Tag: autistic

“Are You Hallucinating?”

“Are you hallucinating?” 

It sounds like such a simple and important question. But there are several catches that people don’t realize when they want to hear yes or no.

First question: do I know I’m hallucinating? I usually have a pretty decent grasp on that for the big stuff, but not everyone does. Corpse, not there. Dog I don’t have, not there. Hallucinations. 

But is that flash of light in the corner of my eye from traffic out the window, or my own mind? Is it just a trick of the light? Is staring at a trick of the light unsurely for way too long a hallucination? 

What about changing real objects? Is that cup upside down on the counter, or right side up? Well, if I just confirm: is there a glass? That’s not useful. Sometimes it is Alice in Wonderland like distortions, larger, smaller, some more subtle than others until your fingers flit through the top of an object that doesn’t quite reach there. 

Is there a slight aura around that lamp, or just me? Is the cat messing around upstairs making hard to describe noises, or is it in my head? Neighbors talking indistinctly, or just me? 

Should I start describing everything in the room to you to make sure we see all the same things? Hear? Smell? 

What about the fact that my sensory processing issues mean I frequently hear very real sounds that other people don’t pick up on until they really listen for them? What then? 

I remember in a bad psychosis phase putting on noise canceling headphones and realizing how much noise I still heard. But it was just that: noise. Like a white noise machine. Like very steady running water. Like the sound of a crowded restaurant when no table is drawing attention in particular. Like the cats making a ruckus upstairs. It just kind of added mental decibels to what was really going on around me (which, as someone with sound sensitivity, is its own very real issue). But how to describe that? 

Also consider that my line between reality and hallucination, or even fantasy, is jagged and thin and I’m highly suggestible in that way. If you say, “Are you seeing Farrah right now?” Well, I wasn’t. Until you said her name. Now I kind of got a flash of her, my little recurring golden retriever, like a mental flashback. But is that the normal helpless visualization that comes from people talking? What if, three minutes after you said that, she hasn’t quite gone away yet, flickering in and out, under a real chair in the room? “Ah, now I am. Nope, not anymore—wait, there it is! Oh—nope. Hold on—ah, there—no.”

Is my daydreaming over the line of hallucinating when it sometimes slips a few seconds ahead of my actual thoughts? When characters can do things unexpected? When I can’t snap back out of it?

Is seeing a blur out of the corner of my eye that’s never there when I turn a hallucination? Is it a hallucination if I sense something that isn’t there, but don’t strictly see it? 

What if the real issue is delusion—times I think I’m hallucinating something that’s very much there—like the person asking the question? 

“Are you hallucinating?” It’s not really a yes or no question. No is a simple, soothing answer, if temporary by nature. Yes means something definable has gone wrong without doubt. But it’s not really hallucinating or not hallucinating—or, for my Hunger Games fans—real or not real. 

The answer for me, sometimes, is pretty definitively yes. But I’m not sure I’d ever give a definitive no—because what do I know? Who am I, the schizophrenic one, to answer that? I don’t trust my perceptions any longer. And how long do you have to think you’re not hallucinating for before it counts? If Farrah was here three minutes ago and isn’t now, can I say no? An hour? A day? A week? Ah, gerunds.

I don’t really have a better question to propose. Just some things to keep in mind. It’s tricky in a lot of often overlooked ways. That’s the thing with schizophrenia—it’s not a real or not real game—even when it is mostly episodic, you are always questioning. Every flash of light, every distant conversation, every dog, every bump in the night. 

Real or not real? 

Might want to ask someone else. 

Assorted Illnesses and Language (A Conlang Concept)

As someone into grammar and linguistics, who debates the requirements of a split infinitive and the correctness of implied antecedents and whether you can punctuate dialogue with semicolons, for fun, language is in my head a lot. 

As someone with schizophrenia, not to mention autism, language gets messy. 

I’ve pondered making a mini conlang based on superlatives. 

Tired, tireder, tiredest. 

The thing is that the difference between “tired” or “very tired” or “sleepy” or “exhausted” can mean very different things to lots of people. 

To me, “exhausted” clearly meant, “I am about to fall asleep on my feet and it is hazardous for me to stand up.” I found out that apparently, other people use exhausted to mean what I call pretty sleepy—a strong urge towards going to bed as things got hazy. 

Additionally, I separated mental and physical energy in a way a lot of people apparently do not. I can be ready for a long, productive writing session while barely able to sit up. Much less frequently, on the other side, I can be nonverbal and ready to run a mile. Their correlation is low if not nonexistent. 

Plus, it can be hard to describe things that are incredibly subjective or an uncommon experience. How dissociated are you? How intrusive are the hallucinations? How bad is the sensory overload? This isn’t a new problem—say, pain—if you’ve ever been to a doctor’s office, you’ve seen a chart of smiley faces and numbers desperately trying to solve it.

So I pondered a sort of mini loglang that would use some extremely simple ways to describe certain spectrums, to be used between me and people its relevant to. I faced the reality that they would go “which one was that word again?” and I would tell them the definition, which meant I should just start with that definition. It still might be useful for journaling or something, and it’s still in my mind. 

Say, tired, tireder, tiredest, sleepy, exhausted, mental and physical energy. 

It could be given a rating system, maybe 1-5. 

MentalTired1—messing up a few words now and then, a bit slow to catch hidden meaning or jokes, not coming up with brilliant ideas. 

to

MentalTired5—nonverbal, and non responsive to language input.

or 

PhysicalTired1—notable muscle fatigue, depending on cause, might be slightly short of breath/sweating. 

to 

PhysicalTired5—it is hazardous for me to be sitting up unsupported; will be unconscious shortly. 

Etc. 

There’s also the kinds of overlap—mental distress that creates physical symptoms. Anxiety and muscle tension, nausea, chest pain. Depression and lethargy. Hallucinating and dizziness. Sensory overload and headache. Things that can be hard to explain in English if you have only ever experienced the symptoms independently, or only the physical side. 

When tested for diagnosis, I took an IQ test, which I don’t find to be the one true measure of intelligence or all of what it’s sometimes made out to be, but it was interesting, and an example here— 

My verbal reasoning? 130. 

My spatial reasoning? 92. 

I’ve written millions of words of fiction in my life, never gotten a B in English, but I both miss doorways for walls and still have to do the L thing with my hands to find left and right on a daily basis. 

The difference between skills like that also influences how some days I can write a book but not sit up. 

When those physical and mental lines get blurry and when adjectives don’t describe symptoms, language gets tricky. At least English—I may have to look into others. 

What seems like a long time ago, I pondered going into a very specific form of being a therapist as a career based on what I would call conlang therapy—like art therapy, but creating with language. While being a mental health professional is not for me, and I have no idea if that as a therapy type would’ve been really feasible, it was an interesting concept. 

Words make people feel powerful. It’s why we reclaim slurs, cling to favorite quotes and lyrics, wear some labels with pride. 

Surely there’s something to a therapy practice of building yourself up by making language that has failed you, work for you. 

Just a thought.