What is Avoidant Personality?
Each of these symptoms are horribly debilitating all by themselves. Wrap them into the condition called AVPD and they become overwhelming. This makes AVPD one of the worst mental health conditions known to man!
Because people that have AVPD cannot function socially with friends and family, they seek isolation from everyone including the world. This isolation even extends to potential mates making dating and marriage extremely difficult.
There are over 400 Million people around the world that are affected by AVPD. In the US around 30 million suffer from AVPD. There are also millions of Loved Ones around the world that are in a relationship with someone that has AVPD.
In spite of all this, there is hope!
The Avoidant Personality Research Center (APRC) is focused on helping those suffering from AVPD and their loved ones by providing resources, information, and ways to find the path to a healthy future.
- Do you avoid friends and family?
- Do you feel like you are defective and alone in the world?
- Do you feel rejected by family, friends, or co-workers?
- Do you feel like you are inferior to everyone?
- Do you feel like everyone hates you?
- Do you hate going outside your home?
- Do you bounce from job to job?
If you answered yes to any or all these questions, you may be one of the millions of people around the world suffering from Avoidant Personality (AVP).
Take the AssessmentImagine you are in a pool. Only this pool is not filled with water. It is filled with the most disgusting, most awful sludge you can think of. Like tar that is put down on roads before they throw down gravel.
You are completely naked in this pool. The very smell is so disgusting that it makes you vomit. The tar is the blackest black you have ever seen. It’s not a smooth black substance, but it’s full of lots of very jagged rocks.
The rocks tear at your skin and open wounds. The very act of being in this sludge is unbearable. You can’t swim out of the pool, and you can’t tread water. You can’t do anything to try to escape.
The only thing you can do is stay in this pool of sludge. Staying in the pool is such a vile experience that makes you throw up repeatedly. The act of throwing up makes your body convulse which causes you to sink.
Any movement at all only makes you sink deeper. It is as if there are unseen hands that are reaching for you trying to pull you under to your death.
There is no escape. If you stay in this pool, you will die. If you try to escape from this pool, you will die. The only thing you can do is try to stay as still as you can and just try to survive - day in day out, 365 days a year, year after year.
This is the reality of an Avoidant Personality. This is the reality of the day-to-day existence of someone suffering from Avoidant Personality.
The sludge in the pool is Major Depression, Severe Social Anxiety, Fear of People, Fear of Going Outside, Extreme Sensitivity to Criticism, Extreme Sensitivity to Rejection, Hatred of Oneself and a host of other symptoms.
The rocks in the sludge and the feeling of hands trying to pull you under is the feeling of Constant Criticism, Constant Rejection, and the Constant Feeling of Hatred and Judgement coming from everyone everywhere all the same time.
Someone that has Avoidant Personality may have some, or all of these symptoms.
- Major Depression
- Severe Social Anxiety
- Fear of people
- Fear of Authority
- Severe Sensitivity to Criticism
- Severe Sensitivity to Rejection
- Need to be in control
- Panic Attacks
- Inability to hold a job
- Feelings of being inferior
- Feelings of worthlessness
- Self Isolationism
- Self Hatred
- Paranoia
- Inability to be intimate with a partner
- Feeling of being alone in their suffering
- Feeling that something else is controlling them
- Feeling that everything will go wrong
- Fear of being yelled at
- Mistrust of people
- Addictive Behaviors
- Obsessive Compulsive Behaviors
Therapists characterize AVPD by six major indicators.
- Severe Social Anxiety
- Feelings of Worthlessness
- Severe Sensitivity to Criticism
- Severe Sensitivity to Rejection
- Fear of People
- Obsession
Typically, these indicators are seen by the time a person reaches early adulthood. In addition, those with AVPD may exhibit the following symptoms.
- Low self-esteem or lack of self-worth
- Wearing dark or nondescript clothing
- Staying in the background in social situations
- Unable to form stable relationships with those outside of the family
- Easily hurt by criticism
- Fear of speaking in public places
- Unable to participate in new activities for fear of rejection
- Excessive feelings of inadequacy and worthlessness
- Overwhelming discomfort with work or social activities
- Preoccupied with being rejected, laughed at, or shamed
- Unable to make new friends
- Obsessed with criticism, ridicule, or rejection
Official diagnosis for Avoidant Personality Disorder (AVPD) requires a psychological evaluation by a mental health professional.
Today’s researchers do not know with certainty what causes Avoidant Personality Disorder (AVPD), but here are many theories and beliefs about possible causes. Most professionals subscribe to a biopsychosocial causation. Those causes include:
- Genetics
- Social risk factors from early development
- Individual Personality
- Temperament
- Trauma
- Substance Abuse
If that holds true, then there is no single factor responsible for AVPD, but a complex and intertwined history where all these factors have some measure of influence.
Additional Causes
Research shows that these additional issues may cause the development of mental illness.
- Parents do not show their children enough love
- Children are rejected or marginalized
- Children that are neglected
- Child grows up in an environment where there is lots of fighting
Men are more likely to suffer in silence with AVPD due to social pressures and cultural constraints that they feel do not allow them to seek help. Because men refuse to seek help, they are often the more vulnerable to long term damage. This also makes obtaining accurate numbers of men affected by AVPD nearly impossible.
Women tend to suffer the effects of AVPD more acutely due to emotional deprivation. For example, when in a relationship, women are the major players that provide emotional support to their loved ones. AVPD short circuits emotions and can even prevent women from being able to adequately portray those emotions. This dichotomy means they cannot fulfill their purpose, making them more depressed and deepening symptoms of AVPD.
Women tend to be the ones more likely to seek help from AVPD, especially if they are the Loved One in the relationship.
If we go with the conservative middle of 10%, that means that
329 Million
If we choose the more conservative middle ground of 10% that means that
US - Our research suggests that the US has by far the highest percentage of confirmed cases of AVPD. The actual number is impossible to obtain because people that have AVPD tend to stick to themselves and avoid being diagnosed, seeking help, or being known as mentally ill due to the stigma that surrounds it.
Other Countries - There is very limited data on other countries right now. This is something that we at Avoidant Personality Research Center are working on. We hope to have this data soon. If you live in a country other than the US, and have, or suspect that you have AVPD, we highly encourage you to take our assessment so that we can work on gathering this data.
Avoidant Personality is a terrible mental health condition, but like any other condition, mental or physical, there is always hope. You came to this web site because you are looking for hope.
We can help you find the path to recovery from Avoidant Personality, but only if you are willing to put in the work that is needed.
If you have other questions about Avoidant Personality, please click below.