The Betrayal of the Body. Dr. Alexander Lowen M.D.

describing such a personality as schizoid.

      In terms of symptoms each of the four cases—Jack, Peter, Jane, and Sarah—was different. In terms of the two variables which determine this illness they were alike. Each one suffered from conflicts that split the unity of his personality, and in each there was some loss of contact with reality. The most important aspect of these cases, however, was that the conflict and the withdrawal were manifested physically. Jack could describe his problems with a verbal fluency that contrasted sharply with the rigidity and immobility of his body. In Peter the conflict was expressed in the contrast between the athletic appearance of his body and its marked incoordination. Jane showed the conflict in the contrast between the two halves of her body while Sarah's sophisticated attitude contrasted sharply with the immaturity of her body.

      Withdrawal from reality was manifested in each of the four patients by the lack of aliveness and the emotional unresponsiveness of the body. An observer of the schizoid individual gets the impression that he is not fully “with it.” Phrases such as “not with it” or “not all there” are commonly used to describe a schizzy quality in a person. We sense his detachment or removal. This impression stems from his vacant eyes, his masklike face, his rigid body, and his lack of spontaneity. He is not absent-minded like the proverbial professor who is absorbed in some mental preoccupation. The schizoid individual is consciously aware of his surroundings, but on the emotional or body level he is out of touch with the situation. Unfortunately, we lack an expression to denote the complement of absentmindedness. Schizzy is the only word that describes a person who is mentally present, but absent on an emotional level.

      An air of unreality is the hallmark of the schizoid personality. It accounts for his “strangeness” both to us and to himself. It is also expressed in his movements. He walks mechanically, like a wooden soldier, or he floats zombie-like through life. Ernst Kretschmer's description of the physical appearance of the schizoid individual emphasizes this point.

      This lack of liveliness, of immediately reacting vivacity, of psychomotor expression, is found also in the most gifted members of the group with their hypersensitive inner capacities for reaction.⁵

      When an individual's appearance is so bizarre that his unreality is clearly evident, he is called psychotic, schizophrenic, or insane. The schizoid person feels his unreality as an inner emptiness and as a sensation of being removed or detached from his environment. His body may feel alien to him or almost nonexistent, as the following observation indicates.

      Going to work yesterday I didn't feel my body. I felt skinny, like a bag of bones. I never felt so bodiless. I just floated in. It was terrible. I felt strange in the office. Everything felt different, unreal. I had to pull myself together to be able to work.

      This graphic description of depersonalization shows both the loss of feeling of the body and the concomitant loss of contact with the environment. In other cases the tenuous contact with reality is threatened when the schizoid individual uses drugs which further dissociate his mind from his body. For example, Virginia took “pot” (marijuana) one night. This is what happened:

      I had the feeling I was watching myself. I felt my body was doing things which were not connected with me. It was very frightening, so I got into bed. I became paranoid. I was afraid I might jump out of the window.

      The schizoid may be said to live in limbo, that is, he is not “gone,” as is the schizophrenic, nor is he fully “with it.” He is often found on the fringes of society, where, with like kind, he feels somewhat at home. Many schizoids are the sensitive persons who become the poets, the painters, and the musicians. Others exploit the various esoteric cults which flourish in the borderlands of our society. These cults are of several kinds—those that use drugs to achieve higher states of consciousness, those in which Oriental philosophies are exploited to find a meaning in life, and those in which various body exercises offer the promise of a fuller self. But it would be a serious error to assume that the schizoid personality is found only in this milieu. He may also be the engineer who runs his life like a machine or the schoolteacher who is quiet, withdrawn, shy, and homosexual. She is the ambitious mother who tries to be very enlightened and do the right thing for her children. She is also the little girl who is bright, eager, excitable, and compulsive. As children, these people are characterized by insecurity; as adolescents by anxiety; and as adults by an inner feeling of frustration and failure. These reactions are more severe than the words imply. Their childhood insecurity is related to a feeling of being different and of not belonging. Their adolescent anxiety verges on panic and may end in terror. Their adult feeling of frustration and failure has an underlying core of despair.

APPROACHES TO THE SCHIZOID PROBLEM

      The schizoid disturbance has been investigated along a number of lines, three of which are important to this study. These are the psychological, the physiological, and the constitutional. Psychology attempts to explain behavior in terms of conscious or unconscious mental attitudes. Physiology seeks the answers to disturbed attitudes in derangements of bodily functions. The constitutional approach relates personality to body structure.

      Psychologically, the term “schizoid” is used to describe behavior which qualitatively resembles schizophrenia but is more or less within normal limits.⁶ The specific behavior patterns which suggest this diagnosis are summarized as follows:

      1. The avoidance of any close relations with people; shyness, seclusiveness, timidity, feelings of inferiority.

      2. Inability to express hostility and aggressive feelings directly— sensitivity to criticism, suspiciousness, the need for approval, tendencies to deny or distort.

      3. Autistic attitudes—introversion, excessive daydreaming.

      4. Inability to concentrate, feelings of being dazed or doped, sensations of unreality.

      5. Hysterical outbreaks with or without apparent provocation, such as screaming, yelling, temper tantrums.

      6. The inability to feel emotions, especially pleasure, and the lack of emotional responsiveness to other people, or exaggerated reactions of hyperexcitement and mania.⁷, ⁸, ⁹

      Schizoid behavior, however, often appears to be normal. As Otto Fenichel points out, the schizoid individual has succeeded in “substituting pseudo-contacts of manifold kinds for a real feeling contact with other people.”¹⁰ Pseudo-contacts take the form of words which are substituted for touch. Another form of pseudo-contact is role playing, which is a substitute for an emotional commitment to a situation. The main complaints of schizoid individuals, as Herbert Weiner states, “revolve about their not being able to feel any emotions: they are estranged from others, withdrawn and detached.”¹¹

      It can be shown that the psychology which characterizes the schizoid individual is related to his lack of identity. Confused as to who he is, and not knowing what he wants, the schizoid individual either detaches himself from people and withdraws into an inner world of fantasy or he adopts a pose and plays a role that seemingly will fit him into normal life. If he withdraws, symptoms of shyness, seclusiveness, suspiciousness, and unreality will predominate. If he plays a role, the outstanding symptoms will be tendencies to deny or distort, sensitivity to criticism, feelings of inferiority, and complaints of emptiness or lack of satisfaction. There may be alternations between withdrawal and activity, depression and excitement, with rapid or exaggerated mood changes. The schizoid picture presents many contrasts. Some schizoids are highly intelligent and creative, although their pursuits may be limited and unusual, while others appear dull and lead empty, docile, and inconspicuous lives.

      Another view of the schizoid personality, a physiological one, is offered by Sandor Rado.¹² According to Rado the schizoid personality is characterized by two physiological defects. The first, an “integrative pleasure deficiency,” denotes an inability to experience pleasure. The second, “a sort of proprioceptive diathesis,” refers to a distorted awareness of the bodily self. The pleasure deficiency handicaps the individual in his attempt to develop an effective “action self,” or identity. Since pleasure is “the tie that really binds” (Rado), the action self that emerges in the absence of this binding power of pleasure is brittle, weak, prone to break under stress, hypersensitive.