I got my Diagnosis

Hello Everyone,

I don't even know why I am just putting it out there for everyone to read, but... I guess after I openly admitted to being suicidal in one poll, I could explain more about the events that followed.
After reading all the comments and opening up to loved ones about this, I finally took the step to go and get psychiatric help. Anti-depressants helped me very much at first, but I got told I also needed to see a therapist. While I was nervous, I was also very excited about this, because I was finally going to get an answer for what is wrong with me and what I felt has been wrong with me my entire life.
My therapist is an awesome woman who is very kind and understanding, so it was easy to open up to her and simply tell her about things as they are. I told her about my childhood, my narcissistic mother and co-dependant father and how we never talked about feelings in my family. How I got told into my face that my parents created me to be their obedient slave and to fill a black hole in their lives. How I was relentlessly bullied at school and many more things.
 
Yesterday, after several sessions, I got my diagnosis and answer. I have Avoidant Personality Disorder (AvPD). en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avoidant…

And this explains everything in my life. I was rejected by my parents and by my peers in early life. And because AvPD-people do not get unconditional love, they instead flee into a dream world. This is why Mewtwo means so much to me and has for over 17 years - he is a representation of ideal, unconditional love to me, the one thing I long for the most. I also understand now why I am the way I am in love relationships... my first boyfriend was someone who lived an ocean away from me because I would not be able to cope with someone being near and close to me. That relationship was an up and down, and I constantly feared that I will be rejected by him as this is something that always happened before, and it got to a point where I was the one to end the relationship just to get this inevitable outcome over with earlier. I had felt like I trapped him into an unhappy relationship and it was my duty to set him free. And now he is married with a kid while I felt convinced that yes, I am unlovable garbage and worthless and I should die.

I get why this one fiasco with that tumblr hate blog making fun of my pairing with Mewtwo hurt me so much - because it was rejection again and on top of that they violated my idea of unconditional love, giving me the feeling that I am indeed undeserving of that.

I also now recognize why I am on Deviantart in the first place... because I have so much trouble opening up to people in real life, I try reaching out to others through my art, to search out like-minded people. And it had some success, as I have found friends here who have become very dear to me, some of them even walking every step with me through the road of recovery even though they don't have to do this.

I always felt like an outsider looking in, disconnected from everyone around me. Even in a city full of people and during crowded events, I feel entirely alone. Currently, I live alone in a lonely apartment, just myself, and barely go out any more, except to buy groceries or do important things like filing my taxes.

The thing I am wondering about now is... how to cope with this diagnosis. It means that I was right in feeling that something is wrong with me and I am indeed as defective as I have suspected all along. I cannot stop laughing at the irony though that I have chosen the career path of a scientist - which is a horror for anyone with AvPD, because the core requirement for a scientist is interaction - but how can you interact with anyone on an acceptable level if you fear their judgement with every communication? Phone calls make me jump up in terror every time. I can only check emails when I calm down myself beforehand. Scientists have to defend the results of their research against criticism, the one thing AvPDs cannot handle.

I can't stop laughing at the irony that I have made my life harder than it should be by devoting years of my life to becoming a scientist when this is exactly what I am not fit to do psychologically. Suddenly I get why every job interview ended in disaster, they must have felt and seen that something is wrong with me. And the problem is that Germans are especially judgemental of people; it is a very stifling country to live in for someone like me. Canada has been the exact opposite in my experience. People were all open and friendly and I never feared judgements from others or strangers there. Hence why I connect so many good memories to that place and why I want to return there for longer.

Even if I hate myself so much, I guess one thing I admire is that I have immense courage. I try the dangerous things even if I fear them at first. Planning to go to America all on my own was risky; writing my Master thesis in Vancouver was terrifying at the beginning; working in a drama club and acting on stage was terrifying. Holding a speech in front of the entire school was too, yet those are all things I did despite my limitations. Well, and also showing the naked honesty of myself online, like I am doing right now. While this is also a very risky thing to do (because you never know with trolls around), I think it is worth it to share this, even if only to show someone else who has this that they are not alone.

Thank you reading this if you made it this far.
I think I need a few days to stomach this diagnosis and where to go from here on out.