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Schizophrenia is the price we pay for minds poised near the edge of a cliff

(www.psychiatrymargins.com)
262 points Anon84 | 5 comments | 28 Jun 25 21:22 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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suzzer99 ◴[28 Jun 25 22:20 UTC] No.44408657[source]▶
I've lost one of my best friends to what I think is schizophrenia. We don't know because she's cut off all contact with friends and family and refuses to see a doctor. It's definitely psychosis. She thinks she's in some kind of Truman show that she calls "the game". Since none of her friends or family are willing to admit to it, then we must be in on it.

We don't know her full family medical history because her dad was adopted. I do know that she was "microdosing" and macro-dosing hallucinogens for years. Mostly acid and shrooms as far as I know. She followed the band Phish around with a group of friends. I can't imagine most of those shows were sober.

We've also seen a few incidents of paranoia when she was under the influence of drugs/alcohol going back decades. So it feels like this was always there in some form, but maybe the estrogen was holding it back before menopause hit. I read an article about women who get schizophrenia after menopause that suggested this could be the case.

Anyway, whenever I see wellness healers and the like extolling the virtues of psilocybin, I want to point out that there could be a downside. We don't know that all of her hallucinogen use over the years contributed to this. But it's certainly a possibility.

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krstffr ◴[29 Jun 25 07:20 UTC] No.44410949[source]▶
My friend had a very similar episode with a psychosis, but turned out to be bipolar, not schizophrenic. Sounds very similar though!

He was smoking a lot of weed leading up to and during the psychosis.

Ended up in psychiatric ward for a month, which was followed by a couple of years of depression/introspection/therapy, but is now doing great with lithium.

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1. woodpanel ◴[29 Jun 25 07:29 UTC] No.44410985[source]▶
It’s why I profoundly dislike the line of thinking that easier access to drugs means social progress.

It’s rather a shedding off of an inconvenience for those that have no (direct) problems of functioning (eg risk of developing addiction, psychosis, etc) at the heavy costs payed by those that are more vulnerable.

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2. adaptbrian ◴[29 Jun 25 10:24 UTC] No.44411877[source]▶
I'm all for getting illicit drug users out of jail, that's social progress. There needs to be more education and attempt at shoring up mental health in the public sector and not just kicking everyone into a room and calling it a day, like the problem is solved.
3. anticorporate ◴[29 Jun 25 12:50 UTC] No.44412707[source]▶
> It’s why I profoundly dislike the line of thinking that easier access to drugs means social progress.

While that framing might change the aperture for people to support decriminalization efforts, "helping people who have addiction means social progress" is the greater good here.

Unfortunately, at least from a USian perspective, we only got so far as the decriminalizing part, and we did it while actually cutting a lot of the social services, health care access, and safety net that actually help people with addiction function in society.

I had a parent with schizophrenia. I can tell you what a privilege it is to have my cannabis use be the primary risk factor I have to worry about, and not the financial stress and eventual homelessness, untreated health issues, and lack of mental health support my father faced.

4. tpm ◴[30 Jun 25 14:57 UTC] No.44424151[source]▶
> It’s rather a shedding off of an inconvenience for those that have no (direct) problems of functioning (eg risk of developing addiction, psychosis, etc) at the heavy costs payed by those that are more vulnerable.

And what about those who have a "direct problem of functioning" (like anxiety, depression, ptsd, whatever) and get no real help from the medical profession, but do get help from the drugs?

5. Yizahi ◴[01 Jul 25 14:27 UTC] No.44434225[source]▶
There is pretty much zero barrier for accessing any drug. Even being busted by police or border guards for drugs don't make it a permanent problem. The real problem is advertisement. Cities have drug advertisements everywhere and it's legal. Banning all types drug ads, including ads of brands selling drug products, would be a genuinely great step towards limiting their impact.