I can share from my experience what psychosis is. Psychosis in composed of several things,and many feed off of one another. Now my psychotic episode were based on being manic, so I am taking my explanation from that point of view. Here it is:
1. Every time I have been psychotic I have had hallucinations, 99% of the time hearing voices. It is rare for me to see or feel or taste anything that is not there.
2. Because of the voices I develop delusions. This means I believe things that make no sense. My most common root delusion is God talking to me telling me to do things. Kill terrorists, move my faimly to the woods, do a certain experiment to win the Nobel prize, etc. Always to make myself seem more than I really am.
3. Paranoia. This probably makes me dangerous more than anything, and the reason I go to the hospital. I can believe people are plotting against me, and most importantly, against God's plan for me.
4. I don't sleep, which makes all of the above much worse.
5. I can't keep a train of thought long enough to actually do anything.
6. Personal hygiene goes out the window, along with anything that God does not tell me to do.
A good example of someone being psychotic is Andrea Yates. In my opinion her husband is just as guilty as she is; my wonderful wife always picks uyp on me getting sick before I do.
I find it hard to believe someone who is psychotic could order body armor, and several weapons, rig his apartment with explosives, and then carry a rifle with a 300 round drum clip into a theater and shoot people. It really pisses me off because it makes people who are really in need of help and reinforces stereotypes, and will make sick people avoid care because they don't want to be lumped into a category with him. I'd like to know what others have experienced while psychotic, so please leave comments below.
BB
I thought the people in streets were teachers, along with the people on my job, and everyone and everything, from the TV to the newspaper delivery truck, were sending me messages. I thought there was a microphone in my AC which I could use to talk to people outside in the street and they could read my thoughts. Wrote a memoir of my journey to relative sanity or, at least mostly, out of psychosis. It is called, "Eye-locks and Other Fearsome Things: Learning to Love as a Bipolar Aspie."
ReplyDelete