Hi everyone! I’m new here. Allow me to give a bit of background on myself that’s relevant to the forum. If you want to skip it (as it’s quite long) feel free to jump to my question at the end.
Until a falling out with a friend opened my eyes at 15, I never thought of myself as delusional. 15 I think was the time where I first became aware that something was just off about me. My life had always been strange, but I’d never put much thought into it. When I was very young, from 3 to around 9, I experienced frequent and vivid hallucinations. I recall sitting in my bed and listening to two men talking in my fan as they “fixed” it. I watched my paintings move and talk with each other. If I thought about a particular song I could audibly hear it. In addition, when I stared at my toys they began to swell as if they were breathing, so I thought they were alive and was always very protective over them. None of this ever scared me, it was magical.
However, according to my mom I was a very scared child. I had a great deal of trouble falling asleep at night and always slept with the lights on. It started out that I couldn’t sleep because I experienced HORRIFIC nightmares. Really gruesome stuff. (Ex. When I was 5 I had a nightmare where myself, my mom and best friend at the time were chased by fleshless dogs, that then devoured them alive as they screamed at me to help them), but eventually my fears turned into a general night time paranoia. I was constantly afraid monsters were coming after me to kill me, so I would sleep in different places in the house to throw them off. I also had an issue with seeing faces in things. I made my mom take a painting of flowers out of my room because I saw grotesque and deformed faces in it.
Anyhow my hallucinations would go away for a long time after I hit 9. What didn’t go away was my delusions. From age 5-12 I wholeheartedly believed I was a werewolf, a delusion which I now know I created to protect myself from all the monsters I was afraid of as a child. I created this in depth world and persona. It was very complex. From 12-15 I would go through a wide range of different delusions, from believing two angels controlled my luck on different days, to believing I was the next Jesus to believing I was God. I was deeply depressed and withdrawn during middle school, so perhaps they were a way to cope.
The older I got, the more paranoid and frightening my delusions became. At 15 I was suffering from one where I believed the devil was going to kidnap me and bring me to Hell because I was the next Jesus and he would rape me and force me to have a God-Devil child that would become the anti Christ. As I involved a friend in this delusion, and subsequently lost her as a friend, it opened my eyes to my issues.
For a while I did my best to fight off delusions, but I would get so confused over what was real. At 15 I had still not lost my night time paranoia that I had had since childhood. I just never felt alone in my room, no matter where I lived. (I moved a lot) Finally I had issues with a demon/demons, that began to harass and torment me mentally, physically and sexually. It got to the point where I was being raped and heavily abused by the demons, who would force thoughts in my head and telepathically scream profanities at me. However in middle school I had found God, and thus had him help me with all of my issues. This split up my host of characters who I am still confused over the reality of. There are my “helpers” who give me advice in life, have been with me through everything and are incredibly kind and understanding (God, Jesus, various angels, spirits, etc.) and then there are the antagonists, who drive me further into madness every day (the devil, demons, etc.)
To wrap it up, present day I am really not doing so well. I noticed a while back that anxiety GREATLY affects my psychotic symptoms. When I am not anxious they can be very mild. I don’t get frightened at night, and I still interact with all the characters but not so intensely. I am able to fight off delusions. When under stress (as I am now) it is nightmarish. I don’t know what is real. The demons didn’t let me sleep last night. Lately I haven’t been able to sleep because I’m terrified that my reflection is going to climb out of my mirror and kill me if I look away. Thanks to all the sexual abuse from the demons I am now absolutely terrified of men and even being near a guy causes me anxiety. Whenever I walk the streets I am deeply paranoid and afraid that I’m going to get hurt, or something awful is going to happen to me. I’m filled with rage at my inability to do anything about my situation, incredible confusion at everything that’s happening to me, I feel like I’ve been hallucinating more lately (I don’t have auditory hallucinations, just visual and they aren’t as intense as they were when I was young. I see colored lights emanating off of everything, and sometimes just floating around when I zone out. I see the floors swirl and the walls melt and objects swell. Like a big drug trip without the drugs. Lately I’ve started seeing awful things in the corner of my vision that vanish when I look at them. And whenever I close my eyes I see gruesome faces in the black.) Recently got over a delusion that I was a warrior being trained to fight in the apocalypse.
So yeah. Not doing so hot. But I don’t know what to do about it. I really badly want help. But I don’t know how to go about getting it. Even if I do find a psychiatrist, I feel like my issues are unbelievably convoluted and overly complex. It’s a mess that I honestly don’t think really anyone is capable of handling, because it’s not just one thing it’s a MILLION things wrong with me. I wouldn’t even know where to begin when telling a therapist things. I’ve only gotten help before for my anxiety and panic attack issues, and it was helpful, but those are such normal problems. I really don’t want to be put on medication. I feel like that’s what a psychiatrist would do. I don’t want to be judged for all of this either, because I realize it’s crazy. I just want to be able to have someone to talk about this with and speculate over why I go through what I do. I don’t want drugs shoved on me that are going to zombify me and a stigmatizing label.
How do I get help? Where should I start? Where did you guys start? Advice is much appreciated. I’m really messed up here.