Unknown Visual Problem Which Developed With My Psychosis

I was diagnosed with psycosis in January 2004 and started treatment then. The medication was Risperidone and i was on 4mgs and it seemed to treat everything really well except i had some visual problems. I have used recreational drugs in the past i hope you wont judge me because of this mistake i made but my vision problem was that my normal vision 24 hours a day was like the visual changes that happen when you take ecstacy.

Soon after i was on the 4mgs i developed side effects and my doctors changed my medication and since then my vision has never returned to normal. at this point in time my vision isnt hazy as such it just looks like im on some kind of drug or im drunk. My doctors are stumped as to what this is they said they have had other people develop this ecstacy type look of things before but they have never had to change medicaitons and it has always gone away. I wonder if this could be derealisation but i have noticed that the definitions of derealisation never states that peoples vision looks like they are on a recreational type drug and i would assume that if this was derealisation then most other people who have had it would describe it as like the vision when they are on drugs.

If you have any idea what this is im suffering from and any ideas for treating it could you please let me know as it is very distressing for me as i have had this everyday for over a year now and it is very scary and i dont know how much longer im going to be able to put up with it. Any help would be most appreciated.

Roy:

I am not going to judge you, I know very very few judgemental people in these forums, so feel safe to say what you need to say

I am stumped too. Have you had CT scans or MRI's done on your brain?

Psychosis is an ugly thing. My brother is schizophrenic and I develop what I call mild psychosis from time to time, or I suppose what mental health professionals would call psychosis but it is visual hallucinations and auditory hallucinations that do not bother me, so I don't bother to get treated for it.

Perhaps the vision problems are a form of hallucination? I can't see how, unless you were extremely active in the taking of recreational drugs consistently over several years, how it could be connected at all. But..that is a consideration I suppose. It's good that you can explain this to your docs and sometimes I get those feelings and also "tunnel vision" and mine is connected to anxiety and panic disorders. Perhaps yours is too.

Sorry I don't think I was any help but wanted to throw a few possibilities out there.

Take Care and good luck!
Kimberly.

Hi Kimberly,

I dont think its a halucination because all my other psycotic symptoms have gone away. It seems like this is a kind of derealisation problem however it is constant and dosnt follow any of the other kinds of trends a anxiety problem would cause.

I know i have some anxiety now however this derealisation has been going for quite some time now even before i had anxiety.

It developed in my early stages of psycosis and when i was being treated for it on risperidone it went away completely but then came back again 10 times worse, after a medication increase it went good again then came back slowly, then i developed side effects to the medicaiton and they had to change it and since then it has never gone away.

I hope Dr Grohol or possibly another doctor or training doctor on this website sees this post and could maybe shed some light on the situation. My psyc im seeing now says its anxiety but she is still in training her services are provided to me at no charge by the government. However 2 GP's have told me its psycosis.

Hopefully i can find the answer sometime soon coz it really is hell to live with.

p.s. Also in regards to the recreational drugs i only used them afew times before i developed psycosis then i stopped.

Roy:

Oh no! I fear I've offended you. I, in no way, meant to imply that the use of recreational drugs could've caused the psychosis. While I do believe they don't help the situation (my mother is an addict who is DID and suffers from psychosis). I am so sorry if you thought that's what I meant.

Have you had scans done of your brain to make sure there are no tumors, etc. present. Sometimes that can cause vision problems. What I meant by mentioning the hallucinations is because having several family members and myself, at some points, suffering from psychosis, I know a bit about it and if the Risperadol helped that, then it is psychotic related....I hope that is not confusing. The general guidelines for diagnosis of psychosis are two things: hallucinations and/or delusions. So at some point, one or the other has come into play.

Perhaps trying the anxiety meds would help you, even if it's just to ease you until they can figure out exactly what's causing it. I know a student here that is good at depersonalization/dissociative disorders and I will have her take a look see.

I really wish you luck and hope that you find a solution soon.
I know it must be miserable!

Take Care,
Kimberly.

Kimberly,

Dont worry you havnt offended me i believe myself that the psychosis was caused through the drugs because i never had a problem before i did them.

If you could ask your friend whos studying depersonalization/dissociative disorders to have a look at my post that would be much appreciated.

I do believe it is psychosis related and any help with possible treatments and/or diagnosis about whether this is derealisation developed through the psychosis would be much appreciated. I just need to know for sure and my docs are stuffing me around saying no its not its anxiety when 2 gps have told me its part of the psychosis. Any ideas she may have for treatment would be much appreciated.

I tried getting in contact with afew hypnotherapists yesterday but they wouldnt see me because of my psychotic background. Things seem to be getting harded by the day. I just hope theres some kind of treatment i can try.

Im also thinking about trying some herbal medicines if there is any that would be usefull to try to treat dissociative disorders although i doubt it very much. I think im going to ask my psyc to try and get me into some kind of meditation class at the treatment center i goto.

I know its a long shot but i want to try everything i can to get better although im starting to face the nightmares that this dissociative disorder is never going to go away. Everyday it seems to be becomming more of a reality.

Thanks Kimberly for your help i really do appreciate it alot.

Roy

This is the web adress of a site dealing with derealization. Some people describe it as looking through a grey veil or fog, and other types of visual disturbance. check it out, it may be similar to what you're experiencing.

http://www.panic-anxiety.com/deperso...#derealization

Is it possible to have drug-induced psychosis years after the fact? I have an old friend who whenever I mention anything about my weirdness, always points to the fact that I did so many drugs when we were younger. I haven't done any psychedelics in over 3 years now, and even before that my use had tapered off to being extremely rare (e.g. whereas I used to trip out a few times a month as a teenager, and for a few years heavy like that in my 20s, in my 30s it had become a genuinely rare occurrence, maybe once every 2 years or so). And I don't smoke pot any more because it stopped working for me a long time ago -- would either put me to sleep or give me a panic attack -- no fun. I had an old stash still sitting around last spring and I actually threw it away because it had been sitting around untouched for years, no point to keeping it.

Since Roy brought up the issue of his drugs being what he believes triggered his, I thought I would ask here, maybe someone knows the facts on drug-induced psychosis and could answer.

http://www.ravesafe.org/otherinfo/psychosis.htm

Drug induced psychosis - not the most comprehensive site, but, it's there.

http://www.eagleforum.org/educate/20...-induced.shtml

This is a case of drug induced psychosis, though a little different from your experience - but just to show it can happen, according to these people.

I have just written up a complete description of what im going through to show my doctors in hope that maybe it will show them what im really experiencing as i find it hard to explain when im there in person. Anyone who would like to have a look at it ive hosted it on my website the address is:

http://www.alphalink.com.au/~rellery/derealisation.doc

Be warned its about 3 pages long and in size 12 writing so its a pretty big read. But if you are interested by all means i invite you to take a look at it.

Roy

http://www.psychiatry24x7.com/ ...splay.jhtml?itemname=selfcheck

Click on that link and see if that will help you at all...
I'm thinking that the doctors already know much of what you are suffering because they put you on Risperidone. It is always good to write it all down, though, for you and for them, for clarity!

Did that questionare Sky I will show it to my doctor when i see her next week. Thing is with the risperidone treatment, I was started on it when i was hearing voices and didnt feel i could connect with people which are classic psychosis symptoms. These symptoms did go away and so did this visual (derealisation) stuff. However when i got to 4mgs a day i developed side effects and they took me off it.

Since then the Visual (Derealisation) has come back and i have developed these feelings like i am drunk and extreemy sleep deprived. I dont know whether you would classify these as psychotic symptoms or not. I am beginning to think i may have more of a psychosis induced anxiety disorder however that questionare you gave me the link to it did show that my cognitive and negative symptoms are fairly high.

As for halucinations and delusions they have all gone away now. Its really hard when the doctors dont know whats wrong with you or how to treat it. I feel like im stuck in a world between psychosis and anxiety.

Roy

oh man i know exactly how you feel! i've been drunk once and i've never done drugs, but since i started developing my psychotic behavior I've had that same problem you're talking about. My vision is like i'm drunk all the time. My eye doctor says it's personality. Something about my view of reality is too much fantasy. Chemical imbalance. Maybe it's the same for you.

ok so its officially been over 1 month since my 1st post and im still no closer to finding out any kind of treatment plans for my psychosis induced derealisation. Im starting to get desperate. I was wondering if people could perhaps ask their doctors for me what kinds of treatment would benefit psychosis induced derealisation. My doctor is only a uni student and im the 1st case of this she has seen so she is basically no help and my therapist is only familiar with anxiety induced derealisation. I would really like to know how to try n treat this because its really starting to get the better of me. Ive been suffering with this for over a year now n im still no closer to finding some kind of treatment for it. I dont know if psychological treatments would help it or if i would have to completely rely on medication to fix the problem. Any help from anyone would be so greatly appreciated.

Roy.