Hey everyone, hope your day is lovely…
I am having some issues lately that my friend who is bipolar schizoaffective has pointed out to me…I don’t think that I have schizophrenia, but I’m very worried that my brain started doing this after my friend told me that I might have it. I have a new therapist, who moved from Puerto Rico a year ago, and is super new at her job. She went to another therapist to ask for advice about my symptoms, and she diagnosed me with depersonalization/derealization disorder, which I totally have, I can agree with that. My friend has been with me as I had my “freakouts” as I call them…This next story might be triggering to those who care about animals (No animal was harmed). That being said, let me explain. I was taking the trash out at work, and I saw a lady just dump trash into our dumpster and my IMMEDIATE thought was: “There’s a cat in that bag.” I started pacing back and forth next the dumpster breathing heavily, and almost even reached in to grab the bag. I had NOT seen a single sign indicating that there was even a cat in that bag. But my inner voice was loud about this. I messaged my friend and they calmed me down…Thank goodness. There was no cat in that bag, by the way.
I usually have that inner thought thing going on alot. It’s usually loud (It stays inside my head though) But I WORRY whenever I see anybody whispering or even looking at me, that they are talking about me…I could be talking to someone and if they look at me, my inner voice goes “They’re staring at your ugly acne scars.” And then I feel absolutely beaten and defeated. Sometimes when I am out, like at the diner I love, the inner voice says ridiculous things like, “There’s poison in that coffee.” Which I know isn’t true, so I dismiss it entirely. Earlier tonight I had this same thing happen to me and my boyfriend, where I thought, “He’s going to try to kill me.” Which when I have these thoughts, I don’t freak out at all because I hear them and think that they are silly. He’s so nice to me, why would he even think of hurting me? This inner thought confuses me because it’s not a distinct voice…Or even a familiar voice…It just one of my thoughts that seems…Louder than the others?
I also feel uncomfortable walking by windows at night…If I’m using the bathroom, a lot of times I opened the cabinet so the cabinet door is against the window and that makes me feel so safe…I don’t know why…I know schizophrenia runs in the family a lot of times…So that makes this EVEN more concerning, because my uncle on my mother’s side had it, and my brother has it…I don’t know people on my father’s side, so who knows? Another thing I do is have such strong pings of regret, so frequently, that my body physically feels really tensed up right after remembering a memory and feeling the regret. My mind keeps playing back all of these incidents that I’m sure no one but me remembers, like for example, telling a coworker about how rude my roommate is. Then I feel like I’m complaining too much and get that physical feeling. It’s so hard to stop thinking about things like this…I try so hard.
Also, I am creative and love to do art. I always write stuff on my art that seemingly comes from nowhere. I wrote this just the other day: : “Shrivel. The Garden Party goes on, rain or shine. Abortion or unbirthing. The chrysalis has fallen among the black sheep. It is you, whose wool lulls me to sleep. Wool that whispers into my skin.”
I’m bringing these things up, because…I’m scared…I’m scared that this might be going undocumented. I don’t know all of the signs, so what if I’m not bringing up key signs to my therapist? I think I covered most of the bits, but I’m just super worried about this and have only seen my therapist 4 times now…But she told me when I was worried about this, “You’re not schizophrenic. You would be constantly moving your hands if you were.” But what am I? I’m sorry if I disrespected anyone by posting here…I am truly sorry.