How long have you been off meds? Average time to relapse is a year
1 Like
Medication helps put mind to sleep though it has lot of things going on it. Without it it will be tough to manage the sleep part which is essential to any mental illness. I felt it is necessary when I became normal. Other times I used to argue based on side effects only.
1 Like
I really don’t know.
Even on meds I have symptoms.
How much more if off meds.
1 Like
I just passed 8 months. My average time to relapse is 3 to 6 months.
2 Likes
a dose that high of haldol can cause catatonia…i was more psychotic when i was on 60mg haldol a day and going catatonic than i am on 6mg a day. so be careful to assume the higher the dose the better u should be doing
1 Like
I agree with irrelevant in that the dose can get to high so that you will have a bad reaction.
1 Like
Iris may I ask you a question. Don’t you have a University degree. That very intellectual way you formulate your thoughts to me sound like you at least have got a bachelorgrad.
1 Like
Everyone keeps mentioning that 2 year mark. I recently passed it.
1 Like
Congrats hope you stay well
1 Like
I’m getting the sense that many are hoping I relapse to put me back in my place.
1 Like
If so, they can bite it.
Nothing ticks me off worse than seeing people tear down those that are doing well after a hard fight.
2 Likes
The fight is ongoing. The amount of positive symptoms I live with these days greatly exceeds the level that would cause me to lose insight and relapse in the past. That is my daily trade-off for being able to function at the cognitive level I do. APs slow down the voices, but they also slow down everything else. I have to be very careful to keep on top of my therapy exercises - I think of them as maintaining the dam holding everything back.
6 Likes
I understand most of the diagnosis is anecdotal.
What appears asinine to my eyes, is that why is it the case that some people can go off medication? I’m on a high augmentation of medication, with a lot more than just an conglomeration of antipsychotics. So, I guess it appears that my particular case is not abnormal, as many people on here testify anecdotally that they can not go without medication. I firmly believe that my situation is more genetic than anything else; as my nurture elements and contingencies are well off.
1 Like
I whole heartedly agree with that. There’s 1001 different factors which determine the outcome. Meds are just one. Things rarely change in a hurry. Atleast in a lasting way. But if a person works on all these things they can lessen their meds.
3 Likes
I dropped out of highschool. Maybe I like intellectualise thing but it could also just be Stilted speech and I clearly suffer from Hypergraphia. These symptoms are spectrum, the more you practise writing the less it sounds like nonsense. I also have a special interest psychopharmacology. The more you read around the topics of mental health, the more jargon you add to your lexicon the smater it makes you sound. More important then sounding smart is making complex concepts easy to understand. I was studying Biomedical science but I put that on pause to study mental health because I think my passion is in peer support also. I want to maybe do some research one day but I’m so behind the 8 ball in terms of my formal qualifications hence why I forfill my passion by engaging in the forums rather then the workplace. People who I spoke to in MH reb were influential in my view on scz so I want to give back. I also have an inferiority complex because of the stigma associated schizophrenia so I decided to teach myself about it. I also promised myself that when I started medication that I would beat this and come off medication. After gaining insight I realised I needed medication it kind of morphed into a search for a personal cure for what is ultimately a chronic disorder. If there is enough motivation to learn about something you will, if you asked me about maths or physics I would know much.
@John_Raven
A lot of disadvantage is invisible, certainly many causal factors involved in stress are impossible to see. Sometimes it is also hard to realise what the source of stress is until it removed. I would discourage people defering to genetics to think their case is hopeless. There is always something that you can do and always something to be done in terms of recovery. Start where you are and do what you can. Have a growth mindset. There basically isn’t enough time in the day to do strength training, cardio, meditation, cooking all your own whole food meals, sauna.
1 Like
I am off meds for periods. And in other periods I use very low doses of haldol (0.5-1mg).
That does not mean you are weak. It means your illness develops differently. My mum died of cancer. My aunt did. My incredibly strong friend did. Someone else I know lived. Did she have a stronger mind? Or just luck, that her illness developped in a better direction?
If anything, I am weaker. 
Give me 1mg of haldol, and my body is falling apart (thrombosis, ER). If you’d give me 30mg of haldol, and caplyta too…I’d probably drop dead.
1 Like
I never had luck until I started making my own.
2 Likes
I absolutely do not say, you didn’t work incredibly hard to recover. Or that is unimportant. I too worked superhard to make my own luck.
What I try to say, is that some people work incredibly hard to recover, and still can’t do without meds. That does not make them weak. I find that important.
My friend with cancer did everything to make his own luck. He was a fighter. He was superpositive. He climbed the Alpe d’Huez…in a wheelchair…when he was sick. He survived longer than anyone they knew with that type of cancer. And still he died. As a twenty-something. I’d feel terrible if someone thought he didn’t try hard enough. That is not how it always works.
1 Like
Same. I wasn’t lucky off meds. It was hard as hell. It definitely doesn’t mean i got lucky or have less severe schizophrenia then someone who feels they need meds. And judging severity based on dosage doesn’t work. My schizophrenia was more severe when i was on multiple antipsychotics at extremely high doses and lead me to believe it was bad, but it was the high doses making things worse. Medicine improvement slows after a certain dosage as side effects continue to increase.
1 Like
It’s really pointless to compare. And theorizing that some people can just put up with symptoms isn’t really correct.
I have symptoms but far less than before. They’re not debilitating or even strong anymore.
1 Like