I am in the same position as you with my son who was never religious but something happened a year ago and he now has a diagnosis of schizo affective disorder and believes he is God’s last prophet. This is so painful to watch and we feel helpless as he has no insight.
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After 5 months in hospital, our daughter is back in society, in her own apartment again and just about coping. She’s not the same person she was, but is getting there very gradually, so we live in hope.
She lost her appetite for religion whilst she was in hospital and has shown no desire to return to it, so we believe it was a fixation associated with her relapse i.e. if it hadn’t been religion she would have become fixated with something else.
Her mental health has always gone up and down, but we began to notice significant changes in her behaviour and interaction, with religion being a major factor. We called in the professionals to assess her when we found her in a wardrobe saying God had taken her. The psychiatrists took it from there and decided on hospitalisation.
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I’m so pleased for you, it sounds like your daughter is on the right road to recovery.
My son has had 3 admissions this year but is skilled at masking his true feelings and is able to present as ‘normal’ to get discharged. The first time I had to call the police as he downloaded an ‘exorcism video and got into a state screaming for demons to leave him and reciting the Lords Prayer. He was admitted but just for 4 weeks. Once out his anger at our arranging for psych assessment takes over and he will not speak to me or his father. His religious beliefs are absolutely fixed and irrational. He meditates and listens to The Holy Spirit and takes guidance and instructions – he quit his job and believes God deleted his mortgage. He thinks he is in contact with celebrities and is being targeted by the Illuminati.
Aripiprazole depot isn’t touching it. He seemed better in hospital on 30 mg Aripirazole but I now think he was masking his symptoms. What has your daughter been prescribed?
Interesting that about the illuminati.
I had never heard of them till my son started talking of them . What is it with this illness and the illuminati? How come they talk of illuminati,
There is a disorder called the Jerusalem Syndrome. It is triggered when a person goes to Jerusalem.
Jerusalem syndrome is a group of mental phenomena involving the presence of either religiously themed obsessive ideas, delusions or other psychosis-like experiences that are triggered by a visit to the city of Jerusalem.
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