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mental health, mental illness, mentally ill, paranoia, psychiatrist, psychiatry, psychology, schizophrenia, symptoms, weather
I read a blog that is written by the mother of a young man with schizophrenia. I enjoy reading this blog, because it is a mother (caregiver) on the outside trying to look in. My blog is a person with schizophrenia on the inside trying to look out. It is fascinating to me to put these two perspectives side by side.
Anyway, yesterday on the blog I mentioned, the mother wrote that her son’s doctor said the symptoms of schizophrenia are like the weather, they are constantly changing.
I thought about the analogy to the weather and my symptoms for a long time. I don’t want my symptoms to be constantly changing. When things are good, I want them to stay good. Of course when things are bad, I want the weather to change quickly. After I thought about it for a while though, I had to agree, my symptoms are ever changing.
There are times when I can be at a party enjoying myself for hours, and then all of a sudden a wave of paranoia can hit me and I am frightened, anxious, uncomfortable, and ready to leave. This can happen anywhere at any time.
On the other side of that, there are times when I am so strong in terms of my symptoms that I amaze myself.
Yesterday, I did two things that I never do. I have written about my relationship to food and how complicated it is, well yesterday, the safety seal on the yogurt was torn and I ate the yogurt anyway. This is something I have never been able to do before. Normally, I throw the whole container away without even so much as a thought about it.
Another thing I did yesterday was eat leftovers from a restaurant that we brought home from a city that is two hours away. Normally, I would let my husband eat anything that has sat out more than fifteen minutes, but I popped that eggplant parmesan in the microwave and ate it all up.
I don’t know where my courage came from yesterday, I have not been able to do either one of those things for longer than I can remember. I had to overcome a little fear to eat the yogurt and the eggplant but a very low level of fear, a fear that was easy to override.
I would consider yesterday a huge success. The fact that I could do two things that normally cause me to feel fearful and paranoid, and that I usually would avoid, was huge. I deserve gold stars on my report card in my opinion.
Today, the weather could change and there could be a storm, or cloudy skies. Unfortunately with schizophrenia you never know when you will need an umbrella or winter coat.
Reblogged this on mgwebbuddy.
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You DO deserve a gold star. Well done! Wishing you a summer full of fair skies and sunny days.
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Thank you! 🙂
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Very happy for you, a successful day is still a successful day! I wish you well & continued success each & every day one step at a time! 🙂
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Thank you! 🙂
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Always!
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Amazing!!! Xo I was inspired to eat my eggplant parm too! Loved spending time with you two!!!
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We had fun with you too! xo
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Way to go! Somedays even baby steps are good. My hubby is trying to get me to try sushi – too much worry
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I don’t eat sushi either.
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Nice post I enjoyed reading it. I think most mental illness is a bit weather like, I find similar patterns to what other bloggers write about. The carers do it tough because they never know whether to take an umbrella or sunscreen, with me the changes can be that fast.
Still as long as they are still there for us that’s what matters.
Thanks again I loved it.
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Only do it with trainers that you trust, most of them are novices to moderately skilled
trainers who bucked up the cash to take a test.
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