Voices...

Now I know that this is a rather contentious issue, and one that gets over-stereo typed in the movies and media, but what's the deal with hearing voices.

I am usually a pretty glib fellow, I am often the first to make a joke about my condition. I do it to show people that I am comfortable with it, and to put them at ease.

But this is a different kettle of fish, so to speak.

Recently, I have started hearing voices. No, not my neighbours or my coworkers, them I can ignore. I mean little snippets of sentences. Never clear enough to make out a cohesive sentence. The occassional word or two. Nothing malicious in them, no messages telling me to kill anyone or become a golf pro (WKRP classic episode), but they are there.

What the hell is up with this? I, like many other ignoramii, thought the voices in your head were rather well spoken, highly educated voices. Not mumbling Boomhauer types.

Am I cracked? Have I gone to the next level of Bipolar? Can John Kerry defeat George W. Bush? Anyone got any answers or advice?

Thanks,

Pedro

Bring on a brand new renaissance,
Cause I think I'm ready.
I've been shaking all night long,
But my hands are steady.

Pedro,

Have you ever heard of psychosis? Being a bipolar it would be the first place I would explore with your pdoc.
Here is a website that can help you.

I've also experienced this with an earache, and a migraine, so physical conditions must first be ruled out.


http://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/html/content/voices.cfm

I was worried that this might be the situation.

Time to visit my docs again...now if I could only get a damn complete sentence out of my voices.


Pedro

pedrotater wrote:I was worried that this might be the situation.

Time to visit my docs again...now if I could only get a damn complete sentence out of my voices.


Pedro

Oh no, you don't want complete sentences, or even suggestions from the voices. That would not be so good. You are in the safe zone.... It is when you hear suggestions or you have conversations with the voices the docs will dx you with something else. So stay honest with your doctor, and let him/her know how frustrating it is for you , and that they are not complete sentences. If it happens often write down, when, and what you hear, and any meds that you have taken and at what time. And what your stress level is at the time. and make sure when you go in they take your vitals. B/P, temp, and heart rate, or pulse.

Best of luck, don't worry, they may put you on an antipsychotic, like seroquel or resperdol, but my episodes are very far apart, and usually only happen after long periods of lack of sleep, extreme stress, or med withdrawl(xanax). If you drink, please don't while this is happening until you see your doc.

Let me know how it goes.

dd;

Are you from the UK? You write like you are, and I have noticed most of your refs are UK.

Plus, I notice "u" in words. Same as here in Canada.

Anyway...I just find it amusing that my life has become a WKRP episode. Not sure if you are familiar with the show. In on episode a DJ (Johnny Fever) seems to believe that God is speaking to him, although he cannot make it out clearly..."Johnny...I want you to be...a golf pro?" My stuff doesn't get nearly that clear. It is usually words or noise for lack of a better term.

By the by, since this has come to bare, I have noticed that I am extremely sensitive to sound. Rather disappointing as some of my best therapy is putting on my JET CD or The VINES and blasting it. I guess it will have to be Zamfir and Neil Sedaka now.

Go Gunners!

Pedro

Bring on a brand new renaissance,
Cause I think I'm ready.
I've been shaking all night long,
But my hands are steady.

Pedro, Nope Ize frum missouri, Our vocabulary is a mix of everything I believe. I looked back and couldn't find any u's. Unless you mean when I write thru ?

My first voice was when I was 13, it was a woman, not me or my mother, and it said. "there is a place in Shiloh , that I used to go to when I used to cry", I have spent most of my life trying to find out what that meant. I thought it was an angel, then I read the story of Hannah, and wow. I don't know what it was, but it never came back like that again. I am now 42 and stil have no children, so that story of Hannah, holds dear to my heart. I do have a niece by chance they named Hannah.

I do have friends in the U.K. perhaps I have picked up on their speaking and spelling, I also am a huge fan of the 'Kids in the hall'. so I say, aye? alot. I also find myself writing in different languages, like aussie for instance. My granma was from England, perhaps I picked up some of the lingo from her.

Hope you are doing well.

Hi I am new here. I was reading these posts on hearing voices. I started hearing voices from innatimate objects when I was very young. I would hear full sentences and very intricate vocabulary. These voices left me from about 15 years of age to 41 years of age. When they returned it was different. Now I hear the voices inside my own head. Very loud and clear. The voice usually tells me I am going to do something or it tells me what I have just done. It's like a commontary at times. I seem to hear the voices before, during and after accute stages of mixed mania. I have few full blown mania's but I do hear sounds and voices in those periods too. Aside from the voices I have heard bagpipes and became delusional about them. At times I think when in mania/mixed man. I can smell colognes. Recently I had a few hallucinations that I had become delusional about. But my friend has been teaching me to not believe everything I see, but to question it first. The problem is that the hallucinations I am seeing recently are not fantastic, but rather what a normal person would expect to see, the difference is that when I say something about them, I am told that there is no such sight to see as I have.

I have found that Zyprexa helps to quiet me down, but it is the lamictal and seroquel that help with the phychosis.

I have not seen or heard anything in my many years of mental illness. I tend to get stong delusions and spend a lot of time making detailed plans to accomplish various things. I have a very strong imagination and a rich fantasy life.

I have met a number of people who see and hear things. They seem to be relatively normal folk. There was a man who saw and heard people all the time, but he was a genius. He won a nobel prize. A popular movie was done on his life.

I worked in the field of education for many years. I wonder if seeing and hearing things are just ways a person thinks. It may not have any signifance if that is so. I can just about see visions with my imagination, but I have never heard things. Maybe my brain is wired different than yours. Due to learning problems, by brain works differently than most people's. I see colors, but can't remember them. I dream in black and white. I do well on objective tests, but have major trouble writing answers in sentences. People's brains function in different ways. I had girls who could look at a test in a few minutes and find all typos and spelling errors, yet their grade would seldom even approach a 40%. That is an unusally low score. A person would be expected to get at least 25% on such a multiple choice if they knew nothing.

So, I'm not so sure if hearing or seeing things is that important if the person is otherwise functional.
Jim S

jims wrote:I have not seen or heard anything in my many years of mental illness. I tend to get stong delusions and spend a lot of time making detailed plans to accomplish various things. I have a very strong imagination and a rich fantasy life.

I have met a number of people who see and hear things. They seem to be relatively normal folk. There was a man who saw and heard people all the time, but he was a genius. He won a nobel prize. A popular movie was done on his life.

I worked in the field of education for many years. I wonder if seeing and hearing things are just ways a person thinks. It may not have any signifance if that is so. I can just about see visions with my imagination, but I have never heard things. Maybe my brain is wired different than yours. Due to learning problems, by brain works differently than most people's. I see colors, but can't remember them. I dream in black and white. I do well on objective tests, but have major trouble writing answers in sentences. People's brains function in different ways. I had girls who could look at a test in a few minutes and find all typos and spelling errors, yet their grade would seldom even approach a 40%. That is an unusally low score. A person would be expected to get at least 25% on such a multiple choice if they knew nothing.

So, I'm not so sure if hearing or seeing things is that important if the person is otherwise functional.
Jim S

Hi there, FMFJI, but I believe that movie,is " A beautiful mind" starring Russell Crowe, and was based on schizophrenia, which is a brain disorder, rather than a mental chemical disorder as bipolar is. The same meds are not affective in treatment of schizophrenia, shizoaffective and bipolar tho they each may show signs of psychosis, or auditory hallucination and visual hallucinations, the stimuli is different, that is the cause.

In bipolar psychosis it is a temporary state, and can be affectively treated , and there are many variables for its' onset. From withdrawls, which needs to be outruled before dx is accurate, sleep deprivation, stress, long term manic state untreated, drug induced psychosis, again needs to be ruled out. Alcoholism, overlapping ppd sx's. and many other causes not mentioned here. At the first signs, the consumer needs to see a pdoc immediately for meds, i.e. seroquel for instance. An atypical antipsycotic. followed by either mood stablizers, antiseizers, or antipychotics . And a proper dx needs to be made and can be made within a month.

With schizophrenia, the voices are more two way. as are the visuals. they are more real and talk to you and answer you and tell you what to do. In bipolar it is like a dream state in most cases and makes no sense. And can cause severe paranoia.

Hey everybody,
It's interesting to find somebody that seems to deal w/ the same problem I have. My friend and I were just talking about the voice I deal w/ and she turned me on to this thread. I really haven't talked to anybody that has had this same experience so it's nice to know that I'm not the only one out there exeperiencing this.
I have just a single voice and it usually gets very bad as kind of a warning when I'm going downhill fast and need to have my meds adjusted. My voice becomes very loud, screaming at times and has even woken me up in the middle of the night telling me that "it's time." The voice is ALWAYS telling me that I need to commit suicide. That I've lived long enough, that I'm not worthy of life, etc., etc., etc., my voice is obviously very nasty. I was taking Risperdal and while that seemed to help for awhile the voice is now coming back w/ a vengance. My pdoc is now slowly, but surely switching me over to Geodon. I'm also taking Depakote and Wellbutrin.
For me the voice always starts out as just a whisper in my ear and will go away for a day or two and then another whisper and it finally keeps getting worse and worse. I know things are really bad for me when I stop listening to the radio on the way to work in the morning. I know that sounds insignificant, but for me it tells me I'm listening to the voice more than the world around me and I'm in deep trouble if I don't do something fast. The last time I tried to deal w/ it w/o telling anybody my wife caught me writing suicide notes. I'm lucky she caught me because I was ready. I had everything in place, I just needed to finish a letter or two.
Anyway, that's been my experience w/ my voice. Bastard that it is.

PM