Being Married to a Schizoid: What's a Schiz To Do?

I'm pretty high up, according to my T, on the schizoid scale. She waffles around about whether or not I'm SPD or just close to it, but there's no doubt it's what I am and have always been.

But this post (and this thread) don't have to do just with my being a schiz of some type or severity. That's a given.

No. This post is about my poor wife, a truly normal person who has to put up with me. And has indeed put up with me for decades and decades. And now, as usual (oh! so usual!) we're having a hard time of it, very much because I am who I am.

So I'm posting here in the "Partners" sub-forum because I'd like to request some help from you partners out there. Here's the deal: Someone significantly on the upper part of the schiz scale spends most of his/her life inside his/her own head. Is not huggy and kissy. Has very little appreciation of intimacy, up to the point of finding it horrible, disgusting and awful. Is perfectly happy to spend most of his/her life entirely alone.

Except he/she isn't alone. He/she's married. It happened. Somehow. And the schiz actually loves his/her spouse. Has spent almost half a century with him/her. And now there are serious problems. Strain. Anger. What to do?

Well, I'll tell you. It's not as easy as that. Because you've just unanimously told me all I need to do is enter into greater intimacy, learn how to hug and kiss and be attentive, and spend more time with her, etc., etc. And the really unfortunate part is I can't do that. Not only isn't it part of my personality, I can't even fake it successfully. Why? Because it's just that awfully repugnant to me.

I am the way I am, cold, cool, frosty, aloof, etc., etc., because I need to be, not that I want to be. It would always be better to be a "normal" human being, whatever that is. But I'm not and I can't. And here she is, storming around, all thunder and brimstone, and I just want to pick up and leave. Except of course I don't. There's value here, in a very long term marriage. I want to stay with this lady. Forever. I'm NOT a psychopath. I'm NOT autistic. I just like being by myself, but married at the same time.

Ahoy, you partners out there! Suggestions? Ideas? Thoughts? If you have 'em, I'd like to hear 'em.

Hey Ygrec23, I cannot offer you any advice. From one schizoid to another though, I can see why this would be an issue. It's not as simple as "being more affectionate" or "being more open". That is like asking someone with Avoidant Personality Disorder to just "get out there, stop being afraid". It's not that simple.

I personally couldn't see myself getting into a relationship not only because I don't want one, but also because I could see issues occuring down the road.

I hope you and your wife are able to come to an understanding. Does she understand SPD?

No, she doesn't Melissa, and I'm afraid she'd see it just as some kind of excuse, not to be trusted. We're both going to T today and I'm hoping to get T to explain it. Mrs. Ygrec trusts T. Mrs. Ygrec understands depression (which she had) but that's about it. Take care!

(((Ygrec))) Your devotion and love for your wife is refreshing. It appears to me your wife needs to take a step back and remember her vows - i.e., in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer. She had to have known you weren't the Hallmark romantic type when she met you, fell in love, and married you. Isn't it enough for her to know you love her? If you can love her for who she is, warts and all - why can't she feel the same way about you?

So life didn't turn out for her the way she thought it would. That's just how life goes sometimes - through no fault of our own. She needs to remember you are not only her husband, you are her best friend - and best friends don't get all thunder and brimstone with each other.

I hope your T will help her to understand you better.

I found your post to be very heartfelt and that coming from someone who says they are cold and aloof The fact that you are able to express your feelings re: the way you feel you are towards your wife is "huge" My husband who has very similar traits to your own would never be able to express in words.

It seems to me you are doing the very best you can with the way your own particular drum beats

The longevity of your marriage speaks volumes of the way that both you and your wife have found a way to make it work on some level.

You cannot change who you are and neither can your wife but it seems you are both somehow doing the best you both can.

I don't really have any advice to give you but keep hanging in there. You could possibly show your affection in other ways, little ways. Things that don't involve intimacy.

You were clearly blessed with the gift of empathy as is evident in your concern for your wife.

I understand your dilemma. Normal people can be such a hassle to deal with, especially where marriage is concerned. What with the emotions, and social obligations, and need for attachment, and moral concerns...

While showing and receiving affection is a ritual which perplexes me to no end ... I'm not completely against it or repulsed by it. My experiences, therefore, may be different from yours. But I have developed some tricks of the trade which normies find quite ... charming? Warm-hearted? Whatever it is they feel... And while I can't truly understand the purpose or appreciate such gestures, my wife does. So I make an effort anyway, because it makes her happy when I do... And when she's happy, I'm happy... So, in a way, it does serve a purpose which I can understand fully...

Anyway... Is it more uncomfortable for you to give affection or receive it? If it's the former, you could try your hand at buying her flowers or chocolate or diamonds. Flowers appeal to the sense of smell, which is a strong enticer of memories. Hopefully pleasant ones... So pick a flower which is either her known favourite flower or one which she smelt during a pleasant memory, preferably a memory which involves you... such as a first date, so long as that date was pleasant. Chocolates, of course, release endorphins. And diamonds... well, are diamonds... The trick here is... You don't actually have to initiate any romantic gesture. You don't even have to be there when you give the gift. Yet she'll be happier and wish to be affectionate... You can then let her take the reigns, and all you have to do is go along with it.

If it's the latter, then simply initiate romantic gestures to control the situation. You mention that it repulses you... But you might feel a bit more comfortable if you're in control of the situation and you know where it's heading. It might also help to know what behaviours work and which don't... Then it's just a matter of practice.

Why does it repulse you? I can understand why it would... But if you know why it repulses you, you may be able to counteract that by perceiving it as something else... I perceive it as a game, not just affection... I understand the game.

I think this is a good point. If it's more comfortable for the original poster to receive affection, it might be better for the wife to initiate affection whenever she wants it. This would allow the wife to receive affection without the schizoid husband having to do very much. Also, she should also read about SPD so that she understands her husband better.

You've written quite an interesting post, Michael, on a number of topics. I'll try to do justice to it.

First of all, let me make clear that as far as I'm concerned (and we're talking about 42 years of mutual experience here) my wife is as crazy as I am in her own dear little way. We would never have wound up together (or stayed together) if that hadn't been the case. Without realizing it or knowing it we had both been trashed by our parents at the earliest possible age. And so "deep spoke unto deep." We somehow knew way back in 1969 that we were quite truly meant for each other. And so got together and stayed together, despite a whole, huge encyclopedia of relationship problems we had to go through, since neither of us had the slightest idea about who we were or why we were that way. There's a reason why we're old and gray together right now and will never even conceive of not being together until the end.

As far as affection is concerned, you pose an interesting question. On my end I'd have to say that both giving and receiving are highly problematic. You see, as I've only realized in the past two? three? months, I've had to remain, throughout my life, mentally far away from other people, including my wife. And receiving affection is even worse. Before dating my present wife (a very long time ago) I could only fall in love with girls who were most definitely not in love with me. What was happening? Easy. As I've only just now "felt," and "understood" and "gotten in contact with," my experience with my mom as a baby was just so terribly awful, so incredibly painful, that human contact on anything below the most superficial level was simply out of the question. Would anyone VOLUNTEER to go into the gas chambers at Auschwitz?

But things are changing! T and I decided two weeks ago that as my first step into a rather CBT program (I DETEST CBT programs) I'd sit next to my wife and actually be "WITH" her, instead of far away inside my head. My dear wife swears she can instantly tell the difference by watching my eyes. And she's probably right. But I've done it all my life with every single human being (except girls who didn't love me). What happened? I simply couldn't explain it in less than a million words. Blew me away. Took me right back to when the whole thing must have started, in 1945-46.

So. I'd have to say (and this is very definitely a work in progress) that to me this is BY NO MEANS a game. That this (the relations between people who really care for each other) is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN THE WORLD. Bar none. You and I will have different perspectives on this. I don't believe I have your diagnoses. Very, very deep in my heart and mind was a very, very potentially loving, deeply feeling little boy who was absolutely destroyed by his mother and who spent his life in the worst possible terror of having any such relationship again. And (this is HILARIOUS!) who only came to creep into normal human affective relationships as a very old man. LAUGH, I THOUGHT I'D DIE!!!

Take care, guy. Ygrec

Everything you say, RisingSun, is quite correct, in a kind of dry, cognitive way. The problem is that most people aren't dry and cognitive. Mrs. Ygrec is most certainly and absolutely not dry and/or cognitive. And nor am I. There are feelings involved here. My own "schizoidity" (I love neologisms) is superficial and not descriptive of all my depths. I wasn't born that way or otherwise physically destined to such a life. No. If I'm schizoid (which I am) then it's because of early life experience that taught me just how horrible close relations with other humans would be. And now I'm trying to find my way out. Into a more normal humanity that, to me, is entirely new, different and scary.

Take care!

Ygrec, I can see that you started this thread a while ago. So did you and your wife see the therapist together? Was the therapist able to get your wife to understand your situation?

Just curious,
Open Eyes

Open Eyes, it's like this. Mrs. Ygrec and myself develop together in a kind of intertwining revolution around each other. I move, she moves. She changes, I change. It's a dance. She takes a step and then so do I, and vice-versa. Most of these steps are just between her and me. Sometimes T gets involved, but not always. To me, this is the way people grow together. Not in the sense that people grow more together, but in the sense that each of them becomes different and the other reacts and adapts.

T would have a real tough time "getting my wife to understand my situation." Real tough. Why? Because "my situation" (at the moment, at least) is changing so fast. I'm not fixed and firm in who I am or what I'm doing (thank God almighty!). My wife is the rather standard melody around whom my own harmony twines and changes from key to key. So T holds back (though she knows both Mrs. Ygrec and myself very well indeed). Why adjust person X to person Y if person Y will be someone different tomorrow? We're all now (T, Mrs. Y and myself) in a really fluid situation. I know what Mrs. Y wants (which is really to my mind rather normal and standard in terms of what people want), but who I am is changing fast. I'm happy to try to give Mrs. Y what she wants, but my ability to do so changes from week to week and month to month. I'm not in the kind of situation that Michael D is in. Whatever my diagnosis may have been or is now it's apparently not the kind of "locked in" diagnosis that Michael (and other people) have to deal with.

Take care! Ygrec

I can relate to that in some way Ygrec, I am changing every day myself as I am working through my PTSD. I have taken a journey back in my own life in a way I had never dreamed could happen, what my brain managed to do to adapt to a difficult environment. I don't think I had ever truely felt safe growing up. But children don't always understand that there is disfuction around them, they often just try to adapt to THEIR FAMILY somehow.

I can relate to the struggle with intimacy but for me it comes from abuse. I had trusted my husband and I did try in that department and between his alcoholism and cheating, he just broke my ability to trust. Between my childhood abuse and date rape and still trying and wanting to trust with my husband, well, he pushed me beyond my limit somehow. And though I am a very loving person, I have definite boundary issues now. And my husband tells me he loves me every day and he does try hard, but now I can only do so much. It is not that I am repulsed so much as I just can't get beyond being so hurt. And I have only brushed on that in therapy because I have had to work on so many other things.

So, I can relate to the dance you speak of. My husband is trying to understand my PTSD and he now knows about my troubled past. I know that he feels even more guilty now for his part in betraying me and making me frightened and confused as well. I was scared most of my married life too. I have been married for 33 years come this June. It seems like my whole life has been adjusting to the issues of the people around me. I struggle mentally with considering the other person's problems, like "after all that person struggles with this or that, try to forgive etc.". Then I can see how that didn't really work for me, because in experiencing PTSD, one gets to relive all the emotions of fear, anxiety, anger, and a constant lack of safety. Sometimes I just feel guilty that I cant just push all that history aside somehow, I keep telling myself he is good man and regrets and loves me, but I have not been able to turn off the way I just cant seem to be comfortable sharing beyond kisses and hugs now. I actually get ill just thinking about it right now in my life. I feel guilty for something I can't seem to help and I have to make peace with somehow knowing that I should be able to do what I need to feel safe at this point. IDK what the answer is.
I can't just pretend it is a game or anything, been there done that and it is not an option for me now.

So I can relate to the dance and the love and the friendship and belonging together too. I am doing my best too Ygrec. I am changing every day too. I think I can relate to the need for space that you have, even if I don't have your diagnosis.

Open Eyes

You're right, Open Eyes, there are probably an infinity of personal situations. I guess we can only learn from each other in small bits at a time. This small piece is relevant to me, that piece isn't. All marriages, all relationships are really different when you get down to specifics. And I'm sure yours is different from mine, though I do hope that in some way what I write about my situation can help you and perhaps even others.

I think you're absolutely right. Almost everyone grows up feeling that the way their family lives and relates together is "right." Is "normal." Though, of course, it may be absolutely wrong and abnormal or just plain pathological. I would think that we all try to adapt to our families, sad to say. That's how (to me, at least) pathology can be passed on from generation to generation.

My own problems with intimacy stem from my early childhood and not from an adult-life situation such as you describe. Personally, I've found it very valuable indeed to try continually to separate out (1) what I learned as a child about how family members interact, and (2) the real, actual personality and formative experiences of my wife and the way she operates as a thinking, feeling adult person. One starts out in almost all cases, I'd guess, blending the two together; applying lessons learned from childhood to an adult situation to which they may not really relate. At some point of personal insight, whether in therapy or by oneself, one has to say to one's-self the old mantra: "That was then, this is now."

History isn't something any of us can just erase. We can sometimes change our understanding of it, see it from a different point of view, learn more facts about it that alter what we think, but get rid of it? Never. And feelings? I think feelings are about as set in stone as the Pyramids of Egypt, as resistant to alteration as geometric proofs. Sometimes the feelings permit us to continue a relationship, sometimes not. But the same qualifications exist as with history: if we learn more and really absorb our new learning, if we turn a corner and suddenly see a view from a different perspective, those things can have a serious effect on our feelings. In the early years of our marriage, I thought (and felt) with some frequency that my wife was grossly unfair to me, breaking all our agreements, forcing me to do things I really didn't want to do. But we both came from families in which husbands and wives had figured out how to overcome such things and move ahead together. None of this was conscious, but we took advantage of it and stayed together. And in the end obtained so much insight about ourselves and each other that staying together wasn't so bad. Is this something you could do?

Diagnoses! Sometimes I think they're the worst thing in the world. I do frankly believe that people can and do get fixated on diagnoses, permitting diagnoses to rule their whole lives, preventing them from changing themselves as much as they in reality can. And I do believe strongly that psychologists and psychiatrists, or at least many of them, share my views and put off as far as they can any definitive diagnoses to be disclosed to patients themselves. More people are more fluid than they'd like to believe. I think fluidity, the capacity to change and be different, the real possibility of moving on and transforming one's-self is threatening and scary. Which is a terrible, terrible shame and a loss, a very great loss to all concerned. And diagnoses make "not changing" a whole lot easier and more attractive.

Take care, Open Eyes, take care and be well. Ygrec

I tend to agree with you Ygrec about a diagnoses having a way of limiting someone, or making someone think they are limited in some way. Einstein had dislexia, and he learned how to work around that and tapping onto his genius. I do feel that if we know how we are limited we can work on finding ways around it. I believe in the ability of the brain to do many things.

Open Eyes

A psychologist told me that Schizoid Personality Disorder can be partially genetic in origin. So some people might have a genetic predisposition before their early life experiences begin. By the way, I am self-diagnosed Schizoid.

Wow, very interesting post Ygrec. Your initial post saying that you couldn't get close describes my husband to a T. From the time we were married, when he was reading a book, or watching TV, or just being, his head was in some other place & there was no way to connect with him. Just before I left him, my california pdoc (that he went to at the end) dx'ed him with adult ADHD.....but your description sounds very similar to what we struggles with for almost 33 years of being together.....with many other differences also.

Think the problem with our marriage actually started before we got married though.....I had decided that I didn't like his personality before we got married. He thought because his IQ was so high that everyone should value him for how smart he was & not for the poor work he did in college & didn't get the job he wanted because of his poor grades. Right there was the first nail in the marriage coffin especially when I told my mom I didn't want to get married. My lack of intelligent mother (who I should have known better than to have listened to) said....ah, don't worry, when he gets older & has to be responsible....he will grow up. 33 years later.....he never did.....not only that but he took pride in never growing up. His mantra througout our marriage was "I'm a Toy's R Us Kid, I don't wanna grow up"....& he never did when it came to being financially responsible, or being responsible to do things that needed to be done especially when he didn't WANT to do it.

I ended up in the same career as he did when he finally decided to give up his part time job at the same bank that didn't want to hire him as a programmer after I told him I was going to quit the job I had because I didn't think he was taking his responsibility of having his degree seriously. We were definitely like oil & water. I didn't have the high IQ, but I worked my tail off to get the good grades & LEARN what the classes had to offer. He always thought he was smarter than the professor & did as little as possible to get by without learning anything other than WHAT HE WANTED TO LEARN. Two years before I left.....that was still his attitude in the classes we were taking together. I know that his hiding within himself existed, but I am sure that the failure in our marriage was because I didn't want to continue to put up with someone who wasn't willing to make changes in his life/personality. He truly believed that his personality was cast in concrete & had no intentions or no ability to change. His parting comment was....."you tolerated me for so many years, I thought you would do it forever."

I know that I grew up as an only child & had no need to be connected with social groups as I saw those who did would tend to be what the group wanted them to be rather than being themselves (maybe just the way it looked to me).

What grasped me about your post was that it seems that there is at least a little bit of the Dx you initially were given is very similar to my husband's actions. Only thing about my husband's childhood that caused him problems was that his dad was in Korea for his 1st 5 years of life....then he came home & my husband had been the center of everyone's life & who was that man that his mom was now loving?....then his brother came along & he smashed him with a toy fire truck as soon as he came home from the hospital. He ended up as the 1st of 4 kids & once his father got his engineering degree, they moved several times a year....so there was no stability in his life other than his family.....his parents were together & still are. He never had a girlfriend......hmmmmm that should have been a red flag...lol as much as all the dating I did should have been a red flag to him since I didn't get close to any who I dated.

What impresses me is that you are able & willing to change & grow to find out more about yourself.....I think if my husband had shown any incentive to change & grow, I might have tried to tolerate him longer than the 33 years I did, however I have to admit that the last 10+ years we were only living together in the same house....I had my wing of the house & he had his. We did talk about things now & then, but he didn't know how to take about anything deeper than the weather.

That was obvious when we were out at the ranch & my horse trainer had just gotten married & her new husband was having a problem with the religion she was involved with.....since he had a Top Secret clearance for the work he was doing, her involvement in it was a threat to his career & it was his career that saved her ranch. I was there with my husband & we were talking to him about this. My husband just stood there & when her husband asked him what he thought about something to do with the situation, my husband's reply had to do with "I'm glad we are having good weather now" I kept the conversation going & later confronted my husband with a WTF???? His reply was "I didn't know anything about what he was talking about so what was I supposed to say?" All the times I experienced the same thing.....at least I realized where it came from....not something I wanted to tolerate any longer either.

It's only been the last few years after leaving him that I realize all my suicide attempts were not just about loosing my career. Sad that my dislike for my husband was greater than my love for my daughter.....but that's my own issues where I didn't want to have children because I wanted a career so I could be independent. Anything to not be like my mother. Didn't feel I could do justice to having a career & having a child & I just never had that female desire to have children for whatever reason that came from. Interesting enough....the new psychologist I have here is also not one who has children.....so I don't feel so abnormal as everyone tried to make me feel even after we had our daughter......sure my lack of desire to have a child messed her up big time.....but it seems like there is always something that a parent does to mess up the child/ren they have. I think it's important to listen to those little voices inside that tell us when we shouldn't do something or when we should because I always regret the thing I didn't listen to.

Got quite a bit off track from your post.....but am wondering if my husband may not have a little bit of what you are struggling with as part of his problems also....not just the adult ADD. We all end up with such different Dx's depending on what we talk about at the point the pdoc/T is talking to us which is usually has something to do with what's going on in our surroundings....even with the testing they give to help with the DX.

I think you're right, Open Eyes: I think we're an awful lot more capable than we start out believing. So I tend to agree with all those T's who shy away from giving their patients a particular label from the DSM. It can become way too comfortable to immerse one's self in a particular diagnosis, open up communications with others who have the same diagnosis, and resist possible, painful future change. When Einstein was an adolescent, I tend to think that dyslexia was an unknown problem, and that's why he escaped being diagnosed. At the present, he'd have been diagnosed very early on, perhaps to his loss. At the same time, there indeed are diagnoses that help others to help the diagnosed person. So as far as I'm concerned it's really hard to say that "all" diagnoses are bad. I'm sure that if I was a practicing professional in this are I'd have a lot more important things to say about this subject. Take care! Ygrec

Thanks for this thread.
I am some kind of crazy - those interested in such things might have fun debating it, but I'm not one of them. My wife has bipolar, generalized anxiety, and for added fun, diabetes, and gastro paresis. I believe, (and she does agree) that she tends to be overly emotional, while I tend to be lacking in emotion. (unless I'm not, in which case, look out) But we work it all out. We've been disgustingly happy with one another, if not with life in general, for 3-ish years. I wonder where we'll be in 40? (not planning on living any longer than this, max)
I'd love to have an update. Hope you are doing very well.