There seemed to be years leading up to my development of actual schizophrenia. I am wondering what others’ experience was
Years for me too, I think
What made it so difficult for me to see through, was that as I was being diagnosed as psychotic, I really was being screwed over quite harshly by insurance companies after breaking my neck.
There was no delusion involved in this… Just a harsh reality
But I’m through the worst of it now, and learning to cope better with the passing of time
In hindsight, things went wrong for me in early 2011 while I was in college. But I didn’t have my first psychotic break until December 2016. So almost 6 years I spent in prodromal phase, wandering around not having any idea what was wrong with me.
Like five years. I went from all As and Bs at age 25 to getting a bunch of Fs and having to drop out due to lack of concentration. Then when I hit 30 the voices started and I became delusional for awhile.
@Tulane I think I walked around in that state for about 13 years. It was horrible in hindsight, but at the time I just accepted it as my new reality
wow, 13 years. That must have been miserable. I know I was, at least, during my prodromal phase. Suicidal, drinking heavily, conspiracy theories, isolation. It was awful.
I have suffered the same slide in achievement level @agent101g . Before all this s*** began, I worked full-time and did martial arts twice a week, as well as playing in bands on and off. Now… Don’t ask lol
I can relate to all of that @Tulane . Every day was a struggling to find a reason not to off myself. I drank like a fish, and loathed the world. I don’t miss those days, that’s for sure
I’ve always had this central thought that commented on what I did. I didn’t get psychotic till I was 29 but leading up I slid into psychosis. My psych notes are insidious onset.
About 3yrs before diagnosis.
Had the negative and cognitive symptoms, positives weren’t so bad. All symptoms got worse with time until I was put on meds.
Yeah, the positives such as voices didn’t start for me until about seven years ago. Diagnosis was always Complicated by the fact I had a head injury
my prodromal phase started at about age 19, it started off with paranoia my girlfriend was cheating on me, that the gov’t was spying on me, that the cops were out to get to me. things like that, just thoughts, but i held it together and worked a job until age 27 when i got diagnosed. i started hallucinating at age 28, so you could say my prodromal period lasted 8 or 9 years.
also i had real bad social anxiety back in the day, i would go to work and that’s about it, another symptom perhaps, i didn’t like to go out and socialize, i even made an effort to not go through the same fast food drive through more than once a week, so employees wouldn’t remember me.
I still struggle with this. With one or two people I’m fine, but once there are more than five people in the room, I feel like I’m crawling out of my skin. It feels like I need to keep track of everyone’s words and actions, and I can’t keep up. An obsession with being judged perhaps? I’m not sure
i would say the number 1 cause of my social anxiety was my moderate acne. i would freak out about it and not want to be seen, but i had roommates and friends, i would wait for a day where my skin was clear to go out in public, it’s terrible, that’s what started mine i think. later i learned if i just avoided dairy my skin wouldn’t break out.
i no longer have anxiety btw.
I was really delusional for 2 weeks and having schizophrenic symptoms and then it went away for a year then full blown schizophrenia with voices and everything
Wow, that’s a lot to deal with in such a short period of time. How are you doing now?
I’m doing better now of course I’m not like before schizophrenia but I’m doing ok just waiting for newer meds to come out
Me and you both. I’ve read some exciting things about the next generation of antipsychotics. I have my fingers crossed they will work as well as promised. I don’t get any relief from the voices at all on Abilify