Some people get it some people don't but when I describe hallucinations some people don't understand how I can even have them. It's like I have hallucinations because it's part of 'who' I am I guess. It's just part of my diagnosis. I still get them occasionally due to the fact that my meds don't work 100% of the time. I still see shadows occasionally but that's it. Anyways sometimes I miss being unmedicated but I have to remind myself that I am so much better medicated. Sometimes my brain goes on a paranoia about how it's the government trying to control me and I have to thwart that paranoia away. It's not the government trying to control me, it's me trying to better myself. Sometimes I'm afraid of my medications failing on me because they have failed in the past. It's always a toss up when I get on new medications. I'm currently on one medication called Latuda and that's working but I had to get on a high dose due to the fact that the lower doses weren't working. That scares me because there's only one more dose I can go on before I am out of options with this medication.

i remember when I was on 2 medications to treat schizoaffective disorder and that was a crapshoot after a while. I'm hoping this one stays effective for a while.

Anyways I wish there was a way to explain to people how it's like to have hallucinations, how you know sometimes they aren't real but you steal see them anyways and your brain swears up and down their real while you know for a fact they aren't. Like as an example. When I moved into this apartment that I'm currently living in I saw a half skeleton floating near my bathroom just floating on by just minding it's own business. It looked real but I knew it wasn't.

[Skeezyks]

Hello EliasMason: Thanks for sharing your experience. Yes, it is certainly difficult for those of us who do not have hallucinations to understand what you are experiencing. However, reading you post helps... if just a bit...

[jaynedough]

Idk if these will help. I really like Jonny Benjamin's videos.

This is Anderson Cooper wearing an auditory hallucination simulator:
https://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=yL9UJVtgPZY

This is Jonny Benjamin's "Sometimes (I'm Schizoaffective)/ All of the time (I'm Human)"

This is another good video to show what we experience:

I too have struggled with explaining what hallucinations are like. People just can't understand what they haven't been through themselves.

[ickydog2006]

Thanks for the links Jayne. I've always been fond of the Anderson Cooper one and I'd never seen the Benjamin one, but it's awesome. I explain different hallucinations in various ways but ultimately I know the other person will not gain a full understanding of the experiences.

[avlady]

i understand all to much abiout halciñnations. have them in my sleep too,not sure if sleep could count âs a halluñctp,and in daily life too.i have audîo ones too.i might say something to another about remember when this or that happened and they have nô recolection as to what i am talking about.

[Biteplate]

I'm still not honest with my family cause they don't understand at all. They don't know my full symptoms and diagnosis. They think I just have depression and anxiety.

[OliverB]

Originally Posted by escapeartist

This is another good video to show what we experience:

I too have struggled with explaining what hallucinations are like. People just can't understand what they haven't been through themselves.

I have just watched it and it's exactly what I live everyday

[ninjasm]

I've given up trying to explain it. I say schizophrenic because schizoaffective isn't so known... but schizophrenic brings up a ton of misconceptions that are so entrenched that they really can't be explained away. For me my hallucinations are auditory and I completely recognize them as just that... it's like a whole separate conversation or dialogue that I have proceeding in my head. If no one is around I talk back out loud at times. And people seem to understand that - they seem to accept that part. Only professionals and my wife (because of the endless conversations we've had about it) can understand that hearing things is just part of it - that there is feeling to it - raw emotion. That sometimes, usually even, the hallucinations have claws and teeth and best described as evil. They know all of my weaknesses and rip and tear at them. The tension I carry from it causes physical pain - I'm always sore from being tensed in anxiety.
Here's the really weird part. I thought that these were just normal thoughts, that everyone had an "inner critic." It started mild in me and then started to grow in recent years and I started to recognize it as not right. It wasn't until I asked my wife "what do your thoughts sound like?" that the thoughts started to connect and then I could really talk to the therapist about it.
I am sooo much better with medication - the dial is turned down on them, but the switch is most definitely not turned off. But it's also like my creativity is turned down too, and my passions have been turned down. My fear is still the same. Like you, in many ways I miss the unmedicated me. It feels like I'm missing some of the parts to how I think. As much as I hate The Dragon I feel a little less complete with it turned down. Maybe I'll adjust mentally to it, relearn to be me.
I'm sure some on this forum can understand what I'm saying... and since we're all schizophrenically unique... others won't.
Bottom line though - I'm trying to accept the fact that others that don't have schizophrenia can't understand what my auditory hallucinations are like. It's also a mystery to me when my wife described what her thoughts sound like. We can't understand how each other think. What is really neat is that it's possible to just accept that fact.

[lazlo]

I haven't told my family about schizoaffective
but they already know I'm crazy so whatever

[ninjasm]

I'm with you. My parents are still tracking me as having schizotypal PD from when they were trying to give me a military-friendly diagnosis. I was very adamant in saying that I was not schizophrenic. And now here I am: schizoaffective. Honestly, I don't think it is worth the time describing it all to them.

[neodoering]

The very first symptom I experienced for my schizoaffective disorder was hearing voices. They have stayed with me for 11 years, sometimes really intense and sometimes more laid back. I wrote a memoir about it (Randal, Randal, Burning Bright) and had my family read it, so they got some idea what I was going through. Next year I'm going to write a 10-year update to my disorder, detailing how symptoms have changed or stayed the same over all these years. People think they get it when you describe symptoms to them, but they really don't. They get an idea, but it's not the same thing as experiencing it yourself.

There are a LOT of people out there who don't believe there really is such a thing as mental illness. They think psychiatric workers are the modern phrenologists, and people who say they are 'mentally ill' are just fakers trying to get on disability and defraud the government. These are the guys who shut down the mental health hospitals in the late 70's and early 80's.