Living with Schizoaffective Disorder (Experiencing Psychosis, Paranoid Delusions and Hallucinations)

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I've been hospitalized twice for manic psychosis from my Bipolar Disorder. Really fucking traumatic shit, and there's a lot of bleedover between what he's describing and what I experienced.

When they were discussing the "talking about the delusions reinforces them," I can completely relate to that. When I describe what I've experienced to other people, I can feel my anxiety increase, and it starts to feel like it's all happening again. I still regard a lot of what I experienced during my psychosis as 'real,' even though I know they are delusions or hallucinations. I'll catch myself thinking back on those memories and trying to rationalize them.

It's really hard to separate those delusions out as 'not real,' because there's no discernible difference. The shit feels like it's actually happening.

I really feel for this guy.

👍︎︎ 142 👤︎︎ u/FakeHelicopterPilot 📅︎︎ Sep 10 2019 đź—«︎ replies

"In this moment, even though you communicated it to me that you know it's not real, do you still believe it to be true?"

"Yeah. But I'm working on it."

Now that's some resilience.

👍︎︎ 135 👤︎︎ u/MostlySoundThrowaway 📅︎︎ Sep 10 2019 đź—«︎ replies

The level of resiliency this man has is amazing. respect to this guy.

👍︎︎ 37 👤︎︎ u/[deleted] 📅︎︎ Sep 10 2019 đź—«︎ replies

I had a best friend growing up. All the way from when we were 13 to when we were in our mid 20’s. He started acting strangely one night when we were at a theme park when we were both about 16. I thought he was being silly and messing around, because he was saying strange things that didn’t make sense and his sentences were essentially just random words mixed together. We would often act silly or weird around each other so I thought nothing of it, except he was still acting that way hours later. I was scared and confused, but he was back to normal the next day. Over the next 6 months this started happening more and more, one second he was normal, the next he seemed “out of his mind”. We were smoking lots of weed every weekend, so eventually his mom thought he must have smoked some “laced weed” and damaged his brain. She cut him off from all of his friends and sent him to a rehab, then eventually he was sent to all sorts of different doctors and hospitals.... about 2 years after the initial theme park incident he was diagnosed as schizo-affective.

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Eventually, once his mom realized that weed hadn’t caused this she sort of chilled out and started letting him see his friends again. I hadn’t seen him in about a year at this point and we had only spoken online on RuneScape, which we both played often. Sadly, I was really the only friend who came back because everyone else was sort of scared away. It was really hard to watch because he had always been really popular, really good looking, really funny, lots of girlfriends and lots of friends in general. Now almost everyone was gone.

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But he was still my best friend so we continued to hang out. Over the next the next couple years his doctors put him on all sorts of different meds to try and get him back to normal, some of them worked but had absolutely horrible side effects that didn’t seem to be worth it. This whole situation started getting extremely hard for me as a teenager because sometimes I felt like my best friend had died, but I couldn’t grieve because I would see glimpses of his old self or he would be back to normal at days at a time.

I started seeing a therapist so I could process the feelings I had about all of this and so I could try to be a better friend too. I was the only person he had left, but we still had lots of fun together.

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Eventually after high school and as I started working through college his mother bought a small condo for him to live in. She didn’t want him to be alone, so she told me that if I would live there with him and help him out she would only charge me $300/month. Things were great for the first few years! It was a total “bro-pad”, video games, computers and TV’s everywhere, our fat cat on our comfy couch and my best friend, all in a really nice condo that neither of us could have ever afforded in a different situation.

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Things were looking up for us, his meds were working really well, he was now normal (or back to his old self) about 80% of the time and my career was going great, I was making good money for someone my age and my friend was even able to get a job down the road. Eventually things started getting bad again though, my friend lost his job because his meds just stopped working one day and he couldn’t maintain his composure at work (this sometimes happens with people on anti psychotics, a medication that’s worked for years can just stop one day). After he lost his job he started hanging out with some really sketchy people that I didn’t feel comfortable having in our condo. This was our fun, safe little cave... and now these sketchy “unknowns” started hanging out there at all hours of the day or night. This made me very uncomfortable. Eventually my friend started doing harder drugs, I never complained because I did drugs too and it never really became an issue... at least not until he tried meth.

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Once he started smoking meth I felt like I lost him and the whole thing became too much for me. You think meth heads are hard to handle? They’re nothing compared to someone with a serious psychological disorder smoking meth. The meth and his illness mixed together to create a horrible, barely lucid condition that he was in almost all the time now. He wasn’t making any sense at all, the fact that I couldn’t understand him started to make him angry. One time he got extremely upset and threw a glass blender at me. My face and leg got cut.

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He started having all sorts of random people over, even more than before. Really bad people, people he didn’t even know. There was days where I had to be up for work the next day, I wake up at 2am to the TV blasting at full volume in the living room with 6 people there that I’ve never even seen, all smoking meth. My friend wasn’t even there. I threatened to call the police and got them all out.... but it never stopped, he kept bringing people over, the people didn’t even care about him. My friend was too nice of a guy and these people could see he was desperate for friends, it was easy for them to take advantage of him to find a place to crash or smoke meth. Stuff started going missing or would be broken when I got home some days.... I had to install security cameras around the condo and put a deadbolt on my bedroom door. I stopped keeping any valuables outside of my room. I was constantly kicking random people out of our condo and my friend resented that.

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The last straw was when he started stealing from me. He sold all 18 of my PS4 games to gamestop, he didn’t even get $20. He stole cash. He stole vintage action figures from my collection. He stole my weed or broke my glass bongs/pipes. He stole my new tablet, he broke my computer, he shattered my antique black panther statue during a meth binge.

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It was too much for me. It seemed like my best friend was now gone and wasn’t coming back. Even if hevwas, he had eventually stolen or broken over $2,000 worth of my possessions. I got home one day and saw my quilt sitting outside in the mud, torn and stained. This quilt had been in my family for over a hundred years and was made by one of my great great grandmothers. It was very important to me. No one was even supposed to use it, let alone take it outside for “camping”. He knew this. I couldn’t do this anymore, I didn’t know what to do. I tried to be a good friend to him, I tried to stick around, I tried to take care of him the best that I could. But I was done. I just didn’t know how I could help anymore, I’m not a psychiatrist and I was way out of my depth now. I moved out a month later. We didn’t speak for a couple of years and I promised myself I wouldn’t talk to him again until he got off meth and started paying me back.

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Now a couple more years have gone by. His mother sold the condo and sent him to live in Colorado with his father. This got him away from the meth. His dad is a big hippy that owns a store that sells kitchen appliances. His dad got him to start eating good, healthy food, taking vitamins, got him off the drug and back onto his medication...he started getting better and started contacting me again. Since then he’s apologized to me, got a job working for his dad and has started paying me back slowly. It’s a long road ahead but we’re trying to fix our friendship. But things are better now, things are good.

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All of this is so difficult for me emotionally. I’ve continued seeing a therapist because I still need some help processing my feelings about this. It took me a long time to process. I didn’t know how much was actually his fault due to bad choices and how much was caused by his condition and out of his control. He’s still different now. But deep down he’s a really intelligent, fun and kind person. My beat friend is still in there. I’ve forgiven him.

👍︎︎ 202 👤︎︎ u/FerretHydrocodone 📅︎︎ Sep 10 2019 đź—«︎ replies

Compression can be very comforting for anxiety and using one of those hugging monkeys on his arm is a smart way to achieve that. I feel like I learned a new self-care method.

👍︎︎ 34 👤︎︎ u/katsokute 📅︎︎ Sep 10 2019 đź—«︎ replies

This YouTuber is amazing. Check out what he does for special needs kids!

👍︎︎ 81 👤︎︎ u/TurkFebruary 📅︎︎ Sep 10 2019 đź—«︎ replies

Fuck I wanna give this dude a hug

👍︎︎ 56 👤︎︎ u/TheSoftestTaco 📅︎︎ Sep 10 2019 đź—«︎ replies

My only friend other than my wife has this sometimes, but he is on full disability from schizophrenia.

Sadly, when he was diagnosed most of his other friends split.

Pisses me off, so much stigma on mental illnesses.

👍︎︎ 31 👤︎︎ u/[deleted] 📅︎︎ Sep 10 2019 đź—«︎ replies

Gawd Damn, I need help cause a lot of that stuff scratches too close to home for me

👍︎︎ 48 👤︎︎ u/Pernix 📅︎︎ Sep 10 2019 đź—«︎ replies
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do you believe you still possess the ability to be happy no I know that sounds weird like half smiling right now I don't right now maybe there's a way to get it back but I know I don't think I can experience joy I don't I'm aware that's a very sensitive topic and I want to respect your boundaries so before we begin I want to ask is there anything that's off-limits no if I am uncomfortable with something I'll just say something like can we pass on that for a second and gather my thoughts again I won't say no to anything sometimes there's just need more time to think of how to properly answer because it just works slowly sometimes life does it work slowly sometimes Oh get your head knocked around a lot I've had a least eight concussions can you list for me all of your diagnoses I'm probably gonna fail good try um schizoaffective that's schizophrenia with a personality disorder which is borderline personality disorder with me um CP PTSD C PTSD it's PTSD but instead of one traumatic event it's more than one so it's complex PTSD multiple traumatic brain injuries well obviously like manic depression and an anxiety disorder I loved life and something one day just kind of clicked and it was a steady down down down down and trying to hide it you know because you don't really know that you're going down until people you realize that you're not happy with anything like nothing makes you happy you used to be happy all the time and now everything that made you happy is just tiresome it will freely admit like I'm still learning a lot because I'm sometimes in special in the beginning you don't want to know you want to push it aside and pretend it's not there so you don't do anything and just get worse I had a hospital visit a few months ago where I had a kind of us my psychosis event what is it like to experience psychosis horrifying you don't know what it is well I didn't people I'm now at least a little more alert to some of the symptoms but things for me were normal and then they they weren't and I know I sort of know why I mean nothing really triggered a per se well yeah there was there was definitely trigger um I also experienced delusions and one of mine is I am thoroughly convinced that my people go through my mail our bug my phone the crazy person talk and I can joke about that because I know it's insane but I'm convinced it's real does that even make sense like you can logically know that your being here irrational but what you hear smell see touch taste when your senses convince you it's real what is logic matter anymore cuz I can feel it I can smell I can see it I can hear it so logic doesn't probably won't happen in this moment even though you just communicated to me that you know it's not real do you still believe it to be true yeah I'm working on it do you have memories of psychosis flashes flashes um nah I don't mind I can't describe them as memories because I don't see them as memories on ice I see them almost I'd have to think really hard to think of them too like it's that foggy um I have a flash I'm in a hospital bed I'm laying on my back and the mental health person apparently was there to speak to me and they drugged me I'm so heavily that I could I remember barely being able to open my mouth and speak words and she was asking me a bunch of complicated questions I was getting really upset because I couldn't speak that's the most vivid memory I have people do get upset and hopefully if they watch this they will now understand why it takes me so long to return calls or to hear a voice mail because it is like I don't know how to describe it it's um it's and it's just impossible I don't know I would say better than that it's just you I can't touch it sometimes I don't want to ask you questions about your exact perception of why you don't want to pick up the phone because I'm aware that might be feeding the delusion is that true exactly I think people there's only one other person I've told that's for this kind of stuff and one of their questions was I was obviously in not a good place and he had asked me you know well are you experiencing some right now and it's no I guess I could do it I'm sorry I can't tell you that because when you start mixing real world with fake world it's already intertwined so much you start letting other players on the stage come in and interact with you then you're having a real hard time understanding that those players are there and I think that shows growth that you're able to acknowledge that so what I will say is I do not believe anybody's watching you or following you my question is when you are going through those moments where you believe that how can your friends and family help don't push the issue I know that sounds like I'm not saying just ignore Daniel let him be crazy but sometimes people will ask specific questions and it may seem like not a big deal kind of question but if someone's obviously very uncomfortable to the point where I'll just like I'm just knocking my head on something cuz I I just need you to stop asking me questions kind of thing you know but they'll be like I don't understand it's not a big deal I just want to know how come you don't you know how come he wanted this or how come you're not doing this or what do you mean when you say that as like can you please draw your conclusions and ask me later when I'm not so obviously mmm imploding do you also have hallucinations yes yes um some I I have I have random ones but I also have reoccurring and it there's no telling my either there's no warning there's you know some people with seizures can smell oranges before they have seizures no it's just you haven't a zero control it's it's if it's gonna happen it's gonna happen and the scary part is when it you legitimately just don't know I have a designs that become like 3d prints almost where you're looking at the Jesus poster in the wall but it's the carpet the design where you move and comes up and they become a big it's very disorienting eye shadows my shadow will move it will speak is it offensive or would it be okay if for the rest of this interview I refer to those thoughts of paranoia as delusional thoughts yes right especially right now I'm like it's a good day and I know those thoughts that are irresponsible and make no sense you know maybe tomorrow I'll be in a you know don't question me bad mood but today it's like yeah it's very difficult to describe it's because I hear you say that and my mouth is saying oh yeah that's fine I'm back here saying he won that's just cuz he doesn't know he hasn't seen the letters and he hasn't gone through the phone he hasn't heard that beeping he hasn't felt that second ring that jumps on top of the first ring that shouldn't be there on the phone rings so it's kind of like that it's kind of like okay it's being polite we're agreeing to disagree then there's audio those are fun um I don't know how to describe em some there's two different types I I can have what what you would call voices in your head it's not my voice but it's not some personality it's just a different voice but it's in my head i but then I also have external voices where well I go say where my shadow would be talk to me and I swear I'm hearing it from here like I hear it outside of my head like you would be talking to me and if it is sometimes it's really really really really really fast whispering like a cadence the voices in the head are usually trying to get you do something or influence you to do something and I'm not going to repeat what a lot of those say because that's just not nice for anybody to hear you can imagine how exhausting it is to not just around people all the time like I'm I should not I've been wondering if my Oscar award is because this is ridiculous I mean I've done pretty awesome hiding so a lot of this it gets exhausting putting on a face 24/7 it just not stopped with your family members oh you know I I contact it can be very difficult for me and it's not because it's antisocial it's because to me bad things can happen if I have eye contact with human being and it's gonna it was sound crazy but I'm tired of having like look just in between to look normal know and carry on like nothing's the matter when I'm hearing or seeing or experiencing really intense feelings it's you have to get help eventually because you go down the wrong path in which I have a hundred percent gun down do you think about the future um I haven't for a really long time in fact the future I guess it still doesn't really exist but it's really scary thinking about the future is one of the worst things for me to do because I'm convinced and all I see is usually just a road of nothing nothing just every morning the same Sun coming through the same window at the same time to wake you up to the same day of the same pain of the same extreme boredom of the same frustrations and you see where this goes and so I am trying really hard not not to I'm trying to find a way to be comfortable with the present because I'm not I'm not comfortable at the present I'm not comfortable with the past I'm definitely scared to death of the future try imagine living in a world where you don't really believe that your thoughts of your own and understand how stressful that can be at times how would you describe PTSD mm-hmm I'm not sure because if it's the right word debilitating freezing um an overall suffocation um someone hugging you too hard sometimes or it's an overwhelming sense of doom you just know that bad things are can you tell me about your animals you're holding oh yes um there's a store here in town that does um century and toys and I found with me at least and it's different for everybody especially if I'm having difficulty and a scenario where I'm beginning I called it the melting of the minds I'm a very dramatic person and that's when things aren't I can't tell what's going on really what's real what's not a lot of these things can help life as you can see I've torn away this used to be a fabric now it's just the plastic because I sit there and I rub it so much but that feeling just helps ground you and that's what these guys are what is borderline personality disorder the best way I can describe it is she sees this she's gonna hate me who sees it my ex-wife she's the most wonderful human being on the planet like she is she's fantastic always will love her but that's just it it's you put everything into it like it doesn't have to be a romantic relationship for me it's usually been a romantic relationship but that person they with they become more important to you than like their approval their happiness their overall experience of life becomes more important than anything anything breathing eating family spirituality everything you love to do you put it on hold you know you tell your friends I'll be here then you call them three hours late like hey yeah alright I'm there now because you doesn't matter you will bend the moon and I know that sounds like well that's love it's not healthy love especially all it takes is for them not to say I love you back you know and I was always a very verbal I I'm hopeless romantic like I love candles and baths and dinners and I write poetry and I frame it I'm like the hopeless romantic and if but sometimes all it takes is I'm not saying I love you back and I mean you're flatline for the rest of the day until you hear it you're useless you can't function it's and you're worried it's like what did i do why didn't they say it back and I cute him and you'll go 24 hours just in your head in your head in your head what did I do wrong what did I do wrong she hates me she's leaving me okay well obviously I'm a piece of crap and and then the second they give you approval again you're like alright life is good alright what I needed to keep this approval and that's that's where a lot of it's like a favorite human being I think they call it a favorite person and it's it's it's a lot of whiplash and it's exhausting and you really hurt other relationships in your life and you really put a lot of pressure on that other person I think I'm much responsibility that puts on you and even if you don't want it it's you if I call you you know that if you don't answer Daniels gonna call the 32 now I'm not and I'm not a stalker but it it just puts a lot of pressure on the other person and they don't deserve it they didn't do anything to warrant that and it's not their fault even though you're aware of that right now in the present moment do you still have problems controlling those impulses yes yeah impulse I just when people is like oh yeah problems with impulse control I don't even even know what impulse control is I can honestly say that and 90% of the time I absolutely love Who I am there's a stigma with mental illness especially psychosis yeah mm-hmm that an individual can be dangerous to be around is that warrant it I want to say no but not from I I know for me I'm never like in any way injured or even thought of injuring or wanted to hurt or even done anything that would be danger to someone else I haven't but unfortunately in reality some people that can't happen and that's where again you have to be aware of who you are what you're going through what you need to do to get help so that you're not a danger absolutely you're not I I know I can be a danger to myself but mmm I've never had any thoughts like that you'll if I'm having a really difficult time and I'm experiencing someone on that what honestly happens is I'll just end up somewhere pacing only for hours that was when they had me in the hospitals because apparently I I driven myself to the hospital to get help I don't remember that sometimes I'll drive to College Station just walk on the bridges and that's very odd sounding is them apparently that's part of my dangerous behavior when I'm nearing the active phase I will start doing more things that could potentially harm myself what can others do to prevent you from engaging in that dangerous behavior a lot of times I'll text someone really late friend and I won't tell them what I'm doing but I'll just go ahead and tell you right now if you're getting a text from me in the middle of the night around 3:00 in the morning probably because I'm trying to reach out for help without knowing how to outright say them I'm doing something really stupid I'm about to hurt myself does it make a difference just knowing somebody cares makes a world of a difference when somebody who knows you from your personal life sees this for the first time and for the first time under stains your struggles how do you hope they react I honestly fear the assumptions a lot on the forever seen this way to know that once they hear certain words are certain labels I will always be seen that way I fear losing what little worth I have because I don't have much and it's embarrassing every time I run into someone I know you know someone I knew in high school or something god it's embarrassing now it was really embarrassing because I know I am not who they remember after everything you shared today are you still a hundred percent sure you would like me to publish this interview yes why because those interviews helped me and if it's gonna help anyone else it's absolutely worth it because I need them and we need to know when we are not we are not isolated and alone in this and there are there are groups of their groups there are people that want to help and that want to love you and assist you and sometimes you just got to rip it off take the jump I mean I'm trying to look at it this way if I'm if I was if I am willing and when I'm in my darker thoughts and I'm willing to do something that's going to harm me I think I should be willing to do something that's going to help me so if you have those dark thoughts and you've taken steps at times that were unhealthy then step up and take this ones that are gonna be healthy before we end I just wanted to share that there was nothing you said today that makes it any less likely I'll be your friend that decreases my desire to be your friend and I think it's great you're sharing this and I think it is the right decision to go and seek treatment and anything you need I want to be able to supply to you so that you do get that treatment you need reach out anytime they hate emotions no they're they're good it's just sometimes it helps to hear that why does it help to hear that because don't hear it you don't people it's to find someone who means that in thank you you're welcome you
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Channel: Special Books by Special Kids
Views: 12,400,383
Rating: 4.963254 out of 5
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Length: 22min 28sec (1348 seconds)
Published: Mon Sep 09 2019
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