Schizophrenia Awareness

Today I am going to talk about a mental health disorder that a lot of the time gets misunderstood. When it comes to this mental health disorder, people always think about the worst cases, but what about the others? Schizophrenia is a mental health disorder that many people don’t know about. In my opinion, we need to talk more about it and bring more awareness to this mental disorder. I would like to bring it to the light for others to learn about. I’m only 16, so please don’t hold me accountable if I get some of these facts wrong. I am just talking about the information I could find.

Schizophrenia is a disorder that can cause hallucinations and delusions. Basically, it is characterized by thoughts or experiences that seem out of touch with reality, disorganized speech or behavior, and decreased participation in daily activities. The difficulty with concentration and memory may also be present.

“In the U.S., approximately 2.2 million adults, or about 1.1 percent of the population age 18 and older in a given year, have schizophrenia.”

Schizophrenia may not be that common, but we need to realize that it is a disorder that people do suffer from and need to learn more about it. A lot of the time Schizophrenia appears when a person starts to reach adulthood. There are cases of it in children but it is not as common.

All of these people struggle with being looked at different and treated like they are a monster. Having schizophrenia or another psychotic disorder wasn’t their choice. They didn’t wake up one day and say that they wanted to be terrified by a clown today. That’s not how it works. For every person, schizophrenia is caused by different reasons. These people are more likely to commit suicide than someone who has just regular generalized anxiety. This is because many people who suffer from schizophrenia are scared that they will be looked upon differently if they speak up, and even their hallucinations are so bad that they don’t want to have them anymore and they feel like that is the only way to get them to stop and it isn’t. Some of their hallucinations can get to the point that they seem like they are true or are happening in real life. They can’t tell the difference between reality and fiction.

Different people see different hallucinations such as clowns, spiders, masked murderers, dogs, shadow people and more. A lot of the time it is what they are afraid of, common fears that come to life basically. “Roughly 70 percent of people with schizophrenia will experience hallucinations.” If you are suffering from hallucinations due to schizophrenia just know that you aren’t alone in this. There are others out there that understand what it is like to go through exactly what you are going through right now. Try to stay strong. I know you can do it! I believe in you even if you don’t believe in yourself. I do.

This is a disorder that gets pushed aside a lot and many people don’t know about it. Some don’t even know that this is even a mental health disorder. That is how much people avoid talking about it when it needs to be talked about. Having schizophrenia is a very difficult disorder to live with day to day. Most people that are diagnosed with schizophrenia are medicated due to how life changing this disorder is. There are ways to reduce the symptoms but there, unfortunately, is no cure to permanently take care of the symptoms of it. Even though there is no way to cure it at the moment, there is still hope I promise you. Don’t give up; just because there isn’t a cure yet, someday, there might be one. You aren’t alone on this journey and if you need help. Talk to someone. We are here for you. I am here for you. You can email me with just a push of a button.

My email is: [email protected] .

Personally, I don’t deal with schizophrenia but from what others have said, they would never wish this upon anyone. Someone shouldn’t have to be scared their whole life or being triggered for common things. Many people have triggers that cause their hallucinations. Someone shouldn’t have to go through that process almost every day like it is a regular day to them. If you know that someone is schizophrenic let them know you are there to support them. Don’t let other people make fun of them or make it harder for them to cope. Be there for them. Thank you.

~Natalie Christensen