202. schizoid

Today, the Pink Agendist posted “Are you living with a covert schizoid?”

It’s important to put a crowbar of separation between “schizoid” and “schizophrenic” at the outset. These two have nothing to do with each other.

Both words are derived from the Greek word skhizein, to split. In the case of the schizophrenic, the split is from reality (psychosis). With the schizoid, it’s a split from the human world itself.

By nature, I’m introverted. As a child, I was off by myself, playing on my own or spending hours writing in my bedroom closet. (Yes, the irony.) I’ve learned coping mechanisms, but still prefer solitude or the quiet company of a few friends.

My dislike for human contact and company emerged around age 13 or 14, likely a reaction to the emergence of my homosexual feelings. These feelings were uncomfortable as they were forbidden by the teachings of my religion. Rather than differentiate, I reacted against all human contact. Survival mechanisms can be fucked up.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV) describes the “schizoid personality disorder” thus:

A pervasive pattern of detachment from social relationships and a restricted range of expression of emotions in interpersonal settings, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by four (or more) of the following:

(1) neither desires nor enjoys close relationships, including being part of a family
(2) almost always chooses solitary activities
(3) has little, if any, interest in having sexual experiences with another person
(4) takes pleasure in few, if any, activities
(5) lacks close friends or confidants other than first-degree relatives
(6) appears indifferent to the praise or criticism of others
(7) shows emotional coldness, detachment, or flattened affectivity

(Way to pathologize normal human differences, APA.)

Wikipedia says this about the signs and symptoms of SPD:

Their communication with other people may be indifferent and concise at times (i.e. Meowing instead of speaking English). Because of their lack of meaningful communication with other people, those who are diagnosed with SPD are not able to develop accurate images of how well they get along with others.

Such images are believed to be important for a person’s self-awareness and ability to assess the impact of their own actions in social situations… It is not people as such that they want to avoid, but emotions both negative and positive, emotional intimacy, and self disclosure.

As I read all of this, I’m considering my indifference to my family; my lack of interest in most activities; my highly select group of friends and ambivalence to acquaintances; my inability to hold meaningful conversations without getting stuck or feeling tongue-tied, with anxiety over not knowing what to say; and my choice of career paths that require hours of solitude—writing, and composition.

It’s likely that all of this is related to Religious Trauma Syndrome. One theory about the cause of SPD is an “unloving, neglectful, or excessively perfectionistic” homelife and upbringing. This is somewhat true of my own childhood. Mind you, I never want to give the impression that my childhood was abusive, cold, or unhappy. My parents loved me and my sisters very much, and I have many fond memories from then.

But, by virtue of our fundamentalist Christian beliefs, my childhood was also highly judgmental. I was held to exacting standards, with virtually every aspect of my life subject to criticism and condemnation. It wasn’t just my parents who disapproved if I failed to meet expectations. It was God, who would determine whether I spent eternity in Heaven or Hell.

Pink Agendist quotes excerpts from a website, www.schizoid.info, which has this to say:

Schizoids are usually very intelligent and self-sufficient. They are intensely private people with acute interpersonal boundaries… They are deeply sensitive to intrusiveness, dependency, insincerity, and emotional behaviour. Despite their self-sufficiency, they require connection just like any other human being, and intense loneliness often compels them to reach out for some kind of relationship. This dichotomy leads to an ‘in and out’ pattern of him being in the relationship and pulling out of it, which is confusing and hurtful for the other party.

My previous ex-boyfriend often complained that I was overly withdrawn, that I spent more time on the computer or mobile devices than with him. There were problems in that relationship, and I wasn’t entirely committed, but it’s that way with most relationships for me, romantic or otherwise. Eventually, I need to withdraw and be alone. I feel like a jerk for doing it, but the alternative is exhaustion and shutting down.

Wikipedia mentions one schizoid “subtype”: the “secret schizoid.” (Ooh, la la!)

Many fundamentally schizoid individuals present with an engaging, interactive personality style that contradicts the observable characteristic emphasized by the DSM-IV and ICD-10 definitions of the schizoid personality. [These individuals] present themselves as socially available, interested, engaged and involved in interacting yet remain emotionally withdrawn and sequestered within the safety of the internal world.

I’ve wondered if my introversion and inability to connect was symptomatic of borderline personality disorder, or Asperger’s. I often feel the face I present to the world is an artificial one, having little to do with what I think and feel. I model my behavior and responses based on what I observe in others, but not really understanding the motivations behind what I see. My own therapist has described me as warm and engaging, but it feels like she’s just praising my act.

A simple action like getting a haircut requires intense preparation to overcome fear of what the stylist and I will talk about. It’s not unlike preparing to go on-stage—must remember my lines. Dating advice like going to new places to meet guys is virtually unthinkable. My trouble with job searching is not so much aversion to work as it is dealing with other people.

I write this, not to make excuses, but to explain—why I’d rather not go to gay bars with friends; why you won’t see me for days, or weeks; why I still sometimes flinch when touched.

That’s all.

201. confutation

Yesterday was Darwin’s birthday, so I watched an HBO documentary called Questioning Darwin, a look at the Creationist movement in the United States and its fierce opposition to the theory of evolution by natural selection. It’s basically a dissection of everything I was taught as a child about myself, the origin of life, and my purpose on Earth.

First, some quotes from Creationists in the film:

• “We believe in Creation, because of our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and God’s word, the holy Bible.”
• “If the theory of evolution is a fact, the Bible must be false, so we’re all stupid ignoramuses.”
• “I do not believe that we’re some sort of highly evolved primate.”
• “The Bible says we are created a little lower than angels, which is much more noble and majestic than the explanation that evolution gives for who we are.”
• “I don’t know how someone could observe humans and miss the dignity that’s put there by God alone.”
• “To put man down as just an animal, that we’re no different than a dog, is preposterous. God made us in His image, and so to say that man is an animal, and God created man in his own image… does one come back and say God is nothing more than an animal?”
• “If we are just a product of this random mutation process, where does morality come from? Where does hope come from? Where does love come from?”
• “If that’s the way the world works, then you believe in a God that doesn’t intervene. That takes away any possibility of miracles, any possibility of answered prayer, any possibility of the resurrection.”
• “To think I have no communication with God would be so devastating. I can’t even imagine adopting such a view just to make peace with Darwin.”
• “I can’t imagine life without knowing that God has a plan, and that that plan is not just for the here-and-now, but that plan includes a hope and a future, and a future way beyond whatever we’ll face here on Earth but a future with Him in heaven.”

What I hear in these voices is fear, thinly masked by certainty in a belief that promises to deliver both answers and purpose. These are people terrified by an existence that’s marked by uncertainty and danger. In a way, they’re right to be afraid, irrational as that fear is.

The beginning of my journey to atheism was indeed in finally accepting the theory of evolution by natural selection. I’m not sure when that happened, exactly—somewhere in the years after graduating from Northwestern College. The more I considered the fossil and genetic evidence that all life on Earth is related, and for the age of the universe and the Earth itself, the less likely it seemed that it was designed. For a while I flirted with the idea of theistic evolution, that God put everything in motion. Then something Julia Sweeney says in Letting Go of God stuck with me:

Intelligent design gets everything backwards. It’s like saying that our hands are miraculous because they fit so perfectly into our gloves: “Look at that! Four fingers and a thumb! That can’t have been an accident!’

Fact is, far from “fearfully and wonderfully made,” we more seem to be haphazardly assembled.

This view of a naturalistic universe had real implications for the beliefs my parents had handed me as a child, beliefs that mirrored the sentiments offered by the quotations above. How could a loving God allow such a world to exist? If I, a being made in the image of God, wanted to prevent suffering, how could an all-powerful being then not banish it completely?

At one point, several individuals talk about surviving substance abuse and how their addiction turned to Christianity. This is a popular talking point: without God we’re just animals, slaves to our darker impulses and passions—that we’ll tear ourselves apart. I don’t know how many presentations I sat through growing up: of “recovering sinners” warning us how bad it was on the outside, and that our only hope for overcoming sin and temptation was Jesus.

A fellow from Answers in Genesis sums it up at one point: “When asked what is the primary reason I believe evolution is incompatible with Biblical Christianity, I can sum it up in one word: death. Whether we’re young or old, death is inevitable.”

In the debate between Bill Nye and Ken Ham last week, this issue also came up. Ham said something to the effect of: “Bill Nye can’t tell us what happens after we die.” And that’s true. We don’t know. I don’t know. Yet somehow this becomes a talking point for Creationists to insert a Gospel pitch of salvation through Jesus Christ. You cannot talk to a Creationist who won’t do this at some point.

Their response to the news that we’re essentially alone in an amoral and indifferent universe is to try to shut their eyes tight and stop their ears. For them, if evolution is true, that means that life is pointless, aimless, meaningless. I love how Julia Sweeney puts it in Letting Go of God: “What’s going to stop me from rushing out and murdering people?”

For me, accepting evolution was liberating. For years, I agonized over the struggle between my “earthly” desires and my supposed divine purpose on Earth. The news that I’m an animal, with the same origins and subject to the same needs and forces as other creature on this planet, was a relief. It meant there’s nothing wrong with me, the opposite of what Christianity taught.

It’s futile to argue with Creationists. Their arguments are based on emotion, and apparently fear of death and spontaneously becoming murderers or kleptomaniacs. Or gay. Thus, they can easily dismiss threatening, rational evidence in favor of the Bible.

Darwin wrote: “Man in his arrogance thinks himself a great work, worthy the interposition of a deity, more humble and I believe truer to consider him created from animals.”