# Do you hear voices?



## Shauna The Dead (Jun 16, 2005)

Have your therapists/psychiatrists ever asked you this? What did you say?
And what are some other weird questions you've been asked by a therapist? I was asked about the voices and said no--but then I got to thinking... I DO hear things sometimes. Not regularly or anything, but I could have sworn one night that I heard somebody talking in the other room, when no one was in there---and my mom & dad were asleep. :stu The tv wasn't on or anything either so I dunno... 

I was also once asked if I was into witchcraft. :wtf What does that have to do with anxiety/depression anyway? Of course, just because of the way I look I MUST be into witchcraft and/or be a devil worshipper! :con :roll :twisted I'm sure there are other weird things I'm forgetting too...


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## Aloysius (Jul 16, 2008)

.


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## CopadoMexicano (Aug 21, 2004)

yes, and some of the voices are not my own but are transient


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## R (Jun 13, 2006)

Shauna The Dead said:


> I was asked about the voices and said no--but then I got to thinking... I DO hear things sometimes. Not regularly or anything, but I could have sworn one night that I heard somebody talking in the other room, when no one was in there---and my mom & dad were asleep. :stu The tv wasn't on or anything either so I dunno...


That's normal. My friend the other day said he could have sworn that someone grabbed his butt in the shower but the only other person there was his girlfriend and she was sleeping. Human senses aren't perfect and our minds are tricky and make all kinds of mistakes.


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## kev (Jan 28, 2005)

I had one therapist ask me if I was gay, which was a little irritating. I guess they feel they need to ask things that people might not be willing to admit otherwise.

I wish my therapist would have educated me on hearing voices. He never asked me or even questioned any of the outlandish claims I made about people talking behind my back, and so neither did I. It was really depressing years later when I found out all those "voices" ruining my life weren't even real So try not to let it bother you too much. 

That withcraft thing is weird though. I don't know. That seems a little judgemental to me.

Some transient misperceptions of reality (I think they call them "illusions") are common. If they are not bothersome, don't worry about it. If you were truly hearing voices, you might or might not realize it. And some people who are not mentally ill may hear voices occasionally.

Hallucinations also can happen right before falling asleep or right after waking up. Those are perfectly normal, but a lot of people aren't aware that they are normal and they may think they are going crazy.


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## danielk (Jun 4, 2008)

I remember one question on the MMPI that I still laugh at:

_Do you see things that other people do not?_

My immediate answer was "no"; I don't hallucinate. But then I read the question again. How do you really know unless you constantly seek confirmations? Was that hummingbird I just saw real? _Did_ anyone else see it? :con :stu

Anyway, I think the point is that if you hear voices, and the hearing of those voices significantly impairs your functioning, it would be clear to you - or the therapist/doctor - that it is a real problem.


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## Noca (Jun 24, 2005)

Ive been asked that question many times. I always reply, NO.


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## Shauna The Dead (Jun 16, 2005)

this therapist asked me again today if i ever heard or seen stuff so I said yes and told her about the night that i heard a voice & nobody was there.


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## Shauna The Dead (Jun 16, 2005)

kev said:


> I had one therapist ask me if I was gay, which was a little irritating. I guess they feel they need to ask things that people might not be willing to admit otherwise.
> 
> I wish my therapist would have educated me on hearing voices. He never asked me or even questioned any of the outlandish claims I made about people talking behind my back, and so neither did I. It was really depressing years later when I found out all those "voices" ruining my life weren't even real So try not to let it bother you too much.
> 
> ...


wow...they asked if you were gay? i find that pretty odd...kinda like the witchcraft thing, what's that any of their business? and how would that affect whether you had social anxiety or were depressed or something? :con


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## Shauna The Dead (Jun 16, 2005)

danielk said:


> I remember one question on the MMPI that I still laugh at:
> 
> _Do you see things that other people do not?_
> 
> ...


yeah it doesn't happen to me often but once in awhile. i almost told them about the "ghost"? :stu i saw in the apartment when i lived there too...and heard somebody walking around when i was the only one there.
but that probably would make a therapist think i was crazy I guess.


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## Shauna The Dead (Jun 16, 2005)

rocknroll714 said:


> They probably asked you the witchcraft question because of the way you dress. People are stupid sometimes.
> 
> As for hearing voices.. it's actually pretty common with people on antidepressant/anxiolytic meds. All that excess serotonin causes hallucinations and other psychedelic phenomena. My friend Melanie got started on SSRIs and she started hearing voices herself. It's usually considered a bad thing to hear voices while on meds like SSRIs because it's a clear sign of serotonin syndrome which can potentially be fatal. That's not necessarily true though.
> 
> ...


I'm not even on medications though and I've heard/seen stuff. :stu All I take is vitamins...no antidepressants, nothing else. Just Flintstone vitamins. :b I hate medication.

But when the woman asked me about witchcraft I'm pretty sure I was just dressed in a t-shirt and jeans, nothing special really. My hair wasn't even the way it is now(it was just my natural color-dark brown), and I had no makeup on. I probably did have black nail polish on or something...I guess black nails=witchcraft! :b I may have had a metal band or horror movie t-shirt on or something though...probably did. Otherwise I don't see why she would have asked that at all, but it's still stupid either way.


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## R (Jun 13, 2006)

Shauna The Dead said:


> this therapist asked me again today if i ever heard or seen stuff so I said yes and told her about the night that i heard a voice & nobody was there.


What did he/she say when you told him?



Shauna The Dead said:


> I'm not even on medications though and I've heard/seen stuff. :stu All I take is vitamins...no antidepressants, nothing else. Just Flintstone vitamins. :b I hate medication.


I used to eat those like candy when I was younger.


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## Shauna The Dead (Jun 16, 2005)

R said:


> Shauna The Dead said:
> 
> 
> > this therapist asked me again today if i ever heard or seen stuff so I said yes and told her about the night that i heard a voice & nobody was there.
> ...


She just asked if it could have been anyone in my house hiding from me or something and I said "No, my mom & dad wouldn't do that. Especially in the middle of the night" and then she asked if I was scared or thought I was crazy or something and I said "well I felt a little crazy" :b


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## brealair (Aug 31, 2008)

Did ask that to rule out schizenphia(sp?) and other disorders that cause hallucations.


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## Bunnycakes (Mar 26, 2008)

I was asked about my religion which I felt had nothing to do with my problems.


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## Hot Chocolate (Sep 29, 2008)

I do have one loud voice that called me at random times when I was going to fast asleep. But I guess it's got to do with me going into lucid dreaming?


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## kev (Jan 28, 2005)

Hot Chocolate said:


> I do have one loud voice that called me at random times when I was going to fast asleep. But I guess it's got to do with me going into lucid dreaming?


I think so. I get that too. Do you hear the voice "inside your head." That happens to me when I'm going to sleep. It's like I'll have a loud thought pop into my head but it comes from my unconscious mind, not from my conscious mind. I can actually induce it by deliberately thinking grotesque thoughts. Sometimes it helps me go to sleep but sometimes it ends in sleep paralysis.


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## DeeperUnderstanding (May 19, 2007)

CDL said:


> I hear voices and noises regularly. I often hear the phone ringing when there's no one calling or knocking on the door....or people calling my name, etc. These are just the mild symptoms, it gets even worse than that at times. Life can sometimes be just like living out a horror movie for me when it gets really bad. :afr


That's so weird, I was just going to post about the phone ringing. I don't know why I hear it, it just comes out of the blue sometimes. I always thought it was connected to my tinnitus.

That's the only thing I hear that isn't there, though.


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## darkstar (Oct 23, 2008)

I don't "hear" voices, but I know that not all of my thoughts and feelings are my own... I pick up things from other people all the time.


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## imt (Sep 22, 2008)

I'd usually pass the voices off as being my own thoughts. Occasionally I'd see and hear things. I've done drugs so it has become the norm for me. It's nothing vivid though; unreal is easily distinguishable from real.


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## Kuroneko (Oct 23, 2008)

The reason they ask if you are a homosexual or not is different than asking about witchcraft. Both are to understand certain things about your personality and see how you react to certain lines of questioning. When it comes to anxiety, its always good to test the boundaries to see what makes someone anxious. 

When it comes to the question of "Are you gay?" Its asked based on how gays tend to face the struggle of being judged by their peers constantly. There are many people who will outright walk out of the way so they don't get near someone who is `different`. There are others who will say things that are just unbelievable and unfounded when faced with gay/lesbian/bi-sexuals. When faced with situations like this, it tends to cause a person to become anxious when dealing with social settings. So they are seeing if that could be a cause of your social anxiety. Lets face it, if the world is actively trying to make you miserable or feel defective because of your choices, you have a 50/50 chance of becoming susceptible to it.

In regards to the other question, "Are you into witchcraft?" "Do you practice witchcraft?" "Are you a wiccan/pagan?" These are asked when trying to understand your personality type. Therapists and Psychiatrists base things off of studies. Lets face it, they are the ones who usually conduct all of the studies. The `studies` have shown that depressed individuals tend to practice a form of witchcraft or call themselves wiccan. They have also shown that individuals who suffer from social anxiety feel this way in social settings because they feel they lack in the areas that others do not.

This is a lack of control over others. When someone makes you feel anxious, they are exuding a type of control over you (or so you are led to believe) and what social anxiety sufferers seek is a way to gain that control over others. Some will try to stand out as much as possible by either changing their style to something exotic or crazy. Others will become the `class clown` or an ultimate jokester so that they know what other people are thinking about them. And then some will seek a form of `power`, which can include magick. 

A Therapist is usually someone who spends more time studying and judging people than those who suffer from SA do. They ask these questions, not to be differential, but to seek an underlying issue. The majority do not believe that SA is a disorder, but an effect of another disorder or emotional problem. So do not be surprised when they ask these questions just to figure out if you feel you lack control, or have been shunned by the public in some way.

The cliches that I have mentioned in my post have all come from general psychiatric case studies, they are not my own opinion.


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## UltraShy (Nov 8, 2003)

I might have been asked that during an interview for a clinical trial -- they ask you every question you could imagine and then some, going on for almost 2 hours.

Otherwise I've never been asked if I hear voices. I don't, except once in a while when in a state somewhere between sleep & awake I will think I heard my name called even though it wasn't.


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## Bon (Dec 24, 2005)

UltraShy said:


> I might have been asked that during an interview for a clinical trial -- they ask you every question you could imagine and then some, going on for almost 2 hours.
> 
> Otherwise I've never been asked if I hear voices. I don't, except once in a while when in a state somewhere between sleep & awake I will think I heard my name called even though it wasn't.


Yep, recently when I took a psychological test, one of the questions "Do you hear voices" when people talk to me;-) they're feeling you out, trying to find out what's wrong etc.

Other than the voice say "Go ahead, have the last cookie" I told him that once in a while, I think I hear something (which is normal) I was also asked "Do you see things that aren't there" now, really how would one know that?????????? If your alone that is....

I said no, but once in a while I think I catch something out of the corner of my eye.....That's normal too.

As karl said, between falling a sleep and being awake, I often hear my Mom call my name, but she would always do that, so my system is expecting it.


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## trancediva88 (Aug 11, 2008)

darkstar said:


> I don't "hear" voices, but I know that not all of my thoughts and feelings are my own... I pick up things from other people all the time.


_I feel the same way..._


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