#schizospec things

[rachymarie]

normalize rambling

normalize the messy thinkers + talkers

for one thing let's get our collective attention spans back

for another, let's be more inclusive of + compassionate towards folks whose disabilities cause "rambling" and disorganized speech/thought

[littlebumbliebee]

Hallucinations and delusions aren’t always funny and meme-able. You’re not always going to see Joe The Grocery Store man, or hear uplifting voices, or believe you’re sonic or something. It’s possible, but that’s not always the case.

A lot of hallucinations are scary. You can see scary things. You can hear violent and vile things - nothing is off limits for hallucinations, much like intrusive thoughts. They can be traumatizing.

Likewise with delusions. Common delusions include believing your brain has been hacked, that you’re a chosen one selected by a god, a prophet, or a God yourself, that you’re being controlled or hunted, that you’re possessed, and so on. These delusions can be scary and traumatizing.

Even small things like seeing insects crawl up you, or believing you’re contaminated somehow can be anxiety inducing.

While it’s true schizospec disorders and psychosis aren’t distressed for everyone, and you can have non-distressing hallucinations and delusions, we shouldn’t try to sanitize the disorder for other people. People with scary, vile, or violent hallucinations and delusions deserve respect like anyone else and should be included in activism.

[avpdpossum]

can we talk more about avpd being a (proposed) schizospec disorder? because i almost never see that theory talked about but i wish it was. like…

avpd makes me censor my thoughts because i think someone might hear what i’m thinking and see what a horrible person i am on the inside or judge me for thinking embarrassing things.

avpd makes me so afraid of someone walking in on me doing something i Shouldn’t Be Doing that my brain twists background noise into the sounds of whispers and footsteps behind me.

avpd makes me so worried about people staring at me that in my peripheral vision, anyone near me looks like they’re already staring at me, and it’s only when i look at them directly that i realize they’ve been looking in a totally different direction the whole time.

avpd makes me so convinced of how much everyone must secretly hate me that i often start thinking everyone secretly wants to hurt me too, to the point where i’ve had panic attacks from a person walking too close behind me because i feel like they’re getting ready to attack me (when i haven’t had any kind of trauma that would create that fear), and the paranoia just serves to reinforce my need to avoid people.

avpd makes me lose my ability to speak or reduces it to nothing more than one word answers only when spoken to, turning the thoughts i wanted to express into a jumble that’s impossible to turn into words or just throwing them away completely and making my mind go blank, so i end up just staring at people silently or even acting like i don’t see them standing there at all (not on purpose but because my brain won’t let me engage with them).

avpd makes me look damn near emotionless around everyone but my safe person (and sometimes even around my safe person) because showing my emotions would be far too vulnerable for its liking, so it completely takes away my ability to express them.

and i could keep going! there are so many things i experience because of avpd that i’ve seen really closely reflected in the experiences of schizospec people. i don’t know how common these kinds of things are in avpd overall, but they’re a really prominent part of my experience with it, so when i found out that some research suggested it could be considered a schizospec disorder itself, that made so much sense to me! and i’d be so curious to see how many other avoidants have dealt with this stuff but haven’t talked about it because it’s never mentioned as being part of avpd.

[l0nely-writer]

i absolutely cannot stand the lack of data, studies, and overall academic knowledge or understanding regarding aspd. its by far one of the most "umbrella term"-esque diagnoses in the DSM and its pretty damn clear that 99% of pop and past psychology has no intention of further educating on it. not only is there little scholarly drive to explore the disorder, it's outright just demonized and discredited. and i cant help but feel and know deep down that the next four years won't bring much more knowledge regarding the topic. instead we will see a drastic increase in the throwing around and slap labeling of prominent political figures, fascists, and neonazis with disorders like aspd or npd and terms like psycho/sociopath/narc.

[aftonsreprise]

Most of the people who call themselves a “weird freak” online are just losers who use microlabels nobody gives a shit about, and they wouldn’t last a day around… actual people who are considered freaks and met with disgust and the true hate, going far beyond simple disrespect, that they use as their “edgy” little aesthetic.

[schizopositivity]

Me watching Madagascar for nostalgia and to unwind and watch a silly movie: 🤗

The characters saying "psychotic" to mean "dangerous" throughout the entire movie: 🫩

[schizospec-culture-is]

schizospec culture is being told by close friends that you're using your psychotic episode "as an excuse" when you've been constantly telling people to be cautious around you because you could lash out at any moment. but then they start poking the bear (me) and act like victims when i, wow big surprise, /sar lash out at them.

it's so frustrating when i ask for basic respect from MY FRIENDS and they don't fucking listen. i'm not using it as an excuse, i genuinely cannot control myself when you treat me like that and i feel like i can't trust you anymore and feel even more shame for my psychosis.

-

[headshotters]

realizing that other people experience emotions differently is so interesting, i noticed this recently while talking to a friend of mine and it was genuinely kind of shocking? i figured everyone felt things the exact same way as me and just majorly overexaggerated everything, but learning that people will use the same words to describe very different experiences is actually pretty cool

[ofcrystalsandart]

The Magnus Archives is one of my fav podcasts ever and yet I've never been able to finish it cause of the way it portrays paranoia and just,., psychotic elements in general. It hits so close to home that it feels extremely personal

I got made fun of and laughed at for not being able to finish it, but I think people who don't experience psychosis will just never understand how intense it is to finally find media that you can relate to, without feeling like you're being vilified just for having a psychotic disorder

EDIT: Just to be clear I am definitely NOT saying TMA put in psychosis representation on purpose or that its perfect! For me personally there are just a lot of things that I can find myself back in, even to a detriment, pls dont take this any other way than me trying to express myself (i feel like i need to over explain myself rn cause you know,.,. paranoia and all that)

[lifenconcepts]

hiiiiiii friendly reminder to not go knocking on strangers doors and running away :)) or just doing that at all :) some of us have sheer paranoia that can render us stressed for time long after the action is done :) because you don’t experience consequences doesn’t mean you’re free to go around doing this like a fucking asshole. :). I know most people who’d listen to this don’t go around doing it but I hope that at least one person reconsiders doing this just to look cool in front of their friends. You don’t seem awesome, you just make it clear your an uncaring asshole and nobody will come to you. I hope karma does its thing. :)

[rachymarie]

Wdym bathing is not more involved?

Is showering not a feckin gargantuan unappealing task for everyone? It's so flippin daunting on the best of days

Granted i feel kinda on top of the universe once stepping out all squeaky clean

[u5eername]

attempting to self diagnose szpd while having autism may be a new layer of hell good lord

[gor3sigil]

I have to share a story about why I HATE the term "trauma dumping".

So basically, we were at my at the time partner's house with friends of them and we were talking about mental health.

I don't remember exactly how we came to this but one woman started talking about psychosis and her sister who is schizophrenic.

She had a lot of preconception about this and, while I am not schizophrenic, I dealt with psychosis and hallucinations.

So I started to talk about my experiences with that, stating AGAIN that I wasn't schizophrenic but I thought it was an interesting point of view.

Some other people started asking questions so I answered them, asking here and there if it was okay for me to talk about it, and nobody, INCLUDING the woman who started the conversation in the first place, said anything.

And at one point I saw she was uncomfortable and asked her if she'd rather drop the subject.

And then, she BLEW UP on me saying that I was trauma dumping, that she felt like she was partaking in a conversation she NEVER ASKED to partake in (again, she was the one who brought up the subject), that I was being insensitive and over sharing shit and that she didn't like it.

Like, bitch, I asked a bunch of time if it was okay, you were the one talking about these symptoms without even living it and trying to teach people some crappy over the counter shit, but now that she wasn't the Main Character with the Knowledge it became an issue and I was the problem.

I know that I'm open about my experiences and tend to talk about it but I ALWAYS make sure that people on the other end are okay with me sharing this. This was just utter bullshit.

And online or IRL, I just noticed that the term "trauma dumping" is just the easy way out of a conversation that makes you feel uncomfortable while putting the blame on the person doing it.

You can absolutely put boundaries, but don't you dare guilt someone just to avoid being seen as an asshole and make yourself clean of anything. It's healthy to state that you are uncomfortable talking about things, but you can do so without making up shit about others.

[villain-disorder]

Having no empathy and limited sympathy is so thankless. You can sit here doing equations in your brain trying to figure out how to not upset people and they still get mad if you make an "obvious" social mistake. But they don't see the amount of thought that goes into every damn interaction to make sure you're not unintentionally being hurtful, so if you make too many "obvious" mistakes, you're evil and a bad person.

You have disorganised thinking and can't see every outcome for a social interaction? Evil. You have no/low empathy and struggle to see how others feel and can be seen as cold even if you try to seem kind and be compassionate? Evil. Cut us some slack, it's not innate to us to function "perfectly". When I'm in a psychotic episode I can hardly think at all. Chill out.

[autopsyfreak]

born to rot alone in my room.

forced to go outside and communicate with others.

[disapunk]

just so you know,

i love you people who are in remission of their psychotic disorder/symptoms.

i love you people who don't have a diagnosis yet

i love you people who are psychotic and loud, and have no filter while talking and ranting.

i love you people who dont suffer from any shame when they're psychotic and say ''weird'' shit that only them understand

those who do not care if people think they're weird, annoying, ''dangerous''

those who are violent, who get restrained, those who are in psych wards, the so called ''crazy and insane''

those who have more delusions than hallucinations, or the other way around.

those who, will never recover, those who dont take meds nor therapy

the schizoaffectives, the schizophrenics, the schizophreniform, the brief psychotic disorder ones, those delusionals, to anyone who had or has a psychotic episode because of drugs or other reasons

i love you, you're not a bad person, you have 0 control of what your mind thinks or does, your condition is stigmatized, but i love you, you can take up space, you can talk about your experiences, and that will be valid, and cherished, i know people are afraid of you, of what the mind can do, of what they don't experience, but never believe that you are a bad person because of your psychosis,

be loud, be scary, be dirty, be ''embarrasing'' be ''gross'' be everything, or nothing at all, be proudly mad.

let people know about you, you have a voice, you have stories to tell, and your stories? will always be accepted by the right people, you won't be judged by the right people

this one is for the schizos, for the psychotics, the delusionals.

shoutout to you