I have doubts about my long-standing diagnosis of schizophrenia/psychosis

DX'd - Other
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I think what I have is actually personality disorder. To be specific, Paranoid Personality Disorder along with my already diagnosed Avoidant personality disorder. I have other problems, namely anxiety and depression that are helped with medication, but I don’t believe I’m schizo. Some of the stories I hear here, I don’t relate to, the voices, hallucinations, mania or delusions of grandeur. I do have disorganized thoughts, and sometimes don’t bother or have trouble organizing information, but think that could be attributed to mediocre intelligence or just bad organizational habits?

In recent years I’ve been reluctant to play doctor with myself (in the sense of diagnosing myself), but after some digging this seems like a personality disorder that came about from the environment in which I grew up, more than something that just came up out of nowhere from genetics. My brother has emotional/mental problems, but other than that, we don’t have a history of mental illness in my family. So it’s starting to look more and more like I have a personality disorder

I hate telling doctors that I disagree with their analysis, dealing with the eye-rolling and so forth, although I understand where they’re coming from. The medication does help with paranoia, so I’ll probably take it as long as my situation remains the same.

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embarrassed, i don’t know how to create a post here. unrelated to your post, my official dx list psychosis as an added feature, a depression not otherwise specfiied, mdd, ad, bipolar and supposedly a personality disorder.
i lose time. years of my childhood were erased.

that being said, i did not see a psychiatrist till in my 40’s. because likely of that personality disorder.
because of my ability to be functional, maybe poorly at times, nevertheless my pdoc allows me to choose my meds and such.
in the beginning i was often given blood test and such by him and docs that take care of physical illnesses.

i think i appear as if i do illegal drugs. i don’t feel i have the extra brain cells for that nor alcohol.

and i feel that aviding the sz type dx is a safety net for me. my doc allows me to speak freely without record. i do not want to be committed, and my doc respects that.

from what i know other than to get me to see a specialized person, as a general rule a patient should not be told a personality disorder exists. such were developed along with the personality. and are considered untreatable.

i don’t mention to this new doc about a personality disorder. i don’t need it acknowledged and feel such if such exist he will be or already is aware. i can’t separate the pd from the dissocciation of black outs. all i know is problems, such as aggressive men, are fixed. i am not given the information myself.

i have worked, even for the government. just want to let you know i feel it is likely the pd that allowed for me to function. my family if mi are untreated high achievers. i think i needed to have some of my disorders to function in such a socially elite group. we were poor as children. grasping financial success has been given them. and i’ve mostly had new homes and such myself. from an outhouse to 3+bath homes.

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p.s. i think personality disorders (pd’s) are common among the mi dxed.

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You might be right.

Here’s the deal,

It doesn’t matter what your diagnosis is,

Really.

We’re all treating symptoms here as there is no “schizophrenia pill”.

But I’m proud of you for looking at your illness and coming to some important conclusions.

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Have you ever had paranoid delusions and negative symptoms?

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I got to the point of paranoid delusions such as strange beliefs in technology that could view me through walls and such, but are they delusions if they may be true? Where do you draw the line between what could be true and what is true? I guess I’d need some sort of proof but I have trouble defining reality sort of, like when someone does something, or something happens, I tend to have trouble articulating exactly what is going on there in words.

As for negative symptoms, I hadn’t even heard of negative/positive symptoms until I started frequenting this forum. i looked them up and I’ll list a few that might apply to me:

Reductions in speech: This is tricky, as I’ve never been a talkative person and may just be a part of my personality. I’ve found I’ve gotten quieter since suffering from symptoms, but not sure if this relates to me.

Blunted response to emotional events: Definitely this one. I barely reacted when my father died a few years ago. And we had a decent relationship, and I liked/admired him. It bothers me that i never got to process that event properly.

Social withdrawal: I AM the picture in the dictionary next to social withdrawal.

Lethargy: This is one for me, although it may have something more to do with my thyroid problems (Which are admittedly slight). When I was working, I had huge problems keeping up with everyone else in a physical job.

That’s about it for the negative symptoms. As for the paranoid delusions, it’s hard to cut into that, as they aren’t delusions unless we believe them. At some point after medicating, I stopped believing many of them, although about half of them are at the back of my mind, and I do feel somewhat threatened by them. Again, these are rather mundane fears/concerns, that could potentially be true. It’s hard to say. I just have to trust my doctors about certain other delusions since they’d be readily apparent whether or not they’re true.

Thanks for the responses everyone, I really find this forum valuable to my recovery.

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normal: someone could view me, who cares it is almost impossible.

paranoid: omg, maybe someone is watching me!

delusion: THEY ARE WATCHING ME, I’M SURE! CAN’T YOU SEE IT?

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Okay, was delusional, now I’m just paranoid.

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