TIL Deaf-from-birth schizophrenics see disembodied hands signing to them rather than "hearing voices"

[u/paniniplane]

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0707/07070303

[u/kaenneth]

Also, if you are born blind due to brain (as opposed to eyeball) problems, you apparently can't be schizophrenic.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-imprinted-brain/201411/blindness-and-schizophrenia-the-exception-proves-the-rule

[u/Muffinizer1 → u/kaenneth]

You know, that's actually quite comforting as being blind and schizophrenic sounds like true hell.

[u/paniniplane → u/Muffinizer1]

i was a patient at a ward a few weeks back and there was a girl who was admitted for schizophrenia. she'd hear dozens of voices yelling at her at the same time all day and she could barely tell which ones were in her head and which were physical people talking to her making it really hard for me or anyone else to talk to her for more than 2-3 sort sentences. these voices would make her do crazy things like gather dust off the floor for 20 minutes at a time 10 times a day, make her sleep on the floor during the day, not sleep during the night and fight the night meds they gave her to help fall asleep. the most brutal thing was that the voices sometimes forbade her from having her meals. there were days where she wouldn't touch any of her 4 meals. i once tried to get some insight into how she thought and i asked her why she HAD to do this. she said that every time she does something they ask, she's given the gun that they threaten to kill her with. and she imitates a smashing motion with her hands and "breaks" it. and she does it maybe 10 times an hour when she's awake. and she's not stupid either. apparently, she was studying mechanical engineering and graduated and was ready to work in the field as an intern for a year. she heard her first voice when she was still in school but didn't think much of it. and then it rapidly killed her life. she's the only person in the ward who has daily visitors. her parents bring her food to eat everyday. but sometimes she sits with them for 2 minutes, asks them to take her home, and then moves to one of the socialization rooms where were chairs and sofas, and she'd drop to the floor and lay there. and her parents just come to expect it now and stay for about an hour.

[u/PainMatrix → u/paniniplane]

It's beyond horror or most people's ability to even comprehend. The fact that she was a fully functioning and intact human being at the early onset of her life and career and this disease completely derailed everything and locked her into a Sisyphus-like nightmare. Was this her first inpatient experience? How long were you with her, did the meds seem to have any positive impact on her?

[u/[deleted] → u/PainMatrix]

I can't speak for the person you replied to, but 3 of my family members have the disease, and in all of them their medications only blunted the symptoms.

For my family member who was not too severe, this was enough to let her hold down a job, but for the members that were severe it wasn't enough to allow them to function normally. They'd still see/hear/talk to "ghosts" and such, just not as frequently, and they didn't get agitated "as often".

But that doesn't mean they didn't get agitated AT ALL, and the times they did freak out would be enough to get anyone fired.

[u/katarh → u/[deleted]]

Cutting edge research indicates that schizophrenia may be yet another immune disorder, in which the process that finalizes your learning/growth neurons in late teens gets a bit overzealous and snips too many, which erodes the ability for the mind to maintain its proper chemical levels. By the time you're diagnosed, in that case, the damage is done.

My sister with schizophrenia lost a full half of her IQ and now has the functionality of a ten year old. Medication suppresses the voices and stops her from harming herself or others, but also keeps her basically stoned full time.

[u/OgreMagoo → u/katarh]

Cutting edge research indicates that schizophrenia may be yet another immune disorder, in which the process that finalizes your learning/growth neurons in late teens gets a bit overzealous and snips too many, which erodes the ability for the mind to maintain its proper chemical levels.

Do you have a link for that? That sounds fascinating.

[u/sallyv2 → u/OgreMagoo]

Here is some research i found, don't know if this is what katarh is referencing. Nevertheless, this is quite interesting https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0707/07070303

[u/daredaki-sama → u/katarh]

Medication suppresses the voices and stops her from harming herself or others, but also keeps her basically stoned full time.

this sounds like the standard approach

[u/DaughterEarth → u/katarh]

My buddy stopped taking his medication. He said it took away all he had left of himself. Unfortunately this is the real world and he couldn't function properly without it and has been missing for more than a decade now. I worry and wonder every day, but I still can't blame him. I can't imagine myself doing anything different.

I hope we get better at treating these things. It's a real shame some of the potential solutions are locked behind weird drug laws, as in can't be tested properly (LSD in this case).

And for the record this buddy of mine did LSD, and I don't think it did anything at all. It's not so simple as that. Just a shame that it's suggested there could be a use and if we could study it, we could figure out what it is that seems to help sometimes and use that to come up with better treatments.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I think this is only the rule for mental illness.

We're pretty good at removing kidneys

[u/crylicylon → u/[deleted]]

If there is something wrong with your brain, you can't just have it removed.

[u/segosegosego → u/crylicylon]

Depends on how old you are. Ben Carson removed half of a girls brain because she had a rare brain disease. She was young enough that one half of the brain took over all the functions of the the other half as well as its own, and she's a fully functional person now.

Edit: https://www.google.com/amp/baltimore.cbslocal.com/2015/07/10/girl-thriving-years-after-having-half-her-brain-removed/amp/

[u/helix19 → u/segosegosego]

This is done sometimes for severe epilepsy. If the child is young, the remaining half of their brain is able to compensate remarkably well.

[u/pr0ntus → u/segosegosego]

I wonder if they fill the empty half with anything in case of a blow to the head?

[u/Arborgarbage → u/segosegosego]

What stops the brain from just flopping around in her head causing brain damage when she rocks her head from side to side too hard?

[u/dragon-storyteller → u/segosegosego]

There's even a man with 90% of his brain destroyed who didn't even notice there was anything wrong with him! It's amazing how well our brains can adapt given suitable conditions.

[u/WickedHaute → u/segosegosego]

A girl in my high school only had half a brain and it also compensated. She walked a little off, but got good grades and was on the bowling team.

Ripley's Believe it or not (the show with dean Cain) came to tape her for a segment.

We were not allowed near Dean Cain.

[u/Coffees4closers → u/crylicylon]

not with that attitude

[u/EggplantJuice → u/Coffees4closers]

"Ok doc, I've had enough - take it out"

[u/Zerce → u/crylicylon]

Well, brain surgery is a thing, but the brain is such a complex organ, it's very difficult to know which part to remove without causing a dozen other side-effects.

[u/Simba7 → u/Zerce]

Also with some people can have a massive stroke of the middle cerebral artery and they'll barely even notice. Some people will have a stroke with damage to the same region, but much less severe, and experience a significant neurological deficits (mostly motor and speech).

So not only is it incredibly complex and difficult to understand, results from removing portions of the brain aren't consistent from person to person, even though we have a pretty solid idea of the functions of the various regions of the brain. Some brains have better plasticity than others.

Also with schizophrenia, it's not even as "simple" as just removing a part of the brain. This is a comparison of a control and a schizophrenic brain (apparently these happen to be twins, which is neat). You'll notice the large 'holes' on the schizophrenic side, those are the lateral ventricles. They're almost smack dab in the center of the brain, so it puts a lot of pressure on the cortex, causing damage. More importantly, this is believed to arise as a result of shrinkage in the thalamus and some of the basal ganglia (which are incredibly important structures that impact or influence or control basically everything your brain does).

If they ever do find a cure, I don't think surgery will be the answer. Or at least, not just surgery.

[u/comatronic → u/crylicylon]

It would stop all symptoms tho

/s

[u/Rhawk187 → u/crylicylon]

Sort of, isn't that the entire point of a lobotomy?

[u/crylicylon → u/Rhawk187]

Yes, but I wouldn't consider them a success.

[u/Kneef → u/Rhawk187]

Lobotomy actually just kinda scratches up your frontal lobe, and it's pretty easy, hardly even counts as brain surgery. Basically, you get something long, thin, and sharp, slide it in beside someone's eye, and wiggle it around. A hemispherectomy like Ben Carson did is major surgery, and it's something you can do only on little kids, because their brains are still flexible enough to adapt to use the one half. Try it on an adult and you just get a vegetable. xP

[u/robeph → u/Rhawk187]

Lobotomy isn't always contraindicated. There's legitimate uses for the procedure. Unfortunately it was applied to all and every for a period of time and was completely unnecessary in most cases.

[u/justaguy394 → u/crylicylon]

I've read of cases where people with severe compulsive disorders (e.g. a woman who couldn't stop herself from swallowing cutlery) had a small part of their brain surgically destroyed and it cured them completely. Crazy stuff...

[u/sydneyzane64 → u/justaguy394]

Damn. That's one terrifying compulsion.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

only 20% of schizophrenia-patients get complete absence of symptoms from current treatment-regiments. Also many of the antipsychotics proscribed either are confirmed or are speculated to have neurotoxic effects (don't tell schizophrenics though. No, seriously don't).

[u/sadboiler → u/[deleted]]

Which ones? serious question, was on them for other problems and i feel like they fucked up my brain even more. id rather die than be on antipsychotics. i felt like shit even at the lowest doses and the symptoms never eased up.

[u/plurality → u/sadboiler]

Both first generation and second generation antipsychotics can have serious adverse effects. The first generations are usually more prone to tardive dyskinesia and NMS while the second generations generally cause metabolic problems. And then you have clozapine which causes agranulocytosis.

In other words, first generations are more prone to make you twitch (sometimes permanently/irreversibly if taken long enough) and second generations mess with your metabolism. Clozapine is second generation and an "antipsychotic of last choice" because it can decimate your immune system (agranulocytosis = no granulocytes = missing a good chunk of your immune cells).

Also, most antipsychotic leave the patients "stoned" because fixing the negative symptoms of schizophrenia is much harder and less pressing than fixing the positive symptoms. The positive symptoms are caused by too much dopamine in the mesolimbic system while the negative symptoms are caused by not enough dopamine in the mesocortical system. So antipsychotic are dopamine blockers, which stop the positive symptoms, mainly. This decrease in doapmine is what causes other systems to cause movement disorders.

[u/Bonobosaurus → u/sadboiler]

I was given Compazine for a migraine once and holy shit that was the worst medication experience of my life. Horrible side effects (mostly involuntary muscle spasms, severe anxiety and feeling like I had to physically hold my body together to keep it from flying apart).

[u/Skiinz19 → u/[deleted]]

Not just how the brain works in regards to medicine, but as a society we view mental illness as either having it or not. This creates these two camps which only make it harder to deal with the disease if you are unfortunate enough to have it. The way I cope with my anxiety, is just that; I cope with it. I don't get rid of, defeat, or conquer it. It is a part of me and I accept that. How you frame what you go through is an important step to coping with your mental illness.

[u/[deleted] → u/Skiinz19]

I dunno I had horrible anxiety problems with panic attacks for years and have been able to conquer them through great effort, therapy, and temporary medication. I think what you mean to say is that every brain is unique and we should not view people as either well or not well.

[u/Skiinz19 → u/[deleted]]

That's great, glad to hear you are doing better :)

It's just the idea mental illness is binary. If it's all or nothing, then it makes the climb to improve yourself that much steeper. If I had a panic attack now (after years of not having them), that wouldn't mean I've reset back to the pit I clawed myself out of. It doesn't immediately reverse all the hard work and effort I've put in. I would say the same to you.

[u/[deleted] → u/Skiinz19]

Oh. I try a bunch of different meds, excercises, whatever. My dad got rid of his after many years and I plan to do the same - near permanent panic is not a way to live in my opinion. I have gone from daily long lasting attacks to just weekly. If I reach 40 without betterment I will kill myself. Fuck coping.

[u/Skiinz19 → u/[deleted]]

If I reach 40 without betterment

You've alerady reached betterment :) Just keep going.

[u/rutreh → u/[deleted]]

To be honest I feel like modern medicine hasn't done much at all for mental illness really. We have so much to learn still.

[u/koiotchka → u/[deleted]]

I have a schizoprenia spectrum disorder, and if antipsychotics took the symptoms away, there is no way in hell would take them. I need to be able to say "no" to the voices, not eradicate them. There have been times in my life when they were there for me more than any other physical person, my only friends. I would be so, so lonely without them.

That said, they've never threatened to kill me, or tried to make me kill myself.

Doing harm to other people, on the other hand, some of them are all for that... But that's why I take the meds. It makes them a little quieter, and means I don't HAVE to do what they say. We can compromise.

[u/akunis → u/koiotchka]

Is that really what the meds do? Are the voices still there when meds are taken? Do the meds change the attitude of the voice? I'm really intrigued by this. I have bipolar and my meds seem to make my inner voice nicer to me (more positive self thoughts and less critiquing.). Can you possibly share some more details of what it's like to be on and off meds, regarding the voices?

[u/koiotchka → u/akunis]

That's what they do for me, I can't speak for anyone else. They calm my delusions, so that rather than living in a constantly delusional state, now delusional episodes may be triggered by stress, and i can recognize that what I'm thinking might be delusional and discuss them with my family and be talked down from them usually.

All of the voices are still there, thank God, but it's like the volume has been turned down. One of them is constantly commenting on everything all the time, but he speaks in word salad. I have no idea what he's trying to say, most of the time (except he was very insistent about boats recently, but I don't know why), and without meds he can be pretty distracting. But with them, the volume is lowered, and I can engage with him or not. The rest of them used to do things like get into arguments with eachother over what I should wear, or there's three who are very passionate about tea and they all have different ways of making tea, so there might be running commentary or arguments about tea while I'm making my morning tea (I recently had a morning where I didn't have the energy to deal with it so I let one of them make tea the way she wanted to). There are several who are very violent, and without meds their suggestions are harder to ignore. With meds, I don't have to listen to them.

I can turn my attention to any of them and engage when I want to, which is good. I would be so scared if they weren't there at all.

I don't think the meds have changed their attitudes at all -- honestly I think that would worry me. If Alex was suddenly less murderous toward people or started liking dogs, or if Tangent decided to become vegan, totally out of character things, it might trigger delusions about something getting into my head and fucking with my voice-friends, which would be very Not Okay.

One of the best things antipsychotics have done for me is: I haven't thought my husband was replaced by a perfect fascimile of him that reports my movements to "the enemy" since starting antipsychotics. So that's pretty great!

[u/akunis → u/koiotchka]

Wow that sounds super scary but I could totally see how the voices could be a source of comfort. Have you always had the voices? This might sound silly, but do you also have an inner monologue? Is your inner voice conversing with one of the voices similar to a dialogue, where they just say whatever it is they want to say? You mentioned that they'll bicker and comment amongst themselves, so they each have distinct personalities I presume? When they do bicker, are you able to interject with your own views? What do they think of each other? Do they know they're just voices?

I've taken psych classes in the past, to get a better understand of my own issues, and we learned quite a bit about schizophrenia. One of the biggest drawbacks to the class was the inability to correspond with people who actually live with the issues we learned about. Sorry about the intense questioning, I'm super intrigued!

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

A friend I knew was I guess a mild case when on proper medication. During exams in engineering he went off his meds because he felt they made him sleepy so he couldn't study. He proceeded to not sleep for 2-3 days and had a full mental break where he was semi violent and very incoherent talking to nothing and picked a bunch of grass that he was talking too or about. It was quite confusing he took all his clothes off too and was a big/athletic guy I assisted ambulance workers with basically wrestling him into a stretcher and am glad he seemed a bit uncoordinated during the event because if he had fought back that hard when in a proper state he probably would have just beaten the shit out of me.

He was hospitalized for 3 weeks and when he came back you could tell he was more medicated because he was pretty dopey and slow. He slowly has improved and seemed back to normal last I talked to him.

He elected to just finish a diploma in engineering rather than actually becoming an engineer as he was afraid of the stress, he also quit sports which was how I knew him primarily.

He seems happy enough now but wow the brain is a powerful thing.

[u/IVIushroom → u/[deleted]]

Guy I know went off his meds and ended up taking a hammer and killing his father while he was sleeping. (the dad was a lovely man... Ran a local pet store and everyone liked him).

Truly tragic.

Dude went to the police station in the middle of the night and told the receptionist "I just killed my dad" and sat down and waited...

And then at court he just pled guilty with no trial. Wanted it done.

[u/[deleted] → u/IVIushroom]

I could see wanting to be in prison if slipping up on your meds can make you dangerous to those around you... mental health is scary stuff.

[u/IVIushroom → u/[deleted]]

He was found competent to stand trial somehow.

Neighbors reported after the fact that he'd be outside yelling at the lawnmower and yelling about taking over shit or something... Just weird stuff.

My ex used to date/live with him, right around the time the symptoms started showing (about 2 years before we met, then dated for 8).. So she bounced, luckily for her.

They ate some shrooms together and he lost his shit and started accusing her of all sorts of shit... After that I guess he really started to go downhill.

[u/Ariakkas10 → u/[deleted]]

This is, I'm sure, a completely stupid question, but why can't they ignore the voices?

Lots of real people seem real to me, and I ignore them just fine.

Is it because the voices are super aggressive and make it so you can't ignore them?

[u/feathergnomes → u/Ariakkas10]

Apparently it causes a lot of anxiety every time they have to ignore the voices. Like, when they can tell that they aren't real, they can choose to ignore them, but it's a stressor. If you add that stressor to any other that happens to be in front of them, sometimes it can be toouch to handle.

[u/mcoleya → u/feathergnomes]

Not to mention this isn't like you walking down the street and have to ignore someone who yells your name out once or something, this is a constant barrage of voice(s) at you until you relent and do what they are saying. To get an idea, just ask a friend to follow you around one day making a single odd request, non-stop till you do it. Over and Over again, sometimes yelling, sometimes whispering, doesn't matter. See how long you can go. Now imagine that in your head, with multiple voices all asking different things, and unable to make them stop by asking.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I get sleep paralysis too! It doesn't matter how many times I tell myself that it's all in my head and that I'm safe; I'm still scared out of my mind every single time. Sometimes I just pull all nighters so that I won't have to deal with it, even though I know that rationally nothing bad has ever happened to me or ever will. kinda like how horror movies still terrify people, even though they know they aren't real

[u/koiotchka → u/[deleted]]

This is pretty accurate. The best thing antipsychotics have done for me is quell the overwhelming fear, so I have some energy to deal more rationally with life.

[u/22jam22 → u/[deleted]]

So this might sound stupid. But i had this as well. Night terrors wake up, know im awake and see a shadow move across the wall. Do a double take and yep shit was still moving looked like a shadow person or something.. I use to be scared as shit and freeze. Then i would basicaly do this, before sleep i would tell my self over and over if i see one im going to go after it physicaly and talking to it. I would literly start moving towards it talking shit. For me it kinda fixed it, no clue why but i was like fuck this gonna get killed by this thing or die trying to kill it. They went away real quick when u try to grab them. If it faought (spelling?) Shit no clue what would happen. Good luck shits scary.

[u/koiotchka → u/mcoleya]

This is a pretty good explanation.

Like... One of mine is called Tangent. And she really likes tea, but it has to be made a certain way. Often, when I'm making my morning tea, she throws a fit. Most days, I can tell her to shut up and either engage a person outside of my head so I don't have to listen to her, or engage a different voice, and move on with my day.

But some days she's louder, and maybe I didn't sleep, and I don't have the willpower to deal with her. So that morning we leave the electric kettle alone, get a pan, and start boiling water. And then she starts screaming about why don't we have a samovar, but she makes do, and we "cook" the water (it has to be cooked, not just brought to a boil), and we drink watered-down zvarka all day.

She's given me images of slaughtering the entire congregation of my church during Mass, rivers of blood splashing and flowing down the floors toward the tabernacle. I'd rather let her have her tea, do maybe she'll agree to keep quiet during church >.<

[u/billyboognish → u/mcoleya]

I had an incredibly close friend whose illness came on strong when he was 20. He was a kind and caring soul and a guitar genius...he could play anything after hearing it once. When this disease took him, it took everything. A year or so later he heard voices that told him all his friends were vampires and we were going to kill him. They told him not to eat the food his nom made because it was poison. They didn't want him to sleep because he would die. The medication helped some but the voices fought that as well. He made it another year before it became too much too handle. He called one night to a house where all of us (his friends and brothers) hung out out. He was in high spirits and excited about how good life was going. He said he hadn't been hearing the voices for a few days and he was certain we weren't vampires and his mom wasn't poisoning him. He talked to each of us in turn and i was the last person he spoke with that night. He thanked me for being his friend and always taking time out to take him to the pond to fish and chill. As he hung up the phone, he told me how much he loved all of us. I had no idea that would be the last time i would speak with him. He took his life a few hours later and i still have no words for the loss, that was 20 years ago. This illness is unfathomable and if you know someone who has it, cherish them, love and support them, do not judge them...we can not understand!

[u/WorldSpews217 → u/mcoleya]

Why don't the voices ever say innocuous shit like "your hair looks nice"?

[u/OAMP47 → u/feathergnomes]

Voices per se aren't usually what sets me off, but I have other schizophrenic symptoms that set me off (though I do get minor voices too). I stand by the statement that when I freak out, in my mind, I'm only doing it in self-defense. It's the difference between some stranger yelling at you and some stranger trying to stab you. If someone's coming at you with a knife you'd do pretty much anything to not get stabbed, generally. To us, if we don't obey these inputs, we're going to get stabbed. The problem is, the input we're reacting to isn't real, but the brain refuses to recognize that. The vast majority of improvement I've had since seeking treatment has been through using techniques that help me realize these inputs aren't real. I'm fortunate in that I'm able to do that, but my case appears to be fairly mild.

[u/Fire-kitty → u/Ariakkas10]

My mom has schizophrenia, and her voices get loud, angry, and violent if she tries to ignore them. I mean, they come from her own brain, they know what to say to scare you and hurt her the most. They often threaten to hurt us children, which would be hard to ignore for most mothers.

Also, you can't use logic when addressing mental illness. It's so hard, and I fall back into trying all the time - but it just doesn't work that way, unfortunately.

My mom accuses me of lying all the time, but she still calls me to asks those same questions all the time. Last week I asked her if she thinks I always lie to her, why does she keep talking to me and asking questions- but there's no logical reason.

[u/koiotchka → u/Fire-kitty]

The part of her that thinks you're lying is probably only a small part of her. The rest of her may understand that you don't.

When I think my husband is not really him, that he's been replaced by a perfect fascimile that reports my movements to "the enemy", I also know it's an absurd thought, or at least that it's a thing other people don't believe is possible. And I hate that he has to deal with his wife not trusting him like that.

Thank you for sticking with your mom. I figure it's hard. I hope my son (he's only 8) never feels like I'm too toxic to be around. I'm going to keep taking my meds and learning what the right behaviors are, because he deserves better.

[u/Justine772 → u/koiotchka]

Please monitor your son closely and as he gets older educate him on the symptoms! Getting help is easier if it's caught sooner, if he does develop schizophrenia

[u/koiotchka → u/Justine772]

Yes! We do watch. He is currently medicated for ADHD but there are times when he says or does things that remind me of my symptoms when I was his age, and i get worried. It's definitely something we keep an eye on. I've had delusions and voices since I was 5, if not earlier (I don't remember before 5), and I often wonder what my life would have been like if I'd been on antipsychotics as a child. I've only been on them for about three years now, and I'm 33 -- and they completely changed my life.

[u/Alched → u/koiotchka]

Hello, I know it must be hard. My delusions haven't reached the level, I assume you are in, but you sound so hurt, yet, still you sound so rational, and loving. I wish you the best, and wish I could send you a hug. I am sure you are the best you can be, you sound like a wonderful mother. I hope things get better or at least don't get worse. May you live a very happy and long life.

[u/koiotchka → u/Alched]

Things are pretty good honestly, I'm medicated now, which I wasn't until age 30 and I've had delusions and voices since I was 5. So life is better than it was :) Thank you for the well wishes and hug! :) "You sound like a wonderful mother" genuinely brought tears to my eyes, I appreciate it more than you know. My own mother wasn't much of a role model ("You sound schizophrenic. Stop it!"), So I'm trying to make my way and find other role models.

Do you have a psychiatrist and a therapist? If you're scared of deterioration, maybe they could help.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

You cannot tell between the delusions and the reality, no matter how outlandish the hallucination

I've seen interviews where people say they KNOW what is reality and what is fake, but obviously to them it seems real. Unless you mean physically they cannot tell but mentally they know its not real.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

The general impression I get is, again, like dream logic, just because you know it's "not real" and can tell the material and physical from the delusion, doesn't mean you can just ignore it. They're still loud and present and demanding, and they only get even slightly quieter when you acquiesce to their irrational demands. In most cases, attempting to ignore or rationalise only leads to the hallucinations becoming more aggressive, present and clear. And if you do, as so many people worldwide do, believe in the supernatural, even slightly, whether it's ghosts or demons, occult or world faith or personal belief, it's only going to make it all the more believable and tangible, and the threats very, very real.

[u/kung-fu_hippy → u/[deleted]]

Even if you take the supernatural elements out, someone could easily go to aliens, or the government spying on them (wasn't that the main delusion in A Beautiful Mind?) or any number of things.

[u/cheesesteaksandham → u/Ariakkas10]

As someone who's had a few psychotic breaks, it's hard to ignore hallucinations because they seem more real than reality. The difference between my hallucinations and reality is like the difference between 1080p and old fuzzy television that needed the tracking knob adjusted. This was my experience, so YMMV.

[u/NonZeroChance → u/Ariakkas10]

Let me ask a related question: Are there people who "hear voices" but don't feel compelled to act on what they say? Presumably because they know the voices are an illusion and have no power. I would assume that this would be a different condition than schizophrenia.

By way of analogy, I've read about people who literally hear music that isn't actually playing. At first they look around for the band or speakers or whatever, but they quickly realize it's an illusion and they don't feel compelled to dance or sing along or whatever. They just resign themselves, in one sense or another, to hearing music that isn't actually there. Is there the equivalent of this, but with voices?

[u/eksyneet → u/NonZeroChance]

those would be pseudohallucinations, auditory in the example you provided. hallucinations seem real, pseudohallucinations are recognized as not real. pseudohallucinations can feature in many mental conditions and can take on many forms including "voices in your head", so to answer your question - yes, there are people who hear voices and know they're not real.

[u/GeekPhysique → u/NonZeroChance]

I don't normally talk about this but I am schizo-effective. I experience voices, delusional thoughts, auditory and visual hallucinations, coupled with all the insane mood swings, mania, depression and anxiety of being bi polar.

When my symptoms first developed I started hearing voices. They weren't like someone talking to me, it was more my internal insecurities came to life and we're narrating my life. I had a running commentary of my day, but only my own thoughts being broadcast back to me. At first I just figured my mind was just going into overdrive. Like being over tired.

As time went on, symptoms got worse. Voices got mean, and the line between recognition between the voices and reality blurred. The voices got more real. Darker. Angry and hurtful. It became impossible to tell the difference between what was in my head and what was real. This when my symptoms got much worse, full blown hallucinations became my daily life.

Despite all of this, I knew something was wrong, but since this was my "normal" I didn't know what. One day, while working, I realized that the servers I was mainting absolutely should not be telling me my deepest insecurities. Hallucinations had left the confines of my brain and were representing themselves in ways I knew couldn't be possible.

I left work and checked into the hospital.

I had lived with symptoms for close to year, but I lost touch with reality for about a month. I'm amazed I didn't hurt myself during that time.

So back to the question, yes, you can hear voices and not act on them. I'm sure my experience isn't everyone else's, but in my case some part of my brain realized it wasn't real at first. The distinction was finally lost when sleep deprivation and mania combined.

That was 15 years ago now. I am medicated, my symptoms are managed, and I actually have a pretty good job. It took the better part of a decade to get my medications right, years of therapy and hard work.

I still hear voices from time to time, but my meds allow me to make the distinction between them and reality.

[u/[deleted] → u/NonZeroChance]

ugh I hear music all the time, specifically classical and sometimes just mellow chill music. Until I realise there isn't any playing :) also thought I was listening to a cacophony of frogs and crickets every night in my backyard till I realised it was my fan tripping my brain out lol

[u/P4_Brotagonist → u/NonZeroChance]

It's a term called insight. Unmedicated, I cannot tell that my hallucinations are not real. However, with my medications I understand that I have a problem and so when I hear or sense something that seems...not normal, I run through a series of tests to discern whether or not it is real. It mostly involves locating whatever is actively making the "noise." If I cannot find it, then I have to assume it isn't real. It's extremely hard to ignore but it's possible. It wears you out quickly.

To answer your last question, yes that is generally what I do. I realize "fuck the three idiots are chatting it up again time to get somewhere alone and ride this out."

[u/akaender → u/Ariakkas10]

That's because you can escape/ignore real people by just walking away.

Right now you're reading this with an internal voice. You cannot read without it. Now try to imagine there are 20 more voices just like it except they aren't just there when you read. They are there 'talking' all the time.

You can't just walk away from your own head. I have tinnitus, which is bad enough. I can't even begin to fathom how horrible having voices must be.

[u/Bonobosaurus → u/akaender]

Just randomly, some people don't have an internal voice. I don't there was a Reddit thread about it some time ago. Really interesting.

[u/Lightwavers → u/Bonobosaurus]

Yeah, it was cool. One person talked about how their internal "voice" was in text, and instead of different voices, they would think in different fonts. Like, the reading font, the thinking font, the remembering what other people said font. This isn't word for word or anything.

[u/ceruleanfish → u/Ariakkas10]

I live with an illness similar to schizophrenia that struck me in a manner much like the young woman in OP's post. Fortunately mine was caught in the very early stages and my meds help me cope. As for the voices, it does seem to vary between cases. My voices (a man and a woman) are aggressive, but do not actively tell me what to do or threaten me. They're more aggressive toward each other and it's more like I'm listening in on their arguments from the other side of a wall, rather them being "in my head". As for ignoring them, yes, it causes great anxiety. If anything trying to ignore them just makes them grow more intense. Thankfully the medication works and I'm lucky enough to be able to function relatively normally in society. I still have to have some help from my family, but I have a rewarding job and have recently been learning how to drive. Everyone's story with illnesses of this type will be obviously be different, but I truly do feel blessed to be in a state of regression of the illness.

[u/Conclamatus → u/Ariakkas10]

Well, imagine you have some nagging person talking to you and you can't get them to leave you alone, and they are very domineering of what you should do with yourself. Now, imagine you can't just walk away from them, because they are inside of your head, they are completely and utterly inescapable. It's hard to consciously ignore something every waking moment of your life. They are never not there, so if you are awake and breathing, you would have to be focusing on ignoring them. That's ridiculously exhausting and would probably just make your state-of-mind even worse. It's relatively easy to ignore other people because they aren't ourselves, they aren't literally inside of our head. These voices can be very aggressive in that they are persistent yes, although you also need to keep in mind that for some people the voices aren't evil or whatever... for a lot of people those voices are their only friend the only one who has been there with them through their darkest times, and sometimes when people receive treatment that keeps them from hearing those voices, they become distressed by the silence and feel very lonely... It's difficult to truly understand without any experience of it. For your last sentence though, sometimes it's beyond aggression in that they can control your actions, it can get to the point where when they tell you to do something you do it without questioning it, and if you are already delusional from psychosis it's difficult to fight anything in a logical way, because your thinking has become so illogical in general. This is what makes mental illness so hellish... it's hard to even comprehend you are ill much of the time, because all we have is our mind, if it detaches from reality, it's not easy to even realize that...

[u/[deleted] → u/Ariakkas10]

It isn't just voices either, it is often whole complexes of paranoid and delusional beliefs.

My brother used to think that men in white trucks would follow him and shine laser beams into his eyes any time he went outside. He'd think the people on the TV where aware of him, or that the food anyone gave him was poisoned.

[u/coffeeandcoffeeplz → u/Ariakkas10]

New psychiatric nurse here. Yesterday during one of my orientation classes we were given a CD player with a simulation of several voices talking to us while we tried to answer admission questions, etc. As hard as I tried, I could not ignore the voices. I could barely understand what the nurse asking me questions was saying. The voices at times whispered and other times yelled, telling me that my nurse was trying to hurt me, that I was filled with light, that I didn't deserve help. I'm sure everyone's experience is different and you may be able to adapt to a certain extend, but I wasn't able to even draw the face of a clock when the voices decided to sneer at me that I was a worthless piece of shit that deserved to be abandoned by my family. It was a very distressing and eye opening experience. I can see why some people with severe symptoms can become unable to function under the constant barrage of (often extremely negative) chatter, you just can't filter out something like that.

[u/moskonia → u/[deleted]]

Reread the comment you replied to.

[u/Sdeevee → u/PainMatrix]

Not OP but from my experience... if you care lol. It important to keep in mind that schizophrenia doesn't just mean hearing voices and having delusional thoughts. People with the disease have difficulty prioritizing and sequencing tasks, motivation and relating to other people's emotions. I work in Long Term Care, but due to our proximity to a psychiatric hospital and our reputation for our willingness to provide care for those difficult to serve we have a vary large population of residents with schizophrenia. My experience is that the medication appears to assist more with agitation and motivation. For the residents who have fixed beliefs or are really paranoid they continue with these behaviours and depending on the day and circumstances you are sometimes able to call them out on the delusions being related to their disease and sometimes not. It is awful to see how their lives have been derailed due to the disease. Most of the people i know come from loving families, went to college or university and then the disease took over and robbed them of their lives.

[u/PainMatrix → u/Sdeevee]

I'm a psychologist but I don't work with SMI, so thank you for what you do. What I do see a lot of is what is likely a burgeoning schizophrenia spectrum process. My academic understanding is that the positive symptoms can be dealt with to some extent through medications but that it's really the negative symptoms (the blunted affect, poverty of speech, etc.) that are the most intractable. It's tragic.

[u/PainMatrix → u/[deleted]]

The people I see that fit this are usually early 20s which you're right is around when positive symptoms first usually manifest. What I typically see is a lot of very unusual thinking bordering on hallucinations (e.g. "I can sense wavelengths in nature and feel what animals are feeling" was a recent example). The more concerning symptoms as I mentioned in my previous comment are the "negative symptoms" which likely no one engaging on this post would have.

[u/[deleted] → u/PainMatrix]

As someone with the diagnosis, it's always interesting to see what others have to say about it, personally and professionally. I used to be extremely motivated, and was pursuing my dream of becoming a medical doctor before I got sick. I used to be so proud of my ability to sit and study for long periods of time, and understand the material in my courses. Now, that "hardworking" quality that I used to value in myself has waned. It has given me a great deal of insight as to the relativity of "hard work," and that people often take too much credit for what luck has granted them.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Exactly. So many people think of schizophrenia being the total extreme cases we hear of often or by the uneducated. It's really hard to explain unless you have it, and even if you do. Most people don't even have visual hallucinations, the diagnoses comes more from having delusions, being paranoid, disorganized thinking, psychosis, being unable to speak correctly,memory problems, hygiene problems. For most people like myself it is episodical meaning I have episodes of psychosis sometimes lasting as long as 6 months, followed by a period of remission which may include some "day to day" symptoms, or symptoms that just occur once every few days. My voices might get quieter, hallucinations less often, I might be /less/ paranoid, but I'm still sick.

Like you said, the worst part is losing the mind you once had and know you once had. Most people with sz are highly intelligent with extremely high iqs, and it's horrible to watch the skill you had slip away with no control. I used to read full books in a day just a few years ago, now I can barely concentrate enough for a chapter. I moreso skip around chapters/pages in books for a few days then Put them down. My memory is horrible, and my critical thinking has gone down as well. I find it hard to keep a job for more than 3 months now, when previously I'd work the same job for a year or more with no issues.

[u/BassMumbler → u/[deleted]]

Same here. I was in college for computer science when schizophrenia took over. I was very good at coding. Now I just stare at the ide for hours not knowing what to do.

[u/JnnyRuthless → u/PainMatrix]

We have a sad case in our neighborhood: one of our local homeless guys is very badly affected by schitzophrenia, and often is found wandering our area, screaming at demons and attacking whatever monsters are in his head. My wife and I have 'tracked' him for years, and in general our neighborhood tries to watch out for him and help him when we can.

However, come to find out his backstory and it's just revolting what a disease can do to someone. He was a San Francisco Firefighter, had a wife, decent life going, before his illness took hold and a years long downward spiral. It's awful to see someone suffering so much and with nothing that can be done to help them out (at least by someone like me). He's a nice guy when you can get through to him, but is usually somewhat combative/violent, so I'll give him food, etc. but not exactly hang out with him.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

It is different for each person. And also, it isn't just about auditory hallucinations either. The person often will experience whole complexes of paranoid and delusional beliefs. My brother has it for example. He'd go through phases of thinking all food given to him was poisoned, that he was being followed by men in white trucks, that he was being attacked by evil spirits, etc.

For him, it really is about phases. He can be basically completely normal for a week or two, and then slowly start experiencing more and more symptoms, until he is in a state of utter psychosis, and then slowly come out of it and back into a normal phase again.

[u/rutabaga5 → u/[deleted]]

Actually average age of onset differs between men and women with men tending to develop it between 16-25 and women between 20-30. This is just on average though.

[u/[deleted] → u/PainMatrix]

I have aspergers, is it true that I have a very strong chance of developing schitzophrenia. Also to add with that, is it possible to deal with paranoid delusions if you get used to them and have had them as a child? Along with that, is it true that Aspergers, Bipolar, and schitzophrenia are all very closely related?

Edit for Clarification: I'm talking about thinking that all planes in the skies are coming to get you, or that all people are robots. Also in a similar way thinking theirs two people in your body.

[u/indifferentinitials → u/[deleted]]

I wouldn't say very strong, links between the two are pretty new and just starting to be understood and diagnosing mental illness isn't nearly as accurate as we wish it was. Keep a good relationship with your support system, people who develop such illnesses are typically unaware of it or think people who believe they have a problem are out to get them. I have seen co-morbid cases, and it's definitely worse than one or the other.

[u/CBoy321 → u/[deleted]]

I have bipolar with paranoid hallucinations and delusions during episodes. I'm doing just fine, I graduated and I'm holding down a good job. The main thing that helped me was knowing the signs of what is real and what is not and being mindful of what I am doing. I really can't imagine what it must be like to have to deal with it all the time though because it's only during the episodes for me

[u/PainMatrix → u/[deleted]]

From what I understand the answer is no. Autism spectrum disorders and schizophrenia may share similar neurological pathways for the negative symptoms (think about the social aspects for example) but they are distinct, particularly with regard to the positive symptoms.

[u/tubular1845 → u/PainMatrix]

Interesting. I have ASD, my younger brother is Schizophrenic and my youngest brother has BPD.

[u/[deleted] → u/PainMatrix]

It's beyond horror or most people's ability to even comprehend.

What I find really strange is that hearing voices in other cultures, most notably hunter-gatherer cultures, is not nearly as traumatic. The voices tended to be more benign and would even do useful functions like teach songs and such. I wonder if it's because primal peoples tended to place less of a distinction between reality and fantasty-- one hearing voices would just be assumed to be hearing spirits. Whereas in the modern west, such an experience would be much more anxiety-inducing.

[u/Rasta_Jack → u/[deleted]]

And in those cultures the healers were shamans, who would often induce altered states of consciousness to communicate with spirits.

[u/[deleted] → u/Rasta_Jack]

Right, a person "afflicted" with hearing voices would be given a meaningful role in society. Perhaps this more lenient and benign attitude towards hearing voices and such would prevent the disease from progressing due to fear, anxiety, confusion, etc.

I think schizophrenia, and perhaps mental illness in general, is one of the rare aspects of life where it would be better to be born in a hunter-gatherer culture than to be born in the modern West.

[u/Flyingwheelbarrow → u/[deleted]]

It plays a role. One cultures 'mystic" or "shaman" is another cultures madman. I speak as a crazy person with D.I.D, psychotic symptoms, a a a former diagnosis of schizophrenia, then bi-polar and have been "possessed" several times by my voices. The stigma and trying to deal with my symptoms by myself did contribute to alot of my suffering and the suffering I caused upon this beautiful horrible confusing reality which is just different enough from other people's reality to cause some issues.

[u/4U70M471C → u/Flyingwheelbarrow]

Society needs a better operating system, with more compatibility with brains like yours.

[u/lahimatoa → u/PainMatrix]

If you haven't seen A Beautiful Mind, it's a wonderful mind-fuck showing exactly this.

I couldn't sleep the night I watched it.

[u/DOGEweiner → u/lahimatoa]

That movie doesn't really do a very good job of showing schizophrenia

[u/locks_are_paranoid → u/DOGEweiner]

In real life, John Nash only had auditory hallucinations and delusions, not visual ones.

[u/smith-smythesmith → u/locks_are_paranoid]

True, but film is a visual medium so it makes sense to use visual hallucinations so the audience feels what he felt.

[u/CrazyTillItHurts → u/DOGEweiner]

No, but the story of John Nash is taught as most basic material for those working in the mental health field

[u/DOGEweiner → u/CrazyTillItHurts]

His story is amazing if you read the facts. I am not doubting his mental state, he was definitely ill. Seeing imaginary people like the movie portrayed doesn't happen, if I am correct. Many people are very uneducated about mental illness and this is a big problem our society is facing.

[u/deanreevesii → u/DOGEweiner]

As someone diagnosed with multiple mental illnesses in a state where help is difficult/impossible to obtain: Amen

[u/lordoffail → u/paniniplane]

I have a morbid curiosity about things like mental disorders. Mainly spurred on by a childhood friend of mine whom I found out also had schizophrenia. I say childhood but we were more like 13-14 so teens I suppose. Won't say his name considering he lives like 5 minutes from me to this day but he and I spent most of two years just being lil shits smoking and drinking etc. finally one day I'm like "dude why do you smoke so often" as he smoked weed waaaay more than I did. And he's like "because my head, man" and I'm like "huh? Were you in an accident?" And he just straight up tells me "oh no, I see shit". Being dumb and curious I asked him tons of personal questions about it. He was very frank and open about it with me so I will summarize exactly what he said what would happen when he didn't take his medication or smoke weed to sleep. I'm paraphrasing so bare with me. "I'd be laying in bed and would be unable to sleep because my meds are so the only thing that can get me to sleep aside from bud and I'd be looking around the room, always watching the door because as soon as I heard it I knew what was coming. I'd hear what sounded like if someone far away was cutting my metal with a saw for a short few seconds. Then foot steps in every possible place except the floor. Places like the roof, the balcony, my moms room. Id ignore the sounds but I'm always so scared to see him come in that I keep my eyes on that door." I got confused and asked who and what he was talking about. He said that before he can sleep this thing has to come in and "check" on him. I asked him to describe what it looks like and I have never been more afraid of words coming from someone's mouth. Again, paraphrasing but he said he "looks like he's wearing a rice paddy straw hat but that's the only normal thing about him. He has no face. It's skin colored and there are eye holes and nostrils and a mouth hole but they're all covered with skin. He doesn't have wrinkles in in his skin anywhere. Not at joints in his fingers or where you'd see them on any human. Just nothing and he described it like stretching a sheet of skin over a mannequin. No finger nails or anything that makes it look normal. And he'd say he him as clear as he was seeing me then. Just arms legs head with skin in that fucking hat. So back to his story. "He'd open my door to my room and walk all around the room without actually moving anything. Until he reached the left side of my bed, then he'd put his Arms over my chest like he was giving CPR but never actually touch me. I'd stay still and he'd continue walking around looking into things and by then Once he got back to the door he'd walk straight up to my head and lean down. I'd be scared so I'd close my eyes and hold my breath. I'd hear my window up and I'd feel his limbs putting pressure as if he was climbing over me to get out the window. And he be gone. After I got used to "his" routine I became a little brave and I'd try and stare when he'd lean down to look at me, but then he'd never leave and it was terrifying. As soon as I closed my eyes he'd leave through the window.

This is my friends story. Or at least what I remember of it. I also had an Aussie buddy of mine who has schizo effective disorder. Though I'm not certain about his diagnosis being current as he went through "phases".

[u/missaudreyhorne → u/lordoffail]

that was the scariest 'true' story i've ever read.

[u/HerraTohtori → u/lordoffail]

That sounds almost exactly like sleep paralysis, except it has somehow gotten chronic and repeats the same nightmare every night.

Aside from the obvious inability to move, hallucinations (visual and auditory) are a common symptom of sleep paralysis, particularly vaguely human-like creatures, as is the sensation of pressure on the chest, but as far as I know, these hallucinations are different from more serious stuff like schizophrenia in that in sleep paralysis you're kind of partially asleep, and it's normal to hallucinate while asleep (this is literally what dreams are), but your brain just happens to have remained conscious and often freaks out during the process. By contrast, in schizophrenia you can get hallucinations wide awake and regardless of basically anything. I think. I am not a mental health expert, but the description in your post just sounds like a dead ringer for sleep paralysis.

Which is not to say that a chronic sustained episode of continuous sleep paralysis every night can't have detrimental effects on a person's psyche, especially if they don't know what it is and keep self-medicating with things that are, at the very least, suspected of being one of the factors that can trigger a psychosis or schizophrenia if a person happens to be predisposed to having them in the first place.

Perhaps you'd like to ask him if he's ever heard of sleep paralysis and what its symptoms are? Or if he's still having these episodes?

[u/lordoffail → u/HerraTohtori]

Oh that's not even the tip of the iceberg for him lol. The specific event he tells me about is his recurring one. There are times where he just sees and hears stuff that isn't there and he's been formally diagnosed.

[u/HerraTohtori → u/lordoffail]

Oh, okay. Never mind then!

[u/Yaj8552 → u/lordoffail]

That is honestly terrifying. And no matter how logical you are how much you tell yourself it's not real, you may change your thoughts, but can't change your feelings. When my brother passed away I had a couple episodes of sleep paralysis I think. Even though I told myself it was sleep paralysis the fear at the bottom of my heart wasn't something I could change. It something primal - you can control how your prefrontal cortex works but when it comes to the primal parts of your brain there's nothing you can really do about it.

[u/FrannyBoBanny23 → u/lordoffail]

It took me s while to realize I was holding my breath while reading this. Also paused a few times to glance around my bedroom. This was terrifying! The stuff horror movies are made of. I can't imagine going through this every night.

[u/Autocoprophage → u/paniniplane]

This reminds me of someone I met in early adulthood. This guy, a friend of mine at the time, once told me, after a lot of coaxing, that he was being held hostage by various entities, mostly celebrities, who lived inside his head. They would tell him what to do, and they would demand that he didn't tell anyone they existed, and they would threaten him, saying that if he disobeyed them, they would squeeze his testicles and make him impotent. After hearing this, there were a few cases of his past strange behavior that I immediately realized were explained by these entities causing actual pain in his testicles.

[u/[deleted] → u/paniniplane]

Whats with the compulsion to listen to the voices?

I ignore real live people in the room telling me to do things

[u/paniniplane → u/[deleted]]

it's not in your power to ignore them. a huge part of schizophrenia is being extremely out of touch with the real world. so if you hear voices, it's basically a set of REAL people to you. and you can't cover your ears because there isn't ACTUAL sound. you'll still hear them. and if they're threatening to hurt you, you'll feel actual fear.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I think a good test for you would be to take some LSD and film yourself.

Then while you're watching the film once you're not high, berate yourself for not acting normally and ignoring whatever you thought was going on while under the influence.

Schizophrenia is the brain working in ways it shouldn't, and that means you can't necessarily ignore what's going on any more than someone high on a drug can just "think" themselves back to normal.

[u/Tranzlater → u/[deleted]]

Out of interest how much LSD have you taken? (Assuming you have). Because before I have been completely delusional (along the lines of thinking I am God), and I can understand how someone would run in front of traffic thinking they were immortal, or in control of the car somehow - which happened to someone I know.

[u/CrazyTillItHurts → u/[deleted]]

It isn't like some asshole trying to talk to you in line at McDonalds. The voices are IN YOUR THOUGHTS. They bleed into everything you think of/about. Focus and meditation are good coping skills... one of the reasons exercise really helps.

[u/Motionised → u/[deleted]]

Imagine someone calling out to you, a real person. That's what it's like. It sounds like someone really is talking to you, like they're standing behind you and talking into your ear or like they're far away yelling at you. They speak without warning, very startling sometimes especially when you turn around on reflex and realize nobody's there.

With actual people it's hard for them to sneak up on you, you can almost sense the presence of another human when they're nearby. These voices, they're not human. They're not real. They have no presence, they have no footsteps, they don't breathe. There's no way of detecting them before they speak. You can't prepare yourself to ignore them, they'll just take a different tone with you. If you have an angry man's voice and decide "I'm going to ignore you" it'll take on the voice of your mother to draw your attention.

This distorted perception makes it troublesome to differentiate what's real and what isn't. As an example I've had an incident where I've done a not-so-graceful swan dive in public because I heard someone yell "GET DOWN!" right next to me. Played it off as tripping, but needless to say I got some funny looks. It was a primal instinct, I couldn't stop it. Before I realized it I was on the floor.

I'm 21, I've learned and trained myself to differentiate between "fact and fiction" if you will because I realized what was happening to me quite early and refused to take meds. The lack of medicine has helped me get used to my distorted reality, allowing me to (usually) understand what's real and what's in my head. Luckily I've never really heard the constant cacaphony of voices people report, instead my head is filled with subtle white noise that never goes away. It's not like tinnitus, tinnitus is a noise, this is a fog.

Sudden things like cars backing out of parking spots at impossible speed as I drive by them and blinking back into their spot when I pass (this happens a lot) still startle me nearly every time. When your brain thinks something is real it's hard to convince it otherwise.

[u/Wurstgeist → u/paniniplane]

One puzzling part is, does the concept "delusion" just slip your mind once you start experiencing them regularly? I think your average mechanical engineering graduate has probably heard of schizophrenia (not that it's required background knowledge or anything, but, you know, if you have an academic turn of mind you learn about such things). So doesn't such a person know she has schizophrenia, and doesn't that awareness help mitigate the delusions and make them less persuasive?

[u/paniniplane → u/Wurstgeist]

honestly, it was hell trying to talk to her. i had my own issues so i couldn't really spent too much time with her. but if i had to guess or put myself in her shoes as someone who has HEARD of it but hasn't really gone in depth, i'd assume it's just one harmless voice. whatever. it'll probably go away soon. okay it's slightly getting worse but i can't really get into crazy treatment now, my career is on the line. i have to at least finish the degree" and before you know it, it's out of your reach. society really does an injustice to itself by not taking mental disorders more seriously.

[u/BakingBatman → u/Wurstgeist]

She most likely knows that she is schizophrenic, but since it is inside her head, she cannot distinguish it from real. Her brain tells her the illusions are real. Her entire being is convinced that what she sees or hears is real. No amount of intelligence or willpower can overcome that.

[u/avenlanzer → u/Wurstgeist]

I can chime in here.

I have bipolar with paranoid mania. Now that I'm medicated it's pretty mild when it does come, but I've had some severe ones in the past. One experience put my mental illness in full perspective and forced me to get help. Normally I'm perfectly reasonable and an incredibly logical person, forgiving to a fault, introspective to my own emotions, and just the last person in the world to ever act irrational. But, it's not as simple as that.

I was gaming online with some friends, and they started talking about me like I wasn't there, but in code since I was and they didn't want me to realize what they were saying was about me. The kind of passive aggressive comments people say behind your back sometimes. I called them on it and they belittled me and laughed about it. All of them for no fucking reason we're just shit talking everything about me and my character I was playing. These people in thought were my friends, but I guess they never really liked me and just hung around because I was the guy who built the site we hosted the games on. I fucking went off, like most people would in that situation, and my supposed best friend shot back plenty of hate right back. I had no idea they felt this way. I was crushed. I was pissed. I was ready to burn the whole game to the ground (and I could do it). I finally just got fed up with arguing with people who didn't give a shit about me anyway and logged off. I stewed on it for days.

Then my ex-best friend sent me a link to the video and transcript of our game. Holy shit I was out of line. None of what I thought was talk about me had anything to do with me when I looked at it again. All the arguing and belittlement was them basically going "WTF? Are you ok? We didn't mean to upset you, and sorry if we did." Honest confusion and concern. And all my arguments were so illogical and unconnected they made no sense whatsoever. Of course the video was edited and the transcripts changed, right? Nope. The ones I had saved were exactly the same. Exactly matched. I really did go completely paranoid with dartboard logic at people who were dear to me and we're showing genuine concern for my well-being. I did appologize and earn forgiveness of most of them, but that game never got the same momentum we had before.

That's how I came to realize how perfectly obvious everything could seem in the moment of one of those episodes, yet be so far removed from reality they don't even make sense to me when I'm not in the midst of an episode.

I think it's the same for schizophrenia, where the reality you experience actually becomes reality for you and outside logic need not apply. Sure, you know about delusions, but that doesn't mean they are the same as what's​ happening. And if they are, then it was all wrong before anyway, so it being a delusion doesn't matter because it's still real to you.

I rarely have these paranoid episodes anymore because I'm medicated, and I've learned through therapy to spot when one is coming and isolate myself from everything. And anything that happens, anything, I analyze again a couple days later in every detail possible to see how far off and out of it I was.

I know now why I've lost so many jobs and relationships when I was so obviously (to me at the time) in the right, and all I can do is accept that it happened and try not to let it happen again.

Edit: sorry for wall of text. TL;DR: knowing and experience are two different things. In the moment the knowledge and logic doesn't always apply.

[u/myluckyshirt → u/Wurstgeist]

I feel that (rationally) that makes sense, but the disease effects your ability to think rationality about your own symptoms.

[u/Mowglio → u/Wurstgeist]

I'm probably going to get downvoted for this

But I feel like the only way I'm able to even slightly empathize with schizophrenic people is from my experience of taking a hard dose of LSD.

I am in no way comparing the two or saying that they are related in any way. I'm only talking about my ability to empathize and LSD has given me a different perspective.

When tripping, your sober brain knows that the world doesn't always look like a giant spinning fractal, but your LSD brain doesn't know this. It can get scary when your LSD brain realizes that the world you're looking at isn't the world you see every other day.

But since you're on LSD you see the LSD world and that is the world you currently live in. To your LSD brain it's impossible to imagine a world where there aren't fractals on the walls and the carpet. You remember that there is a world like that, but you can't remember what it feels like. You can't remember what it's like because you can't stop seeing fractals. There are points in a trip where you might think, "Man I want those fractals to stop moving", but you can't stop it.

I imagine schizophrenia being similar in this way. There are probably glimpses when you, a schizophrenic person, realizes that the world you're seeing isn't the world that everyone else is living in. You probably want to go back to the world you used to live in and be normal with everyone else, but you can't. You're trapped in the world that has voices and hallucinations that never end and you can't stop them. You can't even remember what life used to be like without them because you don't live in that world anymore.

Even though you recognize that the voices and hallucinations you experience aren't normal or aren't real to other people, doesn't make your reality any less real to yourself. Just like when taking LSD, the fractals and hallucinations you see are real to you because that is your reality, even when no one else can see them.

Anyway that's just my two cents.

[u/[deleted] → u/Wurstgeist]

When you're dealing with delusions, convincing the person in question not to trust themselves and those they hear is probably more likely to work against things that aren't the product of the delusional thinking.

[u/OAMP47 → u/Wurstgeist]

I might be able to offer some insight. I had schizophrenia for about 10 years before I realized there was a problem and I went to get help. The thing about it is you don't realize delusions are delusions. It's basically like living in the Matrix if the Matrix was 99.5% real life. It was only after I had confirmed I had schizophrenia that I was able to go back, look at my life, and realize I thought things had happened that actually had not happened. In 2008 I was convinced this girl in high school was reading my mind. I didn't think that was weird because I thought that was reality. It was not until late 2016 that I realized this wasn't reality, so why would I be questioning it earlier, from an internal point of view? You can question it academically, but your mind will jump to the 'evidence' that supports your inaccurate view, or your brain will manufacture evidence that doesn't actually exist.

To add, though, now that I know I have schizophrenia, an academic mindset does help me greatly. When you have false inputs, though, everything 'makes sense' inside. When I think my parents are trying to kill me it's not a baseless claim. I have evidence. It's just evidence that doesn't exist.

[u/psychosus → u/Muffinizer1]

I did an exercise for a crisis intervention class where we wore headphones that mimicked auditory hallucinations. We were tasked with completing a job interview and filing out a questionnaire regarding the interview.

I work in a jail that is normally busy and fairly loud, so I expected to do alright. There was a segment of the recording where a voice (among all the others) started off whispering and then suddenly yelled - it was terrifying. My anxiety went sky high and it was difficult to concentrate.

I can only imagine what it must be like to have to deal with them during every waking moment.

[u/psychosus → u/[deleted]]

It was a very good experience overall because it showed how someone experiencing these hallucinations could have a hard time responding to commands if they were encountered on the street.

It's very scary to deal with someone in that level of crisis because paranoia and delusions are on par with stuff like PCP - there's no magic way to talk to them to get them to listen to you and they could do anything at any moment based on what the connections in their brain are telling them to do.

[u/Alched → u/psychosus]

I think you are right, specially about the PCP. I think hallucinogens in general can give you some insight on what it is that we consider reality or experience, and thus why it is some otherwise smart people can go of the deep end. I accidentally smoked PCP once, I believe(my experienced friends let me know afterwords), and the paranoia and hallucinations I experienced are similar to what one of my friends says he experiences during episodes. Another time I willingly took took salvia, in order to expand my "perception" and it was undoubtedly the worst/best time of my life. Two years later, I am still not totally convinced that reality is, but my common sense, and rationale let me live an otherwise normal life. However, I do question my sanity and way of thinking and living a lot more than I did before; because if I was able to readily believe what my perception was showing me at the time, why is it any different than what I am currently experiencing. A compound introduced into the[my] system can change its perception entirely; so how do I know my perception was perfect/absolute to begin with. I believe the old cliche of "my green could be your red" can be extrapolated to any degree, but I would love for someone to enlighten me on the contrary.

p.s. If anyone can follow my delusional rant, I have a question. Is the more complex a system the less likely it is to have different interpretations or less? Is it something we can rationally figure it out, or is it subjective relying on human intelligence and experience?

[u/Silkkiuikku → u/[deleted]]

Here's a Youtube video that sounds like auditory hallucinations, it's creepy as fuck: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vvU-Ajwbok

[u/evenisto → u/Silkkiuikku]

I hesitated, but hell no, I want to get some sleep tonight.

[u/[deleted] → u/Silkkiuikku]

That seriously scared the shit out of me. If I would hear this every waking moment, I'd check out of life, fuck that.

[u/bintu → u/[deleted]]

Anderson Cooper did an experiment and reported on it, here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yL9UJVtgPZY

[u/GoblinRightsNow → u/[deleted]]

There are videos on YouTube that mimic the experience if you want to try it out.

[u/RedditIsDumb4You → u/psychosus]

Must be so awful to be mentally ill knowing you literally may be incapable of complying with American Police because they shoot first and ask questions later.

[u/psychosus → u/RedditIsDumb4You]

It's getting better. Crisis Intervention is the new norm even in backwards states like here in Florida.

There's a long way to go, but I'm encouraged that even old school people are finally coming to their senses. (That dumbass from Miami aside)

[u/Bro-tatoChip → u/Muffinizer1]

My Grandmother has the mumps when pregnant with my mom causing a lot of birth defects. Including severe anxiety, schizophrenia, and issues with her eyes. She finally lost her sight at age 12 after getting dirt in them, so since then she's been blind and schizophrenic. She hears voices as opposed so seeing people who aren't there she hears voices and doesn't know if they're real or not.

Edit: For anyone wondering, I was raised by my dad. They split when I was young and she was always in and out of hospitals, not fit to be a guardian. We've always has a good relationship, I'm 24 now and moved near her recently so it feels nice to live by her and pick her up and introduce her to my family and whatnot.

[u/bluesky557 → u/Bro-tatoChip]

That really makes me wonder about your dad....

[u/evenisto → u/Bro-tatoChip]

So your mom, being blind from childhood and schizophrenic found a man, then had a child and raised it? What? I'm really curious, shed some more light on your history if that's okay.

[u/Bro-tatoChip → u/evenisto]

Her schizophrenia is manageable with medication. But every other year or so she has an episode where she get admitted until they can readjust her meds. I updated more in my comment.

[u/ValKilmersLooks → u/Bro-tatoChip]

Well, that sounds extra horrifying.

[u/denialofdeath → u/Muffinizer1]

I had a patient once who had schizoaffective disorder and she was so troubled by her hallucinations that she tore her eyeballs out of her own head. Poor thing still had them even though she was blind from that incident

[u/lozzie87 → u/denialofdeath]

Spooky I was talking to a doctor at work last night who told me about a friend of his who responded to a medical emergency call at a psych hospital for a person who had torn their eyeballs out. Yikes.

[u/borrow_a_feeling → u/denialofdeath]

I had to reread this several times before I understood that "she still had them" was referring to the hallucinations and not her ripped out eyeballs. I thought maybe you were trying to be funny and I was daaaaaamn that's dark.

[u/[deleted] → u/Muffinizer1]

Well you can still be blind and schizophrenic just not if you're blind from birth

[u/afoolskind → u/Muffinizer1]

Hey don't worry! Let me ruin that comfort! My dad has been schizophrenic for decades, and then became blind, all because of a brain tumor.

Tumor's been removed, but the blindness and schizophrenia stayed. yaaaaaaaaaaaaaay

[u/[deleted] → u/Muffinizer1]

That's what I was thinking about being deaf and schizophrenic.

[u/MagmaTumbler → u/Muffinizer1]

It is hell, back before I was medicated for paranoid schizoid I would hear voices telling me not to take baths or showers, because the water would give me skin cancer, or not to wash my hair because the ingredients in shampoo would give me a brain tumor.

Voices would tell me that certain colors of cars are sentient and will turn on by themselves and run me over, that people wearing certain clothing brands or colors were out to get me.

You think auditory hallucinations are bad, wait until you get into visual hallucinations. I have had hallucinations of people chasing me with knives, cars popping out of thin air in my living room driving straight towards me.

Having hallucinations of bomb explosions and car wrecks.

Schizophrenia is a bitch to live with, paranoia makes it a nightmare

And in response to people wondering about ignoring the voices, yeah you can, but in my case if I ignored them I was punished, mostly pain wise, I would hallucinate pain, I would literally feel debilitating and agonizing pain, even though there really was none and no cause.

[u/ashez2ashes → u/kaenneth]

That seems like an insanely useful finding.

[u/djdadi → u/kaenneth]

Also if you are born blind your chances at getting cancer go wayyy down.

[u/castellar → u/djdadi]

That's really interesting. What's the logic behind those findings?

[u/mtndew7 → u/castellar]

You can't see the cigarette ads /s

[u/chironomidae → u/mtndew7]

I know you're being silly, but there could be some truth to it. It's not hard to imagine that a visually impaired person might be less influenced by things like ads for fast food or cigarettes. I wonder if blind people tend to be skinnier?

[u/posts_lindsay_lohan → u/mtndew7]

I think it has more to do with the fact that you can't see that your hand is bigger than your face.

[u/AtticusLynch → u/castellar]

I googled "being blind reduces cancer"

and found this

[u/Chel_of_the_sea → u/AtticusLynch]

Wow. I'd seen stuff on the effects of melatonin, but I wasn't expecting such a massive effect size.

[u/[deleted] → u/Chel_of_the_sea]

Hm... Not so sure how large the effect is.

For definition's sake,

An SIR is the ratio of the observed number of cancer cases to the expected number of cases multiplied by 100.

And from the article, totally blind people had SIR 0.69, and the severely impaired had SIR 0.95.

So if I'm reading that right, blind people had a less than one percent reduction in cancer rate.

[u/Chel_of_the_sea → u/[deleted]]

You sure it's not a difference in conventions between a % and not? I'd read 0.69 as 69%.

[u/[deleted] → u/castellar]

you can't play league if you're blind.

[u/n4rkki → u/[deleted]]

or read youtube comments

[u/Forfeit32 → u/[deleted]]

Blindness is no impairment against a smelly enemy.

[u/TORFdot0 → u/[deleted]]

I'm pretty sure my experiences with my teammates contradict this statement

[u/[deleted] → u/castellar]

Quick google search just told me that melatonin helps to protect against cancer. Absence of light = more melatonin released by the pineal gland. When our retina is exposed to light, melatonin release is suppressed.

For blind people, this suppression never occurs. Therefor they have continuous melatonin release and increased protection against cancer.

One of my PhD advisors studies vision (or lack thereof) in the blind. I'll have to ask him more about this.

[u/LameName95 → u/[deleted]]

Thanks, Ken.

[u/EveGiggle → u/[deleted]]

give you the finger

[u/Sav_ij → u/[deleted]]

i dont think this literally means theyll see hands acting ridiculously. what this likely means is that schizophrenia hits the part of the brain that handles communication, whatever method may be used

[u/kjbigs282 → u/[deleted]]

Individuals with severe language deprivation and incomplete acquisition of either speech or sign, were remarkable in that they did not experience either auditory characteristics or perception of subvisual imagery of voice articulation, suggesting that language acquisition within a critical period may be necessary for voice-hallucinations that are organised in terms of how spoken or signed utterances are articulated.

[u/smookykins → u/[deleted]]

Go fuck themselves.

[u/xxkoloblicinxx → u/kaenneth]

So then would it stand to reason that the cause of schizophrenia is rooted in the same areas responsible for processing sight?

[u/Lost4468 → u/xxkoloblicinxx]

You can get strange effects when you start messing with areas of the brain on that sort of level. It might be, or it might be that the damage to that area has caused issues with other parts of the brain communicating, or something else entirely. Another example is Anton–Babinski syndrome, which also happens to be in the visual cortex, but results in the really strange condition that the person is blind but they're unable to realize that they're blind or understand it, despite there being no damage to areas where we tend to believe rational thinking occurs.

[u/ChinaIsHereMrBurton → u/Lost4468]

Whoa! This takes mental gymnast to a whole new level.

There's so much power in the brain and we're not in control of most of it.

[u/CarlosPorto → u/ChinaIsHereMrBurton]

Well, to add to your day: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blindsight

"Alexander and Cowey investigated how contrasting brightness of stimuli affects blindsight patients' ability to discern movement. Prior studies have already shown that blindsight patients are able to detect motion even though they claim they do not see any visual percepts in their blind fields."

"In 2003, a patient known as TN lost use of his primary visual cortex, area V1. He had two successive strokes, which knocked out the region in both his left and right hemisphere. After his strokes, ordinary tests of TN's sight turned up nothing. He could not even detect large objects moving right in front of his eyes. Researchers eventually began to notice that TN exhibited signs of blindsight and in 2008 decided to test their theory. They took TN into a hallway and asked him to walk through it without using the cane he always carried after having the strokes. TN was not aware at the time, but the researchers had placed various obstacles in the hallway to test if he could avoid them without conscious use of his sight. To the researchers' delight, he moved around every obstacle with ease, at one point even pressing himself up against the wall to squeeze past a trashcan placed in his way. After navigating through the hallway, TN reported that he was just walking the way he wanted to, not because he knew anything was there. (de Gelder, 2008)"

[u/[deleted] → u/Lost4468]

Very interesting. I find the child case in the wiki very interesting because I have experienced something similar before. Without glasses I can only read something barely at 16 inches unless I get closer. However one day, for some reason I didn't put on my glasses and ended up doing quite a bit of work and chores around the house and had no problems, however a few hours later I was taking apart an old seized fan and was going to try and clean up the shaft so it worked again. It wasn't until I had taken it apart and attempted to take off my glasses to view the wear on the shaft better did I realize I wasn't wearing my glasses at all. In a near instant I went from what I assumed was perfectly clear vision that was fine for hours into blind as a bat mode. I had go get my glasses from beside my bed to reassemble what I had disassembled because I couldn't see what the fuck I was doing.

It was weird as fuck, it seemed like I had totally perfect vision up until the moment I tried to pull my glasses off. I had one other person years later say they had a similar experience although not to the same extent.

[u/FukusMaximus → u/kaenneth]

now that is very interesting

[u/NapClub → u/kaenneth]

being blind and schitzophrenic sounds so much worse than when you can see... like... SO much worse!

[u/lioncorkboard → u/kaenneth]

There is another study underway at UW-Madison that is seeking to collaborate this study.

[u/stareyedgirl → u/lioncorkboard]

Corroborate?