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I actually can’t with pop psychology and the demedicalization of disabilities and conditions.
No, your ex is not a narcissist.
You are not “so OCD”
The weather isn’t bipolar.
Loving your boyfriend isn’t “BPD coded”
Small inconveniences aren’t trauma.
You aren’t “delusional” for having a crush.
Stop using medical language to describe everyday, non clinical experiences.
REGRET, REMORSE, GUILT, ACCOUNTABILITY
Regret - What it is: Wishing the outcome had been different. - Focus: The consequences of the action - especially for yourself. - Key traits: Self-focused, reflective, sometimes selfish.
Remorse - What it is: Emotional sorrow for causing harm to another. - Focus: Empathy and moral awareness. - Key traits: Other-focused, internal suffering, emotional heaviness.
Guilt - What it is: A moral or emotional weight for breaking a personal or societal rule. - Focus: Internal shame or conflict. - Key traits: Internally driven, can be irrational, often causes rumination.
Accountability - What it is: Acknowledging and taking responsibility for your actions. - Focus: Behavior, consequences, repair. - Key traits: Can be rational, does not require emotion.
HOW THEY OVERLAP
All Four Present ✅ Regret | ✅ Remorse | ✅ Guilt | ✅ Accountability Example: “I lashed out and hurt someone I care about. I hate that I did it (regret), I feel awful about the pain I caused (remorse), I can’t stop thinking about how wrong I was (guilt), and I’ve already apologized and made amends (accountability).” → Classic “I messed up and I know it” moment.
Regret + Remorse ✅ Regret | ✅ Remorse | ❌ Guilt | ❌ Accountability Example: “I wish I hadn’t said that. It clearly hurt them and I feel bad. . . but I don’t think I was actually wrong, and I’m not going to apologize.” → Feels sorrowful and wishes things went differently, but doesn’t believe they’re morally at fault.
Regret + Guilt ✅ Regret | ❌ Remorse | ✅ Guilt | ❌ Accountability Example: “I broke the rule, and I feel ashamed. I just wish I hadn’t gotten caught.” → More focused on personal consequence and inner shame than on the harm done to others. Self-loathing can show up here.
Regret + Accountability ✅ Regret | ❌ Remorse | ❌ Guilt | ✅ Accountability Example: “This deal went badly. I’ll own it and fix the damage, even if I don’t feel bad about it.” → Professionalism. Do what must be done but don’t get emotionally involved.
Remorse + Guilt ❌ Regret | ✅ Remorse | ✅ Guilt | ❌ Accountability Example: “I had to make the choice. . . I know it was right. But I still feel awful for what it did to them, and I can’t stop thinking about it.” → A moral dilemma. They wouldn’t take it back, but they still hurt.
Remorse + Accountability ❌ Regret | ✅ Remorse | ❌ Guilt | ✅ Accountability Example: “I don’t think I was wrong, but I hurt you. I want to make that right.” → The person doesn’t think they acted immorally, but still feels emotional pain for causing harm, and they try to fix it. A very mature emotional space.
Guilt + Accountability ❌ Regret | ❌ Remorse | ✅ Guilt | ✅ Accountability Example: “I broke the rule and I’ll face the punishment, even if I don’t feel bad about it or think it hurt anyone.” → Rule-follower or someone trying to prove their morality. They take responsibility purely from principle.
Regret Only ✅ Regret | ❌ Remorse | ❌ Guilt | ❌ Accountability Example: “I wish I hadn’t done that. It didn’t work out.” → Often selfish or neutral. There’s no emotional weight, just a reaction to negative consequences. A wish that the situation ended differently.
Remorse Only ❌ Regret | ✅ Remorse | ❌ Guilt | ❌ Accountability Example: “It had to be done. . . but I hate that I hurt you.” → Sadness or empathy without shame or moral conflict. A great example of emotional depth without self-blame. You just hurt for them.
Guilt Only ❌ Regret | ❌ Remorse | ✅ Guilt | ❌ Accountability Example: “I feel guilty for surviving when they didn’t.” → Internalized shame without external harm or desire to fix it. Often irrational guilt.
Accountability Only ❌ Regret | ❌ Remorse | ❌ Guilt | ✅ Accountability Example: “I did the thing. I’m responsible. That’s all.” → No emotion, just ownership.
None ❌ Regret | ❌ Remorse | ❌ Guilt | ❌ Accountability Example: “Yeah, I did it. So?” → No emotional or moral engagement, no ownership, no care. Just indifference.
Why It Matters
When people use them interchangeably, it erases nuance.
You can:
Regret something but feel no remorse
Feel guilty but not be accountable
Take accountability without feeling bad
Feel remorse without wishing you’d chosen differently
And that distinction is super important when you're figuring out:
Who’s genuinely sorry?
Who’s trying to do better?
Who’s just upset the consequences suck?
The parallels between the way society treats people with low/no empathy and people on the aro/ace spectrums. Am I onto something here
Empathy and attraction are both treated like inherent and essential parts of the human experience, and people who lack them are viewed as unfeeling, inhuman, or defective in some way.
Empathy and attraction are seen as the literal sole reason someone would engage in certain acts (helping others, dating, having sex). Allos and persotypicals often act like because THEIR motivation to do those things comes from their experiences of empathy/attraction, those are the ONLY POSSIBLE motivations, and thus anyone who lacks those feelings should not only be incapable of but entirely disinterested in those actions.
Which is frustrating because there are plenty of reasons why someone with no empathy might choose kind and helpful behaviours, or why an aroace person might choose to date or have sex. Other people just don't realise it because their motivation is the typical one, so they never have to look any deeper into it.
And of course, it's fine if someone with low empathy doesn't want to help another or someone without romantic/sexual attraction doesn't want to engage in those relationships; those choices shouldn't be forced on anyone and it doesn't make anyone less human or less deserving of basic respect. But I also think we shouldn't make assumptions about a person's choices based on the feelings they do or don't experience (and vice versa).
Anyway, this post is brought to you by aspec-persodivergent solidarity 🖤
Just a little reminder that p-shifters, endos, tulpas, holotheres/kins, clinical zoan/lycanthropes, medians, endels, those with personality disorders, and those who are schizopsec, are all welcome on this blog, my side blogs, and any communities I run.
you are a hypocrite if you support people with bpd’s need for approval if you:
shame npds for needing supply
shame hpds for needing supply
shame aspds for needing space
shame szpds for needing space
shame dpds for needing reassurance
shame avpds for needing reassurance
etc. this goes for any pd. you cannot be in support of one but be judgmental and hateful towards the others. all of them are primarily caused by trauma. there is no “morally correct or incorrect” personality disorder to have.
narc abuse this narc abuse that
every therapist I've been to has said that my parents were either narcissists or showed signs of narcissistic tendencies. and you know what?
i still don't go around calling people I don't like or that are being rude/mean/cruel narcissists/psychopaths/sociopaths etc because I understand some of the horrors folks with personality disorders face in the psychiatric system, that a mental health condition does not turn anyone with it into Big Bad Scary Abuser™.
I understand that these conditions are literally caused by trauma, often by the person being a victim of abuse themselves, that people with these conditions are also more likely to be future victims of abuse, including at the hands of the very system that says it is meant to help them, and I also understand that no amount of being traumatized or unempathetic makes someone automatically a bad person.
I used to have hyperempathy, to a degree that one of my therapists called me an empath with such certainty that I thought it was a diagnosis. It didn't make me a better person. It just made me scared and in pain and stressed, all of the time. It was a trauma response, just like low/no empathy so often is. And even if it wasn't, even if we were just born like this or if it just happened one day, it isn't what makes us good or bad people.
Empathy is a tool. It's a very helpful tool, but it's by no means necessary. I navigate the world with my tool of balance heavily impeded by using other tools, like crutches and caution. Without empathy, you can still navigate the world and choose kindness, even if sometimes it's a bit awkward or clumsy.
And both of us would have a much easier time if people would accept our differences and accommodate for them instead of treating us like an Other, like some kind of spectacle, like a monster or an animal or something beneath humanity/personhood.
You can't get on a high horse about being soooo much more empathetic than those nasty psychos when you are treating your fellow people like they're not even people just because you've been convinced that Bad Person Disorder is a real and true thing and should be eradicated at all costs.
my parents treated me horrifically. many other abusers do the same. i don't know how many of them have this or that condition, and frankly, i do not care. if they don't, I'm only harming folks that do by armchair diagnosing them. if they do, it's not an excuse for the behavior and focusing on it is again harming others with the condition(s) that have to fight their own brains and the whole damn world just to live; not to mention, it's not my job to diagnose or treat/fix the people that hurt me.
stop calling people psychos, psychopaths, sociopaths, narcissists, etc. I'm fucking tired of it. you are not protecting anyone by doing this. you are doing harm. knock it the fuck off.
Helpful Blogs
Please let me know if you do not wish to be tagged, and I will remove your tag!
Tumblr doesn't allow more than 50 mentions in one post, which is why some accounts aren't clickable!
Cluster A
Paranoid Personality Disorder (PPD) @ppd-culture-is - a blog for submitting PPD experiences in the form of "culture is" asks @paranoia-culture-is - a "culture is" blog for those who experience paranoia in general (not exclusively PPD)
Schizoid Personality Disorder (SzPD) and Schizotypal Personality Disorder (STPD) @schizospec-culture-is - a blog for "culture is" asks from folks on the schizo spectrum (schizophrenia, SzPD, schizoaffective disorder, StPD, etc.) @schizopositivity - a positivity blog for those on the schizo-spectrum @auschizm - a blog exploring the overlap between being on the autism spectrum and being on the schizo spectrum @schizosupport - a support blog for those on the schizo spectrum @funnier-with-stpd - a blog that collects posts that are funnier to read through the StPD lens @szpd-confessions - a "confession" blog for those with SzPD @szpdadvice - an advice blog for those with SzPD @schizoidpolls - a poll blog for those with SzPD
Other blog(s): @cluster-a-culture
Cluster B
Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) @borderline-culture-is - a blog for submitting BPD experiences in the form of "culture is" asks @intersex-bpd-culture-is - a blog for intersex pwBPD to submit their experiences in the form of "culture is" asks
Histrionic Personality Disorder (HPD) @hpdcultureis - a "culture is" blog for those who have HPD, to which you can submit your HPD experiences @funnier-with-hpd - a blog that collects posts that are funnier when looked at through the HPD lens @hpd-polls - a blog with polls for pwHPD @honestlyhistrionic - a blog run by a pwHPD that collects resources and information about HPD [has not posted since July 13th, 2025; may or may not be inactive] @your-fav-has-hpd - a blog to which you can submit fictional characters that you think fit the HPD criteria @histrionic-culture-is - another "culture is" blog for those with HPD
Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) @narcissisticpdcultureis - a "culture is" blog for pwNPD to which you can submit your NPD experiences @narc-rants - a blog for pwNPD to rant and talk about their NPD experiences @npd-confessions - a "confessions" blog for pwNPD to talk about the NPD experience @npd-culture-is-blog - another "culture is" blog for pwNPD @npd-avpd-culture-is - a "culture is" blog for those with NPD and AvPD @narcissism-positivity - a positivity blog for those with NPD @funnier-with-narcpd - a blog that collects posts that are funnier through the NPD lens @npd-advice - an advice blog for those with NPD @this-is-narc-joy - a blog for NPD folks to share positive experiences on
Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD) @antisocial-pd-culture-is - a "culture is" blog for those with ASPD to submit ASPD experiences to @aspd-culture - another "culture is" blog for pwASPD [currently inactive; has not posted since August 16th, 2025] @aspdculture-is - a third "culture is" blog for pwASPD @actually-aspd-culture - a fourth ASPD "culture is" blog
Other blog(s) @this-is-cluster-b-saneism - a blog to which you can submit instances of saneism against cluster B folks @epick-cluster-b-blog - a positivity blog for those with cluster B PDs @pollsforattentionlovers - polls for those with NPD and/or HPD
Cluster C
Avoidant (sometimes called Anxious-Avoidant) Personality Disorder (AvPD) @avpdculture - a "culture is" blog for pwAvPD to submit their AvPD experiences to @avpd-polls - a blog that makes polls for pwAvPD [currently inactive as far as I can tell] @avpd--culture-is - another "culture is" blog for pwAvPD [currently inactive; has not posted since November 21st, 2024] @your-fav-has-avpd - a blog to which you can submit fictional characters that you think fit the AvPD [inactive as far as I can tell; hasn't posted since September 30th, 2023] @funnier-with-avoidantpd - a "funnier with" blog that collects posts that are funnier when viewed through the AvPD lens!
Dependent Personality Disorder (DPD) @dpdculture - a "culture is" blog to which you can submit experiences with DPD in the form of "culture" asks [currently inactive, has not posted since January 15th, 2025] @culturedpd - another DPD "culture is" blog [may or may not be currently inactive, I am not sure] @dpd-culture-is-blog - a third DPD "culture is" blog [non-frequent submissions, but it is not inactive! :)] @dpd-confessions - a "confessions" blog for pwDPD to submit their DPD experiences to @yourfavhasdpd - a blog to which you can submit fictional characters that you think fit the DPD criteria
Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder (OCPD) @obsessive-compulsive-culture-is - a "culture is" blog for those with obsessive-compulsive tendencies. It is not OCPD-specific but is welcome to OCPD submissions [has not posted since May 17th, 2025] @ocpd-culture-is-blog - a "culture is" blog for you to submit your OCPD experiences to [has not posted since December 16th, 2024, so it is most likely inactive] @ocpdvents - a vent blog for those with OCPD
Other blog(s) @this-is-cluster-c-saneism - a blog to which you can submit your cluster C saneism experiences
Other PD blog(s)
@pd-systems-culture-is - a "culture is" blog for plurals with PDs @pdcultureis - a "culture is" blog for pwPDs to submit experiences with PDs to @psychotic-culture-is - a "culture is" blog to submit your psychosis experiences to (as quite a few pwPDs sometimes also experience psychosis!) @psychresources - a blog gathering resources for neurodivergent people about neurodiversities! I may reblog many things from this blog, as they post very helpful and informative things :)
This post will be edited as I find more blogs. And again, please tell me if you do not wish to be tagged, and I will remove your tag!
something so embarrassing about avpd is getting little 'friendship crushes' on people. why is my heart clenching because someone liked my post? why am i so nervous to interact with you? why am i so eager to see what you post online despite talking once or twice? why can i not respond to anything you say to me out of panic? it is so embarrassing, i feel like a middle-schooler having a playground crush and scribbling messy valentines that will never be delivered.
