"Psychotic?"

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Hello,
A few months back I was in the hospital for various reasons and because I was an adult who enjoys colouring and plush animals the attending doctor sent a psychiatrist out to see me who deemed me "psychotic" which was rather dumb of him because I wasn't hearing voices or seeing things or having any dellusions whatsoever. I am simply an adult who enjoys juvenile things. Has this happened to anyone before? Have they been told their psychotic because of some odd behavior society seems to deem as abnormal? I'd also like to ask...are there any other adults out there who are like me and enjoy colouring and have a toy collection? Thanks.

A church elder started a rumor that I was "mentally ill" because I was able to illuminate the flaws in his personal interpretations of the Bible.

Do you talk to your plush animals?

There is nothing wrong with talking to plush animals.

I didn't say there was - and I'm not the psychiatrist.

Last I checked, seminary was supposed to teach you what "humility" means... for example, the willingness to consider that you may be wrong, and the ability to accept the value of others' opinions even when you think they are wrong.

OP, I'm willing to bet that coloring and owning stuffed animals would have been considered a harmless eccentricity if you had not been a mental patient at the time. Psychologists don't think about that sometimes. We know that eccentricity is not harmful and does not need help from a psychologist--every beginning psychology textbook contains an explanation something along those lines. But when professionals see eccentric behavior in someone with a mental illness, they immediately jump to the idea that this behavior must be a.) part of the mental illness and b.) harmful.

Autistic people are often eccentric, and our eccentricities may have to do with our autism, but they are not usually harmful. And even then, sometimes we're just plain eccentric in a way that hasn't got much to do with our autism. My mom, who's as Aspie as they come, is a conspiracy theorist and a natural-foods afficionado, just like many NTs are. Her level of obsessiveness is autistic, but her odd beliefs are simple eccentricity.

There's one case where eccentricity is a symptom--schizotypal personality disorder. However, it's one of a group of symptoms, and you don't diagnose it unless there is an actual problem in the person's life, just like you don't automatically diagnose nerdy folks with Asperger's.

I have had some similar assumptions made about myself: I kept to myself while hospitalized, and this was assumed to be a sign of depression. They did not consider that most of the patients were not particularly interesting to talk to (maybe because they didn't know interesting things or maybe because they were too drugged up to talk about the interesting things they knew), and that I had gotten books and my schoolwork from friends when they visited me. Yes, I was "withdrawing", but that was because I was an autistic introvert with interesting things to do alone, in the middle of a major burnout episode and instinctively trying to conserve my resources. I had been admitted due to suicidal ideation, which abated by the third day to the point that I was no longer in danger, but they kept me for ten days because they didn't believe I was no longer in crisis. Only once they explicitly told me that they were keeping me because I did not socialize, and once I forced myself into the dayroom and sat there doing the things I usually did in my room, did they finally conclude I was getting better.

Last edited by Callista on 23 May 2013, 2:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Unfortunately, the elder never went to seminary. He was a retired police officer; thus, he was not used to having his authority questioned on any given subject, no matter how respectful or "humble" the questioner may have been.

If you can, get yourself to another doctor who knows what they're doing and get that diagnosis off your record.

Unless of course the toy animals have been talking to you. In that case, the doctor could be right.

If not, you really don't want to be viewed by future doctors as in that catagory. It could have negative effects on your life.

Lawsuit for slander?

The only known witness was/is too intimidated to agree to testify, so it's the ex-cop's word against mine.

Whose word would carry the most weight in court - a retired police officer or an Aspie with anxiety issues?

Even my lawyers said my case was too weak.

I have a collection of stuffed plush toy frogs , I currently have 32 of them and I like to colour. Also, I like to swing on the park swings near my house. I go for a walk everyday and if the swings are deserted then I go on one. Oh, yes, and I read teen literature (as well as adult ) and watch children's cartoons while I eat breakfast. I'm 28 years old.

To answer your first question, I've never been labelled psychotic.

I occasionally write random words and draw lines on a piece of paper. My friend saw one of those paper lying around and called it a psychotic act. The subject was never brought up again.

Many of our eccentric qualities are thought of as psychotic to NTs because they aren't used to seeing that so don't let them get on your nerves and do what you do.

Yeah, ASD being misdiagnosed as some sort of psychotic condition due to behavior that is considered eccentric by others is very common. Maybe you can consult with a child/adolescent clinician and ask them for advice on this? I did this when my therapist set out to eliminate my RB/RI's because he saw them as just obsessions and compulsions; I spoke with the child psychologist and asked her for advice, and she gave it to me and said I could use her as a reference to give to the therapist.

(Of course, that's not to say a person with ASD can't develop psychosis. I did at age 14.)

I have a thing for pandas. I have a large number of plush pandas and other "kids" things that are panda (backpacks,hats,and such). I also have a thing for hello kitty, not sure why really. I find myself drawing and coloring a lot when I have nothing else to do. I go to the park (I often bring my little cousin as to not look like a creep) and swing and play around on the monkey bars and see-saws. I have never been told I was psychotic or anything like that (although I have also not seen a doctor since I was maybe 15-16)

Actually, autism used to be considered childhood psychosis back in the 1960s. 'Early infantile autism', which was a much narrower diagnosis back then, was considered a subtype of childhood psychosis, while many kids who would now be called autistic were considered to have other types of psychosis (such as symbiotic psychosis, which roughly corresponds to regressive autism).

I still watch cartoons and I have all of my stuffed animals from when I was little and I'm not psychotic. A little weird, yes but most certainly not psychotic.

I believe 'psychotic' only pertains to someone if their behavior is harmful to themselves and to others. I don't see how being 19 (your age indicated below your avatar) and loving to collect stuffed animals and draw is harmful to society. That's just ridiculous.