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I'm thinking on this and the reasons for why there's a compulsion for us to label people with mental health conditions.
First, I think it's because we can. Information is available to us today that former generations just didn't have. And like any little knowledge it can be injurious to us or others. That's why I like to take it with a grain of salt.
Even professionals argue over correct diagnostics. It's not as simple as reading in a book and checking off behaviors. Sometimes it takes long-term observation over a period of decades. People change over time based on their life experiences. Psychiatry is both a science and an art.
But to be able to label someone diagnostically seems to validate our hurts as in, "Hey, you know I was hurt. Really hurt. Because look at the evidence in the criteria here: That person is a certified Whatever."
Maybe there's even a hope to protect others by proving what a bad actor the person is. Or is it a mean-spirited attempt to turn others against him? Could be both.
Like I said, I don't know if my friend is character disordered or is just self-centered and a little maladjusted due to former hurts in her life. Maybe she's just secretly needy and too accomplished and proud to admit it. At any rate it hasn't developed to the point where her existence is a curse to all who encounter her. I think that's true for many of the people we'd like to give labels to.
It's all her stuff, not mine. I don't see much advantage in finding a name for her stuff. She's still going to be herself and I still will be powerless to "fix" it.
I'm thinking on this and the reasons for why there's a compulsion for us to label people with mental health conditions.
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I don't see it as a compulsion, and it's not about labeling people for the sake of labeling them. It's about trying to make sense out of a topsy-turvy world sometimes, or out of "off"-seeming aspects of it.
It's helpful for someone to point out, the X behavior is actually part of a syndrome, so that you don't doubt your own perceptions, and you have a clearer understanding of the people around you. Instead of scratching your head after an evening of chit-chat that was oddly unsatisfying, and wondering what went wrong, and asking yourself the inevitable "is it just me?", you can recognize off-base behavior when you see it. Once you recognize it and understand it to some extent, you can make better choices about how to respond to it.
Knowledge is empowering. Don't knock it, or stigmatize it by calling it a "compulsion to label people". That's not what this is about at all, IMO.
I don't see it as a compulsion, and it's not about labeling people for the sake of labeling them. It's about trying to make sense out of a topsy-turvy world sometimes, or out of "off"-seeming aspects of it.
It's helpful for someone to point out, the X behavior is actually part of a syndrome, so that you don't doubt your own perceptions, and you have a clearer understanding of the people around you. Instead of scratching your head after an evening of chit-chat that was oddly unsatisfying, and wondering what went wrong, and asking yourself the inevitable "is it just me?", you can recognize off-base behavior when you see it. Once you recognize it and understand it to some extent, you can make better choices about how to respond to it.
Knowledge is empowering. Don't knock it, or stigmatize it by calling it a "compulsion to label people". That's not what this is about at all, IMO.
I'm thinking on this and the reasons for why there's a compulsion for us to label people with mental health conditions.
First, I think it's because we can. Information is available to us today that former generations just didn't have. And like any little knowledge it can be injurious to us or others. That's why I like to take it with a grain of salt.
Even professionals argue over correct diagnostics. It's not as simple as reading in a book and checking off behaviors. Sometimes it takes long-term observation over a period of decades. People change over time based on their life experiences. Psychiatry is both a science and an art.
But to be able to label someone diagnostically seems to validate our hurts as in, "Hey, you know I was hurt. Really hurt. Because look at the evidence in the criteria here: That person is a certified Whatever."
Maybe there's even a hope to protect others by proving what a bad actor the person is. Or is it a mean-spirited attempt to turn others against him? Could be both.
Like I said, I don't know if my friend is character disordered or is just self-centered and a little maladjusted due to former hurts in her life. Maybe she's just secretly needy and too accomplished and proud to admit it. At any rate it hasn't developed to the point where her existence is a curse to all who encounter her. I think that's true for many of the people we'd like to give labels to.
It's all her stuff, not mine. I don't see much advantage in finding a name for her stuff. She's still going to be herself and I still will be powerless to "fix" it.
Great post, and it definitely gave me some food for thought. We all have characterological flaws, some greater and some lesser, but assigning a pathology to those things isn't always appropriate or necessary, and indeed can end up doing more harm than good. Thanks for posting.
I don't see it as a compulsion, and it's not about labeling people for the sake of labeling them. It's about trying to make sense out of a topsy-turvy world sometimes, or out of "off"-seeming aspects of it.
It's helpful for someone to point out, the X behavior is actually part of a syndrome, so that you don't doubt your own perceptions, and you have a clearer understanding of the people around you. Instead of scratching your head after an evening of chit-chat that was oddly unsatisfying, and wondering what went wrong, and asking yourself the inevitable "is it just me?", you can recognize off-base behavior when you see it. Once you recognize it and understand it to some extent, you can make better choices about how to respond to it.
Knowledge is empowering. Don't knock it, or stigmatize it by calling it a "compulsion to label people". That's not what this is about at all, IMO.
Also a good post, like the one above it. I think what I'm hearing you say is that it is the natural course of human understanding to try to find order in disorder, to help understand it better. I have a science background and agree with you in this regard, but I'm still meditating on two seeds of thought that I took from Lodestars post:
1) In our effort to find order in disorder, does it push us to categorize phenomena inappropriately, or 'put things in boxes' where they don't belong?
2) I think most mental illnesses (at least the more significant/severe of them) either have a genetic basis -or- are the result of severe psychological trauma (probably often in childhood). Conversely, I think most manifestations of 'off' behavior can be attributable to a variety of life events (some more severe than others), or could simply be behavior patterns that the person learns from early behavior-reward events.
We all understand that response to a stimulus is what shapes behavior, so perhaps two different people who appear to be narcissists come from wildly different backgrounds that shape the behavior, and one is the true narcissist as a protective mechanism from significant childhood trauma, the other simply entered a positive feedback loop with their parents who fawned all over him/her when they went on about themselves.
In a practical sense, I could walk around a local mall and have a full day with a DSM, while my wife could take the car ride with me and probably open it up a few times herself. There are times when I lament not going into psychology as a field, and there are other times when I feel that it is a bottomless pit, and we'll never completely understand human behavior, not because of the complexities of the behavior itself, but because of the complexity of the events that shape it.
I'm thinking on this and the reasons for why there's a compulsion for us to label people with mental health conditions.
Judgement is human nature... but also, to some degree, a doctor (PhD) lives and dies by the papers they write, and the change (positive?) they can make in their field. it's part of becoming a PhD. For psychologists... this is literally how you do that. Labeling a new mental or behavioral diagnosis.
There have been times when I've been actually grateful to let someone else keep talking and not ask me a whole lot of questions about my life especially if I was going through a hard time at the time. Or, if I knew they would take issue about some things in my life and/or past.
I was involved with a man a few years ago who demonstrated 8 of the 9 hallmarks of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). I began to think about it after about a year of dating him. I had seen articles online and I watched a couple of YouTube videos by professional mental health experts. One of them of course was Dr. Ramani.
I mentioned the BPD idea to his mother at one point. She told me that he had been diagnosed with schizophrenia at age 19. I don't know how true that was because this family had an issue with tall tales. She also may have had a little bit of dementia at the time. It IS possible that he had schizophrenia because he was frequently paranoid for no logical reason. There may have been co-morbidity. All I know is that the relationship was unsustainable.
I do remember thinking that I was glad to have some sort of idea what might be going on with him. It wasn't about judgment. It was about trying to understand.
I have mentioned in the past on here that I ended up ghosting this person because he could not even be a good friend. I wanted to stay friends with him afterward but he was too emotional and volatile; always swinging wildly between positivity and negativity.
My brother-in-law (husband's only brother)is like this. When I first was married my husband was in a terrible accident and ended up in the ICU with a broken neck. I was still in shock when I received a phone call from him. I said hello and he replied "I can't believe this is happening to me. First my best friend's father just had a heart attack and now my brother is in the hospital!"
He barely asked about or listened to any information I had about my husband, just wanted to talk about how everything was happening to HIM.
Judgement is human nature... but also, to some degree, a doctor (PhD) lives and dies by the papers they write, and the change (positive?) they can make in their field. it's part of becoming a PhD. For psychologists... this is literally how you do that. Labeling a new mental or behavioral diagnosis.
Not gonna lie, I am probably guilty of this at times. I am usually keenly aware of when it's happening, and try to step back and hand the conversational reins to the other person. Unfortunately, I am friends with a lot of introverts. I am an introvert with extroverted tendencies. So I tend to talk A LOT more than my friends do. My wife is much more extroverted than me, and sometimes can monopolize a conversation. She's also aware of this tendency and tries her best to fix it. With all the isolation, it's probably gotten a bit worse.
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