How do you treat Dependant personality disorder

[random]

How do you treat it, can you treat it?

I know a guy who has a very severe case of this condition there is alot of info about the condition but very little on actually treating it. Can he be helped to become an individual? He's like a chameleon with personalities it's amazing to watch him adapt himself to any situation. When he gets a girl her likes become his and he does whatever she wants him to he actualy say's he does not have his own personality anymore. He becomes whatever is needed.

[lemur]

How do you treat it, can you treat it?

I know a guy who has a very severe case of this condition there is alot of info about the condition but very little on actually treating it. Can he be helped to become an individual? He's like a chameleon with personalities it's amazing to watch him adapt himself to any situation. When he gets a girl her likes become his and he does whatever she wants him to he actualy say's he does not have his own personality anymore. He becomes whatever is needed.

He sounds like a total social relativist. He needs to develop a personal sense of values and tastes and choose personality traits and culture for himself based on what HE wants and likes instead of on the desire to cater to the person/people he is with.

[Genecks]

Psychologists are suppose to suggest ways to solve problems... The ethics involved suggest that psychologists do not deliberately alter people's lives (not without permission, etc..). If there is no problem, at least he thinks there is no problem, then what is the problem? You're problem? Well, if it's not his problem, then there you're wasting your time by acting as an good and ethical scientist.

Edited October 9, 2010 by Genecks

[ewmon]

You have a kind heart, but I've known three people diagnosed with Dependent Personality Disorder, and they did not act as you described. These three could not function properly without supervision, and all had exceptionally strong relationships with, and dependencies upon, their mothers.

 

Examples. One, a intelligent highly-habitual middle-aged man, could not do his own clothes shopping, and he literally wore out his clothes until a co-worker arranged for someone to take him shopping. Another, an average woman, could not lead a normal married life without daily coaching from her mother. And a third, a very active, highly-moral woman, actually suffered a mental breakdown when her mother died, because she had been her connection with reality, and it resulted in her "going off the deep end" (alcoholism, drugging, violence, criminality, etc).

 

IMO, the person you describe seems to have been raised to believe that he doesn't count for anything, and you mentioned his reaction to girlfriends, so he may be specifically enslaved to always please the woman in his life. Again, a nod toward his mother's involvement in his condition. These things can develop out of a perverted sense of "Don't be selfish", or "Always being nice to women", etc. Everyone needs an ego, and IMO, it's pathological not to have one.

 

The future? Most women reject men who are too subservient, even to them, so he may end up with some weirdo. He seems to know how he is, but also that his sense of subservience is stronger than his sense of self. IMO, considering all, he needs professional help that takes him back to early his childhood. But, as with the joke about how many psychologists it takes to change a bulb, only one ... but the bulb must want to change.

[lemur]

Everyone needs an ego, and IMO, it's pathological not to have one.

Freudianism is popular because people worship the ego and make everything about it. However, there are other approaches that question the ego and emphasize other forms of consciousness over egoism. Marx, for example, wrote about "species being," which is the ability for a worker to become completely immersed in their labor, to the point that they are not really conscious of themselves outside of their labor function. This is an enormously pleasurable state because self-consciousness is utterly transcended and replaced with total engrossment in one's creative labor.

 

Many religions actually pathologize the ego. Buddhism, for example, sees it as a form of attachment. In Judeo-Christian mythology, it is the sin of pride which caused Lucifer to become opposed to God out of become enamored with his own beauty as God's best angel. By that logic, ego is the thing that seduces people out of faith in God to elevate their own selfishness to the primary importance.

 

Why has the ego become so important in modern culture and freudian psychology? Imo, it is because a well-formed, well-defined ego facilitates many forms of social-control. Consider the use of resume's and personal references in business. Basically, this cultural practice encourages people to view everything they do professionally in terms of how it makes them look to potential employers. In other words, it's all about defining themselves as a worker instead of what they actually produced with their labor.

 

While these dependent social disorder people sound like they have problems insofar as they refuse to exercise independent judgment and exercise their own will, I think it is false to claim they don't have an ego or that not elevating their own ego is pathological. For one, they probably have such an excessive ego that they refuse to risk criticism of it by making choices that they aren't sure about. Choosing one's own clothes, for example, carries with it the risk that people will criticize your clothing choices. So someone who refused to take this risk may very well be doing so to protect the sensitivity of their ego. This may be arguably pathological, but it is certainly not a lack of ego.

 

I think it is hard to say what is pathological psychological because varying degrees of pathology are normal and even institutionalized in so many ways. Most people, for example, seem to organize all life decisions around managing their egos - to the point that they are not able to consider interests and needs outside themselves. That is certainly pathological, yet someone who has discovered this power to empathize with others, see things from their pov, and overweigh numerous interests in addition to their own, may be labeled pathological just because such is so uncommon in ego society.

 

 

[random]

You have a kind heart, but I've known three people diagnosed with Dependent Personality Disorder, and they did not act as you described. These three could not function properly without supervision, and all had exceptionally strong relationships with, and dependencies upon, their mothers.

 

Examples. One, a intelligent highly-habitual middle-aged man, could not do his own clothes shopping, and he literally wore out his clothes until a co-worker arranged for someone to take him shopping. Another, an average woman, could not lead a normal married life without daily coaching from her mother. And a third, a very active, highly-moral woman, actually suffered a mental breakdown when her mother died, because she had been her connection with reality, and it resulted in her "going off the deep end" (alcoholism, drugging, violence, criminality, etc).

 

IMO, the person you describe seems to have been raised to believe that he doesn't count for anything, and you mentioned his reaction to girlfriends, so he may be specifically enslaved to always please the woman in his life. Again, a nod toward his mother's involvement in his condition. These things can develop out of a perverted sense of "Don't be selfish", or "Always being nice to women", etc. Everyone needs an ego, and IMO, it's pathological not to have one.

 

The future? Most women reject men who are too subservient, even to them, so he may end up with some weirdo. He seems to know how he is, but also that his sense of subservience is stronger than his sense of self. IMO, considering all, he needs professional help that takes him back to early his childhood. But, as with the joke about how many psychologists it takes to change a bulb, only one ... but the bulb must want to change.

 

 

Well I guess he has nothing to worry about compared to these people. Though he is also diagnosed with DPD. This man prefers to simply have women make all his decisions and he will act accordingly in exchange he will do whatever they ask of him he feels it's in his best interest to allow someone else to control his life This man however can structure his day's with just a bit of direction not eery minor detail needs to be decided for him. like those you described. In short you would never know he has DPD provided he is in a relationship once that guiding person is gone he deteriorates drastically and will find a replacement very quickly. I thought it was a bad case but it is minor compared to what you described.

 

Once "connected" to a female he is or appears to be the same as you or I, how much direction is going on behind the scenes is uncertain short of casting off hobbies, relationships, etc. associated with the previous relationship and developing new ones centered around his new partner as well as the frequent "I have to ask so & so he appears outwardly normal. Without the relationship and guidance he's lpretty much FUBAR til he gets a new one. His life goes on hold until he's directed in where to focus his energy.