To motivate me and others.
Hey @Daimon. how many new threads are you planning on starting? I’m a little worried you spent the last year coming up with an infinite list of thread topics. 
after my schizophrenia started but before it became disabling I had a driver’s license, a CDL and a motorcycle permit.ive probably had it since I was a 6 year old.
I feel a lot better since getting back on here. I felt like I was going crazy because the only people in my situation I could talk to were into tinfoil hat conspiracy theories.
It was a bunch of people twice my age who started having problems in their forties, so I couldn’t identify with their group.
The people in those groups are killing themselves left and right because they don’t realize the benefit of medication. Yeah the ■■■■is harsh and ■■■■and might not be for everyone, but I could predict when someone was going to off themselves and knew only meds could possibly save them.
And they’re doing damage to people I believe cause they have a dualist perspective on psychosis (in the sense it doesn’t have a strong physical/chemical component) with a bunch of bs psycho analysis and ■■■■that doesn’t work.
They labeled me with a bunch of personality disorders and â– â– â– â– when there is just 1 label that fits for having my kind of problems, schizophrenia.
I think my voices are real but I also realize I constitute as schizophrenic from a medical standpoint.
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I have spent three years hiding in my small bedroom after the psychosis. I think it has to do with both sz and the med, I became very lame. I can’t even wake up or walk. I have been confined to my bed and only get up for dinner every day. I can’t even talk to my mom because my mind was blank. I can’t focus for 5 minutes so they only think there’s no reply when they tried to talk to me.
Around 2014 winter, I get into contact with an old friend, who put me into a part time job. I worked in a deli being a shop assistance for a few months. I decided that I need to work again. My friend told me to work in a simple repetitivejob considering my cognitive deficits. I can’t rely on mom forever and I better have sth to do everyday. I was hospitalized again. I asked for a referral to vocational rehabilitation. The nurse told me to try clerical work. I remember talked to the nurse and they gave me advice. The case manager at the vocational rehabilitation centre said that she considered my very brave. I’m coming out of home to ask for a low level job. She gave me short term jobs in the centre. I remember I still sleep 12 to 14 hours for most days. I put myself together and tried to take up the job. People in the centre are not happy with my job performance. They said I didn’t talk. They said I have progress but they expect more than that. I was helping a workshop instructor. He said I’m doing very well on the clerical tasks. I get another job working in the office. I remember I tried really hard to focus myself in photocopying. I manage the job better. The case worker told me to look for a new job via open employment. We decide that since I have computer skills and typing skills, I shall apply for data entry job. I hence find the current job by myself. It doesn’t take long to find an entry level clerical job in the gov. I’m getting better every year and I manage the current job quite well. Since it’s atemp job, I’m applying for perm job. I feel more confident now I can manage my new job reasonably. I like that the current job put a little physical demands on myself everyday and I get more physically fit over time.
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That sounds like a good success story.
I have made myself walk again recently. I have goals in getting and managing a job and then exercising daily. I manage to walk 1 hr everyday. I expect myself to lose a lot of weight in 3 years. I think that it’ll help me to find a better job easier. So my lookout is much better now. With repeated efforts everyday, i would get slimmer and find a permanent job.
How is your social life and love life?
If you’re out of shape I can understand why you might not have a lover. I’m young and fit now so I think I can get a gf perhaps if I have my own place and a job. I’m hoping on that. I want a normal life and a family one day like @shutterbug I feel really psyched out from being unemployed and living with family. I feel like no one respects me. I will never fit in unless I am working. I realize that now.
I haven’t been able to work for years now so I work on things like managing my finances maintaining the lawns maintaining my room and kitchen saving money getting my full license washing the car eating and sleeping right fixing the car all of which I will do this year then next year visiting friends keeping in touch with extended family etc and work may be possible by that stage. Got to go stage by stage even if it is only getting up at the right time in the morning and making your bed having breakfast etc
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I had a major psychotic episodee in 2015 and took nine months off work. During the time I was ill I thought constantly, and wrote many, resignation letters thinking I would never get back to work.
I improved, with medication and a good team of psychiatrists, to a point where I could return on significantly reduced hours. It didn’t work out with the team I was put back into because that’s where the stress that caused my bad episode began and I was working with two bullies. So I asked to move teams.
Still on my significantly reduced hours, three days a week, five hours a day, I started in my new team. It didn’t take long before I realised i was in a team of good people, with a very supportive team leader, and work i could manage. So I increased my hours to three full days per week. And instead of being on a return to work plan, I am now just on a part time agreement.
Work give me a sense of purpose and belonging. I’m responsible for complex duties which I can manage because I’ve been doing this kind of work for six years. I have a reason to get up, shower, brush my teeth, cook lunch, use public transport, interact with people socially and professionally three days a week and it is a huge part of my recovery.
I see work as therapeutic. I still “hallucinate” and have “delusions” but I also have something to distract myself with. And I’m less self centred because I have a responsiblity to my team and my clients.
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as a truck driver I got to visit 48 states.
I work two part-time jobs, one teaching at a community college and one at a pharmacy. Both jobs carry some stress with them, but I am able to manage it. I think I would be miserable if I didn’t have work in my life. It gives me purpose, forces me to get out and among people for hours at a time, besides the pay I so desperately need. I’m excited about this full-time job at a university that I plan to apply for. I think I would be much happier there, but we’ll see what happens. I need to line up three people to write letters of recommendation for me before I submit my materials to the human resources department; I’m trying to be patient while I await return emails from those people, letting me know if they will do it or not.
I don’t have a working success story. Sorry. I’ve literally failed at everything I have ever done. From wifedom to motherhood to nursing to composition, I have failed at virtually everything. My former nurse says that this is because of my sza illness. I haven’t worked in 24 years. It’s probably just as well. Because I get fired from all of my volunteer jobs I have ever held in the past. My judgement is too poor to work successfully. Same reason I can’t drive is the reason I can’t work.
What is your diagnosis?