Reply To: Forum Case Study – Avoidant Personality Disorder APD

I do have one question for you. Have you ever felt like a fake, phone, fraud or an “impostor”? That if others knew who you really were they would reject you and even abandon you?

Yes, absolutely, you're describing my whole life. It's crippling.

An example: I've been internationally certified as a personal trainer for nearly a year now. There's a large fitness community here, including international level leaders / world champions in both the training world and the bodybuilding world (former Mr Olympias, current GB Olympic team member) who know / support me and tell me I would be amazing at it. The training institute that I certified with kept telling me they've never seen someone so ready to just ” start now and be super successful” – they even asked me to come back to the course 6 months later as a paid instructor to teach others. I had the opportunity to work for one of the biggest name international gyms in the world, a 5 minute bicycle ride from where I live…

I haven't taken a single client. I'm absolutely terrified I'll be “found out” as a fraud, imposter, etc – despite so much support and opportunity. I avoided it all, and now am stuck in a desk job working for a company who are literally just a bunch of crooks and scammers and I hate it, but I have no other option, and I need the money to support my family and pay off a very large amount of debt… Again (I worked in the oil industry for 3 years and cleared many 10s of 1000s already, only to get myself back to the same level less than 4 years later)

Wow that sucks to summarize in public!