PTSD after psychosis

After a prolonged psychosis, I think I got PTSD due to the trauma it brought… I feel anxious, fearful, shameful, lost, hopeless and lonely… I sit mostly in my chair and look outside my window. Finding it hard to cope with it.

After my psychosis I described my experience as having experienced a hundred wars in a span of 8 months, day and night… am very afraid that it will happen again, and I know I cannot cope with that. The meds brought relieve, but my best cure is and still is sleeping. My brain is healing now, but I do have PTSD symptoms from the experience.

I smashed all my furniture and now I have to buy new pieces. The psychosis has cost me thousands… so it also is a monetary loss, next to everything else it ruined for me. I bought a new rug, without any patterns on them as patterns turned into faces when i was sick. So I have no patterns anywhere on my interior. I have set fire to curtains, ruined many objects and items. I am recovering from that as well, and it has set me back massively financially.

Anyone else has PTSD from a heavy psychosis, and how did you cope?

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I smashes my walls (dry wall) when I had an episode. Now I have to fix them! This means I have to remove the floors. Rip the wallpaper and put in new drywall. I probably need to change the wallpapers in the whole living room.

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Feeling afraid that it might happen again… only thing that frightens me. Sometimes I don’t want to buy new things because I don’t know if they last.

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It’s certainly something to think about, but I don’t see any resources from MH teams to bother diagnosing these things when you already have a SZ dx

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I have PTSD both from real abuse and from psychosis. Even if it wasn’t real to the people around me, I genuinely believed that the most hellish tortures were happening to me and my loved ones. I also experienced the psychiatric treatment as extremely traumatizing and violent. I find it inconceivable that my MH team has refused to even acknowledge that this is traumatic. Let alone talk about it with me or - but that is apparently a radical thought - treat the traumas. I feel non-psychotic persons can get all sorts of trauma help. But once you have been psychotic, somehow your traumas are completely denied and ignored.

Sorry for the rant. I feel unjustice is done to me, as well as fellow patients, and want it to change.

How I cope? I don’t really know. I have all sorts of coping mechanisms, some helpful, some harmful.

  • I pray and listen to soothing (religious) music and hope after this life there is comfort.
  • I am very selective with the people I let into my life. I am only really friends with people who are very kind, predictable, honest, safe, warm. I avoid people who scare me…which can also mean I avoid someone kind because they have a tattoo or music taste that scares me. Which might sound unkind, but if I’m having nightmares and fears of that…I don’t feel at ease with someone.
  • I try to see my son and be there for him and have worry-free time together. This is most helpful.
  • I avoid what reminds me of all that happened - say, I couldn’t listen to metal music or watch a thriller movie or have physical contact with a man.
  • I tried to reconnect to my life history, my emotions and talk about them. I know now what got me into this situation, more or less, and that gives me a feeling of overview over my life.
  • I write.
  • I try to focus on small positive things in my life: playing a boardgame with my child, a neighbour smiling at me, a swim in the river.
  • I try to walk a lot and be in nature a lot, which is hard because I live in a very urban environment.
  • I read books that inspire me.
  • I avoid all news (tv, internet, papers) and world trouble and I lead a really quiet life with no smartphone, no tv, no job, no busy social life.
  • If I’m really overwhelmed, I withdraw into a safe place and try and sleep.
  • I try to be very aware of what helps me and what hurts me and listen to that. Even if other people find it crazy (“how on earth can you live without the internet, you idiot?!”).
  • And I do stupid things like run away and stay in bed all day and stare into space and drink wine sometimes to calm me and neglect my household… but that are the less helpful coping mechanisms. :slight_smile:

For me this quote was helpful: “When the big things feel out of control, focus on what you love right under your nose”.

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I had PTSD from my childhood that is mostly sorted. Still have leftovers, but I see therapists to keep discarding bits of it along the way.

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I too think that my psychosis may have brought on some PTSD. I think some of the things that I may have regarded as “negative symptoms” of sz, may indeed have been symptoms of PTSD. They seem to be fading with time.

Edit: I am not sure though, its easy to confuse symptoms of one disorder with another. I’m just glad to be making progress.

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Yes I did, I still do. Not as bad as before but I still do. What helped me was writing. I put what is in my mind on paper. I write about the experience everyday. This has helped

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