Scared of becoming psychotic again...

Hi! So roughly an year ago, I had a brief psychotic episode (my doctor called it a 'euphoric reaction') as a result of taking LSD. I was quite delusional with little to no insight and I used to believe that I could control things like the weather, what was on TV was totally related to me and a consequence of my thinking, that I was on a pathway to enlightment and I had to deal with my past daemons in order to reach that state etc. etc. all the delusional 'works'....

This lasted for roughly 3 months in which I had little to no insight into what was going on with me and fully accepted the fact that I can control things outside my mind merely by thinking about it . I never took anti-psychotics and gained insight into my condition on my own by talking to myself and disentangling all the delusions until the point I returned to 'reality'. Since then, I have developed a huge level of anxiety related to the possibility of returning to that state. I started having intrusive images of me being already schizophrenic or of shadows eating me while also being unable to shake the thought that I am going schizophrenic whatever any doctor would have said... All of this lead me to a subsequent period of 2-3 months of depression... Now, I still have those intrusive images but they usually lack content - random flashes of light, or random abstract images of nothing. When they do have content, they are just unexplainable scary faces, screams (which are merely thoughts, like, I don't really hear them or anything), or just a jumble of random images of what I did in a previous day (when going to sleep, especially).

I am verrry paranoid and hyper-vigilant to the point that it is ruining my life. For example, when I hear something, I think that it might be only in my head (even if it is not)... I have never had any 'real' hallucinations during the psychotic episode, nor afterwards...

However, I feel that my mind is basically trying to convince me that I am becoming schizophrenic, for whatever reason, by creating all these scary things for me to deal with....

With relation to my delusions, I still get weird ideas in my mind sometimes....For example, if I am tired and stressed out and someone looks at me, I think that they might have looked at me because they know what I am thinking about...But it's like an 'automatic' thought, something more akin to a feeling, actually. I don't believe in any of these things in any way, though...

I also get distracted by random objects around me, especially if I remember how a year ago, they 'meant' something for me. While I don't believe any of these delusional thoughts, they cause me a lot of distress and reinforce my thinking that I might return to a psychotic state. I am really happy with my life at the moment and I really don't want to lose contact with reality again....

You sound very knowledgeable about the condition. I have shared this fear. It's hard to feel in control of your life and confident to set out in new directions with the prospect of losing touch with reality.

I'm no expert on coping mechanisms but I have like three very close people in my life who know the warning signs to get me help.

You could look into antipsychotics or talk to a psychiatrist about options. There are a slew of them with better and worse side effects. Health insurance can make a difference.

I guess my approach is just being prepared. And when I have strange thoughts I think "hmm this isn't a normal every day thought, is it realistic? What are the chances that x,y,z is really happening?"

Oh and if you are in your early 20s that is a normal time for this stuff to come into play. Euphoric huh? Does that mean it could be bipolar related?

I was a bit like you, I still am at times.

A would lurk on the internet days for days reading up about psychosis, trying to constantly diagnose stuff in my head, constantly wondering and being worried if I will ever be better.

It wasn't till I realized that I should just stop caring about it. I don't know how to explain this really, but I was just kinda like "###$ it if I go psychotic again" and it calmed me down. It basically calmed me by thinking, what's the worst that can happen? I've already dealt with the worst, so what should I be scared off? This really helped me with my anxiety and my concentration, I'm even able to better form sentences now which makes me quite happy. The worrying just creates negative energy and stresses your brain out more which will just make the pre-existing conditions much worse.

Honestly, just ###$ it. If you keep getting worried you will just create a vicious cycle. Honestly when you have those paranoid moments, try to laugh about it and how stupid that is. The humor of it may really help you get back to reality.

You may also want to consult a psychiatrist, and *mod edit*

I feel like I can relate so much... Except I wasn't so delusional, it was more hallucinations.

Around last August, 2015 I had smoked weed a couple of times, didn't feel much of a change in the latter weeks. Then suddenly my mom brings up Schizo being related to smoking weed, so I stop it and just focus on doing other things, because I wouldn't want to risk getting Schizo (My grandma was Bipolar/Schizo so it's in my genes, + risk), then suddenly one night, I had been partying with my group of friends (I was sober though, had a couple of sips of alcohol but no more) and a couple of us fell asleep at my friends house, all 3 of us in the same bed. I wake up around 5AM to a door slam, I don't know if it was a hallucination or just me making it up, trying to find a reason to why I woke up in the first place, I was very confused. I see one of my best friends walk from the door to one corner of the room, and I say his name, let's just call him X. I call out X a few times, he doesn't respond and just keeps walking into one of the corners, because he didn't respond I decided to wake up my friends and say "Hey, X is here!" - They tell me, no, he's not here, there's no one in the room except us... So I raise myself up from the bed and I look at him for a couple of seconds and he just sort of fades away, he never even looked at me. Then my paranoia started and I felt like I was being watched by shadows or demons, I start tearing up and sweating, I just feel horrible, my friends try and comfort me but I am still freaking out and I ask them repeatedly to call the cops, call an ambulance or whatever, just mumbling about that I need to get out of here and get help, very paranoid and confused. We end up calling my parents to my friends house to come pick me up, and they drove me home and I managed to get a couple of hours of sleep.

A week later I start getting minor hallucinations, such as voices and smells, images in my head when I closed my eyes, such as dead bodies, the smell of diapers?? and seeing movement and "shadow" people very briefly in corners. The voices lasted very short amount of time, perhaps 5 seconds at a time, 5 times at night, mainly in the dark. They'd mostly just tell me to "Hurry!" "We're leaving" and door knocking. I got insomnia, slept very little for a period of 3-4 months, my hygiene was terrible, I was lazy, I did terrible at school due to always just falling asleep in class no matter how much I tried.. I started smoking weed, drinking a lot of alcohol and shrooms as a self medication, they only worked as long as the high did so I stopped that, now I only drink alcohol and smoke cigarettes. This phase of brief hallucinations lasted about 3-4 months. I often mumbled a bit in the middle of a sentence, like I'd say to my friend "Hey you wanna go to the mvmfoeis?" "What are you saying?" "Mvmfoeis?, oh wait I mean movies." I always figured it out afterwards but it was weird, like a lazy tongue. At times I felt horrible, terrible depression just for a few hours, and then at other times I'd have this strange euphoric feel for a few hours too, like happiness, like I could just sit there until the sun rises and just feel good. This would happen every other-few weeks. I would get strange thoughts at times, sort of talking to myself in the head about people, I would get strange thoughts about my friends, whether they hated me or not. For a few weeks I had this minor delusion about that my friends didn't really like me, they must be using me for my money and kindness, I also thought they plotted to stab me, but it was very minor, I would still hang out with them and I'd just joke around with it but secretly I was scared of them at the same time. I still haven't gone to a psychiatrist, don't know if I should, since this only lasted 3-4 months (stopped December 2015) but I feel anxious about it coming back, and last night (1 march, 2016) I wrote a desperate post here while anxious, it was really just utter #######4, it was written in such a hurry at around 4 AM. I felt like it was really desperate for me to get help AT THAT moment. I was convinced I was getting sick again and I needed to get institutionalized tomorrow. As I wrote that post I was also convinced someone was hanging around outside my window. I saw movement but not much more. I don't want to get institutionalized, I have school, I'd mess up that if I did... I don't want to be diagnosed with anything either, I'm anxious I'd be judged by my parents and friends, I guess that might be another reason why I haven't seen a psychiatrist yet...

tl;dr I can relate to a lot of what you said, please keep me updated how it goes for you.