Tag Archives: stereotypes

A Look Back Over Three Years

23 Wednesday May 2018

Posted by in bipolar, caregivers, hope, mental illness, relationships, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized

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In March, I celebrated this blog’s third anniversary. In the three years that I have been writing about life with schizophrenia, I think I have tried to keep one message in the forefront, and that is, people with schizophrenia can look, act, care about, and live a life similar to everyone else.

Of course, I have also made sure to point out that everyone with schizophrenia is different. Just like everyone without schizophrenia is unique, so are we, and so is the way the illness manifests in each of us. Those of us who have schizophrenia may share similar symptoms, but how we experience those symptoms and the level to which they impact us varies tremendously.

I hope from reading my blog that people have more of a sense of compassion and understanding for those of us living with this brain disease. The biggest issue in helping is first to be able to relate to us as human beings. We were all born the same way everyone else was born. We all have or had a mother and a father.

Many of us have people who love and care about us, and that would be true if we were in the hospital, in prison or living on the streets. Just because someone has lost touch with reality and appeared to be a loner, doesn’t mean they don’t have family or someone looking for them, or that cares about their well being.

Schizophrenia is not yet curable, but for many people, it doesn’t have to be a life sentence. It is a chronic illness like other chronic illnesses, and it is possible for some people to manage it as such. (There are, of course, people who are medication resistant, or who doctors haven’t found the best or workable combination of medications to help them reach their full potential). And there are others who manage without medication at all (an impossible scenario for someone like me).

In my three years blogging, I have tried to write against stigma. I have tried to write against stereotypes. I have tried to put the most human face on schizophrenia that I possibly can. I have shared some of my childhood here. I have shared some of my heartaches here. I have shared some of my joys, my strengths, and my weaknesses.

I have tried to make myself as three dimensional, and as like everyone else as possible, because I believe before there will be a better treatment environment for the mentally ill, everyone has to see something in those struggling that reminds them of themselves.

This blog is dedicated to those people who can’t show you what they love, what makes them happy, what they hope for and dream about, I can only hope I have been a voice for those people. I want all of our lives to be better, and I hope I have created a bit of that here.

 

 

 

 

Many Sides to the Same Story

01 Tuesday May 2018

Posted by in caregivers, mental illness, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized

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We have to be complicated and complex enough to hold two extremes in our hearts and our minds.

I try very hard to present as someone with schizophrenia who blends into a crowd. I am someone who is college educated, married, has been both poor and middle class, struggles with health issues, and looking for work. I am someone who is happy, gets angry, envious, tired, anxious, etc. like almost everyone else.

That is the point; I try to show the world how much I am like the average woman at the grocery store, or gas station, or restaurant. I want this image of people with schizophrenia to be more common in our books, movies and everywhere in our lives, but the truth is, there are other sides to schizophrenia that exist as well, and we can’t overlook them or pretend that they are simply stereotypes.

Some people are suffering from hallucinations who can’t take care of their basic needs and who end up on the street. There are others who commit petty crimes and go from prison to street, prison to the street in an endless cycle. There are also people who have support or family that help them get into treatment or residential facilities, but who suffer too much from symptoms to live on their own. And there are those, the ones I hate to admit have the same illness I do, who are violent or dangerous.

Somehow in our advocacy, we must embrace, or address, all these different manifestations of the same illness because to not do so is either seeing schizophrenia through rose-colored glasses or seeing it as the stereotypes the media portrays.

We need more people speaking out and showing us their average lives because we have lived too long with the opposite of that reality, but it is important when we write letters and vote on election day not to forget those who are in different circumstances than us. Those people who refuse medication or who medication doesn’t completely eradicate symptoms.

The only way I know how to be an advocate for all of us is to continue to remember that I am not a spokesperson for everyone with the disease. It is different for everyone, and to remember to talk about those who are still overcome by symptoms, or lack of treatment, or poverty, or medication resistance.

The best I can do is write not only about myself but those on the streets and in prison and in other situations so that people don’t get the impression that schizophrenia is not an issue that needs further study, funding, programs, and legislation.

Oh, how cliché the truth – it’s complicated.

 

When Writers Are Lazy We Get Stereotypes

03 Saturday Feb 2018

Posted by in bipolar, mental illness, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized

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We finished the series (only four episodes) of Retribution on Netflix last night. My brother told me to watch it because of the way they handle schizophrenia. The series is a pretty good mystery, but the writers were lazy. Lazy is what I am going to start calling writers who can’t be bothered to move past stereotypes or do research.

The suspected killer in Retribution is “a schizophrenic off his medication.” No, I can’t make this stuff up. The character’s mental health has absolutely no value to the story whatsoever, and they decided to add that line. The story might have been stronger without the reference to schizophrenia. The character shows no symptoms of the illness and only shows symptoms of drug addiction (and people with a former addiction might have a problem with making the criminal a drug user, I don’t know. I don’t follow many people recovering from drug addiction).

Not only do the writers get schizophrenia wrong (stereotype and no sign of symptoms), but they get Parkinson’s wrong as well. My brother-in-law has had Parkinson’s for over twenty years, and my dad has it as well, and it isn’t a death sentence the way the movie makes it out to be. The way the character with the disease acts it is as if he only has a short time to live which is not the case with anyone I know with Parkinson’s.

I have three new books to read that all have a character with schizophrenia. I will be posting the books and how well I think the authors portray the illness. I still think movie writers do a poor job overall, let’s see if novels and memoirs are any better.

Do any of you have good examples of books or movies with mentally ill characters? I am mostly interested in the portrayal of schizophrenia, but if a book or movie has a good representation of bipolar disorder, I might read or watch it.

 

More Than One Side of Schizophrenia

10 Wednesday Jan 2018

Posted by in caregivers, mental illness, relationships, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized

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I need to work harder. I wish that my blog and the articles I wrote for Teen Vogue, Good Housekeeping, Dr. Oz, Yahoo News, Ravishly, The Fix, Headspace, and even the fashion magazine, Byrdie, would go viral. Last night I got the feeling that people don’t assume it is possible that a person with schizophrenia could wake up in the morning, grab their coffee and sit down to an issue of the Washington Post, New York Times or Boston Globe. I’m here to say it is possible, and it is happening in more homes than just mine (although my subscriptions are not paper, but electronic).

Yesterday, I was furious, exhausted, and felt completely beaten by an article in the Washington Post. Of course, the article was about schizophrenia, and the first sentence pulled out of the article is, “Her “perfect child” was now schizophrenic and homeless.” It is hard for me to imagine that a staff writer at a paper as big and prestigious as the Washington Post, can’t even bother to try and use disability friendly language. I know not everyone who has schizophrenia is opposed to this language, but the majority of advocates, academics, and mental health professionals no longer refer to people as schizophrenic – something a writer at a major paper should be aware of if he is going to write stories about people in our community.

And of course, it is a story that we have all seen time and time again: A parent’s perspective. Homelessness. My once golden child is now defective. Do you know how hard this story is to read? I admit that homelessness is a shameful problem in this country (it is the cause I give the most time, effort and money toward), and yes, I think we should have way more psychiatric facilities for people who are medication resistant, or chronically psychotic, or even to get temporary treatment. And I even believe that there needs to be some change in the laws about getting someone treatment who may not be deemed a danger to themselves or others but is clearly at risk, but even with all that, the article hit me as stereotypical and highly stigmatizing.

Our mental health system is in shambles, but another story about how a person with schizophrenia is causing his or her family distress because they won’t take their medication, and have disappeared into the shadows and unknown territory of our urban streets does not help those of us who have the illness. And does another story about homelessness and mental health push people into action? I don’t think so. A story about how a fourth of the people living on the street are mentally ill doesn’t get people to act. If it did, things would be different by now, because this story is worn out, told again and again.

Why not tell the story of people who have received help and gotten off the streets? Doesn’t a story like that help us to realize that we need to do something different? Doesn’t a success story let people know that we are not (like many people believe) throw away humans without hope or value, but people who have an illness that is possible to manage and with treatment and care recovery is at least a possibility?

To be truthful, I don’t know the story to tell to get people to wake up to the plight of the most vulnerable members of our society. I don’t know which stories would get people to vote for representatives who make the treatment of the mentally ill a priority. I’m not sure that any story can get people to act. If seeing the faces of people, both women, men, and children living without shelter, in squalor, and having many of them be out of touch with reality, isn’t enough to change laws, hearts, and minds, then maybe stories aren’t enough. Especially the stories we have been telling. We have to find a new way to talk and write about the struggles of severe mental illness and what it does to a person, a family, a community.

I don’t have the answers, but I hope I can dig deep into my creativity and one day tell a story that gets people to see the whole picture of schizophrenia and those who have it. I’ve been a person who refused treatment. I have been that person who left the comfort of their home. I believe there is hope for every single person with this illness. I believe that a person living on the streets today, could one day be a person reading a major paper while they drink their morning coffee –if I didn’t believe that, I doubt that article would have made an impact on me.

Look at The Big Reveal: Going Public With My Diagnosis

16 Saturday Dec 2017

Posted by in bipolar, hope, mental illness, relationships, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized

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We are in the midst of the holiday season, and I am looking forward to the new year. 2017 was tough on my husband and me. My husband had four or five serious medical problems (not life-threatening of course, but terrifying as he had two occasions with fevers over 103). And I had two incidents of diverticulitis and a breast cancer scare that lasted most of the year (almost over now). But there is something different about this year than any of the others I have lived.

Since I went public with my diagnosis, I am more comfortable with myself. I am more comfortable with being who and what I am in almost every situation. Even with all the stressful medical situations, and even with all the bad news out of Washington D.C., I laugh louder, harder and more frequently than ever before ( I cry a lot, too, but that is common for me – I have a very soft heart. For example, I cried when Al Franken resigned his Senate seat because I like him and I have thought of him as a fierce fighter on issues I believe in. I also cried when John McCain received his diagnosis and when some famous people passed away). Anyway, it is no big deal, but I cry easily, the great thing is, I laugh easily, too. I have a big laugh. I have a belly laugh. I have a very distinct laugh that turns heads in a room. I love laughter. I love when people laugh, and I love when I laugh. And since opening up completely about living with schizophrenia laughter is more common than ever around here.

People frequently tell me they live in the closet and are afraid of coming out because of the consequences it might have on their job, and relationships. The stigma around schizophrenia is all too real, but for me, coming out is one of the best things I have done in my life. I feel whole, and I feel free. I wouldn’t recommend being open about living with a severe mental illness with everyone, (I don’t tell everyone, but anyone can find my articles about it on the Internet). But most people who know me or have any contact with me on social media know that I have schizophrenia. I am not hiding. Are their consequences for me? Yes, I think there are. I don’t know when I apply for a job if people are discriminating against me – it is possible that they are. I don’t know if people talk behind my husband’s back and work about his “crazy” wife. I assume it can, and possibly does happen. But for the most part, people are kind, and open, accepting and compassionate toward me.

For the first time in my life, I feel free to open up a conversation about mental illness and talk about the issues, the struggles, my diagnosis, etc. I don’t feel like I am keeping more than half of my life hidden from all of the people around me. Keeping that big of a part of myself secret for so many years left me feeling distant and disconnected from other people. Now, I feel as if I am all in, and completely myself. I know not everyone has the luxury to risk what I have, and I wouldn’t want everyone too, but for me, I’ll take the increased laughter and lightness of being even if it means the occasional stab of stigma, judgment or pain.

 

Would You Hire Someone with Schizophrenia? Be Honest.

11 Saturday Nov 2017

Posted by in mental illness, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized

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I’m slightly heartbroken. I haven’t written about this until now because I was trying to lay low about it, but I applied for a job and found out yesterday I didn’t get it. Initially, I applied for the job online. The company had me take a test. I found the test to be one of the more difficult I have taken for employment. I must have done well on the test because the company scheduled an interview. I interviewed and thought I did well. The company then set me up for a computer conference interview with two other employees. I thought that interview also went well. Part of the interview was another test. I didn’t do great on the test, but I didn’t bomb it either. In the years since I graduated from college, if I made it to the interview I almost always got the job.

I can’t help it, but I keep thinking there is a possibility that the company Googled my name and came up with dozens of articles about schizophrenia. This is the second time since I decided to disclose my diagnosis publicly that I have been turned down for jobs I was highly qualified for and after I went through lengthy highering practices.

I have tried working a few times in the last few years, and it hasn’t worked out, but this was a job I knew I could do. It was a work from home customer service job. I have years of experience working with the public in difficult situations.

It is possible that they found candidates that they thought fit the position better than I did, but the possibility that they discovered my diagnosis of schizophrenia and chose not to take a chance on me because of stereotypes and misconceptions, will never entirely leave my mind.

I wish I could find a part-time writing job because artists and editors tend to be less judgemental about mental illness than the general public. Also, I could work from home, be creative, and not worry about the symptoms that crop up on a daily basis.

I’m happy that the writing world works differently than the rest of the world – you pitch to an editor if they like your story they either tell you to write it on spec, or they buy it outright. I’m having a tough time selling enough articles to make a substantial paycheck, but I’m going to work harder at it now.  I feel like I am personally fighting stigma, disability, misconceptions, etc. and that has put a determination in me to succeed and say, “See, I told you, I am worthy. See, I told you I am worth it.”

I want to be one of the ones who can make a livable paycheck and have their dreams come true at the same time. Stay tuned – let’s make this happen.

Look for much more writing to come.

It Would Be Nice If Our Motto Was Do No Harm

06 Monday Nov 2017

Posted by in mental illness, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized

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I don’t usually lose my cool unless I’m in a car, but that is another story. Today, I lost my cool. On my Facebook feed, I saw a post by a woman that said schizophrenics (I hate that word) in America hear voices telling them to commit acts of violence but in India schizophrenics (that word again) hear voices that tell them to clean house. I have over one thousand friends in common with the woman writer who posted this and the last time I checked her post had eleven likes from other Facebook users.

At first, I left a comment telling her she was ignorant and wrong. Then I deleted that and left a message about it on my Facebook page with a big F.U. (something I rarely, if ever, do), and then I deleted that too.

When my husband got home from work, I couldn’t even bring myself to tell him what had happened. There is a wound that is caused by people’s ignorance. It is like being bullied. It is like being called names. It is like being an outsider who is misunderstood. Of course, the name for this type of incident is stereotypes and stigma.

People’s ignorance and terrible comments make me feel shame for an illness that I didn’t ask for or do anything to create. Schizophrenia is not a punishment from God or an attack from demons (no matter what some people would have you believe). It is a disease of the brain, just like brain cancer only it doesn’t require chemo or surgery – it disrupts the thought process (a tumor can do that, too). Also, schizophrenia doesn’t equal violence and what does some woman on Facebook know about hearing voices – her words are in reality preposterous.

What gets me about today, was that I lost my cool and that I was ashamed to tell my husband what happened. I didn’t want him to hear about how some people think about me, and people like me. I want my husband to be shielded from the cruel words and beliefs that others hold about my condition.

I want my husband to think the best of me, and I know that he does, because he knows me, loves me, and counts on me almost as much as I count on him. I just couldn’t take having him hear the negative way people think and talk about people with schizophrenia because I have schizophrenia so that woman was saying something about me.

Occasionally, the uphill climb to educate and inform people about my illness is too steep for me to get up. Today, I needed help, and I felt too weak to let the person in who loves me most.

So, does it matter when we stereotype, stigmatize and marginalize people – yes, it matters a lot. Words and actions are significant, and they can pile on injuries to people who have collected injuries all their lives in the same way that other people collect dolls or action figures. In medicine the oath is to do no harm, we should all claim that goal for our interactions. Do no harm. Do no harm. Do no harm.

It has a nice ring to it doesn’t it?

Writing Schizophrenia

12 Wednesday Oct 2016

Posted by in heroes, hope, mental illness, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized, writing

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Last night I was binge watching old episodes of Blue Bloods. My husband and I have always enjoyed the cop show mostly because of its focus on family. I don’t think either one of us will see it the same way again after the writers created a man with schizophrenia who had killed a young girl’s family but became stable (and remorseful) in prison after taking medication.

I can’t tell you how many times a very similar character or killer is part of the story on Criminal Minds, and other detective/cop shows. Will Hollywood never tire of the killer with schizophrenia?

In every beginning writing class students are urged to avoid stereotypes because they make writers look lazy and ignorant. Apparently, writers for Hollywood haven’t received the Composition 101 memo, or they think writing in a killer with schizophrenia is just too appealing to the general public to leave it out. I doubt the latter; It’s simply bad writing done by people who refuse to spend ten minutes researching the statistics regarding people with schizophrenia and instead turn to an old and tired story.

I can’t help but think that if the same writers created a stereotypical character from another minority, there would be some outrage on the part of the public (at least I hope so). But with mental illness, and particularly schizophrenia, the outrage seems to be limited to a few blogs and occasionally one of the larger mental health non-profits will have their members write letters.

How would I like people with schizophrenia to be portrayed? Realistically of course and that requires talking to people who have the disease and asking about their symptoms. Do they hear voices? Do they hear voices continuously or only sometimes? Do they suffer from delusions? If they experience paranoia, how does it manifest in their everyday life? What other symptoms do they have, and how do they manage those symptoms?

I have encountered dozens of people with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder, and they can all answer the questions that I just listed. In the disability community there is a saying, “Nothing about us, without us,” and that is how I feel about schizophrenia. If people want to write about it, that is great, but hopefully, they will care enough to do some research to make sure their characters aren’t just the same old stereotypes that are written about frequently now and over the past few decades.

It would be admirable if a few writers would like to do some good, and find out what living with a severe mental illness is like and how difficult it can be without trying to live with the views that they have reinforced over and over again by making us out to be dangerous killers.

We can all agree the pen is a mighty instrument that can be used for the good of others or to harm others. I hope that someday soon in Hollywood, the writers of popular shows will decide to help eradicate stereotypes about schizophrenia rather than perpetuate them. I can only think of one story where the hero has schizophrenia, and it was a blockbuster. The movie is, “Beautiful Mind.”

The success of “Beautiful Mind” should be an indicator that the public is hungry for a different narrative where mental illness is concerned. And the old cliche that says, “there is nothing new under the sun” simply isn’t true especially regarding characters with schizophrenia.

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Netflix And Psych Central

24 Sunday Jan 2016

Posted by in bipolar, mental illness, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized, writing

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I have four things on my mind today.

I watched a movie on Netflix, Neverwas. If you would like to see how Hollywood romanticizes mental illness, I suggest watching this movie. Let me know if you decide to see it. I would love to know what you think.

A series that I watch, Longmire, had an episode with a Native American man who had schizophrenia. The character killed his sister, of course. You can’t get any more stereotypical than the violent man with schizophrenia. They did get a part of the illness right though. The character suffered from delusions of a spiritual nature.  Also it seemed as if the character had a very low IQ which is an inaccurate portrayal of the majority of people with schizophrenia.

Enough of Hollywood.

I am reading a book, Women of the Asylum. It is a book that has over twenty essays, letters, or journal entries from women who lived in an asylum between the years of 1840-1945. I have finished the introduction, and two of the women’s essays. I like the book so far. If you are interested in reading about the history of feminism, psychiatry, and first person accounts of the mental health system, this is the book for you.

I have two new posts up on my Psych Central blog.

One is Treatment Can Be Harder Than You Think.

The other one is The Mentally Ill As Advocates For Each Other.

Something To Consider (Trigger Warning)

23 Saturday Jan 2016

Posted by in bipolar, mental illness, schizophrenia, stigma, Uncategorized

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Trigger Warning – Upsetting Content

I don’t expect anyone to answer the question I am going to ask. I think the reason I don’t want to know your answer is because I am afraid of what you might say, or what your answer means about how you see my life – specifically the value of my life.

If you were pregnant and they could test your fetus for schizophrenia, and the test was positive, would you terminate the pregnancy?

I would love it if researchers found a cure for schizophrenia. I would love it if researchers discovered more medications that worked better with fewer side effects. One thing I hope they never discover is a test for schizophrenia or bipolar disorder in a fetus.

What people with schizophrenia need is a positive PR campaign. We need a talented marketing firm to help change the image of the illness. Corporations do it all the time. If a restaurant has an outbreak of e-coli, or some other health issue or scandal, they usually change their marketing so that people see them differently and begin to trust them again.

Think about it. Right now, people who have little experience with someone who has schizophrenia, probably get their information from the media. The media portrays people with schizophrenia as killers or as the shooter in a mass killing. It would be terrifying to think your baby was going to grow up to kill other people.

But, a really good marketing team could turn that stereotype into something else. They could show families at home together. They could show a lawyer arguing a case in court. They could show a professor teaching a class. They could show an artist, writer, father, sister, aunt, brother. There are so many other images that they could choose. There are millions of people living with schizophrenia who have never hurt anyone else.

With or without a test for schizophrenia, we could use that PR campaign. It would help people with schizophrenia feel comfortable talking about their illness, asking for help, and getting treatment.

Let me put a question to rest. Even with schizophrenia, I am happy to be alive. I am thankful that I got a chance at living, loving, working, traveling, laughing, eating, writing, sleeping, and on and on and on.

I wouldn’t wish schizophrenia on anyone (I wouldn’t wish cancer or diabetes or any other illness on anyone either), but life has its challenges for everyone, and I am living with mine the best way I can, and I still manage to experience joy. This essay is the beginning of that PR campaign. I will be the first in line to open my life up and show people what it can look like to have schizophrenia. I don’t have money to run commercials, but I can write a blog, and that’s a start.