Circumstantial speech

I’m also reading that. Yes a hallmark of narcissistic abuse in particular is word salad.

I never would have thought!

I looked up "thought disorder" in Wikipedia and there is a massive list of thought problems. It's a wonder doctors pick up on these. Like I said, no doctor has ever discussed speech with me in 35 years but my speech has been awful. Co-workers have picked up on it.

Yeah a former manager or supervisor said I was random, along with another boy who has unmedicated ADHD. I was like, well then, and I try to pay attention to what I say now. Its really hard, but I don't want to "be myself" at work in that way.

The "word salad" that refers to personality disorders is NOT the same as word salad that occurs as a result of schizophrenia.

The former is a pop-psychology term that is used to describe the type of manipulative speech some people with personality disorders use. That kind of word salad is intentional and controlled. It is used with an end result in mind.

Word salad as a scientific term specifically means a symptom exhibited by people with schizophrenia and certain other brain disorders. It cannot be controlled or "willed" and it is not used to manipulate others. It is a sign of neurological dysfunction.

I actually had a pdoc tell me this was a trait of potential OCD. However, once it was brought to my attention, I was able to curb it. So, for me, it was just a function of being long-winded, I think. But I have seen others that cannot separate the relevant from irrelevant information.

Thank you! I definitely meant the latter.

It’s not necessary to get defensive.

I'm sorry; you've misunderstood. I was not being defensive, just wanted to clarify the definitions

Thank you for the clarification. I was only aware of the term "word salad" in reference to schizophrenia, psychoses, and dementia. When I Googled it, almost all the searches I found were on this definition. However, I did find an article that referred to this other kind of "word salad," which is referring to abuse. Here is that article, it's interesting: https://www.psychopathfree.com/artic...ord-salad.147/

It seems like the term was appropriated to discuss abusive speech because of how abusers use it against their victims. But it's important to recognize it has more than one meaning.

I didn’t misunderstand. You assumed I didn’t know what I was saying. If you want to discuss schizophrenia please start your own thread. Bipolar can be caused by trauma which comes from abuse. Please leave the gestalt of this thread intact.

Thank you for that article. Bipolar can be caused by trauma which can come from abuse. Perhaps I should differentiate between the different kinds of bipolar. I will read that article and may post it.

I'm not sure what bipolar possibly being caused by trauma that comes from abuse has to do with circumstantial speech? I'm confused because, to me, it seems you jump from one topic to another topic and the topics don't seem to be connected.

You're asking me not to stray from the the subject of this thread, yet it seems to me that's what you're doing. By posting the definition of "word salad" I wasn't changing the subject of this thread to the topic of schizophrenia, I was defining a term used IN this thread.

Uh no you misread me. This is my thread so if you disagree I encourage you to start your own. I won’t argue with you on yours, please don’t argue with me on mine, ok? Deal? Thank you.

I agree with Laurie here. Her post seems appropriately on topic. Also, I saw no defensiveness in her providing a definition of word salad, since it came up in the normal course of the thread.

I also do not know why you feel it's on topic to post a definition of the different types of bipolar when you're asking about circumstantial speech and no one has expressed confusion about the types of bipolar?

I see this defensiveness and confrontationalism come up often from you, leomama, in many of your threads, so perhaps it is something to consider?

I wonder if this is tied to your symptom of circumstantial speech because following your thought process and why you seem to get annoyed or angry at people for things you think they have done, which I don't see evidence of - in this thread, is quite difficult.

Thank you for your comments, seesaw.

leomama, I also perceive you as being unnecessarily defensive on the forum. It seems that maybe you don't logically follow what people are saying, or perhaps you feel like people are questioning your intelligence?

Really, there's no need to be so defensive here. We're all trying to support each other as best we can.

Not at all. I’m trying to keep this focused but it appears I’ve lost control of this thread so I’m bailing. Im not interested in getting personally attacked. You will carry on without me. I hope people learn from the subject I introduced. As you are not bipolar I don’t know why you are here. This thread has gone way off topic.

No I don’t appreciate my thread being hijacked nor the inappropriate personal attack another poster made. I’m going to leave it now. Carry on without me. I hope you all learn from my topic.

I didn't think there was a rule that you MUST have an actual diagnosis of a disorder to post in any specific sub-forum. To answer your question, I commented on this thread because I was intrigued by the concept of circumstantial speech.

I read threads in this forum because I have loved ones with bipolar and it helps me understand them and offer them support.

Regardless of why I am here, there is no need to be rude. I did not attack you. I made an observation about a recurring pattern for you and asked you about it. Questions are not personal attacks.

You are correct, seesaw. You do not have to have bipolar disorder to post on this board.

leomama, I maintain that you are misperceiving some of the comments on this thread. Your flares of defensiveness blind you to what people are really posting.

I have only read the headings of this article. It discusses important and completely legitimate issues and from spending 30 seconds scanning the article I recognized my father.

But I am completely horrified that a term that has a very clear meaning when applied to schizophrenia (and thank you, Seesaw, dementia - I did not know that) was appropriated for something for which it does not even fit. The unnecessary confusion has been created, and people might mistakenly believe that schizophrenics do not make sense on purpose, whereas - and it has already been pointed out - word salad cannot be willed.

Again, I did not read the article, but it seemed that the good old passive aggressiveness would fit at least some the subject headings.

POP-psychology is the key differentiator here.

Word salad as refers to schizophrenia is a scientific term. It is not a pop-psychology term.