Paranoid Personality Disorder
What is it?
Paranoid Personality Disorder is a Personality Disorder under the Cluster A category. The cluster A category describes the personality disorders under it as, "odd", "weird", or eccentric thinking/behavior.Paranoid Personality disorder may consist of severe hypervigilance, mistrust, belief that others are out to get/harm them, and many other feelings, behavior, and thinking related to such.
PPD Criteria
This is taken from the DSM-5 and DSM-4 as a criteria model to diagnose, or acknowledge a disorder medically. Can be used as an informed self-diagnosis. Below are the criteria lists of symptoms from the DSM-4 and DSM-5 alongside other needed criteria that comes from both.
DSM-5
Criterion A: A pervasive distrust and suspiciousness of others such that their motives are interpret-
ed as malevolent, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as
indicated by four (or more) of the following:
Suspects, without sufficient basis, that others are exploiting, harming, or deceiving him or her.
Is preoccupied with unjustified doubts about the loyalty or trustworthiness of friends or associates.
Is reluctant to confide in others because of unwarranted fear that the information will be used maliciously against him or her.
Reads hidden demeaning or threatening meanings into benign remarks or events.
Persistently bears grudges (i.e., is unforgiving of insults, injuries, or slights).
Perceives attacks on his or her character or reputation that are not apparent to others and is quick to react angrily or to counterattack.
Has recurrent suspicions, without justification, regarding fidelity of spouse or sexual partner.
_ /4
DSM-4
Criterion A: An enduring pattern of inner experience and behavior the deviates
markedly from the expectations of the individual's culture. This
pattern is manifested in two (or more) of the following areas:
Cognition (i.e., ways of perceiving and interpreting self, other people and events)
Affectivity (i.e., the range, intensity, liability, and appropriateness of emotional response)
Interpersonal functioning
Difficulty with impulse control
_ /2
Criteria that must be met. Taken from both the DSM-4 and DSM-5.
Does not occur exclusively during the course of schizophrenia, a bipolar disorder or a
depressive disorder with psychotic features, or another psychotic disorder and is not
attributable to the physiological effects of another medical condition.
Significant impairments in self (identity or self-direction) and
interpersonal (empathy or intimacy) functioning.
The impairments in personality functioning and the individual's
personality trait expression are relatively stable across time and
consistent across situations.
The impairments in personality functioning and the individual's
personality trait expression are not better understood as
normative for the individual's developmental stage or socio-
cultural environment.
To note: PPD (Premorbid) is the diagnosis of an individual having PPD before the development, or early onset, of Schizophrenia.Unrelated to above: If you find you do not entirely meet the critieria, but still experience traits that are not better explained by something else, you might use the label PPD traits. This can also be used if you present PPD symptoms that stem from another Personality Disorder. Occasionally, people will use it if they're uncomfortable with using PPD, or uncomfortable using PPD if they're not medically diagnosed.
Below are going to be ways as to how PPD may present throughout the day, and also share what PPD may due in some situations. This is mostly to show the possibilities rather than limitations. You do not have to relate at all, as everyone's experiences is wildly different. These are simply from my perspective.
School
In school, you'll find that being surrounded by many people will make you naturally nervous. However, with PPD, that nervousness will be amplified. You think that any small comment, or any friendlly gesture is easily an attack on you. When it comes to academic successes (rewards, scholarships, high grades, etc etc), you might get thoughts of others trying to destroy, ruin, or actively steal those successes away from you.
Relationships
When it comes to relationships, rather platonic, romantic, or whatever attraction, you'll find that you would want to be more dependent on the trust, loyalty, and confiding in said individual you're in a relationship with. You might find it's harder to confide in them about information, hobbies, mood, current mental state, or whatever it may be, due to the thought of them betraying you. You might find yourself prone to attacking those in said relationships if you think, or feel, that they are being disloyal, untrustworthy, or attacking you.
Work
It might be harder to create a more workforce, 'platonic' friendship while on a job due to fear of being attacked, believing others are going to take any promotions from you, or simply unable to adjust to any conversation based environment without the fear and paranoia of attack on oneself, betrayal, and paranoid based delusions.
I have a survery that reached out to those with PPD and PPD traits. Below are the quotes from those individuals. You may also take the survey!
Paranoid Personality Disorder - Taken from those who have it
What are some things you wished others understood about PPD?
"That it isn’t about them or a reflection on their trustworthiness. It’s entirely in my head and my mental illness, so no matter how much I trust and believe someone, I cannot stop being paranoid. It isn’t their fault but it isn’t mine either." - Percy, They/Them
"it's very difficult to change the lens of ppd. it's similar to delusions-- you could explain it objectively, but it's still a pervasive pattern in my life that i will experience intense distrust and suspect things in what others say despite that. another thing i wished others understood about ppd is that it really isn't just overthinking. although that's a big aspect of it, to tell me i'm overthinking will not change much, because it will just become more persistent in how i perceive others. ppd is also not always the most immediately visible to others. of course, there are cases there are, but ppd can also be very internalised, and you may not know about all their suspicions. ppd also isn't something to excuse my actions. i've done a lot of things i regret because of how much i constantly doubt others that i need to figure out myself, which has led me to lash out and even cross boundaries. this is why i've grown to keep much more of my ppd beliefs to myself, but it still is an extremely prevalent theme in my life, i still struggle with it a lot." - Anonymous
"the link between all my different delusions it causes" - Courthouse, It/Its
"lots of people think of having a genuine paranoid /disorder/ and they think of the crazy terrified tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist who locks themself in their house and sits in the corner and rocks in the fetal position while muttering paranoid insanities to themselves. i just wish people knew that it wasn't usually that dramatic, and that i'm pretty sure most people are aware that they ARE delusions. like yeah i'll have episodes of not really being able to tell what's real or what's my thoughts, but those are few and far between, and i'm usually calmed down from them rather quickly by friends, family, and partner." - Sparrowhawk Pines, He/Him
"That we don't want to feel this way, and it can be an utterly terrifying experience when you suddenly feel unsafe and suspicious. That we want love and support for how we feel" - Raccoob, Fae/Xe/It/Ae
How did you find out you had PPD [where did you learn about it, did you read articles on it, etc etc]?
"I found out by researching as much as I could and talking to other people with PPD. I found @shitborderlinesdo on tumblr to have very helpful checklists." - Percy, They/Them
"Through an online search while researching BPD" - Anonymous
"i found out about it through researching personality disorders due to suspecting bpd for myself. resonating with the ppd symptom list after my deeper dive in personality disorders, i then referred to the dsm-v to grasp more of an understanding as well. there are not many resources on ppd, so articles and the DSM was the main resources i used at the time!" - Anonymous
"i've pretty much always had paranoid delusions and overactive thoughts when it comes to paranoia in general, and i thought it was anxiety, but after learning that ppd existed from an article online about anxiety vs paranoia, i was like "ah. wonderful /s" and pretty much realized i had it right away" - Sparrowhawk Pines, He/Him
Paranoid Personality Disorder Traits - Taken from those who have it
What was your distinguishing line between having PPD traits rather than PPD?
"I feel I only have the traits and it's not as drastic as the disorder" - Anonymous
What was something you wished others could understand about your PPD traits?
"i don't know, that im not frail or anything. i may be suspicious of most people, but that doesn't mean im trying to plan against you or anything." - Riot, Predator System It/Its