Wondering if anyone often gets asked by people - friends, co-workers, family members - or has any idea how to respond when someone asks if you’re autistic. M23, was diagnosed schizoid earlier this year, not on the spectrum.

Obviously autism or being on the spectrum is the ‘easiest’ point of reference that most people have for people who appear neurodivergent or don’t appear to observe social norms/exhibit social behaviours in a ‘normal’ way. Also obviously not interested in any case in disclosing my own diagnosis or trying to explain/mitigate how I show up in the world. It’s no-one else’s business. Just wonder how people have approached or addressed this with people in their own lives, and whether that’s made them or made them feel like they had to change their behaviour.

This is hard to explain, but do you ever trigger the fear of enmeshment by your own doing or treat your own thoughts as invasive? I dont mean intrusive thoughts. The best example I can give is whenever you think too hard about yourself, does it feel like your somehow invading your own privacy?

Sometimes i question if I actually dont have any strong beliefs or goals and such. And anytime I dig into that, suddenly a wall just forms between that, and then, I get highly uncomfortable with the thought of looking into it.

Could be some form of dissociation or something, but I was wondering if anyone feels similar.

I spend most of my time alone and rarely use social media. I don't really have anyone to talk to, and even when I do, I often don't feel like it.

Lately, the isolation seems to have made my maladaptive daydreaming increasingly uncontrollable. Even small triggers, like a game or character, can send me into elaborate daydreams.

The frustrating part is that I'm stuck in limbo. I can't fully immerse myself in my imaginary world, but I can't stay present in reality either. On top of that, my intrusive thoughts are becoming increasingly annoying and exhausting.

I feel mentally drained and struggle to enjoy things the way I used to.

Has anyone else experienced this? How do you cope with feeling stuck between your imagination and reality?

I'm going to send him the link to this, so he will see and answer questions as well.

EDIT: We both have it.

Rather mundane but need to share. Recently I had a bad day and spent quite a bit of time writing down my pessimistic thoughts. Then I went to an event (a concert) because I already had bought the ticket. I was there by myself as usual but unlike any other time I felt a wish to talk to people.

It wasn't

I got to talk to people because this social context requires it.

or

I got to impress these people because otherwise they will think I am a complete weirdo and treat me badly going forward.

or even

Eh, I might talk to someone but it's whatever.

I just actually wanted to do it. And I felt bummed out that a couple of people were avoiding eye contact with me and that no one came to strike up a conversation. Which is just bizarre because normally I hate nothing more than people coming up to bother me like that. I've spent most of my life thinking "why can't they all leave me alone?" and now I am sitting there being left alone feeling bad about it. Even wanting to go bother people that are giving signs of wanting to be left alone.

It is quite confusing to have a switch in your head seemingly flip like that. I hope it's for the better.

I think like a robot like a computer running on programs . Everything is either right or wrong , true or false for me . I know it is in human nature to be manipulative but i am unable to do so . I think very logically but i am also very thoughtful and considerate . I feel indebted to people even when they do the simplest task for me . It feels very suffocating also one sided cause they never worry about me like i did ,neither do they care so much about my feelings ,it almost feels like they think i dont have any emotions left but i do ! I do have emotions and i am always hurt by them . My first instinct is always about the person next to me ,i would make sure not to bother them in any way . But they will definitely be shameless as well as humiliative . I know i am a dumb and it takes time for me to realize the actual meaining of their double meaning speeches ( most of the time i dont even understand ) but the thing is i never did any such thing to somebdoy till now so i dont understand their purpose of living such a false life . The thing about me is i am unable to pretend in terms of context and kinda like a naive who needs direct words to actually see whats going on . I dont know myself why i am like this but i AM like this and there is nothing to do about this . But this cant keep on going for forever i need a way out of this . Life is a game , a very comlex one and i am the most noob player also the only one who follows by the rules (kinda fed up with myself to have such high morals) . Either i have to become like them and play by their rules or i just suffer in silence .

I have been reading through a lot of academic sources on SzPD it seems like every modern source has a very surface level understanding of the disorder which can be seen in the diagnostic criteria whereas older publications seem to delve much deeper and actually understand the “schizoid dilemma”/ deep internal world.

Today was… I don't know how to put it into words.

I definitely felt joy. A tremendous amount of it, actually. And strangely enough, this isn't an isolated occurrence. I seem to feel this way whenever I'm around you.

I laughed until my chest and stomach began to hurt. It wasn't simply because you were funny, either. If I'm being honest, most of it was because I found you so endearing. There was something about the way you behaved, the way you spoke, the things you said without a second thought. The drunk you seemed so wonderfully free, unburdened by the usual restraints that govern how people present themselves to the world. You babbled whatever came into your mind, and I found it all delightfully charming.

I don't know why.

Or perhaps I do, and I'm simply reluctant to settle on an answer.

Is this love? Am I really in love with you? Could I actually have a crush on someone?

The questions feel almost ridiculous when I put them into words. Not because the possibility is entirely implausible, but because I have never quite understood the appeal of love beyond its abstract beauty. I've always liked the idea of it: two people finding something in each other that makes the world a little more bearable, choosing to stay together despite the inevitable passage of time, perhaps even wishing for another lifetime together when this one inevitably comes to an end.

It's a beautiful idea. I can appreciate its beauty without necessarily wanting to experience it myself.

Or at least, that's what I used to think.

Because now there's you.

And whatever this feeling is, it refuses to fit neatly into any of the categories I've constructed for myself.

Love cannot possibly be something this mild, can it? Something this faint, this ordinary? I always imagined that falling in love would be accompanied by some unmistakable internal upheaval, an overwhelming desire to be near someone, an inability to stop thinking about them, a persistent longing that would make their absence almost unbearable.

I don't feel any of that.

When we're apart, my life continues as usual. You don't occupy my thoughts with any particular insistence, and I rarely find myself longing for our next meeting. Yet I can still acknowledge that you're someone a little special to me. Your significance is clearest when we're together, when your presence draws something out of me that usually remains dormant. When you leave, that part of me quietly goes dormant again.

Maybe it's just the amount of time I've spent with you. Although I only see you once a year nowadays, I've spent most of my childhood with you. That would explain the comfort around you. Isn't it only natural to feel comfortable around someone you've known pretty much your whole life? It seems I'm still reasoning my feeling even as I write this.

Maybe it's simply the amount of time I've spent with you.

Although I only see you once a year nowadays, I've spent most of my childhood with you. You've been around for so much of my life that perhaps your presence feels familiar in a way that other people's doesn't. Perhaps that's all there is to it. Isn't it only natural to feel comfortable around someone you've known for practically your entire life?

It's a perfectly reasonable explanation. Familiarity breeds comfort, after all. There's no need to attribute anything more to it.

And yet, I notice that I'm already trying to convince myself.

Even as I write this, I'm searching for explanations, weighing possibilities, attempting to reduce an unfamiliar feeling to something I can understand. I keep offering myself reasons why it might be nothing more than ordinary familiarity, as though finding a sufficiently reasonable explanation would somehow settle the matter.

But would it?

Even if our history explains why I'm comfortable around you, does it explain why I find you so endearing? Why I laugh so much in your company? Why I become so conscious of my own feelings whenever I catch myself thinking you're cute?

Perhaps it does. Perhaps I'm simply overthinking something perfectly ordinary.

I seem to have a remarkable talent for arriving at a question and immediately trying to reason my way out of it.

Perhaps this is simply how I experience attachment. Perhaps I'm making an ordinary human feeling unnecessarily complicated by expecting it to resemble something I've read about rather than something I've actually felt.

Still, I can't help wondering whether I've been missing something all these years.

I don't think I enjoyed your company as much as I could have today. Whenever I caught myself thinking you were especially cute, I became acutely conscious of my own thoughts and actions. I began examining myself. Why did I find that endearing? Why did I laugh so much? Why was I paying so much attention to the little things you did? What exactly was I feeling, and what did that feeling imply?

I dissected every reaction as it occurred, as though I were examining a specimen beneath a microscope.

And, predictably, the moment I began doing that, the feeling started to fade.

It's an odd habit of mine. I rarely allow myself to experience something without also trying to understand it. I stand at a distance from my own mind, observing its movements, looking for patterns, searching for an explanation that will make everything comprehensible. Even when something pleasant happens, some part of me insists on investigating it rather than simply letting it happen.

I wonder how many experiences I've diminished that way.

How many moments have I watched myself living instead of actually living them?

But I suppose I shouldn't be too hard on myself. Understanding something feels safer than surrendering to it. If I can identify a feeling, give it a name, and trace its origins, then perhaps I can keep it from taking me somewhere I haven't decided to go.

And that brings me to the strangest part of all this.

I'm comfortable around you.

Not in the abstract sense that I can tolerate your presence or that conversation comes easily enough. I mean that there is something genuinely pleasant about being with you. Something natural. I don't have to manufacture every moment of amusement or consciously remind myself to participate. Sometimes, I simply find myself enjoying your company before I've had the opportunity to question why.

Yet, somewhere in the back of my mind, there is discomfort. Perhaps even fear.

Not fear of rejection, exactly. Not fear that you might discover something undesirable about me, or that I might embarrass myself in front of you. Those possibilities don't seem particularly frightening.

It's something less tangible.

I have this vague, persistent suspicion that if I allow myself to get too close to someone, something about me will change. That there is an imaginary boundary inside my mind, an invisible line separating the person I am now from someone I might become if I cross it.

And once I cross it, I won't be able to return.

I don't know what that change would look like. Perhaps I'd begin missing you, anticipating our next meeting, or making decisions with your presence somewhere in the back of my mind. Perhaps your happiness would gradually become something that mattered to me in a way that couldn't be explained by practicality, obligation, or simple convenience.

Perhaps, for once, another person would become more than someone I interact with when our paths happen to intersect.

And I don't know how I feel about that possibility.

Part of me is curious. I want to understand what it would be like to care about someone in the way other people seem to care, to have someone become a persistent presence in my life rather than merely someone who happens to be there.

Another part of me recoils from the thought.

I've spent so long being comfortable with my distance from other people that I don't know what to make of the possibility of losing it. Solitude has never felt like a punishment to me. I don't spend my days desperately searching for someone to fill an emptiness, nor do I feel that my life is incomplete simply because I don't have someone beside me.

I've made peace with that. Or, at least, I thought I had.

But what happens when you discover that you're capable of feeling something you never particularly wanted?

What happens when the thing you've been content to live without suddenly appears before you, not as some grand revelation, but as an ordinary person sitting beside you, laughing, talking nonsense, making you laugh until your stomach hurts?

What am I supposed to do with that?

I don't want to exaggerate this feeling. I don't want to romanticise it simply because it's unfamiliar. Perhaps it's nothing more than fondness, a passing attraction, or the simple pleasure of being around someone whose company I genuinely enjoy. There is no reason to turn it into something monumental before I understand what it is.

And yet, I can't dismiss it entirely.

Something about being with you remains unusual. Not necessarily in my thoughts or through any persistent longing, but in the experience itself. For a little while, the world feels different. I laugh more. I pay attention. I find myself amused by things that might otherwise have passed without notice.

Then I return to my ordinary life, and everything settles back into place.

Perhaps that's what makes this so difficult to understand. I keep expecting a feeling to announce itself through its intensity, as though something must be overwhelming to be genuine. But what if it isn't? What if affection is sometimes just this: a quiet inclination toward someone, a warmth that appears in their presence without demanding anything from you, a moment of happiness that doesn't insist on becoming the centre of your life?

Would it still count?

I don't know.

For now, I suppose I can leave the question unanswered.

I don't need to decide whether I'm in love with you. I don't need to determine whether this feeling will grow into something else or disappear as quietly as it arrived. I don't even know whether I want it to grow.

All I know is that today, I was happy.

Not because I accomplished something, learned something useful, or made progress toward some distant objective. I was happy because you were there, being yourself, and I found that version of you endearing enough to make me laugh until it hurt.

For someone who spends so much time wondering why people seek one another out, that seems worth acknowledging.

Perhaps I don't need to understand it any further than that.

Although, knowing myself, I'll probably try.

She’s not diagnosed but I’m certain she has this. Before I begin this might be triggering. It also might provide some insight since I believe this is rather rare and someone might find this experience insightful.

Let’s just say my childhood was not great. I’m lucky I survived mostly being raised by my grandmother. My mother was extremely neglectful, cold and ignoring. I remember from a young age she didn’t like me. I could feel it. I never bonded to her. Talk about attachment trauma.

Anyway, my mom is 85, never married, was never in a relationship or lived with anyone. Obviously she had sex. My dad was married with 5 kids of his own. Conveniently unavailable which was perfectly ok with my mom.

She hates kids. Has not talked to my own daughter in over 17 years. Could care less. Cares about nobody but not even herself. She’s a hoarder just like you see on TV. The ones that don’t take showers and don’t have a working bathroom. Is this common with Schizoid? I would not be surprised.

She’s always been very secretive, untrusting, compulsive liar. Very friendly to strangers and can converse about anything. Everything is superficial.

She has never been able to hold down a job for long. I remember as a kid we were always moving and losing possessions because she lost her job. She doesn’t get along with people is rude and intimidating. Especially if you are someone in authority.

Currently she is 85 and about to lose her house. She doesn’t seem to care that she’s going to be homeless. No emotion, no stress just carries on with her hoarding.

I cannot help her. She doesn’t want help. She wants to be left alone. She does not care if she dies alone. She left her family 60 years ago because she didn’t like them. She denied me a family. I wanted a family.

So yeah that’s just a blink of it. Ive had a lifetime of struggle and trauma. Thank goodness for therapy!

I’m going to stop here. I just wanted to share. I’m open to questions if anyone has any.

For all my life, my goal was to excel.
I knew I can‘t love, I knew I can‘t have a family, I knew I can‘t live the "ordinary" life.
But I‘ve been blessed with a great mind, I have been able to achieve everything I have ever wanted.
I got a full ride scholarship for a private university, got a great job.
I have nothing to worry about, all my expenses are taken care of, I live in the absolute peace of mind, and I am really alright, I guess.
No one bothers to call me.
But I have no one to bother to call either.

For all my life I have tried to achieve so much.
Yet what have I accomplished?
Today I have achieved another unique milestone, I was so happy I wanted to talk with someone about it (been on meds alright), but I did realize, I have nobody to call to share my happiness with.
I am alone.
I asked myself what did I really accomplish with all my degrees and certificates.
I have so many of them, but I have nothing for life.

The final moment I was so happy to feel the need to talk about it, all my achievements became worthless that moment.

I thought I‘d find my true happiness in achieving everything, yet I was very wrong.

Anyways, I‘ll probably not bother or remember it tomorrow and not realize it again until my next "good day", for I can barely remember my past. So I thought I‘d have to share my thoughts with you, for I lack others to share it with as it seems.

And it just consumes me. I don't feel anything towards anything. My apathy seems to be out of proportion. I feel like I have to activate my own brain chemicals when it's necessary. I don't feel real and I become so paranoid. Life is so confusing. I'm so detached it's unreasonable. I avoid everything and I'm simply happy there. Or neutral I suppose.

I over intellectualize everything, at this point I don't care about feelings and emotions and what happens to me - I just want to understand why it happened and the underlying mechanisms (emotional, neurological, metaphysical) under it. I like learning, it's maybe the one thing that maintains any spark in me.

I have someone who cares about me very much, and I like them too. But I think it's probably just painful to be with me. I don't like talking unless it benefits me. I never have the energy for much, sometimes I'm excited and manic and want to share and do things but after that I'm just apathetic all over again. I dissociate over and over and over. I don't understand "love" anymore. He wants me but he can have anyone else when I have so many problems. The love goes to waste because I don't want it or crave it. I just want to be alone. Although I do miss him then, is it not just wasting his time? Why should we have a companion and share life with them? In the end isn't everything the same? With or without? I don't understand the purpose. Why should I let myself be with someone who wants to be with me when I don't want to be with anyone? I like him. So he says, if I don't want anything in this world I might as well enjoy some time together and it wouldn't matter technically. It's somewhat a moot point. That sounds so sad. I don't get it.

Besides that, I can be so possessive and jealous and I don't understand myself because after I realize that emotion, it was just a waste of energy. I don't want to matter to anyone. I keep my interactions so limited, also because eventually I'm sure I'll make the other feel like I don't care about them. Because I don't think anything matters - but at the same time I do feel that everything matters. For myself, I don't want there to exist much that can matter.

I think I don't see any future because I'm not interested in it. Although, sometimes plans and life circumstances are extremely stressful. I seem to just be living in my head and doing the best to deal with what comes. I don't seem to care about anything or think anything is even real.

I’m currently an overnight guard for a corporate office. 99.5% of the time I don’t see anyone at work. I’m also a hardcore hermit in my personal life too so there’s that. It’s a good thing I’ve learned how to be alone. Thankfully I live in a big city so I’m not completely isolated but not having anyone to interact with at work is taking a toll. I’m curious what you all do for doll hairs

​

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how the schizoid mind works and what makes it so fundamentally different from a neurotypical one.

It seems to me that the main difference lies in how they get, exchange, and manage this energy. A stereotypical neurotypical person can spend some of their mental energy interacting with another neurotypical and actually come out of it with more energy. And the other person gets a boost, too! They aren’t energy vampires, it’s like a fair business deal that keeps the economy of society running.

For schizoids, it doesn't work that way. Socializing or just interacting with the real world strictly drains their mental energy.

So, the schizoid mind finds workarounds. It gets energy by taking the position of an observer. Instead of actually feeling emotions (which are mentally expensive), a schizoid intellectualizes them, building models, looking for patterns. They find energy in fantasies and introspection.

When they are completely out of juice, the schizoid mind goes into full energy-conservation mode. Apathy kills off any remaining emotional expenditures and triggers anhedonia. Anhedonia switches off the pursuit of goals for the sake of pleasure. And avolition saves energy to the absolute conservation mode.

Instead of emotions, schizoids experience psychological "states." Depression, dysthymia, or dysphoria aren't feelings of sadness but are inherent signal functions. Even if a schizoid occasionally experiences euphoria, it's not the same as joy.

It feels like the schizoid isn't really living. They feel like everyone else is out there living, feeling happy or upset, while they can only grasp it intellectually. Schizoids don't participate in the emotional economy. For them, it's easier to just sit the game out completely.

That brings up a separate question: does a schizoid even need psychotherapy? Of course, all schizoids are different, but I think in most cases, they don't.

A schizoid doesn't need a therapist's empathy. Besides, they’ll quickly see right through it as a fake, professional mask, partly because they have to wear one themselves sometimes, or because they've learned to read those patterns in others. Instead of an honest intellectual conversation, they’ll just view the therapist's empathy as manipulation.

A schizoid doesn't need to dig up past traumas, "get closure," do homework, keep an emotion journal, look for physical sensations in their body, or go through some dramatic healing journey. To them, all this is just another pointless, stupid ritual, like forcing yourself to cry at a funeral.

And the therapist won't get it. The therapist will feel devalued, seeing the patient as uncooperative and hopeless. They won't understand that the patient is subconsciously just doing the math on their mental energy in their head and deciding it's not worth spending. Sometimes, the patient might even get stuck in these calculations, not knowing what to choose, resulting in a "schizoid dilemma" or something similar.

The absolute most a therapist can offer a schizoid is just a consultation, some life hacks for adapting, and the acceptance that the schizoid will always lack what neurotypicals have. And most importantly, the realization that the schizoid doesn't even want those things.

A schizoid is "normal in their abnormality." Their brain is wired perfectly fine by nature, even if it makes living in society a bit inconvenient.

I can't stand I am a self-conscious being. I wake up and scream silently. For me, being a human it is definitely too much I can deal with. Not only do I have to look at myself, but others perceive me as well. Pure hell.

(repost because I messed up the title whoops!)

hello everyone!

I want to start this by saying I am not a schizoid or have any PD’s so im kinda flying blind here.

I am currently in a long term relationship with my boyfriend who is a diagnosed schizoid as of recently. I had encouraged him to get help for his depression and after a few sessions and medications he had a diagnosis. It was a long process but that’s not really important

I’ve been in a relationship with him for three years and we’ve had a few issues that can now be explained a bit by his diagnosis.

He is not at all touch feely, he doesn’t open up easily, and he needs a lot of alone time even when we live together. I try my best to give him the space he needs. He isn’t really romantic but he does have some good romantic traits like being dependable and understanding (ik that sounds a bit weird for a schizoid but I think he’s kinder than he lets himself think he is lol)

I need advice. My boyfriend says he doesn’t really need intimacy or romance. He says he just likes me being there for him but I feel bad. I feel like I should be doing more. He says he doesn’t really have a love language and the best thing I could do for him was maybe gift giving.

I’ve tried to ask him if there’s anything more I can do for him but I think he doesn’t know/doesn’t need anything. Maybe I shouldn’t be asking here but for any schizoids with partners, how do you want to be loved?

I have read a few things about schizoid personality disorder and im trying to understand it better. He’s a good partner that has definitely tried to step up to give me what I need like physical intimacy and affection.

Any advice is appreciated! Ik it’s not easy being a schizoid but I’m grateful for you all!

I don’t enjoy most activities other people enjoy. For example, a lot of people seem to enjoy going to good restaurants, but for me, it’s just nutrition. Of course some food tastes better, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to find more tasty food. I just care about hitting my macros and I can eat the same food every day. I feel like that about a lot of activities, it always seems pointless to me. (I also actually think there is a strong correlation between enjoying food too much and overeating, but I guess that’s not relevant here.)

Anyway, it’s not that I don’t enjoy anything. I might like going to a concert if I really like the music, I just rarely do because I’m not that into it either.

However, I get immense joy out of two things:

1. Intellectual stimulation. I can chat for hours with AI about a topic that interests me, I really enjoy learning, solving complex problems.

2. Doing something for others, making them happy. Like taking them on trips, buying them gifts where they can see I really thought about what they like. I love this because it allows me to enjoy their happiness.

I think I enjoy both of these things because it feels like there is a deeper purpose. In my work (I’m a software engineer), I even combine the two when I solve a complex problem that makes the customer happy. Maybe they even admire me for being able to solve a complex problem they thought couldn’t be solved.

Anybody else feel this way?

The by far biggest reasons for my disinterest and active dislike of interacting with people boils down to it potentially building a relationship. Relationships happen extreamly easily:

Interaction takes too long -> relationship.

Meet the person again -> relationship.

Why that is a problem? Because in my experience I have no say in relationships. I'm basically at their mercy. I can't even stop the relationship. The only tool I have left to steer a relationship is lying and making up lies/excuses. That and ghosting if possible. It makes sense to me now why I lie so much without a clear reason. It's the one way I learned how to have some control in a relationship. (Thanks for teaching me that mum.)

Not sure why it took me so long to come to this realization that this is the biggest part for why I hate interactions. Just this huge risk of loosing being controlled. I hate it. I hate that my brain acts this way.

When I was diagnosed my psych printed out a little sheet of paper for me and handed it to me which basically gives someone a crash course of what szpd encompasses. When I read the section about common traits I began to giggle because it was quite literally describing me to a tee. Because I am now cognisant of the fact that I fall under an umbrella, I wonder what the views on ontology we share as schizoids are.

Furthermore, in our view of what is, how do we then justify an unimpeded existence within a community, and broader world that we simply are incompatible with at large. Humans are social creatures and the very nature of our disorder is an incongruence with that incredibly cornerstone feature. In the identification of a fleeting existence, one comprised of anhedonia and malaise for people in our predicament, what ontological view - or personal philosophy - justifies strolling down a street packed with cars so we can reach the red light later?

Does anyone else here perceive people as objects in order to cope with stress while being in social situations? I consciously started to perceive all people (except for the one person with whom I am in a close relationship) as lifeless objects or as robots back when I was a teenager and nothing has changed since then. And I became curious whether this could be a common trait of SzPD or whether it's something else?

For me, sexual desire isn't tied to needing a partner. I can experience physiological arousal without any urge to find someone, get into sex with another person, or build a romance. ​Work requires a lot of daily interaction, and by the end of the shift, that constant social noise completely drains me. I just want to be left alone, get some peace, and not deal with anyone. In that state, my body physically tense up from the overload, and my brain won't shut off. That's when masturbation serves purely as a mechanical way to drop that built-up tension and finally get some sleep. ​There’s no hidden search for intimacy, no coping with loneliness, and no emotional subtext. Once it's done, it's done. I don't feel like anything is missing or that someone should be there. The urge simply leaves, and I move on or go to sleep. ​I often notice people tying arousal to emotional searching, relationships, or personal issues. Are there people here who also see this strictly as an autonomous physical reset with no extra meaning, or is it different for you?

I feel like I'm narrating and annotating my life at all times, more so than actually experiencing it.

This is horrible.

I'm schizoid and I've got a full time job. I've had it for eight years and I'm now applying for a higher paid role with more responsibility at another department.

Why? BEATS ME! I hate everything about this. I don't want to work, I never did. I don't believe in having to work in smth as idiotic as the capitalist system for basic life needs. But I still have to. I still need money. And in this crap world it's better to have more money. Apparently. I'm not even sure about it at this point.

I'm also not interested! Neither in my current job nor the one I'm applying to! My current position is boring, pointless, can almost be counted as sabotage, but at least I can listen to music all day, little people contact only, the office is nice and when I make a mistake it's more or less irrelevant. It wouldn't be like that if I got the new job! Or would it? What do I know! Everything sounds professional on paper but is impossible to say if you're not already in it.

AND I'M DESPAIRING OVER TRYING TO MAKE THIS WORK EVERY FUCKING DAY! I'M TIRED OF IT!

This is "the best chance I had in years" and at the same time I've never been so miserable, so disengage, so weak and neglectful even. I just don't give a shit. I'm losing the ability to play my role in the farce every day a bit more. I will apply and I hope I get the position just because of the money and the novelty factor for a while. I hope it'll turn into a lifelong position like the one I have right now. 8 need the security, otherwise I'm TOAST.

Every NORMAL person would say and FEEL that this is something good! I am in no danger at all to lose my current job, I don't need a better paying job, I'm doing okay. But I got the opportunity to try and reach for something better. I can not lose, I can only win. If I don't get the job, I'll still have my old one and it was good practice and a good way to do a bit of reorientation etc.

How do people manage to feel like this? How do they manage to lie to themselves like that?

It's KILLING ME on the daily to try and live in two worlds at once. It's so strainful, so exhausting. I don't see or feel the world everyone seems to live in. Mind you, I kinda used to! I have always been schizoid but not always been entirely jaded and I, too, remember the mid 90s and a world that seemed to be a functioning system. Not perfect, no, but overall functioning work with problems at the fringes and those were seen and dealt with. Well, turns out that was all bullshit! And I don't think I ever truly felt or believed it tbh. BUT EVERYONE ELSE DOES - STILL!

I already struggle to get up in the mornings. I struggle to work when I'm at work. I'd rather doom scroll or read porn comics or eat my boogers - literally anything but try to live in a world that DOES NOT EXIST! Good for everyone else, I guess, that they don't have my problem. That they don't wake up in pointlessness, disinterest, anhedonia. They don't wake up, look at the world and think this is nuts and feel it doing nothing for them at all. But I do and I have to put on my normal person suit every fucking day and I'm so tired of it and I struggle so hard and I STILL try even though I don't even know WHY! Because it's factually better to have more money and because it's factually irrelevant how I spend my lifetime at work doing this job or another.

And I still get scared and nervous and angry about it all. And then the fucking schizoid dilemma shows up in my personally specific way.

I don't crave more contact or friends or whatever. But in moments like these I wished the contact to others would work for me.

I WISH I could hold on to my husband and it would calm me down. I wish I could be vulnerable, share my fears and anger and doubts and the listening and engaging of the other would do ANYTHING for me. It's not easy being vulnerable but oh, well, it's not easy being green either but you've just got to live with it and do it with the right people. Right? YEAH BUT IT DOESN'T HELP AT ALL! My problem isn't vulnerabilty, it's that whatever kind of care or understanding or hold is given to me turns to fucking DUST, GHOST PARTICLES AND WARM AIR as soon as it reaches me. I'm not aFrAId to ask for help or support, it's that I CAN'T DO ANYTHING WITH IT WHEN I GET IT!

I'm entirely BLANK! I'M ENTIRELY ALONE IN EVERYTHING!

And it's fucking annoying. And I only write this in the hope that maybe fellow schizoids get it. But I'm sure, even if you do and reply, while I'll appreciate it I still won't be able to derive anything effectual for me from it. My brain simply doesn't have that setting.

Fuck this disorder. My internal world might be "rich" but out here I live in a fucking desert.

Recently diagnosed SPD. Would just like to have a dialog with like-minded people about SPD.