GAD and paranoia

Does anybody have any experience with anxiety so acute that it lapses into paranoid thinking? My doctors swear I'm not paranoid in the classical sense, just anxious (though I'm on four different meds for it) but I go through phases of acute paranoia.

I feel like everyone is watching me, especially the police, and that people I know are setting a trap for me; a policeman was standing in line behind me at the gorcery store today and I just managed to make it home before having a panic attack, though I've never done anything wrong and don't have a reason to fear the police.

Anyone have any similar experiences and/or ideas to cope?

nog wrote:Does anybody have any experience with anxiety so acute that it lapses into paranoid thinking? My doctors swear I'm not paranoid in the classical sense, just anxious (though I'm on four different meds for it) but I go through phases of acute paranoia.

I feel like everyone is watching me, especially the police, and that people I know are setting a trap for me; a policeman was standing in line behind me at the gorcery store today and I just managed to make it home before having a panic attack, though I've never done anything wrong and don't have a reason to fear the police.

Anyone have any similar experiences and/or ideas to cope?

Yes I've actually experienced similiar events but not necessarily with authority figures but with people in general. Of course random strangers don't bother me as much as people who actually make a conscious effort to stare at me or maybe get too physically close to me. Then I start lapsing into paranoid thinking. But my doctors are also under the suscipicion (which I strongly disagree with) that I have bipolar tendencies (and manic phases can lead to stages of psychosis). So I'm not really sure. But I think the type of paranoia that we are experiencing can definitely have origins in anxiety.

I agree with your doctor, my psychiatrist said the same thing, that it is not paranoia, but worry. And that's anxiety, worry.

I was often corrected with that.

sounds quite similair to my problem. I also get really anxious, like i lived in this house for 13 months, then the moment i leave i got anxious and worried i left something, and i am not sure what i could have left so it may be bad etc etc. Even though when i was there i 'knew' there was nothing. I also got nervous around police too, thinking they are coming for me etc. The worts part is i cant see how irrational it is, it seems very logical and rational to me. Maybe its just worry. i hope so.

I have GAD and schizoid personality disorder(which is easy to mistake for SAD) and paranoia, but not to the point of having paranoid personality disorder. Unfortunately, I can't take meds specifically for them because I have bipolar disorder, which comes first. I can't tell you from first hand experience, but I can tell you that for those disorders you'll most likely get SSRIs and/or benzodiazepines.Odds are, you'll get whatever the psychiatrist likes.
Every medication is different for every person. That's why they have a gazillion side effects. You're pretty much wasting your time by asking people what medications they took for these disorders, they probably took a ton of different stuff and it worked differently for all of them.