Schizophrenia - Faking it or Real?

Also you need to pretend to be psychotic 24/7 for 6 months…

There is a sort of movement of people on tumblr(and elsewhere) that say self diagnosis is preferable to seeing a doctor. They usually diagnose themselves with autism and PTSD though. Some do schiz

Why do they say self-diagnosis is preferable to seeing a doctor? That is strange.

If you ask them, they would say doctors are trying to play God. And that you know yourself better than they do. if you tell them they need to see a doctor they will tell you that you’re being classist and ableist. I don’t pretend to understand it. :roll_eyes:

Classist and ableist aren’t even the right labels

Classist because I’m assuming they can afford a doctor. Ableist because I’m denying their disability. Again…:roll_eyes:

All my doctors are free

I’m certain that the vast majority of them didn’t even try to seek help. They just saught attention

Autism or PTSD I can understand. I got tested for tourette’s when I had read about it on internet. It’s hard to not notice having tics since I was 4 years old. I got the diagnose when the tests were done. I believe Autism can be noticed the same way.

But sz…the key is that you are not aware of your delusions. And believe every one else is wierd, reading your mind and stuff. It’s much much harder to self diagnose sz.

That is my main disagreement with the people who self diagnose with schiz. They’ll say “I’m delusional”. And I’m like, if you recognize it as a delusion, you’re not really delusional, are you?

As far as I know, one can be delusional and be aware of it. Being aware that one may be delusional is acknowledging that what one is experiencing may not be as real as it seems. It’s a good thing, not an indication that one isn’t sz or whatever other diagnoses.

I think that kind of insight can come with time and with the right medication. But then it also kind of stops being a delusion, since delusions are defined as strongly held irrational beliefs. Maybe there are a few exceptions where the person believes strongly but is lucid enough to be able to discuss and question their beliefs. But saying “this is a delusion” is evidence that the belief is not strongly held at all and then “delusion” is not the right word.

Our last encounter with law enforcement was with non-trained officers, and they said my son was faking it, and took him to jail instead of to hospital, which was the reason I had called for their assistance.

like the line goes, a crazy person doesn’t know they’re crazy?

Could this mean like someone believes in aliens despite others telling them they’re are no such creatures? Or believing in God(s)/Goddesses despite the lack of physical proof of their existence? More like someone believing in one thing because they were taught to believe that one thing but the vast majority of people are telling you are wrong.

What I’m also thinking about is what about times like in my personal life when I think I see things, something moving in the shadows or just out of site, or I think I see a bug when there’s nothing there. I know 99% of the time there is nothing there but something in my head reverts to thinking otherwise. I think the main thing is that I can recognize a delusion thought but it doesn’t prevent them from sneaking up on me…

I will also talk about something in terms of it being a delusion because people will listen when I do that. If I just say what I’m experiencing people will just say that that isn’t happening or argue with me. So I just “lie” and say I’m experiencing delusional thoughts.

My brother has had paranoid schiz., manic depression, bipolar effective, delusion, for 41 years. He has probably cost the taxpayers several millions of dollars for his care. Twenty-five years spent in state mental wards. He had been a top student, born-again Christian. When the illness first appeared his doctor put him on strong psychotropic medication, when all he needed was counseling. The drugs caused him to see and hear what was not there. His so-called Christian friends wanted nothing to do with him. He couldn’t keep his clothes on. He felt gay" and fantasized about men and boys he saw and met. All along our dysfunctional parents contributed greatly to making matters worse. Mom babied him, excused him, and let him slide in school. Dad worked hard to keep himself in expensive cars and fancy clothes. I was already married and out of the area. Bottom line is this: NOTHING, zilch, has worked. The controlling spirit is narcissism! They ALL believe the world revolves around them. Hardly any of them have and love pets. Mom and Dad passed away. Brother is still in mental ward. Will not participate in any therapy. Sleeps all day. I’ve spent thousands of hours trying to help. When you have a brother who was a star student and athlete and his younger brother a “has been,” never seeing his full potential, you have a 60 year-old baby waiting to die. It’s his ONLY out and answer. Sorry for the negativity, but schizo. is incurable. Take care of your OWN life and other healthy loved ones. After having met and talked to so many health professionals concerning my brother’s case, I can only conclude…the blind leading the blind. Many of them should be locked up themselves and go back to their foreign homelands.

No. There is no way that I can think of that anyone can fake such a horrendous illness nor why they would ever want to. One of the unfortunate earmarks of the illness in many cases is not being aware that you have it. Any psychiatrist worth his salt will know how to diagnose correctly.

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My husband just told me his feelings and it is identical to your post. I have a business and can get away but he is retired and actually feels just as you do. I would like to sell our business but he warned me that it might not be the healthiest decision. It does require me to think about something else but it can also be overwhelming and I don’t feel like I’m doing my best anywhere.

I will admit that some people will fake anything if they think it will get them a disability check - I know people like that.

However, no one can fake the day to day, hour by hour suffering that someone with a severe psychotic disorder goes through for long.

I’m guilty of going into denial between episodes early on & blindly hoping it just would never come back. My husband’s denial was not really a “faking it” kind of thing, but trying to come up with things that could have happened without our knowledge, maybe some kind of abuse, that would have caused this. Or, he’d think maybe if he was around people more, or had a girlfriend, or a million other things.

But, no matter how hard we denied it, it’s been there on some level consistently for the past 12 years. It started at 15, and he’s been stuck in limbo for all that time. Absolutely no one would fake that, and if they did, that’s a whole other level of crazy that’s far worse than SZ.

We don’t give up hope though - we continue to believe that with the right treatment, everything will click for him and he can move past this.

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If a person wasn’t schizophrenia then can the medication give them psychosis?