What it's like to be a schizophrenic with auditory hallucinations

Explanation: I would like to try show a comparison between useful hallucinations and non-useful hallucinations.

I present this musical video that to me represents what it could be like ... when the fear level goes away.



Please listen to the lyrics very carefully and please note the highly unusual 'reality' that is portrayed.

For me ... such a reality would be amusing and magical and wouldn't increase my fear or cause me to feel I am in harms way.

For me there is a spectrum ... the more fear ... the more the voices become agitated and emotional and compete/ talk over each other ... the more confusion I experience with trying to sort out who said what and why.

The 'technical' terminology for this state of being is called becoming 'prodromal' and it is based on the concept of 'Command and Control' ... i.e. who is control ... me .. or the voices!

There are times when the 'internal dialog' (ie I know the voices are just inside my mind) is like a softly flowing gentle stream and I feel at ease with my lot ... and there are times when it is like a swift flowing river carving a course over the landscape and I feel driven and compelled to engage and act on what the voices are telling me ... and there are times it is like a set of whitewater rapids followed by a bloodshed watershed moment as I feel I go over the edge of a waterfall and my 'grounded' reality ... no longer exists ... and I become swamped by extreme visual hallucinations ... that ARE REAL as I can physically sense them but I am like a ghost to them in that I can't 'use' them ... for example I may feel that there is a cup that I can pick up ... but it holds no fluids ... or there are stairs leading somewhere but I cant use them to go up or down as I sink through them like a ghost.

Most often the visuals and the physical sensations are wrong when veiwed from the point of view of normal reality ... shadows that go towards the sun instead of away ... or no shadows at all.

People walking through walls or other people like ghosts ... because the wall and or those people are only in my head.

Example. I often see a small petite short haired female cat that glides [legs dont move] and doesn't cast any shadow ... but I can feel her rub up against my leg and I can hear her purring.

For me the ONLY thing that brings me peace of mind is to work out my own fears and then deal with them and to do that I must extend trust in others and not doubt myself that I do trust those 'designated' people in my life with my life. The same goes with objects.

It is the paranoia that I must defend against ... not the voices or hallucinations.

The latter inform me of many points of veiw ... the former informs me that I am not making full sense of what I am sensing.

Personal Disclosure: I was afraid to post this reply ok

Nobody likes to be and or feel judged unfairly or innaccurately.

I hope by posting this to reduce my own unfounded fear level ... because there are many real world founded fears we all have to deal with right now and aint nobody got time for being distracted.

I hope this helps.

reply to post by Mr Headshot


Wow, that is really interesting. Must be hard trying to convince yourself that the voices, although very real in your head, have no power over you. Not being schizophrenic it's hard to imagine that internal struggle.

On the subject of auditory hallucinations.... I've had it since as far back as I can remember. From the age of about 8/9 I have memories of hearing music that others can't hear. It always sounds like it's muffled through a wall or just very far away. SOmetimes it's a song I know, sometimes it's something different/new. It's quite often classical/heavy rock.

Really interesting and it feels kinda special. I'm just glad my brain never changed over to the 'bad' kind of auditory hallucination.

Nice post OP,

Peace

Wow, that would be completely unbearable for me to deal with for more than a couple of days.

My sympathies go out to anyone that has such strong auditoury hallucinations.

I almost find it hard to believe that those videos in the first couple posts are an accurate respresentation of what most auditoury hallucinations are like, but if they made them with the help of actually sufferers.... That's just scary.

I live with chronic pain, which before I was treated was so terrible, I was contemplating suicide. I never thought such pain could exist. If someone had told me what I tell people the type of pain I get I wouldn't have believed them probably. So I'm completely open to the idea that some people actually have to put up with "voices" like in the videos on a daily basis.

Again I'd go mad within a couple days. I'd be in the ER after 30 minutes of hearing that. I hope they have some decent medicine that helps people suffering with this.

Thank you for this, I have always been curious and wanted an example of what people with this condition heard.

Originally posted by XsweetNspiceyX
reply to post by TruthxIsxInxThexMist

 

It makes sense to me. Those people have a totally different view on things and seem to be more inclined when it comes to the supernatural. The more spiritual a person in modern society gets the more they would fit in with lower levels I would think.

edit on 23-1-2013 by XsweetNspiceyX because: (no reason given)

Maybe but I'm telling you first hand that I don't think Voodoo has anything to do with my condition or anything I may hear!

What I can tell you though is that I think most who are labelled Schizophrenics are nice people

Originally posted by muzzleflash

Originally posted by akushla99

Science can neither confirm nor deny 'voices in the head'...

Ding ding ding.

That's why I don't buy it one bit.

I have heard a thousand arguments and none have convinced me yet.

Interesting to note the 'cherry-picked' sentence...

You missed this...
"It is foolish or convenient, to attribute the phenomena holus bolus to a diagnosis of schizophrenia..."

I do respect a 'position' from absence of experience, and many could reduce all 'voices in the head' to biological processes in the body...but this would be foolish...

A99

Originally posted by jaguarsky

Originally posted by HomerinNC
i dont hear them like that, just whispering, nothing that can be picked out or distinctive voices, and ill hear muisic

Hearing music is very common. The brain tries to make sense and find a pattern for all data, when it encounters data that it can't immediatley identify or quantify it will fill in the blanks. If you are near running water, or something with an electrical motor (ceiling fan, AC unit) in an otherwise quiet setting, your brain may decide it is hearing music and fill in music even where it does not exist. I would suspect that in the absence of a musical solution the brain might decide it is hearing a conversation instead and react the same. (Although, I have never read any documentation of that.) As I said, this is very common and has nothing whatsoever to do with mental illness.

I hear bluegrass music usually, some I recognize, some not. I wish I had the ability to write it down. I have tried to memorize some of the tunes. My son hears classical/orchestral music when he is in the shower or by flowing water. It is an amazing little trick of the brain/mind, enjoy. [/quote

Great theory and I have also researched that electrical reaction and it still does not work I know this due to wearing ear plugs, and they were not cheap kind either... So your theory is not valid ..sorry..

A way of describing such experiences is in relation to experiencing dreams or nightmares while you are awake.

www.youtube.com...


This is literally the type of # going through my head some of the time. Watch quickly, youtube keeps taking it down.

I'll tell you what. I am almost 47 years old, first diagnosed at age 12 and everything just got worse. At my apogee which wasn't too long ago, I copied this for my doctor to let him know how my head feels during stages of paranoid schizophrenia/clinical depression/panic disorder etc.

It is NOT a good scene or thing to go through. I am surprised I have made it this long. And you are right...it's NOT fun!!!!! I had many at once: hallucinatory; audio; physical and would not leave the house and felt almost agoraphobic and claustrophobic at the same time. I don't know how else to explain it.

Then one night while lying there picking scabs off of my scalp, I swear I felt each and every one of the 50 billion or so neutrinos passing through my body at once. I swear I thought I had reached a total state of Nirvana. Nothing, null. And whose to say it's people like us who are mentally screwed up?? It is very possible we are more connected to a bigger picture.

When I was first hospitalized, it was back when they still treated people like #. And on top of all of this, I have those wonderful Cluster Headaches to deal with.

But believe it or not, I test at very high levels of intelligence and almost finished a master's and worked about 20 years as an artist/writer. It wasn't easy, and I've had every typical and atypical med there is.

It's not a life.
I still have no life.
I died a long time ago.

Originally posted by ipsedixit
When these sorts of hallucinations are given "attention" by the victim, that act by itself, feeds and reinforces the phenomena, unless the attention is in the form of skilful techniques of meditation, designed to subdue or expel spirits, rebalance the flow of nervous energy in the body and acquire and confirm a view of reality that is more detailed and sophisticated than simply taking things as they appear.

I agree with most of what you are saying except the subdueing or expelling spirits part. They should be viewed as constructs of others who each exist in their own dimension or existence but can express themselves through these constructs much like through an interdimensional wifi.

Those representations should be taken apart just as if a mobile phone would be taken apart. The representation will keep on existing whether subdueing it or expelling it and might cost attention or some kind of energy or focus, so it must be deconstructed just as it was constructed in the mind. And before deconstruction can begin, one's own mind, reactions and expectations must be known so this is why this mental state is so difficult to overcome as most people who don't even hear voices or anything can have a hard time with this.

At the same time, a lot of hidden parts of the mind are laid bare by these spirits and the sufferer can use this to their benefit, they have a chance to achieve true eternal happiness if they can overcome the mental battering. Where sane people take the easy spiritual road and just talk eachother into a kind of pseudo heaven based on will where people's strenght is dependent on actions towards eachother (like subdueing and expelling but also flattery, praise and recognition). It is much harder to fool oneself into fake beliefs when spirits can easily disprove a particular belief, pointing out the weaknesses and flaws. The interaction also allows for practicing communications techniques, if the expierencer dares to make the voices as real as life itself it can actually be used as a beneficial method of learning how to verbalize the many human expressions.

The sufferer can achive self-recognition at a soul level, learn how to deconstruct any living being in their own space and even to guide or influence the construct of another which the other might 'mistake' as their own construct, pretty much the manipulated being exposed to the manipulation techniques, learning them and then using it in daily life on others.

Originally posted by Mr Headshot

Schizophrenia interests me, in sort of a morbid way. Some of its manifestations are certifiably terrifying, like in the video above.

If you can't listen to it, it's a video made using the descriptions of the voices people with schizophrenia hear in their head. It's not fun, it's not pretty, it's not something you should listen to if you're weak of heart or alone in the dark.

Can you imagine that playing in a loop all day long, while you're trying to have normal relations with folks? Nope.

It's pretty close, there is a little more to the dialogue though.

Originally posted by fastbob72
Wow what an interesting video,both the one in the OP and the one OL posted.I found them very insightful and disturbing aswell.Though I have to admit I didn't find them scary or frightening in anyway,more revealing than anything on what sufferers endure daily !!

Just a couple of questions though.Are the voices always in the 3rd person.i.e do they hear other people talking about them ??
I mean,I have an inner monologue which sometimes I wish would shut the f**k up (although the older I get the better I'm getting at ignoring it and shutting it off) but it's always my own voice,like I'm having a conservation with myself !!!

Also my inner dialogue,if dialogue is the right term,I think it's applicable as although it's me talking to myself there's definitely two different points of view,as such which technically constitutes a dialogue.

I don't hear it,rather it's a mono/dialogue in thought rather than audio.Do schisophrenics actually hear these voices rather than experience it as though ???

These videos gave me a little insight into what it must be like although clearly I can't truly understand what it means !!

I get songs stuck in my head all the time and it's nearly always some real annoying mainstream pop song I can't stand.The Germans have a name for songs,pieces of music and advertising jingles that get stuck in your head.They refer to them as 'Ear Worms',a rather apt name wouldnt you agree.

For me they are always in the third person, YOUR inner voice is normal, what we hear is not, and it's not like hearing it with your ears, it's the same way your inner voice manifests itself.

Originally posted by metalholic
reply to post by Mr Headshot

 

That's not believable I doubt any human being can actually sit in a room or walk down a street without being somewhat mentally handicapped is some way. That is not the title schizophrenia and hear voices in their head.

That stuff would have to come from the Project Blue Beam Voice of God technology that the navy uses to communicate to other ships without being in site or range. Atleast that was the experiment.

Crew members actually believed god was talking to them. You ask why would someone do that to people?

Fear!

You're one of those people that believe PTSD is fake as well, don't you? it is very real my friend, if it struck you right now you might curl up in the fetal position and cry for help until you die, those of us with it live with it everyday, EVERYDAY!

Originally posted by metalholic
reply to post by Mr Headshot

 

I'm pretty much saying that you cannot be non mentally handicapped or have psychological problem that is not schizophrenia and hear those voices. Schizophrenia is actually a concoction of other mental physical problems. They then prescribe you medicine that induces these problems even more. That way someone who might not stand out in a crowd can now be isolated an shunned if the crowd desires.

Had the individual grew up their whole life without any of these problems and just woke up one day with them. Most likely it's illegal testing of classified technology. the las thing TPTB want is for someone to prove the existence of god. Cause then they are screwed. If the dreamer so chooses.

*facepalm* You know NOTHING about this condition what so ever, please just do yourself a favor and stop posting in this thread!