I feel like one of the most useful things I ever heard was in the first class of Introduction to Abnormal Psychology which I took waaaayyyy back in college. The professor warned us NOT to self diagnose because we would end up diagnosing ourselves with everything.
Because the "abnormal" in abnormal psychology wasn't the psychological processes we were reading about. The abnormal was the degree to which the functioning of that process in a way that negatively affected someone within the context of leading the life required of them by their culture.
His first example was Schizophrenia. Saying that most of us probably had a very minor Schizophrenic episode with uncomfortably regular frequency. Every time you are terribly tired at night and think you hear or see something odd that isn't there, that's the same psychological process as Schizophrenia. The difference was that all of us shrug it off and just go to sleep. At most we walk around where we live to check on things. Then it's over with. We don't think about it anymore.
Whereas, with an actual Schizophrenic, the same brain function will activate much more frequently and they will experience much greater effects from it. Same normal thing to an abnormal degree.
For instance the one Schizophrenic I vaguely knew at the time, if his meds weren't spot on, would hear the devil and demons talking to him on the regular. Even just during regular conversations. But he knew he was Schizophrenic and had learned skills to manage it, so he had developed this habit of asking people if they heard what he heard, too. Like, did you just hear someone saying, "Kill everyone?" And you'd say no and he'd say that's good and then go call his doctor. But it could also absolutely be a real thing: did you hear the song say something terrible. Yeah, it had a kind of messed up lyric. And he'd say, oh, good, that IS messed up and let it go. And, not only was it somewhat frequent if his meds were off, it would bother him more as well. He'd get significantly more anxious about everything he was perceiving because he didn't entirely trust his senses and the false information about the world registered just as real to him as the true information. So it deeply impacted the quality of his life. It was hard for him to do everyday things that were required of him to get through his life.
But then there was the second example, given to beware extrapolating one experience as all experience.
The professor talked about having a patient that had been court ordered to come see him for therapy for anger management issues. He explained the story as a freshman from a pretty not nice neighborhood in Los Angeles.
On his first day of classes, he rode his bike onto campus, very normal behavior, and since it was his first day, he didn't know all the rules. So he parked against campus regulations. So he's sitting in class and sees some random guy dressed like a prissy jock (Campus Security and Enforcement but he doesn't know that) who is just unlocking his bike and walking it away.
So he jumps out of his seat runs out the door and confronts the Campus Security guy. And the Security guy is a volunteer student as a majority of them were, so he's not exuding authority, it's just some asshole taking his bike without even being ashamed about it when he's caught. So they have a short argument. Finally, the Security guy says the student parked illegally so he's impounding the bike and the student has to go to office X in building y and pay the fine to get his bike back and then just starts to walk on.
So the student, who doesn't know any of this from the stuff on the final exam that he hasn't even finished the first class for, decks the security guy. Knocks him flat on the cement. Then gets on his bike, curses the security guy out, gives him the finger, and rides home so his stuff can't get stolen for another shakedown.
Administration steps in. Says the student has anger issues and has to go to therapy and do community service and have a note on his record - the whole shebang because he clearly has some ISSUES!
Now he's in the professor's office telling this story of getting robbed and it sounding like a grift.
And then the professor asks us if that's actually a psychological issue or is it someone responding perfectly appropriately to his previously normal environment, just in an environment where the social interaction rules - which, again, he hasn't learned yet - are sufficiently different that following the rule set that was completely appropriate only a few days or weeks ago, are now severe violations of social etiquette.
He gave us a moment to ponder before saying, I'll never know for sure but I know that if I grew up where someone might steal my bike for any reason they felt like and no one but me and a careful demonstration not to mess with me via an application of due force was going to keep me and my stuff safe, I'd probably punch some guy I didn't know, too. The problem isn't that he's abnormal or has anger issues. The problem is that the contexts have changed and he hasn't had enough time to adapt yet. Which is the other question you'll have to wrestle with in this class: should he have to? Is our context actually better, is it even just better FOR HIM, or are his actions actually demonstrating something that is merely not how we want him to behave and isn't actually a problem at all?
Normal is contextual. What's normal for someone on a college campus where most students are fairly wealthy isn't going to be what's normal for someone in inner-city LA. They can't be. So is forcing him to adjust and comply to this context, here, helping or hurting him in the long run. It certainly is going to cause him problems when grad schools are looking at his college records. Is that fair? Is it right? Are we entitled to make that judgement? What happens to those we think we're trying to help when we ARE eventually proven wrong?
These days, I know I am quite literally abnormal, as in my brain functions in a way that is statistically quite rare. I've only met one therapist (and I have interacted with a LOT!) who had some specialty in the field of what I have. I'm prompting the creation of a second in my own therapist as they get to know what works and what doesn't for me. My therapist is, thankfully, extremely good and very adept at managing and learning strange and unfamiliar waters.
But I'm lucky in other ways as well. As disturbing and constant as my issues are, they're not particularly bad in context. I mask well enough - even from myself a lot of the time - that we can afford to experiment, give things room to let things play out, and even contradict the accepted wisdom around my issues. Most people with even a hint of my issue are working to "remove" it. I'm working on realigning it, and I can see a LOT of positive benefits from our tactic that I have no idea if I would get from the standard procedure.
Abnormal doesn't necessarily mean bad. It also doesn't necessarily mean anything else except what is on the tin: it is a statistically unlikely occurrence to have a degree of effect that is so different from the majority of people's experience within the context of my inhabited environment. Maybe if I lived somewhere / somewhen / someway else it would be different. Maybe my issues would be the normal statistical likelihood. Maybe not. But I don't have to deal with that. I only have to deal with here and now.
I only have to live with my variance from local demands and expectations by the judgement of how difficult does it make my life.
I'm now on both an on and off label use for dexmethylphenidate. It is the single most effective drug in my arsenal. A day without my proper dosage of speed is a miserable day. I find it extremely hard to function. It helps me wake up. It helps me sleep. It helps me self regulate. It helps me feel immensely less existential depression. It helps me feel calm and centered in comparison to my normal without it. And, yeah, it helps me fiddle with my weirdo dissociation thing in a way that makes my life better. For me, it's as close to a miracle drug as I can get. I may not be instantaneously healthy and normal on it, but it makes working toward healthy possible.
And healthy is absolutely contextually defined. Everybody just loses track of the here and tunes out every now now and then. I just do it more often. Everybody has to stop occasionally to readjust and catch up with their thoughts. I just do it mid-sentence for longer than it takes to say a paragraph. Everybody has different aspects of their personality move in and out of charge of them according to their feelings and current environs. Mine just regularly struggle with each other over who gets to drive the bus and play host. Most people will be slightly different depending on which personality part is seizing control of their reactions. I just have different mannerisms, perceptions, default thought patterns, and attitudes depending on who is driving.
Most people I interact with don't even consider that I might be nutters until I mention having been in the mental hospital. I'm what's called "high functioning" meaning my behaviors aren't too much out of line with societal expectations. I'm abnormal but, thankfully, not terribly so. And I can function better by leaning in. I've watched people just calm down and have the total opposite of an anxiety attack when the right personality is driving. Last thing I would want to do is "cure" her from hosting. Most of us are actively working toward her being the default driver. I have a reminder on my phone that goes off every two hours to remind us to work on having her host. That's not me wanting to be sick, that's me wanting myself to function in the way that I like best, whatever my context expects. I'm a 48 year old man, having a feminine personality running my system is not going to be everyone in my context's preference.
Which is all a hugely long, over-wordy (a reliable indication that the previous default host is running the show XD) agreement with the OP above.
So I will cut the final quarter of this and shut up now instead of saying, 'yeah,' more.
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