I didn’t decide jack - the doctors have done that. It’s not how I live my life - it’s just an area of my life that I have to pay attention to.
Got a friend deeply involved in a delusion I was having during high school. She eventually was able to snap out of it and told me she thought I should go see someone, that I needed help. (Not in a mean way, but concerned)
I was terrified she was going to tell someone and everyone would think I was crazy. I told her I had made it all up as a joke, and she got really mad at me because it was a scary delusion! Anyways time passed and I thought more and more about what she had said, and I realized how nothing I thought was going to happen to me according to my delusion had happened. It all sort of fell apart then, and I started looking back at my past and all the strange beliefs I had had and realized that something wasn’t right with me.
That’s where my journey to recovery began. I feel like you can’t really begin to recover until you accept that you’re ill.
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I didn’t decide I was schizophrenic. I thought lyrics and movies were guiding me to report into a psychiatrist that I had some message to give them and then afterwards I was admitted to a psych ward. I didn’t believe I was schizophrenic then, and after being released stopped taking my meds and I was delusional another seven months until I was again put in a state hospital ward for two months and finally stabilized. It was evident by then after stabilizing I knew I was mentally ill.
A better way to ask the question would have been when did you accept the decision that you are schizophrenic. Although i do feel you have to make a conscious decision about if your symptoms are a result of a brain disorder or for some other reasons. No intention to offend.
No offense taken. I was just adding clarity to the question as it seemed a bit ambiguous to me. It’s all good. 
I thought for along time that I had DID but soon plugged everything in for sz my mother also told me early You’ve always been weird. I was like thanks a lot noncommittal.
The fact that I believed I was talking to fictional characters in books, or to people through their photo was a big give away something wasn’t right in my head. I didn’t know what it was at first except for me just being creative…but then I slowly started believing in everything I was hearing and seeing and quickly started slipping down that rabbit hole with nothing to grab onto. I used to also believe at one point I was someone I wasn’t like at the time I remember believing I was Wednesday Addams (I was a freshmen in high school at this point). I’d give myself moments where I’d pretend one thing, or daydream and I’d forget that I was just pretending/daydreaming.
The one thing that finally sent my parents over the edge I guess was that I kept not really sneaking out, but just going out and getting lost, wondering around confused and in a delusional state. One time, I don’t remember how I got home, but I thought I’d walk to Iowa…(which was at least an 8 hour car ride from where I lived, imagine trying to walk there). No clothes packed, no money, nothing just me walking. After that incident I believe they started with the testing. I don’t remember much of that time. I guess I was so out of it.
From the testing came the hospitalization. I was in the psyche ward for six months before I was released back to my parents. Again I still don’t recall much…too heavily medicated I guess. I think of it as my mind had a complete break-down and left me permanently scared, mentally at least. To this day I still have horrible memory, and feel so bad when my best friend will ask “do you remember when” … I think she can tell I don’t because of the blank look on my face eventually I just nod my head and agree to it with her in hopes she’ll move on to another topic.I just feel bad that I don’t remember all the same t hings she does and it makes me feel like a bad friend…and it’s because of my first real knowledge that I was different.
I think it took me some studying for several months on the topic of Schizophrenia just to understand what it was I had. I’d try and find any book I could in the library about the topic and just sit and read it. I think though very earlier on I knew something wasn’t right about me that I was seeing and hearing things other people weren’t and having trouble distinguishing fantasy from reality. And trust me being a teenager trying to learn and accept this about yourself is hard, as if being a teenager on it’s self is any easier. I was already picked on before my symptoms got serious, and to learn quickly to just keep my mouth shut. I was so happy when we moved back to St. Louis to where no-one knew me. It was so much easier to sit quietly and be ignored in a place where no-one knew you.
I was dxd about 1.5 years out from a psychotic break.
lagoonlovely, you are absolutely correct about monitoring the medication. Some pdocs; although even monitoring your medication monthly and your explaining the problems, don’t want to adjust it or prescribe you different meds that might be better for you,
As for me; I knew that I was “sick” since about kindergarten or first grade. I had been several different diagnoses from college onward… I studied books on schizophrenia for years and then said to myself, “no, that’s not me.” and gave to the library. Several months ago, a book from 1979 about schizophrenia attracted my attention at local used book store. I bought the book, I took it home and read it. Much of the data on treatments, especially meds, has changed. Also, the theories has to the causes of schizophrenia have changed dramatically.
However, the information on symptoms was priceless. I saw too much of myself in those pages I have been diagnosed with many different “labels.” The most latest was bipolar disorder. I don’t know my current diagnosis, but, I know my pdoc and therapist disagreed with initial evaluation. Then, maybe we should diagnose our selves. But then, maybe we are to close to ourselves to do ourselves any good. Perhaps, it should be a collaborative affair; between pdoc, therapist, and patient and maybe others affected?
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I decided by empirical observation. When the medicine is taken away the delusions and mania comes back. The medicine treats bipolar or schizophrenia so I must be one of the two. I don’t care which one as long as the pills keep working.
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I was 17 when I was diagnosed. The swan song of a break landed me in hospital for a the better part of a year.
It wasn’t a decision I wanted to accept. I denied it for a long time… self medicated… got worse instead of better.
It was six years ago I really nearly left this life… and that is when I decided it was time to change and try to make my life better.
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I was dx with schizophreniform in hospital 4 years ago. My guardian angel explained to me what it was. He told me too go google it. I did and found out.
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I was diagnosed, which is a fancy way of saying “being called a name” or “labled” by a psychologist. The name now means nothing to me, though it did for 8 years. Sure I experience psychosis, but there are definite reasons for why and none of them are addressed by the Medical Model of Psychiatry. I had to go down other paths to heal and resolve.
When I was about 6 years old a kid bit me and I had heard about rabies and thought it could be transfered from person to person, so I told everyone and so that was when I found out about schizophrenia I think, that people don’t easily suffer from rabies, but they can suffer from schizophrenia. At least that’s what I remember. Also, I couldn’t speak well, I understood I was strange from the others, I laughed a lot, as you can see, it came to me at an early age, about 8-10 years old, at least it was a prodromal stage.
I took a hit of LSD when I was nineteen after smoking much pot in the 4 years before. Well that hit of acid put me over the edge and into this semi-permanent psychoses. I didn't know a thing about schizophrenia or it's prevailing symptoms but as I remember I started to have many imaginations and seemed to becoming a witness and aware of another spiritual realm.
It took more then ten years to finally get help at the request of my family after getting into a bit of trouble self medicating with street drugs. I checked in to the local mental health facility and told a doctor what was bothering me. I told him of my delusion of grandeur and the one of persecution and was happy that their was a medication for these symptoms. I still used street drugs and alcohol but finally gave up the drugs but kept drinking as I needed a buffer between me and the harsh crude affects that reality was having on me. May be I should just write you a book about it, as it is an ongoing revelation to me.
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I know I am seriously mentally ill, but I do sometimes wonder if I am sz. I’ve been hospitalized a lot, and every time it was against my will. I fought my commitment in court several times. I have hallucinated before, but not extensively. Since they’re so determined to treat me for sz, I guess I will go along with it.
I consider this forum to be the stepping stone to my recovery and awareness, it all started to seem true illness when I started to read from you guys about your symptoms and how much in common was there. After that I started to read more and became convinced of my illness. It was an important turn in my life to take and I am thankful I did. To know your limitations is the first step to overcome them. That’s how I do things nowadays.
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Hey! I 'm sorry you have been hospitalized so much! Maybe it’s because you don’t admit you have sz! Admit it and be calm and don’t start any court and treat people as normal as you can and maybe you’ll see a difference! I 'm telling you these for your own good!
i was having tea 
with the mad hatter 
and the march hare 
and the little mouse 
…mmmmmm…and i thought to my self…i think i want to be mentally ill…
what disease shall i have…
i know i’ll be sz…with ocd…and …paranioa…and …psychotic…and depression…and to top it off i’ll have ptsd too… dusted lightly on the top !?! 
take care 
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After three hospitalizations, I was diagnosed at 38 with Chronic SZ. Again at 51 with Undifferentiated SZ. Again at 61 with Paranoid SZ. Why can’t they agree? I didn’t think I was sick until I was 33. My first hospitalization was in 1963. I’m just now realizing the implications of having this disease. (17 doctors).