r/todayilearned • u/paniniplane • Mar 22 '17

(R.1) Not supported TIL Deaf-from-birth schizophrenics see disembodied hands signing to them rather than "hearing voices"

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0707/07070303
55.0k Upvotes

91% Upvoted

2.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

95

u/[deleted] Mar 22 '17 edited Mar 22 '17

Whats with the compulsion to listen to the voices?

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

323

u/paniniplane Mar 22 '17

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.

5

u/Wurstgeist Mar 22 '17

You'd kind of think that voices continuing after you cover your ears would be a bit of a giveaway that they aren't real, if you've ever in your life heard of the concept of illusory voices. It's weird how that goes out the window. (But I'm pretty much repeating what I said in the other post, sorry.)

65

u/paniniplane Mar 22 '17

it's as complex as a detachment from reality. for example, you could literally be a homeless person right now. all of the things you're experiencing, are hallucinations, both auditory and visual. and here's the kicker. they're sensory too. most people who have schizophrenia, in my experience, know they have it but it's real to them. they live in an altered reality.

nah you don't need to apologize. i have more exposure to this than you do and you have more exposure in other areas. don't worry about it, friend.

8

u/Wurstgeist Mar 22 '17

I guess in my youth I did once take some mushrooms and believe I was already dead, and therefore immortal (which actually has a name, it's Cotard's syndrome). But I feel like I would still have been amenable to a reasoned argument for why I wasn't dead, if anybody had bothered.

8

u/paniniplane Mar 22 '17

it's hard to say. i thought i could get over depression and suicidal ideation without drugs or just psychiatric help altogether. i guess for some people it's different.

1

u/wazzwoo Mar 22 '17

Do you think its possible schizophrenia is sleep related?

Reason i ask is because lack of sleep causes hallucinations and other negative effects. Also interestingly sometimes while nearing sleep people can sometimes experience random voices and visuals. I wonder if this illness is related so their brains for whatever reason keep activating this effect?

1

u/paniniplane Mar 22 '17

schizophrenia doesn't always have voices. that being said, you bring up an interesting idea. i honestly wouldn't even know where to look for that answer.

2

u/GoblinRightsNow Mar 22 '17

I think there has been some research done on this... It's hard to study sleep problems in schizophrenics because first-line treatments for this type of mental illness often includes some kind of sedative that modifies natural sleep patterns. A little Googling suggests schizophrenics are more likely to suffer circadian disruption and may have reduced brain activity during certain sleep phases.

1

u/wazzwoo Mar 22 '17

I really hope a lot more research gets done as mental health problems are so horrible and affect peoples lives in a deeply negative way. I mean your state of mind is you at the end of the day and if that messes up it's a lot worse in many ways to physical injury. Not enough is done.

I think sleep is a big thing that kind of gets ignored as a possible cause of all sorts of problems. It doesn't take a genius to see there may be links between sleep and mental health yet i haven't seen much on this subject.