[HN Gopher] Navigating the world when your senses conjure up phe...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Navigating the world when your senses conjure up phenomena others
       can't perceive
        
       Author : Caiero
       Score  : 67 points
       Date   : 2023-04-22 05:38 UTC (17 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (theamericanscholar.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (theamericanscholar.org)
        
       | TheAceOfHearts wrote:
       | If you get really good at meditating you can temporarily cancel
       | out tinnitus. Well, the input still appears to be there, but you
       | can shift it outside of your awareness. Have you ever tried using
       | tinnitus as a meditative anchor?
        
       | tyingq wrote:
       | The _" senses conjure up phenomena that others can't perceive"_
       | reminded me of stories I've seen of compass implants that give
       | you some innate ability to know which way is north.
       | 
       | I'm skeptical about the actual devices that are available now,
       | since they seem to come from a very fringe subculture. But, the
       | general idea is pretty interesting. Whether that's a compass, or
       | IR sensing, sounds out of normal human hearing range, or
       | something else. Any sort of of additional sense you don't have
       | already.
       | 
       | I'm curious about how well a device like that over time might get
       | sort of "wired" in a way that it works on a subconscious level.
       | That it would add a new signal that your brain would incorporate
       | without you having to mentally consider it.
        
       | everyone wrote:
       | HN Are any forms of tinnitus treatable?
       | 
       | I have pretty bad tinnitus, a very high pitched ringing seemingly
       | coming from one ear. It seems to have gradually gotten worse and
       | worse over the past few years.
       | 
       | It's kind of driving me crazy. I am normally the kind of person
       | who likes to sit quietly thinking and listening to the wind.
       | 
       | I've been really busy with work, but one thing that's been
       | keeping me going is a plan to go see some specialists about this
       | when I have time. If there is a way to cure it I would give up
       | everything I own, all my money to do so. Even if I had to go deaf
       | in one ear or something.
        
         | bruce343434 wrote:
         | I find momentary relief by opening audacity, generating a sine
         | tone that is roughly the same frequency. Wear headphones and
         | set the volume to sort of loud, play for roughly 5 seconds.
         | This relieves my symptoms for a few seconds, after which they
         | come back again (but weaker, and not as intrusive as before).
        
         | anon84873628 wrote:
         | Your last paragraph doesn't compute for me, friend. This issue
         | is so bad that you would give up everything to cure it, but you
         | haven't seen someone yet because you're busy with work? What's
         | the real priority then? Don't let healthcare be some sort of
         | reward -- are you working to live or living to work.
        
           | everyone wrote:
           | Yeah I agree, but I know how to work and have been doing it
           | every day for most of my life. I dunno how healthcare works
           | and how to even begin this tinnitus investigation process.
           | It's a domain knowledge thing, Its very easy to just keep
           | doing what your doing no matter how much it sucks.
           | 
           | Also one thing I have picked up is that healthcare is
           | extremely expensive. I said I'd give up all my possessions
           | for a cure, but lets say there is a cure, I realistically may
           | not have enough wealth to afford it. And food and shelter is
           | actually a higher priority than the tinnitus.
        
             | klyrs wrote:
             | Stress can cause or aggravate tinnitus. If you feel like
             | you can't step away from work long enough to see a doctor,
             | that might be the problem.
        
         | meneseteung wrote:
         | I also have bad tinnitus in one ear, as well as hearing loss
         | and occasional balance issues (Meniere's disease).
         | 
         | In my case, managing my blood sugar levels has probably been
         | the most helpful thing. Specifically, I've started using sugar
         | substitutes that don't spike my blood sugar, such as stevia,
         | xylitol, and allulose, whenever feasible. I've also found that
         | keeping a regular meal schedule (i.e. limiting snacks) and not
         | overeating does a lot to keep my tinnitus in check.
         | 
         | Reducing your alcohol usage could help as well, as alcohol is
         | known to be ototoxic. For me, red wine is probably the worst,
         | as it dependably exacerbates my tinnitus.
         | 
         | If you're experiencing hearing loss as well, you might also
         | consider reducing your sodium intake if it's above the
         | suggested daily limit.
         | 
         | None of these solutions completely get rid of my tinnitus, but
         | they do help keep it to manageable levels.
        
         | zarzavat wrote:
         | It often gets better with time. You don't notice your clothes
         | on your skin right? Even though objectively you know that the
         | clothes are touching your skin, your mind learns to tune that
         | out. The best thing you can do is to preoccupy yourself with
         | something else and let your mind do the work of learning to
         | ignore it.
         | 
         | If you keep focusing on it then you are reinforcing the
         | stimulus which makes it worse. And you get into a vicious
         | cycle.
         | 
         | Perhaps unhelpful advice to follow but the best thing that
         | helped me was getting a crazy girlfriend, my mind was so
         | preoccupied with other things that I just forgot about the
         | tinnitus.
        
         | codethief wrote:
         | > Are any forms of tinnitus treatable?
         | 
         | Yes, at least some are. From personal experience I know that
         | stiffness of the neck & back and, e.g., trigger points[0] can
         | cause tinnitus, too. Fixing those has cured me of tinnitus
         | various times. Though I should add that that neck issues and
         | those trigger points will have a habit of coming back if you
         | don't also fix your overall posture and balance spending hours
         | in front of a screen with plenty of (back & neck) exercise.
         | 
         | [0]: https://www.painscience.com/tutorials/trigger-points.php
        
         | mhandley wrote:
         | I've had hearing loss and really loud tinnitus in one ear for
         | more than 40 years, after getting mumps as a teenager. But if
         | I'm not thinking about my tinnitus, I simply don't notice it.
         | As soon as I think about it, it's there, really loud, like
         | high-pitch radio static on maximum volume. Over time my brain
         | has become accustomed to separating real sounds from the
         | tinnitus. I can still really appreciate a quiet place, despite
         | the roaring static in my ear. I'm sure that it helped that my
         | hearing damage happened when I was relatively young, and that
         | it only affects one ear, but the brain is amazingly plastic,
         | adapting to cope with your limitations.
        
       | tenken wrote:
       | Have doctors not been able to help with the authors ear issues?
       | .... Hearing aids don't help?...
        
         | jeroenhd wrote:
         | If they were able to, the author wouldn't have written this
         | article, or would've added it at least.
         | 
         | Tinnitus is a challenging problem because there can be physical
         | causes (like hearing damage from loud music) but there's also a
         | brain component. Certain diseases like MS, concussions, or some
         | types of brain diseases can cause it even if your hearing
         | organs are perfectly fine.
         | 
         | It's possible the author has had damaged hearing from a very
         | young age but based on the wide variety of sounds they're
         | describing, I'm guessing there's more going on than just ear
         | issues. It's possible that these noises are just strange
         | hallucinations of the auditory cortex, like someone hearing
         | voices or sounds that aren't there but expressed less
         | concretely.
         | 
         | As anecdata: an acquaintance of mine was cured of his tinnitus
         | when he got therapy and made life changes to benefit his mental
         | health. It turned out stress and other such problems were
         | causing his hearing issues all along!
         | 
         | As far as I know, there is no known cure to tinnitus as bad as
         | this article describes. In some cases the problematic symptoms
         | can be reduced (people sleeping with a fan on or some white
         | noise generator running to reduce the ringing of the ears is a
         | common example) but the symptoms often come back soon after
         | turning off the noise.
        
         | quantumsequoia wrote:
         | I suspect you have the common misconception about how hearing
         | loss works. Impared hearing doesn't mean the volume is turned
         | down and needs to be increased. Often times, impared hearing
         | means you can hear some frequencies perfectly fine, but are
         | deaf to some frequencies (usually higher frequencies)
         | 
         | If you are missing hair cells in your ear for a certain
         | frequency, hearing aids can't make you hear them no matter how
         | much they increase the volume for those frequencies. Best they
         | can do is pitch shift them so you hear them at a different
         | frequency.
        
           | tenken wrote:
           | ah thanks for the clarification.
           | 
           | I suppose I was unclear, i ment in the article they mention
           | some breathing techniques to try to help hearing... But i was
           | curious if any other steps were taken? And if they helped
           | whatsoever.
           | 
           | I asked because their brief discussion on vision quality was
           | " i lied to my doctor as a kid, and in my 30s got eye surgery
           | that was scary and messed with my perceptions!"..... Yet they
           | seemed to skip just using plain old glasses to aide their
           | vision throughout their formative years or even young adult
           | years .... Or maybe that was just a narrative omission.
           | 
           | I was born premature at 2 lbs which caused retinopathy of
           | prematurity. I've used glasses since age 2 and my eyes are
           | prone to complications; having just had cataract surgery in
           | my early 40s .... It seemed to me from the writing the author
           | has an aversion to doctors throughout their life and seeking
           | informed treatment ... But maybe I read the piece wrong...
        
         | [deleted]
        
       | motrm wrote:
       | This was an interesting read for me, particularly around the
       | phantosmia.
       | 
       | For the past few decades - since puberty or thereabouts - I
       | started to smell something unpleasant and it wouldn't go away no
       | matter where I was, or how recently I'd had a wash, leading me to
       | assume it must be me and that I simply smell.
       | 
       | After suffering for a while I finally reached out to family and
       | bosses at work and of course their response was that I don't
       | smell, which was news to me. I had assumed I stank and everyone
       | was awfully politely putting up with it.
       | 
       | Spoken therapy and CBT helped a bit, but being the NHS it trailed
       | off in an unsatisfactoy fashion and so I dealt with it myself
       | over the years by becoming a hermit.
       | 
       | Later in life I paid for further spoken therapy and was
       | prescribed an SSRI anti-depressant and that finally put me on the
       | path to not smelling bad smells more often than not. SSRIs of
       | course have side effects which aren't fantastic, but it's better
       | than the godawful feeling that you stink!
       | 
       | I feel for the author who dealt with this on top of tinnitus.
       | 
       | It's not often that I get to talk about this, if anyone has any
       | similar experiences I'd love to hear about them :)
        
         | nashashmi wrote:
         | Could be your upper lip
        
         | echelon_musk wrote:
         | To say that I experienced a mental breakdown would be putting
         | it lightly.
         | 
         | However, in this time I experienced altered smell. I haven't
         | spoken about this much. Nearly all food smelled rancid, putrid
         | and rotting. Despite visually appearing to be free from decay -
         | it was normal food. Humans stank, including myself and it was a
         | horrible time.
         | 
         | Eventually, also with medication, I was able to regain a more
         | normal sense of smell. I suspect that human smell is something
         | like a radio - capable of perceiving far more than we imagine,
         | but that neurochemistry dictates where that smell frequency is
         | dialled to.
         | 
         | Perhaps as humans we are ordinarily on the evolutionarily
         | optimal frequency, a kind of middle ground, despite much more
         | being possible.
        
       | ghastmaster wrote:
       | Reading this was like reading my biography with the exception of
       | covid nose. I on the other hand gained better sense of smell
       | after a routine gallbladder removal surgery. I smell some
       | fragrances for hours or days after the person has left after just
       | a brief interaction. I am smelling things I never smelled before.
        
         | quacked wrote:
         | Do you enjoy having a sense of smell that powerful?
        
           | ghastmaster wrote:
           | Yes. Except twice a day when I drive by the city dump.
        
       | criddell wrote:
       | I'm also dealing with tinnitus, although I've only had it for the
       | past 5 years or so (I'm 53 this year).
       | 
       | For a while I was following the development of the drug FX-322
       | and was really disappointed when it failed in trials.
       | 
       | Does anybody here know anything about https://www.lenire.com/?
       | I'm on their waiting list for the US and am hopeful.
        
         | maininformer wrote:
         | I don't know how severe yours is, but I meditate and I either
         | developed or started noticing mine; then I found out many many
         | meditators have it too. It is possible to not notice it in your
         | day to day unless I focus on it.
        
           | criddell wrote:
           | I'm not 100% sure, but I think systems like the one I linked
           | to help you train your brain to react differently to the
           | stimulus (or lack of stimulus) that may cause tinnitus. I
           | really don't know though and finding people who have tried
           | the system is hard (I think they are mostly in Ireland).
           | 
           | There's another system being spun out of research from
           | University of Michigan that seems similar but they seem to be
           | very slow getting anything to market (which may be a good
           | thing).
        
       | vvoid wrote:
       | I empathize especially with the author's account of "covid nose."
       | For me, Coca Cola now tastes like patchouli. When I say that out
       | loud, it's easier for others to believe I'm simply a
       | hypochondriac, or that I've forgotten what Coke tastes like, or
       | possibly it's made differently where I'm from. As far as I can
       | tell, it's nerve damage. How could I forget the taste of summer
       | vacation?
       | 
       | Back when smell loss was a common side effect of Covid, the NYT
       | ran a series of articles on retraining one's sense of smell, by
       | e.g. smelling all the jars on the spice rack. I found those
       | articles patronizing. I can instantly recall what both Ceylon and
       | Korintje cinnamon are "supposed" to smell like, but those
       | memories are now mismatched with my olfactory system. All I can
       | do is decide whether to accept the new sense, or just avoid the
       | taste altogether.
       | 
       | We don't discuss smell like we discuss our other senses. Perhaps
       | it's due to the difficulty of producing smell on demand, unlike
       | within the visual or auditory domains. Despite being one of our
       | most basic senses, smell seems to lie behind an inherent veil of
       | subjectivity. My experience with continuous olfactory
       | "hallucination" made me second guess that.
        
         | seiferteric wrote:
         | > All I can do is decide whether to accept the new sense, or
         | just avoid the taste altogether.
         | 
         | I've accepted that my sense of smell will never fully recover
         | (been about 1.5 years now). It's not as bad as when I first got
         | it, where things smelled really weird and chemically/burnt,
         | some things are closer to what they used to be, but overall my
         | sense of smell is greatly muted from what it used to be. Kinda
         | sad since I used to think I had a pretty "refined" palate :)
        
       | moffkalast wrote:
       | > I like that the word phantom is used. There are ghosts in my
       | ears, spooks in my nose, tiny wraiths in my eyes.
       | 
       | This reminds me of that quote mocking old timey doctors "You've
       | got ghosts in your blood and should do cocaine to fix it."
        
       | danparsonson wrote:
       | I know someone who recently started to experience visual noise -
       | spots all over their field of view like TV static. After some
       | research and testing it appears they have a thing called Visual
       | Snow Syndrome, sort of the eye equivalent of tinnitus.
       | 
       | So far no idea what to do about it though - has anyone here come
       | across this before?
        
         | DontchaKnowit wrote:
         | This is very common in recreational polydrug users,
         | particularly in users of dissociative anesthetic drugs and
         | psychedelics. So if you do those, stop for good. The effect
         | will slowly mitigate.
        
         | sneed_chucker wrote:
         | I've had this for a few years now.
         | 
         | I'd say the first thing to do is go to a doctor and rule out
         | any more serious cause of the visual phenomenon, e.g. MS, brain
         | tumor, and so on.
         | 
         | If that's all clear, then you kind of have to just get used to
         | it. Taking care of your overall health, like getting enough
         | sleep, exercising, and eating well, seems to help people with
         | their symptoms either directly or indirectly.
         | 
         | There are a few neuro-opthalmologists working on treatments
         | that seem to produce some degree of improvement in patients.
        
           | danparsonson wrote:
           | That's useful, thank you for sharing your experiences.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | loa_in_ wrote:
         | In my case, anecdata warning, it was caused by nose injury due
         | to dry air 24/7 causing swelling inside the skull and impairing
         | circulation combined with overall circulation problems, mainly
         | neck tightness due to stress building up over time. It's now
         | gone
        
           | Wurlitzer wrote:
           | Interesting. Did you do something in particular to make it go
           | away?
        
             | loa_in_ wrote:
             | No alcohol, more rest, more coffee with cinnamon, more
             | sugar to help relaxation of muscles, more magnesium, b12,
             | 
             | extra water and salt, temporarily, to accommodate more
             | fluid capacity of relaxed body and it's vessels
             | 
             | Eye movement. Eyeballs have a little opening at the back
             | that acts as a drain for eyeball fluid, but it's only able
             | to drain in "wall eyed" position for me, so looking at
             | something very far away
             | 
             | Eyeball massage. Gently pressing down on your eyeballs with
             | palm of hand or squeezing one's eyelids tight shut for few
             | seconds repeatedly
        
             | [deleted]
        
           | danparsonson wrote:
           | That's very interesting thank you - stress may well be a
           | factor in my friend's case. Glad to hear that you recovered.
        
       | VoodooJuJu wrote:
       | I think one of the best treatments for tinnitus is, not
       | experimental drugs, nor surgeries, but a book: Marcus Aurelius's
       | _Meditations_. Stoicism.
       | 
       | I have tinnitus. It's particularly bad in one ear at the moment.
       | It's not ideal. Not pleasant. But I get over it, and I continue
       | living my life. What's strange is, practically every time I've
       | seen someone bring up their experience with tinnitus, it's
       | accompanied with a deluge of whining and commiserating. It's
       | weird because there are far more grave medical conditions that I
       | don't think have even a fraction of the commiserating and
       | depressiveness that tinnitus sufferers have.
       | 
       | So, as a tinnitus "sufferer", that's my personal recommendation:
       | Stoicism. Deal with it and move on.
        
         | _dain_ wrote:
         | have you considered the possibility that other people have a
         | more severe form of tinnitus than you.
         | 
         | besides, putting suffering in scare quotes -- i.e. macho
         | posturing where you pretend the suffering is not real -- is not
         | what stoicism is about at all.
        
         | CoastalCoder wrote:
         | Not everyone is at the same place in their grieving /
         | acceptance/ adaptation process.
        
       | FollowingTheDao wrote:
       | Person with Schizoaffective Bipolar Disorder here. (I also have
       | tinnitus but whatevs).
       | 
       | Doing this has been what I feel is my greatest accomplishment.
       | You know, thoughts are a sense. You sense thoughts like you sense
       | sounds. You do not think thought, that is just an illusion of the
       | ego. You are not the thinker!
       | 
       | Once I understood this my life became so much easier. Nothing is
       | reality to me anymore, everything is a loosely coordinated social
       | hallucination. So when I see birds flying the corner of my room
       | it makes sense, and I enjoy them. When I see a cat walk across
       | the coffee shop I get to enjoy something no one else can. When I
       | hear peoples thoughts and they are telling me they can read mine
       | I open myself up to them and share my darkest secrets.
       | 
       | We should all realize that our senses are a shared hallucination.
       | It might help solve a lot of problems in the world.
        
         | kayodelycaon wrote:
         | > Thoughts are a sense.
         | 
         | I never really thought of it that way. I can feel my mood as if
         | it was any other sense. Subconscious paranoia has the feeling
         | of sharks in the back of my mind.
        
         | psychphysic wrote:
         | Those are very unusual, atypical hallucinations and
         | Schizoaffective disorder and Bipolar Disorder are two separate
         | but similar disorders.
        
           | FollowingTheDao wrote:
           | "Those are very unusual, atypical hallucinations"
           | 
           | They have been telling me that all my life. What is your
           | point?
           | 
           | "Schizoaffective disorder and Bipolar Disorder are two
           | separate but similar disorders"
           | 
           | Yes, and Schizoaffective Disorder Bipolar Type is it's own
           | thing.
           | 
           | A Misdiagnosed Case of Schizoaffective Disorder With Bipolar
           | Manifestations
           | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8394638/
           | 
           | What's your point?
           | 
           | There is a relation to them all, some of us do not fit into
           | neat little diagnostic packages. Actually, most of us do.
           | 
           | https://academic.oup.com/schizophreniabulletin/article/40/3/.
           | ..
        
             | [deleted]
        
           | kayodelycaon wrote:
           | From Wikipedia:
           | 
           | There are three forms of schizoaffective disorder: bipolar
           | (or manic) type (marked by symptoms of schizophrenia and
           | mania), depressive type (marked by symptoms of schizophrenia
           | and depression), and mixed type (marked by symptoms of
           | schizophrenia, depression, and mania).
        
             | psychphysic wrote:
             | The issue isn't that, you can't simply rearrange words and
             | omit others the way he used the phrase was nonsensical.
             | 
             | And having a quick look through his post history I suspect
             | it's a self diagnosis and one of several he has given
             | himself, which is at times just "bipolar disorder".
        
               | FollowingTheDao wrote:
               | Sometimes people do not put words in the order you want.
               | Sorry.
               | 
               | > And having a quick look through his post history I
               | suspect it's a self diagnosis and one of several he has
               | given himself, which is at times just "bipolar disorder".
               | 
               | Sorry I was not specific enough for random people on the
               | internet who are not into psychiatry and would probably
               | not know the distinction. I usually tell people I am just
               | Bipolar because that is less scary to people than the
               | "Schizo" part.
               | 
               | And you know, in general, I am nonsensical to most
               | people, but most people are not as smart as me.
               | 
               | If you want to call my doctor to verify my condition. But
               | I mean how does one get disability with a diagnosis I
               | made up myself? A lot of people with Long COVID would
               | like to know.
        
             | [deleted]
        
         | austinjp wrote:
         | > thoughts are a sense
         | 
         | This is a wonderfully simple, profound insight. Thanks for
         | sharing it :)
        
         | CoastalCoder wrote:
         | I'm really impressed that you came up with a mental model that
         | works so well. Thanks for sharing!
        
         | SamoyedFurFluff wrote:
         | I agree and I would take this one step further. I would
         | challenge that not just our senses are a shared hallucination
         | but how those senses are perceived are just as prone to
         | delusional thinking/beliefs not set in reality as anyone else.
         | Someone can objectively type a neutral statement but you can
         | interpret it as passive aggressive and now have a delusional
         | belief that this person dislikes you, assuming you know their
         | intent and mind.
         | 
         | I myself run into this a lot with people who aren't on the
         | schizophrenia spectrum of disorders: they tend to believe
         | wholly that their interpretation of stimuli is equivalent to
         | reality, and are highly resistant to the idea that their
         | impressions can be wrong. This is anywhere from "you didn't
         | text me back after 10 minutes, you don't like me" to "I like
         | this programming language therefore I end up believing it's
         | technically necessary" and especially the "I can't
         | conceptualize someone else's experiences, therefore they must
         | be lying".
        
         | sabpthrwy wrote:
         | Hi, I realize this is unorthodox, but there are so few people
         | like you, that I'm hoping you can offer me some advice. My wife
         | was diagnosed as BP1 at 18 due to psychosis associated with
         | mania. Many years later in her mid 30s, I believe she's been
         | misdiagnosed, as she suffers from persistent auditory
         | hallucinations even when not manic, which I believe is the
         | threshold for schizoaffective BP. I've actually just only come
         | to learn about this disorder recently. I've thought she was BP1
         | this whole time, but I think there's more to it now.
         | 
         | The issue is that I cannot convince her that she's
         | hallucinating, even though I'm positive she is. Indeed, she's
         | hallucinated me saying things, and those are just about the
         | only ones I can convince her. But that only happened one time.
         | What's more, she believes she's hearing things from her
         | doctors, so she switches them constantly. I can't get a hold of
         | them either, of course, because as you probably know, family
         | members have next to zero rights when it comes to this kind of
         | thing.
         | 
         | How can I ever convince her to seek help and medication for
         | these hallucinations? How can I get a doctor to listen to me
         | and take me seriously about what's happening to her? It seems
         | impossible to break through. Even when I do convince her that a
         | specific hallucination was as such, she never considers the
         | possibility on her own.
         | 
         | This leads to situations where she's cut out her entire family
         | because she believes they are saying terrible things about her
         | when her back is turned, or through walls. We can't pass
         | strangers on the street because when we do, she's sure they're
         | talking shit about her. She can't hold down a doctor because
         | when she leaves, she thinks he is gossiping about her with the
         | receptionist, and when they talk, of course she never brings up
         | hallucinations she's having. Thank God for remote work because
         | she hasn't had a serious job since 2014 until now. I don't know
         | how to break this cycle, and it's only getting worse.
         | 
         | How were you convinced that you were hallucinating?
        
           | LeonTheremin wrote:
           | Schizophrenia is electromagnetic interference caused by
           | terrorists with access to advanced weaponry.
           | 
           | The cure is to shield the nervous system by using absorbing
           | material like meat or living in a shielded room.
           | 
           | Same for Havana Syndrome, EMF hypersensitivity. Read my
           | posts.
           | 
           | Read or watch "The Three Body Problem" series to understand
           | why humanity is under electromagnetic surveillance and
           | sabotage and our science and tech is hindered so we can't
           | defend ourselves.
           | 
           | Religion is organized fraud to prevent scientific progress,
           | but attacks with radiation are done to scientist also.
           | 
           | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YrLompD6e_k
        
             | FollowingTheDao wrote:
             | > Schizophrenia is electromagnetic interference
             | 
             | I agree that EMFs play a role in mood disorders via
             | activator of voltage gated ion channels.
             | 
             | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3780531/
             | 
             | > caused by terrorists with access to advanced weaponry.
             | 
             | I do not see any evidence for this.
             | 
             | And I love you. Take care of yourself.
        
           | FollowingTheDao wrote:
           | > How were you convinced that you were hallucinating?
           | 
           | To be honest, some things were easier to spot than others. I
           | used to have olfactory hallucination and it drove on ex
           | girlfriend nuts cause I was always smelling things that were
           | not there. I just invited she was not smelling anything.
           | 
           | I also have closed eye visions. These appear as faces and
           | scenes when I close my eyes, mostly in the evening that are
           | quite visually crisp. Most of the faces are frightening. I
           | did not know I was dealing with this till I started Zyprexa
           | and they stopped.
           | 
           | The visual hallucinations were easier since I would say "Did
           | you see that cat?" and I would get strange looks or someone
           | else there would not see them. And seriously, watching "A
           | Beautiful Mind" helped me with this.
           | 
           | The thing that helped me most was Buddhism and meditation.
           | Buddhism lead me to thinking more about the nature of
           | perception and meditation allowed me to perceive without
           | reaction so I can judge things better.
           | 
           | A also have perceptual changes, like being on psychedelics,
           | but these are not hallucinations. I feel like I can see
           | around things or everything has light trails or colors are
           | really intense. When I was early in mediation the floor would
           | always start waving like an ocean. When I was young I saw the
           | faces of people on the TV change and I thought I was seeing
           | them as they really were.
           | 
           | I get a lot of the talk that your girlfriend has, and that is
           | hard an I still deal with it but mostly by ignoring it. It is
           | by far the most difficult. Its base is paranoia I feel
           | because those voices are always saying negative things, like
           | I did not pay for my coffee right. Ha! Just happened today!
           | 
           | By the way, COVID threw me into my worst psychosis ever.
           | 
           | I do not know what to say about helping her. I was in her
           | space and I know how it feels. No one could convince me of
           | anything. I thought the water was "too blue" coming out of my
           | faucet that I called the water department twice for them to
           | check it.
           | 
           | 1) Don't take things she does personally. That eases your
           | stress. 2) Do not directly contradict her hallucinations but
           | try guided questioning about them. That is what 30 years of
           | therapy taught me. I question everything now. 3) You can call
           | her doctor and leave a message. 4) I do not recommend ever
           | having her involuntarily committed unless she is a serious
           | danger.
           | 
           | But this is not something anyone else can force her into, it
           | is a process of self discovery, a Shaman's journey. And maybe
           | phrase it as that; A Shaman's Journey.
           | 
           | I lost my whole family, but frankly they were not good for me
           | anyway. And I still have episodes, as you can see if you go
           | through my history here, but I am much more stable now than
           | ever and no longer need medications.
           | 
           | Good luck and if your want to email me:
           | followingdao@proton.me
        
         | jtr1 wrote:
         | I've become very interested in the phenomenon of hyperphantasia
         | recently, or the degree to which people are able to conjure
         | various senses in their imagination. My wife is able to
         | envision spaces well enough to recall where most things are in
         | the house, a friend can nearly taste a flavor she's only
         | encountered in a dream. For myself, I can recall music or
         | sounds quite vividly, and on occasion this manifests as aural
         | hallucinations (often with fatigue).
         | 
         | If you don't mind me asking, I'm curious if you feel that your
         | visual and aural imagination are very strong and if so, do you
         | believe there's any connection with the additional sights and
         | sounds you encounter out in the world?
        
           | FollowingTheDao wrote:
           | I have a strong imagination and make connections easily that
           | people have a hard time seeing until I explain it.
           | 
           | I believe most hallucination are the result of a creative
           | predictive mind that is trying to understand patterns. Like I
           | can often feel like I understand the meaning behind some of
           | my schizophrenic friends hallucination. I think that they are
           | speaking in stories and metaphors.
        
       | _dain_ wrote:
       | _> Also, the surgery seemed to introduce dark maggot-size shapes
       | in the periphery of my vision. Switching from near sight to far
       | sight brought on a bout of the maggots, which were hard to ignore
       | at first, but I learned to forget about them. If I'd had this
       | surgery as a child, I probably would have explained the maggot
       | shapes by assuming the scalpel had implanted them in my eyes._
       | 
       | we're not supposed to talk about those.
        
         | rzzzt wrote:
         | Roko's Bas- I mean, floaters? Yesterday one tortured me by
         | floating towards the center of my vision where I'm reading the
         | letters.
        
           | klyrs wrote:
           | I've had one of those for years, smack in the middle of one
           | eye. I often read like a pirate.
        
       | shusaku wrote:
       | > The day after the procedure, I looked out the car window and
       | saw, for the first time from such a distance, individual leaves
       | on trees.
       | 
       | This is how I feel every time I replace an old set of scratched
       | up lenses!
        
         | kamma4434 wrote:
         | ...every time I wash my glasses...
        
         | wwilim wrote:
         | One of my most vivid memories of adolescence is walking back
         | from the optometrist wearing my new glasses, after finally
         | accepting that I can't continue to function without them.
        
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