After being diagnosed with schizophrenia, I am learning a whole new way of living.
At 21, many ghosts haunt my life, lost in the whirlpool of my own mind. I am not at home in my own body. My face, my eyes, my skin, my bones. The people around me seem unreal. I am never sure who is real and who is not in a crowd. I exist between my morning pills and my night pills.
It is true that I need help many times. Someone to remind me to take care of myself. To shower, eat, clean my living space, brush my teeth, and take my medications. Someone to help me when I am distracted, someone to open the blinds when I am feeling paranoid, or someone to encourage me to go outside. I need certain routines to succeed in my college classes. I have to follow a straightforward schedule for sleeping, eating, taking my medication, and studying.
Wait, I am a great hibernator; the next two heartbeats and a hummingbird with a mouth full of tongue.
Hallucinating is the most exhausting part of schizophrenia. It’s talking without being spoken to. Seeing yourself with more faces than you can count and forgetting to count the people who aren’t real.
But the schizophrenia I know well and the schizophrenia you’ve been misinformed about are different entities.
Schizophrenia is an uprising of my own mind. Schizophrenia is not violence. In fact, people with schizophrenia are more likely to be victims of violence than perpetrators themselves.
I want people to understand schizophrenia the way they understand all illnesses. I don’t want to hide behind a wall of lies, blocking out the truth of my reality. The stigma attached to everyone living with schizophrenia is a false monstrosity. Bad guys, mad scientists, serial killers, malevolent geniuses, and horror movies. I’m tired of seeing these clichés. I don’t want people to be afraid of me, to think I’m violent or easily angered.
There is so much I want to teach people about what it is like to live with schizophrenia, so much misinformation I want to reject. I wish I could tell people: “I have schizophrenia and I am kind, gentle, and loving”; “I have schizophrenia and I am high-functioning”; “I have schizophrenia and I am not crazy.”
I want us to bring the conversation about mental health and mental illness into schools and homes. We need to stop using mental health diagnoses as adjectives and stop calling people, things, and events “crazy.” I have been called crazy, to be honest, but the more I hear that word, the more it becomes derogatory. Mental illness is more than just sadness, pain, and suffering. It is a personal and lifelong journey. It can be fatal, it can be deadly. It can also be a beginning, a shaping, a life-changing experience. It should never be taken lightly.
An advocate for me would save me a lot of pain. Someone who would help me communicate with doctors in a definitive way. Someone who would help me get diagnosed early. I spent three years experiencing psychotic symptoms almost every day. I woke up on the verge of losing my mind completely and went to bed on the edge of a disturbing reality. It took three years, six psychiatric hospital stays, more diagnoses than I can count on one hand, three job losses, hours of sitting with caseworkers, phone calls to the disabled, and more medication than I could ever afford. It was a terrifying journey, and I nearly lost my life more than once.
But now, with a diagnosis, the right medication, the right doctors, and the right support, I see no reason why I shouldn’t be successful with a little help. I see no reason why I shouldn’t graduate from college and go into the community health field, teaching young adults about early warning signs of mental illness and mental health, preventive self-care, warning signs for loved ones and friends who may be suicidal, crisis resources, and community support.
I finally get on a good medication that blocks the voices and hallucinations. My schizophrenia is well-controlled, and you wouldn’t know or recognize my illness if you met me on the street. But I shouldn’t have to hide it.
I fully intend to give back to the community of doctors, EMTs, therapists, and friends who saved my life. I want to save the lives of others, or at least alleviate the pain and fear that mental illness causes. And I see no reason why I can’t do that. It’s all in my hands, and I see no problem in achieving my goals despite my disability.
I want to dedicate this piece to my brother for all the strength he taught me to live. I love you so much.