I actually didn't find out about my addictive personality disorder in any of the normal ways. A lot of the time, people with addictive personalities are very good at self deception, and I was certainly no exception to this rule. Every time I would come down with another addiction or relapse into an old habit, I would have some excuse for myself. I would tell myself it was no big deal or that I was only using it this once, knowing all along that in fact my addictive behavior would continue. A lot of my friends wanted me to go in for addiction treatment and counseling, but I was having none of it. I went back to my old ways, forcing myself to believe That there was nothing wrong.

It was actually a free personality test that cued me into the problems. It was meant as a psychological self-evaluation. I found it accidentally when I was wasting time by taking Internet personality tests. At first, I took it as a joke, but with every question I answered I realized that there was something wrong. It was one thing when my friends told me that I have an addictive personality disorder. People close to you care about about you, they worry about you, and sometimes they go a little bit too far in their concern. I could easily convince myself that they were overstating the problem. When an online personality test told me that I had an addictive personality disorder, however, that gave me cause to think. I knew that the test was objective and it wasn't being swayed by concern for me. After all, it was just an automated quiz! I figured that maybe it was time to go in and see what a psychiatrist had to say about things.

When the psychiatrist told me that I had an addictive personality disorder, I can't say I was surprised. It was weird, but I had spent so much time denying things that, once I started to admit that I had a problem, my resolve cracked. I was ready to commit to treatments without a moment's delay, and the shrink was all too happy to recommend a good treatment facility. Apparently, with severe addictive personality disorders, sometimes the best course of action is to isolate yourself from general society for a few weeks. They give you time to recuperate and reflect on the problems you have been facing. After that, you can gradually re-immerse yourself back into the normal wider community. An addictive personality disorder never goes away, but with counseling you can learn to control it. Nowadays, I know when I am about to do something stupid and succumb to my addictive personality. I've learned self-control, and that is worth a lot.