How do you deal with the stigma of schizophrenia?

DX'd - Sz/SzA
21

It depends who im saying it to and what the situation is. Sometimes i say i have depression and leave it at that. Which happens to be the truth, just not the whole truth.

22

I tell people I have anxiety. My closest friends I tell I have bipolar.

Oh to have a world where sza and sz weren’t stigmatized up the wazoo.

23

i’m seeing a lot of people in this thread with SzA-B tell people that they only have Bipolar, and don’t mention the schizophrenia part of it. this is also what i do. i wasn’t aware that this is what other SzA people do, and i feel sort of comforted in that.

even among my own friends, my condition is treated like some sort of baggage, even though i have no choice in having SzA. so, i tend to just not bring it up.

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24

Yes, I have SZA and I tell Bipolar when I have to say it. But, most people in my family don’t know I have a mental illness.

25

I tell as few people about it as I can get away with.

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26

The only people that know is immediate family and 2 doctors

27

Try to be indifferent to anyone’s opinion

28

Everybody thinks that I sometimes have depression :smiling_imp:, which is only partially true.

29

I hope you realize most people don’t really know what bipolar actually is. So if you were hoping they would be more understanding about that mental illness I don’t know what to tell you.

30

Most people never heard of schizoaffective but most people have heard of bipolar.

I was stigmatized terribly by others when I divulged my SZA diagnosis

Bipolar is less stigmatizing

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31

Agreed with @Wave I think more people know of bipolar, or at least can connect the dots, rather than knowing about schizophrenia/schizoaffective. At least that’s the way I perceive it in my neck of the woods

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32

Most people have heard of bipolar but they have no idea what the actual illness is or what it does to people. The only thing they think is you go happy, mad and sad very quickly which is a misconception. if people were aware some bipolar people actually go into psychosis, bipolar people would be right there next to schizophrenia in the stigma level. So the only reason why bipolar is better in the stigma department compared to schizophrenia is due to ignorance.

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33

Yes thats true @Airparticle

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34

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