Hello all,
I’m schizophrenic and in AA. I have 7 months of sobriety and try to go to a meeting everyday. I am relatively well liked, but find that I have a lot of difficulty sustaining friendships in AA. People laugh at what I share in meetings because it tends to be funny, but I get paranoid about whether they’re making fun of me because they can tell I’m schizophrenic. I tend to take teasing completely irrationally and find myself getting furious at people who tease me. I can’t spend too much time doing fellowship because i get incredibly irritable at simple things that I feel like are personal attacks against me but probably are not. Is anyone on here in AA and experienced anything similar?
I have 24 years clean and sober. My drug of choice was crack but I actually got clean by going to AA meetings. Congratulations on 7 months. When I first started getting serious about my sobriety and getting clean, I was going to 5-6 meetings a week. I usually walked or took the bus to meetings.
I am like that in real life but I keep a low profile in meetings. People pretty much leave me alone in meetings. Not because they are scared of me but because I am not a threat. I’ve been in MANY meetings with hardcore addicts and alcoholics. I sit there by myself and sometimes talk. I say funny stuff occasionally and I enjoy making people laugh. I’ve talked for 15 minutes before in front of a hundred addicts. I pulled it off. I don’t know what to tell you. I can tell you to not be so sensitive but I don’t manage to myself. It’s hard to tell someone is schizophrenic if they look and act normal. I have known paranoid schizophrenics who are completely open about it in meetings. They get laughed at but not in a mean way. They just put a humorous spin on their delusions and experiences of being schizophrenic.They are even popular. After 24 years I’ve learned that it is not highly unusual for some members to have been in psyche wards.These people are not diagnosed, they are normal in every way but they got drunk or high or something and they acted weird so the police picked them up and dropped them off at the psyche ward.
I’ve been sober for 4 years in februry. I attended meetings in the beginning, the first year. And later little now and then.
Maybe they laugh because they feel that they have done the same thing? Laughing because of the similarities between you and them?
Yes, that could be it from my experience. They all laugh at each other don’t they? So maybe they are laughing WITH you, and not AT you.
Also diagnosed SZ and a friend of Bill W. here. Sober for 22 years and counting thanks to AA. I had some of the same feelings as you did at first until I realized people were laughing with me, not at me. The farther stuff gets in life’s rear view mirror, the funnier it gets, and that’s a good thing. Sounds like you’re on the right track. Easy does it, but do it. Etc. 
10-96
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That was the same for me as well. At first I was nervous about the new people and I was anxious anyway… and not fully stable after being sobered up so quickly after years of constant stupor.
But as I got more steady on my feet and eventually got more comfortable… I too realized that we’re all in this together and people were laughing with me… not at me. As you get more comfortable and you get to know the people a bit more… I have a feeling you’ll feel better.
Good luck… I’m rooting for you.