What it's like to be a clinically diagnosed perfectionist

What it's like to be a clinically diagnosed perfectionist

It's Mental Health Awareness Week, and we're talking...

This Mental Health Awareness Week, SHS writer Georgie Gilbert reveals what it's like to be a clinically diagnosed perfectionist... 

Ever been 0.5% away from the grade you wanted? Frustrating isn’t it? But maybe not the end of the world. Unless you’re like me, a perfectionist. And by that I mean an actually clinically diagnosed perfectionist, which has a completely different definition to the way we usually use the word. 

In my final year of uni I missed out on a 2:1 by 0.5%. I cried... for a few days. I didn’t bother asking for a remark in case it came back worse. I ditched all plans for a career in my degree field and started to work full time in a job I knew I could do but also knew wouldn’t fulfil me. I even debated leaving my degree off my CV altogether - it seemed better to simply pretend I’d never put in three years of really hard work. 

 

Although categorised simply under personality disorders by the NHS, the world of psychology is accepting of perfectionism as a condition. Experts think that there are two strains of perfectionism - normal and neurotic. Normal perfectionism is perfectionism in the way we know and love - you like to do well but can healthily accept when you haven’t. Whereas a neurotic perfectionist’s happiness depends on their achievements which, due to the unreasonably high standards we set ourselves, are unlikely to ever be achieved. Not only do neurotic perfectionists hold unachievably high standards for ourselves, we also tend to project them on to other people. I (very vocally, unfortunately) cannot deal with other people being late or badly organised, because it is sooooo different to the standards I set myself. I also used to find it difficult to sympathise with people who were having a hard time and wanted to do nothing, because the way I cope with things is by taking on as many tasks as I possibly can. 
 
Perhaps one of the most difficult elements to deal with is the extreme procrastination. I’ve actually been trying to write this article since the beginning of April (it's now mid-May), and gave up several times because I felt it was going nowhere. There was also an incident in my life known by my family as ‘hollandaise'. I was making the sauce and poured one ingredient in too quickly and was told I'd fucked it up. I didn’t attempt to cook again - aside from boiling pasta - for three years. You see, if I’m not good at something on my first go I give up - whether I’m writing an article or playing Mario Kart - and this is classic perfectionist behaviour. A study by  Andrew Hill from York St John University and Thomas Curran from the University of Bath published in Psychological Bulletin found that perfectionists have ‘avoidant coping tendencies when things cant be perfect,’ which makes life pretty tricky when the only way to to improve at something is to practice. 

 

Perfectionism is also linked to a number of other mental health issues and personality disorders, with perfectionists being much more likely to suffer from depression and eating disorders as a result of our perceived failures and need to control. I have certain compulsive behaviours as a result (checking doors are locked and checking my teeth of all things). Black and white thinking is commonly associated with perfectionism - where a less-than-perfect result will be interpreted as the worst thing to ever happen, leading to more depressive episodes. Depending on how you manage your perfectionism (and if you’re like me, its workaholism), perfectionists are likely to always be stressed; even if a situation isn’t particularly stressful, we're able to find a way to make it so. This seems to be linked to how society views the quality of being ‘perfect’  - as it's a quality we value within ourselves, we feel like we need it work harder, which leads to us being stuck in a vicious cycle. 
 
As a society, we like the idea of the perfection. We like the idea of constantly being able to put out our best work, and we are constantly bombarded on social media with the idea of the perfect life. It’s incredibly easy to hear someone say, ‘don’t be too hard on yourself,’ but in reality, what really is the worst that will happen if you’re a mark off a grade, or you lose a game, or you can’t take on another project? The more aware you are of your tendencies, the more likely you are to be able to recognise how unhealthy they are. I, for one, am trying to make a really conscious effort to be less hard on other people, and in doing so, I'm asking why I’m not doing the same for myself? I’m beginning to say no to projects and enjoy time off instead of feeling that I’m not doing enough. I’ve accepted myself as a work in progress, and it feels better than anything I’ve ever achieved before.   

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