Schizophrenia: An Insider’s View

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In March 2007, I was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is a biological brain disorder that causes delusions, hallucinations, and other symptoms. The illness came upon me gradually and I did not know I was sick.

As of today, I have been recovered for 14 years.

As someone with untreated schizophrenia, before I began medication, I saw the world through a very different set of eyes. I still remember my perceptions of the world and of my reality while symptomatic. The following are thoughts that often went through my mind.

I don’t know what is real. Every night, I sleep, nestled behind some bushes, behind a large church. With time, I have come to wonder if the church is in fact just four walls for show, with emptiness inside. I rarely see anyone enter the building.

I am invisible. People walk by. Does anyone care about me? I rarely see people from the church. Do they ever notice me? Do they ever consider helping me? I was here over Christmas Day, and no one noticed me at all.

I have lost touch with reality. Are the birds I see real or are they actually mechanical? Is the whole world like a Disney park, with illusions wherever I look? When I see a skyline, I wonder if it is simply a picture hung by people hired to create a virtual reality, making the “skyline” look far away.

I have amazing expectations. When will the helicopter come to pick me up from the churchyard and take me to a new location to begin my new life? (In recovery, I realized there was no helicopter.)

People react negatively. When people walk by me in the park, they look away, with disgust. Will they someday see me on national television as a prophet and wish they had helped me?

I am confused. I wanted to tell a friend from college I still occasionally speak with that something is wrong with me. I’m sick. But when it comes to the workings of my brain, most likely, she would never understand, and anyway, neither do I. I told her I had cancer. Maybe someday I can tell her the truth.

I have lost hope for my future. I have accepted that I may live in this churchyard forever. I am used to life here. The moon and stars outside each night are beautiful. It does not get dangerously cold here. There is shelter underneath the roof of the church entrance when it rains.

I am dirty. My hygiene is plummeting. My initiative to fight for good hygiene is no longer as strong as it was years back right after I lost my apartment. I used to wash my hair in public bathrooms, but it is such a pain. My life is complicated. No one notices my bad hygiene, anyway.

I am fearful. I always worry that someone will steal or move my sleeping bag during the day while I wander around the public park. Each morning, I hide it behind some bushes in the back of the church. I also wonder who left the sleeping bag originally, which I found at random one night. Was it a churchgoer? Does anyone care about me?

I am alone. I want my mom. I have strongly pushed all friends and family away, and even threatened them.

I am hungry. I have lost a lot of weight, though I always have too much energy. I’m tired of searching for food in garbage cans.

Every year in March, I am reminded of how grateful I am to have recovered completely with medication and regained a healthy life. For me, it is important to take the time to remember what it was like to have untreated schizophrenia and live in homelessness before being diagnosed and starting treatment.

Today, in recovery, I realize that I am not a prophet, birds are not mechanical, and buildings are not just walls surrounding emptiness. On antipsychotic medication, my delusions went away quickly, and I eventually recovered at a high enough capacity to return to college and score A’s again in molecular biology. I have reconnected with family and friends and enjoy warm and loving relationships with them.

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Sometimes, it feels almost miraculous that medication has brought me back to reality and normal life after falling so far.

Today, when I see homeless people, I have a deep understanding of what may be going on in their minds. It grieves me to see so many mentally ill homeless people in the Cincinnati area. Many seek services from my church.

I hope that my lived experience enables me to be more compassionate, understanding, and informed.

I hope to encourage others with schizophrenia and other brain disorders to stay in treatment, return to reality, and embark on a new start at life.