OnTrack

Factsheets Signs and Symptoms of Psychosis

Just like any other illness, psychosis has signs and symptoms.These symptoms are not identical for everyone. For psychosis, symptoms are often broken down into three main groups, positive, negative and mood.

Positive symptoms

Positive symptoms involve experiencing something unusual that you didn’t experience before you had psychosis. They can leave you feeling very confused about what is real and what isn’t.

Negative symptoms

Sometimes when a young person has psychosis, they might lose energy or motivation, not be interested They may also feel like they’ve lost their emotions, for example something that would have been funny once just doesn’t seem funny anymore.

Mood symptoms

feelings that don’t seem right or feel as though their emotions are all mixed up - like feeling stressed and sad when everyone else seems relaxed and cheerful. 

It’s very normal to have ups and downs in life.We would all feel sad if something bad happened, or really happy if something great happened. Sometimes with psychosis, these feelings can become exaggerated and overwhelming.