Is it schizophrenia or something else?

orca · Newbie Joined: 15 Dec 2006 Posts: 1

Im new to this forum and was wondering how do you trust what a specialist says is true or whether there just bullshitting???
Today I was told I have borderline schizophrenia but when Im not smoking dope I am normal-no symptoms, the only thing I get when on dope is I hear noises that are extra loud like when tv is on normal volume,and when on dope I have to turn it down, other than that I dont have any symptoms!!! Ive been of dope now one week. My doctor and family reckon I have undiagnosed and untreated adhd and yet the only psychiatrist where I live doesnt believe in adhd so said I have b.schizophrenia and the nearest psychiatrist is 2 hour plane flight away in another state of Australia. I dont know what to believe and have had no testing down. Does anyone know what I can do??? I need help

Anaphylaxis fears Tony · Posted: 12/17/06 - 08:42 Post subject: Nothing nothing nothing

U have no symptoms only a symptom when on dope which everyone taking that rubbish annoying so called buzz mud gets. One week on weed hardly anything to be bothered about apart from it making people too lazy to wash. People with real mental problems would know something was wrong. Like tripping on acid mental illness tells you you've not quite with the rest of us anymore. Your fine. Dope is childish and just gives you a pain in the head. Why waste the money.

Princesa895 · Newbie Joined: 05 Feb 2007 Posts: 11

The only drug that causes schizophrenic symptoms is LSD. LSD was discovered by two professors in the University of Harvard, and they were kicked out after discovering it. Basically if you have shizophrenia in your family, or any other sort of mental disorders, LSD will make the recessive gene come out, and ta-da...you have a mental disorder for the rest of your life. Other than that, I haven't learned of any other drugs that cause mental disorders i.e. schizophrenia to come out. I have put a lot of attention to this matter, because I have a cousin who smokes dope, and I look after him, and also I am taking classes on psychology. But you never know, so you might want to research on LSD, and B. schizprenia, and whatever illegal drug you may be taking.

guitarist_extraordinaire · Newbie Joined: 03 Feb 2008 Posts: 2

Hi, I know this is a stupidly long post but please take the time to read it. Some of it may be irrelevant but I'm sure this will help you if you take on board what I've said, I've been there myself and I made the wrong choices and it didn't work out too well for me.

I found your post actually looking for something to do with paranormal stuff because a lot of people who have "schizophrenia" believe in various things that most of us would consider to be rubbish like telepathy etc.

Anyway my personal opinion is that you have no mental health problems at all but if you were to carry on smoking pot you might develop some. I'll expand on that a bit, not many people realise but cannabis is actually a mild hallucinogen (not a downer as many people think). People with schizophrenia can suffer hallucinations and/or delusions and many of the symptoms of intoxication with hallucinogens (cannabis, mushrooms, acid, MDMA or ecstacy or any other hallucinogen) are very similar to some of the symptoms of psychosis or schizophrenia. Also psychosis and schizophrenia are effectively the same thing, schizophrenia is just the term given to a long term psychosis. There are many drugs that can cause symptoms of psychosis (contrary to what "princesa" has been told by someone who obviously has no experience in the area of drugs and mental health at all).

Anyway it sounds to me (and also from my personal experience) that you are beginning to get a negative effect from smoking pot. I personally smoked pot for years and as far as I can remember only ever had a negative effect once, but I do know that this time was when I had only smoked a couple of bongs (as opposed to the usual five hundred) and also I didn't make a mix or do a shotty I just smoked two bong'eads pure with no tobacco at all, so the first question I would ask you is how are you smoking the pot?

Also when I say I smoked it for years with no negative effects that is until I started taking other harder drugs (ecstacy and speed) which on top of the bongs started to mess up my head totally so the other question would be are you taking any other drugs (prescription drugs included) and if so what?

To cut a very long story short (or at least shorter) I started to develop paranoia through taking various drugs and after I had this paranoia from a very heavy sesh on pills, speed and pot. The paranoia continued but only when I was smoking pot. Unfortunately I found it extremely difficult to stop smoking it because at this point I was selling it and making money from it and also I was too embarassed to say to my friends that I was going to stop because it made me paranoid. So I continued to smoke it and it got to the point where I was still getting the symptoms even when I wasn't smoking it. I saw a doctor and was diagnosed with schizophrenia and given medication and for a very long period thought I was fucked because I had schizophrenia and I thought that was it for me, life over.

This is getting ridiculously long now so I'll cut the bullshit and just tell you what I think. I reckon that it was the weed that was making me paranoid because when I said I was still paranoid even when not smoking it I only stopped smoking it for a couple of days or a week max and as I'm sure you're aware heavy smoking means it will stay in your system for up to a month, basically I stopped taking the meds they were giving me and stopped smoking the pot (eventually) and after a while my head started to get back to normal again. But now any time I smoke pot I get a return of the symptoms straight away.

So basically what I'm trying to tell you is unless you want to go through the hell I went through and have your life completely ruined I would stop smoking the pot and stay off it for good. Stick to the beer you can have a much better time on that and as long as you don't let it get out of hand it won't cause you any problems.

The other thing I will say is I personally don't believe you have ADHD and I know you don't have any kind of schizophrenia. But I can tell you that I think the pot is the only thing causing your symptoms (not an underlying condition or any of that bullshit). If you do continue to smoke it however your symptoms may get worse. And also on the ADHD matter do you smoke? Don't forget cigarettes are a drug too and nicotine is a stimulant which can make you restless and hyperactive and can also impair your attention span. And if you did get treatment for ADHD it would be ritalin (which is very similar to amphetamines or speed) or d-amphetamine itself, and amphetamines can cause psychosis (yes that's right princesa, there are hundreds of drugs that can cause symptoms of schizophrenia) so I can only assume ritalin can too.

To sum up the best thing you can do is to not take anything at all (i.e. don't smoke pot or take any other drug and quit smoking if you can, also I personally wouldn't take anything the psychiatrist suggests either). Try this for a while and see how you feel, you will probably get withdrawal symptoms for a couple of days if you give up smoking (that is if you do smoke) but after a few weeks of being totally clean you will feel great! Better than you've felt in ages. If you do get the overwhelming desire to get wrecked though just go out and have a few drinks, but if you do, make sure you don't go out with anyone who is smoking as the temptation will be hard to resist, or if you don't know anyone who doesn't smoke pot remember you need to do this for you and you're well-being and if anyone tries to put you down or take the piss for not smoking just laugh it off and remember you're going to be the one who ends up with a nice house and a family and whatever else you want while the people who carry on smoking will probably end up in a funny farm somewhere.

Hope this helps.
Let me know how you get on.

guitarist_extraordinaire · Newbie Joined: 03 Feb 2008 Posts: 2

Princesa I'm sorry if this pisses you off I'm not trying to do that, but if you're going to go round posting things which could potentially change someones life you really need to make sure your facts are 100% accurate.

Many drugs can cause psychosis or symptoms of psychosis (or schizophrenia), as hallucinations are a prominent feature and one of the main symptoms of schizophrenia in most or at least some cases, it would be safe to say any hallucinogen can cause schizophrenic symptoms, but in particular LSD and mushrooms that contain psilocybin (magic mushrooms).

The state of intoxication from some hallucinogens (including the two aforementioned) has been likened to symptoms of schizophrenia or psychosis, but that does not necessarily mean you will develop schizophrenia from taking them, and it certainly isn't as simple as "if you have shizophrenia in your family, or any other sort of mental disorders, LSD will make the recessive gene come out, and ta-da...you have a mental disorder for the rest of your life." and in fact I don't believe it is a scientific fact that there is such a thing as a "schizophrenia gene" although I'm not sure about that having not researched the matter, even if this is true though it certainly doesn't mean that if you do develop some form of psychosis from taking LSD you will have it for the rest of your life, how do you think this will affect people reading your post who have had a bad experience (or "psychotic episode" as psychiatrists would call it) with LSD or mushrooms or any other hallucinogen?

While we are on the subject of LSD by the way I don't know who told you that it was discovered in America but it is common knowledge that it was first synthesised by Albert Hoffman, a swiss scientist who studied at the university of Zürich (not Harvard).

Once again please do not be offended it is not a personal dig at you, just whoever is teaching you this crap.

PsyChris · Posted: 02/04/08 - 00:10 Post subject:

Use of street drugs (including LSD,methamphetamine,marijuana/hash/cannabis) and alcohol have been linked with significantly increased probability of developing psychosis and schizophrenia. This link has been documented in over 30 different scientific studies (studies done mostly in the UK, Australia and Sweden) over the past 20 years.

In one example, a study interviewed 50,000 members of the Swedish Army about their drug consumption and followed up with them later in life. Those who were heavy consumers of cannabis at age 18 were over 600% more likely to be diagnosed with schizophrenia over the next 15 years than those did not take it. Experts estimate that between 8% and 13% of all schizophrenia cases are linked to marijuna / cannabis use during teen years. It is also notable that alcohol abuse is a stronger predictor of psychotic symptoms than regular cannabis use (by a factor of four).

Guest · Guest

hey what's up.....so i just got on here to address my personal experiences with the refer and being batty....... by batty I mean schizophrenia........... I'm 34 and i definitely got it.......shitty huh?? yea it is... even though it's mild in my case....... OK back to the point.... I started having symptoms around 18....... but ..... yea....... only when I smoked the refer.... and at the time I had quit drinking or doing anything else......but every time I smoked I thought my friends were talking behind my back....... or even...(get this) in my head........ but I had no symptoms when i wasn't stoned........ now the question is was I well on the way to being nutty,,,,,, or did the refer bring it on......... i really don't know...... but after counting to smoke I eventually got to the point where it was all day every day.stoned or not........ so hey man if the refer is doing shit like that........ I hate to say it...... quit smoking........ believe me I hate to say it......... i grew up listening to bob marley and peter tosh........( yea ... little skater kid from the suburbs........) but I always look back and wonder if I had just stopped...........would have made a difference....I don't know...... but i think there's a good chance..... so these days I don't smoke.... accept like one hit every few months..... then i regret it cause my head goes nutz.......... but shit give it a chance....... cause if that's whats bringing shit on....... and it sucks while your high..... think of that paranoia all day every day for let's say the next 20 to 50 years.......so hey I ain't sayin it's causing it........ but if it is......... and you stop smoking and never get the shit...... you'll be much much happier being sane.... then stoned......... but you'll miss it..... well I do...... still I'd say give the smoking a rest for at least a few months....... and see of the symptoms worsen or get better........ cause really man.......... if you develop this shit....... you'll always be kicking yourself in the head wondering if I just quit smoking would I be having this conversation with my dog..... sorry I gotta joke about this shit....... it's one of the things that keeps me going........ maybe you could smoke male plants with no THC........ OK I'll quit........ but if it's causing it you'll be happy you quit.......... GARONTEED

Is it schizophrenia or something else?

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