#avpd safe

Most books assume the hardest part is learning social skills.

For AVPD, the hardest part is often showing up in the first place.

It's wanting connection while feeling convinced you'll be judged, rejected, or exposed. Replaying conversations for hours. Avoiding opportunities you actually wanted. Turning down invitations, jobs, relationships, and experiences—not because you don't care, but because the fear feels stronger than the desire.

Then people say things like, "Just put yourself out there."

If it were that simple, AVPD wouldn't exist.

What actually helps is understanding why avoidance feels so automatic and learning how to change it gradually instead of forcing yourself into overwhelming situations. Recovery isn't about becoming outgoing overnight. It's about reducing shame, challenging deeply rooted beliefs, building self-compassion, practicing small exposures, and creating enough emotional safety to stop letting fear make every decision.

One resource that genuinely focuses on those pieces is The Avoidant Personality Disorder Workbook by Jeri Santana. It includes practical worksheets, CBT and ACT strategies, exposure exercises, self-esteem work, emotion regulation, boundary-setting, values-based goals, and step-by-step tools for breaking the cycle of avoidance instead of just talking about it.

I was sexually abused ages 3-about 8 years old. And I was in a cult when I was 13-14. I have a lot of mental disorders. I’m on disability because I cannot function like a normal person.

I don’t take care of myself. I’ve lost all motivation for self care and my hobbies. My mom helps me and tries to motivate me to do basic hygiene and do things like change my clothes , clean , take my medication, drink water and eat. I don’t do anything. I can laugh , I can have fun, I can force myself to do good but I’m exhausted from nothing.

All I think about is how to escape from my constant flashbacks , Stockholm syndrome , and disgusting thoughts. I used to cut myself. I’m a year clean. But now, if dangerous situations where I could get seriously hurt comes my way , I don’t stop it. Nothing too serious but yeah. For example: my brothers dog bit me. I tried to run away but before my mom got him away I just kind of accepted it. I could have got rabies. The thought of death and everything crossed my mind, and i realized I don’t want to die yet. But I do like pain. I feel pain , I can feel it a lot . I enjoy it. So whenever it happens to come by , I welcome it.

I don’t know what I’m doing with my life. I’m on my phone and tablet all day, on the internet, on TikTok , on here on instagram. Talking to people who are like me. I’m a loser. I’m a low life. I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know how to be a real human being. And at this point I don’t know if I should even try anymore. But I have to, I have to keep fighting . I do want a life, a career, I want to go out into the world.

pinned post?

hi, please call me Clover. it/its pronouns. I suffer from AvPD, MDD, PDD, anxiety, and chronic depression

this is where i vent into the void about stuff and coin what i cant on my main,,,

Its especially bad when I do something, (hesitantly) shrugging off the worry that its embarrassing as an irrational fear caused by anxiety, and then it.. being true, and I embarrass myself.