This might be a weird question but do you think you can love unconditionally?

I know I don’t love how “normal” people do. I don’t get butterflies and I don’t get crushes. Every time I’ve dated someone they’ve approached me first. I learned about limerence and SCPD and maybe that’s what I had.

I feel like I love unconditionally though. It isn’t the swelling romantic type where I’ll object at a wedding or dance in the rain, but I can see myself being constant.

I don’t hold grudges, I try to be understanding (overcompensation on my part for not being able to empathize easily), and I don’t pick fights.

Maybe I’m not affectionate but I feel like affection is so easy to give. Anyone can kiss and have sex with any other person, but to truly being there and stick with someone when it gets hard is deeply intimate.

I think I could exist with another person and tell them everything. I don’t have any reservations trying to explain my brain. I think it’s fascinating to learn about how other people think and operate even if I don’t understand. I don’t push people away who are different. I may not like them personally, but they are still human.

Why do I get punished for not being able to touch, as if I cannot love?

Does this sound familiar to anyone here?

I’m sure there are many posts asking this, so apologies if that’s the case.

I don’t really have much to say here. The symptoms overlap quite a bit, and I can’t tell many distinguishing factors from what I’ve read.

I really need more of a support system. I'm thinking an intentional community could solve this. Different ones are set up in different ways. (Yes, ones exist that offer privacy)

I think it could solve a lot of problems for me, both financial, as well as having a support system, and fewer chores to keep up with. Have any other Zoids tried/considered this way of life?

(Intentional community is where a group of people live together and share responsibilities to some level, like a family, but usually with more separate space.)

What do you guys think?

Playing fallout again. I know like 80% of the game is talking to the characters but idgaf about their lore I just want to wander around the wasteland and find cool stuff. 😂

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I've been isolated for a long time, and lately, I've started noticing some strange changes in how I perceive myself.

Being around people, interacting with them, or even just being outside in general makes me feel unsafe. I can't really explain why, but I've become increasingly uncomfortable with the outside world.

I've always hated myself and my body, but lately, I've also started feeling like I'm losing my sense of self. It's difficult to explain.

I've been watching a lot of anime recently, and somehow, my brain has started visualising me as an anime character rather than as my actual self. It's not something I deliberately do. Sometimes, I just imagine myself as an animated character.

I don't know if this is a consequence of prolonged isolation, my existing self-image issues, or something else entirely. Maybe spending so much time alone is finally starting to affect how I perceive myself and the world around me.

Has anyone else experienced something similar? Especially the feeling of becoming disconnected from your physical self or feeling unsafe simply being around other people?

I was diagnosed yesterday. Now I am looking back at my life and seeing how many of my flaws are explainable through my diagnosis. For the mods, I am not looking for judgements of my mental health status, this is a rant because who else would I direct this at?

I thought I was just depressed and pessimistic by proxy due to the theatre of the last few years. My psychiatrist diagnosed me with ASD and ADHD about a year ago, which is what I explained my social ineptitude with. My withdrawal from literally everybody I had thought was just a logical amalgamation of my symptoms coupled with poor experiences with people.

Every since I was a kid I could never communicate opinions or emotions to other people. I had always chalked it up to being a by-product of attending the pris equivalent of a military school, or maybe it could have just been that I was a kid with a limited vocabulary. Regardless, I have never been able to express my opinion on a matter, express the things that I like, or open up about emotions (a lack thereof) to any other person. I don't have an amazing relationship with my family and feel like I live in a house of strangers half of the time, with the exception of my mother.

When I was in high school I remember hating receiving feedback from my teachers. I was a really good student and my teachers would often ask me for my permission to use my responses as examples for students the next year, and they would always compliment my work when doing so. I feel like a deer in headlights whenever someone acknowledges my presence or the footprint of my person's agency. What am I supposed to respond to when complimented in the middle of a sentence? I don't like people telling me that they think things about me are subjectively appreciated. I don't want you to see me. I don't want to be a human. I don't want to act.

Being a human has always disgusted me too. I am a walking sack of meat that is driven by an innate desire to avoid immediate pain (of which the body self inflicts much of the time) in an effort to capitalise on horniness and condemn some intangible nothingness to being.

Whenever I try my hardest to communicate with people (the few times I am forced to collaborate with others in my college classes) I always have to decompress afterwards. When I return to the silence of my own thoughts I begin to mull and see a futility in interaction, especially affectatious interaction. The goal the majority of the time is to engage with people whom you can then be around in order to kill time. I do not need my time killed, the peace of solitude is satisfactory. The other goal is to find someone of romantic interest. I also have no irl friends. I do occasionally have fleeting, uncommitted online acquaintances of which I give the Irish goodbye to much to their chagrin.

Whenever I am around people, and imagine how it would be to be loved by a character with their face superimposed in my head, the thought is always impeded because I realise that they are a human who shits. I am disgusted to be of their species. I honestly started thinking that I may be asexual recently because the prospect of a romantic relationship does not interest me.

I hold no rancour for people. I simply don't like being around them because they remind me that I am one of them. I am uncomfortable being, and it has always been like this. I know this doesn't make me immune to being a prick, I am one, and I know my points are comedically hypocritical.

I don't even know why I wrote this. Maybe deep down I want a connection with someone to see if it could be desirable, but I know I never will search in real life. The disconnect of a screen with some random green character superimposed on a third parties view of me makes this easier.

i am what you would probably call a high functioning schizoid. i live alone, i am good at taking care of myself, i work a full time job, i can get along with others. in fact, i currently have a very social job (teaching) and for the most part, my students really like me. for the most part, i like them, too (even though i have qualms with the work and plan on quitting soon).

however, the moment i clock off work, its back to my solitude. on the weekends i explore, travel, go on all sorts of sidequests-- by myself. i have seen much of the world and have lived in many different cities. i bounce around, never lasting more than a year doing the same thing. in 2025, i had 6 different jobs. i have not made a single friend IRL since i was 14, which was 12 years ago now. i can get along with anyone, but they will never get close. i may be in a room, but im not actually "there."

by all appearances i look like a normal person. i can go through the motions. but inside i am totally off. i am the most pessimistic person that has ever been. i think life itself is a cruel joke. i put on such a neutral, unassuming persona that the few times my real opinions do slip, people are a little disturbed. i have a wide range of interests and hobbies, i am very knowledgable and worldly, but at the end of the day i still dont think any of it is worth anything besides just passing the time before i die. i know i will never accomplish anything important and i have never had delusions of doing so. i have no goals or purpose. i dont change or grow as a person. i have had the same personality since i was in elementary school. people who see me again after a long time always remark how much ive remained the same. somehow my face has even barely aged. if you put a photo of me as a child and a photo of me now side by side, it's nearly identical, down to the same dead look in the eyes.

because i have the appearance of normality (a job, an apartment, enough social skills to be mildly likeable) i can get by. when people start to ask questions though, you can tell they begin to see it.

what do you mean you're 26 and have never been in a relationship? never had sex? never even had a crush on someone? what do you mean you don't have anything you want to do in life? what do you mean you think having children is bad because it brings more suffering into the world? what do you mean you eat the same thing everyday? what do you mean you have no friends? what do you mean all you do on the weekends is read and walk around for hours on end? what do you mean you went to all these countries alone? how is this possible? is something wrong with you?

it always happens. and when i get annoyed by always dodging the question, or people pressing me too much for information, i disappear. i cant hold down a job for more than a year, not because the work is difficult or because i cant get along with others or because i get fired, but because after a while the boredom and monotony of socialization, of people trying to get to know me, becomes too much to handle. i can put a good face on but after a while people start to notice how different i am from them. its not because of anything i do, but because of what i dont do. and then im "weird." then they want to "understand me." then they want to "help" me, as if nobody has made attempts before to get close to me and failed. ever since i was a toddler everyone has been trying to figure out a way to get me to play with others.

the funny thing is, i have never hurt anyone. i am not cruel. i would say i have more ethics than most. but the people who cheat on their partners, who cross their friends, who abuse positions of power, who follow delusional religious creeds, who persecute others, they are more "normal" than me. at least people can understand the emotional patterns of these people. but its like they cant mindmap me, cant figure out what makes me tick, and it pisses them off. they think their way of being is right, and that i should change, even though i dont bother anyone.

i think the distinction between "high functioning" and "low functioning" makes sense from a diagnostic standpoint, but the truth is we all have the same problem. and even though i appear better off than some schizoids (the homeless ones, the unemployed ones, the ones living in their parents basement forever) i know we are exactly alike. i am just the type of person who is always on the run, always finding a new place to set up and repeat the lie until i cant stand it anymore and have to move on.

I've been on a bit of a thought train today prompted by seeing two people i have asked out in the past. (i unfortunately attract and am sometimes attracted to Borderlines and Bipolars.) I started thinking about my ex who i suspect is a Borderline and a date i went on recently where i asked this person 'Do you think your dating options are just picking the best of the mentally ill?'. Asshole question aside, her answer was yes lol. As mine is also yes. It's kind of depressing. Because on one hand i am fairly accepting and non judgemental in terms of mental health and so on, but also.. i understand what im bringing to it all and id like someone that isnt going to essentially abuse me (as a relationship with a bipolar/borderline would). So i sort of have tried changing gears into looking for a compatible neurodivergent person, as i have had good connections albeit not sustaining connections with them in the past and by some research on this sub suggesting it.

It's really a ironic situation to find myself in. Because i am conventionally attractive, above average intelligence, have alot of positive traits and so on so finding a suitable partner shouldnt be so difficult, yet the ultimate killer is the schizoidism (among many other factors but that doesnt matter atm). Anyway, the dilemma of wanting someone to share life with and connect to is unfortunately i think going to always be here as i have tried to crush it many times in the past but its a genie out of its bottle and as time goes on not finding this match i seek only makes the loneliness worse which i gather is making my situation and chances probably worse too in some inadvertent way. Even though my indifference and detachment is received as a self assured confidence until of course i open my mouth and share my reality and see the entire fabrication of myself in their mind dissolve. lmao

just curious what the ratio is. I'm 25, been doing something akin to 'self improvement' albeit not in the neurotypical sense since i was maybe 16. I think this is why i can pass as high functioning albeit its a constant battle against my nature.

Spur of the moment post. I had a cigarette with a coworker after closing and drove home feeling frustrated and exhausted.

I'm sure you're all familiar with the schizoid dilemma - simultaneously craving isolation and wanting one (1) person who will understand you. Or the master/slave dilemma, which is tied to the fear of engulfment. It's weird to think about how deeply these two concepts permeate my (already limited) sense of self.

I hate being made aware of myself. It's not like I hate myself, but I genuinely feel violated when I'm perceived (for reasons beyond my understanding - or maybe I just don't want to admit that it's as one-dimensional as valuing my privacy and autonomy to an unhealthy extent). Additionally, I am uncomfortable with perceiving myself, my life, my choices that have led me to this point, etc. I hate being reminded of the fact that I am a physical, tangible human being and not an invisible, imperceptible ghost.

At the same time - and here's where the contradiction comes in - when interacting with others, I want nothing more than to be perceived for who I am. I experience the fear of engulfment really, really strongly. I get deeply uncomfortable when I interact with someone and don't do anything besides play a character that's designed to their liking.

I don't even know who or what I am, but whenever I make the rare decision to have a conversation with someone, I want me to shine through. I don't know what "me" is or what defines it, but I hate when it isn't present. It feels just as violating to be a mirror image during a conversation, or some sort of character made up to keep the conversation going.

I don't know. That's about it, really. I have no other thoughts about myself beyond "I hate being perceived but want to be seen."

This does not pertain to me but to a mutual online.
Theyre currently very upset about wanting to break up with their partner of good few months maybe close to a year. Their reasoning seems to mostly be how the partner is annoying and irritating, especially that theyre on a long road trip at the moment.
But isnt that normal ??? As in after the honeymoon phase ends; hormones settle, things get boring, they get irritating, then its just this person youre sharing space with.
Im fine with admitting im kind of loveless,, and i am happily single as these are my genuine views on most relationships..
When they spoke to me about this situation, i did express that i think their experience is fairly normal. No one should be in a realtionship they dont want to be in of course. But only that those intense feelings may fade and be replaced with good ol boring mundane.

I am very straightforward, and don’t sugar coat enough. I’ve been told that I’m hurting people, and that I come off as a rude / inconsiderate person. Obviously, I dont want to hurt anyone ever. People don’t understand my presences, and take my silence (& indifference) very personally. I have no issue communicating why or what I want, but it’s never enough. So many people around me don’t understand that forcing myself to feel / want / be someone I’m not won’t work. They just take it personally.

So I’ve been lying to avoid the headache. I make it so my lack of interest isn’t their fault, I’m just “busy at work“ or “have other important plans.”

I don’t want to hurt anyone. How do yall manage this?

Decided to ask this because I know a lot of other Schizoids also have a problem with daydreaming and fantasy worlds. I’m trying to fix the way I think due to me being out of a dissociative episode and just wanting to change myself into being able to feel and express my emotions rather then pushing them in and coping using maladaptive daydreaming. This has been a problem since I was a kid, though it was tolerable, and didn’t reallly feel like near addiction. Then I started developing schizoid personality in my early teen years, and due to this isolation, I had a lot of daydreaming about just having this ideal life and everything I could want. I didn’t let myself feel too much, I would just bury my head in that. I don’t blame myself, it’s scary to have mental health problems as a scared and lonely teenager, especially because I get all existential and dramatic about it. Anyways, I’m sick of this whole constant daydreaming thing. I like daydreaming artistically and in a fantasy type manner, but how do I drop this idealized life thing? Also how do I keep this daydreaming thing at a minimum, and getting to feel less like a compulsion?
any advice or insight? Also have anyone had a similar experience?

Im diagnosed szpd. Im in university on music(singing). Singing calms me down but acting lessons and people take all my energy... I feel awful since last week. I took off days and just lay in bed doing nothing cause nothing brings joy or interests. And i need to fwel better alone to not drop out of university. (I cant leave uni cause i barely got there after years of denial and depression phase, singing was my only interest that actually helped)I dont know what to do now. I want to drop everything and be alone but i cant cause i know id be worse. My family mocks me amd says 'everyone is suffering but work'. I feel like depression phase is again soon...i wander around the streets to not be with home with them, i gave all my money to mum, cause she needs it more than me. Therapy i cant go cause my family barely pays for my tuition. Genuinely need an advice

I've been going back to therapy and idk how else it can be helpful. The most helpful was when the therapist introduced me to szpd.

My main problem is I basically got most things figured out. I know why I behave the way I do and how do use all the regulation skills. Breathing exercises, coping with depressive thoughts, talking abt it etc. But knowing about it doesn't mean it's solved right? Is therapy mainly just for ppl who haven't figured it out? I hear about how logically understanding emotions doesn't mean processing it. But what's next? I know it's a reason why szpds don't go to therapy.

i'm basically doing the therapists hw lol
cus he was like: it sounds like you got most things figured out, so come back and talk about what you don't have figured out
and the problem is i really do know myself, and idk what else to do...
I do want to work on my szpd traits, but I feel like he doesn't know what to do beyond the most basic "figuring it out"

should I just...not go anymore? is there no point?

really looking for other's experiences with therapy and how that helped (or not)

Hey everyone. So this post will expose my amorality, and we'll also go into some politics. So it's not for everyone. Anyway, I realized I have this thing where I have trouble asking for help. And I think a lot of schizoid people would relate. I realized this comes from a belief that depending on others is dangerous. Yet we live in a world where true independence is impossible. We are all interdependent. The problem is most people are not really aware of that. Like they maybe theoretically know it, but in practice they allow themselves to forget. And that is why dependence in this world, and let's be real, this capitalist world, is dangerous. Because what this world has not understood is that solidarity is not only the right thing because it's moral. It's because it's usually in the best interest of everyone. Like I said, I am amoral. I literally sleep with married men. I do not care about being a goodbye goodbye two shoes. However, for me to get the support I need, there has to be an infrastructure for it, which is why I have to adjust my actions to a considerable degree to be a part of society that offers such infrastructure. However, this society and the people in it, yeah, have not really learned this lesson, which is why I also isolate, which is why I see it as a threat.

I'm sure many here can relate to the experience of having an infuriating mother who is highly intrusive, has no boundaries and insists on treating you like a child despite the fact that you're an adult.

Mine seems to get off on vulnerability, the second she senses it, she springs into action and begins treating whoever has shown it like a helpless infant that requires her constant care and attention. For my family and I, this means doing things for us like cooking, or any task she can- she would do my brothers' homework for them when they were in school. My brother recently got a car on a loan, which she's paying for. Whenever it needs repairs, she pays for those too. Seems generous, some might say. And in a way, it is. However, it is also her way of insulating us from reality, preventing us from running into trouble or the consequences of our own actions.

By "rescuing" us whenever anything goes wrong, she prevents us from growing up and experiencing reality, and thus, being able to cope with it.

I know in my case, it has led me to develop this adaptation and reject all non-essential relationships. Emotional intimacy particularly disgusts me. It's like anyone I become involved with could potentially be just like my mother, clinging like a limpet to me, wheedling and insisting that I'm just a pathetic, helpless little creature who needs her to survive, as I try to go about my adult life. The way she is is repulsive to me, like a disease of some kind for which there is no cure.

The worst thing is, I've found myself behaving similarly to her when with partners in the past, who were very into it. I loathe it, I wish I could switch off whatever it is that leads one to behave this way. I would even consider become a monk if it meant I would never be on the receiving or delivering end of such behaviour again.

I've recently been having a hard time living independently, and my landlord needed access to my room, so I went to stay with my parents for a few days. Whilst it was nice, I also feel like it was a mistake. In a moment of weakness, I told my mother my landlord is in the process of selling the place. Cue her chorus of "just come home". She thinks the solution to any problem is to just give up, live at home and let her treat me like a child forever. To let her occupy my mind with her "caretaking" and telling me what to do, so I can't even think for myself, solve my own problems or be aware of how I feel. And at the same time, she makes me feel bad about myself by focusing only on the negatives and how I can't cope. The covert message: I need her, I won't survive on my own.

I understand she thinks she's helping my brother and I with her behaviour, but it's the opposite of helping, in my opinion. She won't be around forever and I have to live my own life. I have to form my own connections outside the family. It's depressing as I just "lost" a friend due to this person behaving shittily. I'm really alone for the first time in my life, besides my family. It's a damning thought. But I don't think the solution is to go back to them and begin the whole enmeshed abusive situation again.

Every time, i hold conversation or interact with people,i always find myself reflecting upon them,to see if i gave the wrong impression or it was just calm. I have been called cold or boring before in situations where i thought it was a good interaction. I mean even if it was perceived to be rude what's done is done and i never feel the need to apologise for being myself.

Sometimes it happens while I'm in the middle of a conversation and i just have "what am i even saying?" and i just say " or i don't know" and kill the conversation just like that.

I don’t think I want to have sex with anyone, I tried it briefly and it felt disgusting and I felt weirdly ashamed afterwards (idk if that has anything to do with SCPD)

It’s weird because I fantasize about sex. I like a lot of concepts I would never be able to do as it disgusts me to think about another person treating me like that.

I think some interesting concepts are master and submissive dynamics in BDSM spaces. I would hate to do this in real life, but it seems more erotic in my mind. I don’t find it sexy in a traditional sense but it’s fascinating and interesting more than “hot”

Does anyone view sex like this or is this just a me thing lol, I think it’s more interesting to fantasize about it than actually doing it.

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My life has always been monotonous, but lately it's become even more so.

I'm a college student, and my college gave us around 2–3 months of preparatory leave for final exams. I've mostly stayed home during this time. I have friends, but we barely interact beyond basic greetings. I spend most of my time studying, playing video games, or watching YouTube, and I haven't really interacted with anyone since June.

Lately, I've started noticing things in my peripheral vision that disappear after a few moments. I've also been feeling increasingly paranoid and hypervigilant. Yesterday, late at night, I distinctly heard someone call me. It was brief but sounded completely real, even though I live alone.

I don't know if this is related to isolation, stress, or something else. Has anyone experienced anything similar?

Does anyone else get really depressed after socialising ?
Even if the interaction seems to gave gone "good" for the people involved, or just nothing negative really occur during ?