One thing I’ve noticed during my time reading posts on this forum is that even the most grounded psychologically resilient sz sufferer seems to be vulnerable to losing insight at some point during the psychosis. I think that the moment you lose insight into where the strange thoughts and feelings are coming from…that’s the point where grandiose delusions begin to develop.
I think the high prevalence of grandiose delusions among sz sufferers can be explained by looking at the mental tendencies of the sufferer. People get concerned either with their primal fears (I’m being watched, someone is trying to poison me, there is some kind of conspiracy taking place) or with matters which are very important to people regardless of their mental state (religious experiences, demonology, taboo or inappropriate situations and impulses, the potential of violence from the self or others.)
I think it wouldn’t be a waste of energy for clinicians to start evaluating schizophrenics based on the obvious thought patterns which are characteristic of the different delusions I mentioned. Maybe they could treat psychosis better if they understood the origins and psychological background which produces the delusions.
One case where a sufferer describes the elaborate delusion they suffer from:
I really found this description interesting. It reminds me of my experiences of meeting other schizophrenics who have had analogous mental processes.