Anxiety/Depression/Mental Illness Support

[Shell B]

I was diagnosed with schizophrenia but it was during a psychotic break from reality brought on by excessive drug use and emotional upheaval. I've taken some online tests and researched the disorder and I think I have always suffered from it a little although I've only ever been hebephrenic a few times and catatonic once during my two week stay in a psych ward. Since I've been atheist I don't hear voices, but I still suffer from some very weird thoughts; I just don't attribute them to aliens, pets, psychic links, god, blah blah ya know all the stuff that can go can-caning through the mind of credulous person.

Ugh. Weird thoughts: Shelly bane.

[Annik]

[...]

I used to have catatonic schizophrenia constantly. I wouldn't even be aware it happened. I would apparently just cease talking, and would run on an autopilot, completely ignoring everything everyone said to me or even did to me unless it was an act of aggression which triggered an aggressive response. I wouldn't remember any of it. It seems it was induced by chemical imbalances due to, like what you had, drug abuse, once I ceased that, and underwent therapy and some pharmaceutical regimens it largely stopped. Had it happen only once recently and it wasn't exactly a full-blown attack. I was half-aware, but seemed to just...not be able to care, and I was reacting strangely and saying strange things. Hopefully, it's just an isolated case but if it happens again I'll have to go and talk to a psych again. I seem to have issues with anxiety but it's small potatoes to everything else and truth be told, with my income at a firm 0 right now I can't really afford to get it treated.

Did you ever experience any other types of schizophrenia?





EDIT: Does anyone's voice stop working or throat close up in the midst of a panic attack?

[Creed of Heresy]

[...]

I used to have catatonic schizophrenia constantly. I wouldn't even be aware it happened. I would apparently just cease talking, and would run on an autopilot, completely ignoring everything everyone said to me or even did to me unless it was an act of aggression which triggered an aggressive response. I wouldn't remember any of it. It seems it was induced by chemical imbalances due to, like what you had, drug abuse, once I ceased that, and underwent therapy and some pharmaceutical regimens it largely stopped. Had it happen only once recently and it wasn't exactly a full-blown attack. I was half-aware, but seemed to just...not be able to care, and I was reacting strangely and saying strange things. Hopefully, it's just an isolated case but if it happens again I'll have to go and talk to a psych again. I seem to have issues with anxiety but it's small potatoes to everything else and truth be told, with my income at a firm 0 right now I can't really afford to get it treated.

Did you ever experience any other types of schizophrenia?

Do you mean the other subtypes? No. I've never been overly paranoid and convinced someone is out to get me...though I do get wary around people, and even if I am just passing someone on the streets I feel a light instinctual tensing of the mind. I constantly feel like I am worried that whoever is within range of sight/sound may be formulating opinions on me, and to an extent that is highly unlikely, if not outright ridiculous. That and avolition, which I still have to do this day and will never get rid of, unless modern medicine does something to treat it. I get the desire to do things, to want to finish tasks and projects but I lose all motivation and desire before I can even gather it up. It's a struggle just to do trivial things like the dishes. Once I start, it's no problem, but actually doing it? Shit, it's getting hard to get the motivation to take a daily shower, or cook basic food dishes. I can look at a box of mac and cheese and go "this is tasty...but I just...don't want to have prepare it."

And so help the person who says I'm just lazy. This isn't laziness. Laziness is when you don't want to do something, period. I WANT to do these things...but at the same time, I can't seem to will myself into it. Like my mind says "yes" but then my subconscious goes "no," and my subconscious keeps winning.

And all I can do is wonder "why?" Why did this happen, why does it happen, why must it continue to happen? Why do I feel this way, why can't it be cured, why can't I just function, even SLIGHTLY like a normal person? God fucking dammit, is some TINY semblance of normality really so much to ask for?? Everyone jokingly says normality is over-rated but nowadays I hear that joke and I want to backhand the person saying it because dammit they have no fucking idea how normal they are compared to me and how much I want to be like them, even just a little bit, in that one simple way...

I can't even organize my thoughts for more than a few minutes at most. I'll start doing or saying something and end up a proverbial mile from the road I was trying to take. There's days where I'll wake up and every. Single. Fucking. Thought. Vanishes in the blink of an eye. I'll set a small, simple, exceedingly basic task for myself and forget what the fuck it was three seconds later and spend a good thirty seconds trying to remember what it was only to not follow through with it BECAUSE FUCKING DAMMIT I FORGOT IT AGAIN GAAAAAAAAAH!!!

I fucking hate my life. The one life I get and it's a clusterfuck of crossed wires and misfiring synapses... I don't even have the mercy of being blissfully ignorant of it. I'm fully aware. And I can't do a fucking thing about it.

"I have no mouth, and I must scream..."

[Rhizomorph13]

I created a light form of MPD in myself on accident. It seemed like a good way to handle multiple task would be to segment my brain into "Me" and colored regions that could handle different tasks, so I started talking to the segments calling them "blue" "green" and "orange". I quickly realized that these parts were doing things I didn't like and I was creating like a reverb effect when adressing them and I wasn't gaining any kind of efficiency or meaning from it so I resorbed them. Trouble is, I don't like the color orange so that entity took a while to silence. Weird, I know!

Another experiment, that resulted in a few hebephrenic episodes, was the time I decided that language was a hinderance to thought speed, because it is; I still think that. So, to speed up my mental processing I tried to arrest my thoughts at their inception by occupying the speech centers of my brain through guteral uterances of total nonsense. It worked! The problem was that the resulting thought streams were so hard to convey to other people because they were divorced from rational expression. It is kind of like what happens when you have a beautiful experience on LSD or mushrooms and then try to convey it to other people... um, pretty lights dancing in majestic forms of paisley doileys? nope, um, sentient, fluid, thought forms caught in glycerin and refracted joy? The worst part was that when people asked me things I would sometimes start making weird noises while thinking which really freaks people out! I've stopped it for the most part but sometimes when I am having rushes of thoughts I still fall into *guteral uterances*.

Creed of Heresy,

I certainly don't have any magic bullets for you but I can tell you one thing that helped me unspin my mind after a trip to the psych ward. I started juggling devil sticks. I found that while juggling, my mind was occupied and I was engaging the play circuits of my brain. The coolest thing about juggling is that no matter when you start you can stop and be right at the same spot as when you started. There is a timelessness about juggling that might help your avolition. I still struggle a little bit with that. Also, while juggling all sorts of thoughts would come to the forefront of my brain and if there was someone there to hear me I could rattle off long stories while juggling. Most people liked to listen to these stories while extremely high. I have even been told that people feel high while listening to me.

[jess_essential]

I was diagnosed with a personality disorder when I was a bit younger, and was put on a combination of gnarly meds, but eventually came off of them by myself. The social anxiety is still there, but I suck it up and try to adapt to my surroundings, and do an alright job of it, I think? Lol. Depression is a tricky little bitch that always creeps up when you least expect her to, I don't think pills are beneficial to everyone if they're used constantly. When I panic, I breathe until I'm calm and everything usually falls back into place.

[Annik]

Does anyone know how to stop a panic attack in its tracks?

[Jackalope]

Does anyone know how to stop a panic attack in its tracks?

Xanax.

Other than that, applying techniques I learned in DBT.

[Annik]

Care to share?

[el_presidente]

Does anyone know how to stop a panic attack in its tracks?

There are different thought-stopping techniques out there. I strongly suggest googling REBT (rational emotive behavior therapy). It's as simple as it gets and empirically validated up and down for decades.

If your interest is piqued, there are a number of books written by its founder, Albert Ellis. I use REBT every day and I've got anxiety and bipolar disorders. It is fantastic.

I'm glad this thread it started. I tend to feel that atheists are overwhelmingly logical/analytical and at least in my case living too much in my head can come at the expense of psychological health. This is not at all to say that ignorance is bliss etc., just that I find things can get out of balance if I follow my inclination to exclusively think and analyze rather that feel and experience.

[Shell B]

Sorry I am so late to answer, Annik. I have a lot of experience with this. Severe, acute anxiety attacks can be helped with Xanax or Ativan. Ativan is a lovely sedative. It doesn't take away any negative thoughts, but it will sure as hell turn you into pudding. Now, without medication, people have very different coping mechanisms. Here are a few things that have helped for me. Remember, whatever you choose to do, the key has to be taking your mind off of things or facing whatever is stressing you out and just getting through it.

1. Walking -- this has been my best therapy lately. I just walk until I don't feel like shit anymore. I realize that a panic attack can make you feel like you can't do anything physical. Ignore that.

2. Watch a movie that reminds you of something comforting or is comforting.

3. Draw

4. Do a puzzle

5. Talk. Call someone and just chatter on and on until you feel better.

6. Stop to smell the fucking roses.

7. When all else fails, hide in bed until it goes away.