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naturalplastic
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15 Nov 2014, 3:46 pm

I don't know the proper ettiquette to say this, but.....


The good news is - I agree with you.

The bad news is- I agree with you!


Im being clinical, and I am not being sarcastic here.

Have LONG wondered this from reading your posts- and now that you yourself are essentially proclaiming the very thing Ive been too polite say to you in public- now I WILL say this in public! That you're right- you are NOT on the autism spectrum, but are indeed somewhere on the sczhophrenic spectrum.

And basically you're right about this community -that you dont belong here, but in some schzophrenic community.

But more important- you need to talk to a professional mental healthcare worker about all of these thoughts you have. You need some help because you are walking on the edge of 'going over the edge' in my honest (if lay) opinion.

I mean - I'm a piece of work, everyone on this thread is a piece of work. But we're autistic, (though some might have some psychosis overlapping with it).But you're definitley primarily more - something other than autistic. Thats for sure.



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15 Nov 2014, 4:11 pm

naturalplastic wrote:
I don't know the proper ettiquette to say this, but.....


The good news is - I agree with you.

The bad news is- I agree with you!


Im being clinical, and I am not being sarcastic here.

Have LONG wondered this from reading your posts- and now that you yourself are essentially proclaiming the very thing Ive been too polite say to you in public- now I WILL say this in public! That you're right- you are NOT on the autism spectrum, but are indeed somewhere on the sczhophrenic spectrum.

And basically you're right about this community -that you dont belong here, but in some schzophrenic community.

But more important- you need to talk to a professional mental healthcare worker about all of these thoughts you have. You need some help because you are walking on the edge of 'going over the edge' in my honest (if lay) opinion.

I mean - I'm a piece of work, everyone on this thread is a piece of work. But we're autistic, (though some might have some psychosis overlapping with it).But you're definitley primarily more - something other than autistic. Thats for sure.
The problem is that I stopped going to my psychiatrist shortly after he suggested I could have an Asperger's assesment because I felt that the whole thing with psychiatry was BS and because I was offended at the time. Now I'm not offended by people saying I have a mental disorder or illness, but now I don't want anything to do with psychiatry. So any assessment will have to be self-assessment through tests, and I have heard that those aren't always very accurate. I think I said earlier in the thread that I suspect I might have shifted from one condition to another about a year and a half ago. Perhaps some new condition came on top of the old.



naturalplastic
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15 Nov 2014, 4:41 pm

Could be -like you said- you smoked some strong weed and/or saw the Matrix on a big screen- and it tripped a circuit breaker in your head. And you went from autism to mild psychosis at some moment only recently. I can believe it. You were probably borderline to begin with. We talked once before about a young lady I used to know -who had a history of being in juvinile mental institutions years before- suddenly reverting to talking psychotic to me on the phone after seeing the Matrix.That movie seems to have the power to push some individuals over the edge.

But I think you should reconsider getting professional help- imperfeect as psychiatry may be.



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17 Nov 2014, 1:40 am

naturalplastic wrote:
Could be -like you said- you smoked some strong weed and/or saw the Matrix on a big screen- and it tripped a circuit breaker in your head. And you went from autism to mild psychosis at some moment only recently.


In my case -and of course, I can only talk for myself- I didn't take any illegal drugs. I believe my symptoms of the schizophrenic spectrum started because of way too much stress over years, a trauma and incoherent signals from my environment which I didn't understand, propably also because of my autism.

I also believe, I've both, HFA (or at least PDD-NOS, but I got dx with HFA) and Schizotypal PD, maybe not full blown STPD, possible. I don't believe, I've Mendelssohnn's Syndrome, nor McDD. Why? I didn't have symptoms out of the schizophrenic spectrum as a child, nor mood symptoms, just autistic symptoms. The interesting thing is (and maybe it's a coincidence) that my social understanding and my intuition for social signals got a lot better around that time when my STPD developed. I dunno why this is, but it's like my brain has the choice for one disorder and follows one certain disorder pattern. It might sound strange, but I've no other explanation for it. I can read many social signals intuitively now, which I couldn't as a child, what lead to the fact that I was described as purely HFA in the past, to STPD with autistic symptoms now. I still think there is a certain difference in symptoms if you had autistic symptoms to begin with or if you developed autistic like symptoms because of a schizophrenic spectrum disorder, but I've no proof for that.


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tomato
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17 Nov 2014, 2:06 pm

Raziel wrote:
naturalplastic wrote:
Could be -like you said- you smoked some strong weed and/or saw the Matrix on a big screen- and it tripped a circuit breaker in your head. And you went from autism to mild psychosis at some moment only recently.


In my case -and of course, I can only talk for myself- I didn't take any illegal drugs. I believe my symptoms of the schizophrenic spectrum started because of way too much stress over years, a trauma and incoherent signals from my environment which I didn't understand, propably also because of my autism.

I also believe, I've both, HFA (or at least PDD-NOS, but I got dx with HFA) and Schizotypal PD, maybe not full blown STPD, possible. I don't believe, I've Mendelssohnn's Syndrome, nor McDD. Why? I didn't have symptoms out of the schizophrenic spectrum as a child, nor mood symptoms, just autistic symptoms. The interesting thing is (and maybe it's a coincidence) that my social understanding and my intuition for social signals got a lot better around that time when my STPD developed. I dunno why this is, but it's like my brain has the choice for one disorder and follows one certain disorder pattern. It might sound strange, but I've no other explanation for it. I can read many social signals intuitively now, which I couldn't as a child, what lead to the fact that I was described as purely HFA in the past, to STPD with autistic symptoms now. I still think there is a certain difference in symptoms if you had autistic symptoms to begin with or if you developed autistic like symptoms because of a schizophrenic spectrum disorder, but I've no proof for that.
Interesting. I also seem to have changed in how I relate to others when I had the shift. I was a lot more paranoid/sensitive before I think. It's as if I have become crazier in some ways, but as if my eyes have been opened up to other dimensions or something at the same time. The same time the shift happened I also seem to have split up into two people, which might sound weird but that's how I feel sometimes. And it feels like my old self is shrinking, fading away, and a new self is growing up like from a cocoon. This has made me wonder if this has something to do with evolution, that I passed from one stage to the next.

I have written about this before, and what I'm speculating is that this is written about in the Bible and that autistics/aspies are "Jews in Egypt", and the shift that I went through was "Moses on Sinai" and that right now I am "a Jew in Babylon". May or may not be accurate but I find it interesting.



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17 Nov 2014, 7:00 pm

interesting. before i knew what autism was, i had researched a lot about schizophrenia/schizotypal/schizoid etc and was pretty convinced that i had finally found out what was wrong with me. i tried to dismiss it though and worked very hard on...how do i say this, i realized my tendencies to research occult/supernatural things and how i would react to them so i worked very hard on not letting myself indulge and basically i just try to keep myself from thinking too much nowadays. retreating to very small parts in my brain.

while i can relate to people on here, and i do think autism explains most things for me, i can still see i'm different from people here even. i've been holding onto that thought for a while now, but tried to ignore it. like naturalplastic said, i've also seen your posts and could tell you were different/ a little unhinged in my opinion. but unfortunately i can see myself in you and that makes me very uncomfortable because i'm trying very hard to be normal these days.

sorry if it seems i'm rambling, i had a really bad night/morning and its getting harder and harder for me to ignore certain parts of my brain but i think typing it out helps a bit even if it makes me feel ashamed. do you ever feel ashamed for being yourself? maybe this has more to do with my upbringing, but i feel the biggest thing that separates me and you is i feel deeply ashamed of being like this and i try to be "normal" while it seems like you are embracing it. if any of this sounds aggressive or doesn't make any sense i apologize, i'm still feeling a bit strange.



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17 Nov 2014, 11:38 pm

unit_00 wrote:
interesting. before i knew what autism was, i had researched a lot about schizophrenia/schizotypal/schizoid etc and was pretty convinced that i had finally found out what was wrong with me. i tried to dismiss it though and worked very hard on...how do i say this, i realized my tendencies to research occult/supernatural things and how i would react to them so i worked very hard on not letting myself indulge and basically i just try to keep myself from thinking too much nowadays. retreating to very small parts in my brain.

while i can relate to people on here, and i do think autism explains most things for me, i can still see i'm different from people here even. i've been holding onto that thought for a while now, but tried to ignore it. like naturalplastic said, i've also seen your posts and could tell you were different/ a little unhinged in my opinion. but unfortunately i can see myself in you and that makes me very uncomfortable because i'm trying very hard to be normal these days.

sorry if it seems i'm rambling, i had a really bad night/morning and its getting harder and harder for me to ignore certain parts of my brain but i think typing it out helps a bit even if it makes me feel ashamed. do you ever feel ashamed for being yourself? maybe this has more to do with my upbringing, but i feel the biggest thing that separates me and you is i feel deeply ashamed of being like this and i try to be "normal" while it seems like you are embracing it. if any of this sounds aggressive or doesn't make any sense i apologize, i'm still feeling a bit strange.
Interesting. Yes, I am not ashamed but am embracing it. I think that's mostly because of the "awakening" I had last year, when it shifted. Suddenly I saw the world with different eyes, especially for a few hours but also lasting afterwards seemingly permanently. It was as if the world turned upside down. Every single curse felt like a blessing and every single obstacle or adversary like a helper. I do think that was a more accurate view of the world. Ever since I've felt like walking among blind people or in another dimension or something. I think it might have to do with seeing through conditioning. Everybody is totally caught up in conditioning. And I think your shame is due to conditioning. Conditioning is necessary for society to function though. But I do think there's a lot more to the world than just society, and it appears you might have to go crazy to see it. As for being unhinged, I don't know but personally I think that that perception might be because of conditioning again, madness and creativity are two sides of the same coin. Basically it's what Arthur Schopenhauer said, not to brag but I think it has something to do with it:

Quote:
Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.


I don't know much about Arthur Schopenhauer. The way that quote and some other quotes by him are written makes me wonder if they're a bad translation from the original language or if he was a wannabe intellectual. However the point I was intending to communicate is there.

Schizophrenics are trailblazers, they are far away from the collective, autistics being outsiders but schizophrenics having taken it one step further I believe. They are like astronauts that have lost contact with ground control, with the rest of humanity, or like a diver that has lost contact with the boat. For this reason they appear unhinged. Here's an interesting video with Robert Sapolsky about schizophrenia. There are many other interesting videos with him too. When I listen to this professor I get the feeling that there is some aspect of intelligence that he is lacking in compared to me, even though his "machine intelligence" is much higher than mine. What I'm talking about is embedded within his descriptions of the conditions for those with eyes to see, expressed like "loose associations", "odd thinking" etc. or whatever he said. I think he says too that the diagnosis schizophrenia is skating on thin ice because it's very close to something you might label political opposition etc.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEnklxGAmak[/youtube]

I talked about Jews above. Interestingly he is a Jew. He does appear to be very left brain focused, like a lot of aspies seem to be. However he comes across to me to be very socially well-adjusted and relaxed. Not at all neurotic and stiff. Not at all a typical aspie which is interesting. Perhaps a Jew who "became a Gentile"... Just speculations.



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18 Nov 2014, 3:36 pm

the video was very interesting, i watched it all last night. thanks for sharing. i am feeling much more clear and in control of my mind today so i can reply now.

i agree with you, i think my shame is due to conditioning. and looking back at my post, i don't think unhinged was the precise word i wanted to use. i guess i was feeling a little unhinged myself and ended up using the word. i like what you said re: "autistics being outsiders but schizophrenics having taken it one step further I believe" and i would have to agree. however, do you not see schizophrenia as a negative at all? in the video he did mention how sometimes people label others as schizophrenic to silence them/political blah blah i can' think of the words, but he also mentions this is not always the case.


in the past i have had times where the world has shifted for me too. mine has never been so permanent (so far) and i did not feel my cursing turn to blessings, or rather i'm not sure what that means exactly. it is difficult to put into words. i can only describe it as the world, but shifted to the left. when that happens, i don't fight against my feelings or how i think, it feels strange but more natural. sometimes i think this is how i would always be if i didn't strictly regulate my thoughts and ignore parts of my mind. during those times i don't try to please other people and act socially appropriate like normally, and while it becomes incredibly clear how different i am, usually by the next day or so the world shifts back and i lose all of that. i wish i could explain it better, because i'd like to know if that sounds familiar at all to you.


i won't lie, i feel best and most 'me' during those times, even though it can almost feel like the world isn't real. if it was only like that, i don't think i would fight it as much and i wish i could be like that all the time. however, sometimes instead of feeling 'enlightened', my mind can feel very out of control and all these thoughts and things, and really i am just along for the ride. i cannot stop it. does this happen to you? i'm not sure if this would happen anyway, or if it would happen less if i didn't "lock away" so much of my mind.


sorry for long post, i am just very interested in this and want to see how our different experiences line up.



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18 Nov 2014, 4:47 pm

unit_00 wrote:
the video was very interesting, i watched it all last night. thanks for sharing. i am feeling much more clear and in control of my mind today so i can reply now.

i agree with you, i think my shame is due to conditioning. and looking back at my post, i don't think unhinged was the precise word i wanted to use. i guess i was feeling a little unhinged myself and ended up using the word. i like what you said re: "autistics being outsiders but schizophrenics having taken it one step further I believe" and i would have to agree. however, do you not see schizophrenia as a negative at all? in the video he did mention how sometimes people label others as schizophrenic to silence them/political blah blah i can' think of the words, but he also mentions this is not always the case.


in the past i have had times where the world has shifted for me too. mine has never been so permanent (so far) and i did not feel my cursing turn to blessings, or rather i'm not sure what that means exactly. it is difficult to put into words. i can only describe it as the world, but shifted to the left. when that happens, i don't fight against my feelings or how i think, it feels strange but more natural. sometimes i think this is how i would always be if i didn't strictly regulate my thoughts and ignore parts of my mind. during those times i don't try to please other people and act socially appropriate like normally, and while it becomes incredibly clear how different i am, usually by the next day or so the world shifts back and i lose all of that. i wish i could explain it better, because i'd like to know if that sounds familiar at all to you.


i won't lie, i feel best and most 'me' during those times, even though it can almost feel like the world isn't real. if it was only like that, i don't think i would fight it as much and i wish i could be like that all the time. however, sometimes instead of feeling 'enlightened', my mind can feel very out of control and all these thoughts and things, and really i am just along for the ride. i cannot stop it. does this happen to you? i'm not sure if this would happen anyway, or if it would happen less if i didn't "lock away" so much of my mind.


sorry for long post, i am just very interested in this and want to see how our different experiences line up.
That's a bit hard for me to know exactly what you mean. Maybe that's a sign I haven't experienced that because perhaps otherwise I would know right away what you mean. Or maybe not. I'm trying to think about it. I certainly have times when things flow more smoothly and other times when it seems everything goes wrong. Right now I remembered a thing. At my work a lot of times I feel like it's a struggle that I have to push through, it's a menial job. But a few times I have had an experience where it's almost as if I enter a meditative state and kind of detach from the whole situation and I just am instead of feeling like I'm constantly pushing against resistance. As for being myself vs playing a role, I think I used to try very hard to be something I wasn't in the past and suffered. This went a little bit up and down but I think the general trend was a gradual increase. At the end I thought I was hopeless and totally disordered, but during the experience last year I felt that I was the blessed one and all the well-adjusted people are the ones lacking in blessing. After that I care much less about people and the world, I don't feel like I want any of it. Or, mostly it's like that even though I can have a bit of frustration and envy etc. still. As for whether I don't see anything negative with schizophrenia, which I don't know if I qualify for but might, I think my view relates very much to that experience I had. I think there might be negative things but those things can be seen in a different light. I do believe they exist for a reason, and that reason is a spiritual gift. This is nonsense as long as it's only viewed from the frame of reference of the ordinary conditioned world view, which is why you probably have to be in it to understand. That's what I think I guess. But I don't know anything at all.



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18 Nov 2014, 6:44 pm

tomato wrote:
That's a bit hard for me to know exactly what you mean. Maybe that's a sign I haven't experienced that because perhaps otherwise I would know right away what you mean. Or maybe not. I'm trying to think about it. I certainly have times when things flow more smoothly and other times when it seems everything goes wrong. Right now I remembered a thing. At my work a lot of times I feel like it's a struggle that I have to push through, it's a menial job. But a few times I have had an experience where it's almost as if I enter a meditative state and kind of detach from the whole situation and I just am instead of feeling like I'm constantly pushing against resistance. As for being myself vs playing a role, I think I used to try very hard to be something I wasn't in the past and suffered. This went a little bit up and down but I think the general trend was a gradual increase. At the end I thought I was hopeless and totally disordered, but during the experience last year I felt that I was the blessed one and all the well-adjusted people are the ones lacking in blessing. After that I care much less about people and the world, I don't feel like I want any of it. Or, mostly it's like that even though I can have a bit of frustration and envy etc. still. As for whether I don't see anything negative with schizophrenia, which I don't know if I qualify for but might, I think my view relates very much to that experience I had. I think there might be negative things but those things can be seen in a different light. I do believe they exist for a reason, and that reason is a spiritual gift. This is nonsense as long as it's only viewed from the frame of reference of the ordinary conditioned world view, which is why you probably have to be in it to understand. That's what I think I guess. But I don't know anything at all.


sorry, i have a hard time describing it, so i'm not surprised it was hard to understand. the experience you have where it's as if a meditative state, that would be a more accurate description of what i have experienced. but maybe not quite. i don't know, it hasn't happened in a long time so i'm just going off of memories trying to describe.

i think it's very interesting how you view it. i can't see it as a spiritual gift, but i don't let myself think about spirituality at all, so that's probably why.

anyway, thanks for sharing all this. i have never talked to anyone about this before so i'm trying to share but also be a bit vague at the same time. a bit difficult. i'm not sure if talking about this stuff is also difficult for you or not, but thanks for indulging me, i appreciate your insight.



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19 Nov 2014, 10:39 am

How normal is it to experience synesthesia on the AS?

Is that normally categorized as a pseudohallucination?



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20 Nov 2014, 11:37 pm

I think while I am autistic, I may be schizotypal as well. I relate to people of both of those neurotypes. I think that I may have developed schizotypal traits because my auditory processing disorder made it harder to figure out other people, though I'm not sure.

I think it is interesting what you said about conformity. I usually do not conform, but when I was taught Social Thinking (which is basically a social skills curriculum that says that nonconformity is wrong and conformity is right), my schizotypal traits were suppressed for a while. I only accepted the curriculum because my parents were insisting that I was misinterpreting it. After suffering the consequences of accepting it, I realized that I had a problem with feeling like I couldn't trust the way I think stemming from when I was in middle school. However, at the same time, I felt that most of humanity was misguided.



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28 Nov 2014, 8:06 pm

ME
YES
PLEASE
YES
ME
IT
PLEA
YE

How would one know the difference between this and one with autism and schizophrenia? Or is there no such thing, and it would just be schizotypal autism? Is that how it is?


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28 Nov 2014, 10:20 pm

Raziel wrote:
The more I read about psychiatry, the more I think the differences between disorders are made up.


I've come to the conclusion that the incessant need to label people for their differences is an obsessive compulsion in itself and a prime example of rigid thinking...



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29 Nov 2014, 3:55 am

I was informed about Schizotypal autism/Mendelsohnn's Syndrome on this forum. In Polish AS forum I was supposed to have McDD, two people thougt that I am schizoprenic, one person wrote that I look to be a kook.

When I had diagnosis of AS (I was diagnosed with AS) about 6 years ago, I was "suspicious" about drink which they gave me in the diagnostic centre (I had strange "fear" of being poisoned). I had serious magical obsessions and rituals before 15 years old. I also read the book about AS and NLD written by Y. Fast when I was in the centre.

I suppose that I have just NLD, which is my obsession. It would be sad to my derailed mind. I am not so bad in theory of mind. I am a verbal thinker. My IQ is rather not "extremely high", I do not know if my VIQ is at least 130. The current usage of the name "NVLD" is potty in my opinion and HAS to be rejected. I had delusional ideas (weird ones), magical thinking. I have various "obssesive-like" interests.



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01 Dec 2014, 12:18 pm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schizotypal_autism

Schizotypal autism or Mendelsohnn's Syndrome is an extremely rare neurodevelopmental disorder similar to Asperger syndrome; however, it originates from a schizotypal continuum rather than an autistic spectrum. It is characterized by impaired social interaction, non-verbal communication, ritualistic and obsessive behaviour, an above average intelligence and schizotypal symptoms often resulting in secondary depression and anxiety. It is a lifelong condition; however, it becomes particularly notable in periods of stress. It occurs in North Eastern European populations, and is only officially recognised in Russia, Finland, Kyrgyzstan, Estonia and Belarus as a psychiatric disorder.

A classical symptom is seasonal affective disorder.

For a diagnosis patients need specific symptoms associated with "classical" Aspergers Syndrome, these are usually present from toddler age, like an ASD:

Difficulties with social interaction
Ritualistic Behaviour
Obsessive Interests
High IQ
Impaired Motor Skills
Inability to ""mentalize"
Anxiety

But also symptoms of schizotypy which usually become more prominent in late childhood years:

Aloofness
Suspiciousness
Verbosity or odd use of language
Pseudohallucinations
Depressive Episodes
Paranoia
Suicidal Thoughts


Maybe a PDD described here is specific only to North Eastern European populations? I rather live in Central Europe, not Northeastern. I do not suppose that my ancestors were from NE Europe, but I do not know for sure.

I rather do not have depression (my obsessions, stims are rather pleasant), seasonal affective disorder, suicidal thoughts, extremely high IQ. And I (at least think) that I have more or less ability to mentalize.

I think that the word "schizotypal" and "autism" describe my condtion better than "learning disorder". I think that I have NLD profile and SCT. But also NT "influx".