Recently I had a few flashes of clarity that persisted more than usual. I experienced those previously. Normally it would still leave trace of doubt and delusion. However, with each following occurrence of clarity, it lasted slightly longer and it was slightly more firm than the one before it. It happened a few times a year since 2020 ish.
Now it seems I am completely free of delusions. And almost entirely free of hallucinations of any kind. Note, I had all types of hallucinations, tactile, visual, auditory, pseudo (internal), “true” (external), and they used to be as frequent as every fifteen minutes.
What is important, for the entire duration of my active stage of the illness, since 2015, I took no anti-psychotic medications. I only changed my diet slightly since autumn 2021. I feel focused enough to work out (physical exercise, calicthenics) every day, something that previously I couldn’t ground myself enough to do.
Here is the question. Did anyone here hear or experience suddenly and firmly getting better without targeted professional treatment? I am confident in my progress, but I am scared to lose even a part of it.
This is a topic was brought up before, of course. However I still feel it to be beneficial to document and share, however informally, my progress.
I am on a minimum dose and i had a relapse about one year ago. The nurse gave my partner medication with a plan. My partner gave me the pills three times a day for two weeks. That brought me back to planet earth. When i wouldn’t have taken the medication i had to be hospitalised with policeforce. Anyway, i took them and i am back to the minimum dose, but i am back in the mental health system after 10 years of being out of the system. I am getting monitored for my own good. I think you can do the same, you need a plan, in case you relapse. I hope you won’t relapse and everything goes well. Why not ? You are young, its your life, you should be in control what you do.
I’ve been stable and med free since 2019, but I work at it.
I have changed my diet, sleep, exercise, and what I consume for media (almost no TV, and only feel good media or documentaries). I also do a self healing group class and 1 hour talk therapy every week that has been so great at helping me let go of old negative thoughts and ways of thinking.
I basically stick to all things healing and actually feel better now than I did before the two years of hellish voices and not knowing which reality I was in.
Good luck on your healing
A huge thing was I stopped all caffeine, drink mostly water and water with fresh fruit added. I eat more fruits, veggies, much less sugar, or animal products. I’m not full vegan, but I eat 80-90% vegan. I still will have a few things that maybe I’ll let go of when I’m ready. High fiber foods are better because they move through the bodies system faster, less time building up and bad gut bacteria. It changes the amount of energy I had as well, I didn’t feel hazy.
Sleep is very import too, I use to stay up until 1-2, now I’m normally 11-12. It’s easier for me to think of as a bunch of little changes, then to think I’m going to change everything…which is what I did by little tweaks (that I’m still learning to do better).
Take the medication until told not to by a doc. My only advice is to remember all the healing, natural or scientific, has yet to be able to reconfigure neural pathways, rebuild damaged areas in the brain, or re-configure the electrical pulses that beat through the different sections. There are some promising leads like electrodes directly into the brain to “fix” the rythm of electrical impulses within affected sections of the brain… this helped in tourettes and is being studied for other mental illnesses.
disclaimer: I could be wrong on these assumptions I am not a doctor.
Schizophrenia i think ebs and flows like the tides. Someitmes its okay sometimes bad. I would warn you to not think youre cured or anything and continue the med treatment. It invariably ends in another psychotic break.
Did you eliminate gluten or carbs from your diet? If you have undiagnksed celiac that could be one reason for significant mood improvemnt and possibly less hallucinations.
I was never formally diagnozed and I never took any antipsychotic medication since psychosis in 2015. The reason for that is a combination of poverty, delusions, neglect and corrupted medical system in my country. Hence why I considered sharing my experience here as something mildly interesting.
I did change my diet since around autumn 2021. I violated the restrictions occasionally however. I go into details here Impact of diet and mild intoxication
I also started to work out since january 2022, and kept up with it until june 2022. I stopped because I mildly injured my shoulder. I would say it helped with clarity but I did work out in past years too yet stayed very much delusional.
I mostly documented my journey on this forum. I am well aware how different schizophrenia can be. Even when I gained much insight in summer 2020 I was still very much delusional. It is difficult to describe. Even with insight I still had a degree of “anosognosia” or being oblivious of the fact that my own behaviour and thoughts are deviant.
I would say what snapped me personally back to reality is a conversation on a particular topic with a particular person. Explaining it in detail will take too much time. But basically, my delusions and hallucinations were unexpectedly and suddenly proven completely false with staggering certainty. And this wasn’t the purpose of the conversation at all, it was subtle.
Of course the nature of delusions is that they defy any reasoning or criticism. Hence why I consider this sudden change of getting rid of delusions and hallucinations for three months now so fascinating.
Did you eliminate gluten or carbs from your diet?
No, I consume a lot of bread and grain. I would say what had the most impact on me is getting rid of tea, vegetable oil and fried food, as well as any kind of diary products. I am also vegetarian since 2000s so I can’t say anything about eggs, fish or meat.
Funny that you should mention Tourrette’s. This is actually one symptom that persisted even after hallucinations, delusions and eating disorder vanished. I still talk nonsense to myself uncontrollably. Severe vocal outbursts