Worried...

Well,

Going to a new Psychiatrist on Wed. I've not been to one in a while.

I am most concerned with my lack of emotion. It has been going on for well over 2 years now. I lost my job earlier this year. I had made "6 figures", but now just sit at home and watch the savings dwindle away. I seem to be confused a lot. I don't remember things. I use words wrong and forget the words I need. My wife says it is as if I am a different person.

She things I am depressed. I am not so sure. If I was depressed, I would feel depressed right? I don't really feel anything.

The other morning, while laying in bed, I felt as if my arms were the arms of a 500 pound man. Large and tingly, kind of numb.

I kind of feel like a shell of a person.

I don't hear voices or see things.

I have huge chunks of my memory missing. I have lost the inability to learn new things (like computer programming).

I want to speak intelligently on subjects, but I can't seem to get the words out of my mouth properly. I fumble over them or forget my train of thought. It makes me want to just clam up.

I sleep all day.

I won't call friends or family back when they call. Even when they are concerned. It is as if I don't give a damn. I know I do care, but I don't feel it. I can't seem to make myself call.

I remember one night laying in bed stressing out over all the things running through my mind, then all of a sudden like a switch, the stress and worry went away. The problem is, so did emotion, memory, and many other things.

Oh yeah, I suffer from nocturnal seizures.

Interesting family history: My grandfather and his brother served in WWII. Both were diagnosed with schizophrenia. My sister has checked herself in before (a couple of years ago) and doesn't seem to remember that section of her life when I brought up that I may be having issues... I didn't push her.

I seem to have headaches a lot. I am snappy and irritable a lot of the time.

Hi, griffinz! Good luck with your new psychiatrist. The treatment will probably help, even if it takes time. You're not the shell of a person, you're a real person. You are going to deal with a very tough challenge but you're doing the right thing and getting help and you're still there for you family, even though things have changed. You shouldn't be expected to do more right now. You could maybe ask your wife to explain what's going on to your family and friends.
Post here if you like, it's good to vent.

well since you have a probability of getting schizophrenia, and think you might be in some kind of extended prodrome i think 2 years is too long for a negative symptoms prodrome. anyways, "glycine" was found to reduce negative symptoms 20%, but you have to take a couple grams a day they come in 1gram pills. there is also dimethylglycine and trimethylglycine. alot of the "stimulatory" drugs would enhance your ability to reach psychosis like modafinil and adderall. you seem to need something that enhances lability which is basically emotional sensitivity, some of the antidepressants can do that. since you are resourceful with your money, you should look up "stablon" which is a serotonin reuptake enhancer or basically serotonin cycle stimulator. its only available in europe or online. stablon actually feels "good" while antidepressants mostly blunt your "affect." there is also this substance called "kanna" which is a legal empathogen it contains mesembrine and also has SSRI capabilities. it is similar to a very weak and safe ecstasy. the cool thing about mesembrine is that its actually antipsychotic because of its PDE 4 inhibition.

so yeah i would basically talk to your psychcologist about your diagnosis because i dont know what it is, avoid hard stimulants, and instead start the medication along with a supplemental stack that increases emotions. maybe even some 5htp which is available at grocery stores with supplement sections, it raises the serotonin chain since its a precursor.

theres also a bunch of cognitive enhancing drugs called "nootropics".

i actually dont think you're gonna be able to tackle your multifarious problems with 1 pill, but 1 pill may be enough to get you out of the rut. i remember taking an antidepressant for 2 weeks, zoloft, and feeling happy as hell but that was short lived.

I always believed depression was all about feeling sad but from going through and being treated for it I found this wasn't the case. It can take on the form of feeling tired all the time not wanting to partake in life etc. Simply a shortage of seratonin in yer brain(or should that be the gut) which takes away that feel good feeling leaving one empty inside. Obviously this wasn't my only problem but it was a small improvement made which is a bonus. Lately I've been trying to get out a bit more into the sun as this is a natural source of seratonin. But the short course of antidepressants(citalopram) sure helped.

One of my grandads also fought Hitler. He dropped bombs out of planes which flew on missions over central Germany. I never got to meet him as he died early of smoking related illnesses. .

you should look up "stablon" which is a serotonin reuptake enhancer or basically serotonin cycle stimulator.

I used to take Stablon but it got too expensive for me.

It's a great antidepressant. It really made me feel happy without the negative side-effect of the usual SSRIs. It also reduced anxiety which is great because sometimes schizophrenia can drive you up the wall.

I would be having a schizo incident, take a Stablon, and it would help a lot. It wouldn't really reduce the psychosis... it just helped reduce my anxiety and help my coping ability. I could be in a middle of an episode and actually enjoy it. So it's a great drug for that.

It is a serotonin reuptake accelerator and works opposite to the action of SSRI's - which is weird. I read that they still don't know why it works really. Usually antidepressants work by inhibiting serotonin reuptake, not accelerating it.

You can only get it online if you live in the USA tho. Antiaging Systems sells it but it's a wee bit expensive.

The whole arms and legs at 500 pounds is normal. You're supposed to feel that in the half waking-state or whatever it is called. I was doing all that as a child. All through my childhood. Constantly. Every night it seemed. And then I would wet the bed. I never told anyone because it was all so strange. And I still experience it now, from time to time, although not as intense, and minus the bed-wetting. My problem now is where my mind went. I mean, I know where it went, it's just that Neptune is a big place.

Okay so I just took 2 grams of glycine. I don't know how much of this is placebo effect, and i doubt reccurent administration would have the same profound effect. But it is a good one dose measure instead of a chronic measure. Its a relaxant, since it raises serotonin in the frontal cortex, but inhibits dopamine. This might not be your cup of tea since you're trying to get stimulated. It does enhance emotional lability, its like a calm serious effect with midly enhanced tactile sensations. It produces a shift of consciousness. I think this is good for me because my brain gets diswired at times, so I feel less anxious, more stable but also feeling more of the slow waves of emotion. At one point I thought I didn't have enough privacy between the walls as I don't want to share my intimacy with someone. It has a kind of dulling slow charactor, and it produces some kind of conscious and bodily heat. It is definetly a night time supplement, I don't know much of its other effects but its supposed to increase GH production as well as increase collagen production which helps the skin. I just feel content about sitting here, but it feels like I need a glass of ice water. It has a mild linearity effect kind of like the whole world slowing down. Glycine is an inhbitory neurotransmitter, and also regulates glutamatergic bursts. Its really not something that I would want to take for long periods of time, as I actually like the unstability of the speed of consciousness in schizophrenia. But it might benefit me in thinking over my words, and getting along with people better. Its not really a "motivating" feeling, more like a tyranical wellbeing feeling. Another reason why glycine is probably good for recovery is because it is the simplest amino acid in the DNA chain, and also its a NMDA neurotransmitter which initiates synaptic changes. Of course this could lead to progression or regression, but that depends on other factors. I'm mostly feeling standoffish around people instead of connected though so far.

You can find supplements in bulk powders online, but its good to get the individual bottles to try them out instead of paying more for a whole lot more.

The motavational amino acids would be phenylalanine (dopamine), l-arginine (sexual/steriodial), tyrosine (epinephrine). I took phenylalanine before but I can't have any of that anymore, it is pretty good for working and attention it was in "recall support" from vitamin shoppe along with choline. The thing about amino acids is that they build up the brain rather than just give a temporary effect.