h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi Willem, I agree with your counsellor if you wrote down your problems, your concerns, it is certain to help others. Remember you also have artistic gifts to express yourself - not many people are gifted artist - and this can help to connect with others. I am reminded of a poem by John Donne "No man is an island, Entire of itself, Every man is a piece of the continent, A part of the main ... Any man's death diminishes me, Because I am involved in mankind". The poem is expressing the fact that we are all linked together, a part of a bigger whole, and that each part has value and can be used to help others. S.A.

OK but in my better moments I feel I *could* make a valuable contribution that would make the suffering worth it. But am I suffering from delusions of grandeur then? These are part of the whole paranoid mindset.

That is not delusion of grandeur. Everyone can make a difference. You especially, with your experiences.

Folks, I'm just going to throw the ideas out here for now ... I am not in shape for organizing them in some neat systematic way yet.

As I said to the man: to make this schlep and suffering worth it I'll have to make a big positive contribution ... and this is where the problem of paranoid schizophrenia comes in.

It cuts me off from other people ... it separates me from them. It means that I have difficulty giving to them what I want to give to them. As I said I want to give something to the world, contribute something of value. But being cut off from people makes this pretty much impossible. Contrast: someone with lots of friends, contacts, acquaintances. This person can do a thing and instantly many people can appreciate it - it adds value to many lives.

Paranoid schizophrenic person living in isolation: has almost no opportunity for doing something that any other people will even be aware of. It's like being inside a bubble unable to see or hear anything outside it, and those outside it unable to see or hear you inside it.

This is not the way it might seem to you over there ... you think you can see me, these words that I type. But that is just a tiny crack in the bubble as I see it ... I can only get out a tiny, tiny, tiny little bit of stuff through that crack and only a tiny, tiny, tiny little bit comes through it to me.

Willem mate, a couple of years ago I felt exactly as you do. It doesn't get better - you get better. The pains hurt less, you become stronger, you deal with the hell better. There's specific strategies that can help and I'm sure your counsellor will be able to talk you through them, but most of all you get older, a little bit wiser and a lot tougher.

The people who are around you, who love you - that's not accidental, it's because they choose to be. Believe me there were times when I thought I'd be doing my friends and family a favour by taking myself - and all the hassle I brought them - out of their life. I was wrong. My friends and family are all adults, if they wanted me out of their lives they'd say so and move on. The same is true of your friends and family.

Don't go through this alone, humans are social creatures and we need our friends and family. I know we haven't talked much and we don't really know each other, but I know you have people who will miss you, who want you around.

I've got an email address on my PS - feel free to use it, it can be easier to talk to a stranger - or I'm on facebook with a lot of the other hootooers.

From what I read, I believe you want to give to the world. I also believe that the world (at least some people in it) want to give to you, if you let them.
But it seems that paranoia prevents you from seeing that people want to give to you. And HonestIago is right, if they wanted to give up on you, they would already have.
It's hard to believe positive things when you're unhappy, I know. But its not less true because you are unhappy.

Willem, I wish I had exactly the right words. God, how I wish...I feel inadequate.

These good people are saying a lot of good things. I think we should both listen to them.

Talk it out. It isn't what someone else thinks that matters, it's what YOU think. Just please, try to feel the love they're trying to send.

I don't know if it helps at all, but here goes. Most of this week I've been having a hard time. It doesn't matter why. But when I feel something I call 'the beyond-despair place', I try to take myself less seriously. To move out of the idea that I'm the only one who can solve the problem. For me, this works. I give it into the hands of the Spirit, even if I'm not sure what he'll do with it.

We do not always know the good we're doing. We don't have the perspective. Jesus said something about 'a cup of water'. That cup of water might be way more important than a major scientific discovery.

God, I hope that's some help. Hang in there, my friend.

Thanks for the message HonestIago but if possible keep reading - this was just the first minute or so of our conversation.

Paranoid schizophrenia - what it is and the problems it causes:

I had my first serious psychotic break in 1992. Started getting delusions that the lab supervisor was trying to sabotage my academic career and started planning to murder her. A part of me realized I was going off the deep end. I was writing messages in my own blood on my wall in my hostel room. I finally decided to go through with my plan, which I had worked out in detail - I was sure I would get away with it and not get caught. The part of me that was still aware that I was going nuts intervened and attempted suicide because that was all I could think of to stop the nuts part. At that point my academic career was totally wrecked. I also wanted to kill myself because I wanted to save any further expense on me ... my studies were costing my parents and other people money, money that now clearly was wasted. I wanted to stop further waste.

This has been the ongoing concern since: my life costs money to maintain - and it's money thrown into a bottomless pit. I can't produce something to recompense everyone whose money keeps me alive.

Since then I've been in the throes of numerous delusions. Actually they go back to my childhood and teenage years although then because my life in general was being supported it did not precipitate any existential crisis. But anyways:

As a child, as a youth, I believed in ghosts, UFOS and aliens, Bigfoot and other monsters, fantastical creatures as real, existing beings. As a young child my fantasies were extremely vivid and contributed to my 'artisticness'.

Yes, you may say, but that is just fine, it is good for children to have vivid imaginations.

But if it persists into adulthood and there is a genuine inability to distinguish imagination from reality, if this causes real problems, conflicts with others, and if it turns nasty? If your imagination starts presenting demons and all sorts of evils and horrors to you? TO ME THESE THINGS WERE REAL and I lived in terror. They brought ridicule upon me. As a teenager I went about the gardens of friends looking for gnomes. I believed in evil conspiracies. Satan was real to me and I could perceive demonic influences and activities. I remember a day of extreme terror in a school bus as we drove to a holiday camp ... I could actually hear demonic voices in the music that was playing over the radio. I freaked out in seven thousand different ways during that trip.

If I told you that this was the reaction of someone else you would laugh and say, 'what a nutcase'. Nutcases can safely be dismissed, can't they?

I had developed an obsession with horriffic things that was already well-entrenched when I was only seven years old.

All right, adulthood: there was the complete psychotic breakdown that happened in university and ended my aspirations at getting a degree right there. Later I still fell into numerous further delusions. At a time I believed I was responsible for the September Eleven attacks on the World Trade Centre. There was an extremely humiliating episode that was detailed right here on h2g2 about which I cannot even speak because other people were also involved and I don't wish to involve them in the shameful debacle. I believed in a variety of conspiracy theories ... I at a time believed I was a mind-controlled agent for an extremely evil agency. At one stage I had convinced myself that I had actually killed a prostitute and deserved to die for that. (As far as I know no such thing happened - but I did for a long time imagine I had done horrible deeds the memories of which I had later managed to repress completely.) I WAS ACTUALLY INVOLVED in a 'white resistance' organisation and at a time believed I had committed deeds of terror in that capacity as well that I also later deliberately forgot. I believed and a part of me still believes that my mother was deliberately killed - murdered - by doctors and/or hospital staff. VERY recently I came to the conclusion that my vet was trying to exploit me and again I was planning to kill him. Then I realised that that was crazy, so I started planning to merely PRETEND to want to kill him and to hope to get the police involved so that I could then attack *them* but my actual goal was to commit suicide-by-cop.

Do any of you still think you know me? These are the things I am willing to mention here ... there are things infinitely worse that I will not mention. But that is what I have to struggle with! Now, I am fairly rational and balanced. But under stress, my mind goes off on unpredictable tangents and I cannot control them - even now, after twenty-one years of dealing with this, I don't have perfect control ... and a small slip can cause enormous damage. If I am LUCKY I can contain this damage and all that happens is that further swathes of my psyche get wrecked. But my fear is still that the day will come when I will go so out of control as to actually harm someone else ...

Remember what you describe is also a feature of your medical condition and that is treatable and you must make use of that medical support.

Sometime I think that pain and torture is a message from the body which proves you are still alive and connected with the world. For some that can be a reassurance. Van Gogh I think had something similar; he had pain and torture. He too was artistically gifted and was able to use that to create art. He didn't realise at the time that what he put into his paintings would be recognised by others, that others would find value in his work, that his work would connect with others, connect with their hearts and soul. They were moved by the way he was able to capture movement and energy ... the vibrancy ... his paintings also capture his own moods ... that others can feel and identify with and value.

I haven't seen much of your art work but what I have seen reminds me a little of Franz Marc e.g.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-e4JpqnS6Ib0/UIK-ZbQMHeI/AAAAAAAACA0/8oE19g5z2ig/s640/rote_rehe.jpeg
I think it has something to do with similarity of composition and themes. I encountered his work hidden away in an art gallery in Lenbachhaus in Munich and I immediately felt a connection with his work. It is surprising the effect art can have on people.

Sometimes one can help others without even knowing it ... even in very simple ways. For example smiling at a stranger while out walking. That simple smile can give that other person a little lift in their heart which they might have needed at that exact moment in their life. You might not ever know it, but ultimately you have to have faith that it can.

StoneAart

Stone Aart Van Gogh killed himself. You might want to pick a different, better example.

Willem, you're ill. I wouldn't blame someone for their illness any more than I would blame someone for a broken wrist. You're getting treatment for it: might I make a guess and say you're in your early/mid-twenties? Once you're in your late 20s/early 30s, many more options for medication become available.

Stop focusing on the money, it's not a black hole. Some people consider things more important than money: I'll probably be giving money to my little sister for the next decade or more but I'll do it with a smile because I love her and I'm happy to help. The money isn't important.

HonestIago please don't put StoneArt or anyone else down - please nobody do that, everyone here is doing his or her best, I'm sure.

I am not in my early or mid twenties, I'm in my early forties. Been trying to deal with this for over twenty-one years now.

Right now no-one is helping me financially ...

I think Van Gogh just never knew how valued his work would become ... but we can see from our perspective here and now, just how cherished his work was to become.

At the time Van Gogh was creating his art, his art wasn't recognised by others as it didn't fit the convention. What he wasn't to know was that his work would change our perceptions of art, would show that it could be so much more than convention had asserted, his work broke through those staid conventions into new areas, and into the hearts and minds of others. For me when I am facing a painting by Van Gogh, such as his fields and village scenes, it does something to me, I can feel it, it is a living thing for me with deep meaning, and I am ever so thankful for him that he endured the pain and torture he was going through to produce such works for me (and others). He wasn't to know the effect he would have on people not even born at the time. You have to have faith that it will.

Willem, I am just going to put a few things into the thread, please correct if you think anything I put is not right

FB, and skype and emailing right now don't pariculary work for you, so while those offers are great, not something that is you like to take up now

talking here is good the personal contributions here from reseachers on this thread are all of value


***

This is me now talking to you as your friend

I think what is coming across loud and clear how much people love, respect, care about you and how VALUED you here,

what StoneAart said about out interconnectness, I nearly cried a little bit at that point reading the entirity of the thread

Sharing your experiences helps you to express them, and you are good at expressing yourself so that other people can understand

You will find a fair few people here have direct experiences of their own and are willing to share those also

you are not alone, you are not a freak, least of all because it is not you alone who has had these types of experience,

you are ill at the moment, it is tough to talk about these personal experiences at anytime, tougher still to explain them but actually it is just talking out that breaks the silence and barriers down and for a collective understanding to come about

Please keep talking,

I expect that there might more posts while I have written this, sorry, I don't know how well i am keeping up

Sometimes you write something and before you have time to submit it, it vanishes into the ether. You might feel upset about the loss but at least you have had the experience of writing it and gathering your own thoughts.

I will try to write my thoughts down again later but in brief I just want to say that I thought post @28 was an amazing piece of writing: intelligent, articulate, interesting, well written.

It makes me think it would be of great value to others if Willem was able to write his autobiography or a snapshot of it, changing people’s names where necessary. I think it would be of value both to those with the condition (from mild to strong forms), of value to those who have relatives and friends with the condition (to better understand what people are living through) and of general value (I’ll express my thoughts later). Maybe with some business advisor it might be possible to earn a living out of writing and art.

Willem, I can't really add anything--everyone else, especially Peanut and StoneAart, have said everything I could think of, better than I could've. I know I havent' been posting much lately in your journals, but I *have* been reading them, and I *do* care about you. I've just been afraid of saying the wrong thing, and a or a just doesn't cut it, *especially* since a large part of the problem, as I understand it, is your physical isolation.

I do think that the counsellor was right that writing what you spoke to him about (in an entry, when you're up to it, so you can add to it and it will be easier to point other people to it) will be of great help. Like others, I think that, even if the exact details are different (which they're bound to be--no one's exact details are identical) there are more people than you think who share similar feelings--who also think that they are the only ones. Not only would it help people with similar feelings to know that they are not alone, which could help them, it would help those that don't be able to help, or even to know that there are people that need that sort of help. (Aargh, that didn't come out right, but I'm leaving it anyway--the meaning's buried in it somewhere...) If such an account already existed, wouldn't it have been helpful to be able to say, "This. *This* is how I feel. Please read this, as it says things I can't say right now, but that I need people to know."?

Just wondering how you are doing now?

Willem, you are neither unique, nor a freak. However, you are special, in that you have a huge knowledge which you share so eloquently with your paintings and writings.

Many, many people have similar problems to yours, both mental and financial but your isolation makes them tougher.

I do think the counsellor was right, writing and talking about it helps get it out of your head, which is a bit like a pressure cooker waiting to blow, and it helps us understand better what you are going through.

I would not wish to condemn you to living a miserable life, but when you are in this state of mind there is little anyone can say to make you see that though life is very difficult, there are many compensations, particularly in the natural world, which you have around you in abundance.

I am sorry you think your sister might think it is emotional blackmail, or attention seeking, but can you not visualise how she would feel if you went ahead and did not tell her. She would carry that with her for the rest of her life. Do you really want her to carry that burden?

Are you so deeply wrapped in your own misery that you are unable to think of others? You say you want to live, so you must seek help and not feel foolish. Courage my friend.

I cannot begin to tell you how worrying and frustrating it is for your friends here. not being able to do more to help. You know, we are all very real flesh and blood people who worry about you.

Websailor

Hi folks. I am sorry for not having been around but the police came and took me in and only released me just now.

Websailor: of course I think of other people and how they would react. But what am I to do - in the event where my life is an extreme ordeal to me and to the point where I believe I might constitute a danger to others? Also at this point lacking control ... let me try to describe it: it's like you're on hallucinogenic drugs, it's like you've been on them for days straight, uninterrupted ... it's like you're on PCP to name a relevant example ... you're becoming dangerous and you might harm someone. Harming yourself is by far the better option. You need to understand that this does really go out of your control - you can no more control it than you could drink a whole bottle of vodka and use your willpower to keep from getting drunk. It is not entirely known what causes a psychotic episode but what DOES happen probably has to do with brain chemistry - you are lacking something you need or you're producing something in excess. If your brain is getting poisoned by alcohol you cannot NOT experience the effects - your will is powerless. It's the same here. When you go, you go ... it's like jumping off a cliff, you can't stop until you hit bottom. You are in for an adventure and you don't know where you'll be when you come to the end of it, only that it would likely be horriffic - if previous episodes are any indication. I am totally thinking of people - I want to SPARE them that. A dignified and fairly painless suicide for me - to SAVE me from something horrible beyond belief - could my friends and family not understand that? Imagine I freaked out like some of those mass murderers and killed ten or twenty people. How will my friends and family handle THAT? And again ... please understand what psychosis IS. You are no longer in anything resembling control - you don't know what you are doing - you are interpreting everything wrong, in a totally cockeyed way. You may think you're killing zombies, you may think you're defending yourself against assassins - you are beyond reasoning with because the basic mental machinery has broken down. Now as painful as it may be for my friends to know this about me - what am I to do? I know that if I break down badly enough something like this could happen. I can try and find help to prevent this from happening - and this I am doing right now - but if I can't find help, and if I find myself getting worse and getting to the point of losing all control - what then? I know full well people will feel awful if I kill myself - but if I explained to them, if they understood better, that I was actually thinking of them all the time and trying to save them from having to face something far worse that could have happened with me?

I KNOW that things can get, can BE better - I am trying for that. But - again - I need help! Without help I can so easily get stuck in a horrifying place and not get out! There are myriads of delusions I can suffer from that can be extremely detrimental to me - and in a deep enough delusion you cannot expect me to imagine CORRECTLY what other people might feel. See I can get deluded to think if I kill myself I would rise again from the dead and all my friends and family will be amazed - to name just one example. That is the nature of delusion - that is why I am sick - if I could easily avoid that, then I would - but this thing I have could spin out of control anytime and really no-one could say where it might take me - again I can only say that from experience it is likely to be no good place. Which is why I need help!

Willem, please paint another picture or take another photograph... write about it and send it in Dmitri.



Rod

send it TO Dmitri dammit.




Methinks there are more than a few of us will learn something