Continuing the discussion from Just realized this forum doesnt want me here. goodbye:
I agree - I think this is an important topic - so lets continue the discussion. What things have helped you the most (everyone please add their thoughts) when you were delusional?
writing down my thoughts when i was delusional helped a lot, and then i ripped them up
I have been helped by my friend many times, by him explaining to me that the possibility of the FBI being after me is VERY slim.
And having my priest explain to me that God isn’t blessing me with special telepathic powers.
Listening to people who are rational and calm in their own states of mind helps me see the delusions as such.
Blessings,
Anthony
When I was severely ill, medication was vital. As I became better, other methods helped me.
First, the realization that I was mentally ill was a huge step. Once I realized that I was indeed mentally ill, I knew that my thoughts and perceptions were not always in line with reality.
Comparing my thoughts to those of people around me was important. A therapist once told me, in regard to my paranoia, “If it’s everyone around you, it’s probably just you.” This was so true. I started looking to others, those I trust, as anchors. I’d compare how I was feeling and thinking to how they were.
I’ve also learned, based on decades of illness, to identify when certain thoughts and beliefs that I have previously identified as unreal start to develop. When they do I need to lock down and become rigorous in my medication, my stress level, and my coping skills.
One thing I have found to personally be very detrimental to my wellness is to have my unhealthy thoughts reinforced, When I start feeling ill I need to avoid those things that strengthen my unreal beliefs.
Also, as a note, I have been helped beyond measure by people and their reality-based advice. While I can’t say I have always welcomed it, it has helped considerably over the years. I don’t think that people are always 100% on or off, there are degrees of illness and that is where reality based advice can help.
This might sound textbook, but my meds have been the only thing that helps, namely Haldol. I’ve been on it for years, and is my go-to when I am losing my grip. Nothing else has been able to put the kibosh on delusions and hallucinations…not therapy, not the inferior (to me) new meds, not the gentle voice of my wife. I firmly believe meds are the only way a person can come back down from Cloud 9. Some may disagree with this, and that’s fine, but this is a personal question that Admin has posited, namely, what works for you, the individual. So, in short, the thing that has helped me the most when delusional is meds, be them forced or taken freely.
Talking to my pastor of my church helped a lot. My delusions where all about the Christian religion and burning in hell forever. Another thing that helped was the medicine (Risperdone). It’s helped me to act normal (no more word salad, nonsense speak)
I talked to my family but it never really helped me. What helped me was just getting on the right med and everything became more clear. Honestly i still question my delusions and what happened 4 years later. But the hallucinations went away.
Being given a “point and shoot” camera that took very crisp, clear picture in almost dark. I was told to" prove it to me with a photo" well, yeah, I did very well. They even hold true when “all seems normal to all”
When someone is having a full blown fixed delusion then I would think only meds can help. I am medicated now but at times dip into delusional thinking and say to myself did I write this? or do I really believe in this? what was I thinking, I will tell myself. There is some blurry lines of thinking, This usually happens after the fact. I think we can just be supportive and not trash or mock what they write.
I write a lot just because I can’t help it. Sometimes I can read back and see how none of that made sense or even happened. Some of it is calm logic from my family.
But there are some delusions that I still have a hard time with but they are pretty harmless in the grand scheme of things so if one specific one starts to grab a hold I just have to work around it. I can do that with one of them.
My kidnapper one… well as soon as I even start thinking the word, I sort of pause and step back. If I can’t I do have family who knows the kidnapper glitch very very well and knows how to talk me down from that ledge.
Other delusions I just have to eventually ride out and deal with in hind sight. There are a few that really get me down but I don’t believe anyone when they are telling me the reality of the situation. My sis will say, “well, I you really feel this event is going to happen and it’s going to effect you, please write it out so I can understand it better.” when I start doing that and I go back to try and tie up a loose end and go back and try to tie up a loose end and again and again then it begins to dawn on me, “Caution, head circus at play”
The voices have lead all of my delusions and it’s been experience with them that has made me x sense. Some of them lasted years, some months , some just weeks. Now I have more experience I don’t tend to get bogged down in delusions anymore so the next things will b physical I think. If I can keep a clear head then they r going to have to do something pretty drastic to catch me out this time.
I was told that I was crazy. When my evaluation was finished, he said “can you guess what these results have to say about you?” and I said “I know I am a little crazy, but-” then the evaluator said “You’re very crazy” just like that. I said I heard people laughing in the hallway outside his door and he said “No, that’s you.”
I needed to be told I was schizophrenic. I was too confused with my hallucinations and I was extremely delusional. It took a long time and lots of trial and error with medications to get me back to normal. I am one of the lucky ones who got “fixed” by medication and CBT.
i talk it out with my wife, sometimes this can be for hours, and then go sit in nature away from noise, and sometimes i paint.
take care
p.s food helps to distract and change my mood through the intake of extra protein etc.
Just a word from my provider - You’re deLUsional today.
I understand more now that I’m mentally ill. In fact, the next time I visit my pdoc, I’m going to tell him I can be taken off the zydus form of my ziprexa because I do understand now that I need it.
good question, so far at age 48 nobody and nothing has been able to have an affect on my delusions.
you can’t prove them wrong cause i wrote them in between the knowledge, all my delusions are possible.
No such thing as gravity; no such thing as property rights or human dignity other than the deranged delusions in a bunch of psychopaths. Not located inside my human body, but rather centered in unreality, outside of time, from where I breathe life into my “time garden”, my little garden in time called onderdonk. That the demon world is located in fungus and insects, that their hive mind is the demon world and they have contacted me and I have been living in communion with them for decades. That the bugs crawling all over me are “real” contrary to every pdoc and psych hospital in america- cause I gotta tell ya, I sleep on a metal slab and I eat only antiparasitic raw vegetables and anti-parasitic teas, and i’m fine - no itching; only itch if i eat the human diet, you nuts are just blind to the damage you are doing to yourselves with your so-called “food”, oh yeah, here’s a recent one, that human beings are stupid for splitting themselves into male and female and then getting together to create zygospores, when it’s obvious from the book of eden that adam is absurd to accept an apple from eve, who needs her, kick her outta the garden and parthenogenerate a new mate with another rib, we made lillith and kicked her out for not submitting, now eve is just as bad, won’t submit, I say slaughter any one who plays as if they are one sex or the other, then when there’s almost nothing left, parthenogenerate new ones from some other ribs.And while we are talking about foolish splitting, how about the zoroastrians, and their idea about splitting the mind and behavior of man into two sides, called “good” and “evil”, and then actually try to evict half of themselves. And this took off, you got a bunch of monotheistic religions carrying on that old timey nonsense in the modern age, all science and reason aside, I live in the country where almost everybody believes in angels and demons and gods, according to surveys, most superstious population on the planet; and i sure do rub their foolish noses in it, bad dog!
oh yeah, the delusion that launched a thousand delusions - i created this at about twelve years old, and my parents were defeated, and declared that therefor i was “insane” - they were trying to manipulate me with a material posession. I continued to defy them. they were stumped. “Don’t you want it?”
I said of course I want it, that’s why you are using it to manipulate me, thing is, I’m not tied to what i want, I am free to want what i want myself to want, and I simply don’t want myself to want that, cause you are gonna use it against me.
That escalated to me taking all my belongings, gathered them up in a bedspread, took it downstairs, laid it at the feet of these parents, and said, there, take it all, now what are you gonna do?
so far no hospital, no doctor, no wife or friend, no medication, no life experience, no amount of pondering, will dispel any of these long held delusions.
i call it invincible irrationality, my ex wife is suing for divorce o the grounds of that but she terms it “incurable insanity”
and if you think you have some personal power, well, go for it.
§onderdonk
How to Help People when you think they are Delusional ?
First you must asses your own major problem. Here you have decided to proceed to help someone else who you “THINK” is delusional. Thus in turn you will most likely be trying to convince that other person that he or she “IS” delusional.
WOW…that’s nasty.
The “Martha Mitchell effect” at work again.
hey,
Taking the pills. Old story but really not much people say helps.
The trouble with delusional thought is that it’s a total brain ■■■■and everyone and everything involved is a part of that delusion…saying that…Keep an even keel. ie stay calm and agreeable. Listen! It’s not important what words are said really with a psychotic person but mood is a key! If they are agitated try to calm them down! Try to be agreeable but not convey a lot of useless information…ie Keep centered and convey the important information without adding extras or much emotion…
I always wondered why everyone ignored all my passionate pleas about the messages till years later I realised…it’s the mood and general information I’m saying which tells you I’m nuts…that is all that is important. What I was saying, in hindsight, was the ravings of a troubled mind!
Hope this adds !
Rogueone.
When this whole thing started I was in an imaginary hatfield and mcoy feud with my neighbors that I never met. What stopped me… what made me go see the doc for the first time, was the closer and closer notion of my getting violent. I scared myself. Arguments… feuds… politics… disagreements… they all have this realm they rest in of something akin to anonymity. And its only when the possibility exists of you breaching that realm that things get serious. I’d rather go see a doc than hype myself up to violence…
ah that act never works on me,
yeah the cops try to get you to “calm down”,
and as soon as I hear that I escalate exponentially.
they give up that calm even keel act pretty quick
when they think they’re about to be attacked.
ultimately, they always, eventually, back off
My family know better then to say “calm down” for some reason that just pisses me off more. I those words some how translate into “We are not going to believe you.”
My Mom will asks me to slow down because my words are too fast. My sis will ask me to explain it too her in more detail so the more and more detail I have to tell her about the more and more I do slow down because I can’t see the details when I’m upset.