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snapcap
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 Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 2:28 pm Post subject: Question for the negative schizophrenics |
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What is it like to go catatonic?
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questor
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| Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 5:20 pm Post subject: What's catatonia like? |
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Hate to answer a question with a question, but how is someone who is catatonic supposed to answer that question?  |
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Bun
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| Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 8:00 pm Post subject: Re: What's catatonia like? |
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| questor wrote: | | Hate to answer a question with a question, but how is someone who is catatonic supposed to answer that question? |
Aren't negative Schizophrenics any Schizophrenics without delusions or hallucinations though? As one, I can only say I don't know what Catalonia feels like. If I stay for too long in one position though, I get a sort of itch under my skin, and just sometimes I have a phantom feeling of my fingers moving even though they're not - I'm not sure what it means. |
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Dots
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| Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 8:43 pm Post subject: |
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Catatonia doesn't only occur in schizophrenia. It also can be defined in several ways, not just the common view of catatonia, where the person is fixed in one position and isn't moving. The other end of that scale is also defined as catatonia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catatonia
Can't answer what it feels like though, as I am assuming you mean the description listed under the subtype "stupor". I've never experienced that.
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sunshower
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| Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 10:17 pm Post subject: |
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I experience catatonia (although not these days as I am medicated against it) I think as a symptom of my bipolar disorder.
My experience of it was in a catatonic stupor although I once experienced the reverse (catatonic excitement - which was brought on by drugs) and that was a really scary experience. Catatonic stupor in its most severe form can be very scary too, although I find the level I sink to can vary a bit.
What catatonic stupor feels like is it's like out of the blue you suddenly feel like your body is rapidly slowing down, like for example you could be walking and you find yourself walking slower and slower for no reason even though in your head you're ordering your legs to move at the same pace as before. You may come to a halt, and find you suddenly need to lie down, then you can't get up. While this is all happening other stuff happens too, like you can feel your facial muscles going slack and if you're speaking or you try to speak your speech becomes slurred and slowed down, and incomprehensible (like you start repeating words or there are big gaps). This all happens pretty rapidly but I found that if I got a high burst of adrenalin (from some external stimulation) during the very early phases of going into the catatonic state sometimes this would prevent it.
Anyway, sorry for my atrocious garbled writing, I'm a bit unwell at the moment. I'll continue in a new paragraph.
So you're lying down in some position, and your brain is running in it's usual way (although probably racing a million miles an hour as you're freaking out or feeling frustrated - no matter how many times it happens to me I never take it calmly hahaha) and you've reached a point where you are unable to move a single muscle in your body, not even a finger. You order yourself angrily to "Move! Get up!" over and over but nothing happens. It's like your brain has disconnected from your body. Generally you will lie in whatever position you're in staring blanking ahead until the catatonic spell passes (normally for me 15 minutes to an hour at the outside). Mostly it doesn't get so bad that I can't speak - most commonly I find I get complete physical paralysis but use of my voice as normal, although generally with slurring and distortion. Occasionally I have had it so bad that I can't even speak though. Once I had it so bad I was struggling to breathe, because even that tiny action of taking air in required some sort of physical movement.
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sunshower
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| Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 10:19 pm Post subject: Re: What's catatonia like? |
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| questor wrote: | | Hate to answer a question with a question, but how is someone who is catatonic supposed to answer that question? |
You're not catatonic constantly, you experience bouts of it. The worse your disorder the more frequent the bouts are I guess. Before I had severe onset of bipolar disorder I still experienced catatonia but it was a very rare thing, I'd only have an episode once a month or once every few months. After onset and before medication I was having it several times a day, but no episode ever lasted longer than an hour (for me at least).
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jackbus01
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| Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 10:39 pm Post subject: Re: What's catatonia like? |
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| sunshower wrote: | | questor wrote: | | Hate to answer a question with a question, but how is someone who is catatonic supposed to answer that question? |
You're not catatonic constantly, you experience bouts of it. The worse your disorder the more frequent the bouts are I guess. Before I had severe onset of bipolar disorder I still experienced catatonia but it was a very rare thing, I'd only have an episode once a month or once every few months. After onset and before medication I was having it several times a day, but no episode ever lasted longer than an hour (for me at least). |
Sounds very scary! |
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Bun
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| Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 10:49 pm Post subject: |
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| sunshower wrote: | | What catatonic stupor feels like is it's like out of the blue you suddenly feel like your body is rapidly slowing down, like for example you could be walking and you find yourself walking slower and slower for no reason even though in your head you're ordering your legs to move at the same pace as before. You may come to a halt, and find you suddenly need to lie down, then you can't get up. While this is all happening other stuff happens too, like you can feel your facial muscles going slack and if you're speaking or you try to speak your speech becomes slurred and slowed down, and incomprehensible (like you start repeating words or there are big gaps). This all happens pretty rapidly but I found that if I got a high burst of adrenalin (from some external stimulation) during the very early phases of going into the catatonic state sometimes this would prevent it. |
What would you say is the key difference between that and being depressed/tired? If this is an accurate description of what happens to you when you're Catatonic, a lot of people with sleep disorders act the same way, can they be diagnosed Schizophrenics? |
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sunshower
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| Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 11:52 pm Post subject: |
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| Bun wrote: | | sunshower wrote: | | What catatonic stupor feels like is it's like out of the blue you suddenly feel like your body is rapidly slowing down, like for example you could be walking and you find yourself walking slower and slower for no reason even though in your head you're ordering your legs to move at the same pace as before. You may come to a halt, and find you suddenly need to lie down, then you can't get up. While this is all happening other stuff happens too, like you can feel your facial muscles going slack and if you're speaking or you try to speak your speech becomes slurred and slowed down, and incomprehensible (like you start repeating words or there are big gaps). This all happens pretty rapidly but I found that if I got a high burst of adrenalin (from some external stimulation) during the very early phases of going into the catatonic state sometimes this would prevent it. |
What would you say is the key difference between that and being depressed/tired? If this is an accurate description of what happens to you when you're Catatonic, a lot of people with sleep disorders act the same way, can they be diagnosed Schizophrenics? |
Oh no when you're depressed/tired it's harder to move/you're unmotivated to move but it is still possible to move. This is literally being unable to even lift a finger, even if you're busting to go to the toilet, or there is a plate of food sitting right in front of you and you're starving and all you have to do is reach out and take some. I remember once sitting with my lunch in front of me watching it go stone cold while I waited for the catatonia to end. Also I guess the other difference is you can end up in any weird position. Once or twice I've even ended up lying on my back with an arm sticking straight up in the air. You may feel really uncomfortable, or look utterly bizarre but you can't shift position.
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sunshower
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| Posted: Sat May 12, 2012 11:56 pm Post subject: |
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Also, as a person who also suffers from depression induced immobility, the two states are quite distinctively different to me. When I'm depressed I don't want to move, I feel like I don't care anymore, I have no energy, and there's this sort of hopeless empty lethargy, or I'm just so tired I lie down and don't get up. Whereas when I'm catatonic it's almost the opposite, I feel frustrated and almost furious, I want to get up and get moving, inside my head I'm just continually shouting at myself to move but nothing happens and it feels like the commands from my brain are not reaching my body. Depression doesn't feel like that, it still feels like my brain and body are in communication.
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Bun
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| Posted: Sun May 13, 2012 12:07 am Post subject: |
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Thank you, I understand better now.  |
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snapcap
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| Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 2:10 pm Post subject: |
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I appreciate the answers.
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