Paranoid schizophrenia

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So my grandmother was telling me stories about her mother revealing she was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. I'm just learning this now. Years ago, we sat down and watched old family movies. Every time my great grandmother was filmed, she tried to avoid the camera. I always shrugged it off thinking she was camera shy, but it was worse than that. My grandmother told me of times when her mother would constantly check the house for bugs. She would also put a sheet over the television set believing it was spying on her. She had audio hallucinations too. She would complain about hearing a crying child somewhere or someone playing a flute.

She only got to know me as an infant before dying of emphysema.

Does anyone else in the family have it

Thankfully, no.

Apparently, schizophrenia shares many genetic similarities with autism. So it's not surprising that somebody has a sub-category of schizophrenia in your family, and that you yourself are autistic.

Not just autism, but also ADHD, anxiety disorder, and misophonia.

Yeah.

Beyond similarities, navigating life as an undiagnosed adult with autism would be enough to make anyone display mental illness symptoms.

Yeah. Having self-understanding and hopefully a support system makes things easier for many people.

There's that, but even stuff like understanding that one is at a deficit for theory of mind can help with understanding that people forming negative opinions of one aren't because they all discussed it in advance just to upset that person, they're reaching those conclusions independently as a result of interactions or observed interactions.

I was diagnosed with schizotypal personality disorder before I was diagnosed with aspergers. I think that's also related to schizophrenia.

It's on the schizophrenia spectrum, towards the mild end. It's become the replacement for a portion of Schizoid Personality Disorder folks. Which is itself more or less the junction between all things autistic and all things schizophrenic.

I definately have paranoia schizophrenia.
The amount of hours I spent worrying burns so much energy.

Do you take relevant medications? If not, you should.

I take Lexapro, but it is not strong enough. Next time I have to ask the doctor for something that really kicks hard, so I can function for work.

Lexapro = Escitalopram, which is an SSRI class medication that treats depression.

To treat paranoid schizophrenia, you'd need an anti-psychotic of some sort.

I was prescribed risperidone years ago. I hated it.