undirectedenergy

[undirectedenergy]

ASPD: The Desire for and Run from Intimacy

This post will only contain my personal opinion and experience. It may not be applicable to all other people with ASPD and may likewise be relatable to people who do not have it.

I am only going to be talking about emotional intimacy, but this post is definitely also applicable to the other type of intimacy!

I'll make myself pretty vulnerable in this post, by discussing my personal experience, so you better not make me regret that!

Abbreviations:

ASPD = Antisocial Personality Disorder

ASPD is a disability caused by prolonged childhood trauma (with many possible variations), that develops in order to protect the brain from said trauma, or rather to help the brain deal with it in some way!

While the consequences of this in the context of intimacy, look different for every person with ASPD, many do report: a difficulty with developing bonds, having problems trusting people & giving away control, losing feelings for people quickly and abruptly/getting "bored" of people, responding extremely to arguments, having problems dealing with peoples emotions/ problems with being close to people etc.

This may be due to a variety of factors, but does often tie back to having no or few positive experiences with intimacy, having not learned how to exist in relationships properly/a lack of being socialized, not having the necessary prosocial emotions and mechanisms to deal with it and other similar things.

While this causes some people with ASPD to develop a brain, that does not have a need for emotional intimacy at all, others develop a brain, that craves the emotional intimacy it has been denied, but which will also fight said intimacy at every turn.

Thats as much generalized info as I can give you, as the exact representation of this is highly individual, but I will offer my personal experience on the following slides!

What you need to know is that I was accidentally neglected for huge parts of my childhood and teens and did not get my emotional and social needs met most of the time, while also knowing that my parents were theoretically capable of that, as they were giving everything I lacked to my sibling.

This caused me to grow up with a burning desire for intimacy, while being disappointed by people time and time again, failing to actually develop the things needed to experience this intimacy and partially growing to resent it and viewing it as "weak" and "bad".

Ever since then I have been stuck in what I like to call the "ASPD stages of running". Theres different points in getting close to people (in any nature of a relationship), that'll send me running and feeling like I am "weak" for wanting it, or as if being close to people is the worst thing that could happen.

The stages (simply put) are:

1. Desiring/Daydreaming about my dream relationship

2. Looking at peoples relationships/Looking at people with the intent of getting closer to them

3. Talking to people (online or irl)

4. Getting closer / being friends with people

5. Being friends with people for longer

Optionally:

6. Getting so close that a romantic relationship may happen

7. The moment of getting in the relationship / the days after

8. Being in the relationship for a bit

At any of those stages, I'll very likely have one or multiple moments where my ASPD will try to get the better of me and will try to convince me to just run away, drop contact and never talk about it again. Even just admitting to this and talking about it is hard as fuck, because it is so deeply ingrained in my brain to see emotional intimacy as a weak and dangerous thing.

What this will look like exactly really depends on the person and situation, but things that have happened in the past were:

• blocking the person and everyone I am friends with and pretending I am no longer alive

• my brain fixating on their faults in order to give me a good reason to hate them so I don't get closer to them and can hold them at arms length

• responding less often/more dryly or ignoring messages entirely

• not replicating the energy of the conversation/relationship

• staging an incident so I ruin the relationship

• running at the first signs of a disagreement

• avoiding people when they are emotional

• feeling uncomfortable around people as a whole => isolating

• beating myself up about letting it happen again

• impulsively bumping the relationship to another stage, just to immediately regret it (in a "fuck that has consequences" way)

• shutting off all my emotions, dissociate or otherwise make sure to stop the feelings (or just lose them automatically)

To put it in a shorter and more simple way, I'll usually either get the fuck outta there, or make sure to change the relationship/my personal position in the relationship to a more comfortable and less vulnerable and intimate level. This may also just look like me shutting off, becoming distant, or seeming mad, when all I am is overwhelmed by the intimacy and grossed out that I actually need and desire that.

As you can possibly imagine, that is not the most useful thing, as it causes issues in relationships, cuts friendships short and makes dealing with people a lot harder!

The most frustrating thing about this for me though is, that even if the most perfect friend or partner came along and even if the relationship would work at first, I am very very likely to crash it against the wall, simply because my brain cannot handle having the things, that it needs and desires.

It desires a hug and runs from the one who offers it.

It needs help and bites the hand that does.

It needs love and gets grossed out by whoever offers it.

It wants attention and can't handle it when it gets it.

It wants gifts, but doesnt know what to do when it gets them.

Whatever it wants, it can't have, so it keeps wanting, keeps yearning, keeps desiring and has to watch itself be unable to accept any of it.

And if that sounds painful, thats because it is.

Its a vicious kind of pain when you have to watch yourself ruin yet another thing, because your brain can't handle it, while you scream at it in frustration to get its act together, because it also is everything you desperately need.

ASPD sucks when it comes to intimacy and it especially sucks when it comes to talking about it, or being honest about these problems. It developed to protect me from being too "weak" to deal with the trauma and now its practically preventing me from showing any "weakness" or seeking out what previously hurt me. Which wouldn't be this bad, if I didn't still have this kid in me that just wants to be loved and daydreams about all the things, the ASPD hates.

When your shell disagrees with your core and you're not strong enough yet to break your shell, what does that really leave you with, other than curling up into a spiky ball and letting the shell do its job? I know I still need the protection, but I wish it wasn't actively preventing me from learning to live without it.

First posted on my instagram (same @)

[undirectedenergy]

npd is so odd, it's either im the best at something and my opinion is always right and everyone agrees with me, or everyone around me is stupid and i lash out and kms

[undirectedenergy]

I can't tell what's real. I'm so fucking inconsistent. I try to tell people what's "going on" and I literally can't fucking tell if I'm lying or not. I have like a million different motivations for saying what I'm saying and at least half of them are in some way manipulative (saying it to gain sympathy, or to make them feel a way i want them to feel), but then some are "honest" (like it is just actually how I feel) and some are just because it might be interesting to say the words. But also somehow it's actually straight up lying like I don't feel the way I say i feel at all. Or I'm just wrong

I try to be honest but how can you be honest when everything about yourself feels fake sometimes and true others? I can't even tell if I'm being honest or fucking with my own head so I just think I'm being honest

Oh and then when I'm actually feeling something strongly and try to talk about it just fucking dissociate. Like right now. I can't keep a thought in my head and my eyes keep unfocusing and the second I post this I'm gonna lay here frozen tull my brain starts working again

[undirectedenergy]

Folks I'm losing my shit again

[undirectedenergy]

[undirectedenergy]

[undirectedenergy]

[undirectedenergy]

Npd culture is explaining to your friends that being inferior to you is actually a good thing because they don’t threaten my identity so I can be their friend and being inferior to me doesn’t make them bad because I’m the best so there’s a lot of range in the “worse than me” category

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[undirectedenergy]

NPD (/cluster b) culture is we deserve better. After the things we've endured to end up like this, we still get treated like shit?

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[undirectedenergy]

Me, trying to heal, grow, be vulnerable or whatever, directly asking my partner what his ulterior motive is for wanting to be with me

Him "What you mean like other than the joy of connecting deeply with another human being, literally the thing that makes life worth living?"

Me laughing, internally screaming

[undirectedenergy]

NPD culture is I know advertising is crucial for engagement and popularity but it feels desperate to me so I will never ever do it

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[undirectedenergy]

NPD culture is I know advertising is crucial for engagement and popularity but it feels desperate to me so I will never ever do it

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[undirectedenergy]

People seriously underestimate the long term effects of constant loneliness

"why are you so weird?" Idk, maybe because being completely isolated while growing up has destroyed my brain and now I'm nothing more than a human-mimicking creature that bases all of my actions on what I think is normal human behavior rather than just doing things naturally

[undirectedenergy]

This is gonna make me rage out. Why am I watching this?

ISN'T IT SO FUCKING IRONIC that the disorder that comes from being so fucking traumatized you don't believe you're human anymore gets seen by people as being literally and actually inhuman?

The grandiose part of me is like 👹 ok hot, I'll be a demon then I guess

The vaulnerable part is like she's right

The healing part is like maybe we don't demonize people for being traumatized?

Good job on the compassion empaths you're doing so well 👏🏼 really living in the image of God or whatever

[undirectedenergy]

im so convinced i was some kind of really bad person in my past life and my current life is my punishment for what ive done

[undirectedenergy]

questioning npd culture is ok i just crashed and sobbed for a fucking hour and now i feel like somebody ripped off a chunk of my soul and you’re telling me i just have to go on with life like nothing happened

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[undirectedenergy]

npd culture is getting a kick out of being called a narcissist ( in the derogatory sense ).

like yessss keep going your attempts to hurt me by using my disorder against me are p pathetic. ^_^

— crow 💢

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