masochistic personality disorder

I find i'm more troubled by masochistic personality disorder than any other personality disorder. It's not actually an accepted diagnosis but mental health professionals use it to explain many facets of human behavior. The accepted term is self-defeating personality disorder.

I've been diagnosed with traits of other personality disorders in the past, such as borderline. But i don't find those traits bother me, probably because i am enjoying solitude now and not talking to anyone. However, i am still inflicting pain and humiliation on myself via negative self-talk on a regular basis as in masochistic personality disorder.

The only thing that doesn't fit about masochistic personality disorder is that it's only present during depression. So it's not pervasive. When i'm hypomanic i am delighted with myself. Not sure if any of the personality disorders apply when one has bipolar because the traits vanish when mood flips...

Thoughts?

You know, whatever, I do not know a whole lot about personality disorders, other than antisocial, which I know a lot about. It has always been my impression that personality disorders represent sort of the underlying neural structure of a person's brain. Its operating system, sort of. Meaning, you can't really very easily change it. Maybe not at all. I know this is controversial and it may differ from disorder to disorder.

Anyhow, I don't think mood states can change the underlying personality structure of a person, really. To me, if you have it, you have it. At least, that is certainly the way it is for psychopaths, with whom I have a lot of experience. In my opinion, there is no cure for that illness, if it is, in fact, an illness at all. Which I do not know the answer to.

My entire approach to wellness relies on my belief we can absolutely reprogram. That takes knowledge of how the brain, emotions, and the body process data... I feel you cannot just tackle it from one direction as the systems are completely integrated. The spirit must be accounted for as well. Dysfunction manifests differently in each system. They all have their own mode of operation.

It is like changing one IT system within a networked solution. When you adjust something you must also underatand all of its integration layers and adjust those to accommodate the shift you've created or else you create problems within all of the systems downstream like dominoes falling.

The brain is dynamic and it rewires constantly based upon pattern. Chemical emotional responses are the same. It takes a great deal of will and conscious focus sometimes, but I feel operating systems can be upgraded when they prove to be dysfunctional.

In Whatever's case, I believe her recognition of patterned behavior is an excellent start to a shift. We have to observe and know our patterns if we hold hope for shifting them. Step 2 is understanding root cause. I also definitely think it is possible she could experience the symptoms of one disorder while depressed and not while neutral or manic.

As for psychopaths, perhaps their shift is integrated to such a degree the effort required to reprogram would prove to be too great. Perhaps their shift places them in a state where understanding how to reprogram is impossible. I can see that being the case, but with all of these 'disorders' those who have them are unique and on a spectrum. I hold the belief that a specific psychopath could experience change given the right circumstances. Just because we do not currently know the proper strategy to apply does not mean to me that one does not exist. Free will is gifted to all equALLy.

I do generally agree with this for most people and most disorders. However, as I have stated before, it is my personal opinion, and experience, that some of those with severe iterations of antisocial personality disorder, particularly of the psychopathic subtype, simply lack the neural pathways to support anything approximating normal emotional human fucntioning. Now, the really fascinating question is, can those absent pathways be created anew, or, can some kind of workaround using other pathways they do possess and can use, be created and relied upon? For now, it appears the "experts" are divided, with those of a more psychology background/bent believing it may well be possible for some and those of a more neuroradiology/neuro background feeling it is likely not anatomically or electrically possible.

But you know, stroke victims sometimes improve miraculously, right? They walk and speak again. Same with TBI people. So, why not these folks, too? I think one of your last comments is the most sage one. Just because we don't know how to do it today does nto mean it is not possible. Who would have thought we could transplant a pancreas 100 years ago?

In time, it is just an opinion, but I believe some of these personality disorders will be shown to clearly have a neuroanatomic basis, that they are reall illnesses. It will be interesting to wach...

I feel you. I'm deeply interested in the same subject. My faith won't let me believe in the notion of being lost forever.

There has been some interesting research done over the past decade or so about wiring new pathways through piggybacking on primal pathways that exist already. We do this when we use metaphors. So my young child may not understand calculus, but I can use metaphors of motion and cars and airplanes to explain the concepts to him. Over time, he uses his primal experience of motion to learn something abstract to him like calculus and eventually create a neural structure specific to calculus as his experiential database grows through the application of motion. That may not make sense, but you're someone who I think will get what a non-neuroscoence expert is struggling to convey.

I think we could maybe do something like that with some of these harder to reach disorders, but I'm not sure it has ever been applied in that way. Stop trying to reprogram what we percieve to be missing and instead layer it into pathways that are in the root of all and build from there one experience at a time???

From here on PC:

"A personality disorder is an enduring pattern of inner experience and behavior that deviates from the norm of the individual’s culture. In order for a personality disorder to be diagnosed, the behavior pattern must be seen in two or more of the following areas: cognition (thinking); affect (feeling); interpersonal functioning; or impulse control.

In personality disorders, this enduring pattern of behavior is inflexible and pervasive across a broad range of personal and social situations. It typically leads to significant distress or impairment in social, work or other areas of functioning. The pattern is stable and of long duration, and its onset can be traced back to early adulthood or adolescence."

To my understanding, the personality orders are about pervasiveness. Something that comes and goes doesn't seem to fit with that.

Why not? We do it for other patients every day...

That all works for me.

Thanks for posting. Interesting thread.

Personality disorders don't appear and disappear with moods it sounds more like a bad or disfuntional coping skill you've learned.