living with schizophrenia

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my sister was bulled at school by other girls and she could not keep a job. becuse she had a nervous breakdown. and became
schizoprenic. in the past she was violent but now she is a bit calmer
she has delusions and heard voices in her mind. she was in hospital for 8 years. but now lives in a flat at a hostel. she is now in hospital
again. she comes home to visit us once a week.

i am very sad and embarrassed about it. also i do not know what to say or anwer her when she asks questions which ar not true. i also feel sorry for my mum who is in the same situation as me.

has any one had a similar situation like i have had?

I haven't known a scizophrenic person myself, but a lot of my friends have spent time in (mental) hospital (I narrowly missed out on it myself). You can always talk to us here about it though.

It's OK to be sad about it. I'm not so sure about being embarrassed by it, though it can be really tedious to deal with. What types of questions is she asking? About things that she hears you saying, even though you're not?

That being said, two freinds my only two Highschool freinds got it a few years after graduation. With one of them, I could see it developing, the other moved away, and came back to Maine with it. Another freind slid gradually into it over the space of a year, and it was sad to watch. I've also had apartment mates who were afflicted with it as well, but they were pretty much stablised on medication.

That being said, the medication that they were on had some pretty strange side effects. The Medication that my first roomate was on made him constantly tired and thirsty. --This was back in 1991.
My second housemate gained a LOT of weight, as did the guy that I watched slipping into it.

I assume that your sister is currently in the hospital to get the optimum balance of medications worked out.

I have a lot of professional experience of this as I've been working in mental health for the last five years, most of it with people with that diagnosis.

First off try not to be embarassed about it. Some more background would be helpful - how old are you and she? Where do you live? Mental illness is absolutely nothing to be ashamed of. Personally I've never understood why some people should feel that it is but I know they do. It has a terrible stigma attached to it in our society.

Also, although I know this is harder, try not to be sad about it either. I personally don't believe in 'mental illness' anyway, I just believe in diversity. A lot depends on the nature of the symptoms - with some people they can really lose their personality but remember your sister is still a human being and I'm sure you love her just as much as if she didn't have her difficulties. She just has a different kind of life to a lot of other people, something we can all relate to on this site.

Talking to people who have strange ideas and are maybe hearing voices can certainly take some getting used to but don't worry too much about it. It's no use trying to talk people out of their delusions, better maybe to let them be. However rational you try to be the nature of their condition will always come up with an answer and they mostly end up changing the subject of their own accord. Trust is very important though so try not to alienate her, especially if she is paranoid. Just explain that you don't really understand what she's saying and try to find other stuff to talk about. Try not to make her feel that you are judging her or dismissing her.

Most of all, get some help. This is why I ask where you are because there are almost always people around you can get in touch with - in UK try Rethink, which used to be the National Schizophrenia Society, or the Hearing Voices Network, or best of all Mind have loads of stuff that could probably help you. Try and find out as much as you can about schizophrenia, if you haven't already and that will help de-mystify it for you, and you can also use that to counter prejudice you come across. Your sister will have a social worker or care manager or something of that sort. Keep in touch with that person, go to review meetings when your sister's care is being discussed and planned, get involved, make sure she is getting the best care she can. have you been to the flat where she lives when she's not in hospital? are the staff alright? is she getting everything she needs there? is there another problem that maybe she's hiding, such as alcohol or illicit drug use? these can often trigger re-admission to hospital. She will also be dealing with side effects of medication - is she on the best one? Clozaril and Olanzapine are the most modern ones generally available at the moment and they have fewer side effects than most of the older stuff.

8 years is a long time in hospital so I'm guessing your sister has a severe and enduring problem. Unfortunately the prognosis is that she probably won't get significantly 'better' and it's a matter of making sure she gets the best possible life in the circumstances and I wish you all the best in dealing with it.

I don't really have any experience with this, so I can only suggest that you always speak the truth around her, and try and be as comforting and supportive as possible.

Although I imagine you are already doing this, so just try and keep it up!

that sounds like me a little.. I was bullied at school and in a job so i can't hold one but i still can tell the difference between reality and real life. however I still think im on the verge of hitting that point. I had alot of bad things happen to me and now its eating me alive. Lets hope something in my life changes soon. I don't really know what too say. I will say this though, make sure you give her all the support you can and be her friend.

Its really sad that you're sister is crazy like that. Is she taking her meds??? I remember seeing a crazy person downtown on a field trip once. he was talkin to himelf

Schizophrenia is my number ONE interest. I am fascinated by it to NO end. And i plan to learn everything i can to understand it. Then when i hit about 70 or so i am thinking of abusing the hell out of meth and LSD, and give a detailed documentary on the path to madness.

One thing that pisses me off, is that my best friend has been "diagnosed" with schizoprenia, and she is not in anyway schizoprenic. Just like many parents out there, hers think that she is very delusional (which she is not).

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I know a fair amount about schizophrenia because my boyfriend has it, and we have a good relationship where neither of us has to try to act "normal" around the other. Like other people have said, I don't think it's something to be embarrased about. I'm really glad that you seem to be trying to understand your sister better. It seems like schizophrenia can be a pretty scary thing for a person to experience, and having people to listen to and support her will probably be very good for your sister.

I have dealt with people with schizophrenia, and I have a uncle who was dx'd with it (but I suspect it's an incorrect dx - he was probably AS like me). I agree that the word "crazy" should not be used - it is a word used too often in a perogative and uncompassionate sense, and people who struggle with mental illness have done nothing to deserve that. It's bad enough that their own dignity and quality of life are so assaulted by their illness and the fact that society often doesn't understand otheir experience - we don't need to add to that by using words thoughtlessly.

It's seems strange that your sister had a *nervous* breakdown and that supposedly led to schizophrenia. Normally, it's a psychotic break or simply a slow deterioation.

The distinction between a nervous breakdown and a psychotic break is that a n.b. is simply the brain becoming so fatigued it brings to behave abnormally or withdraws into itself. Once the brain rests (and the stress or other triggers of mental fatigue are removed or addressed) the person recovers, often quite well. A psychotic break involves a more serious dysfunction of brain activity, often a deflect or disorder present prior to the break but made severe and overwhelming by stress or trauma. Symptoms can be very siliar to a severe nervous breakdown. However, the pre-existing problem remains even if the person recovers from the break. People with PTSD, OCD, bipolar disorder, severe depression or another similar on-going conditions are more suspectible to a psychotic breaks, whereas very healthy people can have nervous breakdowns are readily as anyone else if they're pushed tot hat extreme. Schizophrenia is more or less a prolonged (symptoms lasting longer than 6 months) psychotic break.

I find it very insightful that recent reseach on schizophrenia indicates that it's literally the effect of a "broken brain" - the brain's so dysfunction, it cannot work any better than a bicycle with a broken tire chain. The brain can do certain tasks, but its brokenness while always be present in some form. And if that isn't insulting enough to the sufferer's dignity, there evidence that due to its brokenness, and brain is unable to exercise properly to retain its native level of intelligence - most people who suffer from schizophrenia suffer also a significant drop in IQ levels.

In the rbighter side, research has also discovered that the chemicals involved with schizophrenia are different from most other mental illnesses, and thus newer and better drugs are being developed that may help a people cope better with this disorder, as opposed to simply drugged them into a stupor, as has been standard practice for so long (since most pasyt and present drugs don't help these people much).

I know that living with a mentally ill relative can be stressful and taxing on everyone involved. In our society, most other people do not understand what a such a family has to deal with, and so this can isolate people from society and make them feel ostracized simply due to their relative's illness. The illness to isolates the person from their relatives - it can be like having a dead realtive, yet they are physically still alive. It's almost impossible to connect with someone with such severe disorder, especially one that affects both their memories and their perception of reality. All you can do it support them and care about them - but because their needs are often so great (sincee they have so much trouble looking after themselves) this can be exhausting for family members.

I'm not sure what you mean by her living in a hostel - does htat mean she's simply on her own, not getting any help? Or is this a support-type faculty that deals specifically with the mentally ill?

The only friend I had in high school went on to develop it after we both graduated. His father had it, and he got the genes for it.

His mom was the first to see it coming on, she went online and found the he fit the description quite nicely based on what she read. This was back in early 2001. The last time I saw him was three years ago. Since then I understand he's gotten heavily into drugs.