Concern over experiencing schizophrenia prodrome and overwhelming panic attacks.

hi! I really need someone to help out right now. I would appreciate it so much. Thanks:) I know this is kind of long, but please help me out and read it. please help confirm for me that the symptoms im experiencing are just extreme existential OCD, depersonalization, and anxiety. it would make me feel a lot better. 7-8 months ago a traumatic event led me to experience severe depersonalization. ive had OCD for as long as i can remember basically, but it’s become a lot worse from this. i am a very big overthinker, so i tend to over analyze a lot of the things going on around me, my perception of everything, my thoughts, etc. it’s gotten so bad because of the depersonalization that i at times really can’t function anymore. one day, all i’ll be able to think about is the irrational fear that i somehow am going to die and there’s something terribly wrong with my brain, like cancer or something. then the next, i’ll be freaking out, worrying that im gonna go crazy. like this is some kind of early onset schizophrenia. i start doing research and i start obsessing over each and every thought i have, everything i see, etc. then i’ll be paranoid about my family, worrying that none of them are real and they’re imposters or something. i know it’s irrational. i recognize that and don’t genuinely believe it. but the fact that this thought worries me concerns me even more because it leads me to believe im going crazy. i am having existential crises regularly. like, all the time. it’s actually ridiculous. i’ll be reading a book and i start contemplating the English language and how it came to be, and then language altogether, and then how humans were able to create and understand language, and then how they were able to sound it out, how sound exists altogether, and so on. lol. like what the hell? a few days ago i was looking out of my bedroom window, and all the sudden had the intrusive thought come into my head, “what if this is just a simulation and what you see outside of your window is merely a two dimensional image?” and then i almost had a full on panic attack. anyways, those are some examples. i’m so worried. i feel like i have no control over what freaks me out anymore. i feel like i have no control of my brain altogether. i don’t want to go crazy. i don’t want to feel like im stuck in a dream anymore. im so scared. somebody please help me. i live my life in fear, worrying about everything i perceive. im exhausted. i can’t tell anyone because i don’t want them to worry, or think that im going crazy. that’ll only reinforce my fears.

I've made many many posts about this before, l'm just here to share some more symptoms of this HORRIFIC episode I'm going through. For starters I'm diagnosed GAD, panic disorder, cd and adhd. This rabbit hole started when I randomly started to become easily overstimulated by my phone (screens in general)and any type of activity that required a lot of thinking and brain function like reading. From then on I started having major problems thinking and forming thoughts, like there was literally some mental block in my brain preventing me from being able to think. I started to google my symptoms and of course google is going to suggest THE WORST possible thing it could be and I read where the prodromal stage of schizophrenia causes concentration problems and sensory issues and overall cognitive decline. It has been WAY DOWNHILL from there, I started developing new symptoms almost everyday. My brain feels FRIED, my head feels heavy, I'm slow with my responses, some days I cannot think or function at all, I feel EXTREMELY depersonalized and disassociated. I'm having some severe memory problems, and I'm having this strange phenomenon where every stranger I see in public looks familiar or I feel like they look like someone I know, I also get moments everyday where I almost get like deja vu type feelings or maybe even false memory feelings for a moment. Another awful symptom I'm having is sometimes I feel like I have no control over my inner monologue anymore it's those same types of thoughts you would get just before you fall asleep or just as you wake up, my inner monologue just pops random phrases, words, and especially songs into my mind and it feels completely out of my control. My thinking doesn't feel the same. I'm more than OBSESSING over this potentially being the start of a psychotic disorder, it scares the living shit out of me, I can't even leave my house anymore, some days I feel so overwhelmed and just feel like im straight up afraid of everything around me. Im still very very easily overstimulated. Im over analyzing every single thing around me, I cannot enjoy music, tv/YouTube, im constantly on the look out for my "first hallucinations/psychotic break" im so terrified of becoming delusional, im constantly testing if I believe crazy things, l've had a couple instances where I couldn't remember if something was a dream or actually happened (trivial things like, if I said something to a coworker) or (if I had a dream about a commercial or it was a real commercial). Even when I very rarely have moments where I try and lay down and watch YouTube to get my mind off things, I can't enjoy it, it feels like I've forgotten how to think normally, I'm over analyzing trivial details in the video, I start to get scared that I'II believe the tv is talking to me. I just don't feel like me at all anymore. Im truly in HELL. One last symptom id like to add: I’m not sure if this is just the hyper vigilance, but when I’m alone in the house I feel like someone is behind me (I know there isn’t) but it’s like that 6th sense feeling you get when someone’s presence is near you, this symptom has only furthered my extreme fear of psychosis.

Hello, I have hypochondria, gad, ptsd, and panic disorder. For the past 5 months I have been in a deep episode of what I’m hoping is just hypochondria where I’ve fully convinced myself I’m psychotic/developing schizophrenia. This theme has become so debilitating I lost my job and was completely bed bound for a while. Anyway, I have the extreme fear of developing delusions and hallucinations, so I’m constantly on the look out for symptoms like that. For whatever reason I have become extremely sensitive and afraid of anything demonic or horror related, I literally used to be a horror junkie, listen to Marilyn Manson etc. I am literally an atheist, I don’t even believe in the devil or superstitious things like this, but for some reason I have started getting extremely fear inducing demonic type intrusive thoughts, like one night I had the terrifying thought “what if my wife is possessed by a demon and isn’t really my wife” this thought scared the fuck out of me and actually changed my behavior towards my wife and gave me a panic attack, the fear of that later passed, but the uneasy feeling still linger. I’ve been getting all sorts of terrible demonic type intrusive thoughts like that about everybody and random places and even objects and they cause a panic attack everytime I get them, it used to be a panic attack about struggling to fight the urge to believe these thoughts but now I feel like it’s gotten to the point where it just straight up feels like it’s happening and I’m afraid for real and not even questioning the thoughts anymore. I’ve completely stopped listening to any music that references the devil or any type of media that may have dark references, to avoid getting these types of thoughts. When I am not anxious and I take my anxiety medicine (clonazepam) I can laugh these thoughts off and confidently shrug them off as ridiculous, but other times it feels real!Why is this happening to me? Keep in mind I am a literal atheist and do not believe in superstitious things like this, why am I suddenly afraid of things like this? And better yet why do they scare me and “feel real” if I don’t believe them. I feel like I’m fighting for my sanity every single day. I literally dread the anticipation of getting these thoughts. These strange new fears about demonic shit is only solidifying my root fear that I am developing psychosis. Can anyone please help me?