Fear of schizophrenia

[Carol3792]

My name is Carol. I have gad ocd and depression. I am freaking out about having schizophrenia. The past couple of months when I am half asleep I hear voices. It's usually just a random word or phrase. I also have scary images flash through my head. I talked to my therapist and she said it was Hypnagogia. She said I wasn't going crazy. I can't help but think she is missing something. Does anyone else experience this????

[xvolatileheart]

Yep, I frequently experience hypnagogic hallucinations. They are nothing to worry about!

[Emilym80]

Hi there,

I also get this quite often. People who hallucinate because of a psychotic break don't only do so at certain times, such as when they're half-asleep. While, yes, you're technically hallucinating, it's actually because your brain has begun dreaming and your body hasn't fallen asleep yet- so your dreams have manifested themselves in your waking life, temporarily.

I have heard voices, bangs and loud noises, as well as seen flamingoes and postcards flying around the room! I also tend to get tingling all over my body and parts of my vision go black or fuzzy- the first time this happened, I had to go to A&E as a nurse thought I'd had a stroke! As it turns out, it was the hypnagogic state.

While it can range from entertaining and funny to unpleasant, it's actually not uncommon and not a sign of anything more sinister.

All the best :)

[rcs]

From the little I know about schizophrenia if you are thinking about the condition and aware of the symptoms it usually means you do not suffer from it.

When I was first diagnosed with GAD I used to feel social anxiety as well and I thought I could hear voice and people laughing at me but it turned out to be paranoia and mental exhaustion, my doctor and counsellor questioned me on these voices and I could tell they were checking if I was having symptoms.

I also get mild OCD symptoms with intrusive thoughts which really annoy me and frustrate me sometimes but I have learned not to fight them and let them pass and I soon forget them and when I feel better my OCD calms down as well

Bob :)

[MyNameIsTerry]

I also get mild OCD symptoms with intrusive thoughts which really annoy me and frustrate me sometimes but I have learned not to fight them and let them pass and I soon forget them and when I feel better my OCD calms down as well

Bob :)

I'm the same, Bob. My GAD is the primary condition so it influences my various forms of OCD quite heavily. If my GAD increases, the OCD worsens and when the GAD drops, the same effect occurs with the OCD or I at least have more control over it.

My intrusive thoughts no longer bother me as I learnt to be non judgemental about them, just like you. Reaction always reinforces them.

---------- Post added at 05:28 ---------- Previous post was at 05:18 ----------


My name is Carol. I have gad ocd and depression. I am freaking out about having schizophrenia. The past couple of months when I am half asleep I hear voices. It's usually just a random word or phrase. I also have scary images flash through my head. I talked to my therapist and she said it was Hypnagogia. She said I wasn't going crazy. I can't help but think she is missing something. Does anyone else experience this????

So the words come as you are drifting off to sleep? If so, this can happen to anyone as known as Hypnagogia. The term is also often used to cover falling asleep & waking though.

The scary images are likely to be intrusive thoughts which are common to any anxiety disorder but are most prevalent in OCD and can be known as Pure O when they are regular. As Bob & I mentioned, don't interact with them by analysing or questioning yourself because this just reinforces them. Also, don't try to run away from them in any way because this tells your subconscious that it has used a valid thought process (note I used "valid", not correct).

You are not your thoughts, think of them as we do dreams & nightmares in that respect, we have some really weird ones but we dismiss them and they go away. The same with these.

Thinking you are going insane when you have mental health issues is a very common worry that you will see on here. Some people also obsess over certain ones like Schizophrenia, some so much that it becomes a form of Pure O of its own.

Try to spot any mental rituals you take part in because they are compulsions in OCD and will reinforce it. If you want to understand mental rituals, look at Steve Seay's article (via Google) about it which is very informative.

[Matthewray]

I get this same thing man. I too have anxiety over going schizo. I hear random words or phrases as I lay down but I realized this only happens when i'm half asleep. It freaks me out and causes me fear of going to bed. I must agree with everyone, even I know it's Hypnagogia. Its actually comforting to know I am not the only one.

[Carol3792]

Mynameisterry it's always when I am trying to sleep. I close my eyes and aLl of the scary images play in my mind. Someone told me on another thread that hearing things when falling asleep is not normal and that I should find another doctor. I am freaking out again.

[Matthewray]

Carol3792, of course its not normal. Normal is not having anxiety, however as we all know, that doesn't mean it is therefore uncommon. A lot of people who suffer with anxiety have this. Reason being that our mind is so tired after our day of constant worry that we have no control (less than we normally would) by the end of the night to fight off intrusive thoughts. We end up so tired that we are dreaming awake (to a certain extent of course). I highly recommend a book
called "at last a life" by paul david. This guy has had it all! He suffered from GAD for 10 years before he found a way out. I've come a long way since reading his book, I don't think i'd be this far into recovery without it. By far its the most practical. Not everyone has the same symptoms, so it makes sense that someone with GAD would find your experience to be not "normal" but when you look at all GAD sufferers as a whole you will see that a lot of us have the symptoms that you are speaking of ( I am one of them).

If you ever need any advice feel free to send a message!

Best wishes!

[Carol3792]

Thanks for the reply Matthewray. During the day I have to fight through it because I am a stay at home mom to a two year old. When he goes to bed at night everything I avoided during the day hits me. I guess because I am finally alone with my thoughts. I have trouble shutting my mind off at night.

[MyNameIsTerry]

Mynameisterry it's always when I am trying to sleep. I close my eyes and aLl of the scary images play in my mind. Someone told me on another thread that hearing things when falling asleep is not normal and that I should find another doctor. I am freaking out again.

Then they were wrong, Carol. Audible sounds are well documented in hypnagogia so please disregard what they said.

If you were hearing them outside of falling asleep or waking up, then it could be something else as well.

These are not exclusive to anxiety disorder anyway, everyone can experience them. They are accepted as nothing, hence, well, normal. The one thing about anxiety sufferers that differs is our Cognitive Distortions - our thinking styles that are biased towards negatives. This can be changed though as you recover. Right now though you will likely employ them in analysing any issue you have and this will only increase your anxiety levels. I would highly recommend reading them on Wiki, they match the ones I had from a mental health charity that runs CBT based courses so they are accurate. Try to look at what you have said and write down which they are. Using CBT Thought Records helps with this as they ask you to complete evidence for & against. Doing the CD's with TR's helps retrain you to look at things differently over time. Once I learned the CD's I found I could see them in the majority of the posts on this forum.

This is a useful article explaining it and they mention sounds several times:

http://scienceline.org/2014/06/sleeping-on-and-dreaming-up-a-solution/

Wiki has this:

Hypnagogic hallucinations are often auditory or have an auditory component. Like the visuals, hypnagogic sounds vary in intensity from faint impressions to loud noises, such as crashes and bangs (exploding head syndrome). People may imagine their own name called, crumpling bags, white noise, or a doorbell ringing. Snatches of imagined speech are common. While typically nonsensical and fragmented, these speech events can occasionally strike the individual as apt comments on — or summations of — their thoughts at the time. They often contain word play, neologisms and made-up names. Hypnagogic speech may manifest as the subject's own "inner voice", or as the voices of others: familiar people or strangers. More rarely, poetry or music is heard

[Matthewray]

During the day I have to fight through it because I am a stay at home mom to a two year old..

That's the problem. You won't win a fight with anxiety, so stop trying. You have to let it do its job. Your nerves are sick and need to heal. You don't try and fight a cold, you sit back and let it run its course. You don't fix a broken leg by walking on it. Like wise your nerves will never heal unless you let them be. Allow yourself to freak out and you will see nothing will happen. Its all just the illusion anxiety creates. I can't say this enough, get "at last a life by paul david. I honestly believe it will prove beneficial in your struggle.

[MyNameIsTerry]

Correcting your thinking styles as done in CBT will help you as it will teach you that your thinking is biased towards be negatives and how to correct this. Relaxation techniques will also help you.

Is your anxiety purely based on this fear of Schizophrenia? If so, its more likely an OCD issue but if you are already anxious in other ways it could just be the normal 'I'm losing my mind' thinking that many of us go through at some point.

Pure acceptance works for some but it is a very passive strategy aimed on anxiety losing its power and it doesn't work for many people. So, it may work, it may not.