My husband was diagnosed with schizophrenia about 3 years ago and has been dealing with those delusions since then even with medication. He’s on/off med compliant. At one point he was taking that medication that requires you get lab work every week. He did that about 3 months but even then the delusions never wavered. He then started taking Cobenfy, zyprexa and cymbalta for about 2 weeks but nothing changed. Now he’s on zyprexa since he’s refused to take the others. We separated 6 months ago for my and our kids safety and sanity but I deeply care for him and want to help him but I just don’t know how else to help him if he is convinced that there is nothing wrong with him. Do the delusions ever truly go away or maybe the doctors got the diagnosis wrong and maybe that’s why the medications aren’t workin?
Hello BrainSplit. I just came across your post. I do not know if i really have any thing valuable to say to your comment. Just wanted you know that this disease is horrible for the person experiencing it, AND for the people who love them. My loved one has been med compliant for over a year and some of the delusions persist. And because my loved one no longer lives with me, I just don’t respond to the delusion and redirect the conversation…God bless you with peace…
Diagnosed opinion here. I feel a better way to think of it is delusions may fade or become more manageable with consistent treatment of the right medication. There’s no guarantees, and everyone responds to medication differently. The term “Antipsychotic” probably was coined by marketeers— not psychiatrists. Psychosis management would be more realistic.
Caregivers should know that experiences during psychosis seem very real, even hyper realistic. They can be much more compelling and engaging than everyday life. When you expect a loved one to improve, you’re asking them to abandon intriguing delusions that made them and their lives feel special and replace it with a possibly dismal and boring reality with diminished status on many levels.
Personally, I vividly remember those experiences and the mindset I had during them. All the medication in the world couldn’t erase them from my memories. If you’re expecting that to happen, you’ve bought into delusions of marketing. My experience was more that my delusions slowly faded, both in importance and in clarity. I became less sure what parts were real or not, or whether they or this distinction really mattered. Much of this was because I had other things improving in my life that were more compelling— work, school, hobbies and social developments.
This said, if I was doing less well or was particularly stressed or having a bad day, they could return in clarity and focus. Like familiar “friends”. In relapses I might return to thinking I was “right” all along. I feel most psychiatrists who’ve abandoned psychotherapy in favor of medication do a very poor job of coaching patients through this transition.
As a patient I felt insulted and abandoned by them just handing me drugs and expecting my symptoms to vanish in a puff of smoke and for me to shut up about experiences that once consumed and distracted me—expecting me to just sort them out and ease back into “normal” society feeling very much on my own. Now I had a psychologist to help with that, and even then it was hard work.
Most sufferers don’t get this sort of treatment, nor are many capable of receiving it. Yet I don’t feel this responsibility should fall on caregivers lacking the training or capacity to give it. Were your situation more stable without children in the mix, I might suggest the LEAP method (search this forum for more info), but even that can be a long process with no guarantees of success.