While I haven’t met him in real life, one of my online friends is a paranoid schizophrenic. When I was getting to know him, he did (and still does) have a strange sense of humor and he acted odd at times, though I never really thought much of it. He later on revealed that he was a schizophrenic on the website that I met him on. I felt bad for him, but his revelation didn’t affect my judgement of him.
In my long life with schizophrenia, I have met many people with SZ, Most of them.were in hospitals and halfway houses. The last person with schizophrenia whom I was friends with was a homeless person here in town who died this year.
I know several people that are schizoaffective. One is a guy and two are females. I stayed with the guy before I was medicated and aware that I had sz. He was very nice, but would go off in a completely different direction with conversations talking about death, bombs, guns and the government. It made me uneasy. One time I walked in on him masturbating when I was staying with him. He was in the living room doing it and he later told me that he thought I would like it. Not sure if this was because of his condition or what, but it’s made me feel a little unsure about whether or not I should remain friends with him.
One of the females is 28 and I met her at my doctor’s office. She seems pretty normal but when I get delusional and talk to her about it she feeds my delusions and says that it’s all real and happening. I like her though, she makes me feel comfortable.
The other female is middle aged and I know her through my mom. When I have told her about my delusions, she tells me that she thinks I have a demon following me. I know that she still talks out loud to voices and she believes that she communicates with ghosts and people that she knows.
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one of my cousin has Sz… her expression is wide-eyed and stares directly at people and rarely blinks… another is an uncle of mine… he looks like his mind is preoccupied… he also looks depressed. he’s always asking for money to donate. i think they both have religious delusions.
I ve met two people in reality who had psychotic issues. I met one at a railway station. This was a middle aged woman who talked loudly to herself and walked along the railway before the crowd. Obviously she acted not normally. I think she was not on meds and was in an episode. and then I met another woman who was on antipsychotics. We met at a dinner party. She was obese, reticent and sad. You could hardly see her smile.
Do you still deal with some residuals of the god delusion?
I have met a few people with schizophrenia. The most impressive one was a woman with a good full time job and a former teacher who overcame developing the illness as a teen mom.
I met a ppl in hospital, my first feeling I had was sadness, he was having a heated conversation with someone who was not there, he never made me feel he was a threat
I’ve lived at an assisted living center for mentally ill people over fourteen years, so I’ve met a lot of schizophrenics. They all had issues. Of course, my sample isn’t really representative, because all the sz’s I’ve met here are so mentally ill that they can’t live on their own.
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What is the assisted living center like? Is it nice? Do you like it?
I’ve wondered about many people, but I’ve never known for sure if they were SZ or just seemed like it. In the psych ward, a fellow asked me if I was a wicked white witch, because he saw an aura. At the time I was pretty stoked. Awesome, I’m special, it’s my special powers! Gotta wonder about that guy, but he could have been bipolar having an episode too.
Is assisted living a n American thing? Never heard of it in uk
I wouldn’t know if they have assisted living in the UK. To me it seems like it’s a good solution to dumping the mentally out onto the street. I’ve only been in a few assisted living centers, so I don’t know about their overall quality. The one I live in isn’t bad. It’s no resort, but it’s okay to live in.
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What is it? Like how is it different to just hospital
The quality of life can vary from time to time in the same assisted living center. There is a pretty high turn over rate in these places, and if we get a few difficult residents it can bring things down. Where I live it isn’t bad. It’s not plush by any means, but the quality of life isn’t bad. I’m in the “independent living program”, a part of the assisted living center where I live. Because of that I can afford a computer and an internet connection. Right now I get $50.00 a week for necessities, $143.00 a month in food stamps, and a $50.00 a month stipend for not smoking. (They supply the smokers here with a pack of cigarettes a day. Those who don’t smoke get paid the money they would have spent on their cigarettes.)
But if you don’t mind me asking how is it assisted?
i have met a good few and tbh it was hard for me to pick up what they had if anything, i’m not sure how many i know but i do know that 3 of the ones that i do know are extremely high functioning and doing well,
i know two of them take clozapine but they sleep a lot, they still function really well (better than me i think) one of them anyway and i told him about this forum but idk if he will post anything, hope he does though.
It’s no resort. You live with a bunch of other sz’s, so naturally there are a few difficulties between residents, but not that many. When you’re in the hospital in the U.S. there is generally a closer monitoring of the people there. I’ve been in three different assisted living centers for the mentally, the one I live in now by far the longest. I’ve heard that some of the other assisted living centers can get kind of gnarly, but generally not too bad. I’ve described my life in my current assisted living center to Anxiety_Orange. You can get a more detailed account there.
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Tha would be good how do I find that? Thank you xxx
They provide us with the necessities - food, clothes, and shelter. They also have day treatment for us. They take care of most of the responsibilities of daily living for us.