Psychiatry, psychology, and other mental health care-related fields

they are not science

the disorders you have been diagnosed with are not scientific diagnoses

you should stop taking adderall. dont take any psychiatric medication, its all bad. for you.

>>8354964
They won't hear you. American culture is based on "magic pills" to success.

I think most disorders outside of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are mostly a meme and not nearly as disabilitating. Or they are at least a hell of a lot easier to manage.

t. schizophrenic

According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders a mental disorder or disease can not be diagnosed as such unless it interferes with your work or life. Simply put, learn to live with it, own it, or find some way of making it work for you and it's no longer a disease/disorder.

>>8355015

>According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders a mental disorder or disease can not be diagnosed as such unless it interferes with your work or life. Simply put, learn to live with it, own it, or find some way of making it work for you and it's no longer a disease/disorder.

That's what I've been thinking. One of the reasons that I decided to start seeing mental health care professionals (psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, etc.) was because for years my family (among other people in my life, such as in school) have been telling me that I'm "crazy" and that I "need to seek professional help".

And so for years I was thinking that maybe there really was something seriously wrong with me. I started thinking that maybe I had a personality disorder (such as narcissistic personality disorder) or a mental disorder (such as schizophrenia.) So far I've seen two psychiatrists, two therapists, two neurologists, and a psychologist. One neurologist got me to pay $700 for an MRI scan on my brain that didn't reveal anything unusual aside from an "arachnoid cyst" (which is apparently very common, harmless, and goes away on its own.) I paid the psychologist $700 to test me for personality disorders (he administered a "Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory - 2" along with a bunch of other diagnostic classification and rating scales) only to find that I didn't have any personality disorders.

The psychologist told me that I had what he called a "schizotypal personality style" (not "schizotypal personality disorder".) Apparently what I had wasn't sufficient for me to receive the diagnosis of a personality disorder. Which I think it is a bit odd since this so-called "personality style" seems to have significantly interfered with my life, considering that I am a 27-year-old, unemployed, high school drop-out.

>>8354982

>I think most disorders outside of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are mostly a meme and not nearly as disabilitating. Or they are at least a hell of a lot easier to manage.

>t. schizophrenic

I've even been told that schizophrenia isn't real. That schizophrenia is just "hearing voices" and that we all "hear voices" and that it's called "thinking". There seems to be disagreements as to what schizophrenia actually is.

Some people diagnosed with schizophrenia seem to only have it as bad as auditory hallucinations but with no delusions. So they generally seem to function fairly well as long as they remain aware that their hallucinations come entirely from their own minds.

While others diagnosed with schizophrenia seem to have it so bad that they experience hallucinations that affect all of their senses: visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, and tactile hallucinations. All accompanied by bizarre delusions, disorganized thinking, poor memory... they can't really function at all.

Some have told me that "mentally ill" people are simply "weak" and thus can never adapt to the modern world.

After reading through the section on personality disorders on the DSM-5, particularly the pages for narcissistic personality disorder... I see that apparently people with narcissistic personality disorder can go on to develop major depressive disorder.

So if it turns out that I have major depressive disorder because of narcissistic personality disorder, then that essentially means that I really am "weak" and am thus incapable of adapting to the modern world.

I do not seem to have the will power to bring myself out of my depression.

>>8354961
>What do you guys think about psychiatry, psychology, and other mental health care-related fields?
Dim witted, dishonest, lazy bullshit, that's practically become an arm of pharmaceutical companies. Watching their half minded attempts to get results, and observing the average outcome, is quite frankly disgusting and pathetic. Those fields ought to be disassembled and stripped down by force.

Psychology is okay. Just okay. But it needs to recognize its nature. It's not a science and that's just fine, it shouldn't be. Leave the low level mechanistic approach to neuroscience.

I rarely drink, but I'm a bit drunk at the moment and will not allow myself to be pulled into a debate with stupid people. I've been to some fucked up places, and some of them part of me came to live in, to this day. But I fixed my shit. I got results. Which is more than can be said for these hackjob fields.

>>8355879
>Some have told me that "mentally ill" people are simply "weak" and thus can never adapt to the modern world.
These people probably drip all manner of disjointed asinine gutter trash from their mouths, all day every day. Ignore them and their myopic clutter. Be aware of the most base aspects of everyday experience and functionality, don't compartmentalize, build a framework of knowledge wherein all elements are well integrated in a generalized sense (a form of lateral thinking), and learn to think mechanically. The body and mind are machines. For all meaningful purposes in this realm, construcitivism is just reductionism that ignores scale, and reductionism works for a reason. If you think mechanically and try to understand the underpinnings of what you experience, you'll be fine, and you won't be drawn in by any disingenuous "broken for life" "magical vague chemical imbalance that just is" horseshit.

Fuck all of you, by the way. Just for being human. And fuck the DSM. It can suck the D SoMe, if you know what I mean.

>>8355907
You're a sad little man, but at least your less wrong then most

>>8356062
I'm more correct than most.

>>8354961
I was in same boat but my family has these mental disorders up the ass. I was on so many anti depressents but one day I quit them after taking a hit of acid. Started getting into Kundalini Yoga to clear my chakras. I'm not as functional as I was on adderall but I'm improving every single day and I've definitely gotten out of depression.

I've used the sahaja yoga method for kundalini awakening

>>8355121
If you're unemployed how are you partying for these tests anyway?

>>8354961
give this a try if you want: http://www.lindenmethod.com/

i'm pretty sure it saved my life some time ago.

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Hello, this is semi related to the subejct:

I want to acquire the complete syllabus for all basic psychology degree courses at Harvard/Yale/Some other high ranking institution (I hope to gain some insight into the field in the long run), but I don't really know how to go about it and my poor vocabulary hinders my efforts as English isn't my native language.

Could someone please help me find these book lists?

>>8354964
What do you mean they are not science?

Oh is it because they do not follow rigorous scientific methods for proving something?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Have_No_Mouth,_and_I_Must_Scream

>>8356368

>If you're unemployed how are you partying for these tests anyway?

My family has been using my name and social security number for tax-related things revolving around my older brother's illegitimate and morally dubious business these past five years or so.

I get about 10% out of the income that I supposedly make (according to my taxes.) I use that money for my medical expenses since I don't have any insurance.

>>8356072

>I was in same boat but my family has these mental disorders up the ass. I was on so many anti depressents but one day I quit them after taking a hit of acid. Started getting into Kundalini Yoga to clear my chakras. I'm not as functional as I was on adderall but I'm improving every single day and I've definitely gotten out of depression.

>I've used the sahaja yoga method for kundalini awakening

Can you be so sure that the reason those things worked for you had nothing to do with the "placebo effect"?

>>8356399

>give this a try if you want: http://www.lindenmethod.com/

I'm scared to go to that link because my WOT Firefox extension is telling me that it is an unsafe web site. What's it about?

>>8356520
i have no problem accessing the site and it's safe. anyway, it's a recovery treatment for anxiety, panic attacks, phobias, obsessions & depression and all kinds of shit like that.
i really really recommend it, man.

>>8355907

>If you think mechanically and try to understand the underpinnings of what you experience, you'll be fine, and you won't be drawn in by any disingenuous "broken for life" "magical vague chemical imbalance that just is" horseshit.

But how can I be certain that the disorders that I've been diagnosed with have genuinely mechanical underpinnings, and aren't just made-up bullshit? How do I know whether or not I was misdiagnosed?

And if these disorders do have mechanical underpinnings, what can I do? Take antidepressant and anti-anxiety medication (which I already have and they only made me feel worse)?

Some of the most common pieces of advice that I've received from people on how to deal with depression is stuff like "go outside" - "get some sun" - "exercise". And, well, as it turns out, I've done just that. Last year when I started taking Adderall I suddenly started feeling a great deal of energy and motivation, so much so that I would feel bored simply sitting in front of my computer all day long. So I started going outside and walking for four hours every day. I lost a great deal of weight during that time. I went from weighing around 284 pounds in January 2015 down to about 160 pounds in September 2015.

It would seem that Adderall mitigates some of the vegetative symptoms of my depression. I realize that Adderall is a psychostimulant, but it seems to have proven somewhat more effective in treating my depression than the actual antidepressants that I used to take between the years of 2013 and 2014. Which is why I only find it baffling to think that the nurse practitioner wanted to prescribe me an antipsychotic (Abilify) while simultaneously prescribing me a psychostimulant (Adderall). And my psychiatrist wanted to stop prescribing me Adderall altogether, despite my psychologist's advice that Adderall has been greatly beneficial in treating part of my depression and my psychologist's observation that I do not have schizophrenia.

Green tea almost completely cured my generalized anxiety disorder. After a bit of research I found out l-theanine was the active component in tea that was helping me. I ordered some pure theanine powder and started adding 100-200mg to my tea and it's cured my anxieties 100%

>>8356062
His less wrong than most what?

>>8354982
Low functioning autism is far worse than schizophrenia and I say that as someone with high functioning autism.

>>8357597

>Low functioning autism is far worse than schizophrenia and I say that as someone with high functioning autism.

I'm fairly certain that I fit somewhere within the autism spectrum, which is part of the reason why I wanted to see a geneticist. But apparently geneticists don't do DNA tests on adult men such as myself, instead only see pregnant women and small children. I was kind of hoping that a geneticist could find chromosomal abnormalities suggesting autism, but whatever. Apparently I can't even get diagnosed with autism as an adult, it's generally something diagnosed during childhood. Autism would explain a lot about my childhood.

Then again, I've noticed a lot of similarities between the autism spectrum disorder and schizotypal personality disorder. I was pretty sure that my psychologist would diagnose me with a personality disorder (most likely schizotypal personality disorder) but he ended up telling me that what I had wasn't sufficient for me receive the diagnosis of a personality disorder. So now I'm stuck with the label "schizotypal personality style" which doesn't really seem to be a thing. It's not on the DSM and it doesn't have a Wikipedia article or anything. So it's pretty useless to me.

If it's true that schizotypal personality disorder is genetic, it would certainly explain why my family is so fucking weird. That's part of the reason why I decided to get that AncestryDNA test done on me. But that stuff only revealed stuff about my ancestry. They sent me over 16,000 pages of "raw data" which I'm finding difficult to interpret. I've also heard of something called "23andme" which doesn't sound much promising either.

Also, schizotypal personality disorder is understood to be within the "schizophrenia spectrum". And some people diagnosed with schizotypal personality disorder could go on to develop schizophrenia later on in life. So, uh, maybe I shouldn't be taking Adderall after all...

>>8354961

If psychiatric conditions were real they'd be treated by neurologists. As it is, it's the opposite and psychiatrist diagnostic standards specify *ruling out* actual neurological problems.

>>8359043

>If psychiatric conditions were real they'd be treated by neurologists. As it is, it's the opposite and psychiatrist diagnostic standards specify *ruling out* actual neurological problems.

The funny thing is that I actually did go to see a neurologist back in 2013 who then told me (after a 15-minute-long conversation) that I seemed to have anxiety and a bit of depression, and so he prescribed me anti-convulsant medication for treating my essential tremors, and then referred me to my second psychiatrist (apparently these two guys were friends during their college days.) And that psychiatrist then prescribed me antidepressant and anti-anxiety medication (after yet another 15-minute-long conversation) which I took for eight months and only made me feel much worse than I already did. Shortly thereafter, my neurologist closed his office, retired, and then refused to answer any and all of both my phone calls and e-mails. This second psychiatrist told me to go find another psychiatrist.

>>8359072

Right, he treated your hand tremors because they were real and then sent you to a psychiatrist for all the bullshit mental "problems."

>>8354964
It's because of people like you that my brother believes in the illuminati and zombies and his connection with god.

>>8359146

Just because your brother is retarded doesn't mean he need to have his brain physically tampered with. You could just talk to him instead of trying to drug him into submission.

>>8359154
My brother's not retarded, he's lost his grasp on reality.
He has autism and schizophrenia. You can't talk to him, only speak words to him and he speaks some back.
He hears you but doesn't listen.

abilify ain't that bad op, but with the disorders you listed, you don't need it. it's an anti-psychotic, not a stimulant, benzo or anti-depressant.

>>8359163
Maybe his environment is retarded.
You certainly included.

>>8359195

>abilify ain't that bad op, but with the disorders you listed, you don't need it. it's an anti-psychotic, not a stimulant, benzo or anti-depressant.

That's exactly what I'm saying. Abilify is an antipsychotic. Adderall is a psychostimulant. This nurse practitioner guy wanted to prescribe me both drugs at the same time. Two drugs with completely opposite effects. How does that make any sense? It's ridiculous.

And then my psychiatrist wanted to completely stop prescribing me Adderall.

And all of this because I said that I wanted to be referred to a geneticist to have myself tested for any possibly genetically inheritable disorders and/or diseases (Alzheimer's disease, antisocial personality disorder, autism spectrum disorder, schizophrenia, etc.)

This nurse practitioner guy would even ask me questions like "do you believe to be receiving messages from people on your computer?" I was a bit confused by this question, and I responded with something like, "well, uh, yeah... since I play a lot of video games over the internet, I do communicate with people through these games with text messages and whatnot." This nurse practitioner then proceeded to put down on my MedRec that I believed my computer to have been "hacked" and that "there didn't seem to be any reasoning behind his logic." He also put symptoms of schizophrenia on my MedRec like: "illogical thinking" - "magical thinking" - "auditory hallucinations" - "flat affect" - "odd, peculiar, guarded".

But then my psychologist told me that I am definitely not schizophrenic and that I am too old to develop schizophrenia at this point.

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>>8359272
>This nurse practitioner guy would even ask me questions like "do you believe to be receiving messages from people on your computer?" I was a bit confused by this question, and I responded with something like, "well, uh, yeah... since I play a lot of video games over the internet, I do communicate with people through these games with text messages and whatnot." This nurse practitioner then proceeded to put down on my MedRec that I believed my computer to have been "hacked" and that "there didn't seem to be any reasoning behind his logic."

get a new doctor, this one is so retarded it's funny. don't take abilify, you don't seem to need it.
i'm actually schizoaffective and i used to think i'd get messages all the time until they put me on anti-psychotics. abilify is great if you need it, but it can harm you if you don't.

but you kind of sound like you're addicted to adderall, which isn't great. try to do without it for a while. and get a new psychiatrist.

>>8359272
I didn't feel like responding to your response to my post above, so I'm going to use your own post as a response.

Look at this. Look at what you're seeing. Massive confirmation bias, disgusting incompetence. Just a broken mess. And for what? Anon, ask yourself, for what? Why are you interacting with this system? Why do you care? Why do you think you can know if you have any underlying hard mechanical problems with your brain when these quacks themselves aren't even able to unravel the mechanics behind certain disorders, and thus are forced to describe and diagnose them in a strictly high level, subjective, borderline arbitrary way? They don't know, anon. and it doesn't matter.

Seriously, what are you even thinking? Ditch these fucks. Unravel your problems yourself. I recommend an allergy test to rule out chronically elevated histamine levels. Beyond that, stop drowning yourself in the feel good pseudo-happy haze of amphetamine, and its equally false utility, and chip away at what in your environment and psyche is leading to such dysfunction. After all you've said, I can;t imagine why you convince yourself to continue.

>>8359280
Abilify will harm you even if you do "need it".
;^)

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>>8359289
probably, but it beats running through the city disoriented and half naked.

>>8359300
Matter of opinion I suppose.
It wasn't so long ago that I was wandering around rambling the most nonsense sense you'd ever hear, barely aware of where and what I was, hearing garbled gibberish coming out of people;'s mouths and seeing every thin wire-like structure pulsating like a vein. But I fixed my shit.

Whatevs man Mr. Man. Enjoy being abilified. :^)

>>8359280

>get a new doctor, this one is so retarded it's funny.

I wouldn't say that this guy is retarded. This nurse practitioner guy is only one provider out of the four (I think that there's about twenty providers at this practice) that I've met with at this practice. I've been going to these people since July 2013. They're all pretty weird. I've suspected for years that something odd has been going on with them.

Here's some of the theories that I've developed that might explain their unusual behavior:

So I'm left here by myself with my own theories. I've developed several theories, here's only a few of the ones that I have so far:

1. All of this is some sort of really extended, complex, and weird psychological experiment.

2. Sociological experiment maybe?

3. My psychiatrist and the co-workers of his practice are all really bored people and simply enjoying screwing with their patients' heads because they know that their patients can't do anything about it. This whole thing is a twisted prank.

4. My psychiatrist and the rest of the people of his practice are intentionally trying to get me to lose my temper, so that they could say that Adderall is making me aggressive so that they can get me off of it and put me on antipsychotics for the rest of my life.

5. My psychiatrist and the other providers are all just highly disorganized and incompetent.

Anyway, I already went to see a second psychiatrist back in 2013 (after I met with my first psychiatrist who prescribed me Adderall.) This second psychiatrist refused to prescribe me Adderall and instead prescribed me clonazepam and escitalopram for eight months.

I also tried looking for another psychiatrist earlier this year by going to an old clinic that I used to go to and speaking to one of the doctors, asking him if he could refer me to a psychiatrist. He told me that that clinic didn't have any psychiatrists and that they don't prescribe Adderall.

>>8359309
not him but you're bound to experience another episode. I was 18 when I was diagnosed bipolar with psychotic features and was put on mega doses of seroquel and lithium. I eventually weened myself off of the stuff and went four years perfectly healthy before I had another episode. ended up back on zyprexa and lithium. I only take the lithium now and have been okay ever since. Psychiatry is mostly bullshit i agree but if you ever end up in a psych ward it's generally not by accident.


Be careful friend.

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>>8359328
>1. All of this is some sort of really extended, complex, and weird psychological experiment.
>2. Sociological experiment maybe?
>3. My psychiatrist and the co-workers of his practice are all really bored people and simply enjoying screwing with their patients' heads because they know that their patients can't do anything about it. This whole thing is a twisted prank.
>4. My psychiatrist and the rest of the people of his practice are intentionally trying to get me to lose my temper, so that they could say that Adderall is making me aggressive so that they can get me off of it and put me on antipsychotics for the rest of my life.

well, now you DO sound like you need abilify. those aren't theories, they're delusions. i would advice you not to overthink this shit. and don't take adderall

>>8359341
No, he doesn't. As long as he doesn't suffer from a delusional sense of certainty and his error control systems are properly developed and functionally intact, he's fine.

You're just a myopic faith driven degenerate. A "sheep", as they're called. You convince yourself you know more than you do.

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>>8359345
and you're a sociopath that is trying to trick ill people into not taking their meds.

>>8359345
yes anon yes seriously entertaining any of those as true is perfectly healthy and not indicative of prodromal schizophrenia no no not at all it's all perfectly rational.

>>8359352
You're mentally ill and suffering from paranoid delusions.

>>8359361
sure, but that's beside the point. go away with your ad hominem, sociopath.

>>8359328
its probably just their scamming you out of your money for their treatments for their nonscientific diagnoses.

>>8359360
Exactly right. Glad to see someone is on the same page.
;^)

>>8359365
>go away with your ad hominem
>, sociopath.
Lol. Okay.

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>>8359372

>>8359375
Thanks. I'm largely incapable of meaningful connection with other people, but still craving attention.

This gradually makes it worse. :^)

>>8354961
>Major Depressive Disorder, Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Social Anxiety Disorder, and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
Yes they are different conditions, but more likely "differential diagnosis"(if you told them about previous diagnosed mental conditions)

You can have multiple disorders, but to be completely honest you may have Munchausen Syndrome. You seem extremely preoccupied with your mental health problems and not their solutions. Not trying to be a jerk OP but you may have a medical attention seeking problem. You hit some of the marks. Multiple doctors, multiple diagnoses, believing you know more about the doctors, everyone around you telling you to stop taking medicine/seeing doctors
Im not saying your an extreme case, believe me you would know, but you may want to go at this with an open mind.
Munchausens is a hard pill to swallow, in fact if you tell any one who has the disorder they have it 9 times out of 10 they will say they dont. If you really feel you need help, you need to go see a Psychoanalyst and tell them your whole life story and he'll help you figure out why you may do some things, your ticks, your fears. And you need to keep the same Dr, no multiple doctors. They may not be getting your medical information from each other so each time you go in they have no previous mental health history to go on.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_seeking

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>>8354964
If you come off those drugs you must do it slowly. It's called titration.

Get a doctor to help you. An example would be 1000 mg of Lithium.

Week 1 you take 900 mg each day. Week 2 you take 800 mg each. Week 3 is 700 mg each day.

If you're taking a mood stabilizer or antipsychotic then it's of the utmost importance to do it this way. Ritalin and other drugs can still have horrible side effects when stopped suddenly.

If you get can your doctor to prescribe a liquid form of your "medication" it is much easier to ween yourself in increments off the substance.

These are powerful pharmaceutical creations and it can take months to get yourself off of them but you need to do it the correct way otherwise you risk being put in a mental ward.

Look up the psychiatrist Dr. Peter Breggin if you want to know more.

>>8359341

>well, now you DO sound like you need abilify. those aren't theories, they're delusions. i would advice you not to overthink this shit. and don't take adderall

Oh come on, man! You don't know the whole story. It gets so, so, so very much weirder. You have no idea. So much weird shit has happened with these people. Seriously.

And besides, my psychologist wrote the following on my psychological evaluation report:

>There were no questions raised regarding his reality testing, no hallucinations reported, and no delusions noted either, failing to support a psychosis hypothesis (including all Schizophrenic disorders). His commonly paranoid disposition is deemed largely reality-based, informed by years of suffering from bullying victimization at school, exposure to domestic violence, and exposure to criminality in and around his home.

>>8359352

>and you're a sociopath that is trying to trick ill people into not taking their meds.

I have yet to actually be prescribed any antipsychotics, you know.

>>8359378

>Yes they are different conditions, but more likely "differential diagnosis"(if you told them about previous diagnosed mental conditions)

Three of those disorders (Major Depressive Disorder, Generalized Anxiety Disorder, and Social Anxiety Disorder) I was diagnosed with by a single psychologist. I was diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder by my psychiatrist.

>And you need to keep the same Dr, no multiple doctors. They may not be getting your medical information from each other so each time you go in they have no previous mental health history to go on.

I didn't end up with multiple doctors out of choice. I started off with one psychiatrist who couldn't help me with all my questions, so I ended up seeing a neurologist, who then referred me to a second psychiatrist, who then told me to go see a therapist and later told me to go find another psychiatrist, and my therapist told me to go see a psychiatrist for my questions, etc.

>>8359163
you did this. you are obviously a very bad person. you created this brother of your so. kindly fuck yourself and take some drugs yourself

I'd say that those disorders ARE real problems, however they are rarely physiological problems and usually shouldn't be treated with medicine.

>>8359284

>Look at this. Look at what you're seeing. Massive confirmation bias, disgusting incompetence. Just a broken mess. And for what? Anon, ask yourself, for what? Why are you interacting with this system? Why do you care? Why do you think you can know if you have any underlying hard mechanical problems with your brain when these quacks themselves aren't even able to unravel the mechanics behind certain disorders, and thus are forced to describe and diagnose them in a strictly high level, subjective, borderline arbitrary way?

Because I don't know what to do anymore. I'm a 27-year-old unemployed high school drop-out with no friends, no connections, no references, no experience, no real anything. I screw up everything that I try doing with my life. I can't do anything right. I couldn't do a simple mall cop job for one month back in 2011. I tried getting the "adult high school diploma" by taking some adult school classes last year, and I couldn't even do that. I don't think I can handle college. Right now I'm just trying to figure out what's wrong with me. Why I'm such a screw-up. Why my childhood was so shitty. Why I didn't have any friends. Why I don't have any friends now. My whole life people have told me that I'm "crazy", that "there's something seriously wrong" with me, that I "need to seek professional help". And now that I've done just that, I'm starting to see now that everyone else seems to know as much about the world as I do. Which is... nothing, really.

...but then again maybe it's my mental illness trying to convince me that I'm not crazy, that it's everybody else that's crazy.

>hurrdurr mental illness isn't real

>>8359378

>You seem extremely preoccupied with your mental health problems and not their solutions.

I'm just trying to figure out what I *really* have, for how long I've had it, and if I was born with it. I want to make absolutely sure that what I have been diagnosed with is confirmed to be "real" so that I can receive the right treatment. I want to find empirical evidence to prove once and for all to myself what I have. I want to find something with more scientific rigor than simply talking with doctors for a few minutes and them giving me medication. I want to know if I really do have major depressive disorder. I want to know if I really do have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. I want to know if it's attention deficit disorder predominantly hyperactive or predominantly inattentive. I want to know if it's not ADHD, but narcolepsy instead. I want to know if I have major depressive disorder because of an underlying, undiagnosed personality disorder such as narcissistic personality disorder or schizotypal personality disorder. I want to make sure that people can't take the information that my psychologist, psychiatrists, and therapists have gathered and re-interpret as to mean that I have a far more dangerous disorder.

>believing you know more about the doctors

I don't necessarily believe myself to know more than them. I've just seen so many doctors these last few years that I've gotten sick at how they just kind of rush me along, like I'm on an assembly line. They shoot down almost everything that I say. And then when something doesn't go well, like when that antidepressant and anti-anxiety medication was making me feel like shit... I get told to not blame them or anybody else because it was ultimately my decision to make and nobody forced me into it. I'm sick of being influenced, pressured, and/or bullied into making rushed decisions that significantly affect my life.

>>8359280

>but you kind of sound like you're addicted to adderall, which isn't great. try to do without it for a while.

I can't help myself. Out of all the psychiatry-related medications I've taken these past few years, Adderall has been by far the most helpful in giving me a "push". I stopped taking Adderall for roughly two months near the end of last year due to lack of funds, and I just felt like complete and utter shit during that time. I could barely do anything. And my family didn't really seem to understand, or care. I refuse to go back to that. I refuse to go back to feeling that way. I refuse to go back to feeling the way that I did after I stopped taking those antidepressants and anti-anxiety medications back in mid-2014. I hated that awful feeling.

If I ever get permanently cut off from Adderall, that's it. I'm done. That's all I really have left in my life. It's the only reason I bother getting out of bed in the morning. Every few months I decide to take a "break" from Adderall for about a week or two. Maybe one or two days pass before I start craving it. I just keep thinking to myself during that time, "just take it. You know you want to. It's right there. This feeling will go away."

Asking for any sort of medial advice, especially mental health advice, from 4chan is a bad decision.

>>8362190

>Asking for any sort of medial advice, especially mental health advice, from 4chan is a bad decision.

I'm not really asking for any advice, though.

A few years ago (before I decided to seek mental health care) I remember reading this article:

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/01/08/are-raising-generation-deluded-narcissists.html

In it, the psychiatrist Dr. Keith Ablow wrote the following:

>Watch for an epidemic of depression and suicidality, not to mention homicidality, as the real self-loathing and hatred of others that lies beneath all this narcissism rises to the surface.

I remember in middle school, my classmates would ambush me, hold me down, steal my money, food, Pokemon cards, and pummel me in the face.

I remember once asking my older brother (he's 16 years older than me) why it is that people are so cruel to me. He first told me, "it's all in your head." A few seconds later he added, "it's because you're weak. People sense that you're weak."

I remember once asking my brother why it is that he must always loudly make jokes at my expense everywhere we go, and he said, "get over it. You're weak. You want people to think you're weak? Okay, you're weak. You're weak."

I remember once asking my brother if he knew what depression was, why it is that I was taking antidepressants, what they were supposed to be doing for me, what they were really doing to me, and why I had depression in the first place. He said, "hahaha. I don't care. Why should I care? Stop whining. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Who cares? Nobody cares. Suck it up. Tough it out. There are people a lot worse off than you. Be a man."

What I am seeing now is that to survive in this world, one needs to be like my brother. He's one of the most conniving, charismatic, malicious, narcissistic, hateful, and successful people I know.

I can never be like my brother. There is no place in this world for people like me. I am the perfect example of an organism's failure to adapt.

>>8359280

>and get a new psychiatrist.

And what good would that do? They're just going to prescribe me some more antidepressant and anti-anxiety medication which will make me feel like shit again. Just like that second psychiatrist did.

At least with my current psychiatrist it seems that he will continue prescribing Adderall... for now, anyway.

>>8362351
I would argue that a capitalistic society pretty much promotes this sort of behaviour (inb4 I am a Marxist)

>What do you guys think about psychiatry, psychology, and other mental health care-related fields?
It strikes me as very pseudo-scientific.
That doesn't mean they aren't helpful in certain circumstances, chiropractors and homeopaths can be helpful in certain ways despite being con-artists but i have a low view of the mental health field.
If it makes you feel better go for it but don't take their "you're sick at the very core and always will be"(they wouldn't be so uncouth as to say it like that but it is what they believe) spiel too seriously.

>>8363379
Are chiropractors so bad?

Whom should I see to improve my posture?

>>8363332

>I would argue that a capitalistic society pretty much promotes this sort of behaviour (inb4 I am a Marxist)

I think I agree with you, and I think that that "Venus Project" might help steer humanity in the right direction. But now that the Venus Project is so closely associated with the "Zeitgeist Movement" and 9/11 Truthers, it doesn't seem to be heading anywhere. And since the horrors of 20th century communism is still within the psyche of several people alive today, I sincerely doubt that capitalism is heading out anytime soon.

And being that I live within the city of Los Angeles, only a very short distance away from Hollywood Boulevard... where this obsessive popularity of the schadenfreude revolving celebrity gossip spurred on by things like TMZ rages on harder than ever, it would seem that we'll all be stuck on this world for a very, very, very long time. Not that I would consider myself "superior" to people who are interested in celebrity gossip. I mean, hey, if you think that Tom Cruise being a Scientologist is funny and you guys like making fun of all the things he says and does... go ahead. I'm not religious or anything, but I've tried to very closely follow the so-called "Golden Rule" in my life. I'm not going to pretend to be holier-than-thou or take the moral high ground, because I'm certainly not perfect, I'm only human.

>>8354961
Let me help you out here:

mental health is not about who you are, its about what you do:

>Major Depressive Disorder
Do you have any hobbies? do you hold on to a job? are you able to go to school successfully?
If yes, you don't have major depressive disorder

>Generalized Anxiety Disorder
>Social Anxiety Disorder
Do you find it extremely difficult to hold a conversation with people you dont know? Would you call it "terrifying"?
If no, you dont have GAD or SAD

>Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
Do you feel like your life is completely out of your control? Do you continuously use drugs or alcohol to "clear your head" and feel better?
If no, you dont have ADHD

Humans are fallible, doctors are highly corrupt, the american healthcare system sucks. Get a second opinion.

>>8363383
>Are chiropractors so bad?
If they work for you i take the view that nothing else really matters.
>Whom should I see to improve my posture?
I'd see a physical therapist, they might have an approach that better suits your needs.

>>8363459

>Do you have any hobbies?

Not really. Does playing does mini-games on Lumosity for roughly an hour every morning to improve my "neuroplasticity" (which I've heard is all a big scam, but I've already paid for a permanent membership with them so it's done) count as a hobby? Or watching at least one video on Khan Academy each day?

>do you hold on to a job?

No. I've been essentially unemployed for over a decade.

>are you able to go to school successfully?

Nope. I dropped out of high school over ten years ago.

>Do you find it extremely difficult to hold a conversation with people you dont know?

Pretty much, yes. Extremely difficult. Even people with that I already know.

>Would you call it "terrifying"?

Very much so.

>Do you feel like your life is completely out of your control?

Definite yes.

>Do you continuously use drugs or alcohol to "clear your head" and feel better?

Does the Adderall XR that I've been prescribed for over three years and been taking 60 mg daily (highest recommended dosage) count?

>Get a second opinion.

Get a second opinion from who? Psychiatrists? Psychologists? Therapists? Neurologists? I've already seen all of these people. And they tell me that they can only help me unless I give them money first. And even when I do give them money, they just kind of rush me along with these short 20-minute-long sessions, talk over me, and ignore most of my questions. They give me the run-around and tell me to go see a different specialist for my questions.

>mental health is not about who you are, its about what you do

I only want to know what exactly I have, why I have it, and why I am the way I am. Could I see a geneticist who can take a DNA sample from me and look for a genetic predisposition and/or chromosomal abnormalities confirming and/or denying my diagnosis? Could a neurologist run MRI, PET, and CT scans on my brain for further confirmation? etc.

>>8359200
>You certainly included.

English isn't your first language, eh nigger?

>>8360853

I can relate except I've remained tenacious and reached a few milestones. However, my endurance and success has been diminishing these past couple of years.

On the bright side, our writing skills come out be more refined than most.

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hate them nothing but liars and con artist's.
truth : the doc that made up add admitted to doing so on his death bead , said he just wanted to make parents happy. but realized how many children's lives he ruined.
don't trust doc's , I went off all there med and lost 100 lbs and just cause I don't eat subway I'm not getting recognition ? o wait.....
there trying to put us in box's , don't let em do it morty think for your self..

>>8363701
>morty
>>>/co/

>>8354961
Major Depressive Disorder causes Schizophrenic like episodes that can last for years. that would be why shes making that suggestion.

>>8363705

>Major Depressive Disorder causes Schizophrenic like episodes that can last for years. that would be why shes making that suggestion.

My mother doesn't really understand what "Major Depressive Disorder" is. When I was first prescribed antidepressant and anti-anxiety medication back in 2013, she kept insisting and nagging me non-stop for days that I should start taking that medication. I told her that I needed to do more research and get more exams done because I was concerned about the medication's side-effects. She'd tell me, "if the doctor told you to take that medication, then you should take it!" and "all medications say that they have bad side-effects. They all say that they can kill you."

Which is weird because she was the one who for months kept telling me to not taking Adderall because of its side-effects, even though I was the one who initially told her that I wanted to wait before taking Adderall as I had read about it beforehand and was aware of its side-effects. She told me the same thing about Adderall at first (that all medications say that they have bad side-effects and that I should take it.) And when I told my second psychiatrist (not the one who prescribed me Adderall) that I wanted to wait before taking Adderall because I had read that it might trigger psychotic episodes in people genetically predisposed to developing schizophrenia, he shook his head and said, "no. That simply never happens." He later told me not to take Adderall as it could worsen my anxiety and essential tremors. My mother took this second psychiatrist's word for it, but not mine.

Nearly two years later, I started seeing a therapist (I saw her for six sessions back in the months of March and April of this year), and my mother would ask me things like: "how many more times are you going to keep seeing that therapist?" and "I think one time should be more than enough. With one hour you should be able to tell everything you wanted to say."

>>8363674
Elaborate.

>>8359284

>Look at this. Look at what you're seeing. Massive confirmation bias, disgusting incompetence. Just a broken mess. And for what? Anon, ask yourself, for what? Why are you interacting with this system?

You know, the funny thing is... I remember reading on the DSM-5 (Narcissistic Personality Disorder, page 671) the following:

>For example, an individual with this disorder may complain about a clumsy waiter's “rudeness” or “stupidity” or conclude a medical evaluation with a condescending evaluation of the physician.

So a part of me is thinking: "psychiatry is such fucking bullshit. The Scientologists are right about this."

Another part of me is thinking: "no! Don't think that way! It's the disorder making you think that way! How could you possibly agree with anything Scientologists have to say!? You're crazy!"

I find that my mind is constantly arguing back and forth with itself in this manner:

>What's the point of all this? Why am I doing this? I don't even remember where I was going with all of this. I don't even remember what the next step of my plan was. Was there even a next a step? Did I even think this far ahead? Who cares? Major Depressive Disorder? Generalized Anxiety Disorder? Social Anxiety Disorder? Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder? Schizotypal personality style? What does any of this really mean? Is any of it real? Does anybody really care? Maybe it really is Narcissistic Personality Disorder. After all, it's right there on the DSM-5, page 671... people with Narcissistic Personality Disorder could go on to develop Major Depressive Disorder. Maybe my brother was right all along when he told me that I was "weak". The psychologist told me that my brother sounds like he might a sociopath. Maybe he's right. Maybe the psychologist is just playing along with whatever I say. Maybe he doesn't really believe anything that I told him about my brother. Do I really need therapy? Do I really need any medication? I don't think I care.

>>8359145

If the neurologist didn't believe that I had any mental "problems", then why bother sending me to a psychiatrist at all?

He did tell me that my essential tremors were a symptom of my anxiety.

>>8359341

>well, now you DO sound like you need abilify. those aren't theories, they're delusions.

I am not 100% certain that any one of my theories is what is actually occurring. Hence why I call them "theories". I was under the impression that "delusions" are when people believe things with absolute certainty, despite evidence suggesting the contrary. I am willing to accept that any one of my theories is incorrect. However, evidence (that I've gathered these past three years) suggests that I may not be wrong.

>>8354961
People who think mental illness is a psychiatric sham are on par with creationists who think modern physics is a fabrication to discount Yahweh. They don't have the slightest understanding of what we're talking about, nor do they put in the effort to find out.

>>8365932

>People who think mental illness is a psychiatric sham are on par with creationists who think modern physics is a fabrication to discount Yahweh. They don't have the slightest understanding of what we're talking about, nor do they put in the effort to find out.

Alright, then. So mental illness isn't a psychiatric sham. So, then. What do you think about my diagnosis?

>Major Depressive Disorder
>Generalized Anxiety Disorder
>Social Anxiety Disorder
>Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

Are these "real" disorders? Is there any empirical evidence to support that I have them? Could I see a geneticist and/or neurologist to find physical evidence to confirm that these are, in fact, real problems and not purely in my head?

What do you think about Major Depressive Disorder? Could it have been caused by Narcissistic Personality Disorder? I mean, it's right there on the DSM-5 (Narcissistic Personality Disorder, page 671):

>Sustained feelings of shame or humiliation and the attendant self-criticism may be associated with social withdrawal, depressed mood, and persistent depressive disorder (dysthymia) or major depressive disorder.

So then, if that turns out to be true in my case... then that must mean that I really am "weak"?

Of course, I've already been tested for personality disorders by a psychologist. The psychologist administered the following:

>Biopsychosocial History Questionnaire
>Client Problem Checklist
>Beck Depression Inventory – 2 (BDI-2)
>Short Depression Scale (SDS)
>Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI)
>Endler Multiaxial Anxiety Survey
>Social Anxiety Scales (EMAS-SAS)
>Shipley Institute of Living Scale
>Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory – 2 (MMPI-2)

And he told me that I apparently do not have any personality disorder. But then I wonder if he's lying, since, after all, mental health care professionals do sometimes diagnose their patients with personality disorders and not tell their patients about their diagnosis.

>>8354961
This is gonna sound pretty standard, but...
It's all about the neurochemistry working together with your mood. Because of your retarded braincells, you are left exposed to some strange reactions like anxiety and depressive disorders. Been through the whole thing, myself. Forget the diagnoses, just roll with that. Those things are for your health care providers to find a pattern and an effective therapy. Unlike many others, I would recommend you take the medicines perscribed and follow the advice and treatment plans of your psychiatrist. I believe mostly in psychiatry over psychology. Perhaps it is because I believe more in medicine than those theories that are so hard to figure out.
I've done psychotherapy and medication for years, and it really has worked wonders for me. But it takes work and compliance. None of the treatments work unless you both understand and respect each other.

>>8366040
There could be a case of personality disorders, but you have to keep in mind that everyone has traits that coincide with the mapping tools. Administer them to anyone, and they'll get diagnosed with at least two. Personality disorders are only disorders if the traits are so strong and thorough in you that it is a problem for you or your environment. And there is empirical evidence for the existence of these disorders as we have seen that some treatments work especially well in these or those classes or groups. It does take a professional to diagnose these. When taking these tests, your body language says as much about the results as the gradings.

>>8364681
You're stuck in limbo. You need to build, then iterate on over time, a framework of how the world, and yourself, works. This is why you keep pivoting back and forth in almost binary confusion, and are constantly fighting your own split mindedness. You don't have the means to make your own judgements and have a degree of trust in them, because you don't understand how the topics (elements of your knowledge and logical framework) interrelate and fit into the bigger picture. The greater whole.

That's your sole problem, when you lump all the low level stuff into one abstract container. I've been there, though in a somewhat different form. Ultimately, ask yourself, why would someone else be more fit to tell you, and "it", all really is? Are their answers, and the series of logical steps that generated them, truly valid? Is the whole deal even, fucking, meaningful, at all? Is it misframed?

These are answers you need to come to on your own. It cannot be given, it cannot be communicated, ultimately, it has to be realized. I could give you the most in depth and elaborate metacognitive explanation possible, and this still remains so. Same with any educated moron psychiatrist.

why are there so much people in this read against psychiatry? What's going on??

Either way OP if you don't like your psychiatrist just get a new one. You obviously don't trust them and this sort of thing is pretty personal. I like my current psychiatrist because she's pretty grounded I think. find someone that's not gonna keep you around just for money. Well easier said then done

>>8366166
Because psychiatry is garbage that produce sub-optimal outcomes and tends to at best waste people's time when they really need actual help, and at worst damages lives because it's a deluded arm of the pharmaceutical companies.

The model where people going through mental problems are treated as broken for life, needs to go. And it needs to stay gone. Anyone supporting the present system is a threat to this goal, and they're in the way. That's what spawns a lot of hostility. You can't work with delusional people (irony intended), you can only functionally nullify them and learn to quickly get them out of the way. Unfortunately I'm stupid myself and still try, because my misanthropy is built on care, and I've seen enough lives fucked up when I know there are better ways. I'm living proof there are better ways.

>>8366154

>You need to build, then iterate on over time, a framework of how the world, and yourself, works.

After 27 years of careful consideration, I have realized that there is no room for me in this world. I am holding society back. I am too weak to change.

I tried to change. I really did. I tried every year. I can't do anything right. I couldn't even get my high school diploma during my adult school classes last year. I confided in my teacher. I told him about my depression, my anxiety, my insecurities... and he took advantage of it all. I wrote about it in my essays. He took pleasure in my misery. He, his assistant, the rest of his students. They sense my weakness. They feed off of my misery. Schaudenfreude. That's how people in this world survive. I took my therapist's advice and tried to make a friend. I've tried to make many friends. I tried to make my teacher my friend. Multiple failed attempts. Every attempt has failed.

This world was not made for people like me. I must make an example out of myself for all the others that are like me to follow.

>>8366112

>There could be a case of personality disorders, but you have to keep in mind that everyone has traits that coincide with the mapping tools. Administer them to anyone, and they'll get diagnosed with at least two. Personality disorders are only disorders if the traits are so strong and thorough in you that it is a problem for you or your environment. And there is empirical evidence for the existence of these disorders as we have seen that some treatments work especially well in these or those classes or groups. It does take a professional to diagnose these. When taking these tests, your body language says as much about the results as the gradings.

I've been administered all of these mapping tools, and I have yet to be diagnosed with a personality disorder (despite what certain people in my life may believe.) Although I have yet to be diagnosed with a personality disorder, I have been diagnosed with four other disorders... one of those disorders is apparently considered a "mental disorder" (Major Depressive Disorder, apparently), and so I suppose that that officially makes me to be considered "mentally ill".

Regardless, none of this felt all that scientific. When I was taking the MMPI-2 for example, I kept thinking to myself: "how is this scientific? What is stopping someone like me from quickly pulling out their cell phone to take pictures of each and every page of the MMPI-2 to post online so that other people can review the questions and memorize them, so that they know how to answer?"

I remember when I was going through the questions, I pretty much already knew the "right way" to answer them. Since I've spent so much time these past few years reading about the various different mental and personality disorders and their symptoms... I knew how to respond to each and every question in a certain way to get that certain result that I wanted out of it. I knew the "right way" to behave around the psychologist before and after I took the MMPI-2.

>>8354961
I have two problems with the fields. Firstly the clause about mental illness needing to negatively impact your life. This to me is retarded since humans, as a social species, oftentimes shun others for being not like them. This is generally harmful to the persons life. But does this harm constitute an illness? Are the mental qualities that lead one to be very popular automatically discounted as illness? What a ridiculous metric. By this metric having red hair might well classify as an illness, or being a protestant in ~1600s France.
Second, the claim that people with mental illness have measurable deviations in their brains compared to the general population. The same could be said of republicans, or people who meditate, or plenty of other things that aren't at all indicative of improper functioning; this fact is then plainly insufficient to identify a mental illness.
Also as for the 'I was diagnosed with this and I've totally got it etc etc' line, are we to believe in astrology and horoscopes as well?
Anyhow yeah, basically I don't believe we have sufficiently accurate methods to delineate mental illness from mental health, and comparing people to the average is a poor measure for many reasons. Further, it seems very easy for humans to believe they or others are afflicted by conditions which simply don't exist. Curses, hypnotism, magic, demonic possession, etc. Can we be sure that this is not just another episode in our long history of this type of behavior?

>>8367862

>Curses, hypnotism, magic, demonic possession, etc. Can we be sure that this is not just another episode in our long history of this type of behavior?

The funny thing is that I remember my psychologist telling me, "the psychiatrists of today are like the alchemists of the Middle Ages. The alchemists believed that they could create gold from lead, which we now know is impossible. Psychiatrists believe in 'chemical imbalances'. There is no such thing as 'chemical imbalances'."

Similarly, my psychiatrist told me that for testing for personality disorders, there's the MMPI-2... and he said that the MMPI-2 "isn't very scientific." I think it's funny that he would say that the MMPI-2 isn't scientific, and yet this guy managed to diagnose me with ADHD and then prescribed me Adderall after a 15-minute-long conversation in which I could swear the guy was falling asleep.

>>8366179
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical, naked, etc.

>>8356399
You look like a spam bot.

>>8355121
It seems like you want something to be wrong with you so that it will show up on the test; thus, give you some form of validation.

You should stop worrying.

>>8369216

>It seems like you want something to be wrong with you so that it will show up on the test; thus, give you some form of validation.

No. What I want to know is whether or not I was right all along.

I've had this one idea in my head for nearly two decades. But I'm not entirely certain that my idea is logical. And that is why I decided to seek mental health care. I needed somebody to either confirm or deny that my logic is flawed, possibly as a result of mental illness. What I'm getting is a lot of people telling me that there's not wrong with me. Everybody else just tells me to take medication for "chemical" problems that might not even be real.

What I'm seeing now that everybody else seems to know as much as I do.

I am left to trust only in my own judgment.

My judgment informs me that this world is not a pleasant place for people like me. When a person is diagnosed with a "disorder", it's like they're having a big label stamped on their forehead for everybody to see that states "WEAK" or "LAZY" or "CRAZY" or "STUPID" or "EVIL". And so, people take advantage of this. They see a person who is unfit for this world. They see a person who is deserving of all the hate and mockery. I finally understand now. That's the impression that I get.

There is no hope for people like me.

>>8354964
Oh it's this guy again.

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>>8369903

>>8369972

Well now, that certainly explains everything that I've been thinking about these past two decades or so.

i used to be depressed, got prescribed esciloparotam which i used for about a year, got off it and 1 year later i feel better than ever

>>8370059

>i used to be depressed, got prescribed esciloparotam which i used for about a year, got off it and 1 year later i feel better than ever

Did you start feeling better when you were still taking it, or only after you stopped taking it?

And if the latter is the case, how long after you stopped taking it did you feel better?

>>8370064
i felt midly better after my first 5mg, then my therapist upped it to 10mg, and it was slightly better. after 6 months i was pretty much like i used to be, but the therapist said i shouldnt go off it yet, so i waited another 4 months and gradually reduced it. the first week after i stopped was a hell, though, but i feel pretty good now.

>>8370071
by "how i used to be" i mean not so depressed

Pro tip: Mental disorders aren't considered illnesses of the brain.

Glad to clear that up.

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>>8370089

>Pro tip: Mental disorders aren't considered illnesses of the brain.

Apparently there are those who would disagree with you.

Picture related. It's an image showing brain areas more active in controls than in schizophrenia patients during a working memory task during a functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging study. Two brain slices are shown. Areas in orange were more active in healthy controls than in medicated people with schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is considered a mental disorder.

>>8370110
Weell, the search for biomarkers for mental disorder has been going on for quite some time, but no one has ever found a marker that is either necessary or sufficient for the disorder. Let alone both. These findings is just another flavour of these kinds of findings.

However, it is possible that individuals with certain biological (as well as situational) traits are more vulnerable for developing a mental disorder. This can be explained through the diathesis-stress model. That's valuable information; it might help us uncover the general mechanisms through which a mental disorder develops from these vulnerabilities.

>>8367815
>Regardless, none of this felt all that scientific. When I was taking the MMPI-2 for example, I kept thinking to myself: "how is this scientific? What is stopping someone like me from quickly pulling out their cell phone to take pictures of each and every page of the MMPI-2 to post online so that other people can review the questions and memorize them, so that they know how to answer?"

Uhhh, do you know what science is? How does that have anything to do with what's scientific or not? You deliberately taking a test the way it's not made to be taken really doesn't change shit. That's just a pointless self-fulfilling prophecy.

Anyway if you did what you did with the MMPI-2 the scores would be inconsistent and would therefore be statistically non-valid or you would have a high score on the lie scale or there would be some other patterns in the data that suggest untruthfulness.

Also, why are you trying to cheat the tests and evaluations? No wonder everything apparently goes to shit for you then and you have a million diagnoses. Aren't you there to get help?

>>8370160

>Also, why are you trying to cheat the tests and evaluations? No wonder everything apparently goes to shit for you then and you have a million diagnoses. Aren't you there to get help?

You misunderstand. I wasn't trying to cheat the tests and evaluations. These last few years I've spent a lot of time reading about psychiatry, psychology, personality disorders, mental disorders, etc. I only heard about the MMPI-2 until fairly recently (about three months ago.) I considered looking up the MMPI-2 on the internet to see if it was available to review, but I didn't really bother.

When I was taking the MMPI-2, some of the questions were things like: "I believe that spirits communicate through me. True or False?" I'd see questions like that and quietly think to myself, "this seems like the sort of question that a person with schizotypal personality disorder and/or schizophrenia might answer 'True'. I don't want to get myself diagnosed with schizophrenia, do I? They'll just take away my Adderall and prescribe me antipsychotics. Regardless, I don't actually believe that spirits communicate through me... do I? Well, I sort of used to. During childhood. And part of my adolescence. But that was then and this is now. I'm 27 now. I don't believe in that sort of stuff anymore. Or do I? Just answer the damn question already! OK. False."

Other questions were things like: "Your friends often tell you that you have terrible fashion sense. True or False?" I thought to myself, "How am I supposed to answer a question like that? This question does not apply to me because I have no friends."

Another question might be like: "The world would be a better place if you ruled the world. True or False?" OK. That's the sort of question that would require a complicated answer. How much power would I have? Would I be elected? How agreeable are the people of that world? How many people would agree with me that abortions should be 100% legal in every country?"

Ugh, 4chan isn't letting me write too much in my posts. I can't complete my thoughts. Anyway...

>>8370160

>Uhhh, do you know what science is? How does that have anything to do with what's scientific or not?

I'm repeating something that my psychiatrist told me. When I inquired about testing for personality disorders about three months ago, he told me about the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory - 2. He told me that the MMPI-2 "isn't very scientific" (his exact words.) Which I think is a little weird considering that this is the same guy who diagnosed me with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder back in July 1, 2013 and prescribed me Adderall after talking to him for about fifteen minutes, and I could swear that the guy was falling asleep that entire time. He was yawning, nodding off, closing his eyes... at some point he just stopped talking and closed his eyes for about ten seconds while I was describing my symptoms. He would even repeat some of his questions and make me repeat myself several times. After all that I remember thinking to myself, "really? You're prescribing Adderall just like that? What the hell?"

>No wonder everything apparently goes to shit for you then and you have a million diagnoses. Aren't you there to get help?

OK. I've been diagnosed with four different disorders. Three of those disorders came from one psychologist. He diagnosed me with Major Depressive Disorder, Social Anxiety Disorder, and Generalized Anxiety Disorder all at once back in July of this year. My psychiatrist was the one who diagnosed me with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder over three years ago. The point of the matter is that I wanted to be tested for personality disorders because I was fairly certain that I had a personality disorder. I had never heard about the MMPI-2 until about three months ago. After taking the MMPI-2, I just thought to myself, "really? That's it?" The psychologist told me that I didn't have a personality disorder.

>>8370160

>Also, why are you trying to cheat the tests and evaluations?

The point that I'm trying to make is... I didn't try to cheat the tests and evaluations. What I was trying to say is: what is stopping somebody from cheating these tests and evaluations?

Let's take a person with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, for example. This person has the personality disorder, but neither they nor anybody else knows it yet. They haven't been officially diagnosed with it. This person wants to have himself tested for personality disorders to prove to himself and to everyone else that he doesn't have one. The guy could probably be considered to be highly intelligent, and has excellent memory. He's spent a lot of time reading about psychology, personality disorders, mental disorders, and whatnot. He knows the right way to answer to all of the questions. He's also a pathological liar. He's such a good liar that he's successfully lie to himself. He believes his own lies. He rationalizes his own actions. He believes himself that he's a good person, but deep down inside he knows that he really isn't. He wants to prove to himself and to the whole world that he's a good person. So goes on to get himself tested for personality disorders. Subconsciously, he knows exactly how to answer all of the questions, and exactly how to behave when he's around the psychologist. And he's going to do just that. Maybe he's doing subconsciously, or maybe he's doing it consciously. He gets told that he doesn't have any personality disorders. He passes. He got what he wanted.

This guy didn't cheat one of those polygraph machines... he did cheat a human polygraph, though.

>>8359341

>well, now you DO sound like you need abilify. those aren't theories, they're delusions. i would advice you not to overthink this shit. and don't take adderall

OK. So let's say that these are delusions. Who or what decides what is or isn't a "delusion"? What, exactly, distinguishes a "bizarre delusion" from a "non-bizarre delusion"? If the majority of the global human population believes that there is a God, then that must be the "general consensus". If the majority of people believe to have received at least one message from God at some point in their lives, who is to say that it is simply a "delusion"?

What of delusions that include aspects of the paranormal, supernatural... and/or conspiracy theories? Who or what decides that a person who claims to have communicated with "ghosts" is delusional? Or what about communicating with extraterrestrial beings?

Where does one draw the line between reality and fantasy? Who in the world has the authority to draw that line, and why should they have that authority?

Up until what point can a person no longer trust their own senses, their own perception of reality, their own logic, their own intelligence, their own judgment?

>>8370190
Look, you haven't understood how MMPI-2 works. Sure, there is a certain connection between the question and the answers. But the connection is complicated. For example, some questions are obvious, while some are subtle. If there is a big discrepancy between how you answered on obvious questions about, say, depression, and the subtle questions about depression, that seems to imply that you are being deceptive, defensive or confused.

Also, MMPI-2 works in an inductive statistical way as well, meaning simply that if you respond in a manner similar to people who are (say) depressive, then you could conclude that you have a certain depressive type of responding. This is a conclusion that you can make regardless of what the questions actually are, and a clinician will have to contain up-to-date knowledge of the empirical status of various types of profiles and types of resonding.

The MMPI-2 is a very sophisticated and rigorous psychometric test. The devil lies in the details.

>>8370213
It sucks that you felt so dismissed by your psychiatrist. I think it's quite understandable that you'd be frustrated when someone seems so disinterested in something that's so important to you!

The MMPI-2 doesn't assess personality disorders on its own, though. It has to be combined with a clinical interview. A SCID could be a good companion too I guess, however that one relies on how cooperative the patient is.

>>8370223
>What I was trying to say is: what is stopping somebody from cheating these tests and evaluations?

I think I'd say that some tests are harder to cheat on than others. However, that question is a bit odd. It's like saying "what's stopping someone from lying about their stomach issues to their doctor?"

>>8370223
Narcissists are a great problem in mental health. Most ego syntonic psychiatric problems are a head scratcher. If someone likes to be a narcissist and fails to see how it affects parts of their lives and their relationships, then it's really tough to help them. But there are interventions designed for that too, although I'm not knowledgeable in them.

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>>8354961
>that I should use my own will power to stop having depression.

REEEEEEEEE
the ignorance is disgusting.
Use this analogy: you wouldn't tell a diabetic they don't need insulin would you? Same thing, your brain has a chemical imbalance.

Fuck, I'm so mad.

>>8370568
>there are interventions designed for that too, although I'm not knowledgeable in them.
If you're not willing to put them in the ground, the only other effective "intervention" is severing ties. Narcissists exist only to poison everyone and everything they ever care about in pursuit of supply, essentially a constant inborn drug addiction. They are more mechanical phenomena than they are human beings.

>>8370986

>But there are interventions designed for that too, although I'm not knowledgeable in them.

I'm just curious. Are there really any interventions designed to dealing with narcissists who are perfectly fine with being narcissists and aren't even aware that they have a problem?

I'm curious about this because I've strongly suspected for years that my brother (who is 16 years older than me) qualifies as someone who has Narcissistic Personality Disorder. I've also long suspected that my brother might have other and/or co-morbid psychological conditions, such as: Antisocial Personality Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder, and/or Bipolar Disorder. I informed my psychologist about this and he told me that based on what I've told him about my brother, my brother sounds like he might have Antisocial Personality Disorder. So my brother might be a sociopath. But my psychologist can't officially make the diagnosis since he's never met my brother. My brother also seems to have just about everyone within our family wrapped around his finger, completely under his control to feed his narcissistic supply... including: our mother, my brother's wife, one of our cousins, and possibly everyone else in our family (both of my mother's and father's [my biological father, his stepfather] sides of the family.)

But then again, I've considered the possibility that I'm simply projecting my own insecurities onto my brother. If I suspect myself to have a personality disorder (such as Narcissistic Personality Disorder), then I might be projecting this insecurity onto my brother. I informed my psychologist about this but he told me that he hasn't noticed that about me. That I project my own insecurities onto others. But then again a part of me suspects that my psychologist is just playing along with whatever I say, because he's already diagnosed me with a personality disorder but he simply doesn't want to tell me just yet. Or maybe it's just my paranoia screwing with me again.

>>8354961
Do you live in the US? US Psychologists/psychiatrists are taught to shill pills a shit-ton more than you actually need and might more easily diagnose you with illnesses and disorders you don't have. You might want to be cautious in some other countries like the UK as well.

>>8371306

>Do you live in the US? US Psychologists/psychiatrists are taught to shill pills a shit-ton more than you actually need and might more easily diagnose you with illnesses and disorders you don't have. You might want to be cautious in some other countries like the UK as well.

Yes. I live in the US. But my psychologist and my psychiatrist work in two completely different practices, in two completely different offices, in two completely different buildings, in two completely different cities. I first met my psychiatrist in July 1, 2013. I first met my psychologist three years later, in July of 2016 (this year, obviously.)

My psychologist told me that he doesn't like psychiatrists. He doesn't like having to deal with them.

He tells me that there's no such thing as "chemical imbalances". He tells me that the psychiatrists of today are like the alchemists of the Middle Ages. He tells me that what I need is six months of psychotherapy to treat the three disorders that he diagnosed me with: Major Depressive Disorder, Generalized Anxiety Disorder, and Social Anxiety Disorder. He tells me that I should meet with one of his therapists, once a week, during those six months. It will cost me $100 per week. So it will be about $2,400 for the psychotherapy treatment in total. This was the guy who administered the MMPI-2 on me (along with a bunch of other written exams.)

Meanwhile, my psychiatrist told me that for testing for personality disorders, there was the MMPI-2... which, according to him, "isn't very scientific."

So, uh, yeah. I've already told this story in this thread.

>>8371324
>He tells me that there's no such thing as "chemical imbalances".
He's correct. It's obviously false, or more likely, disingenuous.

>>8371331

Regardless. My psychiatrist is prescribing me Adderall. And the Adderall has, by far, proven to be more effective than any other psychiatric medication that I've taken and any psychotherapy that I've received up until this point in my life.

Shit. I went from weighing nearly 300 pounds down to around 160 pounds in about nine months last year. Before I started taking Adderall, I would spend days, weeks, or even months locked up in my room playing video games and browsing the internet. Nowadays I'm actually making an effort to go outside and talk to people. I'm actually noticing that women are paying a lot more attention to me now. Maybe this is just a symptom of my mental disorder. Maybe it's what they call "erotomania". Maybe I really do have schizophrenia. Or maybe it's because of the Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Shit, man, it could even be because of the Major Depressive Disorder. I mean, Major Depressive Disorder is considered a mental disorder just like schizophrenia. And people with Major Depressive Disorder can apparently experience something called "psychotic depression". How fucked up is that? Or maybe all of this is because of "amphetamine psychosis". I still feel miserable, but, shit, all of this has gotta count for something right?

Shit, man, I don't even know what the fuck I'm typing right now. I'm so drunk right now. I'm not aware about how people behave when they've taken 60 mg of amphetamine, 300 mg of caffeine, and, uh... shit... how much alcohol have I consumed? Shit, man, that's like three cans of mango-flavored malt liquor right there. I forgot how to calculate that shit.

>>8371324
If he's suggesting therapy (which in some cases are preferable to medication), the important bit is what kind of therapy he's suggesting. All therapy isn't suited to help with all kinds of psychological issues. I'd recommend doing some research about the method of therapy before signing up for it, as 2,400 dollaridoos is a hefty sum in your predicament. Also, how many sessions are there per week?

Chemical imbalances is no meme. People with depression, alzheimer's and other problems have been shown to have varying amounts of transmitters as opposed to healthier people. It's true that there's too much administering of medication when therapy might be preferable in the psychological practices, but therapy alone can't cure everything. Sometimes you need medication. What's difficult is to know when to administer what drug, and oftentimes practicers tend to rely too much on prescribing drugs because it's easier and because there's a lot of pressure from the medical industry to do so.

>>8371350
God, fucking stop stop stop stop. Just stop. Your signal to noise ratio is terrible and you're constantly running in circles because you're entering a reflective point in your life and trying to dig through, evaluate, and understand a massive amount of loose stuff.

Adderall made you lose weight because it's an appetite suppressant, increases thermogenesis, and has mood altering properties that make you more likely to be active. Again, anon, again, start thinking mechanically. I stopped responding to you because you don't seem to really be willing to think in terms of cause and effect. You say all these things, like:
>>8360853
and yet there's always a curious absence of the "why". You act as though you genuinely don't know why you continue to suffer repeating patterns of outcomes. If that's true, then start thinking about it. Be honest with yourself.

No one can fix you. No drug can reconcile your problems. No amount of having technical terms for disorders that might or might not apply and might or might not meaningfully map to an underlying neurological basis, ascribed to you, is going to give you peace, clarity, or functionality. You must change you. It must be you. I'm not sure what you're really searching for, why, nor if there's really anything to be found. But what's clear is you've fallen into a pattern of behavior where you don't seem to accept much personal agency nor responsibility. Change that.

>>8354964
Therapy, however is a "social" science.
Human beings cannot be scientifically analyzed like a physical object could.
As such, it isn't real, hard science per se. It is an attempt to understamd and assist human beings social side.

Psychiatry is bad, I agree. Drugs will fuck you up.

>>8371363

>Adderall made you lose weight because it's an appetite suppressant, increases thermogenesis, and has mood altering properties that make you more likely to be active.

I understand that. I understand that it's purely superficial. I enjoy the looks that I receive from women now. Maybe it's all in my head. Maybe I'm imagining this whole thing. It's all so materialistic, but I enjoy it somewhat. I'm still miserable, but I'm enjoying this particular part of my life. I'm afraid to quit Adderall cold turkey because I'm afraid of losing this feeling. It feels fucking great, but at the same time I feel empty. It's difficult to describe.

>I'm not sure what you're really searching for, why, nor if there's really anything to be found.

I'm not sure what the fuck I'm looking for, either. Maybe it's the inner child in me trying to desperately look for the meaning of life. Maybe it's the angsty teenager in me trying to desperately look for evidence of the "soul" - of an "afterlife" - of a "God".

I find that my mind is arguing against itself, non-stop. I'll tell myself: "there is no such thing as God. How can people believe in such nonsense?" But then another part of me will respond: "who the fuck am I to tell people what is or isn't nonsense? I'm just a fucking loser. I'm a 27-year-old, unemployed, friendless, virgin, high school drop-out. I don't know anything about the world. Why does my opinion matter than anybody else's? The majority of the global human population believes in a 'God'. I'm in the minority. Why the fuck does the 'Big Bang Theory', or the 'Big Crunch', or 'Big Bounce', or 'Multiverse' theories have anymore hold in the scientific community than the 'God Did It Theory'?"

>>8371393

Not him, but you're not even responding to the points that anon you were replying to was bringing up.

If you want to stop being such a fuck up, you literally have to stop being so uselessly cerebral about your life and just start doing stuff.

You have to sack up, sign up for a class and just do it. Or just get a job and fucking do it. The "why" is unimportant. It will not help you. It's just masturbation.

Actions are the only thing that matter. You have to DO things to be something.

>>8371363

>I'm not sure what you're really searching for, why, nor if there's really anything to be found.

My mind keeps going back to that mentality that I had as a child. It keeps going back to all of those weird, paranormal, supernatural, conspiracy theory -type beliefs.

I keep going back to all of those things I've read all of these years. All of those things about our reality being a "materialistic reality" and it being a "false reality" created by a "false god" or "demiurge". That this is all part of some sort of "simulated reality". That all of these things that we constantly obsess about are meaningless, and they are there to keep us trapped in this false reality.

I'm trying to figure out how logical all of this is. I'm trying to figure out how "logical" I really am.

>>8371363

>and yet there's always a curious absence of the "why". You act as though you genuinely don't know why you continue to suffer repeating patterns of outcomes. If that's true, then start thinking about it.

As I've already stated in an earlier post of mine here:

>>8364681

My mind just doesn't stop. It's arguing against itself all the time. I'll add more to how my mind argues against itself:

> Do I really need therapy? Do I really need any medication? Maybe it's all a waste of time and money. Maybe my mother is right when she tells me "oh, you have depression? Then why don't you simply stop being depressed? Will yourself out of your depression!" The psychologist told me that my mother doesn't give a fuck about me. Maybe he's right. Or maybe it's all pseudoscience. Maybe the Scientologists are right when they say that psychiatry kills and that it's all bullshit. Maybe psychology is bullshit too. Where's all the empirical evidence? Where's the scientific rigor? It all seems purely anecdotal. What am I thinking? I must really be crazy for even considering that the Scientologists are right. Maybe it's the mental illness trying to convince me that I'm not crazy, it's everybody else that's crazy! But I'm not mentally ill, am I? But Major Depressive Disorder is considered a mental illness, isn't it? But Major Depressive Disorder shouldn't be making me think that the whole world is crazy, it should be making me think that I'm deeply flawed! But I do think that way, don't I? I do think that I'm deeply flawed? How could I not think that of myself? Everyone's been telling me for years that there's something seriously wrong with me. That I need to seek professional help. Everyone in my family has told me this. My classmates at school would tell me this. My teachers would tell me. Everyone told me this. When the whole world is telling me this, what the hell am I supposed to think? And now that I've actually seeked professional help, nobody cares!

>>8371416

Additionally:

>Now people are telling me that I'm not "crazy" after all! That the word "crazy" is just a word that people throw around for fun! What was I to think all these years? I'm a 27-year-old unemployed high school drop-out with no friends. I've essentially never had a job. I haven't had friends since elementary school. All my cousins seem to be well-adjusted by comparison. They've all had fairly stable jobs. They all have friends. They all have girlfriends. Some of them have even had kids. Some of those cousins are even younger than me! So what the hell is wrong with me? What am I to think? Maybe my family has been shaming and guilt-tripping me all these years to regulate their own self-esteem. Maybe that's why I feel so screwed up. Maybe I really do have a dysfunctional family. Everybody thinks that of their families. No, but I really do think that my family is a lot more screwed up than others. Maybe I just imagined the whole thing. But how could I have imagined all of that? The psychologist already told me that I'm not schizophrenic. Maybe I'm not smart enough to figure this out all on my own. But that psychologist already tested my IQ and told me that I have an above average IQ! He told me that I could have scored higher if I had finished high school and gone to college! According to some IQ scales, if I had scored 5 points higher, I would be considered a genius! Maybe the psychologist only told me that I have a high IQ to feed my ego. Maybe I really do have Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Maybe it's Antisocial Personality Disorder. No! Asperger's Syndrome! No. Schizophrenia. Maybe I need a second opinion. I need to get tested some more. I need to see a geneticist. I need to see another neurologist. I need more scans. MRI. FMRI. PET. No. Stop. You've already wasted way too much time and money with all of this. Just stop. You've been going on with this for years. Move on with your life already. No! I can't move on with my life.

>>8371393
>It's difficult to describe.
You don't have to. I've done it myself, and know quite well. Harvest what you will from it, but don't forget there's another way to live, and there's another you to live as. Eventually, you will be forced to return and confront this reality. Probably after you get sick of the empty pleasure.

>I'm not sure what the fuck I'm looking for, either.
I think you need some philosophy. It's like I told you, you need to build and iterate on a framework of knowledge until you've traced out the logical boundaries the machinery of your mind is capable of within a given topic. For example, what do you mean when you say "God"? It can mean many things.

I've never formally studied any philosophical texts, but I've indirectly reconstructed a lot of it on my own over the years and lightly referenced other materials. I recommend Descartes' meditations. As far as I'm concerned, the notion that what lies of the core of every logical framework, every chain of reasoning, is the senses and the mind, is interesting and important. That they're axiomatic self referential truths. They cannot be proven without using themselves.

I also recommend watching Ghost in the Shell, Serial Experiments Lain, and Texhnolyze. A lot of people would laugh at this, but when I was all fucked up I really drowned myself in these things, and they helped me a lot. If I didn't find something I felt like I could relate to, and could chip away at (new but familiar), I probably wouldn't have gotten very far and likely eventually killed myself. Ergo Proxy is good as well.

>Why does my opinion matter than anybody else's?
Because you're you. They're them. Ultimately there is only one person you have to live with, and one person you can know.
[...]

>>8371420

Finally:

>I fuck up everything that I do. Every year I try to do things differently and it always goes to shit. Every year I try to change. Every year I try to become a better person. There's something seriously wrong with me. How can they not see it? They have to see it! It's so fucking obvious! They have to know! They just have to! How could they not!? They're just playing along! They know what it is. They just don't want to tell me just yet. They want to ease me into it. They want me to figure it out myself. What the fuck does everyone want from me!? I did everything they told me to do, and they don't even fucking care! My God, what the fuck is wrong with me!? Why won't anybody just fucking tell me already!?

>>8371423
[continued]
>The majority of the global human population believes in a 'God'
And few of them can meaningfully define what the word refers to. Also, you need to recognize tribalism for what it is and understand what drives human behavior both in groups, and as individuals. Stripping away this myopia puts things into perspective.

Personally I bear no real real resentment to the idea of a creator. Probably because I was raised in a secular way that emphasized neither religious nor scientific dogma, and I'm willing to forgive a lot of people's asinine behavior that's rooted in creationist thought, because it's not actually novel in the bigger picture. It's part of a greater complex of things about people that are disgusting and obnoxious.

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>>8359272
>This nurse practitioner guy would even ask me questions like "do you believe to be receiving messages from people on your computer?" I was a bit confused by this question, and I responded with something like, "well, uh, yeah... since I play a lot of video games over the internet, I do communicate with people through these games with text messages and whatnot." This nurse practitioner then proceeded to put down on my MedRec that I believed my computer to have been "hacked" and that "there didn't seem to be any reasoning behind his logic." He also put symptoms of schizophrenia on my MedRec like: "illogical thinking" - "magical thinking" - "auditory hallucinations" - "flat affect" - "odd, peculiar, guarded".

Nigga are you serious?? Get a new doctor NOW.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment

>>8371363

>and yet there's always a curious absence of the "why". You act as though you genuinely don't know why you continue to suffer repeating patterns of outcomes. If that's true, then start thinking about it. Be honest with yourself.

I'm fairly certain that I know why I am the way that I am today. I am not 100% convinced that I have Narcissistic Personality Disorder, or any other illness. I simply want to be 100% certain that my suspicions are either: correct or incorrect. Unfortunately, I find that there is no easy way of doing this without going around asking people various questions and keeping myself constantly vigilant. It seems that I've been this way for the past 16 years or so, since I was possibly 12 years old or younger. I find myself constantly recalling, nit-picking, psychoanalyzing, and picking apart every single little detail of every single conversation I've ever had right down to: people's facial expressions, gestures, tone of voice, the environment around us during that particular day, etc. I'm still processing conversations that I've had with people over a decade ago. I'm even still analyzing conversations that I've had with people over the internet, people that I've never met face-to-face (analyzing their words, obviously not their faces.)

I'm not going to claim to have eidetic memory, but I seem to have excellent long-term memory when it comes to details regarding my life. I can sometimes read an entire book and forget most of what I read within minutes, but I can remember things that I experienced over two decades ago in incredible detail.

I can recall just about everything that I've been told, that I've been taught, that has molded my moral compass, my current belief system, my political affiliation, my tastes in music, films, television shows, video games, etc. Most of it was due to a strong influence from my older brother (who as I stated earlier in this thread, is 16 years older than me.)

shitty retarded parents are always going to turn out garbage, with perhaps the 1 out of 100 self liberated individual. shitty parents who turn to psychologists and meds are just dooming their kids to a life of hell. it's a vicious system that most don't belong in yet can't escape.

>>8371426

>Nigga are you serious?? Get a new doctor NOW.

That "doctor" that I saw was a nurse practitioner. He was within the same practice as my psychiatrist. There are several providers (probably around 20 different providers, including: psychiatrists, therapists, and nurse practitioners) within that practice.

Regardless, that nurse practitioner (and one other nurse practitioner) no longer want to see or speak to me anymore. Apparently my behavior has made them "uncomfortable". So now I'm only allowed to see my psychiatrist.

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>>8362351
>He first told me, "it's all in your head." A few seconds later he added, "it's because you're weak. People sense that you're weak."

Sounds like your brother has no perspective.

It's much better to be weak than to be powerful and misuse it.

I don't think you are weak though. You write very well.

You will find your niche in life. It sometimes take patience, ingenuity, amazing amounts of repetitive "grinding" away, having a creative environment, and support from friends to unlock what will allow you to move forward.

Have you ever had an invincible attitude? When you suddenly feel as if you are on top of your game and operating at your highest potential? It is adopting the attitude itself that helps to facilitate things changing in the physical realm.

Have you ever seen Death Note? Light is the archetype of aggressive intellectual change. Even if you don't have physical strength or held back by your surroundings, you can still make a solid game plan. Watch it on Kiss Anime if you have any interest.

>>8371424
>>8371438
Sorry, I'm not really in a state where I can (or am willing to) engage with or read all of this. I don't feel like reverse engineering your psyche, and you also aren't very responsive to any of the actual suggestions I'll be apt to give you. You don't seem to care for the metacognitive, mechanistic approach, so there's not much I can say. Because any vague heuristic I could give you to find the means to unravel yourself relies on these systems, in some capacity, at their core.

Anyway. My life has been miserable and, perhaps fortunately, I was psychologically torn down repeatedly, by force, and was forced to handle it and rebuild to continue functioning. I had to reconcile things before I was even out of my teens, because there was no way to continue otherwise. I also got very lucky and found various influences that I learned a lot from despite my crippled and scrambled mental state. It was that or kill myself, because there was no capacity for even empty comfort.

Sorry man, you're going to have to sort it out yourself. Hope you figure it out. Ditch the psychiatric bullshit though, you're just hamstringing yourself and running away from self reliance.

>>8371465
Oh. Although, I recommend you listen to some Modest Mouse, Death Cab for Cutie, and Grimes.

Modest Mouse for insight and extrapolation. Death Cab for Cutie for introspection, recollection, and indulgence in self pity / acknowledgement of the human condition. Grimes for relaxation and mental stimulation.

>>8356520
You do understand the sheer power behind placebo, right?

>>8362351
Your "brother" was a natural pitiful whore.

>I can never be like my brother.
Thanks god if you'll never be this shit.

I hope you'll stop any contacts with shit people like him and make stronger contacts with smart and kind people who can actually make you better and not worse. Good luck.

>>8371385
>Therapy, however is a "social" science.

Not really, it's an application of science to real world problems. It's an art in the way that medicine or engineering is an art. Of course, the boundaries are fuzzy like everything else.

>>8371298
>I'm just curious. Are there really any interventions designed to dealing with narcissists who are perfectly fine with being narcissists and aren't even aware that they have a problem?

Unfortunately, I don't know how it's done. Most likely it's a long-winded psychodynamic intervention, like mentalization based therapy or something.

The thing is, narcissists might not see that they have a problem. So they generally don't seek help. We can't force them to get help, especially if they are fine but destroying everything around them. But if narcissists consult psychotherapy, it's because of something else. For example substance abuse or whatever. Sometimes they might even want some tricks on how to better exploit people! The therapist will probably then try to make the patient realize that the substance abuse might be rooted in the way the patient relates to other people, or might invite the patient to reflect on why the patient wants to exploit others. But surely it's a hard nut to crack.

Sorry to hear about your brother, man. Stay strong and be honest and brave in therapy.

>ITT: People are actually arguing if ADHD, Depression, Social Anxiety and shizophrenia is real

I have ADHD, Depression and Social Anxiety. It does influence my life in a negative way and I am (a lot) different from other people. I know another person who also has ADHD and Depression. Her symptoms are very similar to mine. She agrees with me on all respects when I talk to her about it .

I do take medication (weed) and it does help. It's not a placebo effect and I'm also not paying the pharmas.

>>8354961
>What do you guys think about psychiatry, psychology, and other mental health care-related fields?
I think Psych can be a good field if you are interested in the human mind and want to help people like me.
I think other health care-related fields can be good if you are interested in the human body and want to help people in need

>>8366179
>Because psychiatry is garbage that produce sub-optimal outcomes
There are definitive sciences like Maths and less definitive sciences like Biology/Physics/Chemistry. And then there's also Psych, which involves the human mind. We are nowhere close to fully understanding how the brain works, thus making it impossible for Psychs to give an optimal solution. All they can do is act on experience and statistics. And even if we assume to understand the brain fully, there's a good chance that some people can never be helped unless they undergo brain surgery.

>>8371583
>ITT: People are actually arguing if ADHD, Depression, Social Anxiety and shizophrenia is real
They aren't. You're just unwilling to handle nuance because your disorders, and their supposed basis, are part of your identity.

Don't try to bullshit me either. I know damn well how it goes.

>>8371587
>You're just unwilling to handle nuance because your disorders, and their supposed basis
What does that even mean?

>>8371589
Your misframing of the thread's contents being due to a logical, or more likely, embedded emotional bias.

>>8371599
I'm not feeling emotional right now.
Logic can't be biased

>>8371602
-You don't have to feel emotional to be biased by an underlying emotional avoidance
-Logic can be biased, reason can be biased

>>8371607
>-Logic can be biased, reason can be biased
Reasoning can or can not be logical. But logic doesn't derive from it. Logic can be used to make reason. But most people don't use logic to make reason. I do.

Just consider the following: How can depression, for example, not be a disorder if people are attempting suicide because of it? If life eridcates itself, I would definitely consider it a disorder, for it should be a lifes goal to reproduce/survive rather than kill itself off. That's atleast how it goes for humans.

>>8371613
Depression is a cluster of states we've delineated within a grand spectrum of every state the machinery of the human brain can occupy.

"Disorder" in and of itself is a relatively worthless classification, and inherently a relative one (which is where the problems with this logical framework begin). So fine, you feel "it ain't workin' right", let's move beyond this and provide a realistic evaluation of why. But wait... we don't do this. Why? Because of human hierarchical, tribal, and group social dynamics. And we know this, yet we set up systems such that not only are we perpetually slave to such primal nonsense, but people are opened up to massive systematic exploitation.

Look at this thread. This isn't an exchange of ideas, it's the two tribes fighting each other because they've become polarized by local feedback loops. It's inane, and it's irrational. Neither tribe is willing to see the bigger picture, though in the case of the anti-psychiatry crowd, this is almost inherently not the case (it can't be). Psychiatry suffers from the same problems.

Short version, people aren't arguing that "disorders" "aren't real". They;re arguing about the underlying nature ascribed to them, which is almost universally disingenuous horseshit.

>>8371623
So essentially what you said is this is a Atheism vs Religion kind of thread and we are getting nowhere?

>>8371632
Kind of. More or less.

People come to these threads to fight.

>>8371638
Yes fighting sure is a primal instinct of human beings. I myself was simply interested in OPs story. Anyway I gotta go study for biology

>>8371623
It's actually depressing to realize that arguing with people won't ever make a difference because every person I talk to seems to have a fixed state which they can't/don't want to escape from.

Isn't that a funny parodox?

>>8369972
I haven't cried that hard since my father died, it's true, it's all true.


I didn't ask to be born

Jesus Christmas have mercy on me

>>8354961
that's what i call an agressive pharmaceutic marketing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0ZKH2PGA8g

>>8371465

>Sorry, I'm not really in a state where I can (or am willing to) engage with or read all of this. I don't feel like reverse engineering your psyche, and you also aren't very responsive to any of the actual suggestions I'll be apt to give you. You don't seem to care for the metacognitive, mechanistic approach, so there's not much I can say. Because any vague heuristic I could give you to find the means to unravel yourself relies on these systems, in some capacity, at their core.

I think a part of me can kind of understand what you're trying to tell me here. But as I've described in my previous posts within this thread, my mind simply cannot stop arguing against itself. I'm finding it very difficult to pick something to do, grab hold, and run with it. Maybe it's the ADHD or whatever, shit, I don't know.

Maybe it's the fear. These past few months I've felt some of the most intense fear that I've ever felt in my life. I feel like any day now something is about to happen. Maybe it's a side-effect of the Adderall. Maybe it's a symptom of the Major Depressive Disorder. I don't know. But I can feel a change happening in me, and I can't tell if that change is for the best or for the worst.

A few weeks ago I had the most unusual phone conversation with my psychiatrist. The things that he was telling me just completely blew my mind away. It completely contradicts everything that I've experienced. I've started questioning everything that I see and hear.

I tried telling my psychologist about this back in July of this year, that maybe I imagined this whole thing, possibly as a symptom of schizophrenia. My psychologist seemed adamant in trying to convince me that I definitely do not have schizophrenia. He would just cut me off and repeatedly say "no, no, no" over and over again, and shake his head. He'd tell me, "you definitely didn't imagine it." But now this guy is just ignoring my e-mails. He even told me that he would stop responding. And he did.

>>8371895
>my mind simply cannot stop arguing against itself.
Find the means. If it cannot be found, create it. Or let it continue and use it, whatever you want.

>But I can feel a change happening in me, and I can't tell if that change is for the best or for the worst.
You're at a transitional part in your life where you simply cannot continue as you presently are. I have things like what you're describing happen occasionally as well, but it's very rapid and I don't feel like going into it. What I will say is that some part of you knows something is very wrong, and things are moving into place inside. Maybe you should stop fighting it.

The rest is too vague to really offer any commentary on. If you're taking too much Adderall for too long though, yes, you can start hallucinating and or generating false memories at a greater rate. Refer to my post here:
>>8369074

>>8371921

>Find the means. If it cannot be found, create it.

I'm trying to. I really am. I'm scrambling desperately to organize all of my thoughts, trying to form a single coherent plan. But it seems to be a very slow process. And it's making me impatient. I'm not sure how much longer this will last. A week, a month, two months, three... I'm not sure how much more of this I can take. And I'm scared shitless.

Back in September of last year, my brother kicked me out of my apartment. My own apartment. This guy has been using my name and social security number for the taxes for his legally and morally questionable business for about a half a decade. He's been using me to help with his business for years. He's been using my name and social security number to explain how he's paying for a lot of the things that he's paying for: his rent, his bills, his business' expenses... and he's still doing it right now. And he's got our entire family wrapped around his finger, feeding into his narcissistic supply. He's manipulating everybody. He's successfully gotten the entire family turned against me. Our mother defends everything that he does and says. Hell, even my father (who is my biological father, but his stepfather) defends the guy... even though my father has repeatedly warned me about how "crazy" and "dangerous" my brother can be. But he still insists on defending the guy. And everybody on my father's side of the family defends him too.

>Or let it continue and use it, whatever you want.

I'm not sure I know what I want out of my life anymore. Ten years ago when I dropped out of high school, I had so many ideas running through my mind about what I planned to do with my future. I had so much hope, so many ambitions... but it's all gone to shit. I feel that too much time has passed. I have no experience, no references, no connections, nothing. I feel like it's too late for me to start now.

>>8371921

I'm curious... for how long were you taking Adderall? And for how long were you taking Vyvanse?

When you first started taking Adderall, did you start off at 40 mg or 60 mg, or did you start with a low dosage (like 5 mg)?

For example, I first started taking Adderall back in January of 2015. On the first week I started with a low dosage (5 mg). Second week I started with 10 mg. Third week was 15 mg. Fourth was 20 mg. Fifth, 25 mg. Sixth, 30. 7th week, 35 mg. I think that by the 8th week... sometime in late February or early March of that year I was already taking 40 mg. I stuck around 40 mg up until May or June later that same year. I was taking 60 mg daily by around July or August.

As far as I can tell, I have yet to experience "amphetamine psychosis". But I'm finding it incredibly difficult to tell. I have yet to experience anything like what you described in your post >>8369074

But again, it's very difficult to know whether or not I'm really experiencing anything like that.

At which point did you begin to realize that there might be something wrong? Did people start telling you that you were remembering things inaccurately, or did you figure it out yourself? If people started telling you that your memories were wrong, how were you so certain that you could trust those people?

I've noticed, for example, that my brother tends to use a lot of "narcissistic" tactics, things like: "gaslighting", "microaggressions", "backhanded compliments", etc. He would exploit people's insecurities regarding their own memories, intelligence, physique, etc. I've noticed that a lot of members within my family use these sorts of tactics as well, possibly suggesting that these are learned behaviors that get picked up over the years, passed down from the older generations to the younger generations within dysfunctional and narcissistic families.

I've noticed that it's not only my family members that pull shit like this, but people at school and in the workplace as well.

>>8354961
The problem isn't the field of Psychology or Psychiatry, it's the limitations of the DSM.

The diagnostic manual forces them to use these overly-specific diagnosis.
So when you've been diagnosed with these four disparate conditions:
In reality your health care professionals probably know that the underlying condition is a singular problem but are required by the regulatory standards to diagnose your condition in this seemingly over-complex way.

Anxiety and depression are linked and feed off each other, and when you're caught in the grasp of either it makes sense to self-medicate and to have attention deficits because most of the time you're in social scenarios, like class or work, you're wondering about when you can be alone by yourself just as you want to be.

A lot of anti-depressant medications counterract with many things. If you smoke weed or do something even as innocuous as drink beer or eat certain fruits like grapefruit, the whole chemistry of the medication gets fucked up.

The best you can do is work with your health care professional as an active participant and not a 'patient'. You're not a patient. You're a client. You're entitled to the results you want. Understand the relation between the diagnosed traits of your condition (think of them that way and not as individual conditions because it will only make you feel worse by inflating the problem). Understand how your medication works for you (because drugs affect everyone differently) and work toward something more feasible for yourself. It's not all in your head, it's in your BODY. The way you feel is related to your heatlh. Ween yourself off the hard drugs and move slowly towards a more refined medication profile and stop relying on family and friends for diagnosis support. They're not there for that.
You are not a spectator, you are a participant. Switch health care providers until you find one that understands that!

>>8372370

>The best you can do is work with your health care professional as an active participant and not a 'patient'. You're not a patient. You're a client. You're entitled to the results you want.

This is what I've been trying to do. But pretty much all of my health care professionals disregard just about everything that I ask and say. They repeatedly shoot down the things that I say, ignore the questions that I ask, talk over me, in one case they even told me: "OK. Close that mouth" while I was describing my symptoms. They often forget to give me things that I ask for (e.g. referrals to specialists), or they forget to sign my prescriptions so that I end up returning to their office to have them corrected (only to have my doctor writing a completely different prescription than the one that they wrote for me previously.)

For years, my mother and/or brother would insist on walking into the room with me to speak to the doctor because apparently I "don't know how to speak to doctors". Only to have my family members exaggerate or fabricate things about me (e.g. my brother telling one of my psychiatrists that I kept insisting on taking the Adderall prescribed by a different psychiatrist and that my brother kept having to tell me not to take it, even though I was the one who initially said that I wanted to wait before taking Adderall because I was concerned about its side-effects.) This other psychiatrist would just completely ignore everything that I'd say and ask. He never really gave me any helpful advice. He told me that if therapists were too expensive for me, that I could go find "free therapists" at UCLA (I actually did end up going to UCLA to look for "free therapists" only to have them make me wait in their Emergency Room for over four hours, then telling me that they didn't have free therapists and that they would give me a list of where I could find therapists elsewhere. I never got that list. I was later mailed two bills from UCLA: one $212 and ~$100.)

There are facets of psychology I'd consider scientific, where it delves more into psychopharmacology, evolutionary biology and neurology. It's more of a science than sociology or philosophy but less of a science than any hard science.
Psychiatry is more of a science because it requires an abundance of knowledge in pharmacology and integration of traditional medicine.
Psychotherapy is useless. Psychopharmacological therapy can be invaluable to those afflicted with geneuine psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia or genuine bipolar 1.
ADHD is real, believe it or not. Just grossly over diagnosed, I'd say 1/100 person diagnosed with it has next to nothing wrong with them.
The problem with psychologists is theyre quick to label every fucking personal quirk as a cognitive pathology. This is coming from a predoctoral Psy.D student, I know this field is largely a farce but hey. Some of the shit I've seen kids write their dissertations, that pass committee and peer review are fucking astoundingly retarded.
No joke, a Ph.D I know wrote his dissertation on something regarding how people Schizotypal PD tend to dream of plates, like paper plates.

Psychology is glorified humanities degree no wonder there are so many misdiagnoses. On the other hand psychiatry could be considered science in same sense as medicine. In my country at least you need medicine degree before you can specialize in psychiatry.

Mental illness does in fact exist. Some schizophrenics for e.g have visible decrease in gray matter, same is true for some other.

>>8370110
>It's an image showing brain areas more active in controls than in schizophrenia patients during a working memory task during a functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging study.
You can find these differences with any subset of the population vs the norm. Do they really tell us anything?

>>8371613
>I would definitely consider it a disorder, for it should be a lifes goal to reproduce/survive rather than kill itself off
Actually if you consider the case where one feels their relatives will have a greater reproductive success in your absence, and it's nearly certain you will fail to reproduce, it's quite logical from an evolutionary PoV to kill yourself.

>>8371966
Anon you need to find someone (or maybe multiple people) whose mind works the way you want yours to work, and spend time with them. Learn to copy them. Not just their visible actions, but their trains of thought; understand their emotions and what drives them, and how that relates to their external behavior. Emulate how they feel and look at the world, and your behavior should converge to theirs over time via neuroplasticity.

My guess is you picked up some bad mental habits from the people in your life, probably your family, and haven't gotten close enough to other people for you to replace them with better habits.

>>8373619
>Schizotypal PD tend to dream of plates, like paper plates.
if he has a body of data who are you this say this claim is retarded? I get your point but it's not exactly the most far out shit a psychologist has claimed.

>ask a bunch of autistic misfut subnormals for their opinions on mental health treatment
Great idea

>>8373921

Well, what else is this board for? This is a science & math board, after all. Of course, I realize that you guys seem to have different opinions about what is or isn't "science".

Which is why I decided to make this thread about not only psychiatry and psychology, but other similar fields related to mental health care (such as neurology.)

File: images.jpg (8KB, 215x234px) Image search: [Google]

8KB, 215x234px

To >>8371966 and the others in this thread
Check this out: http://sfhelp.org/cycle.htm and tell me what you think.

Here's my take: mainstream psychiatry is mostly garbage, because its understanding of the mind is "outside-in", in other words they spot symptoms that make you dysfunctional (reduce your quality of life), they try treatments; if the treatment is effective, problem "solved", if not, they try another treatment. The problem is that even if it "solves" your problem (anxiety, depression etc), it just removes the symptoms, not the causes. That's because they only understand it from the outside-in. They fix the brain chemistry, but the brain chemistry only reflects your thoughts and feelings; saying that disorders are caused by "chemical imbalances" is dumb because the disorder and the chemical imbalance are the same thing; they are manifestations of each other, they don't cause each other. If you chemically "fix" your anxiety, you remove anxious thoughts, but you don't remove the cause of the anxiety.

Good psychology must have an inside-out understanding of the mind, where you fix the root causes of the problem, instead of the symptoms. This means 100% talk therapy, again because drugs can only target symptoms. Proof: when you stop taking the drugs, the symptoms come back. The only reason drugs exist is because talk therapy isn't good enough (most practicians are shit, and we don't have a definite model of how the mind works, and how trauma works, and how to heal it).

Internal family systems (the link above) is a model of the mind from the inside-out. I saw several psychologists and got nothing out of it, but IFS helped me with depression, GAD & social anxiety. Not shilling, the website is free, so do what you want with it. Hope it helps senpai.

>>8375928
Wrong link, this is the one: http://sfhelp.org/senpai/cycle.htm

>>8375939
>http://sfhelp.org/senpai/cycle.htm
and replace sen pai with you-know-what. Sorry I'm new here, still learning. Saged for shame.

I am autistic and schizophrenic. My whole life has been utter shit even though I am upper middle class. I have been to a mental institution 6 times (one for a 4 months stay) and I don't think I'm capable of doing anything important and contributing to life. What can I do to help myself before I end my life? Don't say therapy, that shit doesn't work. Fuck those money grabbing shit bags they need to be fucking tortured to death. Fucking cunts.

>>8375950

>Don't say therapy, that shit doesn't work. Fuck those money grabbing shit bags they need to be fucking tortured to death. Fucking cunts.

You don't like therapists? What do you have against them?

On the one hand I've found that therapists and psychologists are overall much nicer, patient, and understanding than psychiatrists and other doctors.

On the other hand I feel that only Adderall (prescribed by one of my psychiatrists) has been truly helpful, way above everything else (including psychotherapy, antidepressants, anti-anxiety medication, etc.)

I don't know what Adderall might do to someone like you since you're schizophrenic, and I don't know how bad your schizophrenia could be, so Adderall could do more harm than good.

Anyway, I'll be checking out the links that have been posted in this thread, in these posts:

>>8375928
>>8356399

Maybe you should too.

>>8373853

>Anon you need to find someone (or maybe multiple people) whose mind works the way you want yours to work, and spend time with them. Learn to copy them. Not just their visible actions, but their trains of thought; understand their emotions and what drives them, and how that relates to their external behavior. Emulate how they feel and look at the world, and your behavior should converge to theirs over time via neuroplasticity.

I've tried doing just this for years. I've tried it with various different people. These past few years, I've tried doing this with my brother. I tried emulating him because I saw how everybody in our family seemed to respect him. They see a strong, smart, charismatic, successful handsome man. They look at me and say, "why did he turn out that way? What happened with him?" I don't know if it's because of some underlying, undiagnosed disorder(s), whether it be: bipolar disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, borderline personality disorder, and/or antisocial personality disorder... but my brother's personality is just so inconsistent, nothing that he does or says makes any sense. His advice is inconsistent. Nothing seems to please him. He's never satisfied. And it's not just him. It seems to be the same thing with everybody else in the family.

It was the same thing during my school years, with my classmates and teachers. It was always something with them. They'd always find something about me that they didn't like. Maybe I talked too much or too little, too fast or too slow, too loud or too low. Maybe I used too much cologne. Maybe I didn't use enough deodorant. If I talked too much, I'd come off as loud and obnoxious, and I'd get into trouble with my teachers for being disruptive. If I talked too little, I'd come off as stuck-up, uppity, pretentious, as someone who believed himself to be better than everyone. I tried to like things that other people liked to have something to relate to, but I'd come off as a "tryhard".

>>8360853
>couldn't handle high school
>unsure if he could handle college

Uhhhhhhhhhh

I've been diagnosed with schizophrenia which also leads to being depressed, paranoid, etc. Until this day, I'm not even sure if mental illnesses actually DOES exist, & it's cs it's already been planted in my mind that it doesn't & the problem comes from me. Maybe I'm too stressed out that I hear/hallucinate & have delusions, who knows? In conclusion, I'm not a professional so I just listen to what my psychiatrist tells me what to do & take medicines they recommend for me. Best of luck OP.

>>8356520
Another guy but:
Acid helped me feel more normal long after the effects wore off, while the anti-depressant medication I was on made me feel like a bit of a zombie, but definitely stopped the reoccurring suicidal thoughts. I stopped taking my meds after around 2 years and, while I still have anxiety and depressive moods, I feel like I handle them a whole better and they aren't so crushingly severe.

>>8371409

>just get a job and fucking do it.

And I tried doing just that.

I went with security because I felt that as a security guard I wouldn't have to talk to people, but I was wrong.

My first and only job I ever had was a security guard at a mall. I didn't expect to end up working at a mall, but I was glad to have any job at all. My supervisors would tell me that I needed to learn to be more outgoing and comfortable around people, because I needed to do customer service. So that's what I tried to do. I figured that as adults, people wouldn't be as cruel as they were in middle school. I tried to get over my anxiety and just try to be a "normal" person. This only ended in further humiliation and failure.

I am not certain what I was doing wrong, but I eventually started to receive complaints from everybody. I heard from two other officers that people were saying negative things about me, calling me names such as: "idiot" - "imbecile" - "retard" - "moron", etc. I was certainly not making any friends. Supervisors would regularly become frustrated with me and verbally discipline me over the radio for everyone to hear. My radio calls would often go ignored by both dispatch and my supervisors. They would then complain that I wasn't using the radio enough. Others would complain that I was using it too much. I would receive contradicting orders and advice from my supervisors and other people, making my job incredibly difficult. I felt terribly miserable and lonely, and I was afraid to make any complaints because I didn't know who I could trust. I found myself constantly analyzing every single thing I said and did, and the things that other people said and did.

I quit that job after only a single month, back in the 28th of December 2011. I figured that I would quickly be able to find another job, but it's been nearly five years since I quit. I am still unemployed.

>>8371385
Tell that to the guy having a schizophrenic breakdown getting back to normal just after getting some antipsychotics.
Or to the other guy having a panic attack and feeling like he's about to die being calm 2 minutes after he puts his xanax under his tongue.
Or even the guy who can't sleep at all all night but falls asleep everyday having a perfect night and an energetic day after he takes his xyrem.

>>8371409

>You have to sack up, sign up for a class and just do it. Or just get a job and fucking do it.

After that job experience of mine, I felt that there was something seriously wrong with me. Something that was significantly affecting the way I perceive reality, something that significant impacted my senses: both visually and audibly. Maybe it was a mental disorder like schizophrenia, or a personality disorder like narcissistic personality disorder, or something that was affecting my attention span like attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or something that was affecting my energy like narcolepsy. This is one of the reasons why I quit my job, because I felt that I could no longer be a productive member of society. I felt that I needed to seek help before I could function. So nearly two years later, I ended up seeing my first psychiatrist for the first time (back in the 1st of July 2013.) That same year I also ended up seeing a neurologist, who suggested that I get an MRI scan done on my brain (which I did), and he referred me to a second psychiatrist.

In August of 2015, I decided to try getting the "adult high school diploma". Went to a place called "Job Corps" first (as suggested by my cousin), but I was told that I was too old to go there since they only accepted people between the ages of 16 - 24. I then went to some place called an "occupational center", but it seemed that they were charging a bit too much for classes. So after nearly 10 years of dropping out, I decided to return to my old high school. They were giving free adult school classes for adults of all ages to attend. I figured it might have been interesting to be back in my old high school. Maybe now with Adderall, I could do much better in school. Maybe the nostalgia of being back in my old high school could help in dealing with my depression. Maybe this could help improve my "neuroplasticity", and thus improve my attention and memory spans. I was wrong.

>>8377758

>Another guy but:
>Acid helped me feel more normal long after the effects wore off, while the anti-depressant medication I was on made me feel like a bit of a zombie, but definitely stopped the reoccurring suicidal thoughts. I stopped taking my meds after around 2 years and, while I still have anxiety and depressive moods, I feel like I handle them a whole better and they aren't so crushingly severe.

I feel that I should hold off on using hallucinogens for now. Although the experiences described sound interesting, I feel that it is highly likely that there's a genetic predisposition to schizophrenia in my family. I'm fairly certain that schizotypal disorder among other disorders that could be considered within the "schizophrenia spectrum" run in my family. My family is just so paranoid about mental health care workers that they simply refuse to see any.

Although I probably shouldn't be taking Adderall because of all of this, I seem to have pretty decent self-control regarding my thoughts and actions. Sort of.

Maybe.

I don't know.

>>8377739

I figured that by returning to my old high school to take some adult school classes so that I could get the "adult high school diploma", I could slowly work up my way back up so that I could finally have the confidence to start college (nearly ten years after I should have started.)

But I was wrong. I couldn't even do that. Not even with Adderall.

>>8375950
take meds. then running and reading. seriously it's that simple.

>>8371409
>how to be a burnout 101

>>8363383
Chiro as a profession is not evidence based.

>>8377739

It's funny, I considered not adding the: "I don't think I can handle college" sentence because somebody might reply the way that you did, but then I also thought that somebody would ask: "why are you even bothering with getting the adult high school diploma? You already took the GED exam, passed, and got the high school equivalency certificate, why not just go straight to college?"

In response to this possible question, see my post here:

>>8378958

>>8365577

are you even serious?

You spoke with him for 15 mins and he prescribed you some meds and sent you to his college buddy who also prescribed you some meds after 15 min...

Yeah I don't see any problems here... nothing at all..

>research field produces verifiable and replicatable results
>research field generates fruitful hypotheses
>results produce valid predictors of behavior
>not a science
sometimes /sci/ isn't as smart as it seems

>>8380119

>are you even serious?

>You spoke with him for 15 mins and he prescribed you some meds and sent you to his college buddy who also prescribed you some meds after 15 min...

>Yeah I don't see any problems here... nothing at all..

I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to get at here. Are you saying that I shouldn't have trusted in the neurologist's advice because I didn't have enough time to explain my symptoms? In which case I would say that I sort of agree with you.

One of the reasons that I went to see a neurologist in the first place was because after having seen my first psychiatrist for the first time back in the 1st of July of 2013 and he prescribed me Adderall, I was concerned that Adderall might not have been the right medication for me because I was worried that I might have been genetically predisposed to developing schizophrenia and thus Adderall might hasten the onset of schizophrenia and therefore trigger a psychotic episode.

So I went to see a neurologist and he told me to get an MRI scan done on my brain (which I did, and I paid $700 for back in mid-2013.) He didn't find anything unusual that might indicate that I was at the onset of schizophrenia or that I might develop it sometime in the future.

Regardless, pretty much every doctor that I've seen (psychiatrists, neurologists, GPs, ENTs, optometrists, etc.) are only willing to speak to me for about 15 - 20 minutes. Some of them only put up with me for about 5 minutes or less, even one GP going so far as to telling me: "OK. Close that mouth" while I'm describing my symptoms. I don't really have much of a choice on the matter. I can't tell them, "could I maybe speak to you for about 1 or 2 hours so that I could tell you my symptoms, my concerns, my entire medical history, my life story?" Only my therapists and psychologists are willing to put up with me for that long. Even they sometimes couldn't up with me for that long. One therapist cut the session short after only about 15 minutes.

>>8380119

Anyway, the post that you're replying to was a response to somebody else's post who was suggesting that only neurologists' jobs could be considered as being truly "scientific".

So what I was trying to get at was... if the neurologist didn't believe that psychiatry was "scientific", why even bother sending me to a psychiatrist at all? He did tell me that he believed that my essential tremors and insomnia were being caused by my anxiety and depression. So then, are things like "anxiety" and "depression" considered "neurological" problems, "psychiatric" problems, "psychological" problems, or all of the aforementioned? How are such things supposed to be treated, and by who? Neurologists? Psychiatrists? Psychologists? Therapists? All of the aforementioned?

If a patient is prescribed all sorts of medications that are supposed to help their symptoms improve, that are supposed to help their anxiety, depression, insomnia, essential tremors... but none of the medications work, then what else is the patient supposed to do?

If a patient has already met with all of these doctors... neurologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists... and they're still experiencing the symptoms, what else is the patient supposed to do?

If disorders such as "Major Depressive Disorder" and "Generalized Anxiety Disorder" and "Social Anxiety Disorder" are "physical" things, things of the "body" rather than "mental", if such things have "mechanical underpinnings"... then why can't such disorders be identified by scans like MRI, PET, CT, etc.?

And if such disorders can't be identified physically, then who is to say whether or not they are "real"? Who is to say whether or not they are "mental"?

And if these disorders truly are "all in the mind", then why should the patient need to take expensive medication or go through expensive psychotherapy for things that might not even be "real"?

>>8380119

I've gone back and forth from one doctor to another...

...I went from a neurologist, who then referred me to a second psychiatrist, who told me to go see a therapist (and that same psychiatrist later told me to go find a different psychiatrist), the therapist told me to go speak to a psychiatrist...

...so I returned to my first psychiatrist, and then I was told by the psychiatrist's practice that he would be too busy for the next several months and so I should go see the practice's DO, and then when I tried to see that DO again I was told that she was no longer with their practice so I ended up making an appointment to see a NP, and when I went to see the NP I was told by his practice that he couldn't make the appointment so I ended up seeing a different NP...

...and then when I tried to make an appointment with a geneticist I was told that I could only see the geneticist if I was referred to them by another doctor first, so I ended up telling the NP about this only to have her refer me to a PCP, but then after I went to see the PCP he told me that he couldn't help me with seeing a geneticist and that I would have been better off asking a psychiatrist instead...

....and then after seeing that NP for nine sessions nearly every month for over a year I was suddenly told that I was allowed neither to see nor speak to her anymore, so I ended up with yet another NP only to be later told by this practice the same thing about him not being "comfortable" near me, so now I'm allowed to only see this practice's psychiatrist...

...and when I first went to see my second therapist to see about getting tested for personality disorders she told me that she didn't really specialize in that sort of thing and that she could refer me to a psychologist who could help me, and then when I went to see the psychologist he told me to start seeing one of the therapists that works with him so that I could start my psychotherapy treatment...

etc. etc.

>>8380182
>>8380205
>>8380269

look dad, a future school shooter

>>8380119

And that's what I think is just so funny about all of this.

I'm getting all of these different people with different opinions trying to tell me what is or isn't "science". What is or isn't "pseudoscience".

Hell, I've noticed that even among all of these specialists themselves there's disagreements about what is or isn't "science". What is or isn't "pseudoscience".

They'll disagree with each other about what is or isn't the right treatment.

If there's something that they can't quite figure out, something that they don't specialize in, they simply tell me to go see a different specialist.

I'll have one psychiatrist telling me that for testing for personality disorders there's the "MMPI-2" which he told me "isn't very scientific."

I'll have my psychologist telling me that there's no such thing as "chemical imbalances", and that all psychiatrists are "weird", that he doesn't like having to deal with them, and that "psychiatrists of today are like the alchemists of the Middle Ages."

So I'm left wondering: what is a person to do when they no longer have the luxury to be running around in circles, constantly going back and forth seeing and speaking to all sorts of different doctors who disagree with each other, being repeatedly ignored, shot down, turned away, given the run-around...

...when that person's time is limited, and their source of income is unreliable and could end at any given moment?

Who can that person turn to, when the only people willing to give him any time will only do so if given money?

What can that person turn to next when science and medicine have failed?

Philosophy? Spirituality? Religion?

And what of all of those other people out there in the world today who don't even have the luxury to access all of this knowledge... to access all of the knowledge that may be available in science, medicine, philosophy, spirituality, and religion?

>>8380119

What if a person never had access to all of this knowledge due to unfortunate circumstances?

What if a person once had access to all of this knowledge, but due to a series of unfortunate events lost it all?

What if a person felt that they were on the verge of finally losing it all: financially, socially, physically, emotionally, intellectually, spiritually, mentally? That they were on the verge of losing: their security, their security, their possessions, their freedom?

If this person did decide to turn to philosophy, spirituality, and/or religion, how can they be certain that they could trust their own intelligence, their own logic, their own intuition, their own judgment, their own senses, their own perception of reality to be able to truly comprehend everything that they have read?

If this person really did have a deep, underlying, undiagnosed severe mental disorder all along (like schizophrenia), how could this person know to trust in himself?

How could this person possibly know where one draws the line between reality and fantasy? Who in the world has the authority to draw that line, and why should they have that authority?

How can anybody around this person possibly trust in any of his words and/or actions?

What is this person supposed to do then?

>>8380119

When you have mental health care experts like the psychiatrist Dr. Keith Ablow in this article:

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/01/08/are-raising-generation-deluded-narcissists.html

...describing your entire generation as a bunch of "deluded narcissists"...

...and so you then start wondering if you may have indeed been "weak" all along, that you may have indeed have Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and so you go ahead and have yourself tested for personality disorders only to be told that you don't have a personality disorder... but then you managed to get yourself diagnosed with "Major Depressive Disorder" and you find out from the DSM-5 that people with Narcissistic Personality Disorder could go on to develop Major Depressive Disorder, so you start wondering if your brother was right when he said: "Get over it. You're weak. You want people to think you're weak? Okay, you're weak. You're weak. Stop whining. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Who cares? Nobody cares. Suck it up. Tough it out. There are people a lot worse off than you. Be a man."?

So you start wondering: "Do I have Major Depressive Disorder because I really am weak, and if so, at what point can a person have depression without it being due to them being weak?"

At what point can a person be miserable and actually have good reason to be miserable, actually have good reason to complain?

What is one supposed to do when after being diagnosed with four different disorders: Major Depressive Disorder, Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Social Anxiety Disorder, Attention Deficit Disorder... this person suddenly gets people telling him that these disorders aren't "real problems" and that neither psychology nor psychiatry are "real" sciences?

When the whole world is telling him that he's "crazy", what the hell was he supposed to think? And now that he's actually seeked professional help, nobody cares! Suddenly his "disorders" aren't even real! Suddenly he's not "crazy" after all!

>>8380300
>>8380399
>>8380433
Sounds less like a science and math problem than a health and fitness problem.

Keep looking to find the help you need for yourself, don't get discouraged that life is chaotic and cruel.

>>8380590

>Sounds less like a science and math problem than a health and fitness problem.

And so I'm back where I started.

If even /sci/ can't tell me whether things like psychiatry, psychology, personality disorders, mental disorders, etc. are "science" or "pseudoscience", then what hope do I have in convincing other people?

What hope do I have when trying to explain to people what my disorders are, that they are just as real as any other illnesses, and that I can't do it all by myself when receiving treatment?

If I have people within my own family telling me that my disorders "aren't that big of a deal", that I'm expected to do everything that my family tells me to do, like driving my brother around after he got hair transplant surgery on his overly-plucked eyebrows, all while I was still taking antidepressant, anti-anxiety, anti-convulsant medication...

...or driving my brother's wife to some concert...

...but then my brother refuses to drive me to my doctors because they are "too far away" and tells me that I should "take a bus"...

...or that they are "too nearby" and that I "don't need to be driven there"...

....and everyone in my family agrees with what my brother says because they all agree that my disorders aren't even "real", and so all that medication that my family insisted for months on me taking was essentially for "nothing"...

...and I have the same discussion every month with my mother when she asks me "why are you still seeing a psychiatrist? Why are you still taking that medication? What's Adderall? What's that for? What's ADHD? That medication is too expensive, you should stop taking it"...

...what hope do I have in making any sort of "recovery" over something that people can't even agree on is "real"?

>>8380590

I ask you:

What is a man to do when the whole world has turned against him?

What is a man to do when he has been backed into a corner?

Go to the gym, eat well, but do this while taking the drugs that was prescribed to you and overtime reduce them.

>>8381941

I don't know about everybody else, but I found that antidepressant and anti-anxiety medication made it more difficult for me than usual in working up any energy and motivation for going to the gym to work out.

I think that people who take antipsychotics experience something similar.

Once I started taking a psychostimulant (Adderall), however, I suddenly started feeling antsy simply sitting around all day and actually managed to work up the motivation to go to the gym.

>>8356593

After quickly reviewing the web site's WOT Firefox extension discussion page, it seems that that web site is safe to browse.

I will be taking a look at it. Thank you.

>>8354961
>The closest a neurotic, narcissistic male can become to pregnant.
>Pic ever so related

>>8359272
This is funny but also sad
The system is really fucked.

>>8382655

wot

>>8371423

>I also recommend watching Ghost in the Shell, Serial Experiments Lain, and Texhnolyze. A lot of people would laugh at this, but when I was all fucked up I really drowned myself in these things, and they helped me a lot. If I didn't find something I felt like I could relate to, and could chip away at (new but familiar), I probably wouldn't have gotten very far and likely eventually killed myself. Ergo Proxy is good as well.

>>8371466

>Oh. Although, I recommend you listen to some Modest Mouse, Death Cab for Cutie, and Grimes.

Your taste in anime and in music seems very familiar.

Is your name Roy by any chance, or have you ever gone by the nickname "Roy"? Have you ever lived in Long Beach, California?

>>8366112

>And there is empirical evidence for the existence of these disorders as we have seen that some treatments work especially well in these or those classes or groups.

Shouldn't "empirical evidence" include the fields of neuroscience, neurobiology, and/or neurology along with MRI, PET, and/or CT scans?

File: Page 671 from the Diagnostic of Statistical and Manual of Mental Disorders Fifth Edition with Marker Edit.jpg (2MB, 2481x3507px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

>Be aware of the most base aspects of everyday experience and functionality, don't compartmentalize, build a framework of knowledge wherein all elements are well integrated in a generalized sense (a form of lateral thinking), and learn to think mechanically. The body and mind are machines.

OK. Let me put it this way:

I have here with me four copies, each of four pages straight out of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (which I scanned using one of the scanners at the Los Angeles Central Library a few months back.)

This particular copy here is of page 671 of the DSM-5, from the section for Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

I highlighted the following sentence:

>Sustained feelings of shame or humiliation and the attendant self-criticism may be associated with social withdrawal, depressed mood, and persistent depressive disorder (dysthymia) or major depressive disorder.

"Major depressive disorder" is circled.

File: Page 669 from the Diagnostic of Statistical and Manual of Mental Disorders Fifth Edition.jpg (865KB, 2481x3507px)

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>>8355907

Here's page 669.

File: Page 670 from the Diagnostic of Statistical and Manual of Mental Disorders Fifth Edition.jpg (785KB, 1700x2200px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

Here's page 670.

File: Page 672 from the Diagnostic of Statistical and Manual of Mental Disorders Fifth Edition.jpg (876KB, 2481x3507px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

Here's page 672.

File: Page 1 of the Psychological Evaluation Report with Marker Edit.jpg (769KB, 1700x2200px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

And here's the first page of my psychological evaluation report.

File: Page 2 of the Psychological Evaluation Report with Marker Edit.jpg (515KB, 1700x2200px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

And here's the second and last page of my psychological evaluation report.

>>8355907

Now, what I'm getting here is a lot of different opinions from various different people (not just within this thread, but also in previous threads of /sci/ that I've either participated and/or lurked in /sci/ these past six years or so... and not just /sci/, but people in my life as well) about what is or isn't "pseudoscience".

As stated by me in the OP here >>8354961

I've had people telling me (even in my own family) that the four disorders that I've been diagnosed with aren't "real", and that these disorders are entirely in my head, and that I can easily will myself out of these problems.

To quote the OP:

>Nobody in my family (or anybody else, for that matter) seems to give a single fuck about me having been diagnosed with these disorders. A cousin of mine simply scoffed at the idea of me being diagnosed with ADHD, making a dismissive gesture and proclaiming "everybody has ADHD!" My mother tells me that I need neither medication nor psychotherapy, that I should use my own will power to stop having depression. Other people tell me that social anxiety isn't a "real problem".

So, then. Nobody in my family seems to believe that any of these four disorders are real, and that they are therefore neither worth discussing nor worrying about. And it's not just my family, but other people in my life as well... like my adult school teacher.

And you guys can't seem to agree about whether or not there's such a thing as "empirical evidence" to prove once and for all whether or not any of these disorders are "real".

File: Screenshot of the NPD Study Web Page.png (64KB, 648x757px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

But let's take Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

There's this one study that apparently suggests that they have provided the first "empirical evidence" for Narcissistic Personality Disorder:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23777939

To quote it:

>Background:

>Despite the relevance of narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) in clinical settings, there is currently no empirical data available regarding the neurobiological correlates of NPD. In the present study, we performed a voxel-based morphometric analysis to provide initial insight into local abnormalities of gray matter (GM) volume.

>Methods

>Structural brain images were obtained from patients with NPD (n = 17) and a sample of healthy controls (n = 17) matched regarding age, gender, handedness, and intelligence. Groups were compared with regard to global brain tissue volumes and local abnormalities of GM volume. Regions-of-interest analyses were calculated for the anterior insula.

>Results

>Relative to the control group, NPD patients had smaller GM volume in the left anterior insula. Independent of group, GM volume in the left anterior insula was positively related to self-reported emotional empathy. Complementary whole-brain analyses yielded smaller GM volume in fronto-paralimbic brain regions comprising the rostral and median cingulate cortex as well as dorsolateral and medial parts of the prefrontal cortex.

>Conclusion

>Here we provide the first empirical evidence for structural abnormalities in fronto-paralimbic brain regions of patients with NPD. The results are discussed in the context of NPD patients' restricted ability for emotional empathy.

File: Page 1366 from the Journal of Psychiatric Research 47.jpg (612KB, 1700x2338px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

The following four pages that I will be posting are the full text of this study.

File: Page 1367 from the Journal of Psychiatric Research 47.jpg (735KB, 1700x2338px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

Here's page 1367.

File: Page 1368 from the Journal of Psychiatric Research 47.jpg (675KB, 2481x3507px)

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>>8355907

Here's page 1368.

File: Page 1369 from the Journal of Psychiatric Research 47.jpg (228KB, 2481x3507px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

And here's page 1369.

>>8384534
>internet addiction
Disregard that entire report, please. If its not faked, whoever did it is an idiot.

>>8355907

And I have here with me a disc containing several images of the Magnetic Resonance Imaging scan (which was done from various angles) on my brain back in the 17th of September of 2013.

This is the M.R.I. scan that I paid $700 for and the neurologist that I had met with back in mid-2013 (after I had already met with my first psychiatrist) suggested that I get.

According to the neurologist, he didn't find anything unusual on this MRI scan aside from something called an "arachnoid cyst" which is apparently very common, normal, and goes away on its own.

Over these past several weeks, I've been carefully analyzing these images looking for any gray matter abnormalities in the left anterior insula.

I will be posting screenshots of all of the images of this MRI scan.

>>8384630

>Disregard that entire report, please. If its not faked, whoever did it is an idiot.

Aw, come on, man! I paid this psychologist $700 to test me for personality disorders (with the MMPI-2, along with a bunch of other written tests) back in July of this year. I don't have the money to go around seeing a bunch of other psychologists and throwing around money to get second and third opinions.

I even have this psychologist already annoyed with me because I kept e-mailing him asking him questions about my diagnosis, what it all means, what it means to have Major Depressive Disorder, could other people re-interpret this information as to mean that what I have is actually something far more dangerous (like Narcissistic Personality Disorder), etc.

He'd even tell me stuff like "why would you pay good money for an expert opinion and then disregard it?" and "when will it ever be enough?" He told me that he'd stop responding to my e-mails, and he did.

File: Screenshot of one of the MRI scan images on my brain.png (311KB, 531x593px)

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>>8384664

Here's one image of the MRI scan.

File: 6a9bdad5afbbe1c46a84fd81f95f80a2.gif (300KB, 460x351px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8354982
Ever heard of borderline personality disorder? Those cunts are like a mix of Down's, bipolar and schizophrenia.

>>8384630

I think that the only reason he even mentioned "internet addiction" was because when he brought up what I put down on my paperwork about my substance use (I put down that: I've only smoked cannabis maybe 2 or 3 times in all of my 27 years of life and those times were all around the time that I was 20 or 21 or so, and that I only consumed maybe 2 or 3 cans of alcoholic beverages per year, and also that I currently take 300 mg of caffeine tablets daily along with the 60 mg of amphetamine capsules) he had then asked me if I have ever had any "problems" with "addiction".

And so I answered: "as far as I'm aware, I've never become addicted to anything. The only things I could say that I'm maybe addicted to, if this counts... would be: playing video games, using computers, and browsing the internet. Before I started taking Adderall, I would sometimes spend days, weeks, or even months locked up in my room in front of my computer. I'd sometimes go to bed around 3 PM and get up sometime around midnight, only to go straight to my computer again to browse the internet some more and play more computer games. Nowadays I spend 7-12 hours each day in front of my computer. I try to go to bed around 10:30 PM and get up by 7:30 AM."

there seems to be a higher than average amount of incompetence in the psychiatric field, just judging from some personal experience

>>8384770

>Ever heard of borderline personality disorder? Those cunts are like a mix of Down's, bipolar and schizophrenia.

Wasn't borderline personality disorder at some point called "borderline schizophrenia" and was at times confused with schizophrenia itself?

File: meth.jpg (121KB, 540x396px)

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>>8386179
Yes, yes it was. There's also a correlation between family history of schizophrenia and BPD. Shit's highly heritable, often developing in people with an inborn predisposition towards emotional sensitivity.

File: MRI Scan Image SI 11.png (311KB, 538x616px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8355907

>Be aware of the most base aspects of everyday experience and functionality, don't compartmentalize, build a framework of knowledge wherein all elements are well integrated in a generalized sense (a form of lateral thinking), and learn to think mechanically. The body and mind are machines.

Anyway. What I'm hoping to get at with these MRI scan images of my brain is maybe I'm hoping to find some sort of "empirical evidence" to either confirm or deny the existence of some sort of disorder (any kind of disorder, whether it be a: mental disorder, or personality disorder... like Narcissistic Personality Disorder.)

If it turns out that I actually *do* have Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and there *is*, in fact, such a thing as "empirical evidence" to suggest that such a personality disorder exists... then I should be able to find some sort of physical evidence confirming this on my MRI scans... no?

And if it turns out that I do, in fact, have Narcissistic Personality Disorder... then that might be why I've been diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder. So this would essentially mean that I am, in fact, "weak". But then, to what extent could I be considered to be "weak"? And does this mean that everyone who has been diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder or other disorders like the ones that I've been diagnosed with (Social Anxiety Disorder, Generalized Anxiety Disorder, etc.) are "weak"?

And then what if it turns out that I can't actually find any physical evidence on my MRI scans that confirms the existence of Narcissistic Personality Disorder? Does that mean that I am not "weak"? Does that mean that I actually have good reason to be depressed?

And I can find physical evidence to suggest that I actually do have Major Depressive Disorder, and I don't have Narcissistic Personality Disorder... then what route should I take to "cure" myself? Is there even such a thing as a "cure"?

File: NPDMRI2.png (81KB, 389x293px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8384611

Shit. Looks like the images on that page are too blurry to make out to details.

I'll try posting more highly-detailed versions of those images.

File: NPDMRI3.png (33KB, 382x146px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8384611

And here's the second image of that page.

File: Page1ofJournal2ndAttempt.jpg (512KB, 1700x2200px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8384611

Shit. Looks like I didn't even post the first page of that study. I'll try posting it now.

From my experience with psychiatrists, I can tell you I think a significant part of the diagnostic process comes down to the doc's personal opinion. I have seen doctors for six months or more, and frequently, only to have my diagnosis change when I see another. Their opinions may be more educated and they may have a name for your problems, but in the end, it all comes down to life experience. I seriously doubt a psychiatrist would be able to see through the lies and self-deception very well straight out of med school.

That said, they have an encyclopaedic knowledge about the mental health conditions that they have names for and how to treat them, once their diagnosis is correct. Listen to them, because they still know more than the typical wise-looking idiot at the pub that you unload on for advice.

File: Page2ofJournal.jpg (775KB, 1700x2200px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8384611

Aaaaand here's the second page.

File: Page 1365 from the Journal of Psychiatric Research 47.jpg (722KB, 1700x2200px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8384611

Looks like there was supposed to be a third page.

Here it is.

File: Page 1366 from the Journal of Psychiatric Research 47.jpg (640KB, 1700x2200px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8384611

Aw, man.

Looks like page 1366 of this study got cut off for some reason.

I'm going to try posting a better version now.

>>8386685

>Listen to them, because they still know more than the typical wise-looking idiot at the pub that you unload on for advice.

My problem is that I don't quite have the luxury to go around looking for the "right" psychiatrists anymore (if there even is a "right" psychiatrist.) I don't have the luxury to go from psychiatrist to psychiatrist, going from one diagnosis to another, going from one medication to another, taking all sorts of different medications for all sorts of different diagnoses, medications that could ultimately do me more harm than good... medications like those antidepressant and anti-anxiety medications that I was taking back in 2014 that made me feel like complete shit. Medications that essentially put me in a vegetative state for over a year. I lost an entire year of my life because of those medications. I could barely function during that time.

And I know that it's basically pointless to try and convince people how miserable I felt back then, and how miserable I am now... because I realize that neither time travel nor "telepathy" are possible. I can't take somebody back in time, give them the ability of telepathy, and have them feel exactly how I felt back in 2014. I tried to get my family back then to try and understand how I felt, but they refused to accept it. They refused to believe any of it. My family seems to have a limited capacity for empathy.

As I wrote in my post here:

>>8362351

>I remember once asking my brother if he knew what depression was, why it is that I was taking antidepressants, what they were supposed to be doing for me, what they were really doing to me, and why I had depression in the first place. He said, "hahaha. I don't care. Why should I care? Stop whining. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Who cares? Nobody cares. Suck it up. Tough it out. There are people a lot worse off than you. Be a man."

And I realize that there is no real way to prove to you guys or to anyone that he actually said that.

>>8386740

...but maybe my brother was right all along. Maybe I really am just feeling sorry for myself. Maybe I really should just stop whining. Maybe I should just suck it up. Maybe I should just tough it out. Maybe I should just man up. Maybe nobody will ever care about how miserable I feel right now, no matter what I do or say.

Maybe I really do have Narcissistic Personality Disorder. And if this is true... then what does this mean for me? Is there any hope for me? Is there any hope for other people like me?

And if there is no hope for people like me, then what is to be done with us? Should it be like this person suggested in this post here:

>>8370986

>If you're not willing to put them in the ground

Is that what is to be done with me, and other people like me? Is that the only other option? Is there really no hope for me, or others like me?

>>8386740
Don't give up with the medications if you think you need something. There are millions of them out there, and one of them might actually prove to be beneficial. I remember reading that schizophrenics, for example, will spend a VERY long time trying to find the right meds, like, years.

Meds won't kill you, some can harm you, but in the end at least they aren't cigarettes or alcohol, and if they can make your life a little less miserable then that's way better than being miserable.

Psychiatry is backed by drug companies, so their method for treatment is to prescribe drugs. It's basically your only option a lot of the time, short of diet, exercise, and an active social life, because that's where all the research $$$ go.

>>8384679
>I paid this psychologist $700 to test me for personality disorders
Pysch confirmed for being a fucking racket.

>tfw realize how many fuckups get this test paid for in full by the state and then go on disability for the rest of their lives

>>8384770
Not at all.just think of a normal woman and multiply her need for drama, victim mentality, fear of abandonment, and erratic behavior x100. Then you have a borderline.

File: 690x687_0xd42ee42a_20668733311411738345.jpg (258KB, 690x687px)

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>>8386776
...so basically Down's, bipolar and schizophrenia.

File: Skid Row Los Angeles.jpg (940KB, 2816x2112px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8386764

>Don't give up with the medications if you think you need something. There are millions of them out there, and one of them might actually prove to be beneficial. I remember reading that schizophrenics, for example, will spend a VERY long time trying to find the right meds, like, years.

>Meds won't kill you, some can harm you, but in the end at least they aren't cigarettes or alcohol, and if they can make your life a little less miserable then that's way better than being miserable.

That's just the thing. I don't quite have the luxury to keep doing this anymore. I'm at the end of my line here.

As I wrote in my post here:

>Back in September of last year, my brother kicked me out of my apartment. My own apartment. This guy has been using my name and social security number for the taxes for his legally and morally questionable business for about a half a decade. He's been using me to help with his business for years. He's been using my name and social security number to explain how he's paying for a lot of the things that he's paying for: his rent, his bills, his business' expenses... and he's still doing it right now. And he's got our entire family wrapped around his finger, feeding into his narcissistic supply. He's manipulating everybody. He's successfully gotten the entire family turned against me. Our mother defends everything that he does and says. Hell, even my father (who is my biological father, but his stepfather) defends the guy... even though my father has repeatedly warned me about how "crazy" and "dangerous" my brother can be. But he still insists on defending the guy.

I'm currently living in an apartment with my 70-year-old mother. And I know that this won't last for much longer. I don't know how much longer this will last. Maybe six more months... or five... or four, or three, or two, one...

Pretty soon I'm going to end up like the 6,000 homeless people pictured here living a short walking distance east of here, in Skid Row, Los Angeles.

>>8386810
You could move to a trailer park temporarily, or go couch-surfing and do chores as payment. I'm sure plenty of people have managed to escape worse situations than yours, though I'm not saying you aren't in a tight spot. Best of luck, anyway.

>>8386764

And I just know that when I end up homeless, taking medications that make me feel like shit, even worse than I feel right now... I just know that nobody is going to feel sorry for me.

I remember when I was very little and I'd see all of the homeless people walking around Los Angeles, and I remember thinking that I wished that there was something that I could do for them. That I wished that I could just magically create money out of thin air, give them the money, and magically cure them of whatever mental illness that they might have. But I realize now that it's not quite that simple. And I realize that this anecdote is completely meaningless, because if people already believe me to have Narcissistic Personality Disorder, then that must automatically mean that I have a complete lack of empathy, and therefore it cannot possibly be true that I feel empathy for homeless people or anybody else.

Or maybe something in my brain changed throughout my childhood and adolescence. Maybe my shitty life experiences made me the person that I am today. Maybe my brain's chemistry is so fucked up at this point in my life that there's simply no hope for me. People look at me and they think, "he deserves everything that he gets. He's a narcissist. He's a terrible person. He will never change. There's no hope for him."

These words are similar to the words I've heard people speak of regarding the homeless

I remember that around the time that I was 18 years old, that I once handed over a $20 bill to some random homeless guy he asked for a handout. He excitedly responded, "oh thank you, sir! Thank you!" That $20 bill was money that my father had given to me so that I could pay for his medication when I went to the pharmacy to pick it up. My grandmother had also given me another $20 bill, not knowing that my father had already given me the money. So I just gave up that $20 bill to the homeless guy because I had no need for $20. When I told my family about this, they mocked me.

>>8386860
All human generosity comes down to pack mentality; survival in numbers. If you are without a pack, then you become the pack. A neurotypical person will love the pack, and a narcissist will love himself. That's what I think; are you a narcissist?

>>8386856

>You could move to a trailer park temporarily, or go couch-surfing and do chores as payment. I'm sure plenty of people have managed to escape worse situations than yours, though I'm not saying you aren't in a tight spot. Best of luck, anyway.

It gets worse. So much worse. My brother's business is legally dubious, and highly immoral. And I have my name, face, and social security number all of it... going as far back as the year 2011, maybe even earlier than that. I have here with me several years of taxes, showing how much I supposedly make each other. Money that I see very little of. Money that I basically have to beg for. Money that I've actually worked for, running errands, delivering supplies, driving my brother around along with his: wife, our cousin, our mother... doing chores... and he didn't even appreciate any of it. None of them did.

They'd tell me that they "don't remember" me doing any of that. Or they'd me that I "didn't even do the job right". I remember one day having spent over five hours cleaning our apartment, to the point that I ran out of cleaning supplies. My brother said that I didn't clean it right and he along with his wife spent about an hour that day and about an hour the next day cleaning, and my brother proclaimed, "aaaah... much better."

But, of course, none of that matters now. It's all in the past, right? I should just forgive and forget. And besides, it's not like I had a microphone and camera on me that whole time, recording everything that they told me and did to me. So I have no real way to prove any of it.

So I should I just forget about it all and move on with my life, because nothing bad will ever happen again?

Yeah, well, maybe not. Maybe none of you guys believe anything that I've told you about my brother, my family, the business. Maybe none of you guys will believe what I'm about to tell you. Maybe I just imagined the whole thing.

I remember a few years back, a couple of FBI agents stopped by our apartment.

>>8386886

>That's what I think; are you a narcissist?

That's what I'm trying to get at. How am I supposed to know whether or not I really am I narcissist? Maybe I'm a pathological liar. Maybe I'm so good at lying that I believe my own lies. Maybe I'm so deeply deluded that I genuinely believe myself to be a good person. Maybe all of these stories are stories that I've conjured up to fill in the blanks, to fill in all that emptiness in my life... to make me feel better about myself. Who is to say that anything that I'm saying is true? How could I prove to myself, or anybody else, that I'm not lying? Should I take a polygraph test? How would anybody know that I didn't already know how to "beat" the polygraph machine beforehand, so as to prove to everyone that I'm not lying? Should I see a psychologist to see if he could tell whether or not I'm lying?

And who is to say whether or not I'm such a good liar, I can't just as easily fool the psychologist as well?

It's like I wrote in my post here:

>>8370223

And I actually did go to see a psychologist. And I remember asking him, "I've told you a lot about my family... how do can you be so certain that I'm not lying to you? How can you be sure that I haven't fabricated or exaggerated all of it?"

He responded with, "congruence. Everything that you've done up to this point, everything that you've written, the way you answer all of those questions on the MMPI-2 and those other tests... the way that you behave. Your body language. The way you talk. It all matches up."

But maybe I'm that good of a liar. I managed to fool even this guy.

Or maybe I didn't fool him. Maybe he's the one lying to me. Maybe he does think that I have a personality disorder. Maybe it really is Narcissistic Personality Disorder. But he told me that it isn't. But maybe he's lying. But he's not allowed to lie, because it's against the psychologists' code of ethics... right?

>>8386913
Does it even matter whether you're a narcissist or not? Nobody really cares unless you abuse their trust in you or something. Narcissist or not, just live like everybody else, or try to, life is easier that way. Karma works to some extent, though sometimes it isn't fair. People also generally don't like it if you unload on them, but that's probably why you're on an anonymous site, no?

>falling for a narcissist's pitywhoring

and /sci/ takes pride in its autistic disdain for psychology

>>8386994
Meh, could just be the victim of a narcissistic older brother or something. Little brother takes the blame for big brother's wrongdoings and personality flaws because big brother is a dickhead who scares little brother. The inverse could definitely be true as well though, and it could also be true that nobody is a narcissist, I mean, it's the fucking internet.

>>8386994

>>falling for a narcissist's pitywhoring

>and /sci/ takes pride in its autistic disdain for psychology

And so once more we're right back where we started.

I remember reading somewhere that people who blame themselves for everything that goes wrong are feeling "guilt" and that they are "depressed", while people who blame everybody else for everything that goes wrong are feeling "self-pity". I also remember reading that people with Narcissistic Personality Disorder experience self-pity and shame, rather than guilt. But according to the DSM-5, people with Narcissistic Personality Disorder can be co-morbid with Major Depressive Disorder? So does that mean that people with Narcissistic Personality Disorder can experience self-pity, shame, and/or guilt all at once, or what? Now it's my understanding that if I had, in fact, been diagnosed with a personality disorder (such as Narcissistic Personality Disorder), legally, it should have shown up on my diagnosis, right? But then again I remember reading that under certain circumstances, mental health care workers will not tell their patients about their diagnosis (such as patients with borderline personality disorder) as stated here:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3579480/

I also remember asking the psychologist if a different psychologist might have interpreted the test results differently and they may have diagnosed with me with a personality disorder, and he said that, yes, it is possible. So if it turned out that I do, in fact, have Narcissistic Personality Disorder, does that mean that I have Major Depressive Disorder because I am "weak" and that I should "stop feeling sorry" for myself?

What is this that I'm feeling? Is it guilt, shame, or self-pity? Or is it all of the above, or none of them? How do I know to tell the difference between guilt, shame, and/or self-pity? Is there a difference? Who is to decide what the difference is?

>>8381346
Kill himself.

I mean, if you have all this time to craft rhetoric on this thread, then you should actually do something meaningfull and pull the trigger.

Everyone has their own problems, everyone is on a roadtrip to death, you are not different than them, off yourself if you are so eager.

>>8387022
>Meh, could just be the victim of a narcissistic older brother or something. Little brother takes the blame for big brother's wrongdoings and personality flaws because big brother is a dickhead who scares little brother.

That's part of it- he's obviously the scapegoat of a narcissistic family. The most common way to get a spectrum disorder is to be the offspring of someone with a spectrum disorder. Thus arises whole spectrum disorder effected families.

>>8387243

>Kill himself.

>I mean, if you have all this time to craft rhetoric on this thread, then you should actually do something meaningfull and pull the trigger.

And so we're finally down to this.

When a mentally ill individual reaches a certain point in his life when he realizes that everything he's done up until that point has been met with repeated failures, and therefore anything that he may attempt in the future will inevitably be met with more failures, he must realize that he's merely a drain on society... when he feels that he's been essentially banished by his own tribe, basically ostracized by his entire species, it's time that he must realize that he'd be doing the whole world a favor by removing himself from the genepool.

That's the sort of future that I'm seeing for our species.

It's like the world is telling me, "you got to be 27 years old, and yet you're still unemployed... still haven't finished high school, still don't have any friends, still don't have any job experience, still don't have any references, still a virgin... you're basically at retirement age right now! You don't even have any credit! That's just as bad as having bad credit! If you're like this right now, it's doubtful that you'll be any different by the time you're 65! Pack up your shit and go. You're not even a human fucking being. You're less than human. You're an invalid. Fuck off and die. You'd be doing the whole world a huge favor."

If this is true for me, maybe this is true for everybody who's been diagnosed with a mental disorder.

I finally understand now why men are less likely to seek help for depression.

There really is no hope.

Any OCD bros here? What's your best experience with meds? I've been using prozac and have been pretty comfy, but it gets rid of the highs and lows of life. Sorta just coasting right now.

>>8388031

>I've been using prozac and have been pretty comfy, but it gets rid of the highs and lows of life.

Prozac gets rid of both the lows *and* highs of life?

So you're neither really sad nor happy? Just kinda' like a robot?

>>8388704
Its not to that extreme, its just that I don't get really happy or really sad about anything. I still get happy and sad, and still feel. But it isn't as "powerful" of a feeling I guess you could say

>>8388019
Nah, just have a drink and try to enjoy the show. We'll all be irrelevant soon enough.

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>>8388773

I can see a situation like what is depicted in the film Gattaca unfolding over the course of the next four decades or so.

People diagnosed with disorders like me will be pushed to the side by automation, genetically superior individuals, and sanism.

We'll be placed in poorly-constructed ghettos where we'll be fed antidepressants and antipsychotics until our senses are so deadened that we simply stop caring completely, and then we just find a hole to rot and die in. All away from public view, so that the genetically superior individuals don't have to look at us and feel sorry for our poor quality of life.

It will all happen so gradually that by the time anybody notices what's going on, it'll be too late.

>>8388810
Some of the most intelligent people to have existed have mental disorders anon, we are just a tad bit different, but we can still keep up.

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>>8388950

I realize that. I realize that every once in awhile we get a productive schizophrenic like John Forbes Nash, Jr.

But what happens to all the other mentally ill people?

I remember a few years back watching this documentary called "Lost Angels" about the homeless living in Skid Row, Los Angeles. There's about 6,000 homeless people living in Skid Row, one of the largest stable populations of homeless people here in the US, and this place is only a few miles east of here.

Now, of course, I'm sure that I'm about to get responses like, "oh? You feel so sorry for those homeless people, why don't you go out there and help them instead of sitting here all day posting in this thread?"

See this post here to see the sort of reactions I've gotten whenever I've given homeless people handouts:

>>8386860

But let's say that I do decide to go out there to some homeless shelter, and help out in some soup kitchen.

And I just know how it's going to turn out. The experience will be like every other experience in my life.

People will just look at me and think, "this guy will only be here this one time to feel good about himself. He wants to prove to everyone how much of a nice guy he is. And then he's just going to leave and never come back. He doesn't really care."

Is there such a thing as a "selfless act"? How could I help people and it be completely "selfless acts" when in the end I'm still getting something out of it? I'll feel good about myself. I'll feel good knowing that maybe people will finally think of me as a better person, that I'm not selfish after all.

Maybe I should point out anecdotes in my past in which I've tried helping somebody out, like what I described in this post here:

>>8386860

Which happened nearly 10 years ago. But what good would such anecdotes do when I can't even prove to anyone that they really happened? And besides, all I'll really be doing in trying to prove to everybody that I'm not a selfish person after all.

>>8370986

And so that's the funny thing about narcissists, isn't it?

Narcissists are, in many ways, like sociopaths and psychopaths. In fact, they may as well all be the same thing. Or maybe it's all pseudoscience. Or maybe it's not.

Once a person is labeled a "narcissist", or a "sociopath", or a "psychopath"... or diagnosed with just about any other mental and/or personality disorder, it's basically like they're having a big label stamped on their forehead for everybody to see that states "EVIL" or "LAZY" or "CRAZY" or "WEAK" or "STUPID". And so, people take advantage of this. They see a person who is unfit for this world. They see a person who is deserving of all the hate and mockery.

So it's kind of like: narcissists, sociopaths, and psychopaths are in a way "philosophical zombies" no?

From this Wikipedia article:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie

>A philosophical zombie or p-zombie in the philosophy of mind and perception is a hypothetical being that is indistinguishable from a normal human being except in that it lacks conscious experience, qualia, or sentience. For example, a philosophical zombie could be poked with a sharp object and not feel any pain sensation, but yet behave exactly as if it does feel pain (it may say "ouch" and recoil from the stimulus, or say that it is in intense pain).

>The notion of a philosophical zombie is used mainly in thought experiments intended to support arguments (often called "zombie arguments") against forms of physicalism such as materialism, behaviorism and functionalism. Physicalism is the idea that all aspects of human nature can be explained by physical means: specifically, all aspects of human nature and perception can be explained from a neurobiological standpoint. Some philosophers, like David Chalmers, argue that since a zombie is defined as physiologically indistinguishable from human beings, even its logical possibility would be a sound refutation of physicalism.

>>8386945

And so therein lies the problem. I seem to have reached this point in my life where everybody around me has already assumed that I have, in fact, been officially diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. That I am, in fact, a narcissist. Why do I say this? Well...

In August of 2015, I decided to try getting the "adult high school diploma". Went to a place called "Job Corps" first, but I was told that I was too old to go there since they only accepted people between the ages of 16 – 24. Since I was 26 at the time, I was already too old to go to Job Corps. I then went to some place called an "occupational center", but it seemed that they were charging a bit too much for their classes.

So after nearly 10 years of dropping out, I decided to return to my old high school. I had already taken and passed the GED exam back in February 2010, and earned the "high school equivalency certificate", however; a cousin of mine told me that it looks better in resumes to have both the adult high school diploma and high school equivalency certificate when applying for jobs. The adult school classes are also free, so I figured, hey, this might be interesting. Being back in my old high school could make me feel nostalgic and might even help with my depression, and may even improve both my memory and attention spans through "neuroplasticity". Maybe now with Adderall, I could do much better in school.

It turned out to not be so easy.

>>8386945

On my first day I began to suspect that my teacher did not like me, but I brushed it off as it being due to my imagination. The adult school classes started at 1:30 PM, which was right in the middle of the regular high school classes when there's high school students (the students' ages: 14 – 18, my age: 27) walking around campus. I had initially assumed that the adult school classes would be filled with people 18+ years old (hence why the classes are called "adult" school), but it turned out that the majority of the students in adult school classes are actually minors, some of them are as young as 15 or even younger. I only needed to take three classes to obtain the high school diploma (English Composition/Expository, United States History 2, and United States Government), each class could be completed within ~100 hours, ~6 hours could be completed in 1 day (adult school classes ran from 1:30 PM to 9:00 PM, with a break from 5:30 PM to 6:00 PM), ~24 hours could be completed in 1 week (adult school classes were only on: Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays), and so I figured I could finish these classes within ~3 months.
.

>>8386945

I was wrong. It's been over a year since I started these classes and I've only finished 1 class so far. With each passing month, it was becoming increasingly obvious to me that my teacher, his teacher's assistant, and the students strongly disliked me. This became painfully obvious in April 2016 when I ended up writing an essay in which I believed that I may have Narcissistic Personality Disorder (or some other personality disorder) and that it was what may have caused my depression and anxiety. I had originally written on the essay: “if it turns out that I do have Narcissistic Personality Disorder or some other personality disorder”, but my teacher told me to remove that second “personality disorder” out of the sentence as it was redundant. The essay was typed up and saved on one of the school computers in the classroom. I had assumed that the essay would only be read by the teacher, but I was wrong. The essay could have easily been read by anyone in the classroom, including the students.

As it turns out, the essay actually was read by some of the students. And it seems as if: my teacher, his assistant, and his students have read the Wikipedia article on Narcissistic Personality Disorder. So now it would seem that everyone in the classroom have jumped to the conclusion that I have indeed been officially diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. And so now it would appear to be that they are going out of their way to humiliate and/or criticize me to drive me out of school. My teacher seems to think that I have ulterior (and malicious) motives for returning to my old high school.

I remember walking to my classroom one day and seeing a group of about 10—15 students outside of the classroom whispering to each other, and when they saw me, they stopped talking, turned to look at me, and one of them said “shit”. One student said, “why do you guys talk about him?” Another replied, “because he's a narcissist.”

>>8389287
>This became painfully obvious in April 2016 when I ended up writing an essay in which I believed that I may have Narcissistic Personality Disorder (or some other personality disorder) and that it was what may have caused my depression and anxiety.
Anon why did you think that would be appropriate topic for a class essay?

Also you sound like a hypochondriac regarding your mental health.

>>8389304

>Anon why did you think that would be appropriate topic for a class essay?

Why? Because I had assumed that the essay would only be read by the teacher. I had assumed that my thoughts were private, personal. I had assumed that my teacher would be a mature, professional, adult teacher. I had assumed that the classroom would be full of mature adult students (or at the very least make up the majority of the class.)

It was a reflective essay.

Isn't that what a English Composition/Expository class is for? To improve one's writing skills?

Isn't that the sort of thing that adults take adult school classes for?

That's part of the reason that I decided to return to school, anyway. To improve my writing skills. To improve myself in general.

I wrote that essay as an attempt to organize my thoughts into a legible manner, in a manner that is coherent for other people to read. For other people to understand how I think and feel, and why I do the things that I do.

I wrote that essay as an attempt to better understand myself.

>Also you sound like a hypochondriac regarding your mental health.

Fine. I'm a hypochondriac.

One of the reasons that I decided to start seeing mental health care professionals (psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, etc.) was because for years my family (among other people in my life, such as in school) have been telling me that I'm "crazy" and that "there's something seriously wrong" with me, and that I "need to seek professional help".

I had a job once. A "real" job. As a mall cop. See this post here for my experience as a mall cop:

>>8377797

That was only one month of work. Nearly five years ago.

And then I get people like my brother who I described in this post here:

>>8362351

So, then, what am I to think? When I'm 27 years old and I can't even do a simple mall cop job, when I can't even get my high school diploma, when I don't even have any friends... what am I supposed to think about my mental health?

>>8389377
>Because I had assumed that the essay would only be read by the teacher. I had assumed that my thoughts were private, personal. I had assumed that my teacher would be a mature, professional, adult teacher. I had assumed that the classroom would be full of mature adult students (or at the very least make up the majority of the class.)
Even so, it just doesn't seem like appropriate content for classwork. Surely you could see that it would be wiser to choose a different topic for reflection? H-how little awareness of social custom do you have anon?

As to you being told to seek help by people close to you, what did you do immediately preceding these events? Was it on par with writing a class essay about how you think you have narcissistic personality disorder?

Further, why are you here, on 4chan, asking people about this shit? Do you not trust your own ability to make determinations about things?

These are questions you should be asking yourself, frankly.

>>8389407

>Even so, it just doesn't seem like appropriate content for classwork. Surely you could see that it would be wiser to choose a different topic for reflection? H-how little awareness of social custom do you have anon?

I guess that's just the sort of person I am. I try to give people the benefit of doubt. I try to believe that, ultimately, all human beings mean well.

People (especially people within my family) have often told me that I should try being more sociable. That I'm "too quiet". That I should "talk more". That I should learn to be more "comfortable" with people. That I'm too "paranoid". That I should learn to "trust" in people more.

So that's what I try doing.

However, as soon as I open my mouth... people will immediately tell me to "shut up" or to "be quiet" or "go way" or "fuck off" or "you talk too much". Or, as my brother likes to do, make that "shhhh" sound when I'm talking. Or like his wife likes to do, just interrupt me with her "yeah, yeah, yeah".

I keep doing this. I keep getting told to talk more. So I talk more. Then get told to shut up.

As my father once told me: "you're too trusting". Maybe I really am too trusting. Maybe I really am an imbecile.

>Further, why are you here, on 4chan, asking people about this shit? Do you not trust your own ability to make determinations about things?

I'm on /sci/ right now. The "science & math" board of 4chan. There are many places like this on the internet. I mean, here, I have anonymity. The discussion here is fast-paced. This is the "body politic". I realize that nobody will believe me or even care when I say this, but I've been coming to 4chan since May of 2005. I've been coming to /sci/ since... maybe around... I think it was sometime in early 2010? I've had an interest in science since I was maybe 7 years old. This board interested me.

>>8389407

>As to you being told to seek help by people close to you, what did you do immediately preceding these events? Was it on par with writing a class essay about how you think you have narcissistic personality disorder?

I remember I once tried explaining to one of my cousins why it is that I have no friends. Why is that I've never had a girlfriend. Why it is why I'm still a virgin. I tried to explain to him things like: the "nature vs. nurture" argument. I tried to explain to him things about how the environment effects the way that a person turns out as an adult. A person's childhood and adolescent experiences largely influence how a person turns out. I tried to explain to him that I am the way that I am, because I've been largely influenced by the things that I've been taught by my family. He refused to accept this. He became very angry. He told me that I was "crazy", that there was "something seriously wrong with me", that I "need to seek professional help", that I was even crazier than another cousin of ours who has apparently been institutionalized, restrained, jailed, imprisoned, etc. at various points of his life. I'm even crazier than that guy, apparently!

>Further, why are you here, on 4chan, asking people about this shit? Do you not trust your own ability to make determinations about things?

Hey now, if I really am crazy... how could I possibly trust in my own intuition, my own logic, my own judgment?

You guys love discussing about what is or isn't "pseudoscience". You guys love discussing which fields are worth going into, which fields are "pseudoscience", which fields are superior to which others, etc.

I'm curious to see what you guys can tell me about all of this. About psychiatry. About psychology. About everything discussed in this thread.

>>8389442
>I try to believe that, ultimately, all human beings mean well.
Well you're wrong. Humans are purely self-interested creatures like every other animal, who only care (or pretend to care) about others when it's expedient to do so.

>People (especially people within my family) have often told me
Gonna go out on a limb and say that your family are useless, if only because they've managed to raise someone like you (no offense intended) and thus their advice should be discarded. Learn to think for yourself, and the dividends will literally never stop rolling in.

>>8389467
>He refused to accept this. He became very angry. He told me that I was "crazy", that there was [...] apparently!
At which point you should have realised that for some reason this person had ceased being committed to rational conversation, terminated your interaction, and probably your relationship with them.

>Hey now, if I really am crazy... how could I possibly trust in my own intuition, my own logic, my own judgment?
Well you couldn't, but crazy people tend not to be capable of that line of reasoning, or even of constructing coherent sentences generally. I mean a cousin of mine thinks he can make it rain by praying to god, among other things. He's actually crazy. You're perhaps a weird unit, but seemingly not bonkers.

>tfw starting to have delusions of reference
Jesus fuck please just kill me, please.

>ITT an anon with mild spectrum disorder tendencies talks to himself and listens to nobody.

You were abused, we get it. Move away from your family.

If someone has severe bipolar is it acceptible for them to kill themself

>>8389626

Maybe all of this really is a desperate attempt at gaining pity.

Or maybe a part of me is desperately hoping that you guys can talk me out of doing what I'm about to do... which is something seriously fucked up.

>>8389626
Fucking this every god damned thread in /r9k/

IT'S ALWAYS ABOUT ABUSE

What about the ones who weren't maltreated in an utmost manner or even an average manner?

OP, I've been on this psychological quest you speak of since 2012 and I'm 2 months into being 23 years of age. If anything, I'd say that you're really pushing yourself into psychotic tendies...shit I meant end it....fuck no i mean ten...cents..what? TENDENCES (close enough)...

If anything............it might just be schizoid personality disorder with schizotypal features.

>>8389887
>Maybe all of this really is a desperate attempt at gaining pity.

I've read all your posts and decisively formed an accurate picture of your situation.

Step 1) Stop trying to figure out what your "problem" is.

Step 2) Move away from your family.

Step 3) ???

Step 4) Profit

>>8384520
>>8384524
this is /sci/

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>mfw a /sci/tard tried to convince me that neural activity is the cause of mental activity

Join a crossfit box and don't quit for 6 months

>>8389990

>Move away from your family.

And what good would that do? Where would I go? To a homeless shelter? And then what? I can already imagine what would happen next.

I remember the things that my brother said last year. I remember this conversation that I wrote about in this post:

>>8362351

>I remember once asking my brother if he knew what depression was, why it is that I was taking antidepressants, what they were supposed to be doing for me, what they were really doing to me, and why I had depression in the first place. He said, "hahaha. I don't care. Why should I care? Stop whining. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Who cares? Nobody cares. Suck it up. Tough it out. There are people a lot worse off than you. Be a man."

I remember how that conversation went.

When he asked me, "why should I care?"

I responded, "you should care."

He asked again, "why?"

"Because you're family. You're my brother," I said.

He laughed and said, "hahaha! Not for much longer!"

I can remember a conversation that he was once having with a cousin of ours. A cousin feeding into my brother's narcissistic supply. I remember my brother saying, "if somebody offered me a job outside of the country, I'd take it. I'd just leave without telling my family. I don't care what happens to my family." Our cousin didn't discourage this line of thinking.

It's like this guy said in this post here:

>>8387430

>That's part of it- he's obviously the scapegoat of a narcissistic family.

That's essentially what I've become. I've become the scapegoat. That is my purpose in life.

And one day, I know, this will happen again...

>>8386889

>I remember a few years back, a couple of FBI agents stopped by our apartment.

Back then the FBI agents were looking for an old business acquaintance of my brother's. They were neither looking for me nor for my brother.

But the FBI has been going after my brother's other business acquaintances, little by little, raiding their homes, taking them down one by one.

>>8389990

And I just know that sooner or later, the IRS and/or FBI will find me, no matter where I am.

And they're going to arrest me.

And I'm going to prison.

And nobody is going to feel sorry for me.

I remember telling my psychologist about all of this, and he told me, "if that happens, just tell them that you were forced into it!"

Yeah, right.

That's not going to work.

Nobody is going to feel sorry for me.

Nobody is going to care.

My brother will be gone, and I will be left alone to take the blame.

>>8389626

Who am I going to listen to?

What I'm getting in this thread is a bunch of people with contradicting opinions.

I'm getting people like this guy telling me that my disorders aren't real and to stop taking any and all psychiatric medication because it's all bad for me:

>>8354964

I get people like this guy telling me that if psychiatric conditions were real, they'd be treated by neurologists:

>>8359043

Then there's this guy telling me to stop taking the psychostimulant Adderall and that I should take the antipsychotic Abilify instead:

>>8359341

And this guy is telling me that my disorders are real but they usually shouldn't be treated with medicine:

>>8360003

This guy is telling me that coming to 4chan for advice is a bad decision:

>>8362190

So on and so forth.

>>8389493

>Well you couldn't, but crazy people tend not to be capable of that line of reasoning, or even of constructing coherent sentences generally. I mean a cousin of mine thinks he can make it rain by praying to god, among other things. He's actually crazy. You're perhaps a weird unit, but seemingly not bonkers.

And that's the trippy thing. I can't even tell if any of this is real or not anymore. I can't tell if your post is real. I can't tell if this thread is real. I can't tell if I'm even really here, typing this right now, in front of my computer. How the hell do I know for sure? How do I know that I'm not just in some mental institution right now, imagining all of his?

These last few weeks, I've felt my whole world dismantling itself all around me. The world feels so surreal now. I feel like I'm the last human being on the world left. I have never felt so alone. Or maybe I'm not even human. Maybe I'm the alien, and everybody else is human. Maybe I'm unreal. Maybe I'm not even really here.

What is this that I'm feeling? Is this what schizophrenia is like? Am I at the onset of schizophrenia? Is this what they call "psychotic depression"? Is this what they call "amphetamine psychosis"?

Is this psychosis, is that what this is? How the hell can I tell?

If this were a dream right now, I'd try those "reality tests" (I think they're called?)... right? How do they go again? Count my fingers to see how many I have? Alright. Ten. I have ten fingers. Or eight fingers and two thumbs. Whatever. OK. Count them again. Same thing. It hasn't changed. Count them again. Same thing. Alright. Look at the clock. I'm looking at the clock. 9:49 PM, Pacific Standard Time. Check again. Same thing. 9:49 PM. Check again. 9:49 PM. If this were a dream, I'd see a different time, each and every time right?

God damn it. It shouldn't be that easy, should it? I could easily be deluding myself right now into thinking that this isn't a dream, when it actually is a dream.

>>8390348

God damn it. This is all so fucked up. I don't even know where to begin.

Ever since I had that phone conversation with my psychiatrist a few months back, I could feel my entire world falling apart. Everything that he told me completely contradicted my experiences.

I tried telling my psychologist about all of this, about what I'm feeling... I wanted to explain the reasoning behind my argument, and he refused to hear any of it.

He actually told me on one of his e-mails, "I refuse to accept an invitation into a philosophical argument with you. Your constant disbelief in everything that you are told will make you completely ignore everything that I tell you (I do not blame you for being this way.)"

He stopped responding to my e-mails several weeks ago.

How fucked up is that?

File: ancestryDNA.png (57KB, 999x951px)

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>>8387243

>Kill himself.

>I mean, if you have all this time to craft rhetoric on this thread, then you should actually do something meaningfull and pull the trigger.

>Everyone has their own problems, everyone is on a roadtrip to death, you are not different than them, off yourself if you are so eager.

I've been looking at the raw data of my DNA provided by AncestryDNA.

If a geneticist isn't willing to help me out, I figured that maybe I could find what I'm looking for. Maybe, once and for all, I could find that "empirical evidence" for the disorders that I've been diagnosed with. Maybe I could find "empirical evidence" for disorders and diseases that I have yet to be diagnosed with. Maybe I could find out whether or not I really am genetically predisposed to developing Alzheimer's disease, schizophrenia, antisocial personality disorder, etc.

Maybe if I find out that I don't have that variant of the Monoamine oxidase A gene associated with antisocial personality disorder, I could prove to people that I'm not a sociopath. I could prove to people that I'm not a completely awful person. But I don't think that anybody would actually care either way.

Maybe if I did actually have that variant of the MAO-A gene and I got in trouble with the law, I could get a somewhat less harsh sentence like this guy did:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-human-beast/201007/pity-the-poor-murderer-his-genes-made-him-do-it

I'm looking at my data right now. I tried to print it out. 16,000 pages. 16,000 pages of raw data. I don't think that any of this stuff is going to help me find what I'm looking for.

File: 25 chromosome pairs.png (52KB, 1895x951px) Image search: [Google]

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>>8390408

Wait, am I reading this data correctly?

Does this say that I have 25 pairs of chromosomes?

I thought that humans normally have 23 pairs of chromosomes (22 pairs of autosomes and one pair of sex chromosomes)?

Could this suggest a chromosome abnormality possibly suggesting a disorder such as autism spectrum disorder? Is this what they call "gene duplication"?

Or, shit, maybe AncestryDNA just fucked up my data. It just cuts off right there without elaboration.

Ugh. Maybe I'm not interpreting this data correctly. It's getting late. I should get some sleep.