Psychotic Breaks: Delusions, Psychosis, or Something Else?

Welcome To The Oddity Shop, Where The Bizarre is Always on Sale.  This Week, Your Curator Kara showing us what happens when the brain misfires.

Something about “signs” can feel irresistible: the repeating numbers, the lyric that hits too hard, the stranger’s smile that lands like a message. But what happens when that certainty escalates into a full-blown alternate reality? We’re back from our break with a topic that sits right at the crossroads of faith, paranormal curiosity, and mental health: how do we tell the difference between a genuine spiritual experience and psychosis?

If you’re into the high strange, this conversation is a grounding reminder: sometimes the most important question isn’t “Is it paranormal?” It’s “Is that person okay?” Listen, share this with a friend who loves spooky stories and psychology.

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Welcome Back And Life Updates

SPEAKER_01 0:36

Welcome back to the Oddity Shop, the podcast where we tell you creepy, odd, weird, strange, and bizarre stories from around the world.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

I'm your curator, Kara, and this is your curator, Zachary. And that was the fourth time he tried to do it a few.

SPEAKER_01 0:52

I don't know what's wrong with me. This we took a long break. Um, we've had a very long evening, the two of us doing stuff not even related to the podcast, but we've been pulling our hair out. And what is new with you, Kara?

SPEAKER_00 1:06

Well, there's so much new because we haven't recorded in so long.

SPEAKER_01 1:09

I know. Okay, why did we take a summer break in case people don't know?

SPEAKER_00 1:12

Well, you just like cut me off. I was gonna say my most important new thing is that I have a baby nephew that I guess we're gonna see. He's the cutest thing in the entire world. So Zach took time off because he moved and had a bunch of stuff to do. I took some time off because I needed to go meet my little nephew, and I didn't want to care about anything else.

SPEAKER_01 1:32

She didn't even talk to me for 14 days. Is that what we decided? Was the her she was talking to her husband. She's like, I haven't talked to Zach in like 14 days. He's like, You haven't talked to me in 14 days, but we decided like that number just came out of nowhere.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

Yeah, I don't know where the 14 days came from, but it was it was not calculated. It was like nine days or something like that. But anyway, yeah, so we just took a little break.

SPEAKER_01 1:53

It was great. I'm finally got my car back to Arizona. I'm settled. It is 118 today, and I'm not dying.

SPEAKER_02 2:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

We finally had a little quick adventure too. We got up to the mountains, uh, which I realized like pine forest mountains with free-range crystals in creek beds. It's only two hours away, not even. So I'm really excited about that because it is also like 30 degrees cooler there.

SPEAKER_00 2:18

Oh wow. And it only took you what, 30 minutes?

SPEAKER_01 2:20

Uh, about an hour 45. I don't know where I got that from. I don't know either. Wasn't listening. I know. Yeah, that's that's the real short story of what's been new with me. I I also did get to see my family for 4th of July, so that was really great.

SPEAKER_00 2:36

How many hot dogs did you eat this year?

SPEAKER_01 2:38

Not many. It was bad. It was bad. But we also like had lost power, and I the flights getting home got a little bit messed up because somebody slept through their flight. Me. Which was wild. And I don't want to talk about that anymore. Okay, what about you?

SPEAKER_00 2:52

I I don't even know what else since yeah, other than declining. That's my baby. Um, I miss him so much. I miss him literally the second I got dropped off at the airport. I was like, I need that baby back. I need him.

SPEAKER_01 3:07

He is very cute.

SPEAKER_00 3:08

Yeah, just trying to do some summer things, and summer's almost over. It's over when we're listening to the or when, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:15

Yeah, when this comes out, it's it's pretty pretty close to over. God, I hate that.

Why We Are Posting Less

SPEAKER_01 3:20

Well, should we get into some shop talk? I think we shall. I think we shall. We we have some pretty big shop talk today. And Kara and I have been talking and we made some decisions when we're not, we are not going anywhere, but we're gonna be here a little bit less.

SPEAKER_00 3:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:36

So for the foreseeable future, we are gonna be going down to two episodes a month in place of our four. We're still gonna have our Reddits on Patreon, we're still gonna be active on there. We just we realized at some point we weren't having as much fun doing this when it was taking all of our free time.

SPEAKER_00 3:54

Yeah, and now with like our time difference with each other is three hours difference. It doesn't sound like a lot, but it is a lot when we're trying to plan and coordinate our lives and time to talk and chat and record, and you know, it's just not it's not fun anymore. And it's not fair to us, to you guys.

SPEAKER_01 4:13

So we're gonna we're gonna do less episodes, but I think we're gonna be able to pour more energy into it. We're gonna take more time for ourselves to rest because we had done this for three years straight.

SPEAKER_00 4:22

Yeah, and I have, you know, before Zach and I even talked about this, my talk shop for you guys this episode was gonna be like, hey, I'm really sorry because I've dropped the ball. I have not posted on our Patreon in the whole month of June. I don't think I've posted anything in majority of July because I just I've I've just had a lot of anxiety and things going on, and I'm like, I just dropped the ball. And so I don't want to feel like that anymore. Zach doesn't want to feel like he's always editing on his time and like like we love this. We love this thing.

SPEAKER_01 4:51

We want to keep loving it, but we want to get back to loving it so we stay around for a long it's it's quality over quantity, right? Like at the end of the day, and we're gonna take a little more care of ourselves and come back more refreshed.

SPEAKER_00 5:01

And I think that once we do this for a little bit and it gets funner again, funner when it gets to the way that it used to be, and maybe now that we've started adding, you know, we've we added a lot more stuff, right? We did all the Patreon and then we have like the TikToks I fell off on, but we've added a lot more stuff. But I think that once we can go down to this, get back into like some sort of rhythm or routine, you figure out your life there to coordinate heat with my life here. I think that we could get back to more episodes, but for now, like we like some burnout. No, and for a minute we were both like, we don't ever want to come back from this hiatus, and we don't want that. So no. Hopefully, no one's mad at us, but either way, sorry.

SPEAKER_01 5:43

You can let us know if you are, but it's how it's gonna be. Okay. That's what we got for Shop Talk. We'd love to hear your guys' thoughts on it, but otherwise, do you have a question for me so we can open?

Content Warning And The Big Question

SPEAKER_00 5:55

I do have a question, but it is a little bit I got a disclaimer and stuff to say first, and then I have a question.

SPEAKER_01 6:02

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 6:02

Well, okay, you know, we gotta come back with a bang, I guess. Just kidding, it's not that serious. Okay, so before we get started, like a little content warning. Today's episode discusses psychosis, hallucinations, delusions, and real cases involve involving unaliving or like violence of that nature. And so, as always, our goal is to educate, not to sensationalize. So I don't want anyone to think that that's what this is. Um, so if this really doesn't sound like an episode for you today, I get it. That's fine. You can drop out. I understand. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 6:39

Question.

SPEAKER_00 6:40

Yeah, hold on. Do I have it?

SPEAKER_01 6:43

Asking me if you have a question does not kind of do that.

SPEAKER_00 6:46

No, because I started reading through and I was like, where's my question? Okay, so while reaching, researching this episode, this is the question I kept coming back to, and so I'm gonna ask it to you.

SPEAKER_02 6:56

Cool.

SPEAKER_00 6:56

How do we tell the difference between a genuine spiritual experience or psychosis?

SPEAKER_01 7:04

How do I answer that in the length of not an episode? I I in you know what actually How would you?

SPEAKER_00 7:10

Like if somebody were to be like, I had like this, you know. I I can answer this easily and quickly. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 7:16

I'm not trained enough to answer that. I couldn't, beyond a shadow of a doubt, prove that to you.

unknown 7:20

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 7:22

I know. So when somebody is telling you like Jesus spoke to me, are you thinking that Jesus really spoke to them, or are you more thinking that they're like hallucinating or like in a psychosis?

SPEAKER_01 7:34

That would that would to me just be a a trigger for me to think it's a mental health episode.

SPEAKER_00 7:39

Okay. Yeah. And I think that's kind of like what a lot of, I don't want to say a lot of us, but a lot of people are like, oh, that seems yeah, like not normal or whatever. So I don't, I feel like there's so many different cases like that where, and not even just like Saul God or whatever, people could spin it to the paranormal too and think that they're not mentally well either.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

I feel like that's one a lot of times, um, and I don't know where in the paranormal you're going with this, but in the case of I'm not going paranormal. Okay. In the case of alien abduction stories, right? Like I feel like many of them that I hear about sound more like a mental health crisis than a true abduction.

SPEAKER_00 8:19

Yeah. It's just one of those things where I don't know why it always so anyway, this just kind of came to me. So I I know it's not typical, but it still could be tied into all the other things that we talk about. So anyway, okay, people have obviously been asking this for centuries, and the answer kind of depends on entirely who you ask. So a psychiatrist looks at hallucinate hallucinations, delusions, like sleep patterns, and overall behavior.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 8:44

But maybe like a religious leader would ask whether the experience aligns with faith and leads to compassion or healing, where a paranormal investigator probably wonders if there's an entirely different explanation, right? So the uncomfortable reality is that from the outside they can look remarkably similar.

SPEAKER_01 9:04

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 9:05

So could there be experiences that science like doesn't fully understand yet? Maybe, obviously. Like we're already okay. So here's that was kind of my disclaimer or question. Okay, are you ready?

SPEAKER_01 9:17

I am ready.

SPEAKER_00 9:18

Imagine waking up tomorrow.

SPEAKER_01 9:20

I would like to.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

You feel incredible, not sick, you're just like enlightened, you're just feeling the greatest you've ever felt. You feel like you've finally figured out a secret that everyone else has missed. Okay, so you make your coffee, the TV news anchor looks at the camera, and you know that they're speaking directly to you. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 9:43

This sounds like mania.

SPEAKER_00 9:45

On your commute, every license plate has the same number, every billboard holds a hidden meaning, and every song on the radio has written was like written specifically about your life, okay?

SPEAKER_02 9:56

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 9:57

A stranger smiles at you and it's not politeness, it's a sign, Zachary. And by the end of the day, you are absolutely convinced that God has chosen you for a divine mission. And you don't just hope it's true, you know it is. When your family asks if you're okay, you tell them they're the ones who are blind to the truth.

Psychosis Hallucinations And Delusions

SPEAKER_00 10:22

Oh. So psychosis is a symptom and it's not a standalone diagnosis, which I don't know if a lot of people actually know that.

SPEAKER_01 10:31

Yeah, because it would be like how the actual illness is like showing.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

Yeah, if you think of a fever, that's what tells you something's wrong, but it doesn't tell you why.

SPEAKER_01 10:42

Right. It doesn't tell you like what parasite in your body is what's causing it. To put it in Michigan terms, right? Parasite in your body is making you have explosive diarrhea.

SPEAKER_00 10:50

Yeah, now apparently it's eggs.

SPEAKER_01 10:52

Oh gosh. So does lettuce.

SPEAKER_00 10:54

Yeah, now it's eggs. That's what I heard. I don't know. Okay, so it can be psychosis. Yeah, so it can be triggered like by schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, major depression, brain injuries, substance abuse, or even extreme sleep deprivation. So ultimately, it means something has interpreted the brain's ability to um accurately the ability to accurately interpret reality.

SPEAKER_01 11:18

Yes. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 11:19

Okay, so we usually break this down into a couple distinct things. So hallucinations, which you know are sensory experiences that feel entirely real. So hearing voices, seeing things that aren't there, feeling or being touched or something near you. Delusions. So those are like fixed, unshakable beliefs maintained despite uh overwhelming evidence to the contrary. And someone might believe they are being watched, like we hear a lot of people say, like the government implanted a chip in them, or like you were just saying, like alien abductions, like their phone got hacked. Yeah, yes. Or they're mayor've been chosen by a higher power. And so religious psychosis occurs when these hallucinations or delusions revolve around obviously spiritual themes. And I feel like that we just like hear that a lot. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 12:08

It's either the the feds are after me or God talked to me. So it'd be like the top two.

SPEAKER_00 12:13

Yes. Okay. So yeah, someone might believe that they are receiving direct commands from God or that they are a prophet or an angel or the messiah. Every coincidence becomes that divine experience. And interestingly, psychosis usually reflects a person's existing world. Okay. So the brain doesn't just like kind of randomly tell stories, it pulls from familiar, deeper, meaningful concepts. So, like religion, family, politics, or personal feels, which just fears, which makes sense to what you just said. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:44

It's not like a whole brand new idea. It's something, some some structure they've already had.

SPEAKER_00 12:48

Right. Which does make sense. But like when I was doing that, I was like, wow, I guess I've never thought about it really that way.

SPEAKER_01 12:55

Which also kind of helps you show how internal it is. Correct. And more of a happening to the individual instead of happening objectively outside.

SPEAKER_00 13:05

Right. So then that kind of raises like that uncomfortable question of like, how do doctors differentiate between a profound religious experience and clinical psychosis?

SPEAKER_01 13:16

I mean, even on a smaller level, between I saw a ghost and I have a brain tumor.

SPEAKER_00 13:22

That's what I'm saying. And I didn't bring any really paranormal into this because I feel like we talk about that a lot, but this is that same thing. And it's like, it's one of those things where I was like, holy crap, because you and I are like, we believe paranormal, we believe paranormal, right? But like other people are probably like, these two have a mental issue. They think that they're seeing and hearing spirits and Eloise all the time. Like, what's wrong with them? Right.

SPEAKER_01 13:47

But like your husband's probably the first to think that.

SPEAKER_00 13:51

I know, but then here we are, here we are, this exact same thing.

SPEAKER_01 13:56

Right. And we're projecting it onto something else.

SPEAKER_00 13:58

We're not believing necessarily what they're saying. And I know it's not the exact same thing, but but it's close enough. It's one of those things where I feel like we're kind of hypocrites. I mean, everybody is in some sort of way, but like you get what I mean. That's always like this is so mind-blowing to me. Cause I'm like, what?

SPEAKER_01 14:16

My eyes already twitching. I know. Sorry.

SPEAKER_00 14:20

So is the belief like shared by others in their faith community? Is it causing severe distress or isolation? Has the person stopped eating, sleeping, or like, you know, are they it's not functioning correctly? Are they acting on commands that put themselves in others in danger? So, like these are all different questions that you know you would ask.

SPEAKER_02 14:41

Right.

Jerusalem Syndrome And Sacred Places

SPEAKER_00 14:42

So the intersection of environment and psychology is peacefully illustrated by one of the strangest phenomenons that I've ever heard in psychiatric literature is the Jerusalem syndrome. Have you ever heard of this? Uh you probably have.

SPEAKER_01 15:00

I feel like I I have I couldn't give you a definition, but it's like it sounds familiar enough to me that I've run across it.

SPEAKER_00 15:06

Okay. Every year, millions of pilgrims travel to Jerusalem for a spiritual renewal. Okay. But a handful of visitors experience something entirely different. They become overwhelmed by the city's intense historical and religious significance and suddenly step into what they believe is a biblical reality.

SPEAKER_01 15:27

Okay. So this is people like on pilgrimage to Mecca.

SPEAKER_00 15:30

Yeah. But like, is that that much different to the stories that we hear though? When people are like, I drove down a random street and time warped into like a town from you get what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 15:45

Like hold on. Here's here's the question I'll ask. When they leave Jerusalem, here, I'll keep reading. Does the phenomenon end? It depends. I know it would be time slippy to me, but if not.

SPEAKER_00 15:55

Not yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Okay. So hospital staff in the city has documented these remarkably consistent behaviors for decades. So tourists separate themselves from their groups and obviously cleanse themselves. They drape themselves in white hotel sheets to mimic biblical robes. They preach to strangers in the streets or attempt public bat uh attempt public baptisms in fountains. So this is things that have happened over and over again. Yeah. Like those specific things, which is just kind of wild.

SPEAKER_01 16:25

I I don't know why it's funny to me, but like the sheets being consistent, right? I can see that they had to be able to do that. That's what I'm saying. We're all using the sheets.

SPEAKER_00 16:33

But they just steal the sheets. Um, so in 1969, an Australian turret tourist arrived convinced he was the biblical figure, Samson, attempting to move the massive stones of the western wall before police intervened.

SPEAKER_01 16:50

How many stones did he move?

SPEAKER_00 16:52

I don't think he moved anyway.

SPEAKER_01 16:53

Because if stones were moved, I think that would help.

SPEAKER_00 16:55

Okay. So another visitor believed he was John the Baptist preaching uh repentance in the surrounding wilderness. Those are just a couple. Experts still debate whether Jerusalem syndrome is its own unique condition. Most psychiatrists agree the city itself doesn't create the quote unquote illness, rather, it acts as a spark, shaping the symptoms of individuals who are already vulnerable to psychosis. But it's like, I don't you think that's strange that hundreds and whatever people get there, quote unquote normal or okay until they get there, and then like something switches. Like I understand that that can happen to anybody at any moment where you just go through a break, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 17:44

Or um but for so many people to have the exact same break and be like, I just find it hard to believe.

SPEAKER_00 19:07

And I guess I could we could look up a statistic if we really want to, like how many people out of so many go experience like psychosis or something like that, to be able to break it down to be like that many people visit Jerusalem and that many people end up triggering their psych like do you get what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 19:26

Yeah, so one of the things you'd have to look at, right, is is it the location itself or is it a heightened state of excitement, right? So then when you're looking at that study, you would also have to look at where yeah other people are triggered. Because is it the location itself or is it the ginormous chemical reaction going on in your head when you're seeing that kind of place?

SPEAKER_00 19:49

Right. That's why it's so interesting to me. Because I'm like, what is going on? Okay, so anyway, uh, why does the mind do this? So our brains are weird, but they're also not yes. I meant to say they're wired to recognize

Pattern Seeking And Aberrant Salience

SPEAKER_00 20:05

patterns to help us navigate life, but they're also weird. So, however, during psychosis though, the system mispires in a process like in the process researchers call aberrant salence. I'm totally butchering that.

SPEAKER_01 20:22

Salient.

SPEAKER_00 20:22

Salience. Abernant, oh my god, aberrant salien. So thank you. A A B E R R A N T. Uh Aberrant Salience. Okay, well Okay.

SPEAKER_01 20:35

I thought I was correcting you, but no.

SPEAKER_00 20:37

Okay, so essentially, though, let's just we'll do break it down for us, dum-dums. The brain begins assigning enormous, urgent importance to completely ordinary things. So a passing comment, a random number, a bird landing nearby, right? It's as if the brain is consistently shouting, pay attention, this matters, which does make sense because in that, you know, that that's what you're like, oh my God. And then you get, I don't know, like excited and overstimulated and like but and the brain does this at other times too on a smaller level.

SPEAKER_01 21:09

Right. Think about grief, for instance. Yeah. You start to look for extraordinary signs in common everyday things.

SPEAKER_00 21:18

Yeah, yeah. So essentially the brain does this to make sense of like these intense feelings, the mind constructs a delusion to contact con to connect the dots. So kind of like exactly what you were just saying. So when it's misfiring and getting these triggers of like, pay attention, look at this, then it starts connecting the dots to all of these really insignificant things that then seem huge.

SPEAKER_01 21:39

Yeah, that pr then produce your reality.

SPEAKER_00 21:42

Right. So while the vast majority of people experiencing psychosis are completely nonviolent and are actually far more likely to be victims of harm than to be like actually doing the harm or whatever.

SPEAKER_02 21:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:55

Delusions can occasionally lead to, you know, catastrophic outcomes when a person becomes uh or believes they are, you know, in danger or they're trying to like execute on their divine command, like something might happen. But typically it's that they're probably the ones that are more in danger. And that makes sense because they're not clean thinking clearly. Um, so anyway, I do have a couple specific cases, but we can kind of talk a little bit more about anything else that you thought because I I knew we were gonna have a discussion, so I didn't want to write too much more other than some cases, and they're very quick ones.

SPEAKER_01 22:36

So So you the way you said at the beginning, where other people would think that you know, we're absolutely and I don't like to I probably shouldn't throw the word crazy around, but think that we're not mentally sane because we like to go to haunted places.

SPEAKER_00 22:50

Well, you know what I'm saying. Like, I'm sure people think that.

SPEAKER_01 22:54

Yeah, yeah. So here's the question, though, right? Where because what you said is like they go to the city and all of a sudden they come changed. What about people who go on their first ghost hunt?

unknown 23:02

Right.

SPEAKER_01 23:06

And now they're obsessed with that's what I'm saying. It's like or paranormal investigating. So like you did kind of just do like make my brain flip on. That's a little bit. It's it, I think the the thing is, is your brain is such a survival organ, like it and it will vastly make some jumps to always solidify what you already believe. It's always looking for that bias. And so it's it's hard for anyone unless I'm you you are a trained psychiatrist or shrink, right? To like really be able to pinpoint those things and distinguish.

SPEAKER_00 23:39

But you know, we've talked about this, and I don't remember what episode it was, but I I know that we were talking about schizophrenia or um it was some we were talking we we kind of a little bit talked about It was on the the poltergeist sliding episode I think we were talking about it might have actually been another one, but we were Okay, it doesn't matter. The the point is is that I think we've talked about it quite a bit because it's like do we actually think that and I'm not I am not saying that mental illness and diseases and things like that don't exist? That's not what I'm saying, but you and I have dived into it so much where it's like, do we actually think that it is something? Like, do they get closer to the paranormal? Is it something paranormal? Like where is it? That's why this like where is Can I Can I help you say it differently?

SPEAKER_01 24:27

Thank you. Is schizophrenia really the disorder as we understand it, or are they perceiving something that's happening all around us that we don't have the typical senses to perceive?

SPEAKER_00 24:37

Correct. Thank you. That is what I was trying to say.

SPEAKER_01 24:39

You're so amazing. And this would be in the form of like people who have like auditory hallucinations. Yeah, yeah. Auditory hallucinations or visual hallucinations, what we're talking about.

SPEAKER_00 24:49

Yeah, and they're not schizophrenia alone, but I'm just saying, like, yeah, because we've also talked about a lot where it's like, you know, older people when they're close to passing, they they say that they see people or they see their loved ones or whatever, or how we talk about little kids that don't know any better because they don't have that bias. Those who are closer to the veil are seeing quote unquote ghosts or spirits, whatever.

SPEAKER_01 25:11

So it's just like it's very interesting when you think about it that way because it's like exactly I also love how far we've come in this journey because we're really careful to whether to say ghosts or spirits, or it's just something we don't understand.

SPEAKER_00 25:21

Because it is such a big mental mind flip throughout all of sure, but that's also why when I started looking, I don't even remember how I found this that you know to come up with this episode.

SPEAKER_01 25:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:32

But I was just thinking about it, and it's you said it so perfectly, it's like when somebody goes to a haunted house and we've witnessed it, like where people go and they've never believed. We were them.

SPEAKER_01 25:43

Well, I mean, we believe we had uh yeah, but I mean we've for Cliffordity to believe already, but we came out of there going, whoa.

SPEAKER_00 25:50

Yeah, but we've actually worked, you know, events and stuff at LOE's where we've there's been many people, every up, every group we'd be like, Hey, is there any skeptics? Yeah, yeah, I don't believe she drugged me here, he made me come. And then at the end, they're like, Wow, that's actually wild. I can't explain these couple things, or like, how did that do it again? Yeah, and so like I understand it because then, and it's not even with this stuff, it's just like, you know how hyper-fixated we get on stuff that we're excited about when we research, we do all this stuff, and then all of a sudden you're like, I really want this car. You're researching and researching and researching, and then out and about you see that car all the time. You never even saw it before. And then we take it as a sign. That's that's the universe telling telling us it's the by that misunderstood unconscious brain for sure. But anyway, you get like it's just like, okay, so who's to say that somebody that's like really excited about going, you know, to this retreat and to go, they're like already spiritually invested, and they go to Jerusalem and they see all this, and like, yeah, I could see absolutely I could see the excitement and the fascination, and like you're just thrilled and it pumped in through you.

SPEAKER_01 26:57

I could see it, and where a paradigm shift in your brain might be yeah, triggered, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:02

But then it's like, I don't know, I don't know. It's just mind-blowing to me.

SPEAKER_01 27:07

It is mind blowing.

SPEAKER_00 27:08

Do you have anything else you want?

SPEAKER_01 27:10

No, I want to hear some of the stories.

SPEAKER_00 27:11

Okay, they're not very long, but we can kind of each one we can kind of talk about. Okay, so Andrea Yates. So this case of Andrea Yates is not a story of evil, um,

Real Cases When Belief Turns Dangerous

SPEAKER_00 27:22

but it's really kind of like a heartbreaking example of severe.

SPEAKER_01 27:25

Are we we're gonna talk about the Andrea Yates?

SPEAKER_00 27:29

Um, literally the smallest little portion.

SPEAKER_01 27:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 27:32

It's basically a heartbreaking example of severe untreated postpartum psychosis. So I don't know if this is the same as what you were thinking. Your face. You can give us a little bit more deeper on it if you'd like. So yeah, you go first. A deeply religious and caring mother of five in Texas, Andrea suffered from profound postpartum depression that escalated into psychotic delusion. So she became convinced that Satan was influencing her family and that her children were doomed to damination. So believing it was the only way to save their souls, she drowned her five children in the family bathtub in 2001. Um, and then following treatment and you know, a realization of what had occurred, she was placed in a psychiatric care rather than prison because it was dubbed a you know, a psychiatric break or whatever. But that's like, okay. What horrifying what happened that you okay? So then you go back to like this stuff stems from beliefs, fear, family raising. Like she thought she was saving her children. Right. And she one by one in the bathtub that Satan was influencing her family, which is so I didn't go into detail.

SPEAKER_01 28:46

This is with these been one that's actually been on my list for a very long time. Okay, so then maybe you can cover so dark.

SPEAKER_00 28:52

It is really dark.

SPEAKER_01 28:53

That's I I don't know if I'd want to. It is, and it's one of those things where it's awful. With her receiving the treatment she had, and this is why I've always kind of gone back and forth on it. Like, do we wanna her story's so yeah infamous as it is, you know?

SPEAKER_00 29:07

Like that's kind of why I didn't deep dive into too much of these, but that one is also just awful. But that's one example of like it can be bad, like it can be very horrible and and violent.

SPEAKER_01 29:21

And I think this is one of the few though where the justice system actually did the right thing. Yeah, I think it was just because for so many others in in violent situations like this, they the justice goes I I don't know. It's hard to say.

SPEAKER_00 29:35

It really is hard to say. Um, yeah, okay. Um, all right, so then we're gonna go to Pennsylvania. A shoemaker named Joseph Kellinger struggled with severe mental illness, reporting that he heard commands from God alongside a floating head named Charlie, who claimed supernatural knowledge. Okay, and his complex web of delusions ultimately led him to commit a series of violent crimes alongside his teenage son, illustrating how the entire alternate reality can consume a person's life. Because he literally gen, like it consumed him and then to his child. Or like not to his child, but like he roped his beliefs and things where his child's like, okay, yeah, let's do these crazy things.

SPEAKER_01 30:25

Well, because if it if it becomes so much ingrained in your reality that you believe it's real, you do kind of grow into a position where you can manipulate and influence others by and you you you're not trying to manipulate, you literally think you're doing exactly what needs to be done.

SPEAKER_00 30:39

That's your belief, yeah. You're trying to but like a floating head named Charlie.

SPEAKER_01 30:45

Where did Right? But the at the same time, all our brain is is like a meat sack with electricity running through it. It can be just like any other organ in your body that can just go haywire.

SPEAKER_00 30:55

Dreams too. Yeah, we have the craziest ass dreams, and I'm like, where did that even come from?

SPEAKER_01 31:00

We could do episodes just on our dreams.

SPEAKER_00 31:02

We should start. Well, I never really fully remember them. Otherwise, we should start writing them all down, and we should just literally have a full episode of our wacky dreams. A dream journal one? Oh god. Um, so people often point to David Korish, the leader of the branch, Davison. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 31:19

You got this, Carrie.

SPEAKER_00 31:21

I don't, but you know, the leader of the Waco Texas crap. Yes. So who cla who claimed he could um unlock biblical prophecies and that he was a final prophet? Uh, while it remains heavily debated whether he genuinely believed these claims or was knowingly manipulating the follow followers. His, you know, that case highlights how charismatic leadership, religious extremism, and potential mental illness can overlap in ways that are incredibly difficult to untangle. Um, and so we often hear about the crisis, but we rarely hear about recovery. So firsthand accounts from who from the oh my god, we were doing so well.

SPEAKER_01 32:06

Well, you you were doing well. I started off with having safety takes to get this. I was doing so well.

SPEAKER_00 32:12

Okay, so hold on, let me just like pause for a second. So, anyway, we all know the Waco Texas one. I'm we don't even need to deep dive into that. Let me let me just do a disclaimer though, because I wanted to say that in each of these cases, as I'm reading them to you, I don't necessarily think that it it I'm not saying that they had a mental illness. This is just how the research is, is that these people had the mental illness. Do you get what I mean? Because like, I don't know. I don't know if these people were really seeing things that were real.

SPEAKER_01 32:42

So when I'm saying that they were definitively say, you could say that more than likely it is an illness or a a misfiring of the brain, but yes.

SPEAKER_00 32:52

Yeah, I just mean that, like, I guess I just want to put the disclaimer as I'm reading this, this is because this is what the reach research is saying. Like, this person was diagnosed or had this mental illness. Does that make sense? Gotcha. Okay. Anyway, okay, so um, but I don't, I guess I don't know. Do you think that he was just fully fronting? Do you do you think a lot of cult leaders and leaders like this fully believe in what they're or do you think it just depends?

SPEAKER_01 33:17

I I think it it's an off-topic ramp, but narcissism and gaslighting and and master manipulation. I don't feel I think the power feeds them. I maybe it becomes self-fulfilling where they they've tricked themselves into believing it as they go, but I I don't I don't know if it starts that way.

SPEAKER_00 33:35

I don't know either. I guess it just depends on the person's personal belief. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:39

Um, okay, so like I was trying to say a minute ago, we we kind of often hear about the crisis, but we rarely hear about the recovery. So, firsthand accounts from those who have recovered from religious psychosis describe the experience as waking up from a dream that felt

Recovery Help And Closing Thoughts

SPEAKER_00 33:55

more real than reality itself, which is so I don't know why that's so scary to me. Um, well, I do know why, but one woman recalled staying awake for days and refusing food because she thought sleeping would cause her to miss God's instructions. And after treatment, she couldn't believe how convincing it all had been to her.

SPEAKER_01 34:18

Because imagine if we did remember our dreams fully and they felt just as real after you woke up.

SPEAKER_00 34:25

Well, okay, actually, I know we talked about this a little bit where I had to go get crystals and load up and stuff for my girl Cynthia because my dreams were bleeding into my reality, and it was getting so scary because I was like remembering conversations, buying clothes, doing certain things. Like there was one time where I thought I wrote a whole episode for the podcast because I dreamt I sat down and wrote this whole like weird thing. So yeah, like I that's it is so scary to me. So obviously the recovery brings like a unique emotional hurdle, right? Because you're kind of grieving something that you once believed or thought you had, or you know, right was your everything. So you obviously have that like profound sense of loss that comes with realizing you weren't like chosen by God, but that it was just your brain misfiring, which that's gotta be really hard. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 35:16

So really think that you were like this the PTSD and guilt that must come from that, right? And couple that with the fear that it could happen again.

SPEAKER_00 35:28

Right. Oh my god. So fortunately though, psychosis is highly treatable. Obviously, it can be through therapy, sometimes medication, support networks, things like that. So it's not something that can't be treated, it just kind of depends on, you know, the level of the right people in the right places.

SPEAKER_01 35:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:45

Um, so obviously, if someone you love, you know, begins kind of displaying any signs or anything like that, experts recommend just kind of staying calm, listening without validating or arguing against their delusion. So don't try to pretend like you know what they're talking about and validate it, but also don't argue with it because you know that's not that's not gonna do anything. Either way could be a catastrophe, uh validating or arguing. I don't even know. Basically, you know, just encourage a professional evaluation, which I understand is hard. Obviously, there's like an immediate safety risk, then treat it as a medical emergency.

SPEAKER_02 36:23

Right.

SPEAKER_00 36:23

And like as a paranormal podcast, we spend a lot of time talking about ghosts, demons, possessions, and all that kind of stuff. And we kind of, you know, most of the time we're always talking about what if. So this episode is kind of like a reminder that sometimes the most important question isn't like, is it paranormal? It is is that person okay? Or or you know, is it a crisis? You know, I don't know. It's just I don't know if the priority is proving or disproving the supernatural, or is it just like making sure we all get home safe? I don't know. There's too many mysteries in this world.

SPEAKER_01 37:03

It's one of those things, right? Where like if you're gonna live in the world of a high strange and and being more open and receptive to ideas, I think at the same time it's important to make sure you know the signs of what to look for in case somebody is having an episode. And whether you live in the high strange or not, it's always important, right? And I think you make an important claim there of don't agree, don't egg them on, but make sure that you get somebody who can handle that situation to interview because we can't always. Yeah. A lot of these stories when you're telling me it remind me of two. Have you ever heard uh there's a really in-depth Netflix documentary on them too, but Chad and Lori Daybell.

SPEAKER_00 37:42

That vaguely sounds familiar, but I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 37:44

Lori, and I want to say it was later in life, joined the Church of Latter-day Saints. Okay, and she meets Chad Daybell, who is decently popular within the church. And he wrote a bunch of books about like demons being among us, right? And that she kind of gets this whole delusion of she needs to be a warrior for God to get rid of these demons hiding as humans, and they come up with a whole leveling system of like a labeling by level of people, like they're this level demon, that level demon.

SPEAKER_00 38:17

No, I've never heard of this. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 38:19

Like Andrea believes that her own children were actually demons, and it it it's not a great ending. If you there I can't think of the name of the documentary on Netflix. Um, I should look it up. Let me, I'm gonna do that real quick. It is really great though, because I think it talks about a lot of these kind of points you're making.

SPEAKER_00 38:39

Yeah, I mean, like, I I guess I just it's so hard too because like I feel like you and I have been in scenarios with people where we're like somebody should do something.

SPEAKER_01 38:49

And it's called Sins of Our Mother.

SPEAKER_00 38:51

Sins of Our Mother. Oh sounds scary.

SPEAKER_01 38:55

It's a dark one for sure, but it's interesting.

SPEAKER_00 38:58

Well, that's really all I have. I it's just I know that that was like Did you find any more stories by chance?

SPEAKER_01 39:06

Or were I'm sure they were just probably short, but of the actual happenings in Jerusalem on this. I want to know more about the hotel sheets.

SPEAKER_00 39:14

I didn't find anything else about the hotel sheets. Do you think they probably have to they probably have to order so many extra hotel sheets just to have probably I want to know like how many, I want to know how many sheets that they've lost.

SPEAKER_01 39:30

At least a couple hundred from the sounds of it at the beginning of the episode.

unknown 39:33

I know.

SPEAKER_01 39:34

This one's an interesting one though. It's a thinker, right? Because it I think no matter what your beliefs are, we've all been duped into something. We've all had parts of our reality that weren't real. We've thought they'd become real. And I think it kind of helps to know, like, while we we might call some of these people, like you know, Andrea Yeas is called the monster a lot, or like we're all not far off from being in the same boat.

SPEAKER_00 39:59

No, and also like I this episode isn't necessarily about religion at all. Like, do you get what I mean? Like, I'm not trying to like No, this is more about how the brain works. Correct. And everybody believe in whatever you want to believe in. That's fine. That's not really, but it's just like it's interesting to me that a lot of the times it is like religious psychosis and things like that that we hear about.

SPEAKER_01 40:27

That's what's kind of interesting to me because I understand it's like what your so if your brain, right, is the organ that's designed to keep you alive, and it it's right, it or fight or flight or somewhere in the middle of it. And if it's always it's wonders to either keep you from death, right? It's biggest thing is to keep you away from death. So the human construct or the and I could be wrong, the absolute truth of religion, yeah, of what comes after death, you can see where when the brain is misfiring why it could go to religion. So it's not that religion is the cause of it.

SPEAKER_00 41:06

Right, right, right, right.

SPEAKER_01 41:07

It's more a it's tied to the natural act of the brain.

SPEAKER_00 41:13

Right. And that's why when I was saying earlier, like it seems obvious, but then it doesn't, because I've never thought about it, is that when you go into psychosis, it's not like new concepts, it's concepts that you've it's the frameworks yeah. So that makes sense. Like if we go into psychosis, we'd probably see ghosts everywhere. Absolutely. So I don't know, it's just so interesting to me.

SPEAKER_01 41:36

It it seems like confirmation by us just comes and plays a huge part in it. Yeah, this is a this is an interesting conversation.

SPEAKER_00 41:43

I know, see, and I could have really, really put so much more in, but I was like, I don't, I want it, I I wanted us to kind of talk more about it because it was just getting my brain like so not worked up, but kind of like worked out because I'm like, what is going on? Like what?

SPEAKER_01 41:59

Yeah, because you you think it's like one it can relate out to so many other things, but the brains and then it like it just gets into the whole thing, even when I was studying psychology in school, like the study of the brain is the brain studying the study of the brain, yes, which is correct.

SPEAKER_00 42:15

That's so crazy. You know what's funny? Okay, so I I wrote this up, so right researched this episode, I wrote it, and then I actually was gonna scrap it because I'm like, no, it's I'm glad you didn't. No, I know, and I am too, because I'm kind of like, no, this isn't. And I'm like, no, it's been like just kind of on my brain for I'm like, I want to get it out of my good one.

SPEAKER_01 42:32

All right, well, I feel like I'm gonna think on this one for a while. I'm gonna call you at like two in the morning. Don't worry, I'll have more thoughts.

SPEAKER_00 42:37

Good. I want everyone to have thoughts. Leave comments and perfect, nice things.

SPEAKER_01 42:41

Let us know your thoughts. Write-ins. What do we have a emoji that would go for this episode?

unknown 42:48

I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 42:49

The brain.

SPEAKER_00 42:50

Oh, actually, that's the perfect one.

SPEAKER_01 42:51

There we go. We'll do the brain. Um, and then do we have any special treats for our Patreon folks tonight? We do perfect. So we'll have our bonus episode going up.

SPEAKER_00 43:03

We'll have, yep, some little couple Reddit stories. Perfect.

SPEAKER_01 43:07

Well, thank you, Kara. Thank you, everybody. Uh appreciate you sticking around after our news at the beginning here. We might be a little bit less, but we're we're gonna have some more fun conversations instead.

SPEAKER_00 43:17

We still have a Patreon with bonus episodes or yeah, bonus episodes and content.

SPEAKER_01 43:21

And I bonus content.

SPEAKER_00 43:22

I will promise I'm getting back to it, and now with more time, I can put more time into that. So if you're not always already on Patreon, come on over. There's also free tier. We'd love to have more free tiers. You can get tarot readings from Zachary and all kinds of stuff. So you don't have to be a paid subscriber. I want to make that very clear. You do not have to pay, just come on over, but also write in, give us your stories because that actually that actually is fun for us too, because then we can just sit down and have an episode where we just read your stories, and it's that's fun for us because maybe we'll sneak some of those in those that's what I think we should do. If we get more write-ins from you guys, we can just have more episodes.

SPEAKER_01 44:05

Perfect. All right, all right. What else do we need to do to close the shop up for the day?

SPEAKER_00 44:10

Most important thing you can do for us is to creep around my little eyeballs. Goodbye.