

why am i scared, the best they can do is scream and yell at me. i have nothing to fear.

but then i've started to dream and sentences about killing people in my family and dreams like images, flash, one after another, i cant tell what they are or why i'm dreaming so oddly. but its scary so i wake up, turn on the light and lie there until morning.

images are images, they have no power. but i think about them and judge how real they are? i cant cross out that the danger isnt there.

but why do i keep having them.

i've been having thoughts of suicide again, which is no news. but they images are not romantized like they used to be. i dont like them, there like pictures from a horror film, but saying no to suicide is not something i can do. i keep that one in mind every second of my life.

but the more i have the images of suicidal methods, the more i have ideas about gohsts and disorted screaming human beings.

is heres the question, in theory if i were to stop keeping suicide in the back of my mind would the other stuff that keeps me up at night disappear too?

another thing thats on the cards is that i get prescribed quetiapine (an antipsychotic) if i need it at a low dose, but if i take the drug, it will take away suicide as the crutch i'm leaning on, not only that if those images/thoughts arent real, valid, rational, actually there as real dangers, i'm just using the drugs to ignore my reality... that doesnt sound like a good thing, no?

anyway.

just some question to through at you, if me repeating "images are images" to myself doesnt make sleeping easier.

Personally, I think that the suicidal thoughts are part and parcel of the images that you see - they are both a sign that you are extremely distressed and hurting, and there is clearly something inside you that needs to be got out, understood and healed from. If there are things from your past that you cannot talk about, unresolved issues from a time long past that you have never broqached with others or feel too scared or ashamed to talk about, then you may like to think about some sort of long term therapy that addresses both past traumas as well as understanding which emotional needs were never filled for you, and how you can go about having them filled.

I think dealing with specific traumas such as abuse or neglect, which you may not even have identified as such, will be your first port of call. There is no quick solution to this, and its certainly not possible to give you a comprehensive answer in a forum. I personally would suggest a long term, emotions focused therapy, but thats just my feelings about it.

[wordsmithy]

the trouble is that i'm already a bit sucked it, its in nature to kind of take up ideas very easily, given the scope for not being enitrely certain what constitutes as reality and what doesnt.

bit frustrating because for the moment i'm determed to assert my independence from the mh professionals, i'm essentially on my own. it might be contributing to the general anxiety thats around, i hope not.

i think i can handle one little pill, should i need it. its only one little pill...

thanks jinx.

[wordsmithy]

i been having trouble sleeping lately.

well, its not that i cant sleep, its more that i dont want to.

i sleep by myself, alone, and i have a vivd imagination.

i've convinced myself that ghosts exist, they have distorted, screaming faces, if i'm not in an angle where i can see the whole room, i'm in danger of these things, beings, images of things lurking.

why am i scared, the best they can do is scream and yell at me. i have nothing to fear.

but then i've started to dream and sentences about killing people in my family and dreams like images, flash, one after another, i cant tell what they are or why i'm dreaming so oddly. but its scary so i wake up, turn on the light and lie there until morning.

images are images, they have no power. but i think about them and judge how real they are? i cant cross out that the danger isnt there.

but why do i keep having them.

i've been having thoughts of suicide again, which is no news. but they images are not romantized like they used to be. i dont like them, there like pictures from a horror film, but saying no to suicide is not something i can do. i keep that one in mind every second of my life.

but the more i have the images of suicidal methods, the more i have ideas about gohsts and disorted screaming human beings.

is heres the question, in theory if i were to stop keeping suicide in the back of my mind would the other stuff that keeps me up at night disappear too?

another thing thats on the cards is that i get prescribed quetiapine (an antipsychotic) if i need it at a low dose, but if i take the drug, it will take away suicide as the crutch i'm leaning on, not only that if those images/thoughts arent real, valid, rational, actually there as real dangers, i'm just using the drugs to ignore my reality... that doesnt sound like a good thing, no?

anyway.

just some question to through at you, if me repeating "images are images" to myself doesnt make sleeping easier.

Personally, I think that the suicidal thoughts are part and parcel of the images that you see - they are both a sign that you are extremely distressed and hurting, and there is clearly something inside you that needs to be got out, understood and healed from. If there are things from your past that you cannot talk about, unresolved issues from a time long past that you have never broqached with others or feel too scared or ashamed to talk about, then you may like to think about some sort of long term therapy that addresses both past traumas as well as understanding which emotional needs were never filled for you, and how you can go about having them filled.

I think dealing with specific traumas such as abuse or neglect, which you may not even have identified as such, will be your first port of call. There is no quick solution to this, and its certainly not possible to give you a comprehensive answer in a forum. I personally would suggest a long term, emotions focused therapy, but thats just my feelings about it.

its all emerging from my uncious, thats pretty clear.

i'm almost entriely sure that i've nevered suffered any abuse or trauma, which is difficult to substantiate obviously because the mind does have tendency of hiding that stuff from you. heh.

i cant rember not being scared of "irrational things" at some time or another, i don't know if i'm just the kind of person who soaks up events, ideas, stories, images up and just dances around my subcious when i'm stressed aabout other stuff. but yes, it could be that i encountered trauma directly.

i h am having trouble with therapy lately. i am supposed to be having long-term intensive psychodynamic therapy (i'm halfway through 2 years) but i dont go because i've become a bit upset with me being there and talking to therapists in general.

its a stressful time. fear is byproduct of my stress, or distress...

what is goal of therapy?

[hummm_mabbe]

its all emerging from my uncious, thats pretty clear.

i'm almost entriely sure that i've nevered suffered any abuse or trauma, which is difficult to substantiate obviously because the mind does have tendency of hiding that stuff from you. heh.

i cant rember not being scared of "irrational things" at some time or another, i don't know if i'm just the kind of person who soaks up events, ideas, stories, images up and just dances around my subcious when i'm stressed aabout other stuff. but yes, it could be that i encountered trauma directly.

i h am having trouble with therapy lately. i am supposed to be having long-term intensive psychodynamic therapy (i'm halfway through 2 years) but i dont go because i've become a bit upset with me being there and talking to therapists in general.

its a stressful time. fear is byproduct of my stress, or distress...

what is goal of therapy?

I think perhaps the question to be asking is "what is traumatic?". Trauma, over a long time, can be simply not receiving the most basic emotional sustencance that you need. And if you never had it, you wont know its missing, save for the big hole, depression, anxiety, fear and images that you have. For example, if you were not protected as you needed to be, which can happen in many different ways, you would always feel unsafe. But if you never realised what real protection and support actually was, because you never had it, then you wont know anything is missing. Your subconscious knows, because it makes you feel afraid and alone. But your conscious does not know, because it has nothing in its experience to tell you it was missing. The subconcious can only communicate with you via emotions and symbolic imagery. You feel afraid all the time, but may not even realise that you are MEANT to feel safe. Feeling on edge just becomes an accepted reality, "just part of who you are". You may not even realise the process whereby HOW you come to actually feel safe. With nothing addressing this, your subconscious tries desperately to let you know something is wrong. But it cant communicate normally with the subconscious. It cant tell you in words whats missing - and so it comes up as confusing emotions, fears, images and dreams. What you need to understand is that, if something is missing, you wont realise that it is until someone points out what you SHOULD have. The painful emotions that you experience are the CLUE - therapy aims to help you, at first, to identify whats missing.

So IMO the aim of therapy is identifying the needs that are not, and have never been, met. When I say needs, I mean emotional things you NEED for emotional health. Not emotional 'would be nice to have', or emotional 'I guess I'll get by without them' - but NEEDS. Humans have emotional needs just as they have nutritional needs. Without food, we wither and die. Without emotional sustenance, emotional pain and disturbance results. Trauma adds to this pain, but it doesnt have to be there - the complete lack of something you need, over a long enough time frame, is just as damaging. The only book I have found that adequately describes human emotional needs and how their chornic unfulfilment leads to emotional struggles is "Healing the child within" by Charles Whitman. Its a cheesy title and perhaps a cheesy concept, but its a powerful principle. He outlines much better than I can put it how all these things happen and the effect they have. Inner Child work also meshes well with psychodynamic therapy. Perhaps you could ask if you might take that path?

Once the needs that are unfulfilled are identified, you will feel sad for never having had them. You may feel anger. Grief is the natural result of losing something that you needed and never got, and in this case it was emotional things you needed as a child and may not have got. Once you have moved through realisation, and then grief, you move onto finding out how you can have those needs met as an adult. Most peple never get to this stage. This is because they are firstly unaware of what is missing, and so cannot ever know that something needs to be done. They may pursue surrogates that temporarily make them feel better - sex, drugs, alcohol, spending, driving fast cars. They may feel (like I did) that "if only I could be perfect and always make everyone like me, then this hole inside me will disappear". That was me thinking from a degraded emotional standpoint. I did not realise what life is MEANT to feel like. I did not realise what relationships are MEANT to be like - so I went through life with an approximation of me and humanity that kept me feeling alone, afraid, empty and scared. I Also suffered from images like you, and ongoing fear of devils, demons and ghosts. My subconscious way of trying to label the ongoing sense of fear and unsafety (I also have PTSD) that leaked into every part of my life.

I think it would be important to understand what it is that is making you uncomfortable in therapy. Is it because you are having to face pain? or is it because the aims that you have - ie, what recovery looks like for you - does not seem to mesh with what your therapist thinks recovery looks like?

If you could describe what recovery is for you, what would it look like?

For me it was getting the girl, being a stud, being witty, achieving, being great.

I was wrong, and had missed an entire emotional realm. 'Success' was my substitute for real human emotions and fulfilled emotional needs.

[hummm_mabbe]

To add

For me, not having my problems belived, and having my needs and emotions invalidated, was a huge part of never feeling safe or supported. If people never recognised my pain or problems, how could they help me with them? However I didnt realise this consciously - I just felt alone and afraid and extremely sensitive to being told that 'I am making a fuss' whenever I hurt.

Once, in therapy, I felt that I was listened to, and that my problems were real and not exaggerated or made up, I began to feel safer. Because my problems were now belived, I felt that at last I could be supported, soothed and guided. I no longer felt stranded and alone because I knew there was someone who would belive, understand and protect me (which did not come easily to me - I was always convinced that I had to always do everything for myself and never rely on anyone. I had to learn to be tough and completely independent. This is wrong - we need people, but at first I was too afraid to let them in). The images stopped, and I have not had a repeat of feeling that demons and ghosts are in my room.

EDIT: One question - were you ever bullied, or otherwise the victim of physical (either a one-off event or prolonged) or verbal assaults that went on for some time? Was there anyone, either known to you or someone you didnt know, who would attack you verbally or physically? Did you ever witness it happening to others, for example did you ever see someone being attacked or badly bullied?

[yorkiegal73]

i could have written that opening post. can't offer advice. just want you to know it's not just you. quetiapine takes away most of it but i always feel like it just puts me on hold until the bad stuff can attack again.

[Rael]

yep i could have written that too, i do find that under times of stress it can get worse and some meds can make it worse too, not really sure about that one. i dont see what harm it would be asking the prescribing psychiatrist the question, he can either say no it cant be the med or yeah maybe it could be. wish i could suggest something to help deal with it but havent worked out one for myself yet.

take care

xxx

[wordsmithy]

woah, that is a lot to think about. a lot.

i gave in and took just the tiniest dose of quetiapine i could take and because i'm tired and slowly being drugged up and anxious about sleeping and "hypervigilant", i need so time time to think.

took me three goes to read your first post.

for now i can say i identify a lot with you ross, more than i expected to.

edit. will write back later.

[wordsmithy]

there is sense of not being protected, i saw that myself when as i live with my parents, they sleep in the room besides mine, and yet, i still had to defend myself.

i have to depend on myself, only i am reliable for that. i cannot depend on my therapist/s, i cant expect them to support me as much as i need to be supported. theres boundaries i am scared of crossing, to cross them is to be punished... essentially.

i am an adult i support myself, i need to grow up.

yeah, being afraid is who i am.

i have never knowm anything else.

so identifying your emotional needs, help you move away from this stuff... but how?

i cant see how. i keep thinking i must lack the intelligence to move away from this stuff, to think it out, resolve the problem.

that somewhere i am flawed enough to lack the capicity to solve my problems.

i cant even begin to visualise what recovery would look like. i have a hard time even believing it couldhappen or exists.

the end of therapy, ends with me knowing whats wrong but being able to "unwrong" it.

thats where i am. in therapy i am clouded with problems where i cant see problem for problem , with no ability make the therapists understand how vital it is to solve it. i cant live if i cant solve it.

[wordsmithy]

add. note - sorry for being rude, but, i dont know what else to say,

i can t allow for my therapist to invent situations that never happened.

i am having hard time determinging what is real and what isnt.

ROSSY you are a good inspirer of thought!

[hummm_mabbe]

add. note - sorry for being rude, but, i dont know what else to say,

i can t allow for my therapist to invent situations that never happened.

i am having hard time determinging what is real and what isnt.

ROSSY you are a good inspirer of thought!

Awwwwwwwwwwwwww you called me Rossy Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee huggy vibe

Its difficult to describe an emotional concept. You do not lack any intelligence, you are not stupid. The thing about emotional truths is that you must FEEL them to know them. As a rubbish example, you can be told that war is horrible, war is bad and traumatic - but that is not the same as having been there and FELT what it is like. The emotions of an experience guide something much deeper inside us, and often there are no words that can describe what it means emotionally.

This is the problem when trying to describe emotional needs. Those that have felt what its like to have those needs filfilled, know it intrinsically. They take it for granted, it requires no words or thoughts. It is part of the background scenery. But if it is suddenly taken away, that person would know it was missing and perhaps search for it.

With sufferers of long term emotional struggles, they may never have been in the place where they originally had it. If it 'stays missing', they will not know it is absent - that inner EMOTIONAL drive is not there.

Recovery from problems this deep are not about intellectual understanding. You can be told a principle over and over again, but until you actually taste what is being described, you cannot understand the importance of what it brings, and the damage that its absence causes. As another rubbish comparison, imagine you have never tasted chocolate. People may tell you over and over that its awesome, that it feels amazing when you eat it. But until you taste it, you will never have a craving for it. A craving is a deep, wordless URGE to have the chocolate, you just suddenly feel the need for choccie. No message flashes up "find a dairy milk" - you can just almost taste it, and you want it.

Until you have in some way had these needs SHOWN to you, you do not tend to try to get them met. What you have is the emotional hole that its absence leaves, but what you DONT have is the urge for what is missing. In therapy you first learn intellectually that there is something you should have had - above, you have talked about how you felt unprotected. Perhaps for the first time, you have identified a need that was not fulfilled. But next you need to actually KNOW what it feels like to feel protected.

To feel protected, first someone must recognise that you need support. Then they must agree that you are in trouble. Then they need to take action, either in the form of advice, listening or comforting. Its a process of elements that in certain family environments gets hijacked. Your natural need for protection may have been bashed down by feelings of guilt or shame, or even fear - that perhaps if you show vulnerability, or make a fuss, that you will be criticised or punished. In the first place you never recognise your need for safety. In the second you squelch any likelhood of expressing it in the future by burying it under fear. In the third, the unmet, but unknown, need lets you know that it is unmet by making you feel afraid, depressed and empty. In the fourth, you dont know why you feel this way, because you are not aware of the unmet need and are afraid to look there. You stay locked in a cycle that ensures that need never sees the light of day, kept hidden under fear, shame and mistrust.

At this stage, you cannot know EMOTIONALLY why the things I am talking about are important, because there is no emotional record to compare it to. The only record you have is one of associating expressing emotions or needs with negative cnsequences - as you say above, to cross those unspoken boundaries is to be punished. Those boundaries are unique to you, and your past history. The boundaries you are scared to cross with one set of people ARE NOT the same as with all other people, but the fear in you is so strong that you dare not test it.

Therapy is an environment where you can test your EMOTIONAL truths. It is a safe place where you will not be punished for having needs and emotions. It is a place where you can learn that the unspoken boundaries are an illusion - like the matrix. But first you have to take the risk of testing what happens when you cross them in this environment.

It is common that those who never felt safe at home, cannot feel safe in therapy. The same mistrust and fear that we feel towards others comes out equally with our therapists. We may look at this and say "see? even in therapy I cannot be normal!" when in fact we should be saying "I am so glad that I feel this way in therapy too, because now I have the chance to deal with it in vivo, to experiment with the real, live problem in a safer place". The therapy relationship is a metaphor for every other relationship in your life. When you begin to work through the proiblems there, you can begin to transfer that to others.

You dont need to invent things that didnt happen. Abuse is only one small part of suffering - you do not have to have been abused to become ill. Of course, those that are abused are at a greater risk of developing more severe symptoms. Those people have the added task of grieving for what happened to them, talking about it, finding its meaning and place to you and disarming the toxic messages that it implanted. But those who have been abused, just like those that have not, still have the work of needs to be done as well. You can focus on your needs first, make that the most important thing. Later if this makes you comfortable and things that you do remember come up and need to be heard, then you will be stronger to deal with them. Recovery does not happen in a straight lines - it does backflips, backloops, it takes a left turn, a right - sometimes it drives 6 miles back again and then climbs to 6000 feet. It takes bits from all over the place and requires changes in several areas. This is why therapy is necessary - to provide that healthy human support and guide, and to tie the process together, to give it direction and impetus. That does not mean you are pushed, or driven to do what you dont want to - it means you are guided and supported in what is most immediate for you at that time.

By having needs and feelings met and understood in therapy, we get the URGE to have them met and understood in life. Suddenly the craving, the drive is there - and through therapy we understand HOW to satisfy it.

[wordsmithy]

that is a lot to take in.

you're fighting the fight for therapy, eh? question, could you throw me a few examples of emotional needs?

i spoke to the prescribing psychiatrist from my day hospital on the phone yesterday.

i was talking about medication, she said i could still see her even if it just was to talk. so i'm thinking it might be a good idea to talk to her at some point, just to talk.

i cant really handle therapy but its possible i cant handle not having it either so i was thinking i could do a quick 15 minutes of it tmw or something. i dont really want to i'm dreading it. seems hard to get back on the bike once you fall off, even more so when you only just started to learn how to ride it.

i'm resisting sleeping at night altogether, and less willing to take anything for it. then i'm running around on caffeine states and naps in the day time and i'm disorienated, and just plain wacky now. but making these posts and having replies have helped with devoleping the motivation to do good something about myself. hm...

[hummm_mabbe]

that is a lot to take in.

you're fighting the fight for therapy, eh? question, could you throw me a few examples of emotional needs?

i spoke to the prescribing psychiatrist from my day hospital on the phone yesterday.

i was talking about medication, she said i could still see her even if it just was to talk. so i'm thinking it might be a good idea to talk to her at some point, just to talk.

i cant really handle therapy but its possible i cant handle not having it either so i was thinking i could do a quick 15 minutes of it tmw or something. i dont really want to i'm dreading it. seems hard to get back on the bike once you fall off, even more so when you only just started to learn how to ride it.

i'm resisting sleeping at night altogether, and less willing to take anything for it. then i'm running around on caffeine states and naps in the day time and i'm disorienated, and just plain wacky now. but making these posts and having replies have helped with devoleping the motivation to do good something about myself. hm...

Hi

I did put up a post about emotional needs called 'childhood emotional needs' which had a bit more detail. These needs are just as relevant in adulthood however.

Examples are:

1. The need for validation

2. The need for protection

3. The need for nurturance

4. The need for guidance

5. The need for acceptance

6. The need for empathy

A one word explanation cannot really do what these actually stand for any justice. Entire books can, and have been written on the subject. I think as you are saying that right now youre not sure if you can really be bothered with therapy, that it wouldnt be useful for me to write out a whole long post explaining it to you. This is especially true if this is a whole field that your current therapy has not even touched or considers unimportant, and I also get the impression that it does not seem important to you right now. If you'd like to know more then a google search will help. A good field to look under is 'inner child' work in relation to emotional needs. Its just one area that uses them and has a cheesy title, but it explains it well. If doing a search is not what you want to do right now then thats understandable.

It sounds like sorting sleep is the most pressing problem for you. Has sleep deprivation has been a prelude to a manic or psychotic episode for you in the past at all? Im sure you are well aware of the link between the two, so if this has happened before then I can see why sorting sleep would be your first priority.

Is your dx BPD, or something else?

[wordsmithy]

its not that i cant be bothered with therapy. and its not that i dont think the therapy thats available for me right now is unhelpful potentially.

its more that i cant do therapy. i cant open up, i cant talk, i cant engage with the other patients, i cant trust the therapits, i cant do all the things ineed to do in order to make it work, because it works, but i lack the abilty to allow it to.

or thats what i think i think at the moment.

which isnt the most brilliant answer.

ugh.

no searching sounds good.

sleep is bloody awful, its upsetting to think about how difficult it making things. but no i've never become psychotic or manic following sleep deprevation, though sucidal thoughts and depression has developed aftwards in past.

emotional needs... need to goodle, search... thanks ross.

[wordsmithy]

^oh god, so many typos...

my "official" diagnosis is bpd (on forms and stuff), but i think that it isnt entirely accurate. the consultant doesnt either, and i find that thinking about diagnoses make things, just hard.

complicates unnesscarily.

but have told that i have a number pd symtoms. mostly bpd and schzoid. over the years the number grows and grows. back when i was 18 i was clinically depressed, then i got refrred few months later to a doctor specialising in bpd, and i've been under his care since then. (am 22)

so really i dont know, but i itry not to see that as too important. but why do oyu ask?

[hummm_mabbe]

^oh god, so many typos...

my "official" diagnosis is bpd (on forms and stuff), but i think that it isnt entirely accurate. the consultant doesnt either, and i find that thinking about diagnoses make things, just hard.

complicates unnesscarily.

but have told that i have a number pd symtoms. mostly bpd and schzoid. over the years the number grows and grows. back when i was 18 i was clinically depressed, then i got refrred few months later to a doctor specialising in bpd, and i've been under his care since then. (am 22)

so really i dont know, but i itry not to see that as too important. but why do oyu ask?

I wanted to know, because if your dx was schizophrenia or bipolar it would have made me think differently about what I could say that would be helpful to you.

BPD and schizoid is a harsh combination - I have bits of schizotypal, BPD and paranoid PD. If schizoid is your more primary symptom set (its useful to use diagnoses if only to understand what will be the main struggles you suffer from) then this will contribute a lot to feeling that emotional needs based therapies are not relevant - those dx'd with schizoid personality disorder tend to see no point or value in human relationships and will tend to avoid them. This is slightly different to schizotypal where relationships are avoided out of fear and paranoia. Overcoming paranoia means that the desire for relationships can come back, but with schizoid there may be no desire at all, so knowing your dx helps me to understand a little of how you may react to and feel about certain things.

Really this is what dx's in PD's are - just a shorthand for sets of symptoms and feelings. I agree that a dx is not something to get too hung up on, as the individual is more important.