The guilt of murder can be unbearable

DX'd - Other
#1

Sorry about the length of this post, but it’s pretty involved, and for God knows what reason I feel the need to vent about this horror I experienced during a psychotic break. I think I briefly mentioned some of this in a post months ago.

I’ve posted on here before about how part of my experience with psychotic breaks involves false memories, recalling things that never happened, in very vivid detail. Some of the false memories from my last break (2008) involved murders I believed I had committed.

One murder I believed I had committed involved wrestling for a gun a guy had pulled on me and, after getting the gun pointed up from under his chin and pulling the trigger, taking the gun after he’d fallen to the sidewalk and putting one bullet through each of his eyes. The memory then has me wiping fingerprints off, removing the magazine and the bullet from the chamber (things I don’t even know how to do, have never used a pistol) and fleeing, then returning to work as if nothing had happened.

Another false memory from that break had me leading a car load of guys, guys who were shooting at me while I was driving, into the path of a dump truck. I then drove over to where their car had come to a rest, took a bottle of liquor they had in the back seat, poured it over the one half-dead guy’s head, and lit him on fire. I then showed some sense of mercy by using his gun to put a bullet through his head.

My ex-wife tells me that during this same break she came home from work to find me curled up in a ball on the floor, saying that I had killed her dad. Her dad died from suicide a couple years before she and I met, before I had moved to the area where she and he lived.

I do not understand how a sociopath can commit murders without remorse. The guilt of these murders I falsely believed I had committed just overwhelmed me and destroyed me, until the meds pulled me out of the psychosis and I realized none of it had happened. It troubles me, though, that I could have done these things even just in my delusional mind, no matter how psychotic I was. These false memories haunt me to this day.

Anyone else have similar experiences?

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#2

my little brother said I choked him when we were little. I can’t easily live, knowing that. so I definitely couldn’t live with false memories of murders.

must be hard, dude.

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#3

Yeah, I know none of it happened, but I “remember” it so vividly that it’s still troubling. Like I wrote, the guilt absolutely destroyed me while I still believed it had happened.

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#4

I carry the memory of beating my math teacher to death. It never happened, but I still remember the feeling of bashing his head straight through the projector. The guilt was horrible, and I have since dedicated my life to making sure I have no amount of aggression anywhere inside me. The fact that I could dream up something so violent really scared me, because I am extremely opposed to violence of all kinds. I have spent years training my brain to never lash out, even when I am physically attacked. But sometimes, I still think about the rush I felt when I did it, and it scares me.

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#5

Yes, I had the guilt of believing I had killed people but I didn’t have any memories of the killings so I can only imagine how horrifying it is to have false memories of them. The delusions disappeared when I started taking an antipsychotic.

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#7

Exactly, and I’m very opposed to violence as well, haven’t even been in a fistfight since I was a teenager.

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#8

I still remember that when I was psychotic I had voices telling me I was a murderer. The kept going over how innocent things I was doing had the effect of people dying. I was freaking out and asking people that I knew if I caused to someone to die because of actions that I did. Not exactly a false memory but while psychotic I believed that I was a murderer.

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#9

I would have to question myself about the ability to fire a weapon if you don’t have the knowledge…nothing is obvious to the uniformed. when I’m psychotic, I’m sure I know how to do things, but they never happened.

#10

Oh, I realize that I know nothing of firing a pistol or assault rifle, have never shot or even held either, but in my psychotic mind I believed it. The only guns I’ve ever fired were a .22 rifle and a deer hunting rifle (don’t know the caliber), both when I was a kid.

#11

That shocks me to know that

Ok

Are you born again?

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#12

I have been pondering lately about whether or not violence can be a part of a moral life. I can think of all kinds of arguments pro and con. As for murder, as long as you don’t actually commit the act - as long as it remains completely inside your head - I wouldn’t worry too much about it. I don’t understand why someone would burden himself or herself with such guilt. Maybe you could benefit with psychotherapy, if it is available.

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#13

Yes I’m okay now daze. Thanks for your concern.

#14

Good honey it happens I was schooled after catholicism into evangelical free.

I’ll never forget it

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#15

Therapy is not really available to me, but I don’t think I need it, anyway. I mean, it’s not like I’m carrying around much in the way of actual guilt, knowing that I didn’t do these things. I still just can’t believe that I could of thought up such things and truly believed them, not to mention how disturbing the false memories themselves are, still being so vivid when they cross my mind. I don’t think about it that often, but today has been an exception.

#16

I am so sorry these stuff happened to you :disappointed: This illness is so bizarre

#17

I don’t have false memories of murder but I know how vivid false memories can be. I believed I had terrorized all the worlds religious leaders and had them believing they were going to Hell before I ‘saved’ them and united the world in peace. I would never terrorize anyone but I really believed I had tormented and terrorized people. I am sorry that this has surfaced for you today and I hope it goes away quickly.

#18

When I was delusional I thought I had killed someone because the scientists that ruled my virtual computer world showed me a lyric about a head in a trash can. I later believed that all the cops found was spaghetti in the trash can.