A Letter From an 'Uncommon' Schizophrenic

I am what everyone from my psychiatrist to friends call an “uncommon” schizophrenic. I have never been hospitalized due to my mental illness. I have silently managed it on my own since I was a preteen. I am a wife and a mother. I graduated high school and attended a semester of college. I am a photographer and an aspiring bass player (thanks to my husband). I have never been homeless and didn’t come from a “bad” home. Some modern media would have society believe that the schizophrenic community is nothing more than the opposite of all the amazing things we are and that we’re too “crazy” to complete the goals we want to and can accomplish. The further I venture on this lifelong journey, the more I realize this.

That being said, the few times I have opened up about my diagnosis to the people I’m closest to, the responses I received were less than pleasant. I have gotten everything from, “What do you name the voices?” to, “Yeah, you probably shouldn’t talk about it in case someone tries to have your kid taken away.” I also get everyone’s favorite, “Wow you look normal.”

“Normal”…whatever that means.

I was left with the nagging vibe that no one actually cared about my diagnosis. It was almost like they looked at it as an unreal excuse for my symptoms and I was nothing more than whatever symptoms I was dealing with at any given time. I’m here to say that we are all far more than our symptoms and our diagnosis, and our illness is real. It can be raw and painful to be clinically diagnosed with a mental illness that has no known cause or cure, and we all need some degree of love and support to get through it and begin to heal.

If someone you love is silently suffering with a mental illness, please be there for them in the best way you can. We’re not being lazy, we’re not “just tired.” We need someone we can trust to open up to and start the road to mental health management and healing. Please don’t joke about our mental illness if we come to you about what we are going through. I know from experience how badly that hurts. We’re not “crazy” like everyone thinks.

I’m “normal” like you, but with schizophrenia.

I don’t fit easily into the schizophrenic community or into the group of family and friends I do have. I ride the cusp of that line, the stigmas and everything that schizophrenia entails. That being said, it is no easier to appear “normal” and have schizophrenia than it is to appear different from what others misguidedly call normal while experiencing the same.

I’m more than willing to do my best to break the stigmas surrounding schizophrenia, one day at a time. Very few people know about my personal journey with schizophrenia, and it is my intent that this letter brings insight and hope for others like me.