Help This is the first time i’ve felt something like guilt or empathy or something. This is absolutely terrible, someone please help me get it to stop.

[primadonna_]

For background, I live with sociopathy, meaning I have anti social personality disorder. Guilt is definitely not common for me, and I almost never feel it. Recently, I started feeling this weird tightness in my chest or my stomach and i'm pretty sure this is what it feels like because I got it when I almost ran over a rabbit or I see like depressing videos online. This is terrible, I don't know if this is some affect from me being deprived of the opportunity to be a bitch, or that i'm "getting better," but it's terrible and I NEED it to stop. I'm so confused, and I hate this I literally cannot live with this. I don't even actually feel guilty, just this weird physical sensation is absolutely terrible. Someone PLEASE give me some ideas how to get this to stop, literally anything this is so ass.

 

[NormallyNeurotic]

Unfortunately, getting it to stop completely probably isn't an option.

Do you have a therapist? Because it's a good idea to unpack whether this phantom feeling is more akin to guilt or empathy.

Feeling guilty when watching a sad video isn't really a good thing. It can become unhealthy for some people by leading to moral obsessions and complusions. Feeling empathetic is something that fits both examples you have. I'd assume affective empathy based on your description.

 

[callmeskin]

i also have aspd, sometimes feelings do come which i rarely feel and its overwhelming. Isn't much to do about it except distracting yourself or just accepting that the feeling is natural and it will eventually pass.

 

[primadonna_]

Unfortunately, getting it to stop completely probably isn't an option.

Do you have a therapist? Because it's a good idea to unpack whether this phantom feeling is more akin to guilt or empathy.

Feeling guilty when watching a sad video isn't really a good thing. It can become unhealthy for some people by leading to moral obsessions and complusions. Feeling empathetic is something that fits both examples you have. I'd assume affective empathy based on your description.

this actually sucks how do people live like this. I talked to my therapist and apparently since apparently i'm on the pretty far end of the aspd spectrum, even if I was having physical reactions it wouldn't do anything because it wouldn't affect my behavior since i'm not actually feeling it in my head and it's probably a hormonal thing… thank god, but i would literally do anything to get this to stop indefinitely.

 

[thelostautistic]

This must be really overwhelming for you to experience for the first time. I'm not sure if there's a way to get it to stop completely. But talking about it and time will hopefully help it to subside a little

 

[NormallyNeurotic]

this actually sucks how do people live like this. I talked to my therapist and apparently since apparently i'm on the pretty far end of the aspd spectrum, even if I was having physical reactions it wouldn't do anything because it wouldn't affect my behavior since i'm not actually feeling it in my head and it's probably a hormonal thing… thank god, but i would literally do anything to get this to stop indefinitely.

I honestly don't have that many memories of back when I had affective empathy, but it was rough because I used to be hyper-empathetic. My BPD, I find, is more associated with what little affective empathy I have. I fully believe had some things not happened in my life, I would have ended up just your average borderline instead of a narcissist too.

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[primadonna_]

I honestly don't have that many memories of back when I had affective empathy, but it was rough because I used to be hyper-empathetic. My BPD, I find, is more associated with what little affective empathy I have. I fully believe had some things not happened in my life, I would have ended up just your average borderline instead of a narcissist too.

[Hidden content]

oh yeah what actually triggered that weird physical reaction is that i was in the car with my mom (don't know if ive mentioned this already im too lazy to check) and we almost ran over some rabbits. I don't know if it's because I had a pet rabbit for most of my life (probably that ngl) but that weird feeling sucked i lit never wanna feel that again

 

[Obliviate]

I'm crazy jealous. I have the opposite. Overly empathetic and overly emotional/thoughtful/adhd. It drives me insane. Wish I was like you except don't want to hurt animals.

 

[NormallyNeurotic]

I'm crazy jealous. I have the opposite. Overly empathetic and overly emotional/thoughtful/adhd. It drives me insane. Wish I was like you except don't want to hurt animals.

People with ASPD and other empathy-lacking neurodivergencies can have ADHD, to be fair.

 

[Obliviate]

People with ASPD and other empathy-lacking neurodivergencies can have ADHD, to be fair.

I wonder how that works? Like you feel nothing but your mind races with a million thoughts a second? or is it a low adhd?

 

[NormallyNeurotic]

I wonder how that works? Like you feel nothing but your mind races with a million thoughts a second? or is it a low adhd?

ASPD is a spectrum, so it depends. And empathy isn't inherently tied to emotions anyway, so for other "apathetic" disorders it doesn't change much ADHD-wise. I feel plenty of emotions/thoughts, it's actually one of the main reasons I'm suicidal. I lack Affective Empathy all the same.

 

[froggirl9000]

People with ASPD and other empathy-lacking neurodivergencies can have ADHD, to be fair.

(source, tho i got it from a video about azumanga daioh lmao)

 

[phoebusapollo]

I'm crazy jealous. I have the opposite. Overly empathetic and overly emotional/thoughtful/adhd. It drives me insane. Wish I was like you except don't want to hurt animals.

I am jealous and I also have the opposite. It's a huge problem. Also in my experience I somehow attract humans who are narcissistic and lack empathy. Also I cry a lot.

 

[Bootleg Astolfo]

I personally distract myself by watching Spice And Wolf (2024)

 

[NormallyNeurotic]

View attachment 196069
(source, tho i got it from a video about azumanga daioh lmao)

Okay now I'm curious if there's research on ADHD and NPD. Off the top of my head all I can think of is the prevalence of narcissistic traits in autism + the comorbidity of autism and ADHD.

 

[Obliviate]

I am jealous and I also have the opposite. It's a huge problem. Also in my experience I somehow attract humans who are narcissistic and lack empathy. Also I cry a lot.

It's something about us. We attract the bad horrible people like crazy. Everytime I step out the house, disgustingly rude people always spot me and just have to assault me. I feel like they can sense our high vibration energy and just want to feed off it. Energy harvesting. I wish I could feel nothing. I want empathy because empathy=humanity, i Just don't want to feel too much.

 

[NormallyNeurotic]

It's something about us. We attract the bad horrible people like crazy. Everytime I step out the house, disgustingly rude people always spot me and just have to assault me. I feel like they can sense our high vibration energy and just want to feed off it. Energy harvesting. I wish I could feel nothing. I want empathy because empathy=humanity, i Just don't want to feel too much.

Saying that empathy=humanity on a thread started by a person with ASPD is wild. I get the feeling that you don't know that there are three types of empathy, and that none of them equal compassion.

View attachment 196069
(source, tho i got it from a video about azumanga daioh lmao)

Update: Found it! Oh the things I could do if I had access to these articles, man.

 

[primadonna_]

It's something about us. We attract the bad horrible people like crazy. Everytime I step out the house, disgustingly rude people always spot me and just have to assault me. I feel like they can sense our high vibration energy and just want to feed off it. Energy harvesting. I wish I could feel nothing. I want empathy because empathy=humanity, i Just don't want to feel too much.

gal honestly not feeling it at all is so lit like does humanity even matter like you can literally do anything it's so amazing, and you can't get guilt tripped or anything this is the life

Saying that empathy=humanity on a thread started by a person with ASPD is wild. I get the feeling that you don't know that there are three types of empathy, and that none of them equal compassion.

Update: Found it! Oh the things I could do if I had access to these articles, man.
View attachment 196073

omg yes thanks for this i literally read everything and thought i was being dissed i was so confused </3

I wonder how that works? Like you feel nothing but your mind races with a million thoughts a second? or is it a low adhd?

Nope, not at all. I have severe combined type adhd, which was not masked at all lollll

it's a common misconception that people with this disorder don't feel anything at all, which isn't true at all. You can still feel emotions but they're just super blunted. As an example, even if i did get that physical reaction of guilt if I was hypothetically emotionally or physically hurting someone it still doesn't activate that internal break that gets you to stop since emotions like that are blunted. I'm still affected by adhd, even the emotional disregulation part, I can't focus without meds, have bad memory and everything that comes with it, when it comes to adhd just a mostly normal experience.

 

[phoebusapollo]

It's something about us. We attract the bad horrible people like crazy. Everytime I step out the house, disgustingly rude people always spot me and just have to assault me. I feel like they can sense our high vibration energy and just want to feed off it. Energy harvesting. I wish I could feel nothing. I want empathy because empathy=humanity, i Just don't want to feel too much.

Yeah it's harvesting. I once got almost harvested to death. Interesting way to think about emotional abuse. At this point I don't want to feel anything anymore.

 

[SASU-KE]

I personally distract myself by watching Spice And Wolf (2024)

I felt a bit holo watching that.

Spoiler

Just kidding, it was all right.

 

[Bootleg Astolfo]

I felt a bit holo watching that.

Spoiler

Just kidding, it was all right.

yeah it needs a bit more spice (and wolf)

 

[pax420]

Now I'm confused even more what is wrong with me. I don't feel 'normal emotions' like everybody else. I have no pity for human beings but I do got animals. I never felt love my entire life except for one person. I'm not even sure if f that was even love. I don't care when people die around me I could sit there and watch somebody die from anything or beaten to unconsciousness and it wouldn't bother me at all. I could walk up to anybody and look them in the eye and end their live and go on about my day. I wouldn't fell happy, sad, remorse just nothing. I'm not a psychopath I wouldn't get any kind of gratification from it. I just don't do it because its too bothersome and I don't feel like rotting away in jail. I know I am far from normal but I don't know what is wrong with me. At an early age I became an expert at faking emotions in order to fit in wherever I was at the time but they were all a mask or a put on. I was with a girl for 23 years I said I loved her but I don't really think I did. I stayed with her because she was just as damaged as I am. The day she died I went to the hospital and said goodbye to her at 7 am and went on to work like smy other day. I do feel anger and rage but I choose not to act on them because I don't want to deal with the after effects. Not because it would be wrong. I have acted on those 'feelings' but I always took it to the extreme and had to make myself stop. I've put quite a few people in the hospital and most of them have lifelong scars and permanent damage. A lot of people would say they deserved what they got but it didn't affect me one way or another. I don't know what is wrong with me. But I know I'm not normal. I don't want to get better or change I just want to know what it is and why I'm not normal

 

[NormallyNeurotic]

I'm not a psychopath I wouldn't get any kind of gratification from it.

Psychopaths aren't required to enjoy hurting people. That's a sadist. Have you looked into ASPD?

 

[pax420]

Thank you for responding! What is ASPD? I'm 56 years old. When I was a kid. They didn't have allot of these diagnosis. No adhd, no spectrum autism, no Adderall no ritalan. When I was about 5 I started having what they called seizures. I would bash my head into walls and door jams I got pretty bad to where my dad would have to pin me down and hold me until it stopped. I could not stop and I don't know why I was doing it. They took me to a neuroligist who ran a bunch of tests and put me on cylert which I believe was an early form of Adderall. I started seeing a psychologist and a psychiatrist. Nobody would never tell me what was wrong with me.when I got a little older I learned how to control it and kept it hid where I wouldn't get in trouble. I also started cutting on myself. Which I also learned to hide very well. I wasn't trying to kill myself or actually trying to hurt myself, I was just trying to feel something hell anything at all. By then the cylert wasn't working and I was getting in trouble for bullying the bullies. For some reason I always took up for the people who got picked on. But when I went after the bullies I went at then wide open. I was very hard to stop. It would usually take four or five police or paramedics to hold me down and subdue me. They ended up putting me on a very high dose of mellarill and my parents had a prn shot of thorazine for when I lost it. At 13 they ended up putting me in mental hospitals where I pretty much stayed until I was 16. I had started smoking pot and snorting coke and meth and got some reason I got total control over my self. But unfortunately those three years is where I did most of my growing up, in a state mental hospital. No wonder why I'm so fucked up. I lost my virginity there and learned how to become like a chameleon. I could fit in anywhere with anybody and everybody thought I belonged. But I still never felt emotions like normal people I could fake them, and go thru all the stuff that went along with them. They never would tell me what was wrong with me and to this day I still don't know. Sorry for the long story.

 

[NormallyNeurotic]

@pax420
ASPD is Antisocial Personality Disorder, often called sociopathy (even if the term isn't the best). The person who began this thread has ASPD and has some very good posts talking about the complexities of how it feels to live with it from their perspective!

I'll also list the criteria for ASPD (and its pre-adulthood signs, Conduct Disorder) from the DSM-5-TR, but keep in mind that the DSM doesn't tend to give the most sympathetic wording regarding symptoms of "taboo disorders."
I have NPD (a disorder in the same cluster/group as ASPD) and can tell you that the NPD criteria is worded horribly, so the ASPD criteria may be similar. Take it with a grain of salt and a healthy dose of nuance.

Spoiler: ASPD Criteria

Included the two screenshots below to:
1. Give a better perspective on where it comes from—though I've heard of tentative evidence that similar symptoms can be caused by TBI/traumatic brain injury, and that could apply to you because you clearly got some form of TBI as an adolescent.


2. And to show symptoms that are important, but not included in the criteria, like chronic boredom.

Spoiler: Conduct Disorder

 

[copioushopelessness]

I am jealous and I also have the opposite. It's a huge problem. Also in my experience I somehow attract humans who are narcissistic and lack empathy. Also I cry a lot.

Same

 

[primadonna_]

Aspd is like sociopathy, or psychopathy which kind of overlaps with it, but it's different. The google definition is "a chronic mental health disorder characterized by a long-term pattern of manipulating, exploiting, or violating the rights of others", I think it's different with men and women, with men mostly being more physically aggressive and women being more emotionally aggressive, but I was a mix of both. I was pretty violent at times but i guess I was manipulative and bold enough I guess to the point I was popular, which was kind of dumb because I was a total bitch. I'm in my early 20's now and obviously i'm not as off the rails but emotionally i'm still very blunted it's insane.. but ya I totally relate to you going insane at like 13 and having to go to mental hospitals all the time lol

 

[etherealgoddess]

For background, I live with sociopathy, meaning I have anti social personality disorder. Guilt is definitely not common for me, and I almost never feel it. Recently, I started feeling this weird tightness in my chest or my stomach and i'm pretty sure this is what it feels like because I got it when I almost ran over a rabbit or I see like depressing videos online. This is terrible, I don't know if this is some affect from me being deprived of the opportunity to be a bitch, or that i'm "getting better," but it's terrible and I NEED it to stop. I'm so confused, and I hate this I literally cannot live with this. I don't even actually feel guilty, just this weird physical sensation is absolutely terrible. Someone PLEASE give me some ideas how to get this to stop, literally anything this is so ass.

Maybe you developed sociopathy to survive life. This is actually a good thing tbh. It means you're uncovering your pain.

 

[pax420]

@pax420
ASPD is Antisocial Personality Disorder, often called sociopathy (even if the term isn't the best). The person who began this thread has ASPD and has some very good posts talking about the complexities of how it feels to live with it from their perspective!

I'll also list the criteria for ASPD (and its pre-adulthood signs, Conduct Disorder) from the DSM-5-TR, but keep in mind that the DSM doesn't tend to give the most sympathetic wording regarding symptoms of "taboo disorders."
I have NPD (a disorder in the same cluster/group as ASPD) and can tell you that the NPD criteria is worded horribly, so the ASPD criteria may be similar. Take it with a grain of salt and a healthy dose of nuance.

Spoiler: ASPD Criteria

View attachment 196611

Included the two screenshots below to:
1. Give a better perspective on where it comes from—though I've heard of tentative evidence that similar symptoms can be caused by TBI/traumatic brain injury, and that could apply to you because you clearly got some form of TBI as an adolescent.
View attachment 196612

2. And to show symptoms that are important, but not included in the criteria, like chronic boredom.
View attachment 196613

Spoiler: Conduct Disorder

View attachment 196616
View attachment 196617

Haha thank you, I think! Now I'm really confused, but that's nothing new. I'm planning on ctb in a couple of months anyway. I couldn't never figure out what is wrong with me in 46 years I don't guess I will in two more months. Ive always known there is something wrong with me I just wasn't ever able to put a name on it. But thank you for taking time to try help me out. I really believe there are people who cannot be fixed and I am one of them and that's ok, Im just damaged beyond repair.

 

[pax420]

@pax420
ASPD is Antisocial Personality Disorder, often called sociopathy (even if the term isn't the best). The person who began this thread has ASPD and has some very good posts talking about the complexities of how it feels to live with it from their perspective!

I'll also list the criteria for ASPD (and its pre-adulthood signs, Conduct Disorder) from the DSM-5-TR, but keep in mind that the DSM doesn't tend to give the most sympathetic wording regarding symptoms of "taboo disorders."
I have NPD (a disorder in the same cluster/group as ASPD) and can tell you that the NPD criteria is worded horribly, so the ASPD criteria may be similar. Take it with a grain of salt and a healthy dose of nuance.

Spoiler: ASPD Criteria

View attachment 196611

Included the two screenshots below to:
1. Give a better perspective on where it comes from—though I've heard of tentative evidence that similar symptoms can be caused by TBI/traumatic brain injury, and that could apply to you because you clearly got some form of TBI as an adolescent.
View attachment 196612

2. And to show symptoms that are important, but not included in the criteria, like chronic boredom.
View attachment 196613

Spoiler: Conduct Disorder

View attachment 196616
View attachment 196617

Thank you once again for answering and for this information! It still leaves me very confused bc I fit every one of the criteria for ASPD and most of the criteria for conduct disorder. Except for the cruelty to animals(animals are one of the things I do care about) and the forced sex(I do not believe in rape or torture). Both of those cover more than half of me but there is another part of me that is the exact opposite. I guess you could say I have a good side and a bad side of me. Mainly I just don't feel most emotions. I have learned to mimic them in order to survive and fit in. But I have always cared about animals and have always kind of looked out for or protected or stood up for the weaker and picked on or made fun of people. Like I said there is something seriously wrong with me. I've spent me whole life trying to figure it out with no luck. Lately it's just been more about curiosity than trying to fix it and be 'normal'. I don't guess it really matters anymore bc I don't plan on living past May 30th. Once again thanks for helping.