Challenging difficult beliefs.

Aubergine · 22-08-2015, 11:04 PM

When I'm unwell, I experience some quite difficult beliefs that cause me a lot of distress. I have been so scared by these thoughts that last year I thought suicide was an option because it would stop something terrible happening. I get worried that I'm being hunted down by the devil and that he's going to take me to hell alive. I thought that if I took my own life, I had a chance of going to heaven before he got chance to take me (I do not believe that suicide definitely results in people going to hell.)

It's hard to write that because it makes me worry that it will happen, even though right now I'm in a good place and can see that it's unlikely because people don't go to hell when they're alive. When thoughts of being taken to hell pop into my head, I can push them away. I can counter them with logic and they don't bother me that often.

I hear voices, which compound the problem because they warn me about all of this. When I get low, they become very persistent with the warnings and I get so, so scared. I'm not scared of the voices, because I think they are trying to help me with the warnings, but I get scared of what they're warning me about.

When I'm OK, I still hear the voices on an infrequent basis, but I'm more able to dismiss them and can keep in mind that things can't be that dangerous because they're not being very pushy about it. They also talk more about mundane things like what the person next to me is wearing (or even what I am wearing - I put the clothes on in the morning, so I am well aware of what I'm wearing!)

Does anyone get anything like this? What strategies do you have in place to keep countering the thoughts when you get low and it's harder to push them away? Though I've never attempted to take my life before last year, I have spent 2 months leaving my room only to go to the loo (and sometimes not even managing that. Gross. Please don't judge me.) It usually ends in extreme isolation and lots of terror and then I end up being carted off. I really want to stop that from happening, but my mind seems to take over when I'm like that. How do I stop it?

I've spoken to my vicar at church, but we have a bit of a disagreement about what hell is. He doesn't believe that it's an actual physical place where people go. He believes that it is total separation between the soul and God, resulting in an eternity completely without His grace. I would like to believe that, as it would make things less scary for me (that I wouldn't be taken somewhere and burned for eternity), but I just can't. So speaking the the vicar is difficult.

I just so want to stop this cycle of getting so consumed and preoccupied with scary thoughts that I'm unable to think about anything else/get in trouble.

Sorry about the multiple threads at the moment. I'm getting a lot from each of them. :)

Aardbei · 22-08-2015, 11:14 PM

I'm sorry things get so difficult for you, Ducky, but I think it's wonderful that you're reaching out for support and are able to be quite rational/reflective about things when you're feeling more well.

I'm someone who doesn't have any beliefs about heaven or hell so I don't feel quite qualified enough to comment on that aspect of things. However, I can try and help you figure out how to challenge the bad stuff.

First, do you know what your early warning signs are? Is it easy for you to tell when things are beginning to slip and you might be getting stuck into a scary headspace? If so, can you put some sort of contingency plan into place so the people who need to know (such as your CPN and your Mum) can be warned early enough to maybe help support you out of a full blown episode?

Secondly, would having more visible reminders of the logical explanations to counteract these thoughts around you be helpful? For example, I made a couple of posters with one of my clients for when he gets worried - he goes through some questions/explanations to ask himself as they're written on the poster. The fact that it's on the wall means he can always see it and it can help pull him out of a bad space. Does that sound like something that might be useful?

Aubergine · 23-08-2015, 12:01 AM

Thanks Ali.

I really am able to be more level with my thinking when I'm OK. I'm not weird all of the time.

I did a lot of work on warning signs when I was under early intervention a few years ago. I have a list that is still relevant these days. I saw my CPN last Monday and we talked a lot about what she might notice when things are becoming difficult for me. I think that will be really helpful, as we're new to each other so she needed to know. She said I had quite a good handle on what kind of things to try and pick up on.

I think I find it quite difficult because it can creep up quite slowly. In some ways that's good, because it means that there are things that can be done to stop it. In other ways it's not so good, because things are so insidious that I don't always notice/try and explain it away with something else. Sometimes I so want to believe that it's not happening again, that I'll think that things are just happening because I'm tired/stressed/overworked/physically unwell. I need to not do that, but when the consequences of becoming unwell have been so unwelcome in the past, it can be hard to admit to myself that it could be starting to happen again.

I think things like that could help, yes. I don't think I could put anything too in depth on my wall because I could get a bit obsessed by it - I can have a bit of a one track mind when it comes to this stuff sometimes. I think perhaps a poster/sheet of challenges in a folder with just a prompt to look at it on the wall could help.