I think I have a new favorite theory of psychosis.
If you read all 4,957 words in the online PDF, the author does make a couple of negative-sounding comments about antipsychotics, but he makes even more positive statements about them. He indicates that antipsychotics can help us “to avoid existentially distressing issues,” and that some antipsychotics “endow an individual with an increased ability to repress unwanted thoughts.”
Although I agree with the author’s primary hypothesis, I don’t agree with all of his negativity about antipsychotics. Whether we like it or not, many of us little people have to face existential distress, and antipsychotics are one of the main tools we have to cope with it. Shell shock might even be seen as resulting from extreme existential distress resulting from direct threats to one’s life, and I think I would like to see the author prevent shell shock with his fancy existential psychology.
Oh dear. More theories posing as facts. People are always claiming that they “know” the cause(s) of psychosis and schizophrenia and how to cure it, including reputable psychiatrists. It simply gives false hope to desperate people looking for answers.
YouTube is one such source of miracle cures and miraculous herbal remedies. They are as much use as the mad conspiracy theories that pollute cyberspace.
Can we just be honest and admit, we don’t know what causes schizophrenia, or how to cure it. Yes, you have innumerable degrees and diplomas, but you are still left in the dark, like the rest of us.
Well, the author does make clear that it is just a hypothesis, and needs scientific testing to make it a valid theory. I believe it is far too ambitious to be so negative about antipsychotics on the basis of a mere hypothesis, though.
I’d just like to say/point out, that the two major episodes that I’ve had in my life centered around a grievous loss. The first being that of my mother when I was 11 and diagnosed at 14, and the other at age 26/7 when my first marriage came unraveled. In both cases, I mentally struggled to overcome them, and an average of 5 years of medicine for each loss didn’t touch my symptoms, and actually gave me more problems than I had before. Not anti-medicine, anti high dose medicine.
Perhaps the author is right in some cases. Perhaps it’s all a great big f-ing mystery and nobody’s hypothesis is any better than the next’s.
A common mistake when gauging a new hypothesis is to see in it an either-or dilemma rather than an enriching contribution to an ongoing debate. The paper’s thesis is not exactly new, but it adds weight to the enviromental dimension of sz onset. There is ample evidence showing that individuals in a vulnerable position are more likely to develop sz, genetics notwithstanding. The author, however, runs into serious, arguably fatal, methodological difficulties when he conflates absence of evidence for a biological explanation of sz with evidence of absence. But I agree with him regarding antipsychotics. They remain to this day a blunt, often inefficient tool in the road to recovery.
I’m sorry to hear that you lost your mother at such a young age. That must be difficult.
I feel that the dose of medication I was given for most of my first 6 years on it was way too high, also. Zombified patients appear to be preferred as less of an inconvenience.
I also dislike the way the author seems to imply that psychosis results when a person refuses to confront issues. I don’t think that’s how the coping mechanism works.
I think psychosis results when a brain that has this technique as a protection built in genetically, automatically goes into a protection mode to prevent things like PTSD and shell shock. It may cause temporary loss of function, but less permanent damage.
For instance, I’ve never mentioned this on the forum before, but once I was roughed up (some say beaten) by about 6 armed men with guns and clubs for about 30 minutes when I was unarmed. My parents still have a video.
People are amazed I don’t have PTSD or at least an enhanced fear of people, weapons, or such.
I don’t. It didn’t seem to affect me emotionally at all. Why?
I was psychotic at the time. Being in another world emotionally enabled me to cope, and avoid the existential distress that might have otherwise caused permanent emotional damage to my brain.
So, I think psychosis can serve as a useful coping mechanism to protect the brain. That’s one reason why I like the author’s hypothesis.
