schizophrenia
Schizophrenia 101; look beyond the pop culture portrayals and learn the reality behind this oft-stigmatized mental illness.
Living With Schizophrenia
This post contains content that may be triggering to some. Hi friends, just seeking some advice and to hear if any of you have experienced anything similar. It’s a bit of a dark place for me that I’ve been in, in some ways and so here it goes.
Jessica WilsonPublished 3 years ago in PsycheRebirth
It’s been about a year since I’ve had to chew and swallow your bits and pieces. Every now and then I feel the after effects of the narcissistic abuse you've given to me, and sometimes it's as simple as me noticing someone with a full head of curly brown hair. The post trauma picks at my scabs and leaves them wide open and bloody, never fully healed. I’ve developed a refined acquired taste for buttered over-burnt edges and bitterness. The hostility turned into familiarity turned into clarity. I took the smell of salt water home with me after all the days I spent emptying my obsession into repression into depression. Anything you’ve ever touched has been burned because you won’t be here to touch any tangible material again. I still smell your breath the night you pushed me into traffic and dared me to move a muscle. Precariously, I tuck myself tightly into bed, just incase you pull the sheets out from under me. I've told you before; it's not a magic trick if I don't disappear.
Nicole CafarelliPublished 3 years ago in PsycheConfessions of a schizophrenics wife
Interlude I wrote this months ago I am now safe and happy I had no outlet other than to write! So i am writing this on my iPhone 11 notes because I had to pawn my laptop to survive til payday but I’m bout to get it out lol! Anyway I just fought for my life I’m traumatized I want to go into detail but I feel like it’s snitching so we gonna pretend this is fiction and names and locations are changed to protect my “ ex husband or whatever the fuck he is I hope he alive he’s not answering I can’t go check on him cuz I fought for my life to leave! How can I be so concerned about someone who almost killed me but truth be told I know the real him he just schizophrenic or have demons on him idk which one but I’m drained i pray for him to be ok once I find that out I will be able to move on. So we just gonna start from the beginning! I need to go Into every detail for you to understand! I have to get this out so I can free myself from him .
She Is No Longer Herself
She sits in the chair in the dining room, so small and frail. I can't help but wonder what she is thinking about. Her eyes are red and swollen as she stares at the floor transfixed to one particular spot. She makes no movements for what seems to be hours. Almost as if she is hypnotized in a trance, I snap my fingers to see if she will come back to reality. Is she being haunted by the trauma of her past, or has she always been this way? I ask her what she is thinking so hard about and she replies with the same answer she always does, "NOTHING". I don't want to anger her by asking any further questions so I walk away and let her be.
Joyel Joyel KowalskiPublished 3 years ago in PsycheBlood and Chocolate
“Today is Friday the 30th, 2021. The time is 1:30AM. I’m detective James Marllow. Badge number 3580. Sitting with me is Eric Porter. Hello Mr. Porter. I ask that you acknowledge that the interview is being recorded and that you consent to the recording.”
Shayla BeesleyPublished 3 years ago in PsychePeace
I wake up and the need to put my thoughts in order construes to the blank sheet of paper that’s right in front of me. How can I determine how I feel in words that can only explain so much but explain everything at the same time? It’s like the meaning of love, an easy thing to get into that can bring you a sense of belonging and peace. I enjoy writing about mental illness because it’s what I experience. It’s a matter that is controversial to society but internally devastating to someone experiencing it. My experience was like no other when I was going through it. It was like my mind took over my entire being and controlled everything I thought and said. It’s not something that I feel is necessary to be judged by. It’s not something that should be poked by blame for. It’s something that should be seen like any kind of disease. It’s like having a tumor in the brain, you take medication to devour it, to shrink the mass that is holding back the person’s ability to function correctly. It just occurs relentlessly and freely in the mind. Where no one knows how it occurs or why. But it is an experience like no other and perhaps its partially psychological because its unique to the persons experience in life. However, it is still unknowingly occurring in good people. The mind is not who you are, it is like a navigating device determining, analyzing, and experiencing who you want to be. When I journal, it brings me a sense of eye-opening experiences because not everything I think and feel makes sense. That’s the downside to having schizophrenia it injures the mind and makes everything you experience seem hindering. I can have a thought that I’m worthless and the voices take over and I get the choice to agree. Yet, sometimes I don’t even know why I think this way. It isn’t something that I’ve done or said that has allowed me to go down the path of self-destruction. But rather a feeling of worthlessness. Where does this feeling come from? I think it comes from the chemical imbalance in my brain that is disturbing the chemicals that allow me to feel the right way. You see it’s all a science and not a spiritual disconnection with god. It should not be stigmatized. It is something I have to deal with on a regular basis because there has been more stigmatizing then trying to find answers to what is happening in the mind. It has to be more than a chemical imbalance because there are people who take up to ten medications and still, they hallucinate and hear voices that disturb their everyday life. It’s easy to think the intrusive thoughts that happen in my mind are something that is real because everything you experience in your consciousness is created in your subconscious. Everything that occurs In your mind is the experience you face in life. So, at first you can’t help but believe it’s all true. But with care and wisdom you realize its one experience you face in life and don’t have to make it your reality even though its disturbing. I don’t wish this illness on anyone it is hard to come out of when it’s something you face every day not knowing when the voices will occur or when you’re going to hallucinate. With great support and medication, you can choose to believe it Is just a disease that is medical and physical. Although there are still people out there who believe it’s a spiritual occurrence and that is easy to believe, its only detrimental to the person experiencing this to believe that. The reason is because it’s easy to feel like you’re being punished by something beyond you. Believing that will cause a feeling of not wanting to exist. So, with great care I want to illustrate that it’s important to realize it is a brain disease and nothing more that brings me too a sense of peace and realization.
Cerina GalvanPublished 3 years ago in PsycheThe Witness
I woke to the feeling of a hundred hands. They surround me, holding me, lifting me towards the surface of my self. I continue forward, opening my eyes to the light of the world. My perspective shifts as I lift my left hand from the black polyhedron. As I sit up to a room of rust, an ominous picture hangs just before this room's passageway. Their bones undisturbed on a rusty ski lift, no semblance of fear in their being; it must have happened in an instant. The solitude of these heights.
Tyler ChasePublished 3 years ago in PsycheFactors of schizophrenia
Nowadays, there are more and more friends suffering from schizophrenia, so more people are beginning to care about the main cause of schizophrenia. We know that there are many reasons that can cause schizophrenia. Let me introduce you to the factors of schizophrenia.
Paula J. SpencerPublished 3 years ago in PsycheWhat It Gives, It Takes Away: Creativity and Mental Illness
Creativity and psychopathology “Normality is a paved road: It’s comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow on it” — Vincent van Gogh
Angela VolkovPublished 3 years ago in PsycheSail Away
In their minds– No, in my mind– No. I have to start again. My name is Yanny. I try to read but most days I just sit and look out my window. I guess that's what most of the people here do.
Schizophrenia & Schizoaffective Disorders
Schizoaffective..... Schizoaffective disorder, as defined by the Mayo clinic, is a mental health disorder that is marked by a combination of schizophrenia symptoms, such as hallucinations or delusions, and mood disorder symptoms, such as depression or mania. Frankly, this can sound horrible to a newcomer.
Becky HowellPublished 3 years ago in PsycheWardlord
I am a Marine Corps veteran with scizoaffective disorder and this is my story. I enlisted into the Marines at age seventeen with the consent of my parents who decided it was better than me living in the low income housing myself and a good friend had moved into. I had been kicked out of the house shortly after my 17th birthday because I was partying too much and had started smoking Newport 100s. I had also been involved in a hit and run and since my vehicle was in my fathers name, he now had a warrant out for his arrest. After paying the fines and clearing his name I was out bouncing from couch to couch. I had been homeschooled the majority of my life but had attended a Christian school in Kansas City, MO named The Daniel Academy. This school was horrible, we didnt learn anything other than how to fake a seizure when being prayed for. We were taught that there were Angels visiting us during praise and worship sessions in the morning time and if the spirit of God moved the staff we didnt have class all day. I had grown up in Mississippi until I was 13 years old when my parents had been layed off within days of each other and we had to move up to Missouri. I do not fully understand or remember why this school was selective but I find it and the Church that sponsored this school if you would like to call it that to be the single most damaging time period in my life over any drug addiction or erratic behavior that was soon to follow. I learned almost everything I knew about how the world works from first hand experience or finding the information my own goddamn self. I was not a believer myself so trying to find friends who hadnt drank the kool aid was very hard to do. I was an outcast and a troubled teeanger with a demonic cloud over my head as the dean of the school said. I would have demons cast out of me damn near every week I was there. Its hard to convince yourself that something is not wrong with you when shit like that kept happening. I fucking hated it and I still carry resentments toward some of the people there. Mostly I have forgiven the kids I went to school with and I am working on healing from that as I move foward in life and now have kiddos of my own. Needless to say I did not want to participate in anything going on at the school and the staff knew it too. They kicked me out when I was in the 10th grade. So a year and a half later I am getting ready to go to bootcamp after being kicked out everywhere I have been. I got my diploma from a local Community college and was starting to patch things up with my family. I had a girlfriend who I thought was going to be there forever and I thought I was hot shit. After arriving at bootcamp I realized that I had most likely made a huge error in going but I wouldnt be able to live with myself if I went home. I hated it for the first month or so and then I started kind of digging the whole idea again. I would imagine myself in far off places doing some hood rat shit with my buddies I had yet to meet while hiking to keep my mind off of how dumb it felt to walk up and down some fucking hill in the dark. I graduated bootcamp and went home on leave. The gap between me and my family closed a little more and I thought things were going good with the lady friend. After leave was over it was back to the basics but this time I was at the school of infantry on Camp Pendleton, California. I hated that shit too for a while. I wanted to go home and I was tired of the shitty food and the shitty hikes and getting up in the middle of the night to watch gear that nobody was going to fucking steal. This was in March 2014. Russia and the Ukraine were getting into a pretty big confrontation and we were gearing up for war with Russia. The shit never happened and my motivation went completely away for a while. I graduated from there and went to my first actual unit. There, it was back to the new basics. I hated that shit too but soon found my little homeboi clique and it wasnt so bad. We did alot of cool training and I was in the helicopter company so I didnt have to hike as much, so things could have been worse. Then I started partying again after being pretty chill in that department for quite a while. I was really starting to fit in with America's finest pieces of shit that She had to offer. I was one of the pack. I started to love it, and I was finally accepted somewhere. I was still a fucking boot and still am for that matter cause I never went to combat and never really got to do my job, but it still felt important at the time and gave me a sense of belonging. Things were going to shit with the ole lady and I didnt give a fuck, I had been using MDMA and going to some 18 and up clubs and raves in San Diego and was feeling like I belonged into two groups. Myself and a few close buddies viewed ourselves as warrior hippies and it was kind of fun to shoot guns all week and then go drug it up from Friday to Sunday morning. We got really into that scene but it was time to deploy. For some dumbass reason I proposed to my lady friend and got on a damn slow boat to China, partied it up in Hong Kong and went to Disneyland over there 50 shades of puke drunk. It was fun and I also had my first experience with a prositiute there. I knew it was a piece of shit move but she was back home fucking anything that moved from gas station clerks to people at church. Fair is fair. I still feel bad but here I am. We went a bunch of places on that deployment including Kenya where I pulled security for then president Barrack Obama, not to name drop or anything. I was on the damn night shift at the airport over there I did not get to meet him but that would have been pretty fucking rad. I got to go to Dubai, Kuwait, and Bahrain twice. After getting back on the boat leaving Dubai my fiance told me she had to decided to pursue her life long dream of becoming a lesbian and that she couldnt pretend anymore. So I wanted to blow my brains out right then and there. I hated her but I needed her for some strange reason that I wasnt able to explain other than now knowing I was a "simp". We pulled into Hawaii on the way home and I got to visit my favorite titty bar in all of the land, Hawaii by Night. Im pretty sure they are still open but I loved the trashiness of the pool table with a pole in it. It was a blast. I had been sober from drugs this whole deployment cause how the fuck am I gunna bring em with me. I was drinking enough to fill the gap so it didn't matter at all. When I got home to Camp Pendleton all my friends went to go raving but my mom had come to see me and we hung out for about a week before I got to go on leave to home. The fam bam had moved back to the Sip and it was pretty cool to be back for more than a couple days since I was 13. My best friend came to visit and I picked her up from The Nola airport and we made a day of that and she stayed for about a week and a half. I bought a truck from my dad with some of that deployment tax free money and drove her back to the aiport and kept on heading west down the I10. I had like four days left to drive about thirty five hours but I decided to drive it in one go because my friends were having a hotel party and going to a rave. So after driving all that with no sleep I arrived in San Diego. This was my first time having full blown psychosis. I drank a bottle of vodka after arriving by myself and nobody thought much of it. They didnt know I didn't sleep and I even drove the car to somebody elses house to pick up more people. Then we went to some warehouse and I completely lost it. I blacked out but have faint pictures in my head of slapping some poor womans ass as hard as I could and then she climbed up on my back punching me so hard that I was fully awake but not aware of why I though I was in Mississippi with all my buddies there and this chick rightfully so beating my head in. I deserved it but I was confused as fuck. We got back to the hotel and I started shit with people I did not know and was getting into stupid arguements about what zip code we were in and I couldn't really comprehend what was going down. Luckily my friend decided to take my drunk, psychosis riddled ass back to the barracks and gave me some of his doritos and let me sleep in his room so I didn't cause any trouble. I am thankful to him for many reasons but this is one of the biggest. People never realize how a small act of sharing your last bag of doritos can affect a sucidal person. I finally went to sleep and was bright eyed and bushy tailed the next day. I went and got some real food and I had hope for the future in almost every aspect. My fingers about to fucking fall off cause I am doing this like I just took some benzedrine or however the fuck you spell that shit Kerouac was taking, but alas I have no such cheat code. So I will do this in episodes or chapters or however you want to think of it. Peace be upon you the good reader if you indeed exist.
Noah BrownleePublished 3 years ago in Psyche