Interview with Blair Sorrel, author of “A Schizoid at Smith: How Overparenting Leads to Underachieving“
1. What prompted you to write this memoir? What did you most want people to understand?
I wanted to elevate the profile of this condition and felt it would be the best use of my writing. My hope would be to preclude Schizoid Personality Disorder (SPD) altogether or tweak earlier interventions so that the sufferer’s life is less harsh and less limited. I have a character disorder, not a mental illness or organic brain dysfunction. Dr. Park Dietz made this distinction about Robert Bowers, the schizoid Pittsburgh synagogue shooter. Beyond wanting readers to be able to experience vicariously the challenges of impairment, I hoped they would understand that the afflicted has no control over his/her behavior.
Further, SPD is a double whammy. A personality disorder is a problem and a pain for both generations. Consider the child’s life of rejections, dismissals, and daily harassment (“You don’t listen!” “You don’t think!” “You’re weird!”). Consider, too, that the parent or guardian may become their lifelong benefactor if their son or daughter can’t earn a decent wage or hold a job (unless in isolation). As my clinician, Dr. Selma Landisberg, told me, “They [your employers] saw you couldn’t do the work. They also didn’t understand why you couldn’t — and had very high expectations of you. Absolutely terrible luck!”
Beyond the personal, familial, corporate or community toll, consider the societal one SPD exacts. 65% of a NYC drop-in center for the homeless were schizoid — that’s just those that showed up out of sheer desperation. This condition accounts for high levels of homelessness — it can and should be stopped.
2. How did you approach publishing your story — what steps did you take?
I watched Reedsy videos and contacted author Harry Freedman after seeing his presentation on the art of storytelling in nonfiction. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to do an article or book. But I had so much backstory that he was adamant about the latter. Forty thousand words is the minimum for publication, so I wrote a chapter a month during the pandemic. Since he’s a busy, prolific scribe, that was easier on both of us. I completed the manuscript in a year and started getting nibbles a month or so after it circulated.
3. What do you think people most misunderstand about Schizoid Personality Disorder? What do you wish they could “get”?
I think the prefix, “schizoid,” muddles matters. SPD isn’t actually schizophrenia, although it was once thought to be the precursor (schizotypal is more likely to develop into psychosis). This condition is a maladaptation or defense. What people also don’t get is that it’s unintentional behavior — the person with SPD isn’t trying to ignore you, they just can’t listen, which complicates matters for the schizoid, their parents, teachers, and eventual bosses. Depending upon their level of anxiety about being around people, they may not be able to work. Bosses don’t pay you to daydream, but not every SPD is impaired.
4. Is SPD a condition that’s preventable?
No online critic could argue that any baby is born with a set of attitudes or coping mechanisms. Daydreaming or disassociation becomes a conditioned response. Dr. Landisberg explained “You learned it as a child, as what other defense would a kid have against verbal assault?” So taking a reductionist approach, put a baby in a nurturing, stable household where he or she is made to feel loved, complimented or criticized in a non-castrating fashion, and you have a better adjusted, functional, and potentially self-supporting, individuating sort.
The difference between me and my Belmont High School classmates is simply that they came from more stable households where the outlook was more positive. I have noticed when I was among more caring, mentoring adults that I felt better about myself, had improved focus as my anxiety abated, and seemed at least externally, more “normal.” I was less afraid and better able to concentrate. I appeared more poised. The most blatant symptomology subsided — the fantasies, tardiness, garbled speech. Social skills and fitting in count heavily in the business world. Reading cues can’t be taught while job responsibilities can. Schizoids may overcome this disorder while retaining SPD traits if they develop whole object relations.
5. Is there a traceable cause for SPD, then?
Online I run into clinical speculation about SPD’s mysterious provenance since it seldom presents in their offices. No one has disagreed with me. Dr. Elinor Greenberg’s book, Borderline, Narcissistic, and Schizoid Adaptations: The Pursuit of Love, Admiration and Safety, is the Bible. It’s emphatic that SPD is a set of attitudes and coping mechanisms developed in childhood.
So not inborn, and learned as readily as the ABC’s — yes, it’s fully preventable. Dr. Greenberg also notes that it’s possible for schizoids to overcome their mistrust and intimacy problems if they develop whole object relations. SPD can’t imprint in adulthood, and with good reason.
6. If you could wave a magic wand and let all parents raising young children around the world know one thing, what would it be?
Words can be capable of heartwarming creativity or heinous cruelty. Parents, choose yours more carefully. Harsh rebukes could force your child into withdrawal and have consequences for both of you. Take a more balanced, less regimented approach. Labels can linger all your life — as with my mother’s description of me as “just suited for manual labor.” Setting adult or perfectionistic standards is deleterious. If you go to work on your child, some years later your child may not be able to work. I don’t believe any parent, however negligent, would want his/her child to plummet into homelessness or endure a marginalized existence.
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Blair Sorrel is an author, innovator, and animal lover. She was Free Time’s “Dollarwise Dilettante” columnist, Together Dating Service’s matchmaker, and New York Blood Services’ apheresis recruiter. She founded StreetZaps to protect dogs and people from stray voltage, and was the first community representative invited by Con Edison to their annual Jodie S. Lane Stray Voltage Detection, Mitigation, and Prevention National Conference. Her memoir is A Schizoid at Smith: How Overparenting Leads to Underachieving. Learn more at rockingtributes.com.
