Posts by Karen Garcia4

I’m with Dave on this one, though I suspect it’s tied to this sudden heatwave... It's hard for anyone to stay chill when the temperature is spiking like this. Normal people are getting on edge, let alone everyone else.

Larry Lewis said:Honestly, I couldn't care less about all those medical diagnoses—as long as the money keeps rolling in, they can call it schizophrenia for all I care. Let them chase their little pipe dreams. And frankly, I don't give a damn what anyone thinks of me anyway.🙂

I couldn't agree more. If some distant relative from across the country suddenly cut you a check for $10,000 every single month for the rest of your life, believe me, you’d be looking at a psychiatrist pretty quickly... $133I wouldn't have had any time for that...🙂

slystag43 said:Has anyone else here spiraled into total madness besides me? ☕

To be fair, schizoaffective disorder 🤷☕

--->

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schizoaffective_disorder

😉

Oh, wonderful. For years now, my entire family, doctors, and everyone close to me have been telling me to just accept the diagnosis—that by denying it, I'm only making things harder. And then, once I finally decide to face it,
someone actually tells me that's not what I have. To make matters even more ironic, it's coming from someone else dealing with schizophrenia...

Larry Lewis said:car

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVDBn4S61E8

That's a genuinely great song... immediately made me think of heading to the coast.

I’ve never allowed myself to dive too deep into analyzing my own psycho-emotional states. It never ends well. Just look at how the people around you live. In my line of work, I see some of the toughest cases of all kinds of mental health struggles—people who never even consider that their behavior isn't quite right. They always blame their aggressive outbursts or depressive episodes on external factors. They cling to conspiracy theories that don't exist and jump to conclusions that remind me of days spent in the hospital...

What I mean is, once an episode passes, when you finally realize you were just high or out of it, you stop thinking with a "psychiatric brain" and just move on with life, through the good days and the bad. Realistically speaking, being a psychiatric case in America today isn't easy. You're still met with looks of fear or pity—looks that make you want to either lie about it or just lock yourself in your apartment and never come out. In those moments, when you feel depressed, you aren't actually depressed. You're just, unfortunately, being realistic.

I had to completely overhaul my social life. Friends I used to have became mere acquaintances, and acquaintances became people to avoid. My two best friends today are both psychiatric cases—former ones, hopefully. If I could just find a girlfriend with a diagnosis, I'd be the happiest man alive...🙂

Larry Lewis said:Honestly, you delusional people—this Zeldox has been the only thing pulling me out of the absolute gutter I was stuck in. I was actually starting to think about checking myself into a psychiatric ward at Mayo Clinic... just a hair's breadth away from that point, really.🙂

Well, good grief... I can handle just about anything life throws at me, but a hospital stay? That's where I draw the line. Definitely something to avoid at all costs...

John Perez8 said:I came across this listed as a symptom on one of those medical websites 🙂 You clearly haven't read the whole thing, or you simply have no interest in doing so. Whatever.

I was watching this movie the other day where Leonardo DiCaprio says that's actually the laziest word in the English language.🙂 So, you don't exactly strike me as lazy. Rest your case...

I'm not trying to defend anyone; I just think the behavior described could be interpreted in so many different ways. Honestly, I doubt even a licensed psychiatrist could give you a definitive answer based solely on what you wrote. There's just way too little information here...
@Mr Pringles gave a great response, if you ask me....

Robin Lopez2 said:That’s exactly why I believe—if you look at it from the opposite perspective—that every believer is a potential schizophrenic. There is always that underlying possibility that the illness could manifest in all its full glory, even if it doesn't necessarily happen that way.

I think you’re missing the mark there. Personally, I wasn't a believer; in fact, back then, I would have actually agreed with your sentiment because of my anti-religious stance. I always found believers to be boring, narrow-minded, and weak. It felt like they weren't truly living life to the fullest since their existence was just a collection of prohibitions and empty promises. Honestly, it was just unappealing.

Faith ended up being my last resort, and sometimes I feel like I only used it as an escape hatch. I'm not saying I'm "cured," but the kind of life I've lived over the last eight years is more than what some schizophrenics experience in an entire lifetime...

And... yeah... I've encountered plenty of Napoleons, da Vincis, and even the late Clinton, so don't worry about me. Illness always finds its own sense of mysticism, even when none exists.

@John Perez8, I'm actually a pretty cheerful person and always up for a joke, which, by the way, I’d recommend you try sometime. It feels like you've firmly decided to hand out diagnoses to everyone you meet. Luckily, I've already got mine...🙂

You can't exactly expect someone struggling with schizophrenia to get a kick out of thinking their waiter is actually from the Mall of America. Where's the fun in that? The real mystery lies in faith. It’s that kind of belief that fuels the mind with all sorts of ideas, just feeding into your own internal fiction. I wonder how long a psychosis would last if I started imagining I was a fighter pilot... maybe fifteen minutes.

Look, if you sit there overanalyzing someone for long enough, you can pretty much slap a diagnosis on anyone.

I’d suggest stepping back from viewing everyone through a psychiatric lens. Sometimes people just react strangely because they're dealing with stuff you know nothing about. Plenty of people live their whole lives right on the edge of several different diagnoses and still manage to have perfectly fine lives without ever needing professional help. On the flip side, you've got people who are completely sane but end up seeing a therapist on a regular basis...

That basil incident was basically a month-long odyssey that stretched into thirty-five days. You honestly can't imagine what it's like when someone struggling with schizophrenia tries to drive from New York to Los Angeles after fifteen days without sleep... you just can't.

If you absolutely have to, then go ahead and face it, but if not... just run for the hills...

Six months at Arlington... that's a long stretch. In terms of recovery, if you feel like you're back where you were two and a half years ago, I totally get it. For me, the hardest part was trying to unlearn all those thoughts and actions that took over during the psychosis. It’s honestly wild how this illness just completely screws you over and sets you on a downward spiral. A normal life is full of little triggers that, when you're in that headspace, you interpret through a completely different lens, which only ends up feeding the hallucinations.

I've never been someone who relies solely on meds during a crisis, though you obviously can't survive without them. I know people who leaned so hard on medication that now even massive doses won't touch their psychosis—it's the kind of stuff they don't even write about in medical textbooks. You just have to take action, figure out where your lifestyle is failing you, and if you have to start from scratch a thousand times, be grateful you even have the chance to try. Just look around. Look at how poorly people live and how miserable they are without even being sick. If they can't pull themselves out of their own mess, then you know you have to be ten times more persistent to make it through yours.

As for how to convince someone to actually go to the hospital for treatment, there's usually only one way left: a good old-fashioned LIE. Basically, you coordinate a plan with two or more people, stage some sort of public disturbance, and call the police (well, the authorities handle it, but you know what I mean). If the person is actually composed enough to see through the trap and avoid a breakdown in front of the cops, then you're left with talking... and, of course, another better LIE.

Thanks, Larry Lewis.

We both know luck played a massive role in my situation. I was the textbook definition of a massive ego. I was mixing meds, drugs, and alcohol, all while insisting I wasn't actually sick—just living a "wild lifestyle." Truth is, I was just ashamed of my condition. Now? Everyone knows. My employees, the people who hired me, my friends, family, neighbors... they all know. Even strangers seem to pick up on it; I can see it in their eyes when we meet. You just can't stop that kind of gossip once it starts. I can't really blame people for repeating what I did during my worst psychotic breaks, because if I were in their shoes... well, I’d be doing the exact same thing. But I'm not that person anymore. Today, I finally understand how much a single word can wound someone. I am a completely different human being than I used to be. I've changed everything, but the biggest transformation happened within my own ego.

From what I can gather, Outoftheblue got banned for having multiple accounts. If you look through the thread, you can see a few of her posts under other banned handles too. It's a shame, honestly, because everyone should be grateful to her for starting this discussion. I learned so much from reading her posts and the others... such a waste.

Stay safe and healthy out there...

Well, thanks to a nasty flu, I finally had the downtime to catch up on this entire thread. Some of the posts here are actually pretty impressive, which inspired me to finally register and share my own story.

Gender: Male

Age: 36

Status: Single with a solid career🙏 enough to get by

Experience: 13 years dealing with the CIA, including three intense episodes and, consequently, three forced
hospitalizations.

Medication: 25mg of Seroquel at bedtime for the last 8 years.

Hobbies: IT and religion.

Now that I’ve given you the basics, I should mention that no psychiatrist would ever prescribe my specific regimen. My current dose barely does anything, and ideally, I should be adding another 25mg in the morning—which would still be the absolute bare minimum for Seroquel. For me personally, taking it in the morning was a nightmare because of my job, so after talking it over with my doctor, I tried this modified approach. It’s been working great for eight years now.

I’ve cycled through plenty of different medications over the years (though most were a long time ago, some of which have been mentioned in this thread), but given how severe my psychosis gets—once, the Swiss Guard actually had to haul me off the roof of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome because I decided I was going to replace the Pope—Seroquel was the only thing that could actually reel me in. Of course, there were times when even 300mg of Seroquel combined with Haldol and Modaten couldn't hold me back; I once escaped from a hospital after ten days on that cocktail. But with certain lifestyle adjustments, I’ve managed to stay steady.

Two of my brothers deal with similar issues—one with schizophrenia and the other with PTSD—so those are the only mental health struggles in our family. As for me, I started down a dark path early on with alcohol and drugs (weed, LSD, ecstasy, coke), and I spent a lot of time living right on the edge of the law.

If I can trace these eight years of peace and stability back to anything, it’s my faith, regular exercise, and constant intellectual engagement. My long-term career and my large extended family help too, though obviously not the ones who are ill.🙂 But mostly, it's those first three things. I could go on forever about what my state of mind was like during my worst psychotic breaks—honestly, I’m amazed some people can remember everything they wrote in their blogs—but I’ll save that for another time.

What I’ve realized through sheer experience—since I spent years in denial and avoided reading any literature on the subject—is that every single one of those psychotic episodes was preceded by total sleep deprivation or extremely short periods of rest. By eliminating that factor through daily exercise and staying constantly busy (I actually work two jobs just so I can afford to sleep)🙂 and keeping my Seroquel dose at the lowest possible level, I’ve been able to stay stable for this long.

Sure, those intrusive thoughts still cross my mind from time to time... but that’s when my faith steps in and shuts the whole thing down. ZZ