Fear and Harm

I grew up listening to stories about how my uncles fear others were to do harm to them.

It was not until much later did I start to experience what they experienced through positive symptoms and to understand what it feels like to have this "pathological" fear about being harmed.

And, then, I realized that an alternative kind of major fear I have is to do harm to the others.

Looking back at the past few months, although there were also scenarios within which I was afraid that others were to harm me, I found much of the stressor to be associated with how my own existence might directly or indirectly result in harms done to the others.

Right before I went into the hospital, the delusions and hallucinations were really proliferate... especially during those nights of sleepless in New York.

I will try to describe to you the general stories (delusions) that I cooked up involuntarily in my head. Yet, due to the vast number of the delusions and other concerns, I will not be able give you the exact sequence, scenarios and the true identity of the people involved.

Following is the recurring theme of the delusions that took place the whole night right before I went into ER on February, 12th, 2008.

[background]
Having difficulties sleeping the night before, I took about 600-800 mg of Seroquels before attempting to go to bed at 10:00 o'clock or so. Yet, after tossing and turning for hours, I was still unable to fall asleep. If I could recall correctly, the delusions and hallucinations seemed to have gotten worse and worse as it got later and later...

The recurring stories unfolded through out the night were simple.

[begin recurrent stories]
People could hear my thoughts and they could not stop hearing it. Having my thoughts as the background noise in their head makes them suffer. After hearing too much of my voices in their head, people were tired and frustrated to the degree that they want to come and do harm to me. At some point, there were people affiliated with me whose lives were taken away. The spirit of the deceased was still trying to protect me and told people that the condition won't change even if they were to harm me.

As a result, instead of coming directly to harm me in my room, the unhappy people went to attack those I love and care about... so these people were harmed or killed because of me in all different ways. In addition, some of them felt responsible for the plight I was in and eventually did harm to themselves. In other words, although I did not do anything to my loved ones, for me, I had done harm to them indirectly because they died because of me.
[end recurrent stories]

The description above seems a bit too boring... thought it might make it more contextualizing shall I try to give you a scenario or two within which I took actual actions in response to my delusions.

Scenario 1: They all are coming...

A lot of people were getting really upset because they could not stop listening to what I had to think of in my mind. I tried my best to think of nothing and to hope that, by falling asleep, I would be able to stop hearing them and they could stop hearing me. I did call my psychiatrist, he suggested to up the dosage, I upped the dosage to more than what he suggested, but, regardless how hard I tried, I was still wide awake.

At some point, I heard that a lot of people were really unhappy about their being sleepless... They gathered all together, walked down Broadway, moved towards the direction of my building and tried to revenge for their suffering.

I lied there quietly in bed, not quite sure what to do but feeling anxious about what I was to face.

Then, I finally got out of my bed, looked down the street towards the direction of Columbia University but didn't see them.

I do not recall now whether I realized it was but a delusion... the only thing I remember is that... I went back to rest in bed and fight to fall asleep again with even more delusions to unveil...

Scenario 2: Somebody sneaked in

I heard them said that someone had sneaked into my building trying to hurt me.

All different parties were trying to catch the guy but the guy was still on the loose.

Apparently, they (forgot whom) sent two people up to my floor since they know the target was me.

At some point, I heard people turning the nod of my door.

I didn't know whether it was the guy on the loose or those sent for my protection.

At some point, I got up to check what was really going on in the hallway. Nobody was there.

Scenario 3: Am I too loud?

I was, again, tossing and turning---

The neighbors kept on coming out from their rooms to go the the washroom... Every time they came out, I heard in my head how they were complaining about the loud noises they heard in my head.

They could not sleep because they couldn't stop hearing me... and they slammed the door when they went to the washroom, which scared me from my occasional resting moments and resulted in more and louder noises they heard in their head.

I heard them roaming around in the hallway.

At another point, I got up to check who was out there... I saw one of the guy living next door...

I hated to ask the question but I had to ask... "Am I making a lot of noise?"

"No."

Yet, I knew... he just didn't know how to tell me the truth (my delusional truth).