My whole life I’ve been treated differently, and regarded as different and ‘bizarre’ (among other more hateful words) but no one believed I had sza/ was very surprised when I was diagnosed because I apparently articulate myself very well. So according to everyone around me being able to speak clearly and have a large vocabulary meant I didn’t have anything wrong with me (when in reality I can only do this because I read and wrote nonstop my entire childhood and teenage years), I was also able to show bursts of energy in social situations, though what everyone didn’t see was how stressed, anxious and fatigued I truly was, along with the paranoia that would completely destroy me the second I was alone. I was very different around people in public vs how I was when no one was around me, and I put on a front 24/7 bc I was so tired of people treating me cruelly and wanted to be seen as normal and function like a mentally healthy person. No one seemed to notice I only was able to be around them for a few hours at a time before I had to leave, that was about all I could really handle, and when I got to the point where I had my breakdown and became a full on agoraphobe everyone just told me I was lazy, and a liar, and I was just trying to get out of going to class, going to church and getting a job. For these reasons only a small handful of people in my life truly believed my diagnosis, while everyone else around me (including influential adult figures) told me I was doing it for attention or flat out said I was lying.
Yes just ignore them unless its a psychiatrist.
I used to until I became too pathetic for people to not recognize there was a problem. Look at the bright side. It’s proof that others can’t hear you when you think although as recently as today I still thought someone could.
thats basically what happened to me, except when I got to the state where I was completely broken down everyone just called me lazy lmao
Only person who didn’t believe me
I was talking to a Columbian maintenance guy I said “yo tengo eschizophrenia”
He said “tu? No…”.
I say “similar, la nombre es schizoaffective”
He said “ohhhh lo siento!!”
The hardest person to convince though was myself.
I was a very severe case tho
If you’re diagnosed schizophrenia you probably have it. I’d rather be considered sane. Even though I still have it. I don’t try to convince people anymore. Fortunately now I’m at a place I don’t need people to give me their claim to know what I am.
I of all people, understand myself better than anybody else does.
People say mean things. Do you see a therapist?
I didn’t believe it either lmao, because of everyone around me influencing me and also because of my f***** up brain. It took forever for me to believe anything until my psychiatrist sat me down and showed me my official diagnosis on paper and said “this is what you have been diagnosed with officially” I don’t really care that people didn’t believe me anymore, because I know the truth and the closest people in my life also know and help me, but at that time it really messed up my self worth and furthered my denial towards any sort of help that was being offered to me AND my denial that I had anything wrong with me at all.
I see a therapist and a psychiatrist but I’ve only started opening up to my therapist recently, it’s hard for me to talk about a lot of things.
I went years telling people I had schizophrenia/schizoaffective.
That whole time I was unsure that I really did though
It was hard to understand the nature of the illness
Until I recovered I see the difference now and I clearly have it and had it much worse in the past too.
No one ever said “you don’t have it.” But they did ignore contact with me after I said I did ;). So I took that as a “I believe you have it”.
Actually wasn’t sure what to believe at times. But here I am.
lol.
I’m pretty articulate and have a pretty good vocabulary but I don’t think anybody that knows I’m Sza questioned it.
i dont think anyone would think i had it unless i told them my symptoms or if they knew me back when i was in and out of the nut house.
Yes, prior to diagnosis, there were few people who thought I had autism, Down syndrome or mental retardation, some of those people later went on to believe I had schizophrenia. Turns out, they might have been on to something.
I had a neurologist who I was seeing for brain lesions tell me I’m not weird enough to have schizophrenia. He was convinced my paranoia and hallucinations were caused by ocd
Not really. Maybe some manipulation or exaggerating. Nobody except me questioned it. I guess agnosognosia?
It’s hard to fake it when you suffer 24/7, cannot do ■■■■, and can’t tell what is real…
After years of my family not willing to slow down their style to adjust to an invalid daughter, the diagnosis of sz didn’t help any. They didn’t understand it. Neither did I, actually. I was a stranger to myself.
The only person who suspected I was schizophrenic before I was ever diagnosed was my mom, she noticed everything wrong and shes the one who brought it up, which I rejected immediately. and then when everyone around me refused to believe me/questioned me I straight up refused to accept I was struggling in any way and it was clearly all just an act.
It’s a survival instinct that we want to defend ourselves.
I was similar lmao, classmates and teachers called me stupid/treated me like i was stupid 24/7 in school. I was also almost misdiagnosed with autism, and then DID, before they diagnosed me with schizoaffective
Were you taken to a charter school for “special boys” with a “lisp”?
No I was just in an overcrowded public school system that cared more about football players and potential student athletes than anyone else, especially kids with learning disability. I was part of the ‘no child left behind’ movement and despite not knowing what I was doing I was passed every single year into the next grade