No, it's different, because in Morgellons the patient actually sees something which doesn't exist. The patient will bring a container into the doctor's office claiming it contain "bugs" that they've removed from their skin. Examination under a microscope reveals it to be bits of dried skin (and/or clothing fibers or lint) that the person has scratched from theirself. They may very well have an actual sensation that creatures are crawling within their skin, but they're also seeing things that don't exist.
Not all Morgellons patients "see" something, its often only the ones who start looking at things under magnifying glasses or a microscrope who "see" something.. they all thou feel like something is crawling on them or biting their skin.
I had Morgellons (what many people arent aware is that it can be a coexisting condition of ME/CFS)..
I didnt "see" anything for a very long time.. I had the illness a couple of years before I saw anything and when I did.. I only "twice" saw something.. once I saw three mite looking things just under my skin which moved and then I couldnt see them anymore when I tried to inspect them. The second time I saw something was right at the end of my illness with it.. I had an incident where this hard, crystaline, wee rice like structure stuff started coming out of my skin (that is a manifestation mentioned in some rare Morgellons cases.. I never saw spects of black dust nor threads but then I never got out a magnifying glass to look). Would I have seen the classical threads of Morgellon's had I looked with magnifying glass.. who knows? (I didnt know anything about Morgellons at the time to know or think to even look like that).
Morgellons disease for me was all about feel and the sensations around it. Interestingly..when all this hard tiny rice like stuff started to come out (interestingly Ive since read that something like that can happen in fibreglass poisoning).. and once it did, it was like whatever I was carrying had died (all the crawling sensations just under and on my skin went) and my Morgellons actually went. Ive never had it come back.
Anyway.. I had a hellish time with it there for a while.. unbearable sensations.. so so itchy I wanted to rip my skin off. I think I got rid of my Morgellons and killed whatever it was by all the things I was doing to try to relieve it and did help a touch.. eg long salt and bicarb of soda baths (I was sleeping in a salt bath as it was one of the few ways I could get some relief). I do believe it was some kind of parasite thing as it also improved a bit with white sage smudging (like what is done to kill parasites) and things like rubbing lavender oil on my skin helped a wee wee bit. One can feel stuff coming out (pressure leaving the skin) even when one couldnt see anything.
One Morgellons disease study found that all the ones in the study tested positive to lyme. (Ive seen a lyme specialist and she does think I have lyme but I dont test postive).
One thing interesting was that others visiting me.. would start itching heaps if they sat down where I'd been previously sitting. I even saw people often get up and move after trying to sit where I'd previously been sitting, I experimented with this..offering my visitors a seat where I'd been sitting just after welcoming them into my home.. even if I was making sure I didnt itch.. if they sat where I'd been, they'd start itching right after sitting there (their itchy would stop after they'd moved away from the area I'd been sitting while feeling all these things coming out of me).. (note I didnt tell any of them about the experiment I was doing as telling them could of caused them to start itching due to thinking of it).
. So obviously whatever it was, tried to contaminate others too but their bodies must of been able to stop it taking hold as none of them ended up with Morgellons. (thou my daughter ended up scratching for several weeks). Was I more susceptable to some parasite due to already having ME/CFS? I believe that may of been so.
It even had a pattern to it... whatever it was, become far worst at a certain time at night when it felt like it went into a feeding frenzy in my skin.