hearing voices for the first time and hallucinations

713 · 07-12-2008, 08:36 PM

So today, for the first time I heard voices wich weren't there. I heard them only about 5 times today and only very quiet. Yesterday I started seeing things which weren't there, but today it looked like a shadow was standing next to me and I was so terrified and started shouting. I couldn't even see it properly but,....I don't know, it was scary.
What happened when you had hallucinations or voices talking to you the first time?

jellytot · 07-12-2008, 08:43 PM

this has happend to me recently , just random like people talking but muffled, its horrible , i have seen things too , but hearing things is a new thing to me too ..
ita horrible init , we are all here to support you huni xoxoxo

Wonderland. · 07-12-2008, 09:26 PM

Sweetie i know how scary it can be.
Try and speak to your GP about this if you can.
You don't have to go through this alone.

Amy x

713 · 07-12-2008, 10:44 PM

Thanks, it helps me writing about it to someone.
The first thing a male voice said, was: You are an idiot. At first I thought the CD which I was listening to said that, but I replayed it, and it didn't say it. The song was in english and the voice in german, so it wouldn't be matching anyway.
Then later on I heard someone coughing, but I was alone at home, so I grabbed a knife and searched the house, but I couldn't find were that coughing came from. I also heard some music playing, which couldn't have been mine. A bit later it just called 'Papa' (which is german for dad) once.
And more recently the shower was saying something but I couldn't understand it.
Does it get worse with time? Do they get louder?
I have an appointment with my psychiatrist on friday, and at earlierst I can reach her per phone on Tuesday. I just don't want things to get out of control. And I don't want to take anti-psychotics again. I already increased my risperidone to 1mg, but I suspect that I have to go much higher to stop it. And if I go higher I get very annoying side-effects.

Target Dawn · 08-12-2008, 12:52 AM

If your psychiatrist thinks that you need to increase your dose of Risperidone then maybe you can ask to just try a different medication if your getting side effects from that one. There are plenty out there to try but in general Risperidone should have few side effects compared to others as it's a lot newer.

Leaving this untreated it will probably only get worse with time. You realise now the things you are experiencing aren't real but that could change. If you need to call your psychiatrist on Tuesday then do so and if you think things are getting out of control before then you should tell someone, anyone who can help.

Steel Maiden · 08-12-2008, 10:27 AM

My first set of Voices were in 2004 when I was lying on the bed in a hotel room. Voices started whispering (quite loudly) things like "she's insane, she should be locked up, she should die" etc. I then saw words and numbers floating in the air in front of me. Then the lamp changed shape and tried to attack me! I couldn't sleep at all that night.
How are you doing now? Do you have a psych you can talk to?

Steel Maiden · 08-12-2008, 10:31 AM

Additional (my phone won't let me edit my posts) : four years later, hallucinations are a big part of my life. I've been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. My advice to you is to talk to your psych about this because it could be early signs.

713 · 08-12-2008, 11:35 AM

At the moment I am doing ok, but I am a bit scared because I heard some things today and I wasn't sure if they were real. Yesterday I could rule out that anyone other was making that noise.
Today I am at my mothers flat and it's never quite clear where noise is coming from. It's (luckily) not like the voices are telling me to kill someone or to kill myself, it could be randon stuff. I hope I won't get into any more situations today where I am not sure whether there is someone talking to me, I hope that the akineton in combination with effexor was causing that.
I will look that up and I will phone my psychiatrist tomorrow because I am having seizures, and if I pluck up all my courage I will tell her about the voices and the shadows.

Steel Maiden · 08-12-2008, 02:17 PM

I hope that your psych will help. They say early intervention is best. Good luck and tell us how it goes.

713 · 13-12-2008, 04:58 PM

So, I am back out of hospital today. Unfortunately I didn't get to see my pdoc because, well because I was in hospital. Luckily I wasn't in a psychiatric hospital but in one specialised on neurology, because I was having seizures and couldn't walk properly anymore. Nothing came out though. Somehow I had hoped that I had some neuro problem that would explain the psych stuff.
anyway, getting back onto topic. The voices didn't disappear, but they didn't get worse either. they are just very confusing.
the doctors there wanted me to take more risperidone because I told them my psychotic experience is getting worse (intrusive thoughts are haunting me quite a bit), but I don't know yet whether to take it. I have another appointment with my psych on thursday so I will see then.
The doctor there mentioned, psychosis usually gets worse the more times it occurs, do you think that is true? (Steel Maiden, I understood from your post, that in your case it did get much worse.)

Steel Maiden · 13-12-2008, 07:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 713

The doctor there mentioned, psychosis usually gets worse the more times it occurs, do you think that is true? (Steel Maiden, I understood from your post, that in your case it did get much worse.)

Yes it did. My first two episodes were moderate, but my third episode got me sectioned in a secure unit. My more recent episodes got me sectioned by the police (two occasions, police car and ambulance outside my house and one occasion, being forcefully taken to a section 136 suite by a police van).

So yes it did get worse and I really wish my therapist (that I had for two years before all the schizophrenia stuff started) had listened to me when I told her I was hearing voices and feeling very paranoid. Instead she ignored me and I ended up in A&E 6 months after she discharged me.

So in my opinion, if they can catch it early (early intervention team), its the best for you.

Don't make the mistakes I made because they're irreversible.

Wellingtons · 13-12-2008, 07:47 PM

If you're having neurological symptoms aswell then it's most likely that they're related.

I hope they manage to work out whats wrong so you can get sorted :)

xx

ThinkingofRecovery · 13-12-2008, 07:50 PM

Have you been told that your voices/hallucinations are psychosis?

I see things (myself hanging, a man in our house, etc) and hear things - Leroy and another generic voice that I don't recognise. However, as I know that they can't actually be real, they aren't considered psychotic, they are pseudo-hallucinations. Just because you see/hear things, doesn't mean you are psychotic.

I think you need to ask the drs what is going on and as Daffodil says, it might be that your neurological problems and the voices etc are related.

I hope you get the treatment you need hun.

713 · 13-12-2008, 08:44 PM

No, I haven't been told the voices are part of a psychosis; I haven't talked to anyone about it yet.
I am considered psychotic because I experience thoughts being put into my head which are not mine. At the moment I can't actually 'listen' to them anymore because they took control of me and surpress my own thinking in some areas.
Personally I don't think I am experiencing a psychosis, or ever have, because I have some kind of insight into what I am doing and thinking.
I will post again when I visited my pdoc. Thanks for reading and posting your comments.

ThinkingofRecovery · 13-12-2008, 09:05 PM

There is a man in my house. It isn't psychosis though because he is real - he must be a ghost or something, I see him and he is there so not making it up. I see myself hanging but as I am dead, it can't be real, hence not psychosis. I see myself crossing ahead of me at roads and level crossings but recognise it isn't actually me. I hear voices, one I recognise, another, I don't (sometimes there is another) and which changes but there is no-one there and because I recognise that there is no-one there, it can't be psychosis. It doesn't make it any easier to deal with though and I don't ever want to belittle your experiences. In a way, because it isn't psychosis it is harder to deal with and I don't want people who suffer psychosis to be mad at me. Although I am on APs, they aren't for the voices and as they are pseudo-hallucinations, they cannot be treated with APs. I have to find a way to deal with them somehow and at the moment I am really struggling with them and struggling to remember thta they can't be real or can they? I hope you didn't think I was making it out as though your experiences aren't difficult unless they are psychotic as I have extreme difficulties even though not psychotic. Sorry, rambling but wanted you to know that I understand how scary things can be.

Steel Maiden · 14-12-2008, 06:59 PM

But remember that some neurological illnesses, especially temporal lobe epilepsy, can cause hallucinations.

713 · 19-12-2008, 02:27 PM

Spoke to my psychiatrist today and she didn't have much to say apart from that she was kind of waiting for it to happen again and that I should increase the risperidone.
I told her that I am not sure if I could do that because the extrinsical thoughts are telling me not to and to kill myself instead.
Well, I suppose she couldn't have told me something different because taking more anti-psychotics is the only way to get that stuff down.
I am kind of disappointed though, because I told her that the anti-depressant I am currently taking is not working and she refused to change it because she could only prescribe me another one which I have tried twice before, which also didn't work. I mean those guys have so many medications to chose from, why do they fix themselves on only two?

roiben · 19-12-2008, 05:21 PM

I think it depends on how they interact with everything else you take, and with your symptoms and your body as a whole. It may be, for example, that because of the neurological side of things there are some medications that they are steering clear of to be on the safe side.

*hugs*

I hope uping the dose helps and, if not, go back and say so.

Roiben x

charliotta · 21-12-2008, 01:45 AM

If risperdal difficult then may suggest at least quetiapine - it's sedating at first, which can be comforting. But don't try to hide your voices/hallucinations from your doctor or careworker as I agree the more you let them go on without treatment the worst they could get. When I get them they start with delusions, which I think come from my own head, saying how great I am, and then they can spiral to voices from God saying I'm like a modern day Jesus. (Which you would think is good, unless you're on an inpatient ward who thinks they're Jesus too - it can lead to some clashes!!) But then you get paranoid because (in bipolar delusions) you think that other people are trying to destroy your special powers/or worse, that you have to destroy someone who's the devil. It all sounds made-up, and some people think mania is fun, and hypomania can be, but it all has bad and sad repercussions.

713 · 21-12-2008, 04:11 PM

Thanks for the advice,
charliotta I just looked up what the medication was you suggested. however, seroquel is, along with olanzapine and the old anti-psychotics, something I wouldn't try until it became really necessary. I aprecciate your recommendation, but while in hospital one of my friends was on it, and she was basically sleeping all day and she was gaining weight as if she was just eating sweets all day long.
I still have a packet of 49 10mg tablets of aripiprazole at home, which I got prescribed when I refused to take the risperidone any longer (but I never used it either). That would last until I get my place in hospital or until I see my doc again in the new year.
The thoughts are not so bad at the moment and they don't force me to do anything, so I have some time to decide what to do.
I am aiming to wait a bit because I increased the venlafaxine 3 days ago and I have to make out whether I get seizures from the increased dose or if that's caused by something else, so I can't immediately start the aripiprazole. And then I am still taking a low dosis of risperidone. Hmmm, and the last problem is that it would seem a bit cheeky telling my psychiatrist when I get back to see her that I changed my medication without consulting her. I suppose that problem could be solved by getting a place in hospital before seeing her and later telling her they changed it, but...yeah... I will see.
In the UK it all appears so easy going to your GP and asking them about their medication advice, because the access to psychiatrist is limited. But here in Germany, GP's seem to be heavily oberstrained by mental health problems which involve psychotic symptoms. They just refer people to their specialists, but I am a bit unsure what they are going to do when the specialist isn't available.
I feel a bit stupid for posting all this, because my psychotic experiences are nowhere as bad as those of the people who posted about them.
Mine just gets mixed up with depression and well, I just wanted to say I am sorry if I am using this to get inappropriately attention.