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Enneagram Type 5 Board Archive Re: You're so much like mePosted by Heidi on August 13, 2000 at 12:49:50: In Reply to: Re: You're so much like me posted by synewton on August 13, 2000 at 11:16:41: I don't remember being an emotional child. Like Zen Cowgirl, I studied the wildlife around my house. My mother tells me that I kept very much to myself--she says I could always entertain myself in quiet way. I learned to read at age 3 (although my parents didn't know about it until I got to kindergarten, when they were very surprised to learn that was the case). I've always been very secretive about my activities, for reasons that make sense to me, but generally not anyone else. When I was 13, my parents sent me to a shrink. They thought I was a little too depressed and eccentric for someone my age. They may have thought I was depressed, but looking back I think it was at a crucial time in one's development. I wasn't ashamed about being different from most people, I was more afraid that people wouldn't even try to understand me. I was on "mental health" drugs for about ten years. I've taken so many and had so many diagnoses that my head spins trying to remember it all-- At the worst point, I was considered paranoid schizophrenic. I took so many antipsychotic drugs that I no longer wonder what catatonics think about-- I'll tell you...nothing. It's hard for me to explain this all in a coherent way because it is all so foggy in my head. Ten years of my 24-year life span have a dreamlike quality to them. I went to Cornell University after high school...they asked me to leave and get myself together because I had a "psychotic break." Nonsense! I was taking a handful (24 pills) of prescribed medication every day. They never even considered that the drugs caused instability. I'm still pissed about their incompetence. It seems like they should have considered that I was sane enough to have a 4.0... I'm getting to the point, though.. One day, I decided to stop taking the drugs. It's hard to say precisely, but I think I've always known that there is nothing wrong with me mentally or emotionally. That day I just stopped cold turkey. I remember saying to myself, "There's nothing wrong with you. Stop this before you suffer permanent damage." So I stopped...but I'm still an insomniac two years later and my memory isn't what it should be. Other than that, there really ISN'T anything wrong with me. The reason I tell you all this is because it is the very reason I've been so unsure about my type. For doctors to think there was something wrong enough with me to dope me up for ten years, made me consider my own emotionality. I've never felt overly emotional, but the doctors said it was so, so for a lot of years I believed it. I've since come to work it out in my head, to rationalize it all. I believe that if I could make sense of any of those ten years, I must be a 5. I lived a four life during that time, but not by choice. Needless to say, I don't believe in psychiatry anymore. I can't believe I'm actually writing this. I don't even know you people. I hope you can understand how this relates to the 4w5 vs. 5w4 conversation. I think I may have digressed a bit. It's all related in my head, and I hope I've conveyed it somehow.
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