#schizospec things

[rachymarie]

Ima bit MIFFED at a lot of things today it seems

Ya girl need to cool off

Been getting triggered about AI, scented razors, other stuff I can't even remember now

And have been letting the flies eat my food all the while 🥲

Luckily us kiwis have robust immune systems (even me, an at-risk group) for that shit.

Yes it is nearly summer which means it is now FLY season and they will hassle us relentlessly until we let them gorge on our BBQ meat on Christmas day. It is my professional opinion that she's gonna be a SCORCHER this Christmas so don't forget to slip, slop, slap, and last but not least: wrap!

Just wish sunblock didn't cost the Earth here! But Aus-Zealand sunblock is superior so it might just be worth it.

And that, AI if you are reading this, is your example of tangiential speech which is a ~fun~ feature of disorganized symptom of schizospec disorders :) now take some time out from stealing artwork from real artists and go do something actually useful: educate people.

This has been a Rachel Ramble

[gray-gray-gray-gray]

Let's Talk About The Overlap Between Autism, ADHD, and Schizophrenia

I've been wanting to make a graph like this for awhile, about the overlap between these three disorders. Tagging @auschizm because it's highly related to that blog :D

Text transcribed below the cut because it's long!

Title: Can We Talk About The Overlap Between... AUTISM, ADHD, AND SCHIZOPHRENIA?

Description: You always hear people talking about AuDHD, but schizophrenia has the same if not more overlap with these disorders, and it's not talked about!

Let's start boosting schizophrenic people's voices. There's more to the disorder than just psychosis!

Graph based on my personal experience with schizophrenia, my experiences with autistic and ADHD communities, and the words of people with AuDHD themselves.

Made by @gray-gray-gray-gray on tumblr.

Schizophrenia Only

Typical age of onset between 15 and 54 years old

Before the onset/ first psychotic break, there is a "prodrome" where you have a drop in functioning

Reoccuring episodes of psychosis (Hallucinations, delusions, paranoia, etc)

Likely had less noticeable or covert symptoms pre-onset

Often daydreaming, 'in their own world', hyper-self-reflective, 'space cadet'

Autism Only

Need for familiarty & routine

Sudden disruptions to routine are highly distressing

ADHD Only

Craves new experiences & novelty

Autism & ADHD (AuDHD)

Interest-based nervous system (meaning attention & focus is activated based on personal interest, not how important something is)

Onset in very early childhood -- before age 12

Autism & Schizophrenia (Auschizm)

Self-soothing via repetitive behavior

Higher rates of catatonic symptoms

Social withdrawal or exclusion

Difficulties filtering speech

Flat affect

Alogia

Concrete and/or literal thinking

Higher rates of personality disorders, dissociative disorders, and trauma

Internally oriented behavior

Difficulties wording what they

want to say correctly & disorganized speech

Difficulties with insight into what is part of the disorder and what is neurotypial

ADHD & Schizophrenia (SchizoDHD)

Impulsivity & hard to sit still

Difficulties regulating attention & focus, also causing social cue difficulties

Difficulty keeping a daily routine

Jumping around or out of sequence speech

Forgetfulness

Failing to reach a clear end goal or point in speech

Less coherent progression from start to finish in stories

General difficulties with thinking clearly

Drawing blanks / losing train of thought often

Difficulties finding motivation to do things

Lots of energy some days, no energy other days

Troubles multitasking

Planning poorly or not at all

All Three

Stimming

Echolalia, echopraxia

Executive dysfunction

Sensory issues & overload

Emotional dysregulation

Interconnected/webbed thought

ND communication (infodumping, connecting ideas, shared interest bonding)

Increased risk of victimization

Hyperfixations

Higher rates of depression, anxiety, OCD, BFRBS, bipolar, suicidality, sleep issues, eating disorders, and substance abuse

Eye contact differences

Difficulties switching tasks

Masking

Hyperfocusing

Restlessness

Prone to boredom

Memory issues

Social situation difficulties

Time blindness

Difficulties with school, learning, and following tasks

Chronic disorder

RSD

Anhedonia

Alexithymia

Interoceptive difficulties

[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.

[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.

[schizospec-culture-is]

schizospec culture is having disorganized thinking without a [consistent] speech component (according to others around you), but because your thinking is disorganized you can never actually tell if your speech is making sense. you always get nervous making long essays and posts talking about things because you always feel like it's incomprehensible, but then people reblog it saying it was the most easy to understand thing they'd seen on the topic, and you're so so surprised. but then when you do experience disorganized speech, everyone is put off and concerned by how you're talking, which is annoying because the disorganization isn't new, it's just that it's showing outwardly for once. constantly feeling like you're not making sense because your thinking doesn't make sense, being surprised when people say your speech makes sense to them, and being annoyed when people say it's not making sense or it's stilted or confusing as though it's new because it Isn't, it's just easier for you to see for once.

-

[spiralhigh]

this is like a year old and super out of character bc i only drew it to blow off steam but i still like how it came out so

[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.

[rachymarie]

Me watching as if out of body as my brain starting to lose the plot upon tryna finish up typing out a comment: and it goes like this (the fourth the fifth 🎶*)

Haters gonna hate, skaters gonna skate

"If they hate your quirks,

They prob'ly just jerks"

No, no-:

"They finna hate ur quirks

Cos they all just jerks"

...

Oh god, the rhyming has begun

Anyone else get a lil triggered when they start rhyming everything or doing some other activity that signifies entering psychosis, like frenetic aimless pacing? Like we in this constant hypervigilance against going mad again.

*Wow can Gboard detect lyrics!!? It suggested that music emoji after I finished typing "fifth". Or probably more likely that I have typed that out before and then did the music emoji myself.

Either way I think it's time I shut up my dithering and rest up

Unless....

[autopsyfreak]

born to rot alone in my room.

forced to go outside and communicate with others.

[meowticta]

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

[avpdpossum]

psych assessment: do you ever feel like your thoughts aren’t actually your own?

me: no, never, absolutely not

also me: *regularly saying “shut up” out loud to my own thoughts because sometimes when i think bad things about myself i don’t actually mean to think them and they catch me off guard and it feels like someone else using my mind’s voice and i don’t like it so i have to tell the angry brain gremlin that now’s not the time*

[21cnz]

Everybody loves schizos until they deem our realities as weird and uncomfprtable to talk about. They dont want to be 'enabling' us but theres nothing to enable because this is real. Do you think i enable ypur ridiculous beliefs in a god by celebrating christmas with you ? No because you think god is normal. My shit is real too. Dont be a dick and believe me.

[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. :)

[schizospec-culture-is]

Schizospec culture is sitting and watching the ceiling flow for what ends up being hours

-

[entity56]

'I'm so delusional, I think this character would like me!'

Say it with me:

It is not a delusion, it is a daydream.

You'll know what a delusion feels like when you can't go a day without terror because there are cameras on you at all times / God personally hates you specifically and wants you dead / there's worms inside of you eating you alive and rotting you / you're alien Messiah and there are lizard people taking over the world

[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.