“I told people about my Conduct Disorder and someone told everyone I was abusive and a horrible person due to it.”

My symptoms started around 15. I got diagnosed with Conduct Disorder when trying to get diagnosed with ADHD, which kind of developed to ASPD, I’m assuming due to the lack of treatment or awareness of it as a teenager.  

My main symptoms are apathy, anhedonia, disregarding social norms and laws, inner grandiosity and anger problems. The rest of my problems are less intense then those. I have a partner and it affects my relationship sometimes, because I care about them differently than other people. I find it hard to be interested in what they enjoy, empathise with them, care about certain things. I do try, but it’s hard sometimes.

It’s painful living day to day because I experience intense anhedonia- I do extreme things to get reactions out of myself, which it never does, and always harms me or I become depressed, since nothing gives me joy or pleasure. It can be hard to find reasons to live. I don’t a social life either really, I’m isolated from others.

I’m not formally diagnosed but I got told I had ‘severe anti-social personality issues’ when I turned 18. I got no treatment but I self-medicate with cannabis that helps me cognitively empathise, enjoy things, and enjoy socialising and being with others more, since socialising is really draining for me. It makes life tolerable when I can enjoy things and the people around me and connect with others, which I cannot do with my disorder.

I kind of expected the Conduct Disorder to develop into ASPD as a teenager due to my symptoms never changing or some getting worse and lack of treatment. As a teenager I told people about my Conduct Disorder and someone told everyone I was abusive and a horrible person due to it and I lost a lot of friends. I share other people with ASPD’s experiences publicly on social media and I just say I have it, but I’m not exactly open about it. People are aware I have it, but they’re not aware of my symptoms. It’s not other people’s business and it’s personal.

I’ve never met other people with the same condition as me but I have other people in real life who have BPD, who I can speak to in relation to personality disorders. They’re more likely to understand than people without personality disorders. I’ve never met anyone else with ASPD though. I find that the queer community is far more accepting of people with personality disorders, since mental health and queer acceptance interlock. Everyone I’ve met with personality disorders is from the queer community. 

I wish people knew that the disorder isn’t as scary as others make it out to be, and most of the time we harm ourselves more than other people. These symptoms display for reasons, and just because a symptom seems bad, when you actually talk to these people with these symptoms, it’s not as over-dramatic as people make it out to be.

I used to manipulate a lot as a teenager for my own survival, but people see that symptom and think we all do it because we get off on it and it’s something sadistic. When in my experience, talking to people with ASPD, the majority of the time it’s not extreme- it’s either pathological and mild, or a survival technique. Although our symptoms aren’t good, they’re not exactly evil either in my experience of talking to people and my own experiences with these symptoms.