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What is Schizophrenia?Schizophrenia is a very complicated mental illness, affecting how a person thinks. A schizophrenic may experience hallucinations and delusions. This means what they hear, see and believe might not be real. Schizophrenia is a chronic disorder like diabetes, meaning one person might be affected differently than another. Most people do not have to worry about getting the brain disorder. Sometimes children get it which is very rare. Most people who get it, do so between sixteen and twenty-five years of age. The exact cause or causes of schizophrenia are presently unknown. Research has shown that genetics is involved. The public is often afraid of and misunderstand people who suffer from schizophrenia. Furthermore, people who do not receive treatment from this condition can frighten other people, even their own family, because they are not in their right mind which isn't to say there is anything wrong with being mentally ill. Most people who have the mind disorder and are receiving care do not harm others. It is a brain condition that can often be treated with medication. If you are afraid, please do not be as it is only a condition like Parkinson's disease. Sometimes movies affect how people perceive the mentally ill because they are portrayed in an unrealistic or atypical manner which isn't necessarily to say that some, possibly very few to be precise, have been or are like characters in the movies. Being stigmatized in society is an issue a schizophrenic faces. When a mentally ill human being does something violent, and the news media covers the story, readers and viewers are often afraid because they do not know the fact that most people who are mentally ill do not harm others. In such instances, the news media rarely, if ever, explains the truth about mental illness. A number of schizophrenia sufferers have their own career. Others live off of government and possibly family assistance. Some are in dire need of help as they are on the street. I cannot fathom what it is like being homeless and can only imagine what it must be like especially in cold weather. What is Paranoid Schizophrenia? Paranoid schizophrenia is a type of schizophrenia. It involves the person who has it being under the delusion that they are a victim of some type of persecution. I was once diagnosed with it and did not know I had it because I was under a grandiose delusion which involved persecution. People who are paranoid do not know they are doing something abnormal, at least in my case. What is a Grandiose Delusion? Sometimes people with schizophrenia are not aware they are mentally ill which is extremely serious. A grandiose delusion is a situation whereby someone who has schizophrenia believes they are someone extraordinarily special, as an example. I was delusional and didn't know I suffered from paranoid schizophrenia even though I was diagnosed by a psychiatrist for over twelve years, until I was about thirty-three.
References National Alliance for the Mentally Ill. Understanding Schizophrenia: What You Need to Know About This Medical Illness, Brochure. With editorial input from the National Institute of Mental Health. N.p., n.d. Torrey, E. Fuller. Surviving Schizophrenia: A Manual for Families, Patients, and Providers. 5th ed. New York: HarperCollins, 2006 |
Illustrations © 2007, 2008 Kevin Carlson and Richard Carlson Jr. Web site © 2008 Richard Carlson Jr. unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. |
