Sick of it All

I thought of this after I'd written my post above.

I found those words to be reassuring and comforting the first time I heard them. This is because it's very easy for the people around a person in crisis to say, "Oh, it's not real" but your fear is real; your anxiety is real; your terror is real. Insisting you have nothing to be frightened or anxious about does absolutely nothing to address the reality of your fear -- it just tells you that person doesn't understand and therefore, you can't trust them to talk with them. Yet, it's being able to talk about what is really going on for us that can help us understand and that may be what we most need to do -- to understand what our fears, anxieties, etc. are all about.

The quote above is from an interview with Bertram Karon, a psychologist with a long history of working psychotherapeutically with individuals who have undergone psychosis. You can read more of the interview excerpt here: Schizophrenia and Psychotherapy. Dr. Karon has also written a book that you, possibly your parents and therapist might also find useful: Psychotherapy of Schizophrenia: The Treatment of Choice

Another clinician I've found to be enormously helpful was John Weir Perry, a Jungian trained psychiatrist. In reading through my post above I realized I really had simplified things when they're not that simple. My experience -- perhaps yours too -- was a multi-dimensional experience. Healing and recovery had to address each of those levels of reality and experience.

Here's an interview with John Weir Perry that addresses some of the complexity of the psychotic experience including addressing some of those fearful/paranoid aspects. Again, you might find it helpful to read and share with the people you trust: A Conversation With John Weir Perry

What might also appeal to you about both of the doctors above is they did not rely on medications. Bertram Karon found that the best recovery rates took place among unmedicated individuals who underwent psychotherapy with a therapist who was skilled in working with schizophrenic clients. John Weir Perry founded an experimental project in San Francisco called Diabasis -- 85% of the people in that program were able to successfully move through their fragmentation process without medication.

Please note, that's not to imply that people should not take medication but I know you're interested in non-pharmaceutical approaches. Insofar as medication itself goes -- it's a very personal decision. Some people identify it as absolutely critical to their recovery, others don't. Should you reach a point where you decide it might be helpful to you, you may be reassured to know that medication does not have to be a forever kind of commitment. While some people do identify it as helpful over the long-term there are also many others who only take it for a period of time to help restore stability; they then wean off it and might never take it again. Still others only use medication when they're symptomatic. I didn't have medication but I did derive a great deal of benefit from approaching my experience from a psychotherapeutic perspective. Bear in mind that we're all individuals and what actually works best for us will also differ.

~ Namaste

Thanks

Yeah my psychologist is like that - she doesn't say I'm wrong, even if she doesn't agree with everything I say.
I don't really think my nurse understands though.

Well I still need some more proof - I don't really have any like you did.
I'm trying to get a better picture and some videos - so more people will believe me.
That's what I was talking about with my psychologist today.

Thanks for explaining how it was for you and what you did

Thanks for the links - I'll check them out.

You're right about that quote - it makes sense.
You seem to know a lot - that's pretty cool

Thanks for liking my ideas, but I am not certain whether they would help or not!!!
I do not have much more advice, only good wishes!!!

Take care, never give up hope, there is a possible cure of every ailment!

Regards
ZILCH HOUR

I hate it when I am not believed. It is one of the worst feelings that you can get because that means they don't trust you. One of the most positive qualities about me (or other people) would be honesty. Is there a reason why people would want to kill you? I recently went to a psychiatrist (a new one after 6 months of searching) and she says that my thoughts are not based in "reality." How can she automatically know this? I believe that the Gov is after me (and many others) because of my special abilities known as my "Power of Influence." It is because of my psychic abilities. Then because of this power, they inserted nanobots to turn me into a robot (at least part robot, I still have human feelings and functions) to fight in an upcoming war. Like I said before, I hate the feeling of not being believed, especially when someone really doesn't even know whats going on and just starting to know me. With me I believe everything is psychological, including my physical symptoms. Nothing is ever real for me. Most other people are more real.

Firebird: I recently went to a psychiatrist (a new one after 6 months of searching) and she says that my thoughts are not based in "reality." How can she automatically know this?

What she does seem to know quite well is how to shut down the lines of open communication.

I know I've mentioned this before but I think it would be really interesting if we could group people according to the type of content that emerges for them. Some people get religious themes; some people get alien themes; some people get thoughts falling out of their head; some people get thoughts being inserted into their head; some people get the CIA and the FBI yet all of these tend to be common threads that run through the "psychotic" experience.

Very few people seem willing to ask -- why the commonality? It becomes far easier to dismiss these kind of experiences as little more than faulty neurochemicals but even so, what do these people tell themselves. Do they believe there is a specific neurotransmitter that produces the suspicion that the FBI are following you and a different one that makes you believe you're Jesus. I'd like to see the genome map on that one!

I didn't get alien themes, I got religious themes and in my own case, I can stack that experience against Jung's model of the psyche and what we know of the ego, ego development and transpersonal experience to demonstrate the rationality that was present within it. I have no doubt there is a similar rationality at work with the alien experience too, even if we don't yet understand it. Maybe it's all purely psychological or maybe there really are aliens out there who make their presence known to some people. Maybe some people are highly sensitive to different streams of cultural change and what that group of people "sees" is the technological invasion that is shaping human destiny. Maybe it's something else. "I don't know" is about all I could truthfully say about it.

Meantime, I think those of us who get angels and demons should get together in one group; those who get aliens should get together in another group; those who get something else should get together in their groups and so on, and then -- we should all talk amongst ourselves and see if we can find our own rational answers.

~ Namaste

See also: Have we had a thread about aliens yet?

I have many themes conglomerated into one. Aliens, government after me, men in black after me, CIA watching me, being haunted by demons, aliens making there presence known,social phobias,anxiety, depression,implants and injected nanobots the list goes on and on.Themes would not work for me.Reality is what we make of it.
I believe that I have somehow tapped into a force of incredible power.Most people's minds cannot even fathom what I experience. I believe I have a special gift of psychic intuition. I'm beginning to think the doctors just want to dope me up to silence my thoughts.I'm not sure I want to silence my thoughts.Everyone else lives in their safe little worlds of jobs, home, and family. I live in a world open to all possibility, and I like it.Sometimes the fear I have is not good, but fear is the great motivator. My fear is there for a purpose.To help me grow. The science of the mind is based solely on theory. The doctors don't know what causes these things, therefore how can they now if it even needs to be corrected. science knows what causes our sun to shine, but they don't know hardly anything about what causes the mind to work. Merely synapse's firing again and again. Where do these electrical impulses come from. Some unknown force maybe.Doctors are supposed to be helping us in the fifteen minutes of time we spend with them.How can they help us when they don't even know the cause? How can they say what is normal and what is not.Doctors that integrate Noetic theory into their practice, are starting to understand all of this.

Yeah not being believed sucks

That's why I'm working on getting proof. I explained it all to my psychologist - I'm not really sure what she thought about it - but she did listen and tell me to get proof.