inside.

“I thought space aliens were after me. I didn’t dare leave my room and covered all my windows with aluminum foil to keep them out. I refused to eat because I thought the food was poisoned.”

             This is a quote from a young lady who believes her delusions are real. No one could convince her otherwise. Below is a couple of blogs from a schizophrenic himself. Just to take a closer look on how they think, check it out! http://lifeofschizo.blogspot.com/

           Schizophrenia is NOT a MPD (multiple personality disorder)! This is a common misconception that has greatly contributed to the ‘schizophrenic stigma’ which makes life for people suffering with this illness even more difficult. MPD has been blown out of perspective by society, making it look a lot worse than it really is.  Not all people suffering with schizophrenia will have the same type of

experiences, but they will all at some point have some disturbances in thinking, feeling and having a social life with others. The symptoms range in severity and consistency. They may come on very suddenly, or they may gradually appear over an extended period of time. Symptoms vary within each individual, a schizophrenic may suffer no symptoms at all before experiencing a psychotic episode where symptoms suddenly increase. Schizophrenia has three stages in which people have the time to fully develop the illness, in which then, others can be fully aware of it too.
         Prodromal phase, is the first stage in which people begin to lose interest in their usual activities, and start to stay aware from family and friends. A person is now overwhelmed with everything, and cannot concentrate on a day-to-day task, which causes them to spend most of their days alone. Family members will most likely think they are lazy and get upset over the behavior being shown, rather them taking a second to sit down and see what the problem is. I realized these are phases that teenagers go through on a daily basis, so how exactly can you tell whether a teenager has schizophrenia? You can’t. Unfortunately, no one will notice until they get into the second stage, which is the active phase.
        This is the stage where everyone around will start to think they are absolutely crazy! Many people will start to have hallucinations, experience delusions, strange behavior and feelings, and of course, ‘the voices’.  They may believe that the day they are living through is nothing but a dream, or that the person they pass on the street was only a hallucination.

     The last phase is the residual phase which is somewhat similar to the Prodromal stage in which, they completely want to be withdrawn from everything and everything around them. Their ability to function a ‘normal life’ will decrease after each active phase.

Just like everything else in life, schizophrenia symptoms fall into two categories—“Positive” and “negative” symptoms. The positive symptoms are often called psychotic symptoms because they refer to the symptoms that appear. Negative symptoms refer to the elements that are taken away from a person.

Positive                                                                                   Negative

-          Delusions                                                                                - Attention

-          Hallucinations                                                                        - Memory

-          Disorganized thoughts                                                          - Fluency of thought&language

-          Mood swings                                                                           - Emotional expression

-          Strange behavior                                                                    - Judgment

                                                                                                   -Decision making&motivation