[WishIgotHelp]

Please share your experience with paranoia or paranoid thoughts.

I had paranoia and occasionally have paranoids thoughts. In 2007 a good friend of mine got stabbed in the back by a thug, than later in 2009 another friend of mine nearly got stabbed by some ultras fans and somehow I got involved in the situation and ended up getting life threats from them. I didn't make it a big deal, until after a few weeks I started feeling very alone and suddenly started thinking about my own death. I started thinking about me getting stabbed, this idea brought horror in my mind and body. I would constantly have visions of me getting stabbed in the back. I remember walking on crowded places and constantly waiting for someone to put a knife in my back, so i started avoiding crowded places.

Than the visions started changing a little bit, I was sure that a "friend" in my class would stab me one day. He was a little aggressive and a year before we had a little fight with each other. So i was sure that he is going to stab me with a knife. I was constantly having visions of him stabbing me in the abdomen and I could see his face, claiming victory over me. In my visions he would always hold a big knife in my belly and I was down, defeated.

In 2010 i moved on, nobody had killed me (haha) ...I joined the university and was studying 12h a day, so I could no longer think.

Since then I had 2 mental breakdowns, in 2011 I started having suicidal thoughts, yet i somehow managed to get through it.

A decade later, I am still healing from these experiences and writing this post is part of it.

Please share your experience or ask me questions.

[Breaking Dawn]

Hi, WishIgotHelp, I don't think you're paranoid. That's a negative classification, in my opinion, that people use to make you feel like your experiences aren't real, or are exaggerated & don't really count. Maybe "they" have never experienced what you have seen or experienced personally. Anyway, the way I see it, your brain is doing what it's supposed to do, protect you, remind you of your responsibility to your entire system of cells to watch out for predators & stay alive. You witnessed & experienced, first hand, life threatening events in your personal environment. Maybe you could move to a safer place, & in time your brain would allow you to feel less "paranoid?"

[WishIgotHelp]

Originally Posted by Breaking Dawn

Hi, WishIgotHelp, I don't think you're paranoid. That's a negative classification, in my opinion, that people use to make you feel like your experiences aren't real, or are exaggerated & don't really count. Maybe "they" have never experienced what you have seen or experienced personally. Anyway, the way I see it, your brain is doing what it's supposed to do, protect you, remind you of your responsibility to your entire system of cells to watch out for predators & stay alive. You witnessed & experienced, first hand, life threatening events in your personal environment. Maybe you could move to a safer place, & in time your brain would allow you to feel less "paranoid?"

Yes, what you are saying makes complete sense. The situations were very life threatening and slowly i started to enter this state of "danger" where I was not safe.
In the next 3 months I will leave my country and hopefully I can heal.

[Breaking Dawn]

Dear @WishIgotHelp, I'm so glad to hear your intentions! I'll be praying for your success & for your safety. Something tells me that you're on the right path & things are waiting to work out for you. Good luck with everything, & God bless you!!

[WishIgotHelp]

Thank you so much brother.

[*Beth*]

Yeah, I wouldn't call what you've described as "paranoid"...more so, a PTSD reaction and intrusive thoughts.

[WishIgotHelp]

It could be. I had more than 10 of these events, involving knife crime and life threatening events. I grew up in a very un-safe place.

When i was 13-14 i noticed some emotional dysregulation in my body. Suddenly i couldn't breath properly, when faced with challenging events (mostly school fights or confrontations). I managed to reppres this emotional dysregulation, but than i was afraid to get into daily challenges, because those dysregulations would show up again...so, i started avoiding things, people and events that could potentially put me in a state of fear, in wich i had no control and would feel humiliated.

This is when my escapism started showing up, i would try to make myself smaller and always wanted to disappear or hide, so i would not have to be confronted by people and events.

[*Beth*]

Originally Posted by WishIgotHelp

It could be. I had more than 10 of these events, involving knife crime and life threatening events. I grew up in a very un-safe place.

When i was 13-14 i noticed some emotional dysregulation in my body. Suddenly i couldn't breath properly, when faced with challenging events (mostly school fights or confrontations). I managed to reppres this emotional dysregulation, but than i was afraid to get into daily challenges, because those dysregulations would show up again...so, i started avoiding things, people and events that could potentially put me in a state of fear, in wich i had no control and would feel humiliated.

This is when my escapism started showing up, i would try to make myself smaller and always wanted to disappear or hide, so i would not have to be confronted by people and events.

As someone who has both paranoia (bipolar disorder 1) and CPTSD I feel like what you've described sounds like PTSD. The "paranoid" images and thoughts can be sometimes treated with a low-dose antipsychotic. And therapy, of course.

[MickeyCheeky]

So Sorry about what happened! i am Happy that at least you're feeling better now based on what you wrote, or at least that's what i'm gathering from reading your post. Thank you so much for sharing your experience and i agree with the other wise and wonderful posters. Sending many Safe, warm hugs to BOTH you, @WishIgotHelp, your Family, your Friends and ALL of your Loved Ones! Keep fighting and keep rocking NO MATTER WHAT HAPPENS, OK?!

[annoyedgrunt84]

This sounds like hyper vigilance to me, I had a traumatic experience in April of 2019 and ever since then I have had a little trouble with anything or anybody that reminds me of what happened.