Avoidant, Histrionic, Obsessive-Compulsive, and Dependent (narcissist, paranoid, personality disorders, sociopaths)

[Davros]

How common is this combination of personality disorder traits ?

[Tracysherm]

Well, "officially" there are three clusters of personality disorders, and presumably those in the same cluster have more in common and are more likely to share symptoms or features.

Cluster A includes Paranoid, Schizoid, and Schizotypal personality disorders. These folks have different traits, but tend to not get involved with other people very much, and they often seem strange to others.

Cluster B includes Antisocial, Borderline, Histrionic, and Narcissistic personality disorders. These folks often present very differently from each other, but they all have a tendency to focus on self over others, and have difficulty seeing others as whole people, but as objects who meet their needs or disappoint them. There has been some very interesting work that puts out the idea that Antisocial personalities (what you might also call sociopaths) are actually very heavily defended Borderline presonalities. People with Borderline PD tend to live with constant drama and pain. Their relationship with everything and everyone, even themselves can be described as a love/hate relationship. Narcissists tend to be identifiable because everything is about them, and even if someone else is going through something big, the narcissist will always find a way to make it about themselves. A lot of times, narcissistic personalities and borderline personalities get confused for each other, and some people have traits of both.
Histrionic personalities can sometimes "look" like a borderline personality, but their feelings, bad and good, are much more shallow, and they are easily distracted onto something else. They often seem like they are overreacting to things, according to those around them--getting too angry about something small, getting too upset or afraid about a seemingly small worry, getting overly hurt by the smallest slight. They often appear to be "acting" but when you talk to them, they are really feeling what they are expressing, even though it appears to be an act. Sometimes they can be very seductive, and all their relationships, sexual and non-sexual have a "seductive" quality about them. People feel drawn in, drawn in, drawn in, then they suddenly realize something is off and they try to get away, provoking strong feelings of abandonment. What they HATE the most is when people belittle their feelings and tell them they are over-reacting. To them, there is no such thing as over-reacting, and people are just insensitive.

Then Cluster C includes Avoidant, Dependent, and Obsessive-compulsive personality disorders. They are all different, but have as a common thread anxiety and difficulty adjusting to any changes or obstacles. It is pretty commom for a person to have traits of all three of these personalties, or just one or two. Avoidant personalities tend to be extremely shy and have a very low self esteem. Dependent personalities usually can't make a decision about anything without advice from several people; they feel helpless when they are alone and need a lot of support and nurturing. OCPD (different from OCD) is characterized by a lot of rigidity, with rules, plans, order, etc. Everything must be done a certain way, the right way, and a lot of panic and anger can come up if people diverge from the plans, rules, and order. If "sh*t happens" as it does to all of us, the person with OCPD has a LOT more trouble getting past it. They are often workaholics.

So if a person supposedly has traits of Avoidant, Dependent, Obsessive-compulsive, and histrionic personality disorders, there is either a lot going on, or the person may have just "collected" these diagnoses from various professionals over the years, and the professionals were either sloppy with labeling, or only saw a part of the picture at the time.

I would guess the person would be shy and insecure, dependent on others for self-esteem and decision-making, afraid of being alone but also afraid of people, maybe resorts to seductiveness to bring people close, has very rigid rules about how things should be done and may be very hard on him/herself to do things exactly right, and then very emotional when things don't go right.

Impossible combination? No. Likely or common? Probably not.

Also, when you read the above paragraph of my "guess" on how the person might look, it reads a lot like a person with borderline personality. I've often heard other mental health professionals say the Borderline PD can be a combination of all the other PDs. So it's possible that the person actually has Borderline PD, and treatment providers were reluctant to diagnose because there is a bit of a stigma among providers against borderline PD.

[IndigoLight]

As common as people with Borderline Personality Disorder.