I’ve quit meds before too and I went crazy. I’ve been court ordered to take meds now for five years and I haven’t been in the hospital once. I still hear voices but I’m a lot less agitated.
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I switched over to a new Antipsychotic last June and quickly began to lose my mind.
I was involuntarily commited to the same Hospital twice within a 2 month period.
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Well fortunately I did not experience hallucinations or voices. I experienced delusions of persecution, delusions of reference, erotomanic delusions. I was paranoid about the number 666 which for some odd reason is on all the police cars in my country. I thought we were living in a highly sophisticated surveillance system to the point that people could read our thoughts. I thought the media/radio/tv/internet was monitoring and tracking me and had special messages for me, talking specifically to me. When i would hear a song, by Hozier for example, I would believe it was written for me with 100% conviction. It was actually quite debilitating/disabling. I felt violated all the time. I felt I had no privacy.
On top of this, I experienced social withdrawal, anhedonia, apathy, depression and anxiety.
I was unwell for three years from 23 to 26. I am v much recovered now. Im 28. But I have not had a relapse yet. In retrospect, at the time, I was reading alot of conspiracy theories, dystopian fiction, Biblical prophecy etc that precipitated my first break with reality. I took it all to heart. It started when I began to believe the infamous Rothschild family were monitoring me. I don’t think it will happen again.
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Well, going off meds is a serious decision, and you should work toward it with your pdoc. Don’t take major decisions on your own!
I’m glad you are pretty much recovered. I struggle with negative symptoms like anhedonia, alogia and avolition. Meds don’t help. I’m thinking of coming off the antidepressant and minimize the antipsychotic dose, cause they haven’t been helpful so far. Luckily I no longer experience positive symptoms though, so that’s a plus 
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Me neither. I think I do struggle with apathy and a loss of libido though from the meds.
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I quit antipsychotics for a year because of side effects but I became increasingly more aggressive and paranoid. Eventually the anxiety and panic attacks got to be too much to handle so I went back on meds. I think I’d be okay if I went off them again in the future though
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I think everyone in this thread has been there
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Have not took a ap in 3 1/2 years or so,
Went off meds for like a couple months,
and Talked to pdoc recently and I chose to get back on a anti-anxiety and SSRI.
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I’ve done it once and learned a lesson.
That was a horrible relapse I never wanna experience again.
So I’ve done everything I could to find good meds, now I have no trouble staying on meds.
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I stopped taking meds at the start of 2016 because I didn’t believe I had schizophrenia. I continued to consume several different types of street drugs, weed on the regular. Somehow at the time, I was helping run a business with a friend, he did most of the clientele work and I had the job knowledge. I think I lasted about 6-8 months off meds and then in the space of about 3 weeks I went downhill very quickly and I was involuntarily put in the hospital, although I was struggling the whole time off meds, those last 3 weeks were severe.
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When I was diagnosed, I was told that if I ever went off my meds without consulting with a psychiatrist, I could cause damage to my brain and get even worse than before.
A few years later, I kept forgetting to take my meds until I finally went one full week without them, after having forgotten to take them at least 2-4 times a week for a few weeks.
… It landed me a three-week trip to the psych ward, and I have to take a higher dose than I did before.
They warn us about doing these things for a reason.
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I quit meds 1515
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Let the countdown begin
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