I agree that people can get stuck in thinking in terms of the diagnosis, when after all it is an illness or condition or disorder not the sum total of you as a human being. Even with PTSD, I have fought to get out of the victim mentality.

That said, I do think it varies with different types of diagnoses. They have different patterns and affect us in different ways. Some are more behavioral, some are more internalized. They respond to different treatments and different meds so there is not one answer that fits everyone. And people both clients and therapists differ on how much they use or emphasize them.

Myself, with PTSD, I think less about the actual diagnosis and symptoms and more in terms of the emphasis on trauma and its effects. I used to read lots about it. Now I just trust that when things come up they might have a residue of traumatic material along with them so I'm more attentive to that possibility and more open to working on it. It is not necessarily the diagnosis itself but the issue of trauma.