I was catatonic at the time looked like a wild man
I was relieved. They kept telling me i had depression
I was constantly in denial. Sometimes when Iām well I still deny it. Sometimes I think the doctors made a mistake. Itās hard to believe. But I also accept it too. Itās a vicious cycle. When I was rediagnosed after five years of remission I was in shock. I thought it went away. Iām only coming to understand sz now after 14 years since my first diagnosis.
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I knew I had something very bad so a part of me wanted to accept it but I was denying it at times. Then I remember one day looking through a long list of the symptoms and not being able to say to myself I didnāt have most of them. I broke into tears.
I definitely wasnāt surprised. I had a moment of clarity one time while āout of my mindā and actually realized i was schizophrenic. This was two years before i was actually diagnosed.
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The only thing that surprised me was the fact that it only took a week to diangose me. I thought it was like 6 months or something like that.
I did not want to believe it when I was first diagnosed. In about 1995 I think. I was just getting use to having PTSD and then this was just the tip of the ice burg. I was feeling that this could not be happening. I did not want to accept it. I was not liking taking my meds then eventually I took them religiously somewhat. In 2003 I tried with out meds because I just did not accept it and I did not want to be a schizophrenic. I tried for a couple of months without the meds just to see how long I could handle being without the meds I lasted 4-6 months then I was having problems . Then I started to take my meds because without them it was horrible. I did this three times. Just to come to the conclusion I need my meds. So i donāt end up in the hospital. I now take the meds so I donāt end up in the hospital. I had to do this just to make sure. So now Iām sure. I have schizophrenia and I canāt deny it any longer. Unfortunately I hate bringing this up in public the few people I do tell are people I want to be freinds with but I get mixed reactions at times so. I stopped making friends. Itās rough at times. But i have family relatives and such. So it does not bother me all the time but occassionally it does bother me. But i get over it. At least I try to get over it. But still donāt like it. OK rant over.
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I was the most convencing phsycotic ever. I had no phisical hints of sz. My family and friends were all caught up in my delusions with me. It wasnāt until I got arrested that anyone had a clue that all the people after me was only in my mind. I was wrapped up in my delusions for years. Although the threats had disappeared with the meds and I felt less stressed about my fictitious situation. I still believe that my situation had put me into phycosic and blamed others for my state of mind. My hallucinations were all very realistic and based in my delusions and reality. Eventually I believed I was never sz and went off my meds and got hospitalized. Had a pretty good doctor that didnāt force meds on me and waited until I was so overwhelmed by my hallucinations that I was beaging for my meds. This was were I accepted my illness and began to recover.
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Very interesting, why were these delusions so plausible?
I was just very convincing, Iām the kind of person that doesnāt lie or exaggerate, people tend to believe what I say. I got a guy fired at work because I thought he was after me, they actually sent another worker over to help with protection I had them convinced that he was a pretty bad guy. They ended up fireing him. Had my wife scared to death as I thought he was coming after her, because he was phsycotic an obsessed with some phsycotic movies. My father in-law had loaned us a shotgun that I carried around a lot for protection. My best friend had met with my boss because I had convenienced him of some going on things in the company and with this guy, that I was sure was a pedophile. I was convensed that I was drugged by this person and that he had taken incriminating pictures of me with a child that had been drugged. I had shared all that I knew with family and friends Drs. Police anyone that would listen. When you tell someone that you Know of a pedophile that is getting away with it people listen to you. When I got to the phyc ward and shared my story with a nurse that total ate it up I had asked for a transfer to a more secure phacility and they obliged. My family was very concerned about these pictures that they thought were out there so they had brought it up to the police and the Drs. I was really in a pretty bad place telling them things about pedophilia and acting all crazy saying thereās pictures of me out there and to disregard them. The doctors were taking my claims serious and brought my wife in to ask her about them ,she said heās never lied to me. The Dr. Went and talked with this guy and checked in with my employer , decided he didnāt believe me that I was sz. I was wrapped up with the police because I apparently made a bad choice of words on a 911 tape. I had called to disclose this information to them , they arested me on terroristic threats. Was hell for a few months. Things slowly went back to normal but I held on to these beliefs for a while. Funny thing episode 2 &3 I go right back to believing it.
I was psychotic. Did not react. My voice Jerek told me to check schizophreniform on internet. I did not know what it was.
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You didnāt give any positive or neutral response choices.
I was ill when I was diagnosed so it didnāt dawn on me or affect me in any way. And when I started to get better and it was mentioned in reference to me, I didnāt really care.
I accepted it, but it took a while to fully believe it.
I was shocked at first, then denial for about a year. Just recently have I accepted it and embraced it
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Honestlyā¦ it wasnāt until recently that I was finally diagnosed.
For the longest timeā¦
Literally, yearsā¦ I was left to wither away in my dark room, in the depths of my crippling depression and psychosis.
The people I lived with then didnāt do anything to help me. They didnāt even know half the sh^t I was going through. They didnāt care.
Insteadā¦ I was screamed at, name-called, and all sorts of other things, by my own mother mind you, for not āgetting betterā on my prescribed medication, which by the way, wasnāt even given based on an official diagnosis of any sort.
I was so bad off back then that I couldnāt even hardly speak two words. My mother did all the talking for me, so they never gave me an official diagnosis. Just a prognosis of ābipolar with psychotic symptomsā. They handed out medication based on what my mom had observed of me and told them.
I had no real support during the absolute worst years of my psychosis, when really I probably shouldāve been in the hospital, given my deplorable condition, and the wretched things I was experiencing to everyoneās ignorance/carelessness ā things I just could not express at all, as I was very catatonic.
I am finally in a good place now, and receiving the treatment I need.
My doctor is alternative, and told my father thatā¦ while most typical doctors would have me diagnosed with schizophrenia, he has me diagnosed with āpsychosis from traumaā.
Itāsā¦ it is what it is.
I have so many mixed feelings about it that I canāt really definitively say how I feel.
It justā¦ is what it is.
Iāll leave it at that.
At first I didnāt even know what it was. I was in the hospital. My third trip. They called my wife in and I was in a big room with three doctors a physicians assistant and two psych nurses
They sat me down at the table and told me my diagnosis was paranoid sz. My wife disagreed with them. I didnāt know what that was. Then one of the shrinks said if you donāt like that diagnosis we can change it to PTSD.
Later my primary shrink gave me the DSM 4 and let me read about sz
I had no idea what it meant when they told me what I had. My family seemed concerned that I might develop Alzheimerās early on in life but the doctors assured them that there was no correlation there.
They said that my illness was episodic so the prognosis was better. 15 years later in still disabled and getting worse every year. Iām convinced that psychiatrists know the least about their field than all the other specialties.
I still donāt know my official disgnosis. Itās serious mental illness though thatās for sure.
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shock and fear were the 2 things i first felt but i accepted.
I do hate the mystery of this illness. I felt so pissed whenever Iād ask questions about my disorder to a doctor and he seemed he couldnāt go to ANY specifics about the nature of this disease. Iād think to myself āis this guy for real? is this a doctor?ā
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My dr canāt give me a definitive answer as to weather I have bipolar disorder or schizoaffective. She always says. "Whatever you want to call this"
I guess it doesnāt really matter because the treatments are the same but yea itās frustrating that they donāt know more. The fact that they have no idea what the meds do and the whole practice is based on prescribing these meds that no one knows what they do frustrates me. I know what you mean.
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